Double Shot (8 page)

“Did you touch anything in the garage? Move anything? Take anything?”
“No, no, no, of course not.”
Reilly tapped the clipboard with his pen. “We’ll be analyzing the tape of your call to 911,” he put in.
“Go ahead,” I retorted, feeling fury flare. So what if I’d hung up on the 911 operator? I’d been worried about Arch, still out front. I hadn’t wanted him to make an appearance in the garage and see his father, so grotesque in death.
Blackridge lifted a warning eyebrow at Reilly. “And next, Mrs. Schulz?” he asked gently.
I bit the inside of my cheek. Ina homicide case, the cops traced all the calls you made, so omitting the call to Marla was a bad idea. “I called my best friend, Marla Korman. She’s John Richard’s other ex-wife. I got her voice mail, too.” I took a deep breath.
“And why did you call the other ex-wife of the man you’d just found dead?”
“I don’t know. I didn’t think. Because she’s my friend, I suppose. I left her a message saying John Richard was dead. Then I went to tell my son there had been a terrible accident. That his father was dead. I knew he’d need me. Then the two of us waited for you all to show up.”
Blackridge had hooked his meaty arm over the front seat so he could turn and look at me. “Do you have any idea who could have done this, Mrs. Schulz? Did Dr. Korman have enemies? Say, particular people who didn’t like him?”
I thought of Courtney MacEwan’s cold eyes and hardened visage this morning. He owed me. but she was only one of many women — present company included — whom John Richard had made love to passionately for a while before moving on to someone else.
“He had ex-girlfriends,” I said lamely. “Lots of them. Fifty-some.”
“Fifty-some? Can you give us names of the most recent ones?”
I felt horrid pointing the finger at Courtney, but I was being truthful here, right? “I’m pretty sure the most recent ex-girlfriend is named Courtney MacEwan.”
“Spell her name, please.” Reilly’s thin voice startled me. Feeling like a total heel, I spelled Courtney’s name.
“Anyone else?” Blackridge asked.
“His current girlfriend is named Sandee Blue. I think she works at the country-club golf shop.”
“Anyone else?”
“Wait. He had an argument at the funeral lunch with a man named Ted Vikarios. I don’t know where Ted lives or even if the argument is significant.” I spelled Ted’s name for them. Did I know any other possible enemies of John Richard? they asked. I said, “Apart from the man wanting his money, I don’t know who John Richard’s current acquaintances are. Were.” I did not add my usual comment, I try to stay as far away from him as possible.
“Okay, Mrs. Schulz,” Blackridge said. Finally, “You know the drill here. You’re the primary witness, and we need to take you down to the department to make a taped statement.” Reilly flipped over the pages of notes he’d taken and tucked the clipboard beside him. Blackridge turned the key in the ignition, and we started out for the Furman County Sheriff’s Department. There, I knew, everything would be different.
My new criminal lawyer would be waiting. This would make me look even more guilty, but tough tacks. And the taped interrogation would not be, as they say, a piece of cake.
   
* * *
Brewster Motley had wide shoulders, a mop of long, sun-bleached blond curls, and a tanned, boyish face complete with impish grin. He looked like a surfer who’d accidentally gotten tucked into an expensive gray Italian suit and dark gray leather loafers. Unfortunately, I’d had to deal with a few criminal lawyers. When you’re telling them what actually happened, they smirk at you. And then when the two of you are with the cops, your lawyer commands you to shut up, even when you have a perfectly good explanation for how things went so wrong. In any event, I took to happy-go-lucky-looking Brewster Motley. He’d believe I was innocent, wouldn’t he?
Tom had told me to demand to see my lawyer immediately. So when we reached the department parking lot, I astonished Reilly and Blackridge by announcing that my attorney should have arrived by now. I said I wanted to confer with him before any taping began. When Blackridge glanced in the rearview mirror to check my expression, I just closed my eyes.
After about ten minutes of bureaucratic wrangling and trying to find the person Mrs. Schulz was asking for, I was ushered into a room where Brewster Motley was waiting, grinning from ear to ear. Surf’s up!
“I think I’m in trouble,” I began, once the door was closed. Brewster suppressed his grin and nodded sympathetically.
“Tell me about it.” His voice was as warm and comforting as custard sauce. “Let’s sit.” He snapped open a luxurious leather briefcase and pulled out a notepad. “Relax.”
I did as told. No wonder they call them Counselor.
“First of all, Mr. Motley, I did not shoot my ex-husband.”
“Call me Brewster. And by the way, I’m aware of the few times you’ve helped the cops with cases. I read about them in the paper.”
“Super. But I have to tell you, Brewster, there are a lot of circumstances that are going to make this look really bad.” I gave a very abbreviated account of the terrible history between John Richard and me. John Richard, I went on, was an unreformed batterer who’d beaten one girlfriend almost to death, an act that had finally landed him in prison for aggravated assault. He’d gotten out six weeks ago, on April the twenty-second, and had already dumped one girlfriend who was now furious with him. Brewster asked for her name and I spelled out Courtney MacEwan for the second time that day. I told him about the Jerk’s brief argument with Ted Vikarios, and again spelled out that name. Plus, John Richard seemed to be in trouble with creditors. He was living a country-club lifestyle with no visible means of support. I believed he was borrowing large amounts of money, secured by who-knows-what. That could be the only explanation for his sudden ability to sponsor a golf tournament, afford the rent on a Tudor McMansion, and buy, not lease, a new Audi. John Richard had been trying to embrace the high-flying rich-doctor lifestyle he used to have. Except that he wasn’t practicing medicine. His license had been suspended when he went to jail.
“How do you know he bought the Audi?”
“His other ex-wife, Marla Korman, and I are best friends. She told me.”
“Yes. That’s the Mrs. Marla Korman who hired me.”
“Right. Marla loves to track the . . . John Richard, his love life and financial dealings. And she passes on all she learns to me.” I felt my cheeks coloring. We do gossip about him. Did.”
Brewster tapped his pen on the desk. “Did you and Dr. Korman have any children?”
I told him about Arch, that my son had been with me when I’d discovered John Richard’s body. Well, not exactly with me, and that was part of the problem.
Brewster held up a hand and gave me another charming grin. “Let’s not get ahead of ourselves. Did Dr. Korman keep up with child support while he was in prison?”
“Yes,” I admitted. “His lawyer arranged for the sale of her Jer — uh, John Richard’s house, and supposedly the child support came out of that.”
“What do you mean, supposedly? Did you ask Korman’s lawyer where the money came from?”
“You bet I did. And he rudely informed that as long as I got the money, where it came from was none of my beeswax. He also told me that Marla’s snooping wasn’t going to get her anywhere.”
There was a knock on the door. Brewster Motley jumped from his chair to answer it. He spoke in a low but confident voice.
“No,” he said finally, “my client and I will tell you when we’re ready.” Without waiting for a reply, he shut the door.
“Maybe we should move along to today,” Brewster said lightly once he was seated again. “Tell me everything you think is pertinent.”
I described showing up to prep a funeral lunch, being shoved aside by an unknown assailant and then chopped in the neck. No, I didn’t know who the guy in the mask was. Yes, I suspected the Jerk. That was what Marla and I had begun calling John Richard at least ten years ago. It was based on his initials, I explained, and it suited his personality, too. Brewster shook his head, a grim smile on his face.
I summarized the rest of it — Marla coming, our discovery of the break-in, the mice, my firing the thirty-eight. Brewster wrinkled his tanned face.
“Where’d you get the gun?”
“I’ve been keeping the thirty-eight in my glove compartment ever since John Richard had his sentence commuted.”
Brewster’s blond curlicues of hair trembled. My heart plummeted.
“Why was his sentence commuted?”
I sighed. “A prison guard was having a heart attack. John Richard gave him CPR and saved his life. There were witnesses. The guard, his cardiologist, and everyone in the guard’s family wrote to the governor begging him to let
 
John Richard out.”
Brewster frowned. “And nobody’s tried to hit or ambush you until today?”
“No.”
“And you fired the gun today.”
“Right. You should know that my husband of the past two years is Tom Schulz, a sheriff’s-department investigator,” I added quickly. “He thought my having the thirty-eight was a good idea, as long as I kept the glove compartment locked, which I’m sorry to say I appear not to have done, um, after I accidentally fired at the mice.” Brewster stopped writing and gave me a confused look. “A cop came and took a report. I showed him the gun, and then put it back into the glove compartment. But I forgot to lock it.”
“How do you know you forgot to lock it, Mrs. Schulz?”
“Because somebody stole my gun.”
His expression was studiously flat. “Keep giving me an exact summary of events, please.”
“My assistant and I were able to put together another meal, a cold plate. But after the lunch, John Richard started screaming at me, outside the Roundhouse. He wanted me to bring Arch over to his house at four so they could play golf. It wasn’t a pretty exchange. Even worse, lots of the guests still at the lunch —“
Wait a minute. By the time John Richard and I were arguing, people had begun to leave. There’d been folks milling around in the parking lot, getting into their cars and taking off. One of them had gone into the van and stolen my gun. But why? And who? Usually people sneaked into my van to steal food. So the culprit hadn’t found any food, had stolen my gun, and then had killed John Richard with it, just for good measure?
“Lots of the guests still at lunch,” Brewster prompted me.
“And folks in the parking lot, too. They all witnessed this argument. Anyway, I rustled up Arch, who was with a pal at an ice rink down in Lakewood. I brought them to our house, got Arch cleaned up, delivered some brownies to a bake sale, dropped Arch’s friend at his house and arrived at John Richard’s just before four.”
“Please give me the times, exactly.”
I did. I also repeated the scenario of the fellow asking for money, then driving off, and how I’d discovered the body — by myself. Brewster nodded and kept writing.
“But you haven’t heard the worst part, Mr. Mot — Brewster.”
“He was shot with your gun?”
“My gun was at the scene. How’d you know?”
“More important, how do you know, Mrs. Schulz?”
I let out a breath. How could I say this without it sounding as if I was somehow collaborating with my cop husband? “Even though he’s not on the case, my husband had been up at the garage with the team. When he came out, he spotted my thirty-eight lying beside the driveway. He came back to my van and opened the glove compartment. When there was nothing there, I knew my gun had to be up near John Richard.”
There was another rap at the door. Brewster put the notepad back in his leather briefcase and stood up.
He said, “Every time they ask you a question, look at me before you say a single word.” He hesitated, then gave me his beach-boy grin, as if he were actually looking forward to the interrogation. Still smiling, he said, “Let’s boogie.”
   
* * *
I followed Brewster down the hall until the cop who’d knocked on the door ushered us into an interrogation room. Two more cops were there, along with Blackridge and Reilly. The cops shocked me when they stepped forward and placed brown paper bags over my hands, then taped the bags closed. Meanwhile, Blackridge was talking.
“Mrs. Schulz, you have the right to remain silent. You have the right to an attorney. If you cannot afford an attorney . . .”
Aw jeez, Miranda? And they were checking for gunshot residue already? There was no way they could have run the serial numbers on my thirty-eight that quickly.
“I strongly object to the placement of bags on my client’s hands.” Brewster’s voice was suddenly authoritative, cold with rage. “She is here as a witness, not a suspect. Either arrest hr or take the bag off.”
“Sit down, Counselor,” ordered Blackridge. “She’s a suspect.” He motioned me to a chair, too. I stared up at the blank mirrored wall, behind which, I knew, a video camera was rolling. Probably the chief of detectives was back there, too, observing this little drama along with a prosecutor. Oh, joy. “While the two of you were having your conference,” Blackridge went on, “we had a chance to check our files. There are quite a few reports in there from you, Mrs. Schulz.” He raised those same questioning dark eyes and black eyebrows at me. “Your ex-husband perpetrated violence on you? Did you finally see your chance to get even?”
“We resent the question,” Brewster quickly announced. “My client will not answer. And if you checked those files thoroughly, you saw that Mrs. Schulz has helped your department with several homicide investigations.”
Reilly snorted.
Unmoved, Blackridge went on. “We also had the chance to talk to a few guests at the lunch you catered today. They said that when folks were beginning to leave, you and your ex-husband had a screaming match outside.”
Brewster piped up, “Dr. Korman yelled at my client. He demanded she bring their son over at four o’clock today, which was not a prearranged visitation. As you saw from your files, he was a violent, dangerous man, given to fits of temper. His demand was extremely inconvenient for my client, and she said so. If you check your witnesses, you’ll see it was Dr. Korman raising his voice. Not my client.”
I sighed and put my bagged hands up no the table. This was a mistake.
“How’d you get those marks on your arms?” Blackridge demanded.
Puzzled, I looked down. The places my arms had hit when I’d landed on the ground this morning had had time to swell and turn red. In some places, they were already shading to purple.
“My client refuses to answer questions on her appearance,” Brewster said, indignant.
Blackridge ignored him. “Can you account for your movements, Mrs. Schulz, between the time of your argument with Dr. Korman and your finding his body?”