Execution of Innocence (9 page)

Confident Hannah, not devastated Hannah.

She had tossed aside the charade of grief without realizing it.

“You have pretty hands,” Kohner said to Mary as he scraped her skin carefully with the edge of his razor.

“Thank you,” Mary said quietly.

Kohner leaned over and sniffed them. “But they smell like a strong cleaning solution. Do you use such a product to soften them or clean them?”

Mary stared. “Neither,” she muttered.

Kohner turned to Riles. Sharp also came forward. The coroner seemed to want Riles’s permission. Riles nodded, and the coroner leaned over to smell Hannah's hands. He sat back and smiled, but the detectives weren't sure they liked the joke.

“What is it?” Riles demanded.

“Smart girls,” Kohner said. “They have both soaked their hands in what seems to be Lysol.”

Riles was angry. “That wipes out any powder trace?”

“No,” Kohner said. “Not definitively. But it makes it hard to find.”

Riles glared at Hannah. “You think you're way ahead of us.”

Hannah allowed a thin smile. “How much do cops make a year?”

The question was both insulting and incriminating. Hannah was now her father's only heir. Soon she would be filthy rich while they would still be grinding out miserable salaries. Really, she had a lot of guts to ask what she did. Riles had to restrain himself from slapping her, and he had never hit a woman in his life.

Right then Riles knew they had their murderer.

Yet Sharp was unsure, and Sharp was no dummy.

“It is not how much a person makes that matters,” Riles said seriously. “It is how they earn it. Many of the richest people in the world are the most miserable. Especially when they have destroyed their humanity to get what they have.” He glanced at Mary. “They have no peace of mind. Their consciences haunt them.”

“You think I’m just a punk kid,” Hannah said. “That I have no conscience.”

Riles continued to look at Mary. “Did you soak your hands in Lysol?”

“I washed them at the gas station,” Mary said. “I don't know what kind of stuff they had there.”

“Which gas station?” Sharp asked.

“I can’t remember,” Mary said.

“Charlie hasn't shown up yet,” Sharp said. “We've sent a squad car over to his house a dozen times.” He paused. “Can you remember where he is?”

“No.” A small syllable.

Riles turned to Kohner. “Do the powder stains on their skin anyway. We'll see what we get.” The stain reacted with spent gunpowder. Even through heavy chemicals, it could still work.

Kohner nodded. “I have another interesting find on Dick's blood.”

Riles wanted the girls to hear. “What was it?” he said.

“Besides being drunk, Dick had PCP in his blood.”

The information astounded Mary. She whirled on Hannah, and almost said words the cops would have paid dearly to hear. But at the last moment she restrained herself. The information caught Riles off guard as well. PCP, or angel dust, was one of the few street drugs that made users aggressive. Yet in Maple and the surrounding area PCP was almost unknown. And it was an awfully heavy-duty chemical for a student body president to be snorting.

“Did Dick do PCP?” Riles asked Hannah.

Hannah shrugged. “He did different drugs, I’m not sure which.”

“Where did he get his drugs?” Sharp asked.

“I don’t know,” Hannah said.

Sharp frowned. “This doesn't fit.”

“Maybe it does,” Riles said, watching Hannah. She met his gaze.

“Enough of this playing Sherlock Holmes,” she said. “I want to make one phone call. I’m allowed that, ain't I, even though I am under arrest?”

“Your father is still waiting outside,” Riles said.

“Good,” Hannah said sarcastically. “Then I can call him on his cell phone.”

The detectives told her to wait a minute and retreated into the hallway for still another conference. Kohner followed them, wishing he were a detective on this exciting night. He had a gleam in his eyes.

“Why did you reveal all that stuff in front of them?” Sharp asked his partner.

“I was trying to rattle them,” Riles said.

“We're the ones who're getting rattled,” Sharp complained. He spoke to Kohner, “How much PCP did Dick have in his system?”

“A lot.”

“On top of the alcohol?” Sharp said.

Kohner considered. “It would not be precise or professional of me to say the molecules of alcohol were on top of the PCP molecules. But as a layman I can answer your question in the affirmative.”

“He was stoned out of his mind then,” Sharp said. “He didn’t know what he was doing.”

“Maybe someone wanted him that way,” Riles mused.

“You're thinking of her salary comment,” Sharp said. “I think you’re reading too much into it. I mean, he was her brother for godsakes—her twin. She's only eighteen—how could she shoot her own brother?”

“She certainly didn't spend a long time mourning her twin,” Riles muttered. “We can't let them go before we at least have a report back on the blood.”

Mr. Spelling accosted them next. No one had invited him back into the rear of the station—he made his own way. He still looked shaken, but he was mad again as well.

“Where's my daughter?” he demanded. “I've been here all night.”

Riles took the heat. “She's under arrest,” he said.

Mr. Spelling didn't get it. “What? What for?”

Riles spoke seriously. “For the murder of Richard Spelling, your son. Mary Dammon is under arrest as well.”

Mr. Spelling’s bull neck seemed to swell. “That is the most ridiculous thing I have heard in my life. You let me see Hannah and you let me see her right now.”

“You can see your daughter,” Riles said. “Later. But she doesn't leave here unless she is granted bail by the judge.”

Mr. Spelling gave Riles the evil eye. He could have had a devil in his eyeball because it looked as if some tiny demon was pushing from the inside out.

“You are history, detective. For you to add to our sorrow at this time goes beyond forgiveness.” Spelling held up a shaking finger. “This is the end of your career. It finishes tonight. You won't get away with this, I promise.”

Sharp moved close to his partner. “We have strong circumstantial evidence for arresting your daughter and Mary. If you’ll give us a few minutes, and stop threatening us, we can explain it to you. We all want the same thing here—to find the murderer of your son.”

Mr. Spelling's face shook with fury. “By arresting Hannah? How can you be that sick?”

“Your daughter has lied to us all night,” Mr. Riles said firmly. “You can see her later, and you can ask her about those lies. But as I said, she doesn’t leave here until and unless she’s granted bail. Now get back out to the waiting room and stay there until we call you.”

Riles had his own power. Mr. Spelling turned and left.

Sharp groaned. “How come we’re not loved like cops on TV?”

“Because they're usually continuing characters,” Riles muttered.

“I’ll be happy to testify at your job dismissal trial that you both behaved in the most professional of manners,” Kohner said.

Riles was weary. “Will it be as much fun as an autopsy?”

“Very similar, I believe,” Kohner said. Riles was not looking forward to what he had to do next. He had to get Judge Pierce on the phone before Spelling got to him. Spelling might go to the judge even before he called a lawyer. Riles hurried into his office, Sharp on his tail, and looked up the number on his computer. It rang a few times before the judge answered.

“This had better be good,” Pierce mumbled. He was close to seventy and made of stone. He took a five-mile walk every afternoon and had a brisk voice. Ordinarily, without the Spelling connection, Riles would not have minded Pierce's involvement with the case. The judge had a shrewd legal mind and was not intimidated in the courtroom. He never, in Riles's memory, came to a decision just because it was politically correct. Yet Sharp was right, they didn’t have enough evidence to hold the girls and Pierce would quickly grasp that. Then, when Spelling got to him, they'd have trouble holding the girls at all. Pierce was honest but not stupid. Spelling owned half the town and a hundred percent of the mayor. Riles knew the latter would be calling next, as soon as he woke up and heard the news.

“Eighteen-year-old Richard Spelling was murdered last night,” Riles said.

Pierce had to take a breath. “Tell me.”

Riles gave him an overview and then dropped the bomb concerning the girls' arrests. Riles, in explaining why he moved so quickly, pushed hard on the girls’ lousy attitudes. It was a mistake with Pierce. He wanted facts, not cop psychology.

“The soles of the shoes match perfectly,” Riles repeated when he felt he was losing the judge. “They were there, I’m sure of it, and that's where Dick must have died.”

“You’re not sure where Dick died,” Pierce corrected him. “But even if you are right about that, the shoe prints alone aren’t enough to tie the girls to the scene of the crime.”

“The prints also matched their shoe sizes.”

“But as your partner no doubt told you, all kids wear those same shoes in about the same size.”

“Sharp agreed with my decision to arrest,” Riles said. Sitting across from him, Sharp nodded. They stuck together, in good and bad. But of the two of them only Riles knew how bad this could be if they screwed up.

Pierce continued. “I respect you, Lieutenant, I always have. I know you must have had a long and trying night. And you have collected several pieces of interesting evidence. But, in my opinion, you have failed to make a case for why the girls were arrested tonight. In two or three days,
if
they were at the scene of the crime, you should have far more evidence. Better to use science than inspiration. Call the state police, get their experts out.”

“I have already spoken to the state police. I know how to handle a homicide. But I must protest a couple of your remarks, your honor. I wouldn’t have got the blood from Mary’s hair if I hadn’t arrested them. These girls may only be eighteen, but they’re both strong willed and smart. That Hannah—if I didn't know better I'd have thought she already went to law school, or worse, was a part-time cop.”

“I know Hannah.” There was a dead spot on the line. “I'm getting another call.”

“Don’t take it,” Riles said quickly. “It's Spelling.” He almost added “please” but knew that would backfire with Pierce. In either case, the judge ignored the call.

“Dick was everything to his father,” Pierce said with a sigh. “What can I say to him? He'll want his daughter at home at a time like this.”

“We can't let them go until we get the blood types back.”

“What are you looking for with the blood?”

“A link, of course.”

“Have you got their blood types on file?”

“I’m running that down now,” Riles lied.

“What if Mary has Charlie's blood in her hair and not Dick's?”

“I've wondered that myself, your honor. But any way you look at it that is still a link.”

“Not until you find Charlie’s body,” Pierce said.

“He might be dead, you know. Personally I think he is.”

“Why get rid of one body and not the other?”

“To make it look like Charlie did it and then fled.”

Pierce considered. This was the bad part, his legal mind filing through previous cases. When it came down to it, Riles thought, the law had been designed for the guilty—not for the dead. They never got to file an appeal.

“The only way we can hold these girls is if the blood in Mary's hair matches Dick’s,” Pierce said finally. “Otherwise we have to let them go. How much more time do you need?”

“Three hours.”

“It’s six-thirty now. You have till ten.”

“What will you set bail at?”

“Does it matter in Hannah’s case?”

“No, I suppose not.” Riles paused. Spelling could pay anything. “I'd still like to hold Mary.”

“Why? There’s time, lieutenant. Build your case slowly and methodically.”

Riles felt a chill creep through his body. “Your honor, honestly, I don't know how much time there is.” He added, “It might be good to hold Mary for her own protection.”

“Try explaining that to her. Or to her lawyer.”

“Spelling will not hire an attorney for Mary. He’ll see the conflict of interest right away.”

Pierce sharpened his tone. “It doesn’t matter. Mary has to have Dick's blood on her or she walks. Her family is not rich, and they've lived here forever so her bail will not be excessive.”

Riles realized the conversation was in effect over. They exchanged goodbyes. Riles told Sharp the details, which felt ominous to Riles. He tried to explain his bad vibes to his partner.

“Pierce could do nothing more for us under the circumstances,” Sharp said.

Riles waved his hand. “It’s not that. I expected no more from Pierce. I keep feeling that if we let these girls go more people could die.”

Sharp shook his head. “Now you sound like a TV cop.”

“There's something cold about that Hannah.”

“Now Mary is innocent?” Sharp asked. “And Charlie?”

Riles felt as if he were missing something important. “You know, we haven’t even sat down together and tried to figure out a scenario for what happened. For the sake of argument, let's say both girls are guilty. What exactly did they do? Why did they do it?”

“Speculating on what they did is easy. It's also a waste of time at this point. We’ll come up with a dozen scenarios. Speculating on their motive is impossible. They have their whole lives in front of them and they’re both smart girls. Why would they throw everything away so they could kill Dick?”

“And Charlie?” Riles said.

Sharp frowned. “If the girls are guilty—and that’s still a hell of an
if
in my mind—then it’s possible Charlie helped them kill Dick, and then fled so that he wouldn’t have to take the heat.”

Riles was doubtful. “Sounds reasonable, but it doesn’t fit what we know. Mary is genuinely worried about Charlie, sorrowful even.”

“But Hannah isn't,” Sharp said.

“No. I tell you, Hannah is scary. She doesn’t seem to feel anything except concern about being caught. Even there, she’s cocky for an eighteen-year-old who’s just been put under arrest. It’s as if she has something secret up her sleeve that will make everything OK for her. One thing's for sure, though, Mary is angry at Hannah.”