Fool's Puzzle (26 page)

Julio gave him a nervous glance and backed out slowly.

“Now look what you’ve done,” Carl said. “You’ve gone and scared Julio. Honey, why don’t you just put the gun away and we’ll talk about this rationally.”

“Don’t call me that,” I said coldly. “And I’m not putting it away until you tell me what happened the night Jack died.”

“What are you talking about?” His voice became irritated.

“Look, Carl, I know you were with him. I talked to Suzanne Hart. She told me everything.”

“Who is this Suzanne Hart you keep talking about?”

I felt the gun tremble in my throbbing hand. Stop it, I commanded myself. Hold on.

“How could you? He laid there for hours before anyone found him. What if he was alive, Carl? What if he was alive?”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

I felt the tears start again. “Don’t lie to me, Carl. Not now. I swear, I’ll use this gun if you lie anymore.” For the first time, a look of fear came over his face.

“Honestly, Benni, I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said. “I admit, I don’t remember him leaving but ...”

“Don’t give me that.”

“I swear on my mother’s grave, I didn’t know about Jack’s death until the next day.”

“Who was driving? Is that why you killed Marla and Eric? Were they blackmailing you because they knew you were driving?”

He looked at me in confusion. “You mean the Chenier and Griffin murders? What have they got to do with all this?”

“What’s going on here?” J.D. slammed the door open and stood, a big silver bull, in the middle of the room. “Young lady, I didn’t believe it when Julio told me. You’d better give me that gun right now.”

“Tell him,” I said to Carl. “Tell your dad what a fine, upstanding citizen you are. What a good friend you are.”

“What’s she talking about?” J.D. asked.

Carl glanced at his dad and held out his hands, a dumbfounded look on his face.

“Girl, what would your daddy think?” J.D. said.

“He’d probably tell me to pull the trigger,” I said. “He taught me that friendship meant something. You don’t walk out on a friend. You don’t leave friends to die alone.”

“Give me the gun, Benni,” J.D. said. “You’re upset. You don’t know what you’re saying. Give me the gun and we’ll just pretend like this never happened. Come on now.”

“You just don’t get it, do you? He’s a murderer, J.D.,” I said. “He left Jack to die and then killed Marla and Eric because they were blackmailing him. You raised yourself a fine boy here. You ought to be proud.” Tears flowed freely down my cheeks again. The gun trembled in my hand. I wasn’t sure what to do now.

I turned back to Carl. “I ought to shoot you. Let you lie there and feel your life drain out of you, inch by inch, like the way you did Jack.”

“I don’t remember,” Carl said, his voice almost a whisper. “Benni, I never wanted you to know this but I don’t remember a lot of what happened the night Jack died. Dad told me about Jack’s accident the next day when I woke up.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“I’ve had about all I’m going to take from you, young lady,” J.D. said. He pulled a small pearl-handled pistol from his pocket and pointed it at me. “Now, give me that gun right now.”

“Dad!” Carl exclaimed. “Put that away. It’s bad enough Benni’s gone nuts. This is getting ridiculous.”

“I mean it, girl.” J.D. gestured with his gun. “Give it to me now.”

“How can you protect him, J.D.?” I said. “He killed two people. He left Jack to die. Don’t you think he should have to pay for what he did?”

“I didn‘t—” Carl started.

“He didn’t know about Jack until the next day,” J.D. interrupted. “It was a dumbass thing, but he didn’t do it on purpose. Jack was his best friend. Jack wouldn’t have wanted him to have his life ruined over a stupid mistake.”

“What are you saying?” I looked at him, confused.

“You heard me. You heard him. He didn’t know what he was doing.”

A thick, hoarse groan, like that of an injured dog, came from Carl. J.D. and I turned to look at him. His mouth worked but no sound came out. The look on his face was like someone who’d seen a ghost, or reality for the first time.

“You mean, oh shit, I didn’t ... I’m sorry....” The words spilled out in a torrent, his face contorted in a horrible mask of realization and remorse.

“It wasn’t your fault, son,” J.D. said in a soft voice that sounded strange coming from him. He walked toward his son. “No one blames you.” His face was full of some emotion, though I couldn’t tell what—love, pity, regret.

“Wait,” I said, the gun still trembling in my hand. “If he didn’t even know about any of this, then he couldn’t have killed Marla and Eric. Who else ...” Then it dawned on me. But by that time, J.D. had already pointed the gun back at me.

“You never did know when to give up, Benni Harper,” J.D. said. “You just couldn’t let well enough alone.”

“J.D.” All I could whisper was his name. It had taken me hours to get used to the idea that Carl was a killer. That it was really J.D. seemed too shocking to even contemplate.

“Dad?” Carl looked unbelieving at J.D. His face was wet with tears. Even so, I couldn’t help but feel disgust. He might not have killed Marla and Eric, but he’d still left Jack alone to die. Drunk or not, I didn’t know if I could ever forgive him for that.

“I’ll take care of it, Carl. You just go on to my office and wait for me.” J.D. gestured with his gun for Carl to leave.

Carl looked at me, at the gun I had pointed at him, and gave a small, bitter laugh. “You’d be better off shooting me now, Benni. Dad’s obviously not going to let you out of here, so you might as well perform one last community service before you die. Then we’ll all be where we want. You’ll be with Jack, and I’ll be in hell where I belong.”

“Carl,” J.D. said. “Quit talking foolish.”

He turned to his dad, a look close to amusement on his face. “Give it up, old man. You never did know when to quit helping, did you? You can’t buy or manipulate your way out of this one. Why did you have to kill those people? Why?”

“Because we made a deal, a little every month. But that wasn’t good enough for her. She wanted more, a lot more. Then that little wimp thought he’d take over when I got rid of her.” J.D. shook his head. “Fixed his wagon. Kid was sitting there counting his money when I met him at the museum. He honestly thought we could work something out. As if J.D. Freedman would be held hostage by some little twerp like him.” He gave a low chuckle.

Carl laughed. It was a creepy, disjointed laughter that made me feel as if someone had dropped an ice cube down my back. J.D. laughed with him until, after a moment, he realized his son wasn’t laughing with him, but at him. J.D.’s face became as still as a buck hearing a leaf crunch.

Carl picked up the phone.

“What are you doing?” J.D. said.

“Calling the police.”

“Have you gone loco?” he said. “Put that phone down now.”

“Or what? You’ll shoot me? You should have done that the night Jack died; then none of this would have happened.”

He dialed 911 and spoke evenly to the dispatcher. He was smiling when he hung up. “Someone’s already called.”

“That stupid Julio,” J.D. said. “I told him not to call the police.”

“Guess he thought he was protecting you,” Carl said, laughing that crazy laugh again.

Out of the corner of my eye, through the glass windows of Carl’s office, I could see the police moving cautiously through the outer room, guns drawn. Miguel’s face stood out from the rest. It held a slightly sick look as he watched me hold the gun on Carl. I concentrated on the throbbing in my hand, trying to decide what to do. I held my breath and waited.

“Put the gun down, Benni,” Miguel called out. From where he was standing, he could only see J.D.’s back. He didn’t realize he had a gun.

“I can’t,” I called back, my voice high and wavering. More activity in the outer office. I glanced over and saw Ortiz’s black hair among the uniforms—messy, uncombed, as if he’d just crawled out of bed.

“Give it up, Dad,” Carl said in a voice as gentle as a mother’s with a sick child. “There’s nothing else you can do. It’s over.”

J.D. stared at his son for a moment. A look passed between them, and for a moment, it was hard to tell who was the parent, who was the child. Years appeared on J.D.’s face, like one of those high-speed camera tricks that show a flower blooming and dying in the course of seconds. He slowly placed the gun on the desk in front of his son as if giving him a precious gift.

I lowered my gun and in seconds the room was full of police. Miguel gently pried the gun out of my hand.

“Are you okay?” he asked, laying a hand on my shoulder.

“I think so.” It was too much to comprehend right then. Someone I’d known since I was a little girl had killed two people, was willing to kill me. For what? To protect his son? His reputation? Sheer ego? I stood over in a corner of the office while the police tried to sort out what had happened.

Ortiz walked over to where I was standing. I hugged my jacket close around me. All I could think was home—I want to go home.

“What happened?” he asked, his stern, cop voice like a splash of cold water. In a voice that broke every so often, I told him everything.

“Why didn’t you come to me?” he said, gripping my shoulder so tight I could almost feel the bruise starting. I tried to pull away, but he wouldn’t let go. “Do you realize what could have happened? Someone could have been hurt. You could have been killed.”

At least I got separate billing.

“I ought to arrest you,” he said.

“Arrest me? After I solved your case? Why would you arrest me?”

“I could fill five reports with the laws you’ve broken. And bringing a gun into a situation like this. That’s about the stupidest ...”

“It doesn’t matter,” I interrupted. “I never intended on hurting him. I just wanted to ...” I stopped, not sure about what I had wanted to do. “I just wanted the truth,” I finally said.

He exploded into a barrage of Spanish. Something he said caused Miguel’s eyes to widen in surprise. It was probably better I didn’t know what it was. The other cops in the room inspected the shine on their shoes as his voice grew louder and more angry.

Oh, c‘mon, I thought, when he didn’t stop after a few minutes. I’m tired of this.

“Look, Ortiz,” I said, attempting a calm, even tone. “Now, whatever it is you’re saying, none of it happened, did it? I found your murderer for you. Case solved. All’s well and all that.” I gave my perkiest smile, fighting the urge to burst into tears.

He stopped dead and gave me a look that said he and I were back to square one.

“Book her,” he said from behind clenched teeth to a shocked Miguel. “Assault with a deadly weapon.”

“I DON’T CARE if he fires me, I’m not cuffing you,” Miguel said in the same stubborn voice he’d had at six years old. He walked me to the patrol car and opened the front passenger door. “He’s nuts.”

I just laughed and patted his arm. Though, as Dove would say, I’d tied myself up tighter than Hogan’s goat, I never felt less worried in my life. I knew somewhere down the road it was all going to cave in on me, but right at that moment, all I felt was an odd sort of giddy relief. Something had changed in me in the last two weeks. At that moment I felt like I could face anything.

“C‘mon, Miguel,” I said. “The worst that could happen is I spend a couple of years in the slammer. I’ll write a book about it. Get rich and famous. Go on Oprah.”

“That’s not funny,” he said, giving me a baleful look. He led me to the one cell at the end of the block reserved for women and juveniles. I was the sole resident. He left the door to the cell unlocked and brought me coffee and cups of water until I thought I was going to float away. He told me J.D. was upstairs being questioned and that he’d demanded his lawyer. They were working on obtaining a search warrant for his house. Apparently, Ortiz knew his job better than I thought. J.D. had been one of the suspects all along. I had just brought things to a head sooner than expected.

Ortiz must have cooled off slightly, because a couple of hours later, word came from up top no charges were being filed against me. After giving my statement, I was free to go.

Miguel dropped me off at the
Tribune
, where I picked up my truck. I gave enough of a statement to the reporters to appease them, then drove to my house, packed a bag, and left a message with Constance’s housekeeper informing her I was taking a week off. Let her worry about the museum for a while. On the way home to Dove and Daddy, I swung by the mall. At eleven A.M. on a weekday morning, I was the shop’s only customer.

“Are you sure?” The skinny girl with the platinum crew cut looked at me nervously in the mirror.

“Absolutely,” I said and told her to get on with it.

“For the love of Mike,” Dove said when she saw me. She ran her fingers through my newly shorn neck-length hair. “You look like one of them fashion models in the magazines.” We walked out to the barn so Dove could feed an orphan calf whose mother had died while giving birth.

“Slow down, you greedy little thing,” she said as she held the bottle up and the calf eagerly drank.

“What happened to the cow?” I asked as I perched on the side of the stall.

“She was just too weak to make it,” Dove said. “And we don’t have any spare mamas to graft it to, so I guess I’ll be its mama.” She looked up at me and smiled.

I smiled back. “Like with me.”

“That’s right. Only I’ll bet you dollars to doughnuts this one will probably be a mite easier to raise than you were.”

“I was a good kid,” I protested, kicking the side of the stall with the back of my boot.

“When you were sleeping.”

“Dove?”

“Yes, honeybun.”

“Did Mama ever talk about me to you? I mean, before she died. Was there anything she ever told you to tell me?” I don’t know what I was searching for, some words of wisdom maybe, something to tell me how to make it through the rest of my life.