Unrevealed (7 page)

It was sealed shut with heavy tape. I cut through the tape with the side of my car key and opened the box. There were only three items inside. Three items that someone in that house was hoping would stay buried forever. I collected them, sealed up the box, and replaced it on the shelf so that Winston would never know I had been there.

But somehow, I knew I wasn't finished in there. I stood back and stared at the columns of shelves and drawers that lined Winston's side of the closet. Something tugged at me. This happens to me a lot on the job. It's like a pull on my sleeve that holds me back and forces me to stay focused. When I get in that moment, it's like I fall into the void. All sound disappears and a guiding force takes over. It's the hand of God or justice, depending upon the innocence or guilt of the individual involved. My eyes canvassed the area. And
that's when I saw it sticking out from one of the drawers nearest the door. I opened the drawer and pulled out the items, one after the other. I examined the tags and then replaced each one exactly the way I found it. I wasn't sure how this whole thing was going to play out, but I sure as hell hoped for a favorable outcome.

Four days passed. I got a call from the doc who had completed the autopsy on Abbey Gambrel. The cause of death was 100 percent certain. I got off the phone and took a deep breath and then rushed downstairs into the evidence room and signed off on the lacy panties I'd sealed in the plastic Kapak baggie. I was just getting off the elevator to walk back into Homicide when I saw Winston Gambrel standing in the hallway. I quickly secured the Kapak baggie behind my back. Gambrel looked disheveled, as though he hadn't slept in days. Under his arm, he carried a section of the Denver newspaper. He turned to me. Agony mapped his weary face.

“Detective,” he said, his voice shaking. “I need to talk to you.” The broad British
a
was pronounced when he said the word
talk
.

“I was actually just about to give you a call,” I told him, watching him closely.

He didn't seem to hear me. Instead, he studied the carpet in a lost gaze. “My world is crashing down around me.” Emotion overtook him and he began to weep. “Have you read today's paper?”

I shook my head, and he reluctantly withdrew the section he had tucked under his arm. The article, on the front page of the local section, featured a sensationalized story about the Gambrel case. From the little I scanned, the journalist who penned it intimated that “sources” suggested a sexual slant to the death of Winston's wife. While any mention of
the bloodied lace panties was kept out of the story, the writer got around that by citing, “some investigators on the scene are considering whether a sexual motive led to the death of Abbey Gambrel.”
Fuck
, I thought. I was the only investigator on the scene, so this “journalist” obviously got the story from some rookie cop who hadn't learned to keep his goddamn trap shut.

“I'm assuming that police searched my house that night?” Gambrel asked me, his eyes pooled with fear.

“I was the only one collecting evidence that evening, sir.”

He looked at me, nearly paralyzed, for a hard minute. “I see.”

“I was up on the landing. And in your bedroom.”

The color drained out of Gambrel's face. He turned away, wiping his tears. “This could go to trial — ”

“Sir,” I tried to interrupt him.

“I can't go through a trial, Detective. This is killing me already. God, it's all so random.”

So random.
Yes.
It
is, I thought. “Mr. Gambrel, please — ”

“I have something to confess, Detective,” he said, looking me in the eye. “I killed…my wife.…” He reached out and rested his arm on my shoulder as he dropped his head and sobbed.

I looked at Mr. Gambrel and watched the unrelenting pain course through his muscles. Waves of anguish rose and fell across his chest as he gritted his teeth and gripped my shoulder tightly.

I led him to one of our interrogation rooms and directed him to sit in one of DH's metal chairs, which leave a lot to be desired in the comfort department. I excused myself briefly, returning to my nearby office to retrieve several key
pieces of evidence and information I would need for the conversation. I secured them, along with the Kapak, in a large manila folder. I also grabbed a tape recorder and a bottle of water from the refrigerator. When I returned to the tiny interrogation room, I found Mr. Gambrel with his head buried in his arms on the metal table. His brawny six-foot, four-inch frame barely fit beneath the table. “Here you go,” I said, handing him the water.

He seemed dismayed by my gesture. “Do you always give cold bottled water to people like me?”

I thought about it and nodded. “Yeah. Actually, I do always give cold bottled water to people exactly like you.”

“You're very kind,” he said, dropping his head. “Too kind.”

I knocked two quick raps on the two-way glass.

“What was that for?” he asked with a concerned look.

“I'm letting them know on the other side to start the video.” I pointed up to the two corners of the tiny room where the video cameras were perched and pointed toward the table.

“You're filming this?”

“Yes, sir. Have to get it on record.” I sat down and started the tape recorder. “That's my backup in case something goes screwy with the video.”

Gambrel seemed overwhelmed. “How many people are behind the glass?”

“Two, I think,” I said, opening the manila folder on my lap. Gambrel gazed at the two-way glass with great concern. “You thought this was going to be private?” I asked him. “Get used to it, sir. Confessing to murder can become a very public affair. Especially when it's someone as prominent and well-loved in the community as you.”

“My world is crashing down around me.” He tossed the Denver newspaper to the side.

That was the second time he'd said that in the last ten minutes. “Yeah, after we're done here, I'm going to call that news writer and show him some love. My job is tough enough without having a case tried in the court of public opinion. It can't help but infect a jury pool — ”

“But I'm
confessing
,” he said quickly. “That means no trial, right?”

“Your lawyer is going to fight you on that. They hate it when you confess.”

“I don't want a trial,” he stressed. “
That's why I'm confessing
.”

“You know that you've got the right to remain silent? Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law — ”

“Yes. Fine. Understood.”

“No. I really have to finish this spiel. This is how the defense likes to catch us up later in court and I'm not going there.” I rattled off the rest of his Miranda rights. “Take a sip of water,” I suggested.

He took a rushed sip and shook his head. “You must think I'm awful.”

I studied him. “You're not the first husband to confess killing his wife. You won't be the last.” He looked at me briefly, pain laced in his blue orbs. “I see the guilt all over your face.”

“You do?” He seemed shocked by my statement.

“Oh, yeah. I saw the guilt when I talked to you in the entryway of your house too. Guilt has a way of shadowing all of us. The things we strive to conceal from others tend to hide in the baggage around the eyes.”

He was taken aback. “Really?” he said quietly.

“It's not obvious to everyone,” I assured him. “You have to be
observant
. You have to know the codes.”

“What codes?”

“If I told you that, I'd give away all my secrets and then I'd be an open book, and we can't have that now, can we?”

“I suppose not.”

“You want a cigarette?”

“Excuse me?”

“A cigarette? Sometimes it helps to calm you down. I'm sorry I don't have any Dunhill ciggies to offer you — ”

“Dunhill?” Gambrel looked at me, his mouth slightly agape. He gulped another sip of water.

“That's a fancy English brand? Lots of well-heeled Brits and celebrities favored them back in the day.”

He was flustered. “Yes. I know.”

“I figured you probably smoked those at some time in your life?”

“Is that right?”

“Well? Didn't you?”

“Yes.” He paused. “But I quit.”

“Well, good for you, Mr. Gambrel. I still can't give up the habit.”

“Please call me Winston.”

“Okay, Winston. You can call me Jane.”

He furrowed his brow. “Friendly, aren't you?”

“Normally, no. Okay, so first question: where'd you go to college?”

He looked at me as if he didn't understand the question. “Excuse me?”

“College?”

“I thought…” He peered toward the two-way mirror and the video camera in the corner of the ceiling. “I thought I was making a statement — ”

“Yes. We'll get to that. Right now I'd like to know where you went to college.”

“Oxford,” he stated without hesitation.

“Oxford.”

“Yes.”

“What years did you attend?”

He rubbed his forehead. “I went from 1964 until mid-1969.”

“The five-year plan is alive and well in England as well, eh? That's kind of a staid college for a guy like you. Didn't a lot of uptight prime ministers graduate from Oxford?”

“I…I'm not sure…”

“Really? I thought that was common knowledge — ”

“Yes, of course, you're right. Quite right.”

“Just because I'm an ugly American doesn't mean I don't know a little bit about the motherland. Getting back to Oxford — I know it screams British just like tea and crumpets, but you seem like a fellow who would prefer a more outside-the-box, liberal education. I mean, your pub is not exactly a religious experience unless you worship the Queen Mum.”

He appeared baffled by my banter. “When can I begin my statement, Jane?”

“In a second. I need to cover some basics for them.” I gestured behind me toward the two-way glass. “Would you agree that you're a guy who is more of a free spirit?”

He looked flummoxed but he answered. “Yes. I would say that was true.”

“Always have been?”

“Yes. I don't understand where this is — ”

“Is that what drew you and Abbey together?”

He was silent as a sad smile crept across his face. “Yes.”

“Was she an English rose or a wild child of the '60s?”

“I would have to say the latter. England couldn't contain her. She dreamed of hopping across the pond to America to find the freedom she longed for.”

“And you? Did you want to experience America's freedom?”

His eyes strayed from mine. “Of course. Land of opportunity. I always wanted to experience it. I'd never been here.”

I looked at him pensively. “When did you and Abbey meet?”

“Late October of 1969.”

“Did she take that photo of you crossing Abbey Road?”

Winston looked slightly aghast. “Yes. She did. How did you — ”

“It was toppled over in your bedroom. You looked like a young John Lennon in that photo.”

“Thank you.”

I looked at him. “Why'd you say thank you?”

“I — ” He struggled. “I don't know.”

“Obviously that observation doesn't insult you, right?”

“Why would it insult me?”

“Of course it doesn't. You dress like John Lennon every year for the Halloween party at the pub. And you wear the same outfit at those parties that you wore in the Abbey Road photo.” I could see he was getting uncomfortable. “You liked John Lennon, didn't you?”

“Yes,” he said carefully.

“You connected to him in some way. His tough childhood?” I looked at Gambrel's eyes but he wasn't relating
to that comment. “His free-thinking ideology?” He arched his eyebrow.
Bingo
. We had a winner. “Well, of course. That was Lennon's draw for you. He represented an off-the-wall, British outlook you respected.”

“Quite right,” he said nervously.

“Yeah. Quite right. Where were you born, Winston?”

His eyes skirted again to the two-way mirror. “Is this the typical sort of questioning that is done when one is confessing to murder?”

“I don't know if there's any ‘typical' questioning. This isn't like, what's that British cop show on PBS?
Prime Suspect
? It's not like that. So, where were you born, Winston?”

“Cheltenham.”

“Prosperous area. Not far from Oxford.”

“Right.”

“That's convenient. A short hop to the ol' alma mater. You grew up with some means?”

He looked me straight in the eye for the first time. “Yes. I did.”

“Which helped you open Abbey's Road Pub.”

“Very much so.” He looked down at the table, a wave of sadness washing over him as a memory appeared to crop up unexpectedly.

“Are you okay?”

He swallowed hard and let out a hard breath. “Yes. I'm fine. Just quite tired.”

“Yeah, fatigue tends to do strange things to a person. Defenses are lowered. You're not as sharp as you should be.” Winston looked at me warily. “For example, you should have an upper-crust British accent. And yet, you don't. That's the thing about the Brits. They still have levels of status that structure their existence. And each level of status has a
unique enunciation.” I tapped my ear. “But you gotta have the ear for it.” I leaned back in the chair. “My sergeant — Sergeant Weyler — he only watches PBS. I think he figured I needed some class in my life, so he taped a bunch of episodes of shows he liked.
Prime Suspect
was one. But the series that struck me the most was a classic called
Upstairs/Downstairs.
I'm sure you know it. It's the upper class who live upstairs versus the working class who live downstairs.
Upstairs/ Downstairs
. Clever, eh?” I could see Winston squirming. “I watched a bunch of episodes and it was pretty damn good. And I started to get tuned into what a working-class accent sounded like versus that upper-crust intonation the wealthy class adopt. There's quite a difference. And the two of those accents
never
meet. You either speak the working-class or the tight-ass wealthy dialect. And if your status changes from poverty to wealth, your accent does not. Look at John Lennon. He grew up in a rough working-class area, and after he acquired all the money and fame, he never adopted an upper-crust pronunciation. The opposite is also true.” I leaned forward. “You don't grow up with means, as you told me you did, and sound like you're from Liverpool. Your generation doesn't slum like that.”