Megan
Wednesday morning, Brigit and I met Detective Jackson at the W1 station at 8:00. Rather than fill the detective’s unmarked car with Brigit’s fur, she suggested we take my cruiser.
I believed she deserved due warning. “I’m driving the Barf-mobile.”
“Thanks for the heads-up. The shaking I can handle, but that smell?” She grimaced and pulled a small jar of VapoRub from her desk drawer, scooping up a smidge with her index finger and spreading it over her upper lip. “Works like a charm, especially when you’re faced with a decomposed corpse.”
Yuck. “Thanks for the tip.”
She held the jar out to me and I snagged a swipe. The stuff would not only mask a scent and clear your nostrils, but with all the oil it contained it was probably a great wrinkle fighter, too.
We piled into the car and shook and shimmied and bounced our way down I-35 to the Hill County jail in Hillsboro. A stocky female sheriff’s deputy checked us in and led us down the hall to an interrogation room. Haynes was already seated inside. Next to him sat a young white male attorney who looked to be fresh out of law school. He wore a suit a size too big and a few years out of date. A public defender, no doubt. They performed an important service, but weren’t exactly paid the big bucks to do it. He’d probably borrowed the suit from a friend.
Jackson and I introduced ourselves and shook hands with the attorney, who’d stood from the table. Haynes refused to stand, merely glaring at us from under thick, dark brows. His curls were much shorter today than they had been in the photograph Detective Jackson had shown me on her phone days ago. With the shorter hair, he looked very much like the person of interest depicted in the police sketch. He also resembled the guy from the Bag-N-Bottle who’d fed jerky to Brigit. But while the guy who’d looted the liquor store had sad eyes, Haynes’s eyes glowed with evil, as if the fires of hell burned within him.
After we took seats, the attorney said, “I hope you two—” he cast a glance at Brigit, “—or three—haven’t wasted your time coming down here. I’ve advised my client not to say anything.”
Detective Jackson raised a shoulder. “That is his right. But if he doesn’t give us a good alibi we might soon be charging him with murder.”
The attorney’s eyes went wide. “I thought you were coming down here to discuss a drug offense.”
“I suppose it’s a drug offense, in a way,” Jackson replied. “The man who was killed was a known dealer of methamphetamine.”
Her eyes locked on Haynes, probably to get a reading on his response. I turned my eyes his way, too.
“His name was Brian Keith Samuelson,” she told Haynes. “You know him?”
“I’d like to speak privately—” the attorney began, but his words were interrupted by Haynes saying, “Never heard of him.”
There’d been no flicker of alarm in Haynes’s eyes when Samuelson’s name was mentioned, no noticeable change in posture or respiration. Either the guy was an emotionless sociopath or he truly didn’t know Samuelson. Of course I supposed both things could be true, too.
“He was killed in Fort Worth on Sunday, February eighth. Someone repeatedly slammed his face into a tree.”
The detective didn’t mention the broken chain embedded in his neck or the telltale marks on his face caused by brass knuckles. Those were facts the department had decided to keep in reserve.
“Sunday, February eighth?” Haynes repeated. A slow, sick smile spread across his face. “Oh, hell yeah, I got a good alibi.” He expelled a nasty chuckle and leaned forward across the table. “I was on a double date with Beyoncé and Rihanna.”
Another dumbass being a smartass. Forget siccing Brigit on him, I was tempted to bite this guy myself.
Detective Jackson, on the other hand, kept her cool. “I’m having a little trouble believing your story, Mr. Haynes. You want to tell me what you were really doing?”
He sat back in his chair. “I was in the city jail down in Austin.”
His attorney cocked his head. “You sure about that, Owen?”
“Of course I’m sure!” Haynes spat. “Whose side are you on?”
“Yours, Owen,” the attorney said resignedly. “Yours.”
“Anyways,” Haynes continued, returning his attention to the detective and me. “I went down there to visit my cousin. Him and me went to a bar on South Congress, and when we came out two punk-ass guys started some shit. The cops took us in, too, even though we weren’t the ones who started it. I thought people in Austin were supposed to be cool but they’re just as big o’ pricks as they got anywhere.”
“What time were you picked up?” I asked. If it wasn’t until late in the evening, it would still be possible he’d committed the murder and then made the three-hour drive down to Austin.
His evil eyes looked up in thought. “Around five o’clock.”
Jackson and I exchanged glances. Assuming what Haynes was telling us was true, we could rule him out as a suspect.
The detective stood. “I’m going to verify this information.”
Haynes sneered at her. “Knock yourself out.”
I stood, also, and gave a low whistle to rouse Brigit. Jackson and I exchanged a final handshake with Haynes’s attorney, bade good-bye to the deputy manning the front desk, and returned to the Barf-mobile.
“What now?” I asked once we were seated inside.
“We follow up on Gallegos and Duong. Their curly-haired buddy may or may not be our killer, but I’d at least like to snag their black friend. Anyone who’s pulled a gun on a cop needs to be reckoned with.”
While I drove back to Fort Worth, Jackson phoned the Austin Police Department from her cell phone and verified that Haynes had, in fact, spent Sunday night in jail for assault. When the detective completed her conversation with Austin PD, she called Melinda from her cell to obtain home addresses for Gallegos and Duong. The detective activated the speaker feature so her hands would be free to jot down the addresses.
Melinda’s voice came across the line. “Looks like they live in the same apartment complex. They’ve got the same street address but different unit numbers.”
Jackson wrote down their addresses, thanked Melinda, and thumbed a button on her phone to end the call. “They live in West Morningside.”
The neighborhood began just north of Berry Street and continued eastward for several blocks, in close proximity to the Bag-N-Bottle.
Forty-five minutes later, I turned into the apartment complex. The place was constructed of a salmon-hued brick that had been popular decades ago. The gray awnings were faded and frayed. Oil spots and potholes dotted the parking lot.
“Bring your laptop with you,” Jackson advised. “We may need it.”
We checked in with the on-site manager, a haggard woman in her fifties with monotone jet black hair and deep facial lines that told of numerous summers spent basking in the Texas sun. Let’s Make a Deal played on the small television set sitting on top of a modern black lacquer credenza that didn’t match her classic oak desk.
She gestured for us to take a seat.
Detective Jackson explained that we’d arrested Gallegos and Duong. “We’re looking for two other young men who might live here. A black man with a swirl pattern cut into his hair and another who may be mixed race.”
“I can go over the current list of tenants with you,” she said. “Would that help?”
Jackson nodded. “Sure would.”
“We’ve got sixty-three units,” the woman said as she turned to her computer. “Most of them are occupied now. Just a couple of vacancies.”
For the next fifteen minutes, the woman went methodically down the list, giving us the names and birth dates of all male tenants. Several of them sounded like possible matches, but when I pulled their driver’s license pictures up on my computer, it was clear that none were either of the men I’d seen at the Bag-N-Bottle on Valentine’s Day.
Jackson harrumphed. “What can you tell us about Gustavo Gallegos and Lahn Duong?”
The woman pulled up their records on her screen. “Gustavo Gallegos has lived here since last June. Duong moved in last November. Their names are the only ones on their leases. Of course that doesn’t mean someone else might not be shacking up with ’em.”
“Is there anyone here they’re friendly with?” the detective asked. “Male or female?”
“Wish I could help you,” the woman said, “but with the way people come and go around here I don’t bother to pay much attention. I do my job, show apartments, and post eviction notices, and in between I just collect rent and do the bookkeeping. I don’t socialize with the folks here. The management company I’m employed with offered me a discounted apartment at the complex, but who wants to live where they work? My own place is a couple of miles up the road.”
Jackson nodded. “Understood. You don’t mind if we ask around, do you?”
The woman made a broad sweep with her hand, indicating the buildings outside the window. “Be my guest.”
We stood and went first to Duong’s apartment, then to the one belonging to Gallegos. There was no answer at either place, though Brigit performed a voluntary snuffle around the bottom and sides of each of their doors. I wondered if she recognized their scents from the Bag-N-Bottle. I wished I could ask her whether she smelled the other two men in the vicinity. Too bad the dog couldn’t tell me.
We tried the doors on either side of their apartments, too. While neither of Duong’s adjoining neighbors was home, we had better luck at Gallegos’s place. A young woman with a chubby baby on her hip came to the door. She glanced around the courtyard as if to make sure none of the other residents could spy her talking to the police. Couldn’t much blame her. Talking to law enforcement wasn’t considered the neighborly thing to do in places like this.
“The curly-haired guy doesn’t ring a bell,” she said, “but I’ve seen the black guy you’re talking about. He’s totally ripped. I don’t think he lives here, though. I think maybe he’s just friends with some of the guys here.”
We thanked her for her time and returned to the stinky cruiser.
“All right, aspiring detective,” Jackson said to me. “If this were your case, what would you do now?”
“Does that mean you’re out of ideas?”
She chuckled. “You’re a smart cookie. And speaking of cookies, I’m hungry. Let’s get some lunch.”
We stopped at a sub shop, went inside, and ordered sandwiches. I chose a healthy veggie sandwich for myself. For Brigit, I ordered one with a variety of meats. “No veggies, no condiments.”
After obtaining our food, we carried our trays to a booth in the corner. Brigit hopped up on the seat next to me. I unwrapped the paper from her sandwich and tore the enormous sub into bite-sized pieces that I placed on the tray. Knowing she’d try to eat the wrapper, too, I wadded it up and set it on the table to my other side.
As I dug into my sandwich, I mulled things over. “Let’s pay a visit to Roland Wilson,” I suggested. “Might as well let him know we’ve arrested two of the m-men who looted his store.”
Jackson swallowed her bite and raised her cup of diet soda in acknowledgment. “Sounds like a plan.”
When we’d finished our lunch, we drove to the Bag-N-Bottle. Plywood boards covered the windows and a wide swatch of clear plastic now served as the roof. While the detective and my partner waited in the cruiser, I went to the door and tried it. Locked. Cupping my hands around my face, I peered inside. No signs of life.
“Nobody’s here,” I called back to the detective.
As I settled back into the patrol car, Jackson pulled up Wilson’s home address on the laptop. “He lives just a little southwest of here.”
She navigated the way, and we arrived at his home ten minutes later.
Wilson answered the door in a blue bathrobe, white socks, and a pair of corduroy slippers. An attractive woman also dressed in a robe stepped up behind him. The slightly embarrassed looks on their faces told me that our visit might have interrupted the two engaging in a little afternoon delight.
Since I’d been the one to interact with Wilson previously, I introduced Detective Jackson. Wilson, in turn, introduced the woman behind him as his wife.
“We arrested two of the men who looted your store,” I told him. “The Asian and the Latino. We caught them selling the liquor at a high school yesterday afternoon.”
Wilson’s wife put a hand to her chest and said, “Oh, my.” She seemed more concerned about the arrests than relieved. As for the man himself, he merely shook his head.
“I was hoping maybe you’d changed your mind about things,” I said. “Your testimony would go a long way in putting these guys behind bars where they belong.”
Wilson frowned. “I told you I didn’t see them.”
“I’d like to believe you, Mr. Wilson. But I don’t.”
“You’ve got some nerve,” he said. “Coming to my home, calling me a liar.”
He began to shut the door but I put out a hand to keep him from closing it.
“We think one of the group could have been involved in an unrelated murder.” I removed my hand. “If people like you don’t speak up, guys like them will keep getting away with their crimes, hurting other people.”
“Not my problem,” Wilson said. “I’m going to take my insurance check and call it a day. I should’ve sold that place and retired years ago.”
With that he shoved the door closed.
* * *
Seth texted me that afternoon. Watch Mavs game at Ojos Locos tonight?
I sent a quick reply. Perfect. I could use a margarita. Who we playing?
The Thunder.
Huh. That was ironic.
Seth swung by my place at 6:30 to pick me up.
“Want to come with us?” I asked Frankie. “There’s liable to be quite a few available guys.”
She sighed from where she sat, Indian-style, on the futon, still wearing her pajamas since she slept during the day. “I’m still at the all-men-suck phase. I’m not quite ready to get back out there yet.”
“When you are,” I told her, “just say the word.” It was the least I could do for her. After all, she’d taken a chance on me, too, letting me move into her place without knowing much about me.
“Yeah,” Seth added. “I could bring along one of my buddies from the firehouse.”
Frankie’s face brightened. “Got one that’s over six feet?”
“Sure.”
“Give me another week or two,” she said. “My pity party should be over by then.”
We left Blast and Brigit at the house with Frankie and Zoe and a couple of chew treats apiece. As we left, I admonished my fluffy partner to “be good” and gave her a kiss on the snout. She replied with a swirling tail wag that told me she’d consider being good, but wasn’t going to make any firm promises.
As we headed to the sports bar in Seth’s Nova, I caught him up on the burglary, looting, and murder cases. “All of the leads have petered out. I’m feeling frustrated.”
He slid a sly smile my way. “I can relieve that frustration for you.”
I slid him a sly smile right back. “I just might take you up on that.”
“We could do it in the hammock,” he suggested. “That would be daring and dangerous. I know how you like a challenge.”
Normally, I did enjoy a challenging task. There was little reward in work that could be accomplished easily and quickly, and I enjoyed putting my intellect to work, analyzing clues, assessing evidence. But I feared that if the murder case wasn’t solved soon, we’d end up with another body on our hands. Anyone violent enough to punch someone’s face with brass knuckles, smash their face repeatedly against a tree, and attempt to saw their head off with a chain could be capable of anything.
The waiter took our order and, a few minutes later, plunked a frozen margarita in front of me, a draft beer in front of Seth, and a platter of nachos between us. We’d made only a small dent in the pile when it was time for tip-off.
While I was only a fair-weather sports fan, tonight’s game against the Thunder was exactly the mindless entertainment I needed to give my brain a break. Plus, it felt nice to be with Seth, to see him getting a chance to relax. Like my job, his work with the fire department could be both physically and emotionally demanding. He deserved some downtime, too.
Two margaritas and approximately two thousand calories later, we’d polished off the nachos, as well as a basket of fried pickles and jalapeños and a couple of churros for dessert. I hadn’t just fallen off the health food wagon, I’d dived off it headfirst.
The Mavericks had trounced the Thunder, making the crowd happy and the night lively. Seth draped an arm around my shoulders as we walked back to his car. When I stepped up to the passenger door, expecting him to open it for me, he instead backed me up against the side of the car.
“Hey!”
His soft, warm mouth was on my neck. “Hey, yourself,” he mumbled into my flesh, stepping closer to press himself gently against me.
Maybe it was the margaritas, maybe it was the stress of work, or maybe it was because fooling around can be a lot of fun, but I found myself tilting my head back to allow Seth better access to the sweet spots on my neck and shoulders. He inched closer, the pressure of his body no longer gentle but insistent and thrilling. When I arched my back he emitted a moan and sunk his teeth into my skin. The feeling was so hot it wouldn’t have surprised me to see actual fire shooting down the side of his car along with the painted flames.
He moved his mouth to mine, his kiss the perfect blend of sweetness and seduction. When we came up for air, I turned my attention to his neck now. After all, turnabout is fair play. I trailed a line of kisses down under his chin, his five o’clock shadow rasping lightly on my lips, and stopped to suck gently at his Adam’s apple.
He offered a husky chuckle. “Remind me to take you out for margaritas more often.”
A car passing by let loose a loud honk followed by wolf whistles from the inhabitants.
I raised my head and put a hand on Seth’s chest to force him back. “It’s getting late and I have to w-work tomorrow.”
He groaned. “But things were just getting good!”
I gave him a chaste peck. “Patience is a virtue, Seth.”
“And blue balls is a recognized medical condition.”
“No man ever died from it.”
He groaned again. “Are you sure?”