CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
Five miles south of Stillwater, a white plantation-style house sat on the western bank of the Cypress River. A crushed gravel drive lined with cypress trees veered off into a sparsely filled parking lot before circling under a porte-cochère and back toward the highway and past the sign marking this as CYPRESS COUNTRY CLUB, EST. 1954.
Jack walked up the AstroTurf-lined stairs and shook his head at the sight of the two black lawn jockeys guarding the front door of the clubhouse. A fat man with the ruddy complexion and wide nose of an alcoholic held the door for Jack, sloshing pale yellow orange juice out over his hand.
Inside, the clubhouse smelled of stale beer, cigar smoke, old grease, and sweat. Jack followed the sign to the golf shop down a hall to his left, past a bar with men playing cards while the Golf Channel played low on the television behind them. The smile the golf pro had on his face when he looked up from his paperwork dropped when he saw Jack’s badge.
“Can I help you?” The man’s country drawl was clipped and hostile.
“I’m looking for Chris Ryan. He here?”
The man paused as if debating how much he should stall, or if he should stall at all.
“He’s out on the course.”
“When will he be done?”
“His teed off at 7 a.m. He’s probably about to make the turn.”
“He come back here for the turn?”
“Yes.”
“I’ll wait.”
Jack wandered around the pro shop, stopping to hold up a navy blue golf shirt with the Cypress Country Club logo on it. Khaki pants, Foot Joy golf shoes, straw hats, and conservative ball caps were the sum total of fashion offerings. The golf pro kept peeking at Jack, as though wanting to say something. More likely he wanted to be interviewed so he would have an interesting story to tell his buddies over beers.
“You know Matt and Amy?” Jack ventured.
“A little.”
“They members out here?”
“Sure. All the Doyles are.”
“Matt play golf?”
“Not much. He would occasionally come out with Chris.”
“They get along?”
“As far as I could tell.”
Jack leaned against the counter and picked up a VOTE FOR JOE button from the box on the counter. “Can I have this?”
“Take the box. I’ll have to trash them tomorrow.”
“Thanks.” Jack made a show of pinning the button to his coat. “Is there a bathroom …?”
“Yeah, locker room is down the hall on the right.”
“Thanks.”
Jack went down the hall, peeked into the locker room, and kept going. The next door was a cleaning closet, but the next one was what he was looking for. He opened the door to Chris’s office and flipped on the light. A desk was wedged into a space only marginally bigger than the cleaning closet next door. A filing cabinet, a number of single golf clubs in various states of repair, and a couple of folded metal chairs took up the back wall. A dusty Dell desktop sat on the corner of the desk, looking like it hadn’t been used in five years. No sofa. Jack flipped off the light and went back into the hall.
He walked back to the nineteenth hole slowly, taking in the pictures and plaques on the walls. One name dominated the Club Championship plaques from the mid-1980s to the early 2000s. Jack stopped in front of a fairly recent picture of Joe Doyle, Chris, Matt, and an older man Jack didn’t recognize.
“That’s Big Jake.” Chris stood in the doorway of the nineteenth hole, holding a cup filled with tomato juice. “Red beer,” Chris explained. “Want one?”
“No. Should I know who Big Jake is?”
“Jacob Yourke? Ellie’s dad.”
Jack nodded and turned his attention back to the man in the picture. He was big all right. He towered over Joe, Chris, and Matt. A large nose anchored a face covered in broken blood vessels. A cigar was stuck in the corner of his mouth but couldn’t hide his smirk of self-satisfaction. Jack saw where Ellie got her height but nothing else about this man reminded him of her.
“He spend a lot of time out here?”
“He called it his office.”
“I suppose, for a gambler like him, a country club is a good place to spend your time.”
Chris sipped his drink and stared at Jack over the rim. “What can I do for you, Jack?”
“I’m here to talk about Matt and Amy.”
“You are?”
“Why are you surprised?”
“I assumed y’all weren’t interested in what I had to say since you didn’t come see me yesterday.”
“Lots of interviews to get through.”
“And I’m at the bottom of the list. Come on. Ride a few holes with me.”
Chris didn’t wait for Jack to answer. He was out of the bar, through the door, and outside in five long strides, in his golf cart in ten. Jack sat in the passenger side.
Chris punched the gas pedal and the golf cart jumped to life. Jack grabbed the roof of the cart with his free hand. “You play golf?” Chris asked.
“Some.”
“You should come play with me. Five a hole, usually, but I can go richer or poorer, whatever you want.”
“Probably shouldn’t be gambling, as chief of police.”
“I won’t tell.”
Chris was out of the cart before it completely stopped at the tenth tee. He pulled a driver out of his bag, teed his ball up, took two practice swings, and hit the ball straight down the middle of the fairway.
“Nice shot,” Jack said.
Chris put a stuffed bear head cover over his driver and shoved the club into his bag. “Thanks.” He punched the gas and the golf cart lurched again. “What do you want to know?”
“Why are you playing golf when your brother and sister-in-law have barely been dead forty-eight hours?”
Chris checked the GPS for distance and stopped the cart by his ball. “Two-oh-five. Slight headwind. Looks like a four to me.”
Jack waited while he hit a solid shot. It landed on the left edge of the green with a right pin placement.
They drove to the green.
“I guess it does seem cold, me golfing after my family’s been murdered. It isn’t because I didn’t like Matt and Amy or because I’m not sad. They were the only two people in this whole damn family with a bit of decency.”
Chris got his putter, two putted for birdie, and returned. He drove the cart to the eleventh tee, stopped at the tenth tee box, and picked up his cup. He sat back and stared at the river to their left.
“Peaceful, isn’t it?” Chris said.
“It is.”
“Nothing like what’s going on at Joe’s house.”
“No.”
“Or mine, I imagine.” Chris spread his hands as if it explained everything. “There’s nothing I could do there. They’ve got all the bases covered.”
“What do you mean?”
“My father-in-law is all blustery and indignant, threatening for heads to roll if the murder isn’t solved yesterday. My mother-in-law’s sedated. My wife is methodically taking care of everything but letting her father take the credit. There’s nothing for me to do.”
“Be a comfort to your family.”
He scoffed. “Mary is the only one who needs comfort, and she’s got Prozac for that. She’ll probably be drugged up for a year. She is most of the time as it is.”
“What about Matt and Amy’s children?”
“Being taken care of by Amy’s mom, no doubt. She’ll probably push for custody, which will be granted because Mary can’t take care of them and Michelle won’t want them. Joe will probably put up a fight because it’s expected, but he doesn’t want the hassle, either.”
“You aren’t painting your family in a very rosy light.”
“It’s not a rosy family. I have no doubt Michelle and Joe are livid. But grieving? Not in the typical way.”
For all of Chris’s distance and apparent disinterest, he saw right through his family.
“You have any theories on who did it?”
“No.”
“I don’t believe you.”
Chris Ryan put his arm across the back of the seat and turned toward Jack. “Who do you think did it?”
Jack smiled. “Norman Davie.”
Chris’s eyes bulged and he guffawed. “Davie? You’re shitting me, right?”
“Yes. He has a rock-solid alibi. About the only one close to Matt who does.”
Chris tossed his empty cup in the trash and pulled out his three iron. After he made the shot—straight down the fairway, again—Jack said, “Tell me about Saturday night, Sunday morning after the bonfire.”
“Michelle and I left together. I dropped her at her car and brought the smoker out here.”
“What time did you get home?”
“I don’t remember. Late. After two, probably.”
“Where were your kids?”
“Home. In bed. I checked on them before turning in.”
“Asleep?”
“Yes. Or pretending to be. You know teenagers.”
“And Michelle? Was she home when you got there?”
“I don’t know. We don’t share a bedroom. She snores like a locomotive.”
“When did you see her next?”
“Sunday afternoon.”
“You didn’t talk to your wife until the afternoon? She didn’t call or text you about Matt and Amy?”
“She texted me, but there was nothing I could do.”
“No one can confirm where you were from 12:30 until Sunday afternoon?”
“I was here Sunday morning.”
“Who did you see first and what time?”
“I honestly don’t know. I took a shower in the locker room and got out on the course about seven.”
“I’ll need the names of your foursome.”
“I played by myself.”
“Not busy on Sunday morning?”
“Not particularly. It picks up after church.”
“What was your relationship with Matt like?”
“We weren’t close, but we didn’t dislike each other.”
“How about Matt and Michelle? They get along?”
“No. Michelle resented Matt because he was Joe’s favorite, and Matt thought Michelle was a raging bitch and a bully.”
Finally, a family member willing to tell it like it is.
“Then why did Matt come to work for DI?”
“Joe promised him autonomy from Michelle.”
“Did he get it?”
“He thought he did. My wife can be subtle when she wants to. They needed him to stick around and be happy, so she made sure he was.”
“Why did they need Matt happy?”
Chris’s golf shoes clicked on the cart path. He leaned one arm on the roof of the cart. “You know I have a pretty good life. Hell, I basically play golf for a living. For the privilege, I look the other way when my wife fucks other men, and I do exactly what Joe and Michelle tell me to do.”
“And they’ve told you to keep quiet.”
Chris’s laugh was bitter. “I’m so insignificant, they haven’t told me shit.”
“You know about Michelle’s infidelities?”
“Everyone knows about my wife’s infidelities.”
“And you don’t care?”
“Like I said, I have a good life. I have my share of secrets.” He pulled his driver out of his bag, walked to the tee and teed up his ball. Chris addressed the ball and wiggled his club. With a fluid motion, he sent the ball flying, a perfect draw.
“Remind me never to play golf with you,” Jack said. “Tell me about Paco Morales.”
Chris covered his driver and pushed it in his bag roughly. “Paco? Old bastard hasn’t shown up for work in five days. If he wasn’t the best groundsman I’ve ever had, I’d fire his ass.”
“When was the last day he was here?”
“Thursday, I think. Maybe Wednesday. I’ll have to check the timecards.”
“Ever have any trouble with him?”
“No. None. Reliable. Great worker.”
“We’ve ID’d one of the bodies at the 107 fire as Paco’s.”
“Ah, shit.” Chris rubbed his hand over his mouth. After a moment, he shrugged. “I guess I’m not shocked. He’d occasionally ask me to hire friends of his, pay them in cash. I know it’s illegal, but I would. Only short term. I caught one of his friends living out in the groundkeeper’s shed out by the twelfth green. I tore into Paco. He stopped asking after that.”
“When did that happen?”
“A year ago?”
“No one recently?” Jack said.
Chris frowned, shook his head, and looked away. “Not here.”
“Did Michelle know Paco?”
“Sure. He did our yard, too. Are we about done here? I need to get home and get ready for visitation tonight.”
“Sure.”
They drove the length of a hole before Jack said, “Do you own a gun?”
“No. Michelle made me get rid of them. She has one. She doesn’t think I know about it.”
“How do you know about it?”
“I saw her hiding it in her dresser, Sunday night.”