26
The J & M Diner was in downtown Belham, about three streets over from the police station. Darby opened the front door, a bell tied with ribbon clanging above her head, and she felt as though she had stepped through a portal and back into her youth. She saw the same scuffed and chipped ivory Formica tables and stiff red plastic chairs; the same dull grey, L-shaped counter and stools made of red imitation leather. She didn’t see any cops – at least any cops she recognized. She didn’t recognize anyone in here. The faces she saw looked tired and haggard and weary, and the people stared into space as if lost.
She grabbed a seat by the window, her mind returning to the countless times she had sat here with her father. This was one of his favourite haunts, and what she always remembered, what she loved the most about him, was that no matter how old she was, he would ask her questions and then genuinely listen, give her his full attention, invested in hearing her thoughts and opinions.
It was then she realized why she didn’t like coming back to Belham – not because it had changed (and, arguably, for the worst) but because the city had become one big cemetery to her, places like J & M acting as headstones, reminders of a life that had been torn from her by violence and lies and greed and people whose moral compasses were constantly pointing at whoever could line their pockets and perform the kind of quiet, back-door favours that often left their victims searching for peace and comfort and understanding at the bottom of a highball glass or the sting of a needle.
And now here came Mickey Flynn, the man who had taken her virginity, the first man she had ever loved; a man she still liked and respected. And now she was going to blow up his world again. Darby wondered how many blows the human heart could take before it decided to quit.
She was going to shake his hand when he reached out and hugged her, the way close friends did. He squeezed her a little harder, as though he wanted to take something from her and absorb it, and then he kissed her cheek, broke away and sat down across from her. His face was guarded. Wary.
‘Rough morning?’ Darby asked.
‘Hard time sleeping. What’s up?’
Darby didn’t have a chance to answer. The waitress, a girl no older than twenty by the looks of her, came to their table, set down two thick white mugs and started to pour coffee, asking them if they were ready to order. Mickey knew what he wanted. Darby hadn’t had a chance to read the menu and wasn’t particularly hungry but knew she needed to eat and, in the interest of saving time, ordered the same thing Mickey had.
When the girl left, Darby picked up the blue folder she’d placed on her seat and put it on the table. She made sure no one was standing nearby and then opened the folder and showed him an 8 × 10 colour photo of his daughter’s jacket. A ruler had been placed next to it for measurement purposes. The hood wasn’t folded back, the way it had been when it was found on the memorial. It was open, and she watched Mickey lean forward and look at the three quarter-sized red-brown smudges on the left side of the hood.
Mickey swallowed several times. ‘Those marks, are they –’
‘Yes.’
‘Claire’s?’
Darby felt her muscles tighten, as if expecting a blow. She nodded.
Mickey looked like he’d been dunked in ice water.
‘The lab ran the DNA and a hair analysis,’ Darby began.
‘Hair? They found Claire’s hair in the hood?’ He didn’t look up from the picture. His face was pale, almost bloodless, and his voice had changed, as if someone else were speaking.
‘They found three blonde hairs stuck in the jacket,’ Darby said, hating that she had to be the one to tell him this. But it was the right thing to do. After all the shit he’d been through, he deserved to know. ‘One of them had a root bulb, which means they could extract DNA from it. That’s where they lucked out, because they couldn’t get DNA from the blood. That’s because –’
‘I thought you could get DNA from blood.’
‘You can. The problem is, the blood on the hood is what we call a degraded sample. It means they couldn’t extract DNA from it. But the root bulb they found on one of the hairs did contain DNA, and they matched it against the DNA sample you gave Belham PD.’
‘Her toothbrush,’ Mickey said tonelessly. ‘I gave them her toothbrush and her hairbrush and her pillowcase. And fingerprints. Heather had her printed when she was four or so, at the police station – one of those child prevention things you do because if you do it you tell yourself bad things won’t happen to your kid.’
He rubbed a hand vigorously over his mouth, thinking.
‘What?’ Darby prompted.
‘That night you guys showed me her jacket. Kennedy folded back the hood so I wouldn’t see the blood.’
‘Anything about the jacket jump out at you?’
Mickey shook his head.
‘The white fur lining the outer rim of the hood,’ Darby said. ‘It looks relatively clean.’
‘You saying, what, he stored it?’
‘When the crime lab went through his house a couple of days ago, they walked away empty-handed, which is why Belham can’t build a case against Byrne. The thinking now is he might have hidden stuff at an offsite location, a storage facility, maybe even a safety-deposit box.’
‘Atkinson, the detective in charge of her case, said he checked into all that.’
‘He did check into it.’ Darby had read the notes in the case file. ‘Kennedy did too. But they checked records using Byrne’s name. If he used an alias, forged the paperwork …’ Darby shrugged. ‘Kennedy is digging into that area.’
‘I don’t understand why he’d keep the jacket. That’s evidence.’
‘Serial offenders often keep souvenirs of their crimes so they can … you know …’
‘No,’ Mickey said. ‘I don’t know.’
Darby took a moment to organize her thoughts.
‘No,’ Mickey said. ‘Don’t do that.’
‘Give me the sanitized version. Don’t hold back because you’re afraid I’m gonna – just talk to me like a real person, okay? I need to hear it straight or I’ll … you need to be direct with me, okay? No bullshit. It’ll help me … you know, close the door.’
Darby sensed he was both repulsed and comforted by saying those last five words. She gave it to him straight.
‘Owning a piece of the victim’s clothing, a piece of jewellery – I know of a particular killer who collected women’s driver’s licences – we call them trophies. Serial killers and serial paedophiles often keep things belonging to their victims because it’s a way for them to relive their crimes. It’s also another way of maintaining control over their victims.’
‘You make it all sound so … rational. Predictable.’
‘Creatures like Byrne – ones who are highly intelligent and very organized – almost every one of them follows the same predictable patterns of behaviour to the letter. When Claire’s anniversary day rolled around each year, Atkinson put people on Byrne, to see where he went, what he did. Atkinson even went so far as to collect Byrne’s garbage and sift through it.’
‘That legal?’
‘Once it’s placed on the street, it becomes city property,’ Darby said. ‘Men like Byrne, they’re often very methodical and very patient. In other words, they know how to cover their tracks.’
‘So why would he put Claire’s jacket on the memorial?’
‘Perfectly rational question,’ Darby said. ‘Unfortunately, I don’t have a perfectly rational answer to give you.’
‘What I do know – what you need to understand – is that these types of offenders don’t think the way you and I do. When they commit certain acts, it doesn’t make any rational sense to us. Many of these offenders have a desire to get caught. The desire can be subconscious. Some get caught because they get sick and tired of playing the game and secretly wish for the police or the FBI to come in and catch them. Some make a game out of taunting the police, wanting to show how smart they are. Some, when they get caught, start to brag about their crimes.’
‘And where does Byrne fall?’
‘All I have is speculation.’
‘So speculate.’
‘Putting the jacket on the cross and risking a return to living under the microscope – especially when he’s dying and, from all accounts, wants to die in peace – it defies logic. If I had to guess – and that’s all it is at this point, a guess – I’d say Byrne is terrified of being forgotten. Finding the jacket and finding him close to it puts him back into the spotlight.’
‘And back under the microscope.’
‘Like I said, it’s not rational. They don’t think like us.’
Mickey slurped his coffee. His hands were not steady.
‘I do have some potentially good news,’ Darby said. ‘The lab also recovered two synthetic fibres from the jacket. One of them matches the fibres on Byrne’s winter coat. The other is a grey hair. It didn’t contain a root bulb, so the lab can’t do DNA, but the hair is a strong match for Byrne’s.’
Mickey stared at her for a long moment.
‘Kennedy is getting his ducks in a row,’ Darby said. ‘He’s consulting with the DA as we speak, but the goal is to arrest Byrne. His lawyer will request a bail hearing, but, given the way judges are inclined towards paedophiles these days – even one who is dying – there’s a strong chance a judge will deny bail or, if he or she grants it, set an amount so high Byrne won’t be able to make bond. Either way, he’ll go to jail.’
‘And die there.’
‘That’s where we might have some leverage,’ Darby said. ‘Kennedy will agree to let Byrne die at home in exchange for certain pieces of information – namely what happened to your daughter and the other two girls, where he … buried them.’
‘You said a few minutes ago that you think he won’t share that information.’
‘I don’t,’ Darby said. ‘But if we threatened him with dying alone in prison …’
Mickey stared down at the picture of the jacket. Darby closed the folder when she saw their waitress heading their way, carrying plates of food.
‘I don’t know how to feel,’ Mickey said after the woman left. ‘I should feel … I dunno, vindicated somehow. Relieved. I should feel something. But what I’m feeling right now is … hollow.’
‘That’s shock.’ She reached out across the table, put her hand on top of his. ‘I’ll be with you through every step.’
‘Where’d you get this stuff?’
‘You see the news – the two forensic investigators who were all over the TV because they came into town to work on the evidence?’
Mickey nodded.
‘They’re colleagues of mine,’ Darby said.
‘That’s why you wanted me to wait until Monday, wasn’t it? So they could do this.’
Darby nodded. ‘This report hasn’t been released to Kennedy yet. It’s got to stay between you and me.’
‘Thank you,’ Mickey said. ‘And thanks for this stuff. And for being –’ His throat seized. He swallowed and tried to clear it and speak but he couldn’t form the words. His eyes grew wet and he looked away, embarrassed.
Darby squeezed his hand tighter, feeling surprised and a bit relieved when he squeezed back. Then he gently withdrew his hand and propped his elbows on the table and rubbed his eyes.
‘I keep having these dreams,’ he said. ‘Claire sleeping in her room and she’s crying.’ He opened his eyes and Darby saw the fatigue there and a jittery look that reminded her of a downed power line, its torn edge sparking. ‘She won’t stop crying.’
She sensed he had more to say and waited.
Mickey took in a deep breath and continued. ‘In the dream, every time, I grab a pillow and hold it over her face. The other night I had another dream where we’re in a car and Claire is crying and I kick her out. Me. Her father. Why would I be having dreams like that?’
‘Maybe she wants you to let go.’
Mickey crossed his arms over his chest and looked out the window again, the early morning sunlight bathing his face, Darby watching him and seeing the same look she’d seen hundreds of times in the families of victims of violent crime, that hell wasn’t an imaginary world from the Bible but a real place that, for those unfortunate few, took up residence in your soul.