Betrayed (17 page)

“Hey, Daniel, how’s it going?” Justin said as he reached out to shake his hand.

“Not bad…yourself?”

“Can’t complain,” Justin answered as they walked to the clubhouse. “Are you getting any closer to finding out who killed the Reynolds boy?”

“Unfortunately, we’ve hit a road block,” Daniel said as they walked through the door. “Forensics didn’t come up with anything of importance. The hikers that found the body didn’t see anyone else around and there weren’t any usable footprints, so with no witnesses it’s difficult to pinpoint one person. The kid had enemies because of his bully behavior, but they all have airtight alibis.”

“Do you still think it’s someone he knew?” Justin asked as he pulled up a chair to sit down.

“Yeah, I do,” Daniel answered. “Someone lured him out there…I can’t believe the kid went out to the Forestry on his own because he wanted to commune with nature.”

Justin grunted, “I agree.”

At that second Lily walked up, and gave Daniel a kiss her as he put his arm around her waist. She looked at Justin and said, “How was the ride?”

“It was good, a little chilly, but that never stopped us from riding.”

“Don’t I know it,” Lily laughed. “The food’s ready whenever you guys are. We set up a buffet line on the bar.”

“Thanks, Lily. I think I’ll have a beer first. Daniel, you want to join me?”

“Sure, I’m off the clock. Sounds good.”

Justin grabbed a couple of cold ones and sat down with Daniel and Merlin at one of the tables. Laughter filled the clubhouse as people drank and ate. Although Daniel didn’t ride, had no tattoos, and didn’t wear leather, he didn’t feel like an outsider with this crew. They made him feel welcome, but he also knew if he ever hurt Lily emotionally, they’d cut him out in a heartbeat.

As the evening wore on people sat in group, either talking or playing cards. Lily, Ginger, and the other old ladies finished the cleanup in the kitchen and joined their men. They were laughing at some bullshit story Trig was telling about Justin when he was a kid. That was when Daniel got a phone call. He excused himself from the table and walked outside where he could hear better and have some privacy. What he heard on the other end of the line shocked him to the core.

He walked back into the clubhouse and grabbed his coat.

“I’ve got to get to the station,” he told the group.

Lily stood up and said, “Is everything all right?”

“I think our killer just confessed,” Daniel said as he put on his coat.

“Who confessed?” His tablemates said in unison.

“I’m not at liberty to tell at this time,” Daniel said as he and Lily walked towards the door. “When I can, I’ll let you all know what’s going on.”

As he and Lily stopped at the clubhouse door Daniel bent his head down to kiss her. “Let’s hope this ends tonight,” he said looking into her eyes.

“Yes, I hope so too,” she said. Lily watched as he drove out of the parking lot. Hopefully this was the end of another horrible murder mystery. But the revelation by the killer would stun the entire town of Trinity.

*****

When Detective Daniel Evans entered the police station, Detective Mallory walked over to meet him.

“We have her in room one,” Mallory stated. “Forensics took photos and gathered her clothes for evidence. They also performed a gun residue test and scraped her fingernails. And she was read her rights at the scene.”

“She hasn’t asked for a lawyer?” Daniel asked as he took off his coat.

“No, not yet. I want to get this confession recorded as fast as possible before she does,” Mallory said as they walked to interrogation room one.

“Is he still alive?” Daniel asked.

“I checked with the hospital right before you got here. They said he’s in critical but stable condition.”

“Okay, let’s see what she has to say,” Daniel said as he opened the interrogation room door.

Interrogation room one was brightly lit. One lone underwhelming wood table sat next to a wall. Three uncomfortable chairs took up the rest of the space in the tiny room. The perpetrator occupied one chair, and the detectives took the chairs sitting on the opposite side of the table.

Daniel set a recorder and a sheaf of papers and pen on the table. The woman didn’t look up when they entered, and she continued to stare at the floor as they sat down.

“Mrs. Reynolds, I’m Detective Evans and you’ve already met Detective Mallory,” Daniel said as he spoke to the small figure sitting opposite him. “As I understand it, you wish to tell us what happened to your son Jacob Reynolds and your husband, Jacob Reynolds, Sr. Is that right?”

“Yes, sir,” the small lady answered. The clothes she wore to the police station were taken for evidence. The station gave her what looked like light blue pajamas or hospital scrubs. The too large clothes hung on her skeletal body. Somebody got her a blanket as she shook in the interrogation room. The police weren’t sure if she trembled from the cold or from stress.

“I’m going to record this, okay?” Daniel confirmed.

“Okay,” she mumbled.

“Now you’ll have to speak up for the recording.”

The woman nodded her head. and Daniel turned on the tape recorder.

Her first name was Bonnie, and she proceeded to tell the officers how she killed her own son. Bonnie explained that her husband became abusive after two to three years into their marriage and after Jacob Jr. was born. At first it was verbal, but then it slowly became worse. Normally he’d hit her in places like the stomach or back, where no one could see the bruises. In later years, he no longer cared if people saw the bruising on her face, legs, and arms.

She didn’t leave because there was no place to go, or at least that’s what she thought. No friends or family…he isolated her early in their marriage. He never gave her any money either, afraid she might use it to leave him. So he’d accompany her to the store to buy groceries or other items for the house or clothes for Jacob. She was afraid Senior would someday start hitting their child, but he never did. He took out all his anger on her. She was beat down; waiting for the day he’d go too far and kill her.

Then six months ago, something changed in her son. She saw how he was becoming just like his father. Her little boy who had clung to her leg when he was two, sung her songs when he was ten, and told her about his first crush when he was 11, was turning into a monster. She said the changeover was fast. One day he was normal, and within two weeks he’d become dark, glum and spiteful. She tried to talk to him, but he reacted the same way his father would, in a rage. Bonnie couldn’t believe it. Surely, her son wasn’t becoming like his father, not after all he’d seen his father do to her over the years. She hoped one day that Jacob Jr. would be her saving grace, that he would grow up to defend her, maybe even take her away from the savagery, once he was an adult. But her hopes faded as she watched him go from a bright and cheerful boy to someone she no longer recognized.

Was it in his genes to become like his father? Or had he finally given in to his surroundings? He’d grown up in an atmosphere of violence. Was the burden of denying his true nature too much for him and he’d simply given in and embraced it? Bonnie didn’t know. All she knew for sure was she couldn‘t let history repeat itself.

Two weeks before Jacob Jr.’s death, he replicated his father’s behavior towards his mother. He screamed at her, similar to her husband’s ravings. But now he became physical, slapping her across the face and kicking and shoving her to the floor. The day before he was killed, Jacob Jr. put his hands around her neck and squeezed until she passed out. Bonnie said he later told her he wanted to see how long it would take for her to die. She knew that night as she lay in bed what must be done.

That morning she told Jacob to come home for lunch; she had something special for him. He came home and wasn’t happy when she wouldn’t give him his special gift, an iPhone. She told him she wanted to take a walk with him into the Forestry like they use to do when he was a small boy. They used to escape from Jacob Senior and his alcoholic rants in the sanctuary of Paint Creek. Many a day they would spend there as Jacob ran through the forest playing hide and seek with his mother. She would point out rabbits and birds, even wild turkeys. They had many good memories there.

Somehow, she talked him into going. Maybe it was not going back to school for the afternoon that enticed him or perhaps he missed the tranquility of the Forestry, and the thought of revisiting it persuaded him to go along with his mother’s plan. Daniel thought we’d never know the answer to that question, although he preferred to believe the kid might have wanted to actually go to a place where good memories remained.

Bonnie said he seemed calmer while they walked the unoccupied trails. She said they walked in silence for at least 20 minutes. Once they reached the babbling brook, they sat down on a large rock to rest. It was at this point Bonnie said she wasn’t sure if she’d go through with her plan. Jacob seemed like his old self again, very composed as they walked through the familiar trails. But then he turned to her and said, “Where’s my fucking iPhone?”

Of course, there was no iPhone. She couldn’t afford such an expensive gift. She told him she was sorry, but she had lied. He backhanded her across the face and she fell off the rock they were sitting on. That’s when she knew. She had to continue with her plan. She couldn’t allow her son to become like his father and ruin another woman’s life the way her husband had ruined hers. Bonnie knew someday Jacob Sr. would kill her, so she knew the same blood lust was running through her son’s veins as well. She told herself she wasn’t killing her son. No, her son was already gone. Instead, she was killing a monster before he could harm anyone else.

He’d bent over to drink the clear water from the brook. As he stooped by the stream, Bonnie picked up a large rock that stuck out from the ground near where she landed. The rock was smooth on all sides. Likely, it came from the stream where years and years of rushing water had smoothed its surface. She wondered why it had left its watery home and ended up several feet away. Maybe it was right where it needed to be for her to finish her mission. Strange what you think about during times of stress.

Bonnie felt the heaviness of the large rock in her hands. She knew it wouldn’t take much force to crush a skull, yet she held it high over her head before bringing it down swiftly on the back of Jacob’s head. He let out a grunt and tipped over, lying face up looking at her. His mouth moved and noises emerged. She couldn’t make them out and didn’t have time to. She had to end this quickly, before he could get the upper hand.

She brought the rock up again with both hands and crashed it into the side of Jacob’s face denting his cheekbone. She slammed the rock into his face again and one eye exploded from the collision. He lay helplessly as blood now gushed into the stream, mingled with the water, and headed down the rocks. The one eye looked at his mother, pleading with her to stop this madness. But it was too late. Brain matter oozed out of the back of his skull. There was nothing to do but end it. Bonnie lifted the rock and brought it down another eight times. When she was done, she threw the rock back into the stream where water washed the blood off its surface. Her T-shirt was soaked with her son’s blood. She’d worn a jacket so she pulled it tight across her body and left, never looking back.

She was in shock for several weeks after, almost oblivious to her husband’s rants. She walked the house like a robot, performing her household duties without much thought. Then two days ago, her husband came home with a gun. It was an illegal purchase. There was no way he could buy a firearm legally. He taunted her with it, putting it up to her head and pulling the trigger. It had no bullets in it, but he said one day it would.

As he slept on the couch that evening, the gun lay on the end table next to him. She’d never held a gun before so she picked it up. It was heavy, just like the rock she killed her son with.

She pointed the barrel at her husband’s head. He said there were no bullets in the gun. He’d even pointed and pulled the trigger at her several times and nothing happened. Maybe she wanted to see how the gun felt in her hand, or how it felt to have power over her husband, even if it wasn’t real and he was asleep.

Bonnie cocked the gun as she’d seen done on numerous television shows. It made a loud click, but not enough to wake her drunken husband.
If only there was a bullet in the chamber
, she thought, it would all be over. She squeezed the trigger, knowing nothing would happen.

A flash of gunpowder, a deafening noise, and the gun’s recoil startled Bonnie as she fell backward onto the floor. A trickle of blood spilled from the small hole in Jacob Senior’s forehead. As Bonnie stood up the trickle turned into a gush. She reflexively reached for the phone and dialed 911. She told the operator she’d accidentally shot her husband. The paramedics and police came, and now she was here at the station giving her statement.

Daniel sat back in his chair. The entire statement took over two hours for Bonnie to tell.

Daniel knew this was a battered spouse case and a good lawyer might even get her off or get a reduced sentence. He felt sorry for the woman. Yes she had killed her son and attempted to kill her husband, although that last one was a bit vague as to whether she actually had criminal intent, or if she knew the gun was loaded or not. But years of mental and physical abuse can lead people down paths and into performing actions they may never had considered if they were thinking clearly. Daniel hoped a good lawyer would come forward to take the case, as he knew she couldn’t afford one.