Cemetery Road (Sean O'Brien Book 7) (17 page)

THIRTY

T
hey put Jesse in the back of a squad car as I approached. A deputy looked up at me and said, “Crime scene, sir. Stay back!”

I smiled. “Sorry, didn’t see any of that yellow tape you guys put up. Was the crime here in the lot or inside? Because if it’s not inside, I’d like to enter.”

Before the deputy could answer, the detective looked in my direction and said, “Hold on! You got a hearing problem?” He finished jotting something in a small notepad, closed it, placing the notepad in his inside coat pocket. “This entire place is a crime scene. Beat it.”

“It can’t be much of a crime since you just arrested those two guys and you didn’t read them their Miranda rights.”

He looked at me as if I’d just landed my spaceship in the lot. “Sure we did.”

“I’ve been here the whole time. Didn’t see it.”

A deputy, late twenties, concerned face said, “Detective Lee, sir. I think he’s correct. No rights were read to the—”

“Shut up, Parker! When and if you become a detective your opinion matters.” The detective turned toward me. “Who the hell are you, Sherlock?”

“Name’s O’Brien…Sean O’Brien.” I could see Jesse stare at me, his mouth opening slightly.

The detective said, “If, in the remote chance, they weren’t read their rights, they will be read before interrogation. Are you a lawyer? You represent one of them?”

“No, but it’s pretty common knowledge that without a Miranda warning, the suspect’s rights can be violated, meaning the answers they gave you here in the parking lot would be inadmissible, should this go to trial.” I lifted my phone from my pocket. “Got it here in high-def video.”

“Give me that!”

“Not without a warrant. By then it could be all over the Internet. And there’s no delete button.”

The detective’s eyes burned. He looked above the flashing blue and red lights, slowly turning his head back to me. “Where you from? What do you want?”

“Worked homicide with Miami-Dade. I’m in real estate now. I’ve never seen either of those two men before tonight. What do I want? For those two gents, all I want is a fair evidentiary hearing. From what I heard, looks like no one was hurt inside. No real property damage except a bullet hole in the ceiling. That probably adds to the appeal of the place.”

“These men will be questioned further, booked into the county jail and have a bond hearing before a judge. You wanna be there with your little video, fine. See you in court
asshole.” He turned, walking toward the swarm of officers and lights, signaling for two deputies to drive off with the men arrested.

I watched them drive away, Jesse Taylor looking at me out the side window. He nodded in a gesture of thanks or maybe acknowledgment. I walked toward my Jeep just as more than two-dozen people spilled from inside Shorty’s Billiards. Some lit cigarettes, inhaling deeply, trying to calm the small part of the brain that was demanding a nipple of nicotine. They hung back in small packs—the leaders easy to identify. Lots of enhanced hand and body movement in pockets of black leather and denim. Adrenaline mixed with booze and egos.

Two officers followed behind a tall man wearing a spiked Mohawk haircut. Tats covered his muscular arms. The man held a blood-soaked cloth to this forehead. He spoke with the officers—one scratching notes, the other on his radio mic. I watched the detective approach the man with a familiarity I’ve seen in the body language of undercover cops communicating with street informers. Loose. Casual. Both parties glancing around the perimeter, eyes always moving, trying to make the awkward look routine. The better the actor, the better the act.

The detective wasn’t a very good actor. Mohawk man was most likely the one that tangled with Jesse and the guy with the military haircut. And from the loud interrogation I overheard, the tall guy with the Viking complex was probably Cooter Johnson. I thought about what the detective had said to Jesse: ‘
You start trying to wipe out the old man’s seeds off the face of the earth.’
So who was the ‘old man’ and what was his relationship to Mohawk? Maybe a grandfather? Uncle?

I got back in my Jeep, bar patrons drifting to their cars, trucks, or motorcycles, engines cranking, the metallic clattering noise of tires driving over flattened beer cans. I watched
Mohawk and a woman in tight jeans, tank top, and boots get into a late fifties model yellow Ford pickup. I jotted down the tag number. They pulled out of the lot and turned right. I followed, keeping a reasonable distance, thinking about more of the conversation between Jesse and the detective.

I trailed the yellow pickup for a few miles south on Highway 71, past a barbecue joint, a truck stop and finally into the lot of a $49 dollar a night motel at the I-10 interchange. I’d hoped he might lead me to his home, or maybe a home he shared with others in his clan. Not tonight. Tonight his female companion would tend to his wounds. I had a feeling Jesse Taylor, angry and inebriated, may have done more damage to Mohawk’s ego than the cut on his forehead.

I turned around in the parking lot of a Dollar Tree store and headed back to town. I thought about Jesse Taylor, his struggles leading to an arrest and at least one night in jail until a bond hearing. And I thought about parts of the interrogation and Jesse’s response in the Shorty’s lot.

The most disturbing was the reference of an eyewitness to Andy Cope’s murder. It sounded to me as if Jesse had given the police the witness’s identity. Which, in the vast majority of cases, would be the best thing to do. But after I watched the grilling and arrest, I had my doubts.
‘It looked like whoever lived in that bus is gone. Maybe your witness is picking grapes in California. Migrant’s don’t have a whole lot of credibility.’

Why wasn’t the detective, and maybe his peers, putting any time and real effort into Jesse Taylor’s allegations? Maybe it was because of the same roadblocks Caroline Harper had faced. In the minds of investigators, through the years, Andy Cope was simply a missing juvenile. Probably a runaway. Maybe kidnapped off the road. Like hundreds of others, it was something
that could never be solved. Too much time gone. Too little evidence. No witnesses. That
was
the case. Not now. Who was the man in the bus? Where was it? And most importantly, where was he?

I needed to talk to Jesse Taylor. And I needed to do it quickly.

THIRTY-ONE

P
olice don’t use a squad car to subtly tail a suspect. They use a marked car to make a statement.
You’re under surveillance
, even if it’s only until you reach the city limits. After I’d left Shorty’s Billiards, I looked in my rearview mirror and saw a sheriff’s cruiser follow me for a few blocks before pulling away, making a U-turn in a 7-11 parking lot and heading toward town. I drove up to the drive-through window, bought a fish sandwich and a cup of black coffee.

The motel vacancy sign was flickering when I parked my Jeep in front of the office. It was a single-story 1960’s vintage motel on the fringe of Marianna. I paid cash, the balding clerk smelling of gin and tobacco. There were mostly pickup trucks in the lot, a three-quarter moon rising over the top of cabbage palm trees, the scent of camellias in the warm night air.

I returned to my Jeep, parking a few spaces away from my room, thinking about the phone messages I’d exchanged with Jesse Taylor—the look on his face in the back of the cruiser as they took him away. I called Caroline Harper, got her voice-mail and said, “Caroline, it’s Sean…I was on my way to meet Jesse Taylor here in Marianna. I saw him arrested in the parking lot of a bar. From what I can gather, he got into a fight with a family member of someone who
worked at the reform school when Jesse and Andy were held there. Looks like Jesse had been drinking. There will probably be a first appearance court hearing in the next day or two. I plan to be there. Just wanted you to know.”

I disconnected, slipped my Glock under my belt, picked up the bag I’d packed, locked the Jeep and walked toward my room—number seven out of fourteen, cicadas shrieking from the palms and pines beyond the parking lot.

The room smelled musty—cigarettes, bug spray and bleach. Carpet thin and worn. I tossed my bag on a blemished dresser, a small TV on top of the table. I checked the bathroom and small shower. Both clean. Above the single bed a black ant crawled down the frame of a print depicting an eagle flying over the tops of pine trees.

My phone buzzed. Incoming call from Dave Collins. “Sean, I’ve been doing a little digging on the politics between Jackson County and Tallahassee.”

“Tallahassee?”

“As in the governor’s office. Although the state is ostensibly accepting open offers for the old reform school property from anyone with a deep checkbook, seems likely that the final nod will go to a Miami corporation called Horizons Inc.”

“Who are they?”

“A multinational corporation. Real estate. Telecommunications, cable, Internet, cellular, restaurants, manufacturing and venture cap investments. The company’s board is a who’s who of Silicon Valley and New York conglomerate and investment companies.”

“Let me guess…Governor Burnett’s got presidential aspirations, and he begins to build buddies and raise millions. All his new friends, of course, will eventually expect some kind of a return.”

“Elections and presidents, unfortunately, are bought and sold like global commodities. There’s no secret that Burnett has his eyes on the White House. The CEO of Horizons, James Winston, just hosted an exclusive, five-thousand-dollar-a-plate dinner party at his house in Palm Beach for the governor. Of course, Burnett’s handlers are only conducting an exploratory campaign to determine the viability of a presidential run. In the meantime, they don’t have to abide by contribution guidelines, meaning they can raise millions until there is an official announcement.”

“How does all of that tie in to the sale of the old school?”

“Representatives from Vista Properties, a division of Horizons, made a presentation to the Jackson County Planning Commission last week. The people from Vista rolled out extremely detailed plans for a huge and very exclusive country club community, something they’re calling Chattahoochee Estates. When it all sails through the county commission, and it will, you can bet the proverbial farm that the governor and CEO James Winston will be in gleaming hardhats, holding polished shovels for the official photo-op groundbreaking ceremonies.”

“Send me a picture of James Winston and his contact info. Maybe all bets will be off if I can get excavations going before they bring their shiny shovels and news media.”

“The media will be key to you prying the long-closed door off this thing. But that won’t be easy to do unless and until you have definitive evidence and someone with the chutzpah to
obtain a court order and, considering the circumstances, it may have to be signed by a federal judge.”

I told Dave about Jesse Taylor and said, “I have to get to him before he continues to be a one man tornado, creating an environment of heavy local suspicion, meaning possible old evidence might be tossed, lips sealed, and even an eyewitness neutralized. And that’s assuming Jesse doesn’t get himself shot and dumped somewhere in the swamps.”

“Considering the new revelations you’re dealing with now…the possible family and political ties to an old murder and child abuse, that, compiled with the new interest in a massive property with huge development potential, along with the neat scenario of literally paving over a long festering sore in the state’s past—you better move quickly while you can.”

“How’s Max?”

“Sean, your ability to catalog or change subjects at the blink of an eye always amazes me. Max is fine. She’s sleeping on my couch. The little lady spent most of the day with Nick. I think they both wore each other out. When I went to get Max, I have the evening shift now, Nick was sawing logs on his couch, while Max slept on his bean bag chair in
St. Michaels’
salon.”

“I’ll be back as soon as I can.”

“The law of averages isn’t stacked in your favor on this one. I really hope Caroline Harper appreciates your efforts. Your other client isn’t around to know the difference.”

“You never know, Dave. Maybe, somehow, he’ll know the difference. Goodnight.” I stared at the photo of James Winston that Dave just sent. Winston was close to sixty. Gray hair. Intense eyes. I glanced up at the moonlight streaming through the window and thought about
how the moon has no light of its own, a dark mass moving in a circle. The moonlight is only a reflection of sunlight. But tonight it looked brilliant over the palms. No one shines alone. We all need a hand, a guiding light sometimes.

And so it was for Caroline Harper, maybe even Jesse Taylor. The question was—would I have time to really help either one? Similar to the orbit—the perfect ring the moon travels, this case had no real beginning or stopping point. Maybe the point of entry started 111 years ago when the first kids were confined in the reform school. But the ending, the finish line was not marked, at least not yet. The old buildings would eventually be leveled. The debris hauled away. The misery carted off like cracked rubble. The boys, the survivors now all in their sixties and seventies, would soon be gone. Expensive meals, wines and liquors would pour from posh members-only lounges in the new country club.

Maybe. Maybe not.

I slid my gun from my belt, placing the Glock on a nightstand. I removed my shirt, felt the small photo of Andy Cope in the pocket. I set it next to my pistol, the moonlight falling against Andy’s face. His time had been so short. But I knew time was always borrowed. Always on loan, rented. Never owned. I glanced down at Andy’s picture, hoping for his sister that I could borrow a little more time to carve justice on a headstone that wasn’t erected. Because the murder of a child—a crime buried without justice, should never be forgotten.

I lay down on the hard mattress, listening to the distant and lonely refrain of a train whistle. I stared at the irregular ceiling tiles, looking for a point of entry into the past, hoping I wouldn’t find myself backed into the corner of a sleepless night.