Friction (4 page)

Nugent relaunched the interrogation. “You told us earlier that when Rodriguez busted in—”

“I said when the ‘shooter’ busted in.”

“Same difference.”

“The hell it is,” Crawford said. “As Sergeant Lester here will tell you, the devil’s in the details. It’s my statement you’re recording, so, let’s keep it accurate, please. For the record, I didn’t know his name until just now. Rodriguez, you said?”

“Jorge,” Nugent supplied.

Neal shot a glare at the younger detective, silently rebuking him for the gaffe, then came back to Crawford. “That information doesn’t leave this room.”

“Like I didn’t know that?”

It seemed to rankle Neal that Crawford was also a law officer. His tone remained brittle. “Do you recognize the name?”

“No.”

“Ever seen him before you two met on the roof?”

“No. He wasn’t even vaguely familiar. Have you asked the judge? The name mean anything to her?”

“She says no,” Nugent replied. “But we’re going to check her court records and those of the late Judge Waters.”

“Could be he held a grudge against her or Waters. Or maybe Rodriguez had a beef with the U.S. justice system in general. Have you checked—”

“We’re on it,” Neal said tightly.

Crawford got the hint: It wasn’t his case. A Texas Ranger had jurisdiction anywhere in the state. He could join an investigation or initiate one without invitation of any other agency, local, state, or federal. But Neal was making it perfectly clear that, from where Crawford was sitting tonight, he was to answer questions, not ask them.

Neal continued, “You said that when
the shooter busted in
you were on the witness stand. Accurate enough?”

“Yes.”

“What issue were you and judge addressing?”

“You told me you have a transcript of the hearing.”

“We do.”

“So…” He looked over at Nugent, who was shaking peanuts into his mouth. “What’s unclear, Sergeant Lester?”

“The judge commended you for keeping all your appointments with a therapist.”

“Right. She did. What’s that got to do with anything?”

“It could have a lot to do with how you reacted to the unfolding situation.”

“I don’t see how.”

“Don’t get your back up. I’m just doing my job here.”

“Right.” He gave Neal an icy stare, then shrugged. “Ask away.”

Neal appeared all too happy to oblige. “Why were you mandated to get counseling before being granted another custody hearing?”

“Did you ask Judge Spencer?”

“Not yet. We plan to.”

“Good. I’d like to know the reasons myself.”

“Take a wild guess.” Neal grinned, but it wasn’t friendly.

Crawford divided another look between the two investigators, letting his irritation show. But what would be gained by stonewalling? They would only conclude that he was ashamed of the required therapy sessions. And he was, to some extent. But he didn’t want them to know that.

“I didn’t cope well with the sudden death of my wife. That was four years ago. Last year, I petitioned to regain custody of Georgia. Judge Waters was the presiding judge. He wanted to make certain that I could provide a stable home environment and required a year of therapy in order to determine that I was past all that.”

“Define ‘all that.’”

“Drinking more than I should. There were days when it was hard for me even to get out of bed in the morning.”

“Classic depression.”

“Classic grief.”
Asshole
. Crawford was tempted to tack that on, but didn’t.

“You shirked your responsibilities at work. The Rangers removed you from the Houston office and placed you here.”

“Actually, I requested the transfer. Since the Gilroys lived here, and Georgia was with them, I made the move to be closer to her.”

Neal looked skeptical. “Your transfer had nothing to do with the incident in Halcon?”

“By ‘incident,’ I gather you’re referring to taking out six of the Fuentes drug cartel including the big cheese himself?”

“Plus two law enforcement officers and several bystanders. Your actions there came under careful review.”

Nugent stopped munching his snack. The only sound in the room was the soft electronic whirring of the recording equipment.

Crawford ground his jaw, letting his glare speak for him. He’d be damned before he’d go on record defending himself to Neal Lester, the self-righteous jerk.

Eventually he picked up the thread. “You were eventually cleared of any wrongdoing.”

“That’s right.”

“But since then, you’ve stuck mostly to computer work. Credit card fraud. Insurance fraud. Kiddie porn rings. Things like that.”

Crawford had requested to be moved to Prentiss for the reason stated, and he was assigned to work in conjunction with the law enforcement agencies of several surrounding counties. However, Neal was correct. If there was fieldwork involved, he let another Ranger assume it, while his investigations were more often confined to his desk. He refused to comment on it, though.

Neal persisted. “Nothing to say about that?”

“You more or less covered it.”

Neal gave a noncommittal grunt. “If I deem it necessary, I may subpoena the therapist’s record of your treatment.”

That got Crawford’s attention. Heat crawled all over him. “That’s privileged.”

“I could appeal to the court.”

“No judge would force her to hand over her record of our sessions because it’s irrelevant.”

“If it’s irrelevant, why not tell me what’s in it?”

“I haven’t seen it.”

“Take a crack at what it contains.”

It was difficult to be reminded of the darkest days of his life, to have past transgressions publicly aired. It had happened twice today. It was especially hard to sit and take this shit from Neal Lester.

But he forced himself to assume a nonchalance. “I think the therapist would tell you that I had learned to control my anger over losing Beth, that I had gotten a grip on the alcohol abuse, the depression, etcetera.”

“I wouldn’t be asking,” Neal said smoothly, “except that it’s germane to this investigation.”

His abuse of authority angered Crawford as nothing else could have. “Germane my ass, Neal. You’re trying to humiliate me, that’s all. What I think, you’re still pissed off because I felt up your sister.”

Nugent gulped with astonishment.

Neal said nothing, but his eyes shot daggers.

Instantly regretful, Crawford sighed as he pushed his fingers through his hair. “That was a cheap shot. You’re a prick, Neal, and you deserved it. But your sister didn’t.”

To his surprise, Neal actually smiled, but nastily. “I would expect no less from you. Besides, you’re sitting there, and I’m sitting here. I’ve been placed in charge of investigating this fatal shooting incident, and it’s up to you to convince me.”

His tone set Crawford’s teeth on edge. “Convince you of what?”

“That you were in a sound and stable state of mind when you confronted Jorge Rodriguez on the roof of the courthouse, and that your actions in no way contributed to his getting killed.”

T
he front door was opened before Crawford could ring the bell. “Mrs. Amberson?”

“Hello, Mr. Hunt. Joe called. I was watching for you. Come in.”

“Thanks for this. I’m sorry to bother you so late.”

“No bother, and please call me Susan.”

The Gilroys’ neighbor looked younger than the title
grandmother
implied. Susan Amberson was trim, attractive, and smiled cordially as she stood aside and motioned him into the cheery entryway of her home.

She said, “After what happened today, I can understand why you’d want to see Georgia.”

“Experiencing something like that…”

When he trailed off, she finished for him. “Makes you want to touch base with people you love.” She smiled at him with complete understanding. “I’ve watched the news stories about it. Tragic. I don’t know if Grace will ever recover.”

“I haven’t seen her yet. I came straight here after Joe said you’d agreed to let me stop by. I apologize for keeping you up.”

“Frank’s already in bed, but I’m a night owl. No problem at all.”

Crawford assumed the referred-to Frank was her husband. He was glad he wouldn’t be required to make small talk with anyone else and was grateful to Susan Amberson for not pressing him for details about the events of the day as she led him down a center hallway toward the back of the one-story house.

“Thank you for watching Georgia all day,” he said. “I hope she wasn’t any trouble.”

“None at all. She’s a darling girl. Uses her manners.”

“Good to hear. What’s your granddaughter’s name?”

“Amy. I tuckered the two of them out.”

He followed her into a bedroom illuminated by a small lamp on the nightstand between twin beds. His heart constricted when he saw Georgia’s mop of blond curls and her sweet face. Her lips were bowed. She was breathing through them.

“She snores,” he said, his voice rough with emotion.

Sensing his embarrassment, she touched his arm briefly. “Take all the time you like.”

She withdrew and Crawford moved to the bed where Georgia slept. In the other was a little girl of similar age and size, but his attention belonged entirely to his daughter as he gingerly sat down on the edge of the bed. Mr. Bunny, the stuffed toy she wouldn’t sleep without, lay in the crook of her elbow.

For several moments, he simply stared into her face; then he reached for a lock of hair and rubbed the curl between his fingers. Her lips made a sucking motion, then she swiped her cheek with the back of her hand and opened her eyes.

Sleepily she blinked him into focus. “Daddy!”

“Shh, don’t wake up your friend.”

She sat up to receive his hug and return it. “Have you come to get me? Is it tomorrow yet?”

“Not yet. I just wanted to stop in and see how you were doing.”

“Good.” Yawning broadly, she lay back down and nestled the back of her head into the pillow.

“You like your new playmate? Amy.”

“Um-huh. She’s nice. We had a tea party and got to dress up in Miss Susan’s hats. I wore beads, too.”

“Yeah? How’d the cookies turn out?”

“We sprinkled sugar on top. Mine were pink.” She yawned again. “Do you want to sleep with me?”

“I don’t think we would fit on this bed.”

“You’re too big.”

“Me? You and Mr. Bunny are taking up all the space.” He poked her lightly in the belly, and she giggled. “I’ll see you tomorrow. Go back to sleep, but give me a kiss first.” He leaned down. She wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him on the cheek.

“Good night, Daddy. I love you.”

“’Night, sweetheart. I love you, too.”

She rolled onto her side and closed her eyes. He waited until she was softly snoring again before reluctantly tiptoeing from the room.

Five minutes later, he joined his father-in-law in the Gilroys’ kitchen. Even at this late hour, Joe was fully dressed and spit-polished. He had served three tours in Viet Nam flying F4s. At the end of the war, he’d left the air force. But the air force had never completely left him.

He motioned toward the coffeemaker on the counter. “Help yourself.”

“No thanks.”

“Since I know I won’t sleep anyhow, I thought I had just as well have some.”

They sat down across from each other at the dining table. Crawford said, “Grace went to bed?”

“Finally. I had to slip her a mickey. I ground up a pain pill she had left over from that ear infection. Spiked her chamomile tea with it.”

“Can’t hurt.”

“Knocked her out.”

“That’s what she needed.”

“Did you go by the Ambersons’ house?”

“Just left there. Georgia woke up only long enough to kiss me good night. I’m not sure she’ll remember that I was there. But it did me good to see her.”

“You meet Frank?”

“Just Susan. Nice lady.”

“They’re good people.”

The conversation stalled there. This was the way it had been since Beth had first introduced him to her dad. Once he and Joe exhausted chitchat about the weather and everyone’s health, they never seemed to have anything else to talk about.

While married to Beth, Crawford had gone out of his way to be friendly and easygoing around Joe, even pretending an interest in his hobby of carpentry. But eventually, he’d accepted that he and his father-in-law would never be chums, and he was fine with letting their relationship remain civil and neutral.

Certainly for as long as Georgia had been in the Gilroys’ custody, Crawford had done nothing to provoke Joe, to tip that delicate balance between them, to give Joe a reason to limit his access to her.

But now, sitting in the homey kitchen, without Grace’s diplomacy acting as a buffer, he felt the brunt of Joe’s hostility toward him.

“You talk to your cop friends?”

Crawford wanted to disabuse him of the notion that he would receive preferential treatment because he was a law enforcement officer himself. “As you know, Neal Lester is the lead investigator. He and a guy new to me, named Nugent, took my statement. They knew most of it already and only wanted details from my perspective.”

“Like what?”

“Like I didn’t know you could move that fast.”

“Excuse me?”

“When the guy came in shooting, you reacted with remarkable speed and agility.”

“I guess my two-mile walk every day keeps me limber.”

“Guess so. Lucky for you and Grace.”

“He wasn’t aiming at us.” Joe pushed back his chair and got up to pour himself a refill of coffee. He returned to the table, but once he’d set the mug on it, he didn’t touch it again. “What happened up there?”

Crawford knew that “up there” referred to the roof of the courthouse. “I haven’t been near a TV, but I suppose it’s been a big news story. Your neighbor Susan remarked on it. What’s being reported?”

“That you were trying to talk the guy into surrendering. But that when he realized he was surrounded and fired at a deputy sheriff, SWAT team snipers took him down.”

“That’s pretty much it.”

“The TV people are playing up the fact that you’re a Texas Ranger.”

“I’m a computer geek with a Ranger’s badge.”

“To hear them tell it, you’re a hero.”

“I don’t look at it that way.”

“Neither do I.”

Joe had gradually been working up a lather, so that by the time he said those last three words, he was seething. He turned his head, listened for a moment, as though to make sure that Grace was still in the bedroom asleep, then came back around to Crawford.

But before his father-in-law could speak, Crawford went on the offensive. “Since I came through the door, you’ve been building up to something, Joe. Let’s have it.”

“You took it upon yourself to play John Wayne.”

“I went after a man armed with a semiautomatic pistol who threatened the lives of everybody inside that building. Was I supposed to just stand by and let him walk out of there?”

“That building is crawling with officers of every kind, all day, every day.”

“Well, the only officer immediately on hand was Chet, and he was dead.”

“What did you say to the shooter?”

Crawford had spent the last several hours answering Neal’s questions about that encounter. He resented getting the third degree about it now from his father-in-law. On the other hand, he hoped to avoid creating a rift with Joe and recognized the value of treading lightly.

“I’ll be happy to recount it for you later, Joe, but right now I’m bushed. Thank you for arranging my visit with Georgia. I needed to see her. I also wanted to check on Grace. Now that I know they’re tucked in and all right, I’m going home to my own bed.”

When he pushed back his chair and stood up, so did Joe. He said, “It’s time we took the gloves off.”

Crawford raised an eyebrow.

“You know what I’m talking about,” Joe said.

“Yeah, I know what you’re talking about. But you’ve had years to get things off your chest, and you chose tonight?
Now
?
Lousy timing, Joe. Can’t your grievances keep for at least one more day?”

“No, because I don’t want to be blamed later for not giving you fair warning.”

“Of?”

The older man propped his hands on his hips in the stance of a victor. “You played my ace for me today. You scored a goal for the opposing team.” He gave a short laugh. “I’ve been trying to come up with a way to beat you on this thing, and damned if you didn’t do it for me.”

“This thing being the custody dispute?”

“What
dispute
?” he sneered. “There won’t be a dispute after your grandstanding today.”

“I wasn’t grandstanding. I was trying to prevent—”

“What you did was take a loaded weapon off a fallen officer and chase after a crazy man. Those courthouse employees that you encountered on your way up to the roof? They interviewed two of them on TV. Neither saw the man in white, but both said you scared the bejesus out of them.”

Crawford turned toward the door. “Tell Grace I’ll check on her in the morning.”

“Hear me out.”

Crawford came back around.

“I didn’t like you from the minute Beth brought you to meet us.”

“That’s not exactly a news flash.”

“I disliked you on sight.”

“On sight? Why? You didn’t even know me, so what did you have against me? That I was younger and stronger than you? Mr. Top Gun suddenly had competition for Beth’s affection?”

“I saw right off that you weren’t a man I would want to command.”

“No,” Crawford said. “What you saw right off was that I was a man you
couldn’t
command. That’s why you formed an instant dislike.”

“Beth saw dashing and daring. I saw reckless. And I was right. Your recklessness got her killed.”

Crawford had said as much to himself during booze-fueled self-analyses. More recently, he’d confessed his corrosive guilt to the therapist. But it was devastating to hear the words from his father-in-law’s mouth and to know with certainty that, although he and Grace hadn’t openly condemned him, they held him responsible for the loss of their only child.

Joe aimed his index finger at him. “Your derring-do robbed me of my daughter, but it’s going to win me custody of my granddaughter. Permanent custody this time. I’m going to fight you tooth and nail. And, after your antics today, I’m assured a win.”

By the time the detectives finished interviewing Crawford Hunt, Holly was already exhausted just from sitting and awaiting her turn. Then she was in the interrogation room for an hour, giving her official statement and providing detailed answers to their questions, many of which related to Mr. Hunt’s actions. It was nearing two a.m. when she finally arrived home.

As she’d promised Mrs. Briggs, she requested a police escort home, and, actually, she was grateful for the pair of officers who followed her in their patrol car, then walked her to her back door and saw her inside.

She lived in the guesthouse of a secluded two-acre estate belonging to a friend of the late Judge Waters. The cottage was quaint, charming, and surrounded by lush landscaping. Tall azalea bushes and dense evergreen hedges separated it from the main house, partially screened it from the street, and kept her backyard completely obscured.

Ordinarily she relished the privacy the place afforded, but as she bade the officers good-bye, she would have preferred, for tonight only, having neighbors close by. Feeling on edge and vulnerable, she shot the bolt on the back door, then went through the rooms checking closets and behind interior doors to ensure that no masked man in white coveralls was lying in wait. Her search yielded nothing, of course, and she ridiculed herself for being such a ’fraidy cat.

He’s dead
.

Nevertheless, no matter how many times she repeated that to herself, the image of distorted features behind a clear mask stayed with her, and she knew it would for a long time.

Still nervous, she reconsidered calling Mrs. Briggs, but talked herself out of it. She would insist on coming over, and that would make Holly feel like a ninny.

Calling Marilyn was another option. Even at this hour, she would probably be up. But Holly lacked the energy to engage with Marilyn tonight, who was overbearing even at the best of times.

In the end, she didn’t phone anyone. Her fear was unrealistic. Nevertheless, she showered with the stall door open, even though it was made of clear glass. Dressed for bed, she went into the kitchen and found a bottle of whiskey in the cupboard, one Dennis had left behind. Ordinarily she didn’t drink anything as strong as bourbon, but she couldn’t think of an occasion that better called for hard liquor.

After making certain that all the windows and doors were locked, she took the tumbler of whiskey to bed with her, where she propped herself against the pillows and gratefully sipped it.

Jorge Rodriguez
. She searched her memory for even a spark of recollection. It would be a relief to attribute the man’s shooting spree to a grudge over a ruling that either she or Judge Waters had made. Finding even a tangential connection between her and Rodriguez, any fragmented reason for retribution, would have provided some closure.