Harm None: A Rowan Gant Investigation (24 page)

“No,” I expressed, “I didn’t make a
mistake.”

We stood in silence for a moment, Ben’s hand
on the doorknob. My mind raced, trying to formulate a logical way
to refute the evidence Ben had outlined. Even with my own
suspicions about R.J., I was reluctant to believe he was the
killer. There had to be an explanation, and it needed to be a good
one.

“Are you charging him?” I questioned.

“Not yet,” Deckert returned. “We’re gonna see
what turns up when we search his place first.”

Ben opened the heavy door, and we entered
another corridor in the basement of the building. Fluorescent light
fixtures were unevenly spaced along the acoustic drop ceiling,
bathing the hallway in a harsh blue-white light. One of the older
tubes would occasionally flicker into darkness then burn dull
orange at each end before snapping back to life, if only for a
moment. The glossy, painted, cinder block walls had aged from the
original white to a sickly yellowish tone that was deepened at
intervals by the orange glow. The walls felt close when combined
with the low drop ceiling, and I fought back a thin wave of
claustrophobia.

We continued down a cracked asphalt tile
floor and came to a halt before a uniformed officer stationed at a
large metal desk. Chips and gouges in the grey painted piece of
furniture testified to its age and use. A green desk blotter, a
telephone, and a sign-in sheet adorned its sparse surface. I
couldn’t help but be somewhat amused by the fact that the pen
accompanying the sheet was chained to the desk. A dilapidated drip
coffeemaker, stained from years of use, sizzled and popped in the
corner behind the duty officer—a careless spill being turned into
yet another crusty residue on its heating plate.

Ben and Deckert surrendered their sidearms to
the uniformed man, and he locked them away in the desk drawer. With
a wordless grunt, he indicated the sign-in sheet, and the three of
us added our names to it. With this task completed, the voiceless
guard led us farther down the corridor and unlocked the door to the
first interview room. We stepped in—Ben, Deckert, and finally me.
The weighty door swung shut behind us, and the lock dropped back
into place with an audible metallic clunk that echoed from the bare
cement walls. A plain wooden table with two chairs, much like one
would find in a small kitchen, was positioned near the center of
the room. A bedraggled, unshaven R.J. filled one of the chairs. He
looked up with a nervous start as we entered. For the second time
in less than three days, R.J. was in the custody of the police. His
at once depressed and fearful expression showed that he was still
no more practiced at it than he had been the first time.

“I wasn’t sure you’d come,” he ventured,
looking at me.

“Why not?” I asked, advancing past Ben and
Deckert then pulling out the chair opposite him.

“Because of how I acted Saturday night.” He
looked at the floor then back at me as I took a seat. “I wasn’t
exactly Mister Congeniality... Then, when you shook my hand and I
blocked you...”

“I would have done the same,” I replied
soothingly. “Hell, I had no business trying to feel you out like
that. It was pretty rude.”

“I can understand why you did it,” he told
me.

He seemed somewhat calmer than when we first
entered, but he still looked around the room nervously, shifting
back and forth from me to Ben and Deckert. He wrung his hands, and
every now and again, his voice would quaver slightly. I could see,
feel, hear and even smell the fear coming from him. The emotion
that bothered me most though was the sensation of guilt.

“What’s going on?” he finally asked me. “Why
do they want to talk to me about Ariel and the other lady? Am I a
suspect or something?”

By now, Ben and Detective Deckert had moved
farther into the room. Ben was standing to my right, and Deckert
had propped himself in a corner, behind and to the right of
R.J.

“Are you sure you don’t want an attorney?”
Ben interjected.

“What do I need a lawyer for?” R.J. demanded
fearfully.

As he spoke, I felt a sharp, piercing pain in
the pit of my stomach. Ben didn’t reply. To an observer such as
myself, it was obvious that he was using R.J.’s own fear as
leverage against him. It was a wholly unpleasant and ugly side of
my friend that I knew was a necessary evil for his line of work. It
was a side, however, that I truly didn’t wish to see.

“You knew Ariel Tanner pretty good, didn’t
you?” Ben continued.

“Yeah,” R.J. answered, “you know that.”

“Uh-huh,” Ben grunted. “How ‘bout Karen
Barnes? You friends with her too?”

“I told you already,” R.J.’s voice implored,
“I never heard of her until you asked me about her. Was she the
lady that was killed Saturday?”

A ripping sensation tore painfully through my
lower abdomen once again.

Ben still refused to answer him. “What were
you doin’ at Ariel’s flat Saturday morning?”

“What’re they doing, Rowan?” R.J. begged.
“They think I killed her? They think I’m the killer?!”

His voice went up in pitch and grew wilder
with every word. He was stricken with absolute disbelief at what he
felt Ben was implying.

“Were you there to pick somethin’ up, R.J.?”
Ben continued. “Maybe something you forgot?”

“Like I said before,” R.J. explained almost
angrily, “I was there to water the plants.”

“Saturday was a little soon, wasn’t it? I
mean, you said she was s’posed ta’ leave Friday night. You don’t
think she might have watered them before she left?”

“She asked me to keep an eye on her place!”
R.J. screamed, jumping up from the chair. “I didn’t know I needed
your fucking permission!”

“Now, R.J.,” Deckert’s calm voice expressed
feigned concern. “Take it easy. They’re just questions.” He had
left his position in the corner and was now resting a comforting
hand on R.J.’s shoulder. “Detective Storm just gets a little
carried away sometimes.”

Good cop, bad cop. I couldn’t believe Ben and
Deckert were playing that tired game. Anyone who had ever seen a
cop show on television, good or bad, knew the routine. I could only
assume that being in the hot seat made R.J. vulnerable enough to
fall for it.

Pain shot through my stomach once again, more
intense than before. Extreme enough to make me wince as it hit. I
assumed I was simply feeling empathy for R.J., and I took a moment
to focus my concentration on blocking the spasms as he slowly
lowered himself back into his seat.

“You showed up late at our meeting Saturday
night.” Ben began hammering at him again. “Where were you?”

“My mom’s cat got hit by a car,” he
explained. “I had to bury it for her and get cleaned up before I
could come over.”

Suddenly Dickens’ and Salinger’s reactions to
him made sense. A cat’s heightened sense of smell would have
detected not only the scent of the other animal but any blood he
might have gotten on himself, even if he washed. The cats HAD
smelled death, just not the death of a human.

“I assume that can be verified,” Ben
retorted.

“You can ask my mom,” R.J. shot back. “And
you can dig up the cat if you don’t believe her.”

“We just might.”

Ben scribbled purposefully in his notebook.
The scratch of the pen against the paper was the only sound in the
room, and it was earsplitting in the silence.

Ben interrupted the quiet. “You mind lettin’
us in on why you were drivin’ around shitfaced early this
morning?”

“I dunno.”

“Come on, man.” Ben’s voice took on an
accusatory edge. “You’ve gotta have a reason for getting’ hammered
on a Sunday night.”

“Sunday’s just like a Saturday to me,” R.J.
rebutted, maintaining a modicum of nerve. “Sunday and Monday are my
days off.”

“Good for you.” Ben’s words were sheathed in
sarcasm. “That still doesn’t tell me why you blew close to the
legal limit and had an open beer in your hand when you were
stopped.”

“I had a fight with my girlfriend,” R.J.
returned. “I guess I just lost it for a little while.”

“What time would that have been?”

“I dunno. Around five I guess.”

“What’s your girlfriend’s name?”

“I wanna leave her out of it.”

“C’mon, R.J.,” Deckert’s soothing voice
issued from behind him once again. “I’m sure she’d be happy to help
you out. We can’t verify your story unless you give us her
name.”

The discomfort struck my abdomen again,
penetrating the mental defenses I had erected to stop it. A dull,
throbbing ache followed and refused my attempts to evict it—so much
for mind over matter.

R.J. remained steadfastly silent, displaying
a hardened resolve. Even I was curious as to why he was so adamant
about concealing the identity of his girlfriend.

Deckert spoke again. “Don’t you think she’s
probably worried about you? You never know, she might have called
to try and make up.”

“Why’re you guys so worried about who my
girlfriend is?” R.J. spat. “What’s she got to do with
anything?”

“Why are you tryin’ so hard to keep her a
secret?” Ben retorted. “I would think you’d be happy to have an
alibi.”

“An alibi for what?” R.J.’s confused voice
squeaked slightly. “We had the fight yesterday.”

“Exactly.”

“Whaddaya mean, ‘exactly’?”

“Another young lady was murdered last night,”
Deckert filled in the blank.

“I’m gonna tell ya’ a story, R.J.” Ben
pressed on, slowly pacing three steps past him and three steps
back. “It’s a story about a sick asshole that likes to torture
young women and kill them. Ya’ see, this psycho thinks he has a
purpose for doin’ this, but it’s all just somethin’ he dreamed up
in his twisted little mind.” He punctuated his statement by pausing
and poking his index finger at R.J.’s forehead. “So, every time he
kills one of these young ladies, he feels really bad...”

Ben was obviously telling his tale in order
to force him to crack. I knew that it wouldn’t be long before he
started plugging R.J.’s name into the story here and there to turn
the screws.

“So when Mister Sicko feels bad, he hides
behind a little religious ritual he learned,” Ben continued, “and
whaddaya know, BAM! He forgives himself, and everything’s okay
again. You know that little ritual, don’t you, R.J.?”

“I didn’t kill anyone” was his measured
reply.

“Now, it all starts out when our asshole gets
himself a crush on a young lady who, shall we say, attends the same
church. Let’s call this young lady, Ariel, just for the sake of
argument. Now, Ariel doesn’t like Mister Asshole the same way he
likes her, you see... Just a second... You had a crush on a young
lady named Ariel, didn’t you? What a coincidence.”

“I didn’t kill Ariel,” R.J. insisted, raising
his voice. “How many times do I have to tell you, I didn’t kill
anyone?”

Ben paused and engaged himself in a tremulous
staring contest with R.J. When the young man finally shifted his
gaze downward, Ben looked quietly from Deckert’s face to mine. I
managed to find a small bit of solace in the fact that my friend’s
expression showed me without a doubt that he wasn’t enjoying what
he was doing to the young man.

“Let’s skip the rest of the story,” Ben
finally said. “How about if we get back to a few questions.” He
pulled out his small notebook again and began leafing through it,
eventually stopping at a page and tucking the others back. “So, are
you familiar with a Miz Ellen Gray?”

R. J. bolted upward from the chair, his
red-rimmed eyes widened and wild. I could physically see his
muscles tense throughout his body as he fought to bring himself
under control.

“Why are you asking about her?” he demanded.
“What happened?”

Deckert rested his hands on R.J.’s shoulders
once again and gently but firmly guided him back to his seat.

“Tell me!” he appealed.

“She was the girlfriend you were trying to
protect, wasn’t she?” I broke my self-imposed silence, as the
reason for his feelings of guilt became instantly clear. “You two
were having an affair, weren’t you?”

He never answered me. I could feel his
anguish and confusion as he silently held his head in his hands. If
it wasn’t obvious to Ben and Deckert, it was at the very least
obvious to me. R.J. was not the killer. Of this, I was completely
sure.

“She’s dead, isn’t she?” R.J. finally asked,
lifting his head slowly. I didn’t have the heart to tell him that
Ellen Gray had been the third victim, but the tone of his voice
told me that he had already figured that out. I could only look
away as he stared sullenly into space.

“Now I want a lawyer,” he stated flatly.

The solemn atmosphere of the room was
disturbed suddenly as a key audibly turned in a lock, and the heavy
steel door was pushed open, revealing the hardened face of the
guard.

“Detective Storm,” he stated with
businesslike brevity. “Phone call.”

Ben excused himself and left the room.
Detective Deckert and I remained behind, locked in with a
stubbornly silent R.J. His gaze remained fixed upon an invisible
spot on the wall behind me. Deckert and I simply stared at one
another.

Only a few brief moments passed before Ben
returned to the interview room. His jaw was set grimly, and his
eyes held more than just slight concern.

“Carl,” he addressed Deckert. “Can you see
that our friend here gets his phone call? I’ve got somethin’ ta’
take care of.”

“Sure,” Deckert replied coming instantly more
alert. “Is everything okay?”

“I’ll let ya’ know,” Ben told him, then
turned his attention to me. “C’mon, Rowan, I need you ta’ come with
me.”

I was perplexed at first, then morbidly
hopeful as the thought that another murder might have occurred
crossed my mind. I disdained the concept of such a thing happening,
but it would go a long way in clearing R.J. of the crimes.