Mortal Fall (26 page)

Ken picked up the pace of his gum chewing as I briefed him in the small observation room adjacent to where we held Dorian. Ken, Gretchen, Brander, and I watched him scowl through the two-way.

“Just as well we got him tonight,” I said. “Going to his residence to question him probably would have been a nightmare.”

“Because of weapons?”

“I found out from the game warden, Shane Albertson, that he’s definitely been stockpiling them.” I bounced my pen against my thumb and looked at Ken, who had been home with his wife and his little boy, Chase, when I called him.

“You think we can get him to talk? He looks pretty pissed.”

“Not sure. He already thought he had the upper hand or else he wouldn’t have gone after me like that, and we didn’t have enough to detain him as a suspect anyway. He’d have never come in voluntarily.”

“Hell no,” Brander added. “Not that guy.”

“And if we’d showed up on his doorstep for a knock-and-talk, there’s no way he’d have even opened the door. This is it and even now, we’re lucky if he’ll talk, but at least this way, he’s on the county’s turf facing jail time. We might be able to get something from him.”

The stockpiling, in itself, was no crime unless he had a felony, which he didn’t—only a DUI. Or was collecting weapons for the purposes of carrying out a felony. “A guy like Dorian with AK-47s, SK-3s, and other high-capacity assault rifles,” I said. “He hates the government
with a vengeance. Ten to one he thinks it will all be a one-world order takeover soon and that any government employee is the right-hand of the devil.”

Ken stared at me, then looked back through the two-way. Dorian didn’t move a muscle. He sat with his chin lifted toward us, no fidgeting, no nervousness that he at least cared to demonstrate.

“He’s not saying anything you don’t know, right?” Gretchen asked Ken.

“Nah.” Ken leaned against the sidewall and put his hands in his pockets. “I just haven’t thought about that type of wing nut in a while. Look at him.” Ken motioned to Dorian. “He’s not even fazed.”

“You better start thinking about
that
type because it’s thick around here, and it’s right against your Glacier border even though your average tourist would never even know it,” she said.

“I know the craziness,” Ken added. “That some grand prophecy exists that says the government will become the beast.”

“That’s right, and any fire, tidal wave, or hurricane in any part of the world is further evidence of the fulfillment of such prophecy,” I added.

“Or any researcher studying wolverines . . . ,” Gretchen said.

I pointed my pen at her to emphasize that she might just have a point.

“Okay,” Ken said. “So what’s the plan?”

I considered the situation. If my suspicions were correct, he wouldn’t want us within ten miles of his residence poking around without him there. “If he knows we know he’s stockpiling, and we dangle some kind of bargain before him, we might get something.”

29

I
’M NOT GOING
to lie. I was nervous. There was no way to know what to expect with a man like him—a guy filled to the brim with hatred and his own private Idaho. When Ken and I went in, he looked tired, but still angry, still in control. I knew the key to an effective interrogation was to get as much as possible from him before he asked for an attorney. I also understood that most criminals with experience clammed up and usually asked for one right away. Dorian was hard all right, but he didn’t have a record, so I figured he could go either way.

“So, Mr. Dorian,” I said after Ken and I got him a cup of coffee that I’d brought in for him without even asking if he wanted one or not. It’s good to be polite, I figured, even if the guy had punched me in the face and I wanted nothing more than to throw the hot coffee right onto his. But being polite and in control is what made me feel like
I
had the upper hand. With the good help of my brother, I’d learned over the years that staying still, not flying off the handle, when others are angry or going hog wild is what works, even if they get even angrier that you’re not going along for their crazy ride. “Good to see you again. You were very specific this evening about not wanting me snooping around your turf, well.” I pointed to my eye. “You certainly made your point, so I think it’s much better in here. Huh?” In Melissa’s bar, he might be the toughest cat around, the hero of his own western with his illegally concealed weapon and his bad ass give-the-finger-to-the-law attitude, but in between these four walls and beneath a blinking video light on a gazing camera in the corner, he was reduced to just another criminal.

Dorian glared at me for a moment, then said. “Why the fuck am I here?”

“Why do you think? By the way, I should say for the cameras”—I pointed to it mounted high in the corner of the room—“it’s 8:53 p.m. on July first. This is Officer Ken Greeley, and I’m—”

“I haven’t done a goddamned thing.” His voice was low and throaty, just as I remembered from the bar. I ignored the pain spreading through my upper back and focused on the fact that he sat rigidly, maybe stressed after all, and that the table he leaned on was bolted down.

“I wouldn’t exactly say that. First”—I gave Ken a quick glance—“you’ve assaulted a police officer.” I touched the corner of my eye and winced. “Damn, it smarts when I smile,” I said to Ken.

“I’ll bet it does. That’s a good one there. Gonna turn all sorts of color shades in the upcoming days,” Ken said.

“And, second, you assaulted said officer while he was simply trying to investigate a crime that took place on federal land.” I flipped a page in my notes that I jotted down in Gretchen’s car while waiting for backup, and quoted him: “ ‘You the one pokin’ around in our business? Askin’ about that wolverine dude who had no business around here in the first place?’ ” I looked at him. “Now, I’m not sure if you know this or not, but I work for the federal government, which means you’ve just assaulted a federal officer and that translates to a federal crime. Plus obstructing a federal investigation is a felony as well, and just so you know, I had every right to be asking questions about a federal case—call it poking around or what have you.”

Dorian held my gaze for a moment, his eyes flat, just as I expected. When I became a game warden, this was one of the first things I’d realized about law enforcement, that it required a lot of near comical posturing, the use of the who’s-got-the-bigger-dick stare. But I was willing to continue to play the game if it helped me solve my first case as an investigator for Park Police. I’d solved plenty of cases in the poaching arena while game-wardening for the state, but as I mentioned earlier,
this mission felt different to me. This guy might be mean and tough, but he was stupid to get arrested.

“Third.” I held up his Glock in a plastic bag. “Carrying a concealed weapon without a permit is illegal, even in Montana. But with all the guns you own, I’m sure you know Montana gun laws quite well, and I don’t need to fill you in on those.” I sat back in my chair and folded my arms across my chest as if I had all the time and patience in the world.

Dorian’s eyes narrowed, then he said, “I ain’t helping you with shit. Asshole cops—just as guilty as the dirtiest criminal out there. I want an attorney.”

“Okay then,” I stood and faced Ken. “You up for a bite?”

“Me? I’m always up for food.”

“Let’s go then. We’ll get one of the hands to let Mr. Dorian here make a call to his attorney—perhaps Mr. Rowland, although I don’t believe he’s practicing law anymore. Might need someone a little more, shall we say—current—than Mr. Rowdy, I mean Rowland”—I turned to Dorian—“if you’re going to avoid a few counts of felony. ’Cause you get a felony on your record, well, that changes the game entirely. I hate to inform you—although I know you’re not a man who puts much stock in the law—that it’s perfectly legal in Montana to stockpile weapons, unless, of course, you’ve got a felony on your record. That right, Ken?”

“That’s the way I know the law,” Ken said.

“Of course, cops are always cutting deals. Getting felonies down to misdemeanors if someone can help them out in some more important matter. Anyway, we can discuss it more after you speak to your attorney. In the meantime”—I said to Ken—“Mr. Dorian here can consider his situation.”

Dorian mumbled something as we walked toward the door, but I couldn’t make it out. “What’s that?” I turned back to him.

“What do you want?” Dorian said louder, clear and angry.

“Just some information about Paul Sedgewick.” I walked back over and pulled the chair back out and straddled it, propping my forearms
on the back of the chair. “For starters, I need to know if and how you knew him. He also went by the nickname Wolfie.”

Dorian took a sip of his coffee, wiped his mouth with his sleeve, and said, “I knew your dead guy. Is that all you want to know?”

“And when did you see him last?”

Dorian shrugged. “Couldn’t tell ya. Can’t remember.”

“Well, I suggest you try real hard to recall that information. Let’s try a different angle. Sometimes that helps refresh the memory.” I smiled. “What did you talk about the last time you saw Sedgewick?”

Dorian kept his eyes on me. “He was snooping around where he didn’t belong. Just like you, only worse—doing research in an area he had no business in.”

“Why, you own that land he was on? Your property?”

Dorian shrugged.

“I take it that’s a no. And let me remind you that you assaulted me. So if you think his snoopin’ around was worse than my pokin’ around, then I wonder what you felt needed to happen to him.”

“What happened to him has nothing to do with me.”

“Okay, well, that leads me to my next question. What were you doing on the evening of June twenty-second?”

Dorian stroked his Fu Manchu, his gaze adjusting slightly to the side, to the distance—as if beyond the walls of the interrogation room, then he looked back to me. “I was with someone.”

“Who?”

“Melissa.”

“What’s her last name?”

“You know her.”

“What’s her last name?”

“Tafford.”

“Thought you had a different girlfriend?”

“I didn’t say Melissa was my girlfriend. I was just with her that night.”

“Just the two of you?”

Dorian nodded.

“And where were you?”

“At her place.”

“When did you go over there? Didn’t she have to work?”

“Not that night. Her brother and Val were working. We got a burger, then went to her place. It was early evening.”

“And where were you before that?”

“At another bar.”

“Where?”

“In Columbia Falls.”

“Can anyone vouch for that?”

“Yeah, Tammy can.”

“Who’s Tammy? Oh wait, let me guess—the one you had your arm around tonight at Melissa’s?”

“Tammy and I hung out that afternoon. Had a few, but she had to go, so I went and hung out at Melissa’s and, like I said, we got a burger after she got off work.”

“What’s Tammy’s last name?”

“None of your business.”

Suddenly it made sense why he had walked up to Melissa in a rage and was yelling at her. He felt betrayed that she’d given me anything, yet he was confident and entitled enough to sit in her bar with his hand draped over another woman’s breast. “If you want us to clear your alibi,” I said slowly, directly, “we will need her last name. If you refuse to give it, then we’ll assume you don’t have an alibi and then we’re looking at possible charges much, much more serious than assault. Not that assault isn’t serious enough, but murder . . .” I clucked my tongue.

Dorian set his jaw into a clench and glared at me. I could feel the hate emanating off him like heat from hot coals. I knew he wouldn’t give me her last name, not because there was any good reason not to. He just couldn’t fathom letting me win. I stared back and he refused to look away, refused to say her name.

“We have information that says you and Sedgewick got into it at one point.” I switched gears.

He shook his head with disdain.

“Okay, yeah, that’s a little vague. Let me rephrase that: you and Paul Sedgewick had some words outside the Outlaw’s, and we simply want to know what that was about.”

“You know what it was about, from Melissa.” He sneered and I could tell he was still not happy with her, and she’d hear more about it as soon as he got out. Whatever relief I felt on her behalf for extracting herself from Stimpy vanished when I considered she was stupid enough to hook up with this goon.

“No, she didn’t tell me anything,” I lied. “But we have other witnesses that say you and Sedgewick got into it.”

“I didn’t get into shit with him.”

I half-frowned like an amused and patient mother who knows her kid is lying. “Like I said, we have witnesses.”

“Just Melissa. Lying bitch. Can’t trust her.”

“Can’t trust her? Didn’t you just say she was your alibi and here you’re telling me I can’t trust her?”

He gave me a piercing look that said I’m going to kill you the next opportunity I get.

“There are others.” I clasped my hands together before me and set my chin on my woven knuckles. “You know Shane Albertson, right? Game warden covering the South Fork region?”

The mention of the warden’s name got his attention. His gaze snapped back to me and a sharpness—another layer of hate, like blue fire—came into his eyes, which I didn’t think was possible. “Fuck him. He doesn’t know crap. All hearsay. Just another piece of shit working for the government.”

I pulled out some photos from the crime scene and flipped through them, letting him glimpse the vague, grotesque images of Sedgewick, but not letting him focus on any of them for long. I wanted him to
know this was serious. His reaction stayed the same, his eyes narrowed in hate, and his upper lip curled in repugnance. “Just thought you might know why Sedgewick would have come to the bar that day. Doesn’t seem like a typical hangout for a guy like him, you know, a wildlife researcher.”

“You think I care what a typical hangout is for a guy like him?”

“Apparently you care if he’s doing some wolverine research in your neck of the woods.”