Murder Mountain (17 page)

“I’m sure you would like to know, Jarrod. But I’ll tell you something. You don’t need to know, and you will never know, because you could never acquire such a high quality specimen like that in your lifetime,” he sneered.

This was even worse. There were two men in front of me, one of whom I was attracted to, and one who physically repulsed me, discussing what I would be like in bed.

“Yeah, you’re probably right,” Jarrod conceded. “I got high-quality shit myself over in Roseland. If you ever need me to hook you up, let me know.”

Michael just laughed. He talked to Jarrod a little, I think to see if somewhere in that brain of his he might remember Allen’s real last name. He also asked about his knowledge of Boz’s murder. He didn’t get anywhere. But, Michael’s years of interviewing definitely shone through. He did an excellent job, and I found myself with a deep admiration for him on a professional level.

I think Jarrod had really told us everything he knew. It really burned me that he’d had this information during the course of the case and had never said anything, but I guessed that late is better than never.

We then went over Jarrod’s statement while he was hooked up to a voice stress analysis machine, similar to a polygraph, and he passed. Back in my office, I told him I would be in touch and kicked him loose. I had yet to look at Michael in the face. I was very embarrassed about their conversation, and Michael knew it. I could tell he was about to say something when Coop poked his head in the door.

“Hey, Coop. I want you to meet Agent ...”

He interrupted me. “CeeCee? Bobby Delphy’s dead. He hung himself at the jail.”

Bobby Delphy was dead. I was elated, but unfortunately he’d known plenty about this case and I wondered if, under the right circumstances, he would’ve eventually talked. Coop said that after the bed checks, Bobby had hung himself with his bed sheet. They’d found him an hour later, and he hadn’t left a note or said anything to anyone earlier in the day indicating why.

After introducing Coop to Michael, Coop left and Michael and I were alone, again.

“How do you feel about this? Are you okay?” Michael asked, genuinely concerned.

“I’m fine,” I told him, letting my voice harden. “He did the right thing, as far as I’m concerned. There’s no room in the world for garbage like that.”

“Ouch,” Michael winced and looked at me strangely, “I hope I never get on your bad side.”

I highly doubt that‘ll be likely,
I thought as I grabbed my phone to check my voicemail. There was a message from Larry Johnston. He’d heard about Andrea Dean and wanted to know if she was connected to Lizzie’s disappearance. I wasn’t in the mood to talk to him just then, so I saved the message.

As I was putting my papers back into the Johnston file, Michael asked me a question that completely took me off guard: “What’s Captain Kincaid like?”

“Why?” I said defensively, feeling the jealousy creep back up.

“Just wondering,” he smiled, toying with me again. He wanted to see for himself if I would react in a jealous manner; he was testing the waters.

I didn’t smile back. Instead, I looked him straight in the eye and said seriously, “She is the most worthless, ignorant, poorest excuse of a police officer that you will ever see in your life.”

His smile faded. “You’re serious aren’t you?”

“I’m completely serious. The rest of us busted our asses working the street in uniform for years before we were promoted to detectives. I don’t know what she did, or who she did, going by rumors of course, to get where she is now. I know she didn’t earn that position, not by a long shot. She was in uniform for eighteen months before she was promoted to Sergeant. Supposedly, she’s book smart, can ace promotional exams, and can give a good blowjob. Put all those together and there is our Captain in charge of Major Crimes; a Captain that is afraid to look at dead bodies and doesn’t know how to investigate a simple burglary. She doesn’t have the experience. So, to answer your question again: yes, I’m serious.”

“I’m sorry I brought it up. I guess I hit a nerve.”

“I know she’s divorced, twice, and I think she’s got a boyfriend, but by all means don’t let that stop you,” I said sarcastically.

“Hey, that’s not why I asked. I’m married; maybe on the last fringes of a marriage, but if I were looking, it wouldn’t be her. Believe it or not, CeeCee, everything you told me just now, I could see the minute I met her. Women like that are a dime a dozen in law enforcement, with exceptions like you, of course. I was just curious about her, that’s all.”

I didn’t hear anything except “last fringes of a marriage.” Bingo. He clearly was having marital problems, and I was surprised that he’d volunteered that information. Now I knew why he brushed off my personal questions, he called the shots. He would tell me when he decided to, I guess now was the time. I was not having problems, and didn’t want to start. This minor complication of an attraction for Michael was something I needed to overcome, but my heart had skipped when he’d told me that, which only added to my growing concerns. The major concern being I thought I was starting to develop feelings for him.

The rest of the day was awkward for Michael and me. It was obvious. When he left, I actually felt relieved. Jarrod had occupied our day. Having to listen to him for several hours straight had made my head hurt.

When I got home and pulled into my driveway, I saw the dead rat still lying off to the side, except up the driveway a little farther. I was irritated with Eric. I didn’t ask him to move it, I asked him to get rid of it. I walked into the house and immediately started yelling at Eric, who was standing in the kitchen. “When I asked you to get rid of that rat, I didn’t mean move it up the driveway closer to the house, for God’s sake! How hard is it to pick it up and throw it over the embankment, or put it in the garbage?”

“What are you talking about?”

“What do you mean, what am I talking about? Hellooo! The rat from this morning. I asked you to get rid of it! Why would you just move it up the drive?”

“I didn’t,” he said, looking confused.

“Well it didn’t get bored and get up and walk by itself!”

“It’s in the driveway right now?”

“Are you listening to me at all? Yes!” I snarled, wanting to slap him.

“CeeCee, as soon as you left this morning I bagged that rat up and put it in the garbage. The garbage truck already came and picked it up. Now you’re telling me there’s another one down there?”

“Yes, there is,” I backed off, calming considerably, but feeling ill at the thought of another rat by my house.

Eric went to the door and began putting his shoes on. “You know, that rat this morning looked like it had been stabbed all over the place. It had big cuts on it.”

“A
stabbed
rat?” I shuddered. This was bad.

“Yup. Could’ve gotten caught under a car or something and crawled up there, but this thing had holes in it. Let me go look at this one. I don’t know where they’re coming from, but I see one maybe once a year. This is unusual,” he mused, walking out the door.

I should’ve said something to Eric, right then, about the phone call and the car I’d heard, but I didn’t. I thought someone was indirectly threatening me, but why
rats?
They made me physically sick, that’s why. But how would someone know that? Unless they were assuming that all females hate rats, which I’m pretty sure most do.

When Eric came back in, he told me the rat looked the same way as the one from this morning, except it was smaller. He bagged it up and put it in his parent’s garbage.

“You need to put some traps out. About the first time I see one of those things running up the driveway at me, you’re gonna hear about a hundred rounds going off when I shoot it,” I told him.

“I’ve never seen a rat near the house,” he wondered aloud. I don’t understand this. I just asked my parents if they’re having any problems and they’re not. They said they haven’t seen a rat in years.” He shook his head. “I checked the drainage pipe at the end of the driveway but didn’t see any in there, so I don’t know.”

As the weeks passed, we didn’t get any more rats at the house. This made me feel better, that maybe it was just a coincidence. Michael and I checked out other leads but ran into dead ends. The weeks also brought Michael and me closer; and Eric and me farther apart. I really didn’t know what was happening or how to stop it. Although I knew Eric suspected something, he never brought it up. I kept telling myself I was doing nothing wrong, I haven’t touched Michael. But again, putting myself in Eric’s shoes I thought,
wouldn’t an emotional affair hurt just the same?
I knew it would, but how could I change it now? I still loved Eric as much as ever, I never thought it possible to have feeling’s for two people at the same time, but I find myself being wrong again. Eventually, this triangle would come to a close one way or the other, and I shuddered to think about it. I still had the case to focus on.

I called the bank that foreclosed on Karen Cummings’s house to see if they kept an itemized list of things that were auctioned off. They did, but only kept it for six months. We were still circulating the photos of the suspects through Roseland, but came up with nothing. The people who did recognize the tall guy only knew him as Big Al, as Jarrod had said. We had somewhat of a break when Michael called the FBI to check on the Chatham County Sheriff’s Office.

It turned out that two years before they had opened an investigation into police corruption and meth labs going on with Sheriff’s Office involvement. The investigation began with several anonymous tips and ended when they failed to get any cooperation or witnesses to substantiate the claim.

Spending as much time as we did together, I gathered up the courage to ask Michael about his wife. He had been married for six years and had a four-year-old son. His wife was a bank teller in downtown Cleveland.

“My marriage was over two years ago. I only stayed for my son’s sake. My wife has always hated my job and has lately become downright resentful of it. I came to a point I had to admit to myself I was no longer in love with her.” He was solemn.

But instead of leaving, he dove into his work more. He also added that it’s been a long time since a woman distracted him, or he’s been around one that’s he’s comfortable with.

“I, essentially, closed off the outside world as far as romance goes, I didn’t look, and I didn’t care, until the day I met you, Cee.” He sighed. “You stirred up emotions I haven’t felt in years. What else could I do but take notice?”

I never did respond to his disclosure when he told me, I merely stayed in my chair and remained silent. It disturbed me so much I immediately turned the conversation back to the case, which I think hurt him a little. It didn’t matter; he got to me that day. More than ever, I found my feelings for him growing at an alarming rate.

This case, and Michael, consumed me so deeply that even Eric took notice. He was constantly telling me how distracted I was, how moody I was, and kept asking me if I was okay. I kept telling him I was fine, so he didn’t push the issue. I was hurting him too, and it was killing me. Eric and I always marveled at how strong our marriage was and how it would never break. Now we are beginning to find out we aren’t super-human after all.

Michael and I were seated on the floor of my office one afternoon surrounded by piles of paperwork. We had gotten take-out from the local root beer stand for lunch. I was eating a salad when I heard Michael mumble something.

“What?” I demanded.

He started laughing.

“What!” I repeated, missing the joke.

Michael grabbed a napkin, reached over, and wiped the side of my mouth.

“You’ve got salad dressing on your face,” he smiled.

“Great. Thanks,” I mumbled, thoroughly embarrassed.

I went back to eating my salad, and out of the corner of my eye, I noticed movement by the door. Looking up, I saw Eric standing in the doorway. He didn’t say a word and he had a weird look on his face. He saw the salad-dressing wipe, no doubt about it. Michael turned to see what I was looking at. He recognized Eric from my pictures, got off the floor, and walked over to Eric to introduce himself. Eric stood rigidly, but shook Michael’s hand, remaining silent.

The tension in my office right then was so thick it would take a chainsaw to cut it. I couldn’t talk, either. I was so embarrassed, and felt so awkward, that I didn’t know what to say. I’d never been in a situation like this before in my life. What was even worse was that I hadn’t done anything wrong. I forced myself to act natural, got off the floor, and walked over to Eric. I gave him a kiss on the cheek.

“Hey, baby. What are you doing?” I said sweetly, really wondering why he was there.

“I told you I had court this afternoon,” he said, glaring at me.

“I’m sorry. I forgot. How was it?”

“I can see how you forgot, but it was court; it was fine,” he said this glancing at Michael, who had walked back over to our paperwork file, then went on, “I just stopped to say hi, didn’t mean to interrupt. I have to go now. I have to pick up the girls.”

“Okay. You sure you don’t want something to eat, there’s plenty,” I offered.

Eric, who’d started to walk down the hallway, turned around and gave me one of the nastiest looks I have ever seen. “No, I lost my appetite. I’ll see you later.” He turned around and left.

I was upset, to say the least. Eric was clearly hurt by what he had seen. I could’ve argued with him until the end of time that he was being paranoid. The problem with that was that Eric was smart and sensed something between Michael and me. For me to call Eric paranoid would be disrespectful to him. I glanced over at Michael, who was now standing at the window. He turned around and I could see that he was a little upset, also.

This was crazy. Three people were hurt and upset in a matter of five minutes over nothing. Michael and I were doing absolutely nothing (at least that’s what I kept telling myself.) I was sick to my stomach over Eric. We rarely argued, let alone had something like this happen. The bottom line was that if I had seen what Eric had, I would’ve flipped out. Eric handles things better than I do. If he were spending all his time with an attractive woman, and I happened upon the two of them eating, with the attractive woman wiping his mouth off, I would’ve gone off the deep end; especially if I suspected there were growing feelings between the two, which I knew he was aware of.