The Intersection of Purgatory and Paradise (18 page)

“Two? The body on the football field?”

“Levi Campbell,” Doug said carefully. “Jeff Lowe, Levi Campbell, and—” Doug didn’t want to say it. If Daniels didn’t trust him, the third name was just going to come across as petty, backstabbing bullshit. It’d make Doug look no better than Marshall.

“Marshall’s boy?” Daniels asked, leaning forward.

“Close. Mike Harris.”

“Harris’s oldest?”

“I’ve looked at the original case file. I’m sure you have, too. Marshall wrote it up as a misdemeanor assault. He made it seem open and shut. I’m pretty sure Caleb Owens told his parents he was raped, but his mom insisted he changed his story after he talked to Marshall. Marshall came back and told them Caleb was making up the charges to try and get the kids who were bullying him into trouble.”

Daniels looked incredulous.

“I’m not sure if Marshall lied or if Owens really did change his story. But Marshall knew about it from the beginning, and there’s no mention of Owens changing his statement. I don’t know what actually happened that night. I know that during his autopsy, scar tissue consistent with violent sexual trauma was discovered. The scars were estimated to be about six months old, and his behavior after he reported the assault is consistent with the behavior of sexual assault victims. He was raped. Where, when, and by whom….” Doug could only shrug.

“You’ve got the file?”

Doug passed over the report. “The file from the assault doesn’t include any medical evaluation at all. Not a doctor’s report stating there was no evidence. Nothing at all. The boy never saw a doctor. Marshall didn’t even take photographs of the bruises you said were still visible when he was arrested for shoplifting.”

Daniels studied Marshall’s report for a moment. Doug had highlighted the important bits, but he saw Daniels’s gaze moving across the page, carefully taking in all the details. Daniels might have spent most of his career running the jail, but he’d always been a thorough, professional officer.

“How the hell did he think he could write it out of the report like it didn’t happen?”

“How he thought he could get away with it doesn’t matter.”

“How the hell does one of my officers ignoring policy and procedure, and falsifying a report, not matter?”

“Because Caleb Owens is dead. It’s too late to help him. Someone out there believed Caleb Owens, before the autopsy and this evidence came to light,” Doug went on. “Whoever it is, he is pissed off enough to rip two of the alleged perpetrators apart.”

“Right. Harris should be here any minute. I’m going to…. There are a couple of highway patrol officers helping out down at the school. I’m going to call and have them bring Mike Harris in. As for Hayes….”

“He’s here?” Doug asked. “He’s in a cell, safe and secure?”

“Of course he is.”

“Then he’s fine.” Doug couldn’t help but smile a little at the look of surprise on Daniels’s face. “If I spent the next couple of hours playing phone tag with the county attorney’s office trying to get him released, he’d smack me and tell me to get my priorities straight.”

Daniels’s smile grew huge. “Hold on to that boy, Heavy
Runner.”

“I intend to.”

“D
ON
’
T
TELL
me you decided to complain to the boss because your boyfriend went and got himself arrested?” Roger Harris, a twenty-year veteran who made no secret of his loathing for Doug, stomped into the charge room almost half an hour later. He leaned against Doug’s desk without a word, folding his arms across his chest. “For all of your running around in those fancy suits, I expected you to be a bit more professional about this.”

“You’re late,” Doug said simply. The highway patrol officers already had eighteen-year-old Mike Harris in Booking.

“Am I? Well, forgive me. I had a murder scene to wrap up. Actual police work, not something you’d know much about.”

“Marshall and Glenn are still on the scene, aren’t they?”

Harris rolled his hazel eyes. “Yes.”

“Good. Hey, did you bring back pictures? I printed off ones from the first scene, but pictures of the second body might come in handy.”

“Come in handy? Glenn’s still taking pictures there right now. Do you have a suspect?”

“You think I have a suspect? When I’m so ignorant of actual police work? No, I’m putting together the department’s Halloween safety poster. You think the photos from the murder might be a bit over the top?”

“Cut the crap, Heavy Runner. This isn’t your case. If you’ve got something, hand it over, and we’ll look into it.”

“I asked Daniels to call you in as a courtesy, although I doubt you’re going to thank me when all is said and done.”

“It’s my case,” Harris insisted. “What have you got?”

“Technically, I’m still working Caleb Owens’s suicide. The case has evolved a bit.” Doug’s cell phone chirped beside him. It was a text from Daniels. Mike Harris had been booked and the interview and observation rooms were set up. Doug reviewed the autopsy details, cramming as many of them as he could into his skull, then shuffled the gruesome photos of Jeff Lowe’s body into the case file. “Come on. Daniels is ready.”

“Ready for what? You really did go and whine about it?”

“About what? Chris? No, I’m not worried about that.” Doug strode toward the detention center door, knowing Harris would follow him. He might follow just to keep arguing, but he would follow. Across the elevated platform, a skinny young man with shaggy brown hair was being herded by two tall highway patrol officers into the only interview room with an observation window.

Harris froze. “What the hell are you accusing my son of?”

“Professional much?” Doug scoffed. Then he remembered making Mrs. Owens collapse on the floor in tears. He might not like Roger Harris, but if he was right, the next few hours were going to be hell for the man. “Look, we need to talk to him. I asked Daniels to call you so you could be here to observe the interview because it seemed like the right thing to do. But you should know this is probably going to suck.”

“Harris!” Daniels snapped. “Come on, you’re with me.”

“Why is my boy here?”

“Because we believe he might be in danger,” Daniels said in a tone that could almost pass for diplomatic. “Two of his teammates are dead. We have reason to think he might be next, and we need to talk to him. You’re going to sit in here with me, and when Heavy Runner is done, we can discuss this. But until
your
sergeant is finished conducting this interview”—he nodded at Doug—“keep your mouth shut.”

Doug looked straight into Harris’s glare. He paged through Caleb Owens’s case file and pulled out the coroner’s report.

“What’s this?” Harris asked.

Doug smiled his version of Christopher’s most infuriating grin. “Last winter, on the way home from the division championships in Helena, there was a fight on the bus hauling the junior varsity football team.”

“Is that what this is about? That shit’s done. Boys get into fights. It happens. I grounded Mike for a month. I took away his car and cell phone too. It’s done.”

“Are you willing to bet your son’s life on it?” Doug asked.

D
OUG
PLASTERED
a concerned but friendly look on his face and strolled inside. He took the seat opposite Mike Harris, closest to the glass, and watched the young man fidget for a moment.

“Uh, I don’t suppose you can tell me what I’ve done?” Mike asked, trying to laugh.

“I’m obligated to inform you this conversation is being recorded. You are not currently in custody, we’re just talking. I have some questions to ask about your friends from the football team. Could you state your full name, please?”

“Michael John Harris,” he said immediately. “Whatever those guys did this time, it was all them. I’ve been home playing video games with my kid brother.”

“You didn’t catch the morning news?”

“The news?” Mike asked. “No. We don’t have cable, and it’s just dull shit and the weather forecast.”

Doug stared at him for a moment, then opened the case file without saying a word. He very carefully spread out some of the more disturbing photos of the body that had been recovered from his garage, watching Mike’s reaction as he took in each one.

“What is this?” he asked, apparently confused.

“This?” Doug gestured to the photos. “This is what we’re worried might happen to you. These pictures show all that was left of your buddy, Jeff Lowe. Levi Campbell’s body was found this morning, in worse shape.”

“Jesus,” Mike whispered. “Levi, too?”

Doug nodded slowly.

“You don’t think I did this? You can’t! They were my friends, sure, but I haven’t seen much of them since school let out.”

“You don’t have practice together? You are all on the varsity team this coming year, aren’t you?”

“August,” Mike said quietly. “Coach wants us to start up again in August. But I…. It’s not like football matters now.”

“I suppose not,” Doug agreed, keeping his features neutral. “Especially since you might be next.”

“What?” Mike chuckled. The chuckle died when Doug kept staring at him.

“Last week, Caleb Owens shot himself. He died.”

Doug watched Mike as the news sank in, saw the guilty and horrified realization dawn on Mike’s face.

“Now,” Doug said slowly, “Jeff and Levi are dead. The only hope we have of figuring out who might be responsible is to find out who might be angry about Caleb. We need to know what happened that night, who knew you were involved, and who might blame the three of you for Caleb’s suicide.”

Mike shifted back in his chair, shoving himself away from the table and shaking his head. “I’ve got no idea what you’re talking about. We didn’t do anything.”

“January twenty-first, almost six months ago, on a late-night bus ride back from a tournament, you didn’t do anything?”

“No, nothing!”

“Mike,” Doug said slowly. “Your dad is a police officer. He must have talked to you about the job, right?”

Mike shook his head harder. “Nothing happened.”

“A police officer is never going to ask you a question unless he already knows the answer,” Doug said calmly. “Caleb told his parents everything.” Doug thought about the scars detailed in the coroner’s report, the scars Brittney had insisted were too similar to those inside Jeff Lowe’s body. It was a longshot, but Doug couldn’t see the killer repeating the same attack unless it was significant. “Why don’t we start with you telling me about the crowbar?”

Mike pushed away from the table so hard the chair he was in
clattered backward, tipping over. “That wasn’t me!” he cried,
shaking his head so quickly his entire body shook. “That was Jeff! Jeff did that! It was all his idea! It was him! I just—”

“Pick up your chair and sit down,” Doug growled.

After the boy had complied, Doug continued. “I understand you’re worried about getting into trouble, but I think you need to consider the bigger picture here.” He held up a photo of charred skin. The shape of a human skull could almost be discerned beneath the blackened lines of exposed muscle. “If you tell me everything you remember about that night, you probably will get in
trouble. You might have to spend some time in jail, probably spend a few years on probation, too. But if you can give us enough information to identify who killed your friends, we can stop him. I think getting in trouble might beat the alternative,” Doug glanced at the photograph and then looked back at the pale, hyperventilating teen across the table. “So tell me about the crowbar, or go home and wait to see if our killer offers you a better
deal than he offered Jeff.”

Mike folded his arms around himself, trembling. “They got it out of a big orange box under the backseat of the bus,” he said. “It had a first-aid kit, flares, and some of those weird little traffic cones. The crowbar had a wrench head on one end and a pry bar part on the other. There was duct tape, too.”

“A pry bar? Was it sharp?”

Mike closed his eyes, shaking. “It started out as a joke.”

“A joke?”

Mike nodded. “Jeff always teased Caleb on the bus. He was such a fag, and he always acted like it was no big deal. Like he had a right to be as queer and fucked-up as he wanted. Jeff had some of the guys on the team turn on some music up front, said he wanted to teach Caleb a lesson. Jeff and Levi waited until Caleb went into the bathroom in the back. They grabbed him when he came out. I was sitting right in front of them, you know? I wasn’t a part of it.”

“A part of what?”

He shook his head again. “They covered up his mouth with the duct tape. Levi punched him a couple times, and when he tried to make noise, Jeff brought the crowbar up to his neck. He said if Caleb screamed, he’d kill him.”

Doug’s stomach clenched as his memories threatened to overwhelm him. He remembered the burning itch from when his mouth had been duct-taped shut, and even though years had passed since the night his lover covered his mouth so he couldn’t scream, Doug’s imagination conjured the feel of the adhesive residue around his lips and cheeks.