Firebreak (Josie Gray Mysteries #4)(83)
Josie quickly washed her hands and then appeared back in the living room, indicating to Otto that she was ready to leave.
“Hank, we appreciate you talking with us again. I’d like you to keep this conversation quiet. Don’t mention this to Brenda. She’s not a suspect. We just wanted to clear her name, get through one final set of questions before we put this case to bed.” She put her hand out and Hank stood to shake it.
They walked outside and when they got into Josie’s jeep, Otto said, “What the hell was that all about?”
“Guess who’s shacking up with Hank?”
Otto frowned, then his eyes widened in realization. “Brenda?”
TWENTY-FOUR
Time was not on their side. Hank would contact Brenda as soon as Josie and Otto left. They drove back to the PD and put together a rough outline of their case to present to the prosecutor. It wasn’t a requirement, but Josie had found spending the extra time often helped her ensure she had key details mapped out before making an arrest. Realistically, if the prosecutor wouldn’t support her, the arrest wouldn’t stick.
Josie and Otto walked across the street to the courthouse, where Tyler Holder, the forty-one-year-old county prosecutor, had his office. He had been at the job a little over a year, and so far, local law enforcement were pleased with his efforts. No prosecutor would make every cop happy; but at least Holder appeared motivated by justice rather than the political career ladder.
He wasn’t in his office but Josie and Otto found him in the courtroom, where he sat at the prosecutor’s table taking notes.
He stood and motioned for them to join him.
“They throw you out of your office?” Otto asked.
Holder smiled. He wore a distinguished gray suit, a white shirt, and a red paisley tie. Josie suspected the high-dollar clothes were leftovers from his days as a lawyer for the Houston Oilers—before his new wife convinced him to leave fame and fortune for love and a desert speck of a town sorely in need of a new prosecutor.
“I like the solemn atmosphere. Gets me grounded before the first day of a trial.” He pitched his pen onto the table and turned his full attention to Josie and Otto. “What’s on your mind?”
“Ferris Sinclair and Billy Nix.”
“Ah. It all wrapped up a little too conveniently, didn’t it? Billy kills Ferris, then commits suicide?” Holder said.
Josie smiled. “There’s been a twist. Here’s the short version. Billy Nix had been screwing around with Ferris Sinclair, a kid who was obsessed with him and the fame that went with Billy. Brenda found out, but wasn’t able to stop things for fear that Ferris would go public with the affair and ruin Billy’s chance at fame and fortune as an outlaw country singer.”
“Outlaw?”
“Country outlaw singer. Johnny Cash, Willie Nelson, Steve Earle?”
Holder smirked and nodded. “Ah, outlaw. Like Willie Nelson getting busted for pot all over Texas.”
“You get the idea. They’re tough guys. You can’t be a gay country outlaw singer. Your music wouldn’t sell. Especially if your career hasn’t taken off yet. So Brenda has been sitting by for the past six months watching her husband get led astray by this man who is not only ruining her marriage, but who is derailing her husband’s career.”
Otto put a finger up. “A career that Brenda has devoted her life to. She had a record deal close to signed before all this happened.”
“To top it off, when Mitchell Cowan performed the autopsy, he discovered Ferris was HIV positive. We believe Billy just discovered this fact. The day before the fire, we found Internet searches on the Nixes’ home computer that dealt with HIV/AIDS. When I informed Brenda, she appeared to know nothing about it.”
“I think Brenda’s a better actor than she is a singer,” said Otto.
“Are you telling me Brenda Nix killed Ferris?” he asked.
Josie glanced at Otto. “We believe so.” She sighed, dreading what was to come.
Holder narrowed his eyes at her. “You don’t have anything that ties her to the dead body, do you?”
“We believe she left the Hell-Bent—”
Holder shook his head back and forth and cut his hands through the air to stop her. “‘We believe’ doesn’t work. Do you have a gun, something more than an empty syringe?”
Josie hadn’t realized he knew about the syringe. She had kept him up to date to this point, and she hadn’t mentioned it. She was impressed. “We’re not relying on the syringe. It doesn’t help the case. We have the Zaner stun gun, registered to her, that was discharged the night of the murder. And we have eyewitnesses that placed her at the bar, but then lost sight of her during the time when we believe she drove home, stunned and murdered Ferris Sinclair.”
“You know this won’t work. I’m not sure why you’re here. You have nothing that indicates to me with any certainty that she killed Ferris. I’ve no doubt she wanted him dead, but I need proof.”
“If we don’t bring her in now she will leave. Her house was destroyed from the fire. It’s hard telling where she’ll go.”
“Josie. If you bring her in, you can’t keep her. No charges would stick. I won’t support this.”
“I also found a bottle of Xanax in Hank Wild’s medicine cabinet. Brenda’s bottle,” Josie said.