Hide (Detective Harriet Foster #1)(21)

“She hang out on the Riverwalk a lot?” Lonergan asked.

“Of course not. Why would she?”

“We’re looking for habits,” Foster said, “places she liked to frequent, people she liked to hang out with. Someone who would know why she might have been down there yesterday.”

Rimmer abandoned his pockets to run his hands through his greasy hair. Foster noticed that in addition to the tattoos on his arms, he had musical notes tattooed on every finger. Good reason for Rimmer never to commit a crime. He’d be easily identifiable.

“Peg. Dead. I can’t believe it.” He shook his arms out as though he were an athlete loosening up for a race. “Yeah, okay. A profile. That’s what cops look for, right?” Foster and Lonergan exchanged a quick look, then waited on Rimmer to get on with it, because that was what cops did. “Peg was a good kid. College. Really into it. I went for a year. It wasn’t for me. I want to go after my music. Get my sound out there.”

Lonergan frowned. “That why you’re working in a coffee shop?”

“Temporary. As a matter of fact, I got a line on a gig right now. Touring, too, so . . .”

“Who was Peggy close to?” Foster asked, wanting to move things along. “Was there anybody she had a problem with, or they with her?”

“Enough to kill her? No way. Do you have any suspects? Did anybody see anything?”

“We can’t talk about that,” Foster said. “Let’s stick with the names.”

“Doesn’t seem right,” Rimmer said. “I mean, we hung out for several months. That should give me rights to some details.”

“You want details, buy a paper,” Lonergan said.

Rimmer rolled his eyes. “Exactly why I hate talking to cops.”

Lonergan scooted his chair closer to Rimmer’s, met him dead eye to glassy eye. “Maybe you want to have this little talk where we work . . . and maybe we bring out the drug-sniffing dogs and have them sniff your weedy pockets. How’s that?”

“I’m under the limit,” Rimmer said.

Lonergan grinned. “I’m bettin’ not everywhere, kid. We’ll check your locker, your car, wherever you flop. We’ll turn you inside out.”

Rimmer swallowed hard. “Stella Dean. Try her. She goes to Peg’s school. They hit it off, apparently. That’s when I broke things off.”

Lonergan smirked. “She dumped you for a girl?”

“The breakup was mutual.”

“Only you didn’t see it comin’,” Lonergan asserted. “Had to make you mad.”

Rimmer glowered at Lonergan. “You’re trying to needle me. I don’t like it.”

“Tough,” Lonergan said.

Foster was so over Lonergan’s gruff, macho posturing. He was a bull in a china shop, a dull blade where a surgical knife was needed. And he was costing them time and good favor with Rimmer, neither of which they could afford to squander. “Does Stella live in Peggy’s dorm?” she asked.

Rimmer’s eyes stayed on Lonergan’s, as though the cop were a rattler ready to strike. “I didn’t ask. She didn’t tell.”

“What about Wendy Stroman?” Foster asked. “Know her?”

Rimmer nodded. “I met her a couple times. She’s just a kid. One of those egghead types. I couldn’t tell you anything else about her.”

“And she didn’t have a beef with anybody you know of?” Lonergan asked.

Rimmer shook his head, suddenly somber. “Nobody who knew Peg could kill her. She was okay, you know? Sweet. That’s all I can say. I’m really shredded here.”

Foster closed her notebook. “One last question. Where were you last night? Around midnight.”

Rimmer’s eyes got wide as dinner plates. “Hold on. I told you, I couldn’t hurt her. I was legit home the whole night.”

“Anybody with you?” Lonergan asked.

“I was working on songs. Alone. Like I said, I got a gig set up—”

Lonergan held a hand up. “Can anybody vouch for you being home alone? You see a neighbor? Get food delivered in?”

Rimmer’s eyes narrowed, and he answered through clenched teeth. “No. Don’t you think if it was me, I’d have a better story? That I’d have people vouching for me wrapped around the block? God, I can’t believe you people.”

Foster slid a paper napkin out of the table dispenser and scribbled her name, office number, and email address on it. She had CPD cards from her last district but none yet for her new assignment. Until then, this would have to do. She would’ve asked Lonergan to offer his card instead, but she doubted Rimmer would have taken it. “If you think of anything else that might help us, I’d appreciate a call.”

“Joe, a little help here!” It was the freckle-faced barista from the counter. The line was now halfway out the door, and the exasperated look on the young woman’s face broadcast an unwillingness to wrangle hangry caffeine junkies on her own one millisecond longer.

Rimmer pushed up from the table. “I gotta go.”

Lonergan smiled, looking up at him. “Duty calls, huh? We’ll be in touch.”

Rimmer gave the napkin a quick glance, then tucked it into his back pocket. Weed in the front, cop contact in the back. How times change, Foster thought. When Rimmer left the table, she stood for a moment and watched him fill orders, catching his eye just once before he turned his back and focused on his work.