The Book of Cold Cases(30)

Then she glanced at the tape recorder, whirring quietly on the table. She looked at Washington, standing with his arms crossed, and Ransom, sitting in the folding chair next to hers. She could smell old coffee and stale cigarette smoke and something stuffy and rancid, like bad breath. And she remembered that day. She remembered the feeling of drowning, of sinking deeper and looking up, knowing she would never swim to the surface.

She turned back to Detective Black, her voice mechanical. “Someone robbed my father and killed him.”

Black was still leaning forward, his upper body angled toward her, as if they were alone. “Whoever did it used the same gun for these murders,” he said. “The ballistics will prove it.”

Beth held still, not looking away. This was another game. They didn’t have the ballistics report, not yet.

“Beth, tell the truth,” Black said. “We’re trying to help you.”

That was where he made a mistake, because she knew he was lying. She looked him in the eyes. “You don’t want to help me,” she said. “No one wants to help me. No one ever has.”

There was a second of quiet, the tape recorder the only sound. Detective Black actually looked surprised. He’d had a good life, she realized. Parents, maybe even grandparents, who loved him. A sibling or two. She could see it all: track team, stern but loving teachers, kisses behind the bleachers with a pretty girl. A few silly drunken experiences that were written off to high spirits, then losing his virginity to another pretty girl. Eventually, the police academy and making detective when he was barely thirty. He had the lean physique of a man who exercised instead of growing a paunch, and he didn’t smoke. He saw bad things, sure, but he was saving people and putting the bad guys away. Saving the world.

This case was a problem for him, but it was one he would solve. Because in the end, the world always turned out the way he wanted it to.

Beth thought of her empty house, quiet now that her parents weren’t screaming at each other anymore. She thought of the hours sitting alone in her room as a child, her hands over her ears, trying to make it all go away inside her head. She thought of her father’s blood all over the kitchen floor. A lake of blood, deep and red, because it had gurgled out of him as he died. It had taken a cleaning crew three days to remove it. Ransom had made the arrangements while Beth and her mother stayed at a hotel.

And when it was cleaned up, Beth and her mother moved back in.

She always thought the house smelled coppery after that. She saw shadows in the kitchen, smelled her father’s cologne mixed with blood. She was thought to be an improper young lady, because she couldn’t cook, could barely make toast that she washed down with wine. No one had considered that she simply hated the kitchen at the Greer mansion and couldn’t stand to be inside it.

Tell the truth. We’re trying to help you.

Detective Black had never been as angry as Beth was right now.

“Do you own a gun?” Detective Washington asked for the hundredth time. He hated her, but at least his anger was something she understood. When she didn’t answer, he said, “We know your father owned one.”

Under the table, Ransom touched Beth’s knee. Just the side of his pinky finger tapping her once—his keep-quiet signal.

Beth looked at Washington. “Fuck you,” she said, her voice icy-calm.

Washington looked like she’d slapped him, and Ransom sighed. “We’re leaving now,” he said. “This interview is over.”



* * *



—

Outside the police station, there were two photographers this time, plus a reporter shouting questions. Ransom looked unimpressed as he took Beth’s elbow and led her to his car.

“Damn the papers,” he said. “Some hack is writing a line about a ‘lady killer’ right this minute. I swear to God I’d like the world to surprise me, just once.”

Beth got in the passenger seat. “You have nothing to say about what I said back there?”

Ransom got in, the car bouncing with his weight. His seat was set as far back as it would go to accommodate his long legs. “It would have been better if you were a little more ingratiating, I admit,” he said, “but that was a low blow, so I’m not one to lecture.”

That was almost amusing. Ransom was very much one to lecture. “They’re going to hate me no matter what I do,” Beth said. “Don’t you see that? I could be sweet, and those ‘lady killer’ articles are still going to get written.”

Ransom looked thoughtful as he pulled out of the lot, narrowly missing one of the photographers. Beth thought it was probably an intentional near miss. “I do see that,” he said. “People need someone to take their problems out on. You see that a lot when you’re a lawyer. Since you’re young and rich and lovely, you’re as good a target as any. It’s only going to get worse from here.” He signaled and made a turn, heading up the hill to Arlen Heights. “All I ask is that you don’t employ your sailor mouth when talking to the media, and definitely not if you ever talk to a judge.”

“You think they’re going to arrest me,” Beth said.

“They very much want to arrest you. Two men are dead, and you’re their only lead. The ballistics report might convince a judge to sign a warrant, and it might not. That’s the gamble they have to take.”