The Last Lie Told (Finley O’Sullivan, #1)(28)

“I went to the chief,” he said. “I told him I was concerned with the way the case was being handled.”

“You spoke to Chief Andrew Lawrence?” Not really a question. Lawrence had been the Metro chief of police for the past fourteen years.

Montrose nodded. “He reminded me what a good, dedicated detective my partner was and that I should take a lesson from him and maybe I’d be looking at a promotion in the near future.”

“Were you up for promotion?” Finley held back the fire that ignited. She didn’t know this man. Jumping to a particular conclusion based solely on his word wouldn’t be a smart move. But the chief was an easy target for her. She didn’t like him at all. He was more politician than police chief. It was, she admitted, part of the territory. Yet, somehow it still felt wrong.

Montrose shook his head. “No, and I never received one. I did get suspended. After that my wife begged me to suck it up and stick with the job until I could retire, and that’s what I did. At the end of my suspension, I transferred out of homicide and put in the rest of my time.”

“Why were you suspended?”

“Because I blew up in a meeting with the chief, the DA, and Jones. I made my concerns known again, and I paid the price.”

“This meeting included DA Briggs.” That fire began to build. Her right knee started to bounce a little.

“It did.”

Finley shot to her feet. “I’ll get those beers.”

Deep breath. Another. She had to be calm until she could verify this man’s statements. Although, she wasn’t sure how the hell she would manage that feat. She thought of Briggs’s personal assistant—she and Finley used to have lunch occasionally—but that was likely a no-go. Most of the friends—she used the term loosely—and sources she’d made while an ADA had dropped out of her life after her courtroom debacle.

She snagged the last two beers from the basically empty fridge and squared her shoulders before returning to the living room. She handed one to Montrose and resumed her seat on the sofa. A quick twist of the bottle top and she downed half the contents.

Slow, deep breath. “You were saying.”

Montrose sipped his beer. “That’s it.” Another swallow of beer, this one more substantial. “I said my piece, and that was that.”

“Why bring this information to me now?”

Another quick slug. “Because I believe it was a setup and maybe finally someone will do something about it.”

“You believe Charles Holmes is innocent?” Quite possibly innocent was a poor choice of words.

“Innocent?” He laughed. “The man is pure evil. He’s not innocent by any stretch of the imagination. But I don’t believe he killed Lance Legard. I believe he was hired by someone, or maybe he was covering for them. Either way, that someone needs to be behind bars with Holmes.”

Finley sipped her beer again, took her time, relished the distinct fizz. “The scenario doesn’t fit with his known MO, is that what you’re saying?”

At the time of Legard’s murder, Charles Holmes didn’t have a known MO. It wasn’t until all the evidence came back—connecting his DNA to five other crimes, two of which included murder—that he was labeled a repeat, nonserial homicide offender. He hadn’t sought out his victims. One victim had tried to rob him. The other was a man who’d attempted to have sex with Holmes’s then girlfriend. He confessed to all once the evidence was put in front of him.

That said, Charles Holmes had all the earmarks of a sociopath. He even had the traumatic childhood to blame for his antisocial personality disorder.

“That’s exactly what I’m saying,” Montrose confirmed. “The chances of him out of the blue deciding to take a joyride with the dead guy he’d just killed—it doesn’t work for me. He was too careful about protecting himself in his previous crimes. Why the sudden lapse in judgment with the Legard murder?”

As careful as Holmes had been about not getting caught in the past, he had left DNA at those previous crime scenes. A hair at one. A couple of blood droplets at another. Prints at three others. No big deal in his opinion. Since he hadn’t been caught, he wasn’t in the system. No witnesses. Nothing to fear.

“You’re suggesting he wanted to get caught that last time,” she offered.

“It’s the only reasonable explanation,” Montrose insisted. “If he wanted a joyride in a Jag, why not steal the car while the owner was asleep or at work? When he was pulled over by that state trooper, he hadn’t taken a single step to cover up what he’d done. The body, the blood . . . his prints. All right there. He wasn’t high or inebriated. He was stone-cold sober. Why? Unless he was covering for someone else or paid to take the fall?”

Finley couldn’t argue with his assessment. “You weren’t allowed to put this scenario into the file?”

Montrose moved his head side to side. “No.”

Finley moved on to her next question. “Do you have suspicions as to who the actual murderer was?”

“Sophia Legard. She would have done anything to get rid of her husband to protect her daughters.”

Finley leaned forward, her anticipation getting the better of her. “Did Mrs. Legard say something to you or your partner to suggest she felt her husband posed some threat to their daughters?”