Missing Pieces(29)

“Amy.” Sarah reached out for her hand. “Please sit down. Let them check you over.”

Amy slapped her away. “Get out. All of you, get out of my house. Now.”

“Are you refusing treatment, ma’am?” an EMT asked.

“Damn right, I am,” she said, bringing one shaky hand to her head and recoiling at the matted, wet mess she found. “I have the flu. That’s all. I didn’t make it to the bathroom.” Amy’s lips trembled as her outrage shifted to embarrassment. “Go, please,” she added softly.

“I’m afraid I can’t do that, ma’am,” the deputy said. He snapped latex gloves over his hands. He lifted the box that contained the plastic bag and hooked metal object with a wooden handle, and tilted it toward Amy so she could view the contents. “We need to talk about what’s in this box.”





7

WHEN THE EMTS left and the crowd of neighbors dispersed and went home, Sarah and the sheriff’s deputy remained. Sarah realized she hadn’t called Jack like she told him she would and he must have been worried sick.

“I’m going to need to ask you some questions, Amy,” said the deputy.

“I want you to leave,” Amy said shortly. “Both of you. And I don’t have to talk to you,” she said to the deputy. “I’m sick and all I want to do is take a shower and go to bed.”

“I’m afraid that you’re going to have to talk to me,” the deputy said, his patience beginning to grow short.

Amy narrowed her eyes as she looked in the box. “Is that blood?” she asked in disgust.

Sarah came up behind Amy and peered over her shoulder into the box and her hand flew to her mouth. The metal hook was covered with a rusty-colored substance that looked very much like dried blood.

“And hair,” the deputy added, nodding toward the long, silvery filaments that clung to the hook.

“That isn’t mine,” Amy insisted.

“Well, it’s been found on your property,” the deputy said. “So unless you can tell me where it came from and how it got here, you’ve got a problem.”

Amy’s eyes darted back and forth between the deputy and Sarah. “It isn’t mine,” she repeated more forcefully.

“Amy, let me call Jack or Dean,” Sarah said earnestly. “Don’t say anything else.”

Amy shot her a look that told Sarah she didn’t want or need her help.

“Okay, then,” the deputy said, pulling out his phone. “I’m declaring this house a crime scene. You,” he said, pointing at Sarah, “need to leave the premises immediately. And you,” he said to Amy, who finally had the sense to look nervous, “need to take a seat.”

“Amy, don’t say anything until you get a lawyer,” Sarah advised. “Do you understand?”

“I don’t need a lawyer,” Amy said defiantly as the deputy ushered Sarah out of the house through the damaged front door.

Sarah pulled out her phone and saw that she had several missed calls from Jack. She pressed the call button and he picked up on the first ring.

“Sarah,” he said, relief flooding his voice. “I was getting worried. What’s going on?”

Sarah wasn’t sure where to begin. “Amy’s fine. Sort of. She’s alive.”

“Alive?” Jack exclaimed. “What happened?”

Sarah paced along the curb in front of Amy’s house, careful to stay off the property. “She’s not hurt and she’s at the house. But a sheriff’s deputy is questioning her.”

“Why? What for?” Jack asked in confusion. “Sarah, what the hell is going on?”

“I’m trying to tell you,” Sarah cried impatiently. “All I know is that the deputy found some kind of tool covered with dried blood and hair in a box in Amy’s living room. He’s declared the house a crime scene.”

Two more law-enforcement vehicles turned onto Amy’s street. Behind the wheel of one of them was Sheriff Gilmore. “Jack, I think Amy needs a lawyer. You need to come right away.”

Jack arrived at Amy’s house but the deputy wouldn’t let him inside. The house was a crime scene and Amy was being questioned.

Sarah and Jack sat in the rental car and waited. After an hour and a half, Sheriff Gilmore had the decency, Sarah thought, to come out to talk to them. He hunched over the side of the car, leaning his arms on the open window. “Amy says she doesn’t want a lawyer,” he said.

“Can’t you make her get one?” Jack asked.

“We’re not in the business of getting lawyers for the people we interview,” Gilmore said with amusement. “Just doesn’t work that way.”

“I mean,” Jack said in irritation, “Amy was drunk. Can she even be considered competent to answer questions in that state?”

“Amy may have been drinking and imbibing in certain pharmaceuticals, but as Sarah here can also attest to, most of it ended up on the sofa.”

“This isn’t funny, Sheriff,” Jack said in a low voice.

“I never meant to give you the impression that I thought this is funny. In fact, this is dead serious, Jack. A bloody bale hook was found in there—” Gilmore pointed to the house “—and your sister just happened to be the one who found her at the bottom of the stairs. Your sister is free to ask for an attorney at any time but she has already told us she doesn’t want one.”