“Brian Padget?” I said as I approached, followed by the others. “I’m Lieutenant Joe Gunther, of the Brattleboro Police Department. I have a warrant to search your home for illicit drugs.”
A small crease appeared in the middle of his forehead as he stepped to one side of the open door. “I heard you were doing the internal.”
“That’s right. This is different.” I turned to introduce Kunkle and Tyler. Everyone nodded awkwardly in greeting. Emile Latour hovered in the background, waiting until we’d actually entered the building.
“It’s okay,” Latour said from where he stood. No one looked at him, and the meaninglessness of his words floated in the air like a pall.
We crossed the threshold and split up. The warrant specified the toilet tank, or any other likely hiding place, so I went to the bathroom first, hoping to settle the issue quickly. The search would be thorough in any case, but at least the suspense would end if I found what we were after. Latour kept Padget company in the living room.
The discovery was anticlimactic. I found the bathroom between the one bedroom and the central hall, went straight to the tank, lifted its lid, and immediately saw the plastic bag in its depths, weighted down by a stone.
Tyler appeared with a small evidence kit and, wearing gloves, extracted the bag, opened it, tested its powdery contents in a small vial, and quietly announced them to contain cocaine.
“How much, do you think?” I asked him.
He knew what I was after. “It’s a felony possession, Joe. Way over two and a half grams.”
I left him and Willy to finish the job and returned to the living room, carrying the bag in a second plastic envelope Tyler had supplied. Padget and Latour were standing awkwardly by the window, each one silently looking in opposite directions. As I approached, Latour moved off.
I showed Padget the bag. “Recognize this?”
“No.”
“It was hidden in your toilet tank. It’s cocaine.”
He pursed his lips. “It’s bullshit. I don’t know anything about it.”
“We were told by a source that you’re a regular user of the stuff.”
“He’s full of crap.”
“I didn’t say it was a man.”
His eyes widened slightly. “Then she’s full of crap.”
I hefted the bag in my hand. “Listen carefully. This is a felony amount. If we stick you with it, and we’re nine-tenths there, you’re looking at the end of a career and jail time both. Your only way out is to come up with an explanation that’ll clear you. That does not include repeating that you’re innocent. Do you hear what I’m saying?”
Padget lifted both hands, palms up. “I don’t know what else to tell you. I don’t know anything about that stuff.”
I took his elbow and sat him on the couch, perching myself on the coffee table opposite him, so our knees were almost touching. “You tested positive for coke, your polygraph came up zero, and now this. If you don’t know anything about how all that happened, you better think of someone who does.”
Fear and longing were all I could read in his face now. He was hunched forward, his hands between his knees, the paleness of his face harshly contrasting with a mild case of acne. His forehead was damp. “There is nobody else.”
“What about the reason I was brought up here in the first place?”
He looked shocked at the mere suggestion. “Jan? She’d never do that.”
“How ’bout her husband?”
His mouth partly opened, but what he said reflected how distracted he was. “Why did I come up positive?”
The incredulity in his voice was palpable-and believable-but I needed to keep him on track. “Who have you had over here lately? Jan?”
He blinked a couple of times. “No. My neighbors are almost in my face they live so close. We thought it was too risky.”
I remembered how Anne Murphy had spotted them making out in an alleyway. They could have spared themselves the discomfort. “Where did you meet, then?”
“Cars, back streets, the woods, a motel room a couple of times. It was always real quick. We were scared we’d get caught.”
“So you haven’t had anybody here, in this house?”
“No, not really.”
“What’s that mean?”
“My parents stayed over once, and Emily’s been here to pick me up when my car was in the shop.”
“That’s Emily Doyle, from your department?”
He nodded dumbly.
“How long ago was that?”
“A couple of weeks.”
“What was wrong with the car?”
“It was running rough. The garage guy said he found water in the gas, so he cleaned it out and tightened a hose fitting.”
“When Emily came over, did she wait outside?”
“Not always.”
“Did she ever use the bathroom?”
Padget sat back as if I’d pushed him, and stared at me as if I’d lost my mind. “Emily? No fucking way.”
I answered him angrily. “Keep your eye on the ball, Padget. You’re the guy with a one-way ticket to jail right now. The more you tell me what saints all your friends are, the more you look like a total chump. If you’ve been screwed, then somebody did the screwing. Remember who filed the sexual harassment claim against you?”
He flushed. “She was forced to by her husband.”
“Would you let someone force you to get a friend fired from his job?”
He shook his head as if trying to ward me off. “He’s got her under his thumb.”
“What did she tell you about him?”
“Just that she wanted to be free of him. That she felt she couldn’t breathe when he was around. She wanted to be with me-to run away.”
I could almost hear the words in Jan’s own voice, and see her face as she uttered them-pleading, desperate, clinging. They were clichés common to those who knew they carried no weight. “Did she tell you he dealt drugs?”
“Not directly. I didn’t ask and she didn’t say. She wanted our time together to be free of him. But I knew he did. Everybody knows. We were all dying for him to make a single mistake so we could nail him.”
“Didn’t it cross your mind you were sleeping with the best witness against him?” I asked harshly.
It was a mistake, of course. I was too far from his age to remember what that kind of love demanded of a person-how stupid it could make you.
He gave me a pitying look. “I wouldn’t do that.”
I’d blown it already, but I tried one last time. “Brian. Not everybody treats friendship the way you do.”
He stood up, almost knocking me over, and retreated to the window. His frustration made him throw out his arms and shout. “I’m not a kid, okay? I know there’re assholes out there. I deal with them all the time. I’m good at my job and I know how to read people, so don’t give me a lecture. I don’t know how the fuck that shit got in here, or in me, but I didn’t have anything to do with it. Norm Bouch is who you want, not Emily or Jan. Norm Bouch has been giving us the finger since the day he hit town.”
He stopped abruptly and looked around wildly for a moment. Latour, who’d been leaning against the open door, suddenly straightened and stated Brian’s name.
I rose to my feet as Padget slowly settled down on his own. Both Willy and J.P. appeared from the back of the house. I glanced at them inquiringly. Both shook their heads.
“Okay, Brian,” I said. “I’ll leave you alone. We’ll finish up here as quick as we can. You’re not under arrest, since I’m assuming you’ll stay put, but you’ll be cited to appear for arraignment on this.” I waved the bag of coke in the air. “If you can afford a lawyer, you better get one, otherwise the court will appoint a public defender. It’s up to your chief to decide whether your suspension will be with or without pay.”
I moved toward the door, feeling a sudden need for fresh air, stifled by my own officiousness. But I paused on the threshold. “You might line up a mental health counselor, too. The shit is going to hit the fan on this-no way around it-and you’re going to feel like you’re the only guy on the face of the earth before it’s done. You better figure out how to deal with it. And for Christ’s sake, once you’ve cleared the fog from your head, think about who might’ve done this to you. I’ll do the best I can, but I’m going to need all the help I can get.”