Will said, “Lena told me you spoke with Lionel Harris last night?”
Suddenly, Frank seemed nervous. “Lionel doesn’t know anything.”
“Still, he might have some personal information about Allison.”
“Lionel’s daddy raised him right. He knows better than to be sniffing around a little white girl from the college.”
Sara felt her mouth open in surprise.
Frank shrugged off her shock. “You know what I’m saying, Sweetpea. There’s not a lot that a sixty-three-year-old black man has in common with a twenty-one-year-old white girl. At least not if he knows what’s good for him.” He nodded toward Allison. “What did you find?”
Sara couldn’t find her voice to answer him.
Will provided, “Knife wound to the neck. There’s no definitive cause of death yet.”
Will caught Sara’s eye. She nodded her complicity, though she still felt shocked by what Frank had said. He had never talked this way around her parents. Eddie would have shown Frank the door if Cathy hadn’t beaten him to it. Sara wanted to chalk it up to his exhaustion. He certainly looked worse than he had the day before. Every item of clothing he wore, from his cheap suit to his trench coat, was wrinkled as if he had slept in it. His skin sagged off his face. His eyes glistened in the light. And he still hadn’t taken off his leather gloves.
Will broke the moment. “Chief Wallace, have you completed your report yet on the incident in the garage?”
Frank’s jaw clenched tighter. “I’m working on it.”
“Can you run it through for me now? Just the highlights. I’ll get the details when you turn in your report.”
Frank’s voice was gruff, making it clear he didn’t like being questioned. “Tommy was in the garage with a knife in his hand. We told him to put it down. He didn’t.”
Sara waited for more, but it was Will who prompted, “And then?”
Frank gave another sloppy shrug. “The kid panicked. He pushed Lena out of the way. I went to help her. He came toward me with the knife, cut my arm. Next thing I know, Tommy’s tearing down the driveway. Brad went after him. I told Lena to go, too.” He stopped. “She sure took her time.”
“She hesitated?”
“Lena usually runs the other way when there’s a fire.” He glanced at Sara, as if he expected her to agree. In Sara’s experience, the opposite was true. Lena stood as close to the fire as she could. It was the best vantage point from which to watch people burn.
Frank continued. “She trotted after them. Brad ended up being the one to pay for it.”
Will leaned against the counter, one hand resting on the edge. His interview style was certainly unusual. Put a beer in his hand and he could be talking football around a barbecue. “Did anyone discharge their weapon?”
“No.”
Will nodded slowly, drawing out his next question. “When you opened the garage door, did Tommy already have the knife in his hand?”
Frank leaned down and pulled an evidence bag out of the cardboard box. “This knife.”
Will didn’t take the bag, so Sara did. The hunting knife was serrated on one side and sharp on the other. The hilt was large. The blade was at least five inches long and an inch and a half wide. It was a miracle Brad was still alive. Without thinking, she blurted out, “This isn’t the knife that was used on Allison.”
Will took the weapon from Sara. He gave her a look that Tommy Braham had probably gotten every day of his life. He told Frank, “This looks new.”
Frank gave the knife a cursory glance. “So?”
“Was Tommy a knife enthusiast?”
Frank crossed his arms again. There was a bead of sweat on his forehead. Even with the colder temperature in the basement, he seemed to be burning up in the coat and gloves. “Obviously, he had at least two. Like the doc said. This isn’t the same one that was used on the girl.”
Sara would have melted into the floor if she had the power.
Will asked, “What made you suspect Tommy was involved in Allison’s murder? Other than the knife in his hand?”
“He was in her apartment.”
Will didn’t offer any information to the contrary, but Sara saw that he’d managed to get a question answered. If Lena had talked to Frank, then she hadn’t mentioned that Tommy lived in the garage, not Allison.
Frank’s patience had obviously run out. “Listen, son, I’ve been doing this a long time. There’s two reasons a man does this to a woman: sex and sex. Tommy already confessed. What’s the point of all this?”
Will smiled. “Dr. Linton, I know you haven’t done a full exam on Allison Spooner, but are there any signs of sexual assault?”
Sara was surprised to find herself back in the conversation. “Not that I can see.”
“Were her clothes torn?”
“There was a tear in the knee of her jeans where she fell. Her jacket was cut by the knife.”
“Are there any other significant wounds except for the one in her neck?”
“Not that I’ve found.”
“So, Tommy wanted to have sex with Allison. She told him no. He didn’t tear her clothes. He didn’t try to force her anyway. He puts her on his scooter and takes her out to the lake. He stabs her once in the neck. And then he dumps her in the lake with the chains and cinder blocks, writes a fake suicide note, and goes back to clean up her apartment. Is that about right, Chief Wallace?”
Frank lifted his chin. Hostility radiated off him like heat from a fire.
Will said, “The note is what’s bothering me. Why not just dump her in the lake and leave it at that? It’s doubtful anyone would have found her. The lake is pretty deep, right?” He looked at Sara when Frank did not answer. “Right?”
She nodded. “Right.”
Will seemed to be waiting for an answer from Frank that wasn’t going to come. Sara waited for him to ask about the 911 call, the boyfriend. Will didn’t. He just kept leaning against the counter, waiting for Frank to say something. For his part, Frank seemed to be scrambling for an explanation.
He finally came up with “The kid was retarded. Right, Doc?”
Sara told him, “I wish you wouldn’t use that word. He-”
“It is what it is,” Frank interrupted. “Tommy was stupid. You can’t reason with stupid. He stabbed her once? So what. He left a note? So what. He was retarded.”
Will let Frank’s words hang for a few seconds. “You knew Allison, right? From the diner?”
“I seen her around.”
“Have you found her car yet?”
“No.”
Will smiled. “Did you process Tommy’s car?”
“I hate to break the news to you, Einstein, but the retard confessed. End of story.” He looked at his watch. “I can’t stick around jerking you off for the rest of the day. I just wanted to make sure you had all the evidence.” He nodded to Sara. “You can reach me on my cell if you need me. I gotta get back to Brad.”
Will didn’t protest the abrupt departure. “Thank you, Chief. I appreciate your cooperation.”
Frank couldn’t figure out if he was being sarcastic or not. He ignored the comment, telling Sara, “I’ll let you know about Brad,” before stomping out of the room.
Sara wasn’t sure what to say. Will had let all the important questions go unanswered. Jeffrey’s style of interviewing had been much more aggressive. Once he had Frank on the ropes, he would’ve never let the man walk out of the room. She turned to Will. He was still leaning against the counter.
She wasn’t going to ignore the hundredth elephant that had just walked into the room. “Why didn’t you ask Frank about the boyfriend?”
He shrugged. “An answer doesn’t really matter if it’s a lie.”
“I admit he was being an ass, but he was also being forthcoming.” She snapped off her gloves and tossed them into the trashcan. “Did it occur to you that he has no idea Lena’s been doctoring all this evidence?”
Will scratched his jaw. “I’ve found that people tend to hide things for different reasons. They don’t want someone else to look bad. They think they’re doing the right thing, but they’re really not. They’re actually hindering an investigation.”