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“For the first ten minutes, she just stared at me like a gotdamn lunatic. Wouldn’t talk, just sat there, staring. By the third time I yelled at her to open her mouth, she told me how she really felt about me. Not that I was surprised. That girl loved her mother. Never really gave a shit about me.”
“That happens when you beat on a woman and yell at her child,” Davis growled.
Arnold laughed bitterly. “You don’t know about me.”
“I know enough. What did she say?”
“Said I ruined her life. That she lost her mother because of me. That not being able to keep my dick in my pants was the beginning of the end. I told her she didn’t know shit. She was a kid. Couldn’t begin to understand what went on between her mother and me. She yelled some shit about me being a fucking cheat and a liar. That all men were cheaters and not worthy of being loved by women. I told her that her mother was a weak disappointment who didn’t know shit about pleasing a man. Told her to make sure she did, or she’d end up just like the bitch. Broken, useless, swallowing a bottle of pills, and slitting her own wrists like my sorry-ass wife.”
Davis was floored. It took everything in him not to lunge across the table and smash the guy’s face into it. How could any man, any father, say such horrible things to their own kid? If Tia was as messed up as Davis believed her to be, Arnold had played a significant role in why she was. It didn’t have a damn thing to do with Cassidy.
“You really are a sick son of a bitch. You deserve exactly what you got.”
“So did Kami and her mother.”
Davis felt his fists curl into a ball but needed to get whatever else he could from Arnold first. “What else did she say?”
“That’s about all. Just wanted me to know what a piece of shit I was. How I ruined her life, and that I was the reason she lost her mother. I don’t see what the fuck she’s complaining about. They told me she was adopted. Came here not long after her mother killed herself and forced me to sign over my parental rights. With them fancy-ass clothes she wore in here, it looks like she got the better deal. From what I can tell, she did good for herself.”
“And you did it?”
“Did what?”
“Signed over your parental rights?”
“Why the fuck wouldn’t I? The day I landed here, nothing out there mattered anymore. Not her or her mother. No one else but me. I had to worry about myself . . . deciding how to stay alive because the people in here believed all the shit they heard about me and weren’t going to make my stay any easier.”
“Good, because everything they’ve heard is true, and you need to pay for your sins every minute of every day while you’re still breathing.”
Arnold smiled. “You sound just like that crazy-ass daughter of mine. She said the same thing. They brainwashed her just like they brainwashed that gotdamn jury.”
Davis pushed away from the table and stared down at Arnold. “They got it right this last time. You’re where you need to be. You’re gonna die in here. Sooner rather than later, I hope. Maybe I’ll see what I can do to expedite the matter.”
After a hard stare, Davis turned to walk away. Arnold spoke up once he got to the door and knocked so the guards could let him out.
“You never told me why you were here, Detective. Why are you asking questions about my girl? She finally make good on that promise?”
Davis frowned, turning to face Arnold again. “What promise?”
“That the bitch who lied to her would get what was coming to her too. Seems the apple doesn’t fall too far from the tree.”
“Who was she referring to?”
“That shrink lady she talked to. She testified that Kami lied, and it pissed her off. Apparently, the woman promised to make sure everything worked out like it should have. Kami believed her. So did my wife because right before she slit her wrists, she told my girl that she was to blame for me being in here and the reason why she downed that bottle of pills. Said Kami let her down and tore our family apart. One thing I can say about my wife is that she was a sorry excuse of a woman, but she loved me more than anything. Would do anything I told her to. Even killed her damn self because I made sure she knew she didn’t deserve to live if I was in here.”
His smile was devious. Davis turned and left the room, knowing that with a family like the one she had been given, Tia was cursed from the day she took her first breath.
As soon as he was in the car, he dialed the precinct.
“Jones.”
“I need a bolo out on Tia Murphy. I’ll send over her picture, and I need you to send uniforms to sit on my house.”
“What’s going on, Davis?”
“I’m pretty sure Tia Murphy is the one who killed Cass’s husband.”
“Pretty sure isn’t good enough. You’re gonna have to do better than that if I make that call, and why the hell do you need officers to sit on your house?”
