AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“N-no. I mean, yeah, he came here, I guess. But….”
The word trailed off, and I made myself wait. She sounded far more upset than a simple argument should have made her, but I didn’t know the circumstances. Some people didn’t do well in confrontations.
Another breath, and then Chloe said, “I just found him dead in the living room.”
Chapter 6
HIT THE ROAD, JACK
By this point, Henry Lewis and I had been embroiled in so many murder investigations that he looked more resigned than anything as he stood there in the living room of Hazel’s Airbnb. Chloe was huddled into a corner of the flowered couch, and mercifully, several of his deputies and the EMTs on the scene had already removed Jack’s body to a waiting ambulance. Several more deputies were moving around the house, dusting for fingerprints and looking for whatever evidence they could find, which probably wouldn’t be very much. According to Chloe, she hadn’t even known Jack was here until she left the main bedroom to get herself a glass of water.
“So, you were asleep the whole time?” Henry inquired. Mixed with the resignation on his face was a bit of annoyance, probably at having to drag himself out of bed and come over here in the middle of the night.
Not that I could blame him. Then again, it was probably asking a bit much to request that any criminals in the area restrict their activities to normal business hours.
Chloe nodded. She’d asked me to sit on the couch next to her, but it seemed as though she didn’t want any more contact than that, because, after a brief hand squeeze as I seated myself, she’d wrapped her arms around herself as if to stay warm, even though the room was comfortable enough.
“Yes,” she said. Her voice shook, and I could tell she was doing her best to hold back tears, since she kept blinking. “I got back from dinner with Selena and Calvin and her parents a little after eight-thirty, and then I watched some TV and went to bed around ten.”
“You locked up after you got here?” Henry asked, and off to one side, Calvin shifted his weight from one foot to another. He hadn’t said much since getting to the house and obviously wanted Globe’s police chief to understand that he was here for me and Chloe, and not because he intended to interfere in any way.
Another nod. “I checked both the front and the back doors, and all the windows were closed because it wasn’t warm enough to keep them open.”
That was for sure. The days were just beginning to warm a little, but at this elevation, it would be months before the nights were comfortable enough to leave any windows open to catch a breeze.
“I’m not sure if the windows were locked, though,” she added, now looking worried. “This is my first night here, so I don’t know how everything works.”
Henry made a few notes on the yellow pad he held. I often wondered if he even bothered to consult those notes after he wrote them down, since it seemed to me that his memory was just fine for keeping track of the details of a case. For all I knew, that yellow pad wasn’t much more than a prop.
“So, you went to sleep, but then you woke up. Did you hear a noise?”
Her teeth tugged at her lower lip. Looking at her now, with her long hair pulled into a scrunchie and not a speck of makeup on her face, I thought she appeared barely old enough to drive, let alone have graduated from college.
“I don’t know,” she said after a pause. “I just woke up sometime after midnight. For a couple of minutes, I tried to go back to sleep, but then I realized I was thirsty and wanted to get a drink of water. Since I didn’t know the house very well, I flipped on the light in the living room on my way to the kitchen. And then — ”
She stopped there, but I had a feeling everyone listening knew exactly what was going through her mind.
And then she’d seen her ex-boyfriend’s body lying on the rug, and had panicked and called me.
Or rather, she’d done what I guessed a lot of people would have done, which was to reach out to the person she knew best in town rather than calling the police right away.
Obviously, as soon as I’d calmed her down enough to get a quasi-coherent story out of her, I’d told her I’d contact the authorities and that she should sit tight and not touch anything. When Calvin and I arrived at the house, the police were already there, since they had a much shorter distance to cover.
But as far as I could tell, Henry had waited for Calvin and me to get there, apparently thinking it would be better for Chloe to have a few familiar faces nearby while he conducted his interrogation.
Not that what he was doing could be called that, precisely. It seemed to me he was going pretty easy on my little sister, probably because she didn’t look like the sort of person who would kill a fly, let alone a human being.
“Was there any sign of forced entry?” I asked Henry, partly because I really did want to know the answer, and partly because it was obvious that Chloe needed a minute or two to collect herself.
His mouth tightened a little. Was he annoyed at me for questioning him?
Well, if he was irritated, it wouldn’t be the first time.
However, his tone was civil enough as he replied, “Not that we were able to tell. But I suppose the lock could have been picked by someone who knew what they were doing.”
I glanced over at Chloe, and she immediately shook her head. “Jack doesn’t…didn’t…know how to pick locks.”
Henry looked singularly unconvinced. “Are you sure about that?”
