“Did you know your sister was going to Kevin Crowder’s party?”
“When we talked earlier that day, she said she might stop in at a party after the game, but she didn’t say where. We didn’t hang out together, if that’s what you’re asking. I don’t know the guy, and even if I did, it would’ve been high school kids. Mostly jocks and their crowd.”
“So you wouldn’t know if she was seeing Matt Wentworth?”
“Who?
“Matt Wentworth. He was shot this weekend.”
“Oh yeah, I heard about him and Jason. Mal with a Wentworth? No way!”
“You and Mallory didn’t get along?”
“Look, if you’re asking me if I loved my sister, yes, I did. If you’re asking me if I thought she walked on water like everybody else did, then no, okay?”
“Is that why you didn’t pick up when you saw her name on the screen?”
He shrugged and Dwight sat silently, letting the awkward pause stretch out until Charlie Barefoot blinked first.
“We had a fight when we talked that morning and I was still mad at her,” he admitted, shame and sorrow in his downcast eyes.
“What about, Charlie?”
“N-nothing important. She thought I was being unfair to Da—” He caught himself. “To Malcolm. She didn’t like some of the things I said. She didn’t want me to change my name last spring and she didn’t want me to move out. She said it was a slap in Mom’s face, too. So we fought.”
“Did she leave a message?”
He nodded.
“I’d like to hear it, if you don’t mind.”
He reached into the pocket of his jacket and pulled out a DVD in a cardboard sleeve. “I downloaded it from my voice mail to my computer so I could save it, and I made a copy.”
Dwight reached for it, but Charlie seemed reluctant to let him have it.
“I didn’t listen to it till I was driving to the hospital after Mom called and told me about the accident. I let her listen to it at the hospital while Malcolm was charging around making sure everybody in the emergency room knew who he was and what he expected of them, then I made them a copy the next day. Wednesday.”
He laid the disc on the desktop and stood up. “I can’t stand to listen to it again, so I’m going to go now. If you want to ask me anything else, call me. And leave my mother out of it, okay? She doesn’t answer for me anymore.”
“One final question, Charlie. Was your sister into drugs?”
“Because of what Malcolm’s saying? No way, Major Bryant. As far as she was concerned, drugs—
Dwight gave a wry smile. “Too bad more of your generation doesn’t feel that way.”
“Our generation learned it from yours,” the boy said.
When Charlie Barefoot had gone, Dwight took the disc into the detective squad room, explained what it was, and called for a player.
Richards pointed to one atop a file cabinet and as soon as Dwight inserted the disc and pushed PLAY, the room filled with the sound of a car engine, Christmas music from the radio, and the dead girl’s voice.
There was a horrendous scream that seemed to go on forever above the music, interspersed by the thumps and bangs of the crash itself. For a moment or two all was quiet except for low whimpers and a half-whispered “Mommy?” that trailed off into silence.
Dwight started to push the eject button, but Richards said, “What was that?”
They listened to the ending again with the volume turned up to maximum.
“Is that a car engine starting up?” asked McLamb.
“And going away,” said Dalton. “Not passing.”
CHAPTER 23
MAJOR DWIGHT BRYANT— TUESDAY AFTERNOON, DECEMBER 23
When Dalton returned well before lunch, he brought enough of those plastic pieces that they could fit it together like a jigsaw puzzle. Although most of the edges were missing, enough remained that they could tell it had begun as a six-by-six-inch square with rounded corners. Obviously it had fit onto or over something, but what?
Just as clearly, someone—Jason Wentworth?—had smashed it with the barrel of Willie Faison’s rifle, which was how a shard got wedged inside.
