“Yeah, well. I don’t know what the fuck-pardon, ma’am-what the hell happened. That carving in Jerry’s stomach freaked me out.”
Marcus took the Ziploc bag, turned it over and over in his hands. The pills inside clinked together softly. Still playing with the bag, he raised his eyebrow and spoke.
“Theo, there’s more, isn’t there? You can tell us. You’ve told us almost everything anyway. We understand what you were doing, and I have to tell you, man, I’m damn impressed. You showed a great deal of maturity and bravery here today. But there’s something you aren’t sharing with us.”
He shook his head, eyes miserable. “I don’t know what you mean. I’ve told you everything I know.”
“No, you haven’t. You automatically assumed the Ecstasy was the culprit, that the kids who were murdered had taken it. You said you thought Jerry had OD’d. Why would you draw that conclusion?”
Theo scuffed his foot into the deep burgundy Aubusson rug. He was wearing Doc Marten boots, which didn’t quite fit with his preppy exterior. They let him have a moment. There were answers to be found here.
Theo cleared his throat, but the words came out in a whisper.
“We might have heard that someone was planning to screw with us.”
“Screw with who?”
Theo rounded his hand in a circle. “Us. The jocks. The cool kids. The popular ones. Whatever ridiculous cliche you want to call us. We were the target, and whoever did this got us good.”
“Who made the threats?”
“I don’t know. But look around you. Whoever it was managed to take out two cheerleaders, the captain of the wrestling team and four members of the student council. I don’t know who this last chick was, but she probably had an in with us somewhere. If Daisy and I hadn’t gotten the word out, who knows how many more of us would have died?”
“You’re sure this wasn’t some sort of prearranged event?”
“You mean like Jonestown? Or Heaven’s Gate? I hardly imagine revolutionary suicide has found its way into Hillsboro.” At her incredulous look, he explained. “I did a paper on cults for history last year. My dad’s interested in that kind of stuff.”
“Okay. Yes, that’s exactly what I’m wondering about.”
“I can’t see it. No one from this crowd was into anything more than the occasional good time, if you know what I mean.”
“Do you think someone you went to school with would be capable of killing?” Marcus asked.
“I don’t know. Honestly, I don’t know.”
“Could it have been this dealer you’re talking about?”
The kid was getting frustrated now-small lines appeared in his forehead. “I swear to you, I don’t know who was behind it. It was one of those vague rumors that floats around. I don’t know where he gets his drugs, but he’s always got a ready supply. Whoever he buys from could be involved, too.”
“So why the pentacles carved into their stomachs? Do you know anything about that?”
He looked up, startled. “It was more than just Jerry?”
Taylor nodded. “Yes. All the victims had been cut perimortem. That means at the time of death.”
“I know. I watch Forensic Files, ” he said with such disdain she nearly laughed aloud. The DNA generation. Taylor saw it more and more lately, people who watched CSI and Law amp; Order and thought they were experts on crime. It was damned inconvenient-the prosecutors had the worst of it. Every jury seemed to think that DNA was the magic bullet, the only way to acquit or convict and still sleep at night.
“Sorry,” Theo said. “I’m just a little stressed. I assume you’re going to arrest me now?”
“Because of the drugs?”
“Yes,” he said, squaring his shoulders. He stood up straight and put his hands together in front of him so she could cuff him.
Taylor looked him deep in the eye, and he bravely took her gaze. She could see his lower lip trembling just the tiniest bit.
“Right now, Theo, you’re more of a help than a threat. Would you be willing to come down and make a formal statement? Maybe look at some pictures, see if you can pick the dealer out for us?”
“You’re not going to arrest me?”
“Not at the moment, no.”
“Oh, thank God.” He dropped his hands to his side. “Yes, of course. I’ll do anything you need.”
“Okay, then. I can’t promise that you won’t have some sort of charges filed against you eventually, but I’ll do everything I can to make sure there are mitigating circumstances. What I really need is for you to get some information on who might have threatened your clique. Think you could do that for me?”
The proud man inside him finally deflated completely, and he looked young, vulnerable. She could see the child peeking out behind the face of the man he’d become today.
“Yes, ma’am. I’ll do whatever you need me to. Thank you, ma’am.”
Taylor sent Theo back out to the crowd, shut the door behind him. She sat back in the chair and sighed deeply.
“Do you believe him?” she asked Marcus.
“I want to say yes, but I’d have to talk with him some more. He’s scared, scared enough that he’s willing to face charges to get to the bottom of this. Of course, he also placed the blame squarely on an unidentified person, someone we can’t touch. We have to get the drugs tested-he might have saved a number of lives today.”
“Or he’s our dealer and he’s covering his ass. A prepossessed young man, Mr. Howell.” She took the plastic bag from Marcus. “I need to get these taken into evidence and to the lab. Tim Davis can do a workup for us pretty quickly, see if there’s anything in these pills that might have caused an OD in those kids. But who went behind and carved the pentacles in their stomachs? What the hell was that about?”
“That’s one question. But there’s another, I think. How would the killer know which kids had taken the drugs and which hadn’t?”
She stood up. “That’s what I was wondering. I’m getting more and more convinced that our suspect knows these kids very well. Let’s get these pills to Tim, then see where we stand.”
They found McKenzie and stepped out onto the front porch to compare notes.
“What did you hear from the kids? Anything that will help?” Taylor asked.
McKenzie nodded. “The girls, Chelsea and Rachel? Supposedly they were feuding-the general consensus was complete surprise that they’d been found together.”
“Teenage girls,” Taylor said, shaking her head. “They fight and make up, fight and make up. That’s why I always preferred being friends with boys. You always knew where you stood.”
McKenzie’s eyes twinkled at her. “Yeah, I know what you mean. Anyway, that’s what I’m hearing. They were best friends, did most everything together when they weren’t fighting. Other than the most recent spat, they were a close-knit group-Rachel, Chelsea and Ashley Norton. Tight as ticks. They all know Brandon Scott and Jerry King. Xander Norwood seems to have been the de facto leader of the cool kids, the one everyone wanted to be friends with. You can tell who was close to him and who wanted to be, but everyone loved him. I doubt our suspect felt the same, of course.”
“Theo Howell mentioned a threat against the group. Did anyone else mention that?” Taylor asked.
“Just Daisy Howell,” McKenzie answered. “She’s too upset to make much sense-she was friends with all the girls, as well. She said there’d been a rumor floating around that something was coming, just underground rumblings. No one really took it seriously. It’s high school. There’s always some sort of drama going on. If it doesn’t affect them directly, they ignore it.”
“Good work, guys. We need to finish interviewing the victims’ families, see if we can piece together a timeline for these kids once they left school at noon today. See who they came into contact with, either on their way home or once they arrived. Crime Scene’s been taking evidence from all the scenes, and there’s plenty to keep us busy. Let’s get to it.”
Twelve
