Casey was still having it out with Hutch when Peg Harrington called the house to say that they’d brought Joe Deale into the North Castle Police Department for questioning.
Everyone mobilized ASAP. Hope and Edward grabbed their coats. The remaining members of the task force did the same, including those with Sidney Akerman. The sketch artist was already packing up to move to the police precinct. Sidney was going with him. So was Patrick, who wasn’t about to miss one moment of this opportunity of hearing what Deale had to say.
Casey spoke to Peg on speakerphone. “I want to sit in on this,” she requested. “I think that’s fair, since I gave you the information.”
“Fine. You can sit in-on the other side of the glass,” Peg replied. “The police want Claire Hedgleigh to do the same. You can give us your expert opinions
“Fair enough.”
Once everyone dispersed, the only people remaining in the house were Special Agent Jack McHale, who was monitoring the phone, Vera Akerman, who’d gone up to her room to rest, and Ashley Lawrence, who was weeping silently in the kitchen.
Joe Deale was ready to wet his pants by the time the FBI agents walked into the interrogation room two hours later. He’d had plenty of time to think. And he had plenty to hide. No matter how he played this, he was screwed. If he spilled his guts, he’d go to jail. And, if he kept his mouth shut, there was no way the mob would believe he hadn’t talked. So the options were being locked up or being killed.
Locked up seemed like the lesser of two evils.
“Hello, Joe,” Peg Harrington said as she and Ken Barkley finally entered the interrogation room, armed with documents, and took their seats across from him at the table. The North Castle Police Department’s building was small, since crime there was low. And the interrogation room was bare bones.
“Why am I here?” Joe demanded. “I was paving a bridge. Last I heard, that wasn’t illegal.”
“No, but working for organized crime is.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Sure you do,” Ken said. “You’ve done all kinds of ugly little deeds for your mob friends at Bennato. Shakedowns, violent reminders of monies owed, drug deals-I could go on and on.”
Sweat broke out on Joe’s forehead. “You’ve got no proof.”
“Proof is a relative thing,” Ken replied. “For instance, we’ve got a couple of dealers who’d be delighted to identify you as their heroin connection in exchange for a lighter sentence. And one of my associates says he dug up a witness who saw you hanging around a stolen car that ultimately ended up at a Mafia-affiliated chop shop.”
“Their word against mine. Those guys would trade their mothers for a lighter sentence.”
“True.” Peg leaned forward and took over. “But the stacks of cash taped to the underside of your chest of drawers aren’t up for debate. They’re very real, and very incriminating for a man who makes barely more than minimum wage.”
“You were in my house?” Joe gripped the edge of the table, trying to look outraged. But his hands were shaking. “That’s illegal. It’s breaking and entering.”
“Not with a search warrant, it isn’t. The North Castle police got one more than an hour ago. Given the circumstances, the warrant was issued faster than you can say La Cosa Nostra. We’ve got more than enough to hold you.”
“The money is Claudia’s. She asked me to keep it for her.”
“Nice try.” Peg folded her arms across her breasts. “Let’s stop playing games, Mr. Deale. You can sit here all night while we compile the evidence we need to charge you. You can walk out of here and take your chances on the streets. Or you can talk to us now. Because, quite frankly, your two-bit dealings with the mob are a blip on our radar. This, however, is a whole lot more…”
Peg reached for the table, flipping the architectural plans for Krissy’s school faceup. She shoved them across the table and practically into Joe Deale’s face. “What are you doing with this?”
Joe blinked. “It was a job I worked on.”
“For which you have the plans?”
“I was responsible for providing the right number of containers of tar. So the foreman made me a copy of the plans with dimensions, and I brought them to our supplier. I forgot I even had them.”
“So if we questioned your foreman, he’d tell us the same story?”
“If he remembers me being there, yeah. What’s so important about these plans?” Joe stared at the designs, and realization erupted across his face. “This is that school Judge Willis’s little girl was kidnapped from. You still think I had something to do with that?”
“You’ve got to admit, it looks pretty damning. The diagrams, the cash, the connections.”
“Why would Bennato want to kidnap a kid?”
“I tell you what. Why don’t we send you back out there to ask him?”
Joe went sheet-white. “Please. Don’t do that. I’ll be dead by tonight.”
“Probably. Which makes jail a much safer choice. Tell us where Krissy Willis is, and we’ll put a guard outside your cell.”
“I don’t know!” Joe hollered. “I didn’t take that kid! Neither did Claudia. She resented the hell out of Judge Willis for firing her. But she’d never hurt a child. And even if I did do all the other things you just said-which I’m not admitting I did-I never touched a kid.
“He’s telling the truth,” Casey murmured on the opposite side of the glass. “His entire body language is screaming it. Direct eye contact. Offensive posture. Whole body aligned with his words. He’s not clever enough to fake all that.”
“I agree.” Claire was eyeing Joe intently. “I’m picking up a fair amount of negative energy, so my guess is that the FBI is right about his ties to the mob. But I’m not sensing any real evil. He’s not a sociopath. And he didn’t kidnap Krissy.”
“Then who did?” Casey ran her fingers through her hair in frustration. “I feel like we’re speeding down streets that look promising, but coming up against one dead end after another. We know the main road is close by, but we just can’t reach it. The past and the present are related. I know it-I just can’t get at how.”
Claire angled her head slowly until she faced Casey. “I don’t know what it means, or if it’s related to anything you just said. But I had the oddest dream the other night. It was about Krissy’s stuffed panda.”
