“But he signed it?”
“Yeah. He was the only one who’d sign.”
“Are they high?”
“Who knows?”
“Nobody lawyered up?”
“Not yet.”
“Did the girl say anything?”
“Not a word. Wouldn’t sign the waiver, wouldn’t tell me her name. Just stared at me. Gave me fucking chills. I’d start with the dude.”
“Have they brought the young kid’s aunt in yet?”
“Yeah, but she’s not happy. She keeps harping about his clothes. She says he’s cold.”
“Fuck her.”
Fraley leaned back and stretched, thinking about the utter futility of what he was about to do. Since he couldn’t offer any kind of deal, there was absolutely no reason for any of them to talk to him. What did they have to gain by confessing? Nothing. What did they stand to lose by confessing? Everything. He put his palms on the table and pushed himself up. Pain shot up his lower back from the beginnings of arthritis in his hips.
“Might as well get to it,” he said as he moved to the sink and ran cold water over a dishrag. He glanced up at the clock. Nearly an hour had passed since the suspects had been placed in the interrogation rooms.
Fraley closed the door behind him as he walked into the room where Samuel Boyer was sitting. In one hand he held two plastic bags of clothing and the dishrag, in the other a manila folder. Boyer, still clad in the ridiculous- looking robe, was sitting with his head down on the table shivering, his cuffed hands clasped in front of him. Fraley tossed the bags of clothing down in front of Boyer.
“Sorry it’s so goddamned cold in here,” Fraley said. “Something’s wrong with the heat and we can’t get anybody to fix it until morning. I brought you your clothes, but I wasn’t sure which set was yours. You can put them on or you can sit there and freeze. Doesn’t matter to me.”
Boyer looked at the bags and reached for one. Slowly, he pulled on a pair of black jeans. Fraley unlocked Boyer’s cuffs briefly so he could put on a black sweatshirt. He pulled a pair of black boots out of the bag and looked at Fraley as if to ask whether he had permission to put them on.
“Go ahead,” Fraley said. “For all I know you might be leaving in a little while.”
Boyer pulled on a pair of socks and slid the boots over them.
“There. Feel better?” Fraley said.
Boyer didn’t respond. Fraley sat back and watched as Boyer dropped his head onto the table, into the same position he’d been in when Fraley entered the room. Fraley stood and walked to the door.
“Norcross!”
A moment later, the big man filled the doorway as Fraley sat down.
“This young man’s about to remove his clothes,” Fraley said. “Once he does, I need you to put them back in this bag and tag them.”
Fraley lifted the empty bag from which Boyer had removed the clothing and the boots. Boyer’s head came up off of the table. He looked at Fraley curiously.
“Go on now,” Fraley said. “Take everything back off and put your vampire robe on. I’ll let you keep it until we send you down to the jail.”
Boyer hesitated, obviously confused.
“Take those fucking clothes off now or I’ll have my buddy Glenn here rip them off your scrawny little ass!” Fraley yelled as he slammed a massive fist onto the table.
As Boyer began to remove his boots, Fraley allowed himself a smile. “I appreciate your help,” he said to Boyer. “I thought those clothes and those boots were yours, but it might have been hard to prove until you put them on.” He turned towards Norcross. “After dumb-ass here finishes taking off his clothes, take the other bag in there and do the same thing to the other dumb-ass. As soon as he puts the clothes on, make him take them off and turn the goddamn heat back up.”
After Norcross left the room and closed the door, Fraley tossed the dishrag onto Boyer’s forehead.
“Wipe that shit off your face,” Fraley said. “I want to see who I’m talking to.”
Boyer reached up with his cuffed hands and removed the rag from his face. He was a skinny kid, nothing but a sack of bones. He stared at Fraley for a second, then tossed the rag onto the table.
“The makeup’s coming off,” Fraley said. “If you don’t do it, I will. If I do it, I promise you won’t like it.”
Boyer lowered his head back onto the table. Fraley waited thirty seconds. Boyer didn’t move.
Fraley rose, picked up the rag with his right hand, and grabbed a handful of black hair with his left. He jerked Boyer’s head back and slammed it down, face-first. Boyer let out a groan. Fraley jerked Boyer’s head up again and began rubbing the rag roughly across his forehead. The greasy makeup smeared, but very little of it came off. Blood began to run from Boyer’s left nostril.
Fraley dropped the rag across Boyer’s nose and moved back to his seat. “You shouldn’t have resisted arrest back at the motel,” Fraley said. “You wouldn’t have gotten your nose broken.”
Fraley opened the manila file and took out some photographs. Two were close-ups of the Beck children after they’d been cleaned up, with grotesque black holes where their right eyes had been shot out. One was a photo of Bjorn Beck with his eye shot out and the “ah Satan” message carved into his forehead. Another was Anna Beck. All four photos clearly showed the inverted crosses carved into the necks of the victims.
“A little reminder of what you did,” Fraley said as he slid the photos, one by one, across the table.
Boyer, holding the rag to his nose, glanced at the photos and then closed his eyes. Tears were running down his face, lightly streaking the makeup like lines on a road map.
“Look at them or I swear to God I’ll staple your eyelids open,” Fraley said.
Boyer opened his eyes and at least appeared to be looking at the photos. His eyes were dark, nearly black, surrounded by pink. Fraley leaned back and folded his arms across his chest.
“We found the guns in the glove compartment of your car,” Fraley said calmly. “They’re going to match the bullets we found at two murder scenes. Our evidence guys are going through your car with a fine-toothed comb, including the trunk. We think you gave Norman Brockwell a ride out to the woods in the trunk of your car. They’re looking for little pieces of his skin, fingernails, saliva, hair, blood, anything they can find. And they’ll find plenty, won’t they? You know they will. You were too fucking stupid or too fucking high to clean it, weren’t you?
“We’re going to match the tread on your tires to the tracks we found out there in the woods where you tied Norman Brockwell to a tree and shot him. And those boots you just put on? My guess is they’re going to match up to footprints we found at both crime scenes, you pathetic little piece of shit.”
Boyer’s eyes had glazed over. He looked stunned. It was exactly what Fraley had been hoping for when he entered the room.
“And how do you think we found you in the first place? We’ve got a witness. Somebody already gave you up. Game’s over for you, Sammy boy. You’re going to get the death penalty. The death penalty. They’re going to strap you into the electric chair and cook you like a fucking Thanksgiving turkey. If we can keep you alive long enough. As soon as people around here find out we’ve arrested the gutless sonsabitches that slaughtered a couple of babies, they’re going to want blood.”
Fraley paused to let the words sink in.
“There’s only one way out for you,” he said, leaning forward. “Tell me what happened, tell me why it happened, tell me who was there besides you, and I’ll tell the district attorney you cooperated. You know how it works. You’ve been in the system. The first one to the district attorney’s office gets the deal.”
Boyer’s eyes rose to meet Fraley’s. He didn’t look like a cold-blooded killer. Sitting there with the streaks running through his makeup and his nose swollen and red, he looked like a scared, stupid clown.
Fraley picked up the photo of Bjorn Beck and pointed to the “ah Satan” carved into his forehead.
“And just what the fuck is this supposed to mean?” Fraley said. “Was this supposed to scare us?”
“What k-k-kind of d-deal w-w-will you g-give me?” Boyer said. They were the first words Fraley had heard him speak.
“Depends on what you have to say.” Fraley thought about what Dillard had said in the car: no deals. It didn’t matter. It wasn’t against the law for cops to lie to suspects during interrogation.
“Wh-where is sh-she?” Boyer said. His eyes moved slowly towards the door, as though he were trying to see
