The Cat, the Wife and the Weapon

“I only had one guy I hung with and he left for Duke a couple months ago,” Finn said.

“If you want to call him, you can use my phone anytime. Friends are important.” I was thinking about how smart Finn seemed, how polite and well spoken. He should be a freshman in college like his friend, not sitting in a police interrogation room. I was puzzled as to why he wasn’t in school, but then immediately realized this kid may not have had anyone to help him get into a university. My late husband had told me how he helped Kara every step of the way when she applied to college. But what did kids like Finn do when they distrusted almost everyone in the entire world? They retreated, hid in their rooms. And then, when they got the chance, they ran. Yes, I understood why Finn was now sitting in a police station and not at Clemson or Duke or UNC.

Candace came through the door, strands of hair flying free around her temples. She set a clipboard on the table. When she poured herself a cup of water, I noticed her hand shake.

She sat and smiled at Finn. “Okay. We needed to talk a little more and I’m glad you came.”

“Talk more about the gun?” Finn said. “I said I don’t know anything about it.”

She said, “We’ve already spoken about the weapon. I’d like more information about your relationship with your mother and stepfather.”

“Please quit using any word with father in it. He was Nolan. Just Nolan.” Finn reached for the pack of gum and took out another piece. He didn’t put it in his mouth, just turned the little white rectangle over and over between his fingers.

“I get you didn’t like him,” Candace said evenly.

“Haven’t I talked enough? I don’t know anything else.” Finn remained focused on the piece of gum he was fiddling with.

“Maybe we can go back to before you left home. You remember that much, don’t you?” Candace said.

Finn kept rolling the gum between his fingers.

“If Mr. Roth hadn’t been murdered,” she went on, “it wouldn’t be any of my business. But I have to do my job. We’re working together—you, Tom, Jillian, all of us—to find the killer. But I need more facts.” She tilted her head down, probably hoping he’d make eye contact.

He didn’t. “What did my mother tell you?”

“She said there were problems between you and Nolan,” Candace said.

Tom fidgeted in his chair as the topic turned to Hilary. “I’m not about to bad-mouth Finn’s mother, but take whatever my ex-wife says with a grain of salt.”

“What Tom’s trying to say is, she lies. All the time,” Finn said.

Candace pulled the clipboard toward her and poised a pen over the blank paper. “About what?”

“She lied about Tom after they broke up,” Finn said. “She told me he never wanted to see me again. Only took one text message to him for me to find out that wasn’t true. See, she thinks I’m stupid. Thinks I can’t figure things out for myself.”

“Did she and Nolan get along?” Candace said.

“I guess. But I pretty much stayed in my room since he got out of jail,” Finn said.

“How long ago was he released?” she asked.

“A year.” Finn finally put the second piece of gum in his mouth.

“You’re saying you hardly talked to him?” Candace said. “Things must have been tense around your house.”

Finn looked Candace straight in the eye for the first time. “Oh yeah. By the way, he was a bigger liar than she is. They deserved each other.” Finn blinked a few times and then said, “Sorry. He’s dead and no matter how big of a jerk he was, I didn’t want him to die.”

Tom rested a hand on Finn’s forearm. “Tell her why you left, Finn.”

Finn hung his head. “With my friends gone off to college, I got tired of being alone except for Yoshi. They wouldn’t even let him out into the rest of the house. He had to stay in my room. So I stayed with him.”

Tears stung my eyes at the thought of Finn and Yoshi alone in a bedroom, day after day.

“What else did you argue about besides your dog?” Candace asked.

“It’s hard to argue when you don’t talk to people,” Finn said.

“You did graduate from high school?” Candace asked.

“Yes,” he answered, sounding calmer now.

“If things at home hadn’t been such a mess he could have been first in his class,” Tom said.

“I know you’re a smart kid,” Candace said. “And you probably have information you don’t even realize—and nothing to hide, right?”

“Nothing to hide.” Finn’s face clouded with uncertainty. “At least nothing I can remember.”

Candace said, “Let’s see if I can help you put yesterday back together. What’s the very last thing you remember?”

Finn’s features seemed to relax since she’d switched her focus off his family. “I got a ride with a trucker in Greenville about midday. He was headed for Atlanta. Dropped me at a gas station in—I don’t remember the name of the place. I have maps and GPS on my phone, but I lost it somewhere. Anyway, I hitched another ride with some man in a U-Haul who said he was moving to Woodcrest. I knew Woodcrest was near where Tom lived. The guy let me off on the road into Mercy. Yoshi and I started walking. That’s the last thing I remember.”

“Somewhere between here and Woodcrest.” She scribbled notes on her clipboard. “Should be able to check the timing if we find the guy in the U-Haul. Must be you hit your head bad enough to get a concussion along the highway. You’re sure you don’t have a clue how it happened?”

Tom sighed heavily. “Candace, he’s told you what he knows. Give the kid a break.”

“I have one more request,” she said. “Fingerprints. Then y’all can leave.”

Tom nodded. “Knew that was coming. Let’s get it over with, then.”

“Be right back.” Candace left the room.

“That wasn’t too bad, was it?” I said.

“She didn’t keep on about my mother and Nolan, so I guess not,” he answered.

Tom said, “I hate to tell you this, but you’re gonna have to be more specific about why you left home sooner or later. Your mother was in with Chief Baca when Candace and I came back here with the gun. Hilary probably said plenty, not much of it true.”

“Do you know how long she’d been here?” I said.

“When Candace and I arrived with the gun, B.J. told me she’d been waiting around for almost an hour before she went in to talk to Chief Baca.” He turned to Finn. “Mike only has her version of why you ran, even though he was here last night and knows exactly what I think of my ex and her dead husband. My advice is to set Candace straight in as much detail as possible. But not yet. First I want to find out what cards Hilary’s already played. Mike will tell Candace and she can fill us in.”

Finn nodded solemnly.

Candace reentered the room holding what looked like a smartphone. Turned out it was a portable fingerprint scanner—a new evidence tool. No wonder she seemed happy. Candace loved anything to do with evidence. She was just finishing up with Finn’s prints when we heard a female voice, one I recognized immediately.

“Oh no.” Tom rubbed between his eyes with his thumb and index finger.

But Finn’s expression brightened. “Is that Nana Karen?”

Twelve

Finn rushed from the interrogation room and the rest of us followed. He flew through the gate dividing the hall from the front office and into the arms of Karen Stewart—Tom’s mother.

From their tight embrace, I could tell Karen clearly adored this kid and he seemed to love her, too.

Tom, who was standing next to me, said, “I should have fought for custody even though I wasn’t his real dad. He deserved more moments like this.”

“Is there any other family—like his biological father?” I asked

“Good question,” Candace said as she scrolled through the fingerprints she’d just scanned in. “Has he ever been in the picture?”