“Maybe you should just mind your own business.” He glared furiously at Rachette. Then he blinked, as if catching himself, and he flushed a deep red. “I don’t need to be here anymore.” He stood up and walked to the door. “I know enough about the law to know that. What the hell? It’s locked? Open this up.” He pounded on the door.
Wolf got up, pulled his key ring and opened it. “If we have any more questions—”
“—If you have more questions, you can talk to my lawyer, who I’m going to get right now.” McBeth walked out through the observation room, Yates holding open the door to the squad room for him.
Rachette sat motionless, hands still up in the air. “Sorry.”
Yates let the door close. “Nice work, you nosy bastard.”
“Let’s take five,” Wolf said. “Then who’s next?”
“Whoever you want. We have Koling and Sexton next door,” Yates said.
“No Lizotte?”
“He called and said he couldn’t make it. Had to work.”
“Send in James Sexton. And then find Mary Ellen Dimitri and this Rick Hammes guy. And anything we have on him and his shooting up a truckload of teenagers. Have you heard of him?”
Yates tilted his head in thought. “It’s not ringing a bell for me. Must have been taken care of by the Ashland office and it didn’t filter up to us? I don’t know.”
“Anyway, get on the phone with Oakley’s girlfriend and this Hammes guy and tell them we’ll be coming to talk to them this afternoon.”
Yates nodded. “Yes, sir.”
Chapter 7
“Thank you for coming to speak with us,” Wolf said, shaking James Sexton’s hand. Every one of the man’s fingernails was in some stage of growing back from being ripped, split, or peeled off altogether.
“You’re welcome.” Sexton was of average height and build, with a clean-shaven face. His lack of facial hair was in stark contrast to his fellow miners.
Sexton sat down, his clear blue eyes flicking between the camera mounted on the ceiling and the recording device on the table.
“We’ll be recording this interview for our investigation,” Wolf said.
“Right.”
“Cup of coffee?” Rachette asked.
“No, thanks.”
Wolf put on a smile, noting Sexton’s eyes still on the recorder. “So where did you learn to drive a tractor like that? Formula One school or something?”
Sexton cracked a smile himself, although it was short-lived. “No. Just…had a lot of experience, I guess.”
“You grew up mining?” Wolf asked.
“No. Not really. Just, used a lot of tractors up on the ranch in Wyoming.”
“Oh, really?” Wolf asked. “What ranch is that?”
“Place up in Jackson. Actually, the McBeth family ranch.”
Wolf nodded. “Really.”
Sexton sat stone-faced.
“Right. Well, we’ll visit that subject later I guess. Right now I’d like to talk about your work history at the mine. You’ve been working there with McBeth for three years now?”
“That’s right. I’m the mechanic.”
“Is that right.”
“Yes sir. Among other things.”
“Like what?”
“Like, everything. We all do everything. The digging, the rock trucks. Night shifts.”
Wolf nodded. “I understand. And how do you feel about how the mining operation is going right now?”
Sexton shrugged.
“Could you please answer for the recording?”
“Yeah, I don’t know. We’re not finding much gold right now. But we did pretty good the first year. It’s just a matter of time until Eagle puts us back on the gold.”
Wolf nodded. “You have faith in Mr. McBeth’s operation.”
“Yeah. He knows what he’s doing.”
“So, you’re not upset about not getting paid right now.”
“No.” Sexton shrugged. “More important things than money.”
“I agree,” Wolf said. “And what about Chris Oakley. Was he upset about not getting paid?”
“Yeah. He was. What’s that gotta do with his death, though?”
“We’re just trying to get to the bottom of what happened to him,” Wolf said.
“So he was murdered?”
Wolf chose not to answer for a beat. Sexton stared at him without blinking.
“What makes you think he was murdered?” Wolf asked.
“Not sure why you’d be talking to us like this if you didn’t think he was.”
Wolf tilted his head. “What happened after Lizotte dumped Chris’s body up on top of that wash plant? Who climbed up and looked to see who it was?”
Sexton’s eyes narrowed, then blinked. “We knew it was Chris.”
“Okay. But he could have been hurt. Did you go up and see if he was okay?”
“Eagle did.”
“And not you, Kevin, or Casey?”
“No, sir.”
“So Eagle climbed up, looked at him, and came back down to relay the information?”
“Yeah. That’s right.”
“What did McBeth say had happened to him?”
“He wasn’t sure. He said he had blood on top of his head and on his neck.”
“And you guys weren’t interested in investigating any further than that?” Wolf asked. “To see for yourself?”
“Heck no.”
“How about Koling? Did he go look?”
“No.”
“Did you suspect it was murder?” Wolf asked.
“I didn’t know what to think.” Sexton’s eye contact was unwavering. “So what happened to him?”
“Gunshot wound,” Wolf said. “The bullet went in through his chin and out the top of his head.”
“Suicide?”
Wolf shook his head. “He was found in the dirt, right? You can’t shoot yourself and then bury yourself.”
The eye contact wavered. “Yeah. I guess so.”
“But he could have inadvertently been buried,” Wolf said.
Sexton nodded.
“But we found no gunshot residue on his hands.” Wolf shrugged. “So had to have been somebody else shot him.”
Sexton nodded, closed his eyes, and took a deep breath.
“Were you close to Chris Oakley?” Wolf asked.
“Not really. He was close to Koling. Those two have been inseparable since high school. I never really got along with him.”
“Why don’t you tell me about Friday night,” Wolf said. “From that afternoon, when you guys were done with work for the day, up until whenever you saw Oakley last, could you please tell us exactly what happened?”
Sexton crossed his arms over his chest and began his recounting of events. He touched on all the same points that McBeth had: the text message from Spritz about Mary Ellen and Rick Hammes, Mary Ellen coming up to the mine, the argument between her and Oakley, ending with Oakley and McBeth getting into a heated argument.
Sexton’s version of events was so similar to McBeth’s it could have been