Somehow, I had to protect myself, but I had no idea how. A lawyer was out of the question. I might be able to handle some of this on my own, but how would I do that without my computer? Or even my cell phone? I looked up and Tripp was staring down at me. I hadn’t noticed his footsteps as he walked over to me. His jaw was set in a very deliberate way. “Where’s your mattress?”
I couldn’t answer that. It would just me look worse.
“She thinks I killed him. What do you think?”
He gave me a hard look. A chill ran down my spine. “I think Javier was alive when he was hung. That means he was strangled into unconsciousness somewhere else, possibly the bedroom. Then he was dragged out to the garage and hung.” He left an uncomfortable pause. “When a person loses consciousness, they void their bladders. They defecate. Is that why you had to get rid of the mattress?”
“You were in here that night. Did you notice anything?”
He frowned at me, angry. Then pulled himself together. “Matt, if you made a mistake. If you and Eddie were messing around and you fucked up...you need to say that. You need to say it now. The longer you keep that quiet, the worse it will be for you.”
All I could think was how kind his eyes were, how comforting his voice was. Even though he was accusing me of murder, he remained kind. If I had made a mistake, I would have confessed it right then. But I hadn’t.
“I told you what happened.”
Chapter Eleven
The police left around eleven that morning. After shutting the door behind them, I spent an hour doing nothing but panicking. Pacing around my house, staring at the mess the police had made, thinking, “I can’t go to jail. I can’t.” I’d been a fan of On the Inside, a pay TV show about prison life, but that didn’t mean I’d be able to do it myself. Besides, no matter how bad they made it look on TV, it sounded even worse when you read about it in the newspaper. I was terrified.
I had to get a grip on myself and do something. Something constructive. Without showering or changing my clothes, I walked out of the house and got into the car. Then I drove to the Horizon Wireless Store on Sunset to get my phone replaced.
After I explained that I needed a new phone, the twenty-something, tattooed clerk looked at me, waiting to hear the story of how I lost, dropped or otherwise disposed of my last phone. I’m sure he’d heard some good ones. I, however, was in no mood to tell him the police had confiscated mine.
I could have gotten free flip phone (though it would have still cost about fifty bucks, which I thought was a lot for a free phone), but I was used to having a smart phone and I didn’t have my computer so I upgraded to an Ollea 3000. It would provide me with Internet access, and I’d be able to get my email. I’d miss my laptop, but I’d be able to function.
Horizon Wireless, AKA the Evil-Cell-Phone-Company, added a couple more years to my contract and nailed me for more than two hundred bucks (the water bill would go unpaid this month). The good news was they shut off my other phone. At least the police wouldn’t be able to run up my bill calling long lost relatives all over the world.
Having made a couple decisions, I felt better. Sure they had nothing to do with keeping me out of jail, but they were decisions, right? I got into my car and read the box to figure out the phone’s features. I’d bought the car charger, so I plugged it in and turned the phone on. I wanted to call Peter. I needed to talk to a friend. But I couldn’t remember his cell number. I’d plugged it into my phone when he gave it to me and never thought about it again. Crap. I called information to see if his landline was listed. It was, so I called that. I left a message. “Okay, so something else bad happened and this time it did happen to me. I don’t have your cell number. Yes, I lost my cell phone. I’ll explain when you call. So, call. Soon.” When I hung up, I wondered if he ever checked his landline for messages.
Suddenly, I remembered Eddie’s second phone. As far as I knew, the police hadn’t found it when they searched my house. And they should have. It should have been there somewhere. Unless Eddie’s killer took it. Did his killer have the phone? Had he destroyed it? Thrown it down on a cement driveway and stomped on it, or tossed it into a sewer? But why do that?
The phone company tracked all calls. It wasn’t as though any information on the phone couldn’t be gotten from them. Well, that wasn’t completely true. There’d be an address book of some kind. Which might be backed up on Eddie’s computer. Or there could be photos. Even video. You couldn’t get those from the phone company. But anything like that would likely be on Eddie’s computer, as well.
I began to relax and walked back to my car. The police would get Eddie’s phone records soon enough, and they’d see calls from the killer. How long would that take, I wondered? On TV it was practically instant. But in the real world it would take, what? A week? Two? Six months? Of course, there would be calls from me and to me. That’s what they’d be most interested in, since they thought I did it. They might not even look
