Home free.
Eighteen
Rona Wedmore told dispatch she needed a couple of uniformed officers to accompany her to the Garfield house. One of their cars, she was informed, had just passed by that location. They’d return to the address and wait for Detective Wedmore’s arrival.
It was possible Wendell Garfield would do as she asked, and come down to the station without protest, but you never knew, so it was good to have backup. While Garfield wasn’t going to be charged with murder, he was still in a peck of trouble. He’d covered up for his daughter, he’d moved his wife’s body and disposed of it, he’d misled investigators. Wedmore was even betting there was some kind of environmental pollution charge for dumping a vehicle in a lake, although that would seem to be the least of Wendell’s problems.
Wedmore recognized the two police officers waiting for her. Lisa Gibson and Brett McBean. Lisa had been on the force for about a decade, Wedmore was thinking, and McBean maybe half that time. Both good cops, so far as she knew, although there was talk that since they’d been partnered six months ago, something was going on between them. Not a good thing.
Lisa got out from behind the wheel and McBean followed suit as Wedmore pulled up. Lisa was about five foot eight, but McBean was a towering six foot five and looked like he’d have been more at home in a basketball jersey than a police uniform.
“Hey, Lisa, Brett,” she said.
“Did they find his wife, Detective?” Lisa asked.
Wedmore said, “We have an idea where to look. The daughter’s just confessed to killing Mrs. Garfield, and Mr. Garfield helped cover it up. I’m bringing him in. Have you noticed anything since you’ve been out here?”
They both shook their heads. “He hasn’t come out,” Brett said. “Officer Gibson just said she hasn’t even noticed a curtain move since we got here.”
Officer Gibson, Wedmore thought. That was all the proof she needed that these two were an item.
“Let’s just play this as a straight visit,” Wedmore said. “Garfield doesn’t know his daughter came into the station and made a confession. So far as he knows, we’re here with an update.”
The two cops nodded, and followed Detective Wedmore to the door. She rang the bell while Gibson and McBean stood symbolically behind her.
There was no answer.
Wedmore rang the bell a second time, glancing over her shoulder to take note that Garfield’s Buick was in the drive. When still no one answered, Officer Gibson said, “Maybe he’s in the shower.”
McBean said, “Check it out.”
Gibson and Wedmore looked at him, saw that he was staring straight down, and followed his gaze. There were several dark drops of something on the flagstones.
“From way up here, that looks like blood,” McBean said.
As Wedmore knelt down, she reached into her pocket for a latex glove, snapped it onto her right hand, and touched the tip of her index finger to one of the drops. She gave it the briefest of inspections, looked up and said to McBean, “You go around the back of the house. Lisa, you stay with me.”
McBean gave his partner a look, and went.
Wedmore stood, pulled a tissue from her pocket and wiped off the end of her index finger, but kept the glove on. She wadded the tissue, tucked it back into her pocket, then pulled back her jacket to reveal the holstered gun attached to her belt. She took it out, held it pointed down at her side, and tried the doorbell one more time.
She waited ten seconds, then reached for the knob and turned it slowly to see whether the door was locked.
It was not.
She pushed it wide and called out, “Mr. Garfield! Mr. Garfield, are you home? It’s Detective Wedmore!”
Wedmore only needed to take one step into the foyer to see what was awaiting her in the living room.
“Jesus,” she said.
Her eyes fixed on Wendell Garfield’s body, the pool of blood around his head, some kind of long blue stick coming straight out of his eye socket.
“Oh God,” said Officer Gibson, who had stepped in behind the detective.
Wedmore’s hand was up in a “don’t move” gesture.
“Ask McBean what’s happening around back.”
Gibson touched the radio clipped by her shoulder. “Anything going on out there?”
There was a crackle of static. McBean said, “Nothin’.”
“Get him back here,” Wedmore said.
Gibson told him they needed him around front. Seconds later, he was in the foyer, and saw what the other two were looking at.
“Fucking hell,” he said.
“Secure the house,” Wedmore told them.
The two of them went through the place room by room, closet by closet, and returned to the foyer a minute later to find Wedmore standing over the body, just far enough back that her shoes were not touching blood.
“House is empty,” Officer Gibson said. “’Cept for him.”
“What’s that sticking out of his eye?” Officer McBean asked.
“Looks like a needle, for knitting,” Wedmore said. It wasn’t a pastime she’d ever pursued, but her late mother used to spend hours doing it. Then she saw a ball of yarn on the floor. “There ya go.”
“I think I’m going to be sick,” McBean said and excused himself.
Officer Gibson grimaced as her partner fled and said to Wedmore, “He’s not good with a lot of blood.”
“Call this in. Get everyone out here,” Wedmore said. “This scene is fresh.”
Gibson went outside to make the calls.
Wedmore did a slow circle around the room, studying everything, looking for anything. She went into the kitchen and saw the pot of tea that was still warm to the touch, and the single mug that had been waiting to be filled.
“This was looking pretty simple up until about five minutes ago,” Wedmore said to herself. The Ellie Garfield case had appeared to be a totally domestic affair. Daughter kills mother, father covers it up. Everyone-victim, perpetrator, accomplice after the fact-related. A family tragedy from beginning to end.
But this, well, this had the potential to change everything. Garfield’s death broadened the circle. Melissa couldn’t have done this, because she’d been in police custody the last couple of hours. Wedmore didn’t need a forensic examiner to tell her this murder was less than two hours old. And Garfield-or at least someone claiming to be him-had phoned the station little more than an hour ago, asking for a progress report in the search for his wife.
A shrewd move, Wedmore thought. A nice way to deflect suspicion. Not that his cleverness made much difference now.
She came back to the living room, stood once again over Garfield’s body. A woman’s bathrobe was tossed onto the couch, but the matching sash was on the carpet, just beyond the pooling blood.
Interesting.
Then, studying the body again, looking at the blood that had saturated the man’s shirt, something else caught Wedmore’s eye.
“Hello?” she said under her breath. “What’s this?”
Nineteen
Kirk Nicholson was on the couch, feet up on the coffee table, having breakfast. Or an early lunch. Brunch
