Big Sick Heart: A Detectives Seagate and Miner Mystery (26 page)

“Did Sanders give it up?”

“No,” I said. “We don’t think he did it. His story
is kind of complicated, but we buy it.”

The chief said, “He’s got an alibi for when
Hagerty was killed?”

“Not exactly, but we believe his story about
coming to Rawlings to talk to Hagerty and Dolores Weston about the Henley
deal.”

“Why exactly is that, Detective?”

“Like I say, it’s kind of complicated, involving
his beliefs in the Catholic Church, some past abuse by a priest, his
relationship to Soul Savers, a whole lot of things.”

“So you’re saying you can’t put him somewhere else
when Hagerty was being killed, but something about the church and abuse makes
you sure he didn’t do it.”

Ryan said, “Chief, we could tell you the whole
story, but it would take a while, and we need to get with Robin to talk about
the DNA. Karen and I agree we need to keep looking.”

He shook his head, as if Ryan was getting dumber
every day by hanging around me. “Great work, Seagate. Don’t forget to put in
for your expenses in flying to Milwaukee to figure out that Sanders didn’t do
it.” He looked back down at the papers on his desk, signaling that the
interview was over.

Back at my desk, I saw the blinking light on my
phone and ran over to it. I grabbed it and hit the message button.

“Okay, Robin’s got the DNA.” We rushed downstairs
to her office.

“Hey,” Robin said. She turned down the horrible
music coming out of her computer speakers.

“Well?” I said.

“No small talk, Karen? No ‘How was your weekend,
Robin?’”

“After you tell me whose DNA was under Hagerty’s
nails we’ll go back to your place and have a pillow fight, okay?”

“Now, that wasn’t so hard, was it?” I gave her a
nasty look. “Okay, there were two sets of tissue under his nails. One is our
friend Connie de Marco. The other is a gentleman named Warren Endriss.”

“How’d you get Connie de Marco?”

“She’s on file in Colorado from her days hooking.”

“And who the hell is Warren Endriss?”

She smiled. “How the hell should I know who the
hell Warren Endriss is? You’re the detective. Ryan, do you know who the hell
Warren Endriss is?” Ryan shook his head no.

I said, “How’d you get his name?”

“He was on a bone-marrow donor directory in San Diego
in 1993.”

“But that’s the only hit you have on him?”

“That’s it. Sorry.”

“Shit,” I said.

“You’re welcome, Karen.”

Ryan said, “‘Shit’ is Karen’s way of saying thank
you. If you do a really great job, she might tell you to go fuck yourself.”

“Oh, okay, that clears things up,” Robin said.

“You two done?” I said.

Ryan looked at Robin, who nodded. “Yeah, I think
so.”

“Let’s go, Ryan, we gotta figure out who Warren
Endriss is.” I turned to Robin, placing a hand on her shoulder tenderly.
“Robin, dear, thank you so very much for analyzing the DNA for us. Your
excellent work is going to be pivotal in solving this crime. And remember,
Robin, I love you, just the way you are.”

“Now you’re creeping me out,” Robin said,
shuddering.

Ryan and I started for the door. I stopped and
turned. I patted my heart with my right hand, then pointed to Robin as Ryan and
I left the lab.

“What next?” Ryan said once we made it back to our
desks.

I thought a moment. “Well, we’re running out of
possibilities. I want to call Allen Pfeiffer and see if he can help us track
down Warren Endriss. While he’s working on that, I think we need to interview
Connie again. Other than that, the only other possibilities are Dolores Weston,
Dr. K, and Jon Ahern. You got any other ideas?”

“No, I don’t,” he said, tapping his pencil on the
desk.

I picked up the phone and punched in Allen
Pfeiffer’s number at the FBI.

“Pfeiffer.”

“Allen, this is Karen Seagate. Mind if I put you
on Speaker?”

“That’s fine. What’s up, Karen?”

“I need some database help on this Hagerty murder.
We’ve got some DNA evidence pointing to two people: a Connie de Marco and a
Warren Endriss. E-N-D-R-I-S-S. Connie de Marco’s here in Rawlings with us. We
got her DNA from some solicitation charges a few years back. She was also a
user. We can cover that one. But we can’t place Endriss. Our tech identified
him from a bone-marrow donor database in San Diego in 1993. We’ve got a couple
of other possibilities: Timothy Sanders, normal spelling, the guy who founded
Soul Savers, and Jonathan Ahern, the other guy in the debates.”

“That’s A-H-E-R-N?”

“Yeah, that’s it. Sanders comes from West Chester,
Pennsylvania, went to Loyola University Chicago, lived in Colorado Springs for
a while. He’s now living in Waco with his partner, Stephen Friedl. F-R-I-E-D-L.
Ahern lives somewhere around Atlanta. Used to be some sort of legislative aide
for a state legislator there named Johnny Trautman, now deceased. Ahern says he
used to be an accountant. That’s all I have.”

“Okay, let me see if I can run this down for you.
I’ll get back to you. Might take an hour.”

“Thanks, Allen, I appreciate it.” I hung up and
turned to Ryan. “Want to call the hotel, have them track down Connie and get
her up to her room? She’s probably out smoking somewhere.”

Ryan made the call. Then, we grabbed our coats and
drove out to the hotel. We knocked on her door.

“Come in,” she said.

“Ms. de Marco, Detectives Seagate and Miner.”

“Yes, I remember you,” she said. “Hello.”

“We’re coming to the end of our investigation.
Maybe a day or two more, at most. I understand it’s been a real imposition on
you and the others, having to stay here in the hotel.”

“I spend a lot of time in hotels. Doesn’t bother
me.”

“Can we talk with you a few minutes?”

“There’s two chairs,” she said, pointing to the
desk chair and the reading chair. She sat on the edge of her bed. The bed was
made neatly. The room was made up like it is before a guest enters. On the
night table lay the TV remote, the room-service breakfast card, and the TV guide,
neatly lined up against the table edge.

“We’ve got the DNA results back from the tissue
under Mr. Hagerty’s nails. It belonged to you.” I stopped there. She stood up
and began to unbuckle her jeans. “What are you doing?” I said.

“I want to show you something,” she said.

Ryan said, “You want me to leave?”

“No, stay,” Connie said.

She pulled her crimson turtleneck over her head
and removed it. She folded it carefully, the sleeves behind the back, then once
across the chest, and placed it on top of the pillow. She reached her arms
behind her and unfastened her bra, removed it, and folded it so the cups fit
together. She placed it on top of the turtleneck and walked over to me.

She held out her arms, palms up. Pointing to her
inner arms, she said, “These tiny brown marks are tracks from when I was using.
There are some more on my stomach, right here,” she said, pointing. She walked
over to Ryan. “Let me show you, too, Detective.”

Her breasts were ten inches from Ryan’s face as
she showed him the needle tracks. He pulled his head back, blushing. Connie
stepped back from Ryan, then walked back over to me. She turned around.

Her back was covered with long brown scars,
running from between her shoulder blades to the base of her spine. A set of
eight tracks were fresh, dotted with crimson scabs. She walked over to Ryan and
showed him.

“Because Mr. Hagerty was so heavy, he would lie on
his back, with me on top. He would have me bend down, put my palms on the
mattress above his shoulders. From that position he would suck on my nipples
and rake his nails down my back, as if we were lovers. As if we were in love.
If I had killed Mr. Hagerty, the scratches would be in front.”

She turned around to face me, holding out her arms
again. She moved closer to me, lifting her breasts with her hands so I could
see the undersides. She then repeated the procedure in front of Ryan.

“Would you like to see the rest of me?” she said
to me.

“Would you put your clothing back on, please, Ms.
de Marco?” Connie walked over to the bed, slipped the bra on over her
shoulders, and hooked it. She pulled on the turtleneck and loosened the zipper
on her jeans. She tucked her blouse in carefully and pulled up the zipper,
buttoned the jeans, and fastened the belt.

“Detective Seagate, Detective Miner, in my life I
have done many bad and stupid things. I have been sexually humiliated for many
years by many hundreds of men. But I am not a murderer.” She looked directly at
me, then at Ryan. “Will there be anything else?”

“No, thank you, Ms. de Marco,” I said, my voice
soft. “We appreciate your cooperation, and, as I said, we hope to be able to
let you get on with your life as soon as possible.”

“There’s no need to hurry, Detective Seagate. This
is
my life.”

Ryan and I stood and left the hotel room. I looked
back to see Connie rolling the desk chair back into the kneehole of the desk,
aligning it properly.

We were silent as we drove to headquarters. Back
at my desk, I saw my message light. It was Allen. I called him back.

“Pfeiffer.”

“Allen, Karen. Get anything?”

“Yeah, let me start with Timothy Sanders. He was
born Timothy Skarzenski in Detroit. Family lived in Milwaukee for a year,
eventually moved to West Chester. He went to Loyola Chicago like you said, then
lived in Colorado Springs, then Waco.”

“Just like I said?”

“Just like you said.”

“And what about Jonathan Ahern?”

“That one’s a little messier. The story about
living near Atlanta, working for the Georgia legislator, all that checks out.”

“So what’s the problem?”

“He died in 1991.”

I sighed. “Say again.”

“Jonathan Ahern was born in 1921 and died in 1991.
He owned a plumbing business in San Diego. He paid taxes until 1989. Then he
started paying taxes again in 1999.”

“So my guy’s grabbed Ahern’s identity?”

“Could be. I can’t connect the dots yet.”

“What have you got on Warren Endriss?”

“Endriss: born in 1965 in Sacramento, went to Sac
State—”

“Major in accounting?”

“Yeah, accounting. Lived in San Diego until 1998.”

“Then what?”

“Then he went off the radar. No taxes, no Social
Security payments. Nothing.”

“Bottom line?”

“Can’t be sure, but sounds like there was this guy
named Warren Endriss living in San Diego until 1998. He grabs the Social
Security number of a dead guy named Jonathan Ahern, moves to Atlanta, starts
working for a Georgia state legislator.”

“Allen, thanks a lot. Talk to you later.”

“Anytime, Karen. Good luck.”

I hung up. I called Jon Ahern’s room at the
Courtyard. No answer. I hung up and called the reception desk, asked to speak
with the uniform.

“Hey, this is Karen Seagate. Who is this?”

“Officer Truman.”

“Truman, I’m trying to get in touch with Jon
Ahern. He’s not picking up in his room. Do you know where he is?”

“Just a second,” Truman said, checking his
notebook. “Sorry, Detective, I have no record of where he is.”

“Okay, have someone from the hotel let you into
Ahern’s room, then call me back immediately.”

“Right away.”

I hung up. Ryan was on the phone to someone. “Is
there a guy on the driving range? Forty, forty-five years old. Six one, one
ninety?” Ryan paused. “Check the snack bar, the men’s room. Yes, I’ll hold.” He
shook his head. “All right, thanks.” To me, “He’s not at the driving range.”

My phone rang. “Seagate.”

“This is Officer Truman. Ahern’s not in his room.
The room is made up. I checked with Housekeeping. They didn’t have to make it
up today. He didn’t sleep in it last night.”

“Thanks, Truman.”

Ryan was on the phone. “Ms. de Marco, Detective
Miner. We’re looking for Jon Ahern. Have you seen him?”

“Not in a few days.”

“Ms. de Marco, I know you’ve been straight with
us. This is really important, so I’m going to ask it again. If you know where
he is, the best way to help him out is to tell us where he is. Have you seen
him?”

“Not in a few days.”

“Do you know where he might be?”

“I haven’t seen him, and I don’t know where he is.”

“All right, Ms. de Marco. Thank you. Sorry to
bother you again.”

I said to Ryan, “Come on. We need to check his
credit cards.” We rushed off to the chief’s office, brushing past his
assistant.

“Chief, we identified the murderer. It’s Jon
Ahern. He stole a dead guy’s identity, and he’s on the run. We need
authorization to check his financials. All we need is his credit cards.”

“Another one on the run? Have you considered
interviewing your suspects while they’re still in town, Seagate? You know, to
cut down on expenses?”

“That’s really good advice, Chief, and I’m gonna
take it next time, but right now I need your okay to look at his credit cards.”

“Will the two of you be going on another flight
anytime soon?”

“Don’t know. We think he’s either in Atlanta or San
Diego.”

“This time, it better be three of you coming
back.”

“Got it,” I said as we rushed out of his office
and back to our desks. “Ryan, you find out the banking organization in Atlanta,
I’ll do San Diego. We just need the credit cards from last week through now.”

“I’m on it,” he said.

“I’ll call the prosecutor and ask him to put a
rush on the authorization.”

We made the calls and got the authorization.

“Okay,” Ryan said, “Now what do we do?”

“Now we wait,” I said. “Where do you think he
went: Atlanta or San Diego?”

“I’m guessing Atlanta. That’s where he’s been the
last eight years. Maybe there’s a wife or something in Atlanta.”

“I don’t know,” I said. “When Sanders split, he
went all the way back to his childhood, to Milwaukee.”