Resolve (26 page)

The refuse of misfortune is scattered throughout the rest of the East Liberty and Highland Park neighborhoods. The pleasant two-story houses, behind fifty-year-old trees, look on sympathetically. Wrought-iron fences that have no gates are for aesthetic purposes only. These streets have seen the bad times and bounced back to solemn respectability. No need for gates. The battle-tested faces of those who sit on their porches and watch us pass by are protection enough.

Medics are working on a torn man splayed out by the seminary. His head is turned toward the contemplative brick structures and he mouths something. He gets no response. On the opposite side of the street sits a football field surrounded by empty bleachers. God on one side of the street, gridiron on the other. I wonder which side hears more prayers.

Some more race photographers are on a scaffold up ahead. I prop my sunglasses up on my head and let the breeze evaporate some sweat on my face as I pass by. That’s another eighty-dollar picture I won’t purchase, but it will be invaluable to me.

I’m not going to hit the wall. This is too close to the end for me to stop. Again, I try to distract myself with scattered thoughts of measurements.

Only about 6 miles to go. And don’t forget the .2. A 5K is 3.1 miles. I’ve run dozens of those with no problem. This is two 5Ks. I can run two 5Ks. At this pace I can be finished with this in less than an hour. I can do anything for an hour, right?

Just 6.2 miles to go.

Only 7 more turns.

5 more water stations.

And 1 murder to commit.

It’s almost time.

T
he ground behind my home was still moist enough for me to easily retrieve the gun from the accomplice soil, and take it out of the waterproof bag. Having previously discarded the holster with all the other potential evidence, I had to tuck the firearm into the back of my waistband and cover it with my shirt. I drove to the local library and used one of their computers to do some quick research. It took me the better part of an hour, but I found what I was looking for. I filled the Wrangler’s tank with gas and took off for a small town in Ohio. The round trip took me only four hours. The Jeep smelled clean from the thorough shampoo treatment it had received on the way back.

Back at home, I once again took a walk into the trees. This time I walked nearly a mile into a deserted area. One of the benefits of living in hunter-filled western Pennsylvania was nobody thinks twice about two quick gunshots in the woods.

I walked back into the house, pressed a button on the remote control, and the television blurted out the story I didn’t really want to hear. I reloaded two rounds into the gun’s magazine as I watched. The names were released, an academy photo of Officer Nokes was plastered on the screen, and then the mention of the TRU professor found dead in the same room. The reporters recapped the entire history of Lindsay’s death, the murder of her roommate, and now this. This time the newscast didn’t break away to cover anything else. This was big time.

I checked a national news site on the computer and sure enough, there it was. A photo of the apartment building was front and center with a beckoning link sitting below. It took them no time at all to put a name on it:
The Bloody ’Burgh.

The story detailed everything up to the most recent deaths. My stomach contracted when I saw my name mentioned as the professor who killed Steven Thacker in self-defense. The police were still investigating the deaths of Virginia Richmond, Randy Walker, and Officer Monica Nokes. They had no information to release as of yet. The police refused to comment on whether Dr. Walker was a victim or a suspect. They refused to speculate as to why he would have been at the apartment. They said it would have been irresponsible for them to speculate about who shot who. One thing they did confirm was that Officer Nokes’ weapon was still in her holster. They were looking for a third party.

I needed to call Kaitlyn. She was certainly going to hear about this, and I needed to give her a heads-up. It occurred to me that I hadn’t seen my cell phone in a couple of days, and it took me several minutes until I found it on the dining room table. When I opened it up, blackness stared back at me. Dead. I wondered how long it had been out of commission. I found the charger and plugged it in. Picking up the landline in the kitchen, I dialed Kaitlyn’s cell phone. It went straight to voice mail and I left an overly calm message asking her to call me when she got a chance.

The couch swallowed me up, and I pressed a button on the remote control sending the reporters into the media abyss. Within seconds, my eyes were closed and I left the world I knew for one where my hands were clean of blood, and ghosts of dead students and colleagues fell into submissiveness and rattled their chains no more.

I jumped up in the room that had become dark. Instinctively, I grabbed the gun that was still tucked in the back of my waistband and tried to scan the room for the threat. I saw nothing but heard everything. If an air horn could catch a cold, that’s what a beagle’s bark sounds like when it wakes you up. Sigmund was up near the front window and his bellowing was sincere and alert. Walking down the hallway toward the front door, I found my canine alarm clock with his front paws on the windowsill, and his attention fixed in the direction of the street.

At the door, I peered out of a small pane of glass and caught sight of the cars blocking my driveway. Three men were approaching, and the light from a post in my yard showed me their faces. Detectives Shand and Hartz were scanning the windows as they headed toward the front door and they didn’t look happy. In tow was a local uniformed officer, there as a courtesy to two detectives who were a few miles out of their jurisdiction.

I knew that whatever they wanted to talk about, they would want to discuss it inside the house. I didn’t have time for this, and I needed to get rid of them. Once I let them in, they would be hard to get rid of. Playing the part of the unfairly persecuted was probably the quickest way to send them on their way and leave them guessing.

Quickly, I retreated back to the living room and put the gun behind a pillow on the couch. I only had to wait a few seconds before the doorbell rang. Waiting for a second ring, I opened the door and said hello to my guests.

“Dr. Keller, we were hoping to talk to you,” announced Shand, wearing a brown leather coat that partially covered a blue polo shirt.

Shaking my head and allowing myself a slight sigh, I said, “I heard about Randy. I can’t believe it.”

Detective Hartz asked, “Would you mind if we came in?”

“Don’t take this the wrong way guys, but actually, I would. It’s been a rough couple of weeks and now this news about Randy. I really don’t know how I can help you. Do you have any leads on who killed him?”

Shand ignored my question and countered, “Well, we were thinking you might be more help to us than you may realize. Maybe we can just come inside and talk for a while.”

“Sorry, guys, it’s really not a good idea. The place is a mess and my dog can be pretty tough around strangers.”

Detective Hartz leaned slowly to his right and looked at the front window.

With one eyebrow raised, he asked, “Would that be the little pooch there in the window with the tongue hanging out, tail wagging?”

“He’s different once you’re inside. Quite vicious. Trust me.”

“Dr. Keller, you know how these investigations work, right? Different detectives work the investigations in whatever areas they are assigned. If cases seem to have similarities in them, no matter how small, the detectives get to talking. They start comparing notes and throwing theories around.”

I waited.

“And here’s the thing. We’ve got Lindsay Behram, Steven Thacker, and now this Walker guy all dead. And we sit down and comb through these cases and, sure enough, guess what three of them have in common?”

“Three Rivers University.”

“That’s right. And the Richmond girl, she was roommates with Lindsay, so I think we can safely say there’s another connection as well.”

I kept my mouth shut.

“But the thing is . . . they don’t all just have Three Rivers in common. They have you in common too, don’t they?” Shand accused.

“Was the Richmond girl a TRU student? I thought the newspaper said she went to Pitt.”

“She went to Pitt, but did you know her?”

“Why would I know her?”

“Maybe you would like to come with us down to—”

On the off chance that they would find one of my fingerprints in V’s apartment from my first visit, I decided it was best not to answer the question about knowing V; and I certainly wasn’t going to let myself be put in an interrogation—an
interviewing
room. Time to be indignant.

“Are you kidding me? Because of you guys, my school thinks I’m a homophobe. Aside from that, I can’t take two steps on campus without people whispering,
Hey, that’s the professor who killed his grad assistant!
Now one of my coworkers is dead! And let’s not forget the fact that a student in one of my classes got herself killed—and that’s what set this whole thing in motion! Now you think
I
might know something about Randy and that officer getting killed? This is like a sick joke! What more do you want from me?”

The uniformed officer was standing in my yard, just off the porch. When I started yelling, I saw his hand move closer to an expandable baton on his belt.

Hartz and Shand were in no mood for this. They probably hadn’t had much more sleep than me. Hartz seemed to take particular exception to my attitude.

The giant detective leaned down six inches to look me in the eye.

In a deep, deliberate tone, he said, “You didn’t let us finish.”

He straightened up and left his pupils indented on my forehead.

“Maybe if you would come down to our place, you could help us exclude you as a suspect. You can tell us where you were last night. Maybe . . . maybe you could even let us take a look at the Sig Sauer P229 that is registered to you.”

“My gun! Now you want to see my gun!” I incredulously threw my hands to the sky. The uniform took a step closer. “Oh, you two are really something. Do you have a warrant?”

I felt cowardly even saying it.

Shand stepped in. “You have connections to at least three dead bodies and you own a gun that happens to fire .357 rounds. The same type of round that killed your professor friend. If you were in our shoes, what would you think?”

I knew what I would think. I knew what they were thinking.

“I didn’t kill him.”

“Then help us out. Give us the gun.”

“No. I’ve had enough of this. I want things to go back to normal.”

“What’s normal?”

“Not this.”

Shand reached into his jacket and pulled out a hand clutching a neatly folded set of papers.

“I was hoping you would just consent to this, but here you

go.”

He handed me the warrant. Some judge in this area had a very loose definition of
probable cause.
They were going to take my gun. I stood reading, wasting time.

Hartz spoke from above. “Save us some time. Where is it?”

I opened the front door and led the three men into the living room, turning the lights on as we walked. Sigmund greeted each one with a wet nose and attention-wanting whimper. His tail shot back and forth in sheer delight at having visitors.

Quite vicious.

I pointed to the pillow on the couch. Hartz donned a pair of latex gloves and retrieved two evidence bags from his pocket. “Got the box?” he asked.

“No.”

“Is it loaded?”

“Yes.”

Moving the pillow and carefully holding the murder weapon, he asked, “Expecting trouble?”

“If you expect it, it never comes.”

He unloaded the weapon, including the round in the chamber. He separately bagged the gun and the ammunition, barely taking notice of the bullets as they poured into the bag.

“Normally I would never say this to someone, but you know how this works. You may be able to work out a deal. Get a lawyer and come in. The prosecutors around here are pretty levelheaded. If you give us some good reasons, you never know. Former cop . . . college professor . . . if you were painted into a corner or had no other way out . . .”

“I told you, I didn’t do it.”

“And all of this is just bad luck? People around you dying?”

“The worst.”

“Let me ask you this—why do you think anyone would want Randy Walker dead?”

“I wouldn’t know.”

“What do you think should happen to the person who killed him?”

Basic question. Guilty people downplay the punishment. A subconscious desire to be vindicated.

“Them.” I said.

“What?”

“Them. I assume that the same person killed the police officer too, right?”

“Okay. Them.”

“The scumbag that killed Randy deserves something other than prison. And you shouldn’t even have to ask me how I feel about cop killers. Whoever killed that officer deserves the same fate in return. No question.”

“I don’t suppose you would just want to tell us where you—”

“It’s time for you to leave. Your cars are blocking my driveway. Good night.”