Skeleton Key (21 page)

“
I think that would be a super idea, Erika. I’ll tell her you’re coming.”

***

Erika hung up the phone and looked at Clay. She said, “Okay, Clay, I can tell you know something that you’re not telling me.”

“
I’m that transparent?”

“
No, I can read minds too,” she said sarcastically, but she said it with another amazing smile, and Clay was helpless when she smiled that way.

“
Hopper thinks I need to be careful about what I say, but I’m going to tell you what I think. I had a talk with Jasper, your little friend…”

“
The midget?”

“
Little
person.”

“
So you’re telling me you’re friends now with the scariest person alive.”

Clay laughed. “There’s no need to be afraid of him. You’re never going to believe that Adrian was paying him to scare you. Adrian thought it was funny. He was a peach of a guy, Erika.”

Erika did a three-hundred-sixty-degree turn around the room. “If you can hear me, Adrian, I’d like to say you’re the biggest jerk I’ve ever known.”

“
I’d have to agree. Anyway, Jasper saw Morty coming out of one of his storage sheds, all bloodied. I think he hid Adrian there and buried him after the horses were buried. That would better explain the shovel clue that Adrian kept leaving on Morty’s desk. Hopper’s talking with Jasper right now.”

Just then Clay’s cell phone rang. It was Hopper. “Hey, Luke.”

“
Clay, I just finished talking with Jasper. He seems to like you. I’m afraid to ask what you did to him. Regardless, you’re right about the warrant. I’m working on that right now. I think we’ll have it within the hour. Do you want to be there when we check out the building?”

“
I’d love to. I’ll be at your office as soon as I can.”

“
See if Erika can supply some DNA evidence. Hairs from a comb or brush or an electric razor, or maybe an old toothbrush. If Adrian’s body was stored in that shed, there may be blood evidence and we can match it up to the hairs or toothbrush.”

While Erika was visiting Andi Nickel’s office, Clay met with Chief Hopper. Clay presented Hopper with three different Ziploc bags, each with separate “evidence” from Adrian Payne’s bathroom drawer. Luke had his search warrant and a crew of two forensics experts in tow, and they departed for the storage shed as soon as Clay arrived. They parked back in the Depot parking lot. Once they ascertained that Mortonson wasn’t in his office, Hopper headed for the maintenance building and found Roberto Gomez.

“
Robbie, I need you to open up the storage shed closest to South Oak Street. I have a warrant to search the building.”

“
What’s up, Copper?”

That wasn’t a wise thing to say. Hopper glared at Roberto in a way that made Gomez backtrack with amazing speed. “I mean Hopper. C
hief
Hopper. I’m sorry, Chief.”

“
Grab your keys, and let’s go, Robbie. Police business.”

It took a few minutes to make the walk, which was done mostly in uncomfortable silence. Once there, Roberto unlocked the shed and stepped aside. There was a light inside, but the crew had ultraviolet lights as well, and a quiet but thorough search was made. Finally, in a back corner under a workbench, a discovery was made. The ultraviolet lights picked up some stains on the wooden floor and, when the bench was moved aside, the wooden walls were stained as well. Wood samples were carefully removed and then bagged and tagged as evidence.

“
We’ll have all the evidence sent for DNA analysis,” Hopper explained to Clay.

“
How soon will you know something?” Clay wondered out loud.

“
Forty-eight hours, max”.

“
Isn’t that awfully quick?” Clay asked. “I was under the impression something like that could take a month or two.”

“
It could unless you know the right person, and he owes you a favor, and he’s family, and you bribe him with a steak dinner.”

“
I assume that moves you right up to the front of the line,” Clay joked. He was starting to like Luke Hopper quite a bit.

“
It’s not what ya know; it’s who ya know.” Hopper turned and marched away. He was all business.

He was followed closely by the forensics “crew.” Roberto and Clay lagged behind as Roberto shut the door and relocked it. Then he turned to Clay and asked, “What’s going on?”

“
We’re just gathering evidence of foul play, Robbie. We may have figured out how the body was buried.”

“
Does that mean the investigation is over?” Robbie asked with concern in his eyes.

“
Possibly,” Clay responded honestly.

“
Dios, gracias
,” Roberto thought. “No more search warrants?” he asked.

“
You don’t have any reason to worry, do you?” Clay asked.

“
Just about the train engine
,” he thought. “No. I was just wondering if I could get back to work, or if I would be needed for something else.”

“
This is the only thing I’m aware of. I’m sure you’re free to get back to work, Robbie. Thanks for the help.”

When they all got back to the parking lot, Clay caught Luke up to speed about the discovery of Marshall Mortonson’s two sets of books and Erika’s appointment with an attorney. Then he told about Roberto’s unspoken concerns, especially his worry that another search warrant would be issued to search the train engine. Clay and Luke both agreed that Roberto was probably talking about the engine from the wreck, the very engine that was on display in front of the train depot. It was just one more thing to think about in an already confusing case, but Hopper said that he’d find someone to look over the train engine.

***

Because Erika was busy, and there was nothing else for Clay to do, he shook hands with Chief Hopper and headed home. Hopper promised to call with the DNA results. He would want Clay present for any arrest and interview. Clay’s mind was wandering, and he was driving too fast when he hit a railroad crossing with a terrible bump. He heard what sounded like a gunshot. He ducked and actually wondered if Dan Duncan was shooting at him. None of his windows exploded but a warning light lit up on his dashboard, and based on how the car was driving, he realized that he had a flat tire from the railroad track. There was no end to his railroad track adventures.

Clay got out of the car, popped open his trunk, unscrewed everything related to his spare tire, and pulled the mini-spare, tire iron, and jack from their storage compartments. A few snowflakes were swirling in the air. Clay put on a pair of gloves, quickly read the tire-replacement directions to be sure he didn’t do something stupid, and then he proceeded to loosen the lug nuts from the tire. Next, he used the lug wrench to raise the jack to a height nearly equal to the car frame level. He positioned the jack and continued to raise the wheel. After the wheel was suspended a couple of inches off the ground, he stopped and grabbed the tire to pull it off, but all he managed to do was disturb the perfect balance he had fortuitously established and the car fell off the jack, bending the metal at a ridiculous angle. It was ruined, and there was no way for him to continue. He was stranded on the side of the road with no way to change his own tire. Clay had managed to do something stupid anyway.

If he was the swearing type, he’d have been tempted to let out a stream of curses that would have certainly made himself feel better, but he resisted the urge and pulled out his AAA card to make a call from his cell phone. He couldn’t help but wonder what kind of damage Jasper would have inflicted upon the car, or his own forehead for that matter, had
he
been the unfortunate victim of the flat tire. He laughed out loud at his vision of the little man, his seat squished as far forward as possible. He pictured his head tilted back and his neck craned to just barely peer over the steering wheel while his toes stretched for the gas pedal.

The AAA service representative gathered Clay’s information and let him know that someone from the Shell gas station in Durand would be there to help him shortly. It was only a matter of minutes before a truck rolled up to his car and a man jumped out and retrieved his own jack to help Clay change his tire. He laughed at Clay’s story, but he was gracious enough to not make Clay feel any more stupid than he already felt.

As they talked and the man worked, Clay had an idea. The man’s name was Roger. “Roger, do you remember the night of the train wreck about seven years ago?”

“
Sure do. Was actually workin’ the cash register at the station that night. Missed all the action at the railroad, but I sure remember the truck driver comin’ in there claimin’ his truck’d been ripped off.”

“
What happened?”

“
He came in, paid for his gas, I got him his receipt, and then he asked for the key to the restroom outside. Quite a few minutes later, he was back inside claimin’ the truck had been stolen.”

“
What else do you remember?”

“
Well, he disappeared outside to look again, like maybe he missed the truck the first time he looked.” Roger laughed at the absurdity of the thought. “Saw him walk from one side of the building to the other. Finally, he saw the cop car that was parked in the lot. He went to the car, then came back in and asked me if I seen the cop that belonged to the car. I hadn’t seen nobody, and I told him so. Asked if he wanted to use the phone to call the police station. He took a coupla minutes to tell me about the horses he was deliverin’ and how he was worried about ’em. Then he made a call to the horse owners or his boss or someone. I asked him if he wanted me to call 9-1-1, but he shook his head and finished his call. Then he went back outside like he was hopin’ it might be there if he only looked one more time. Lo and behold, that time the cop was there.”

“
Do you know the cop?”

“
Naw, I’m a law-abidin’ citizen. Never had a run-in with no cops before.”

“
Ever find out where the cop was?”

“
Nope. No one ever came back inside, and I couldn’t leave the register. The truck driver got in the cop car and they drove away with lights flashin’ and siren blarin’. I heard about the train wreck from another customer awhile later. Heard the train blasted the dude’s truck and killed his horses.”

“
Yeah, that’s exactly what happened.”

Roger finished, Clay signed paperwork, and the conversation was over. Even though the flat was inconvenient, Clay actually thanked God for the good fortune of running into Roger. Clearly, his story and the story told by Dan Duncan were different. What was Duncan hiding? Where was Duncan when the truck driver discovered that his truck was stolen? As always, after another day of “investigating,” Clay still had more questions than answers.

After two days of sitting around going crazy waiting for a call from Hopper, Clay decided to get on his treadmill to run off some pent-up energy. Tanner had a game against Bowling Green that evening, and it appeared he would be getting his first start. Clay put some headphones in his ears and started to run. He had called Erika five times in two days. In their last conversation, it was confirmed that Marshall Mortonson was a crook. First he embezzled, then he stole to cover the embezzlement. Then he manipulated numbers to cover financial losses that Adrian was more than likely racking up. He had evaded paying taxes. Most importantly to Erika, he had made one set of books appear that the business hadn’t made much money over the past seven years. He owed Erika a lot of money, but Andi Nickel was confident they could easily prove his dishonesty. Marshall would clearly be in financial straits with Erika and in legal trouble with the Department of Treasury.

Clay had run more than a mile and was getting a little fatigued when he looked down at his iPod to determine the artist of the song he was listening to. His right foot stepped off the treadmill onto the side of the machine. The misstep spun his body sideways and Clay started to lose his balance. He was practically running sideways, but it was clear in a fraction of a second that there was no way he was going to survive the misstep. He fell straight to the course black belt that was rotating through the rollers and it shot him right off the back of the machine. His knee and palm were scraped raw and his body was shot headfirst right into the weight machine set up on the floor behind the treadmill. He hit his face on the metal stanchion, and lay on the floor with a welt below his eye. His pride was hurt as much as his body, but eventually he started laughing, imagining that his fall was captured on video. Spending time with Erika sure had given him a more optimistic outlook on life. He found himself laughing more easily and worrying less. When he dragged his body off the floor, he headed to the kitchen for some ice for his eye. Once he looked into a mirror, he could see that he would have a black eye and a lot of embarrassing explaining to do.

***

“
What happened to your eye?” Zander Frauss asked as Clay took his normal seat next to his friend at Crisler Arena.