Sympathy For The Devil (19 page)

“I probably would’ve noticed him carting a woman over his shoulder into the house,” she said dryly.

“Not if you weren’t watching him at the time and you fully admit there are lapses in your surveillance. Have you noticed any other buildings on the property?”

“A shed around back. I think there’s an old barn, too. I haven’t broken into either, if that’s what you’re wondering.”

“If he’s held her for two days, I need to know
where
.”

“Unless it’s not him.”

“For fuck’s sake, Natasha,
he did it
. You want to know about the complaints from neighbors when he and his dead wife lived in town? How often we showed up there but she refused to pursue it? Domestic violence charges in his records, always dropped? The fucked up shit he’s into?” He waited, seeming to watch her expression.

She was sure it was all over her face—her cheeks darkening, the way shock widened her eyes. Tash took in a sharp breath, blinked, tried to remain calm but her mind was whirling. The ground tipped as an entirely different picture of Archer appeared. Adam had said a lot, never minced words about it and flat out believed he murdered Chelsea, but he never flat out suggested his ex-brother-in-law was an abuser. And there was a disconnect in Tash’s head: she could accept that maybe they were wrong, maybe the reason they couldn’t make evidence stick in the murder was because he was wrongfully accused, but domestic violence charges seemed to make it all so much more real.

“He killed his wife,” Perry continued. “He’s killing again, and he’s doing it right under your goddamn nose. If you don’t want to help us,
stay out of it
.”

He started to rise and she tried to drag her horrified thoughts back to the present, to buy some time while she figured things out, and scrambled to find some way of convincing him. “You said eight to twelve hours ago—that’s what, between 9:00 p.m. and 1:00 a.m.? I was with him last night. He dropped me off at my home at quarter to one in the morning.”

“Dropped you off? So you
weren’t
following him, but accompanying him?”

She hadn’t brought up her vandalized car—in fact, she had no idea where the hell it even was, as she hadn’t the stones to follow up with Archer yet that morning. “My personal life is none of your goddamn business. All you need to know is that Archer has an alibi for
this
murder.”

“He’s being brought in right now,” Perry said as he rose. “So we’ll see about that.”

****

Devin locked eyes with Perry and said nothing as the tall, older man paced the floor in front of him.

“Why don’t you tell us how you know
this
victim?” Perry said.

“I want a lawyer,” Devin said coolly.

“You’re not under arrest yet. Should you be?”

“I want. A.
Lawyer
.”

He’d offer them nothing else. Nothing at all. They’d walked right up to the house and insisted he come down for an interview, poked around his house until he barked at them to get a warrant or get out, wandered his property taking photos...and he’d had
enough
. If Perry had any actual evidence, he’d already be thrown in jail.

A large manila folder sat on the tabletop across from him, open to reveal photos of a dead girl. Devin didn’t look at it once—flat out refused to give a single inch.

“Want to take a shot in the dark as to why you’re here, Archer?” Perry asked.

Devin said nothing.

Apparently Perry didn’t need him to participate to continue the conversation. “Take a look at her.” He stopped pacing, stood in front of the table, and waited. When Devin didn’t move, Perry slammed his hands down on the tabletop, on either side of the photo which vibrated from the force. “Look!”

Devin didn’t flinch, but he did turn his gaze downward, taking in the top photo of the dead woman. Her face was blue from the water, lips slightly parted and bloodless. Cloudy dead eyes stared sightlessly at the camera.

“No idea who that is,” he said simply.

“Really?” Perry swung the folder around, splayed all the various photos out across the tabletop. Different angles but still the same woman, on a sheet of plastic. “You sure about that?”

Devin’s eyes turned upward slowly, glaring. “I’m sure.”

“And you sure you weren’t maybe seen talking to her Wednesday night? At a nightclub for fucking deviants and psychos?”

His stomach went cold. Though he avoided looking down at the photo again directly, he scanned his memory again. Still he said nothing.

“Odd that she was rolled up in plastic.” Perry tapped the top photo. “Traces of paint splatter on it. Sound familiar? Funny how women make it a habit of dying after being in your company, found wrapped up in things from your house.”

If they’d actually had anything, he’d be under arrest by now, but he doubted Perry was past tossing him in jail overnight just to prove a point.

The Deputy Chief stood tall again, backing from the table and leaving the photos in place. “She turned you in, Archer. Even your supposed alibi doesn’t trust you.”

Devin frowned, openly confused about what the hell Perry was going on about. “Excuse me?”

“Natasha Whitaker. Bet you thought you had her wrapped right around your finger, but she knows what you are. Told us everything first opportunity she had.”

Of course she had. She probably woke up that morning horrified with herself for having anything to do with him. A mix of anger and self-loathing rose in him. He grit his teeth, clenched his hands into fists under the table, but said absolutely nothing.

“We all know you’re not stupid. How long have you known you had a private investigator on your tail, huh? Been letting her follow you, set up her as an alibi without realizing it?”

Confusion swirled in his head, though he tried not to let it show on his face. All this time, he thought she was a reporter. Private investigator? Somehow that almost made it worse, yet another level of deception. She’d continued to let him think she worked for the newspaper, but it seemed much more insidious than that. Maybe she was actually investigating for the local police, doing their dirty work for them.

“You’ll be caught this time,” Perry continued. “You’ve slipped up. Witnesses. We’re going over the paint and plastic tarps in your house—what do you think we’re going to find? Blood splatter? Are all your knives accounted for, Archer?”

Devin leveled him with a cold, dangerous look and smiled, exposing his teeth. “Did you get my lawyer yet? Because I have nothing else to say without one, and if you’re not going to arrest me,” he rose, the chair scraping noisily on the floor, “I’ll be going now.”

Perry made no move to stop him as he strolled out of the interrogation room, but he knew it was just a matter of time. The man was determined he’d go down for these crimes and there was nothing Devin could do to stop it.

Chapter Nineteen

Natasha gave details about The Box for the third time to a new officer she didn’t know well, describing the directions there and everything she knew. Even if she wanted to go back, she highly doubted they’d have her now after the police poked into all their personal affairs. If they demanded a list of members and The Box staff gave their clientele up, well, that would definitely damage the business in the future.

At last she was free to go, and though she braced and glanced around for Archer, she didn’t find him. Whether he was still in an interrogation room, the small on site jail, or had somehow been released, she didn’t know, but she was both relieved and disappointed.

She stepped outside the station into the dreary day, stopped under the spot where the roof hung over the door and gave her a bit of shelter, and took a deep breath. No umbrella, and she’d have to walk home in the rain to get her car. She still had to figure out what happened to Malone’s car, and she was
not
looking forward to asking Archer about it.

Rain hammered down on the cars in the parking lot, obscuring the windows. One door opened and someone ducked out, waving madly as she was reluctant to leave the shelter of the vehicle.

Tash jogged down the steps for Dani’s car. Both she and Adam were in the front, so Natasha slipped into the back, swiping icy rain-slicked hair from her brow.

“Thank you,” she said immediately. “They drove me here but that was it.”

Dani twisted around in the passenger seat to partially face her. “Are you okay? Keisha called me. What the hell happened?”

Adam wasn’t starting the car, just watching her in the rearview mirror with his brow cocked in question.

Tash sighed and leaned back, glad to at least be dry and warm. “I found a body.”

“Oh my God, only
you
would just stumble upon a corpse,” Dani said immediately.

“Why does everyone keep saying that? Anyway, I fished it out of the creek, called Perry, and then I got a look at it. I recognized her from...” She really didn’t want to tell Adam about the sex club, though it was possible Dani already had. “...the course of my investigation into Archer. Except I was tailing him when she was killed so it wasn’t him.”

Adam shifted, his left hand resting on the steering wheel flexing though he said nothing. Dani’s gaze flicked his way, sensing his anger.

And since they were both here, and Dani obviously knew what was going on, it seemed time to get a few things out in the open. “You neglected to mention that Devin Archer
beat
your sister.”

She waited but the car was silent, just the steady thump of rain on the room. Adam stared straight ahead now instead of in the rearview mirror. Dani sat back and watched them both, saying nothing.

“Perry mentioned domestic violence complaints when they lived in town, ones that came from a neighbor,” she continued. “But I’m developing a little theory on that. It involves consenting adults and busybody neighbors in a small town.”

Again, she gave Adam a chance to respond, but he didn’t—he looked at everything but her.

“You know damn well what I mean—the two of you caused enough complaints when Dani had an apartment in town, and that’s
without
going so far as to have spanking benches, whips, and chains.”

“You’re talking about my sister!” he snapped at last.

“I’m talking about sending an innocent man to jail
in part
because people think he’s a wife beater when he wasn’t. Chelsea might’ve been a strong, independent woman, but when it came to the bedroom, she was into submissive kink. Which, as far as I know, is still legal even in Stirling Falls. And that’s why you didn’t bring up the domestic violence crap—you knew it wasn’t true.”

“He killed her,” Adam insisted. “She kicked him out, she was terrified of him, and she
told me
he would kill her.”

“She said those actual words?”

“Yes.” His jaw was set, eyes had a steady glare to them.

She wasn’t getting any further with him. Even Dani hadn’t spoken up, which meant things were definitely serious.

“Then I need to go to my office and start seeing how else I can connect him to the victims,” Tash said at last. “If you don’t mind dropping me there.”

Though he didn’t respond, Adam started the engine and pulled out of the parking lot.

Tash sat back in silence. At least he didn’t know precisely how deep she was involved in this.

****

Natasha found several messages on the phone at work. Two were from Malone, which she avoided answering. The rest were all from clients wanting to book a time to come in. Malone used to employ an open-door policy welcoming new potential clients, but that was when two of them worked the place. Now that it was just her, and she was out of the office a lot, meetings actually had to be planned.

She jotted down their names, only two of whom were in Stirling Falls. The rest were from outside town, which meant Mrs. Martin and her loud mouth hadn’t made it all the way there. As she prepared the list to call back on Monday, the uncomfortable feeling in her gut grew worse. If she didn’t get the Archer case sorted one way or the other—whether he truly was guilty or innocent—her reputation would take quite the hit. And even then, it would be worse if word got out that she’d slept with him if he turned out to be guilty.

Her face heated at the thought. Bad idea going to that club. Bad, bad idea. Dani’s sexy heels clearly worked too well.

With everything sorted, she pulled out the current case file and flipped to Deborah Ann Walker’s phone records again. Only a couple of numbers had checked out—the rest would take a bit more work to find without a warrant to get the names that weren’t public.

Tash lifted the phone and started dialing.

The first led her to a boutique in Hastings County, the second a private number of some woman Tash wrote down the name of.

The third got her the voice mail for Stirling Falls Martial Arts. She hung the receiver up for a moment and paused, thinking.

The trouble there was that there
was
no Stirling Falls Martial Arts. She knew all the businesses in the area, knew that local kids went to Hastings County Karate for that kind of thing.

On a hunch, she rifled through her notes until she found the phone number of the vintage shop run by Meredith Freeman, and called. Three rings in and the woman picked up.

“Hey,” Tash said. “Don’t hang up, but I’m the chick who was in with the police the other day. I just have a follow up question.”

Meredith said nothing but at least was still on the line.

“Now, you’re not a member of The Box, I know, but what if I wanted to get in touch with them? To get on their list to attend?”

“I’m not giving you their phone number,” she said sharply.

“Not asking that, I’m asking what the procedure is. Would I end up dialing a private cell phone? Or a real business like yours that’s a front for somewhere else?”

The woman sighed, her tone laced with irritation. “Fake business to keep things private. They change the name every few months and no, I don’t know what they’re using now.”