There are eleven bars in Wind Gap. I went to one I didn’t know, Sensors, which must have blossomed during some flash of ’80s idiocy, judging by the neon zigzags on the wall and the mini dance floor in its center. I was drinking a bourbon and scribbling down my notes from the day when KC Law plopped down in the cushioned seat opposite me. He rattled his beer on the table between us.
“I thought reporters weren’t supposed to talk to minors without permission.” He smiled, took a gulp. James’s mother must have made a phone call.
“Reporters have to be more aggressive when the police completely shut them out of an investigation,” I said, not looking up.
“Police can’t really do their work if reporters are detailing their investigations in Chicago papers.”
This game was old. I went back to my notes, soggy from glass sweat.
“Let’s try a new approach. I’m Richard Willis.” He took another gulp, smacked his lips. “You can make your dick joke now. It works on several levels.”
“Tempting.”
“Dick as in asshole. Dick as in cop.”
“Yes, I got it.”
“And you are Camille Preaker, Wind Gap girl made good in the big city.”
“Oh, that’s me all right.”
He smiled his alarming Chiclet smile and ran a hand through his hair. No wedding ring. I wondered when I began to notice such things.
“Okay, Camille, what do you say you and I call a détente? At least for now. See how it goes. I assume I don’t need to lecture you about the Capisi boy.”
“I assume you realize there’s nothing to lecture about. Why have the police dismissed the account of the one eyewitness to the kidnapping of Natalie Keene?” I picked up my pen to show him we were on record.
“Who says we dismissed it?”
“James Capisi.”
“Ah, well, there’s a good source.” He laughed. “I’ll let you in on a little something here, Miss Preaker.” He was doing a fairly good Vickery imitation, right down to twisting an imaginary pinky ring. “We don’t let nine-year-old boys be particularly privy to an ongoing investigation one way or another. Including whether or not we believe his story.”
“Do you?”
“I can’t comment.”
“It seems that if you had a fairly detailed description of a murder suspect, you might want to let people around here know, so they can be on the lookout. But you haven’t, so I’d have to guess you’d dismissed his story.”
“Again, I can’t comment.”
“I understand Ann Nash was not sexually molested,” I continued. “Is that also the case with Natalie Keene?”
“Ms. Preaker. I just can’t comment right now.”
“Then why are you sitting here talking to me?”
“Well, first of all, I know you spent a lot of your time, probably work time, with our officer the other day, giving him your version of the discovery of Natalie’s body. I wanted to thank you.”
“My version?”
“Everyone has their own version of a memory,” he said. “For instance, you said Natalie’s eyes were open. The Broussards said they were closed.”
“I can’t comment.” I was feeling spiteful.
“I’m inclined to believe a woman who makes her living as a reporter over two elderly diner owners,” Willis said. “But I’d like to hear how positive you are.”
“Was Natalie sexually molested? Off the record.” I set down my pen.
He sat silent for a second, twirling his beer bottle.
“No.”
“I’m positive her eyes were open. But you were there.”
“I was,” he said.
“So you don’t need me for that. What’s the second thing?”
“What?”
“You said, ‘first of all…’”
“Oh, right. Well, the second reason I wanted to speak with you, to be frank—a quality it seems you’d appreciate—is that I’m desperate to talk to a nontownie.” The teeth flashed at me. “I mean, I know you’re from here. And I don’t know how you did it. I’ve been here off and on since last August and I’m going crazy. Not that Kansas City is a seething metropolis, but there’s a night life. A cultural…some culture. There’s people.”
“I’m sure you’re doing fine.”
“I’d better. I may be here for a while now.”
“Yes.” I pointed my notebook at him. “So what’s your theory, Mr. Willis?”
“That’s Detective Willis, actually.” He grinned again. I finished my drink in another swallow, began chewing on the stunted cocktail straw. “So, Camille, can I buy you a round?”
I jiggled my glass and nodded. “Bourbon straight up.”
“Nice.”
While he was at the bar, I took my ballpoint and wrote the word dick on my wrist in looping cursive. He came back with two Wild Turkeys.
“So.” He wiggled his eyebrows at me. “My proposal is that maybe we can just talk for a little bit. Like civilians? I’m really craving it. Bill Vickery isn’t exactly dying to get to know me.”
“That makes two of us.”
“Right. So, you’re from Wind Gap, and now you work for a paper in Chicago. Tribune?”
“Daily Post.”
“Don’t know that one.”
“You wouldn’t.”
“That high on it, huh?”
“It’s fine. It’s just fine.” I wasn’t in the mood to be charming, not even sure I’d remember the drill. Adora is the schmoozer in the family—even the guy who sprays for termites once a year sends doting Christmas cards.
“You’re not giving me a lot to work with here, Camille. If you want me to leave, I will.”
I didn’t, in truth. He was nice to look at, and his voice made me feel less ragged. It didn’t hurt that he didn’t belong here either.
“I’m sorry, I’m being curt. Been a rocky reentry. Writing about all this doesn’t help.”
“How long since you’ve been back?”
“Years. Eight to be precise.”
“But you still have family here.”
“Oh, yes. Fervent Wind Gapians. I think that’s the preferred term, in answer to your question earlier today.”
“Ah, thanks. I’d hate to insult the nice people around here. More than I already have. So your folks like it here?”
“Mm-hmm. They’d never dream of leaving here. Too many friends. Too perfect a house. Etcetera.”
“Both your parents were born here then?”
A table of familiar guys about my age plopped down at a nearby booth, each sloshing a pitcher of beer. I hoped they wouldn’t see me.
“My mom was. My stepdad’s from Tennessee. He moved here when they got married.”
“When was that?”
“Almost thirty years ago, I’d guess.” I tried to slow my drinking down so I didn’t outpace him.
“And your father?”
I smiled pointedly. “You raised in Kansas City?”
“Yep. Never dream of leaving. Too many friends. Too perfect a house. Etcetera.”
“And being a cop there is…good?”
“You see some action. Enough so I won’t turn into Vickery. Last year I did some high-profile stuff. Murders mostly. And we got a guy who was serially assaulting women around town.”
“Rape?”
“No. He straddled them and then reached inside their mouths, scratched their throats to pieces.”
“Jesus.”
“We caught him. He was a middle-aged liquor salesman who lived with his mother, and still had tissue from the last woman’s throat under his fingernails. Ten days after the attack.”
I wasn’t clear if he was bemoaning the guy’s stupidity or his poor hygiene.
“Good.”
“And now I’m here. Smaller town, but bigger proving grounds. When Vickery first phoned us, the case wasn’t that big yet, so they sent someone mid-range on the totem pole. Me.” He smiled, almost self-effacingly. “Then it turned into a serial. They’re letting me keep the case for now—with the understanding that I’d better not screw up.”
His situation sounded familiar.
“It’s strange to get your big break based on something so horrible,” he continued. “But you must know about that—what kind of stories do you cover in Chicago?”
“I’m on the police beat, so probably the same kind of junk you see: abuse, rape, murder.” I wanted him to know I had horror stories, too. Foolish, but I indulged. “Last month it was an eighty-two-year-old man. Son killed him, then left him in a bathtub of Drano to dissolve. Guy confessed, but, of course, couldn’t come up with a reason for doing it.”
I was regretting using the word junk to describe abuse, rape, and murder. Disrespectful.
“Sounds like we’ve both seen some ugly things,” Richard said.
“Yes.” I twirled my drink, had nothing to say.
“I’m sorry.”
“Me too.”
He studied me. The bartender switched the house lights to low, an official signal of nighttime hours.
“We could catch a movie sometime.” He said it in a conciliatory tone, as if an evening at the local cineplex might make everything work out for me.
“Maybe.” I swallowed the rest of my drink. “Maybe.”
He peeled the label off the empty beer bottle next to him and smoothed it out onto the table. Messy. A sure sign he’d never worked in a bar.
“Well, Richard, thank you for the drink. I’ve got to get home.”
“It was nice talking with you, Camille. Can I walk you to your car?”
“No, I’m fine.”
“You okay to drive? I promise, I’m not being a cop.”
“I’m fine.”
“Okay. Have good dreams.”
“You too. Next time, I want something on record.”