Unintended Consequences - By Marti Green

Chapter

26





God had watched over him again. Or maybe it was just dumb luck, his calling the detective at just the right time and learning that he was heading to Minnesota. A nurse knew something. A lead. From the beginning, he’d known it was important to make the detective his friend. Now he pumped him for more information, learned where and when the meeting with the nurse would take place. He got there first and waited. A pasted-on mustache and sideburns helped to disguise him. He was good at waiting. Security probably thought he was a distraught parent who just needed some air.



He didn’t know what he’d learn when the investigator arrived. He only knew he had to prevent him from exonerating George Calhoun. That was his salvation. George’s death for a crime he’d committed meant he’d remain free. If the lead was good, if it proved George’s innocence, he had to stop the investigator before he acted on it. He thought about killing him. It would only delay the information—someone else would probably follow up with the nurse—but delay was all he needed. Eleven days. Surely, eliminating the investigator could buy him eleven days.

Tucked away in his inside jacket pocket was his brother’s badge. Even though Charlie had bullied him ever since they were toddlers, he missed him at times. It made sense that Charlie had become a police officer—he could bully plenty of people without anyone blinking an eye. Still, he hadn’t deserved to die. It had been an accident, really. Just like the child.

It had been his eighteenth birthday. They were both juiced up, having downed shots at the bar all night. The law said he couldn’t drink until he turned twenty-one, but Charlie was the law, and no bartender refused him drinks for his little brother. When they left, Charlie began ragging him again, calling him a no-good loser over and over. He’d taken enough from him, and when he swung his arm around and his fist connected with Charlie’s jaw, he thought, “Good, that’ll shut him up for a while.” Charlie just lay there, his face buried in the gravel, his arms under his body. “Get up, you big jerk,” he yelled at him. “You don’t like it when your little brother gets the best of you, huh? Well, tough shit. Just lay there like the stupid-ass coward you are.” When Charlie didn’t move, he helped him to his feet. As he lifted his brother off the ground, he caught a glimpse of the knife in his hand. He managed to swerve just as Charlie spun and came at him, the blade glistening in the moonlight. Instantly, he sobered up. “Hey, bro, put that thing down,” he said. Charlie glared at him, his eyes black with hatred, and rushed at him again. He grabbed his hand and managed to wrench the knife away, but that inflamed his brother even more.

Charlie then swung at him and caught him in the gut. He doubled over, gasping for breath. “You f*ckin’ crybaby,” Charlie said. “I’ll teach you to f*ck around with me.” Charlie pulled him up and punched him several times before losing his balance. He took advantage of the slip and fell on top of Charlie, hitting him hard over and over. When Charlie no longer fought back, he rolled off him, exhausted. When he got up and offered a hand to his brother, Charlie’s face was a bloody pulp. “You look like shit,” he said. But Charlie didn’t move. His dead eyes stared up at him, frozen with the realization that he could no longer push his little brother around.

“C’mon, stop playing games.” He crouched next to his brother and laid his head against his chest. He heard nothing. He picked up Charlie’s wrist and checked for a pulse but felt nothing. Charlie was dead.

He knew everyone would blame him. Charlie was a cop. It didn’t matter that he was a bully, had always been a bully. It didn’t matter that they were brothers and they’d both been drunk. He knew he’d go to jail for this. He had looked toward the bar. A few stragglers were still inside. The loud music had drowned out the fight.

He did what he had to do. He drove Charlie’s car to Devil’s Turn, the aptly named road that curved sharply around the hill, nothing but cliff on the other side. It was late and no one was around to see him get out of the car, place Charlie in the driver’s seat and push it over the cliff. After it landed at the bottom, he scrambled down, rolling part of the way so his body would be bruised, and lay just outside the car as if he’d been thrown from it. A tragedy, everyone said. Charlie had had such a promising future.

Charlie’s badge had been at his house. He’d told the precinct he couldn’t find it, but that wasn’t true. He’d kept his brother’s badge as a reminder of what he’d lost.

Now that badge would come into use. He spotted the investigator in the parking lot and watched him walk into the building. He followed him to the cafeteria, keeping a safe distance. He didn’t need to hear what the nurse said to him. He’d find out later. When the nurse left, he followed her into the elevator. “Ma’am, I’m a detective from the Hammond, Illinois, police,” he said and flashed the badge. “The man you were talking to, he’s a person of interest to us. We need to know what you told him.” The woman readily cooperated. He didn’t need to follow the investigator. He knew just where he would go next: to the home of Trudy Harrington.

After getting Trudy’s address from the information operator, he got in his car and headed to Byron. No one was home at 4 Aspen Road, so he waited and watched. Having spotted no activity by nine o’clock, he checked into a local motel. At 6 a.m., he returned to Aspen Road. When the investigator finally showed up, he watched him ring the Harringtons’ doorbell and then walk around the house. He watched him go up and down the block, knocking on doors. He watched him leave.

He retraced the investigator’s footsteps, showing his badge at each door, asking about their conversation. When he left each home, he cautioned the residents to not tell anyone about his visit; otherwise they’d jeopardize his investigation. He learned enough to figure out that the investigator would be back after 6 to talk to Laura Devine. He returned at 5:30 and waited in his car a discreet distance away. He watched a woman drive up a little after 6 and enter the home and an hour later saw the investigator drive up. He stayed inside for longer than he had at the other homes, and when the investigator drove away, he knocked on the same door.

He used the same introduction and gave the same caution he’d given at the other homes. Laura told him about Nancy, told him where she lived. He made some calls and got an address but didn’t wait to drive to Minneapolis. There he knocked on doors near Nancy’s apartment and hit pay dirt at the fourth door. The occupant of the apartment, a friend of Nancy’s, told him all about her trip, even showed him the brochure for the tour company. She had been thinking of taking the same trip herself, but Nancy’s decision to go was too sudden. She couldn’t get away on such short notice. He took the brochure with him. There was so much information on the web that he could probably figure out exactly where Nancy would be without even talking to anyone from the tour company.

Yes. God had watched over him again.