“Yes, but—”
“I’ve been lying. I’ve been lying to protect Adam. Because I believe in him. I love him.” She paused, and the look of desolation that came over her face nearly broke Rowenna’s heart. “I did love him. I did believe in him. But, Rowenna, he won’t give up these awful books. He says he needs them. Oh, Ro! He left here on Halloween, and he was gone a long time—right around the time Mary Johnstone disappeared. He was in and out all day—but he was out then. And then…before…that other woman. Dinah Green. When she was in the store, he was flirting with her. She came on to him first—I guess she thought I was just someone who worked here—but he was definitely flirting back. And when she left the store, he left a few minutes later. Oh, God, Ro! I think I might be married to a murderer!”
Joe had to talk the talk, Jeremy thought. The guy was a cop, and he had to do some things by the book.
And as they drove into Boston, Joe ran through the cop playbook.
This man was the first real lead they’d had on the case, and his alibi for Halloween was so full of holes, rabbits could have leaped through them. But as Jeremy listened, he got the feeling that Joe didn’t believe his own words, no matter how logical they sounded. They were following clues the way all cops followed clues, but Jeremy didn’t think Joe expected those clues to lead anywhere any more than he himself did.
Finally Jeremy turned and asked, “Joe, do you honestly think this man is our killer?”
Joe frowned, glancing over at him. “He was the last person seen with the victim.”
“Dinah Green was seen all over the city—she met a lot of people. Any one of them could have arranged to meet her later. I just think our killer has to be someone closer.”
Closer. That was better than saying flatly that the killer had to be a local, someone Joe might know and like. At the same time, he knew it didn’t matter how he phrased it. Misplaced tact wasn’t going to help them find a killer, and anyway, Joe was no fool. He knew what Jeremy was really saying.
“There’s still a possibility this man did it. Scenario—they get into a lovers’ spat. Or he’s picked her up, planning to sleep with her, only she doesn’t come through and he gets mad. He rapes her and kills her. What then? He has a body, and he has to get rid of it.”
“So a guy who just happens to get into an unplanned argument with a woman and kills her just happens to have gloves on, so his prints aren’t found anywhere, like on the stake he’s miraculously found hanging around beside the road to tie her up on?” Jeremy said.
“I should have left you back in town with the moping husband,” Joe muttered.
“No, sorry. I know it’s important that we talk to this guy, even if all we do is eliminate him from our pool of suspects.”
The Boston cops were happy to help and led them straight through to an interrogation room where Tim Richardson was waiting.
He was fit enough, with just the beginning of an armchair quarterback’s paunch. He was rough-hewn, with the kind of weathered, once-classic features that appealed to women.
When they entered the room, he made no attempt at false bravado. He ran his fingers through his hair and told them right off, “I didn’t do it. I swear, I didn’t. I couldn’t believe it when the cops came to get me, when they brought me in for questioning. I met that woman in a shop, we went to a bar, we had some drinks. I asked her to come home with me—to Boston—and she said she had other plans. I didn’t sleep with her, I didn’t manhandle her, nothing. I came right home,” he told them.
“Is there anyone who can vouch for that?” Joe asked him.
“My cat,” Richardson said wearily. “I fed the poor sucker when I got in.”
“All right, tell us about the bar,” Joe said.
Richardson frowned, confused. “It served alcohol.” He really didn’t intend to be a wise guy, Jeremy realized. Richardson honestly didn’t understand the question.
No way was this the guy who had planned and carried out such an elaborate murder.
“Tell us about that night at the bar,” Joe clarified. “Who did you talk to? What did you see? Did Dinah seem to know anyone else there?”
Richardson brightened. “Yeah, she did. She said hello to a bunch of people. Some students—she told me they were students, anyway—and some people she said she met earlier in the day. In the stores, at the museum, you know?”
“Do you remember anything in particular about that night?” Jeremy asked.
Richardson thought about it, shrugged and slumped in his chair. “It was just people at a bar, drinking, talking, laughing, eating…nothing special.”
Richardson groaned and dropped his head in his hands.