“Let’s have a talk with his boss.”
The drive to the brightly colored restaurant took twenty minutes and when they arrived, the parking lot was full. They found the hostess who, seeing their badges, took them to the manager. He was squirreled away in a small office, counting receipts.
The manager was a tall, heavyset man with dark hair parted deeply on the right side. His white shirt was crisp, his name badge polished and level straight. The badge read BOWER. “I’m Seth Bower and I’m the manager.”
Rick noted the extra emphasis on the tail end of the sentence before making introductions. “We’re here about an employee. Ford Wheeler.”
“Ex-employee as of one o’clock yesterday. He said he had to go to the package-delivery office and would be here for the afternoon rush. He never showed, so I left him a phone message and told him not to come back.”
“How long did he work here?”
“A year, give or take. He was good at first. Seemed to try hard and did well with the customers. Then about four months ago he started to get belligerent. Started acting like he was the boss. I couldn’t have that.”
“What do you think caused the change?”
“That’s about the time he started dating his girlfriend.”
“What’s her name?”
“Nancy, I think.”
Rick reached in his coat pocket and pulled out the DMV photo of Nancy Smith. “She look like this?”
The manager studied the image and nodded. “Yeah. That’s her. Maybe she can tell you what ideas she was putting in his head.”
Bishop scratched behind his ear as if annoyed. “She never came by the restaurant?”
“Not once. I saw other photos of her and I never would have put a gal like her with a guy like him. He was nice enough but he didn’t attract an A-list kind of woman, if you know what I mean.”
“Did he have any other friends here at work?” Rick asked.
The manager glanced toward a waitress who held up a bill, her gaze questioning. He held up a finger as if asking her to wait. “Friendly, but he never went out drinking with the other waiters when they did go. Kind of a loner until Nancy.” The manager studied the two detectives. “So, what’s this about? This some kind of domestic problem?”
“Ford Wheeler was found dead in an alley a few hours ago. Drug overdose.”
“No shit.” He rested his hands on his hips. “I knew he’d had problems with drugs a couple of years ago. He told me straight up when I interviewed him. I told him I appreciated his honesty and he seemed relieved, as if my approval mattered. He appeared clean until a few months ago. Maybe this Nancy chick got him into drugs.”
“We don’t believe he was dating Nancy,” Rick said. “We believe he was stalking her. Do you know where he lived?”
The manager blinked and shook his head. “This is the kind of crap that happens on television.”
“It happens everywhere,” Bishop said. “You got that address for Wheeler?”
“Yeah.” The manager ran tense fingers through his hair. “I got one on file.”
“I’ll need that,” Rick said.
The manager shook his head. “To think the guys were a little jealous of him. All his talk about how wonderful his girlfriend was and all the fun they were having was psycho crap.”
“We think so.”
The manager snorted. “Did she file a complaint against him? Did she catch him looking in a window or something?”
“No,” Rick said. “She was murdered.”
“What the hell. Did Wheeler do that?”
“That’s what we need to figure out.”
The detectives arrived at Ford’s small apartment a half hour later. Rick drew in a breath as he pulled on a fresh set of gloves. Keys in hand from Ford’s coat pocket they opened the door and flipped on the lights. The living room was barren, and there was not a stick of furniture except for a recliner and a television balanced on a couple of crates. However, the room’s lack of furnishings was lost immediately in the shadow of four walls covered with thousands of images. They all featured Nancy. Hundreds and hundreds of images of Nancy. Smiling. Talking. Rushing. Jogging.
“Holy crap,” Bishop said.
Rick walked into the center of the room as his gaze scanned. “He’s been following her for a while. Several seasons.”
“Tuttle started stalking Diane last fall.”
Rick shook his head. “No way this is coincidence.”
“Medical examiner has still not identified Nancy. It’s taking time to track down dental records.”
Rick moved to the wall filled with endless images of Nancy Jones. “Really think our victim isn’t Nancy Jones?”
“No.”
Rick studied the photographic collection. “Think it might have been some kind of pact between the two men?”
“Neither had the brains for this kind of organization.”
“I agree. But maybe together they figured it out?”
Bishop looked around the dirty room filled with pizza boxes, trash heaps, and too many empty beer cans to count. “I don’t see this guy planning much of anything.”
“So someone got ahold of these two men and set them on this path.”
“That would be my guess.”
Rick turned from the images. “We’ll search everything in both men’s backgrounds and compare. Maybe we’ll get a hit.”
“Maybe.”
Rick studied Nancy’s pictures and his thoughts returned to the Thompson case as he reached for his phone to call a forensics team. He called in their discovery to the team and then slowly slid the phone in his coat pocket.
He watched as Bishop took pictures of the room with his cell. He’d been careful about opening up too much to his partner, knowing the guy wasn’t crazy about his appointment. Though wiser not to say a word, he heard himself saying, “I read through the Thompson murder files.”
“Jenna Thompson’s family.”
“Yeah.”