A Faint Cold Fear

  “I’m sorry,” Nan apologized around sniggers. “I just never pictured you wearing something like that.”

  Lena gave a weak smile, feeling her lip split back open. She put the wooden box on the table. The gun was useless if she couldn’t chamber a round, but having it close made her feel safe.

  Nan noticed the gun but said, “Well, they look better on you than they do on me.”

  Lena felt a slight trepidation and decided to clear the air. “I’m not gay, Nan.”

  Nan fought a smile. “Oh, Lena, even if you were, I don’t think I’m ever gonna be at a point in my life where I even think somebody could replace your sister.”

  Lena gripped the chair, not wanting to talk about Sibyl. Bringing her into the room would bring her into what had happened. Lena felt a searing shame at the thought of Sibyl’s ever knowing what had happened to her. For the first time ever, Lena was glad her sister was dead.

  “It’s late,” Lena said, reading the clock on the wall. “I’m sorry you got dragged into all this.”

  “Oh, don’t worry about it,” Nan said. “It’s kind of neat being up after midnight for a change. I’ve been going to bed at nine-thirty like an old lady since Sibyl—”

  “Please,” Lena asked. “I can’t talk about her. Not like this.”

  “Let’s sit you down,” Nan said. She put her arm around Lena’s shoulders and tried to guide her to the chair, but Lena did not move.

  “Lena?”

  Lena bit her lip, opening the cut even more. She licked it with the tip of her tongue, remembering how she had licked Ethan’s neck.

  Without warning she started to cry, and Nan put her other arm around her. They stood in the kitchen, Nan holding her, comforting her, until Lena could not cry anymore.

  THURSDAY

  15

  Ron Fletcher looked like a deacon at a church. His brown hair was parted neatly to the side, held in place with some kind of shiny gel. He was wearing a suit, like he was here for a job interview, though Jeffrey had told him on the phone he was needed only to help fill in some background information about Chuck Gaines. By the smell of Fletcher, he was a smoker. By what they found in his locker at the security office, nicotine was the least of his addictions.

  “Good morning, Mr. Fletcher,” Jeffrey said, sitting across from him at the table.

  Fletcher flashed a quick, nervous smile at Jeffrey, then made a point of turning around and looking at Frank, who stood by the door like a military guard.

  “I’m Chief Tolliver,” Jeffrey told him. “This is Detective Wallace.”

  Fletcher nodded, patting his hair. He was a perpetual stoner, a forty-year-old man who had not aged past his teens. “Hey. How y’all doing?”

  “Pretty good,” Jeffrey said. “Thanks for coming down here this early.”

  “I work nights,” Fletcher told him, his speech slow and labored from a lifetime of pot. “I’m usually just going to bed about now.”

  “Well”—Jeffrey smiled—“we appreciate you coming in.” He sat back in his chair, leaving his hand on the table.

  Fletcher turned around and looked at Frank again. Frank could be imposing when he wanted to be, and the old cop had squared his shoulders to make that known.

  Fletcher looked back at Jeffrey, flashing the same nervous smile.

  Again Jeffrey returned the smile.

  “I, uh . . . ,” Fletcher began, slumping forward, his elbow on the table. “I guess y’all found the pot.”

  “Yep,” Jeffrey told him.

  “That’s not mine,” Fletcher tried, but Jeffrey could tell from the way he said it that the man knew that the excuse was weak. Ron Fletcher was in his midforties, and, going by his employment file, had never had a steady job for longer than two years.

  “It’s yours,” Jeffrey said. “We found your fingerprints on it.”

  “Damn,” Fletcher groaned, smacking his palm on the table.

  Jeffrey could see Frank smile. They had found fingerprints on the bags, but Fletcher’s were not on file at the station to make a comparison.

  “What else are you selling?”

  Fletcher shrugged.

  “We’re gonna toss your place, Ron.”

  “Oh, man!” Fletcher put his head down on the table. “This is so whacked.” He looked up, imploring, “I ain’t never been in trouble with the law. You gotta believe me.”

  “I already ran your record,” Jeffrey told him.

  Fletcher’s mouth twitched. His record had been clean except for a parking ticket, but there could have been something else that had not shown up because no charges were filed. Fletcher was of the generation who thought that cops were a lot more powerful than they actually were.

  Jeffrey asked, “Who were you selling to at school?”

  “Just some kids, man,” Fletcher said. “Just a little at a time to keep myself going, you know? Nothing big.”

  “Did Chuck know about it?”

  “Chuck? No, no. Course not. He wasn’t real on top of things, you know, but if he found out I was doing this . . .”

  “You know he’s dead?”

  Fletcher paled, his mouth dropping open.

  Jeffrey let some time pass until Fletcher twitched nervously.

  Jeffrey asked, “Were you encroaching on anyone at the school?”

  “Encroaching?” Fletcher repeated, and Jeffrey was about to explain to him what the word meant, but Fletcher said, “No, man. I don’t know who else was dealing, but nobody ever said anything to me about it. I wasn’t doing enough to cut into anybody’s market. Honest.”

  “No one ever approached you, intimated they didn’t like what you were doing?”

  “Never,” Fletcher insisted. “I was careful, you know. I only had a handful of kids I sold to. I wasn’t looking to make a lot of money, just enough to keep me in weed.”

  “Just weed?”

  “Sometimes some other stuff,” Fletcher said. The man was not completely stupid; he knew that pot was a relatively minor offense compared to some of the other hard narcotics.

  “Who were the kids you sold to?”

  “Not many, just three or four.”

  “William Dickson?” Jeffrey asked. “Scooter?”

  “Aw, no, not Scooter. He’s dead. I didn’t sell him that shit. Is that what this is about?” He became agitated, and Jeffrey indicated he should calm down.

  “We know Scooter was dealing. Don’t worry about Scooter.”

  “Oh, wow.” Fletcher put his hand to his chest. “You scared me there for a minute.”

  Jeffrey thought he would go out on a limb. “We know you sold to Andy Rosen.”

  Fletcher’s mouth worked but he did not speak. He looked from Frank to Jeffrey, then back to Frank again. “No way,” he finally said. “I want a lawyer.”

  “A lawyer’s going to change the whole tone of this interview, Ron. You bring in your lawyer, I’ve gotta bring in mine.”

  “No way. No way.”

  “If I file charges, that’s it. You’re in the system. No deal. You’ll do hard time.”

  “This is so bogus. This is entrapment.”

  “It’s not entrapment,” Jeffrey corrected. Technically, since Fletcher had asked for a lawyer, this was merely a violation of his Miranda rights. “We’re not looking to nail you, Ron. We just want to know what you sold to Andy Rosen.”

  “No way, man,” Fletcher challenged. “I know how this works. If he smoked some dope before he jumped off that bridge, y’all are gonna pin this on me—I mean, on whoever sold him the shit.”

  Jeffrey leaned across the table. “Andy didn’t jump, Ron. He was pushed.”

  “No shit?” Fletcher asked, staring from Jeffrey to Frank again. “Man, that is wrong. That is just so wrong. Andy was a good kid. He had some trouble, but . . . shit. He was a good kid.”

  “What kind of trouble did he have?”

  “Couldn’t get off the dope,” Fletcher said, throwing his hands into the air. “Some people, they wanna and they just can’t.”


  “He really wanted to?”

  “I thought,” Fletcher said. “I mean, you know. I thought he did.”

  “Until?”

  Fletcher grimaced. “Oh, I don’t know.”

  “Until when, Ron? Did he try to buy something from you?”

  “He didn’t have any money,” Fletcher said. “He was all like”—he hunched his shoulders and started rubbing his hands together—” ‘I will gladly pay you Tuesday for some rock today.’ ”

  Jeffrey asked, “So did you?”

  “Hell no, man. Andy tried to burn me before. He tried to burn everybody.”

  “Did he have enemies because of this?”

  Fletcher shook his head. “You could push him and get it back. I felt sorry for the little dude about that. He was all tough and shit, but all you had to do was push him around some and he was like, ‘All right. Here’s the money. Don’t hurt me.’ “ Fletcher stopped, realizing what he had said. “Not that I would hurt him. That’s not my game, man. I’m all about being mellow, exploring your, you know, your . . .” Fletcher looked for the word. “No, that’s not right. Expanding. You gotta expand your mind. Open yourself up.”

  “Right,” Jeffrey said, thinking that if Fletcher’s mind expanded any more he’d be drooling.

  “I felt bad for him. He had some good news. He was ready to do some celebrating.”

  Jeffrey shot Frank a look. “What was he celebrating?”

  “Didn’t say,” Fletcher answered. “Didn’t say, and I didn’t ask. That was how Andy was. He liked to keep his secrets, you know. Even if he was just going to the bathroom to take a crap, it was all a big secret, like he was fucking James Bond.” Fletcher feigned a laugh. “Ha, ha. Not like he was fucking the dude.”

  “What about Chuck?” Jeffrey asked. “How was he involved in this?”

  Fletcher shrugged. “I don’t want to speak ill of the—”

  “Ron?”

  He groaned, rubbing his stomach. “He mighta been getting some money off the top. You know, for, like, rent and all.”

  Jeffrey sat back in his chair, trying to figure out how Chuck could be connected to the recent murders. Drug dealers only killed people who crossed them, and then they did it in a spectacular way to serve as a warning to would-be rivals. Staging the deaths to look like suicides would be contrary to good business.

  Fletcher had grown nervous over Jeffrey’s silence. “Do I need a lawyer?” he asked.

  “Not if you cooperate.” Jeffrey pulled out a notebook and a pen. He slid them over to Fletcher, saying, “I know this is your first offense, Ron. We’ll try to keep you from doing jail time, but you’ve got to tell us what’s in your apartment. If I go there and find something that you haven’t mentioned, then I’m going to tell the judge to give you the maximum sentence.”

  “Okay, man,” Fletcher said. “Okay. Meth. I’ve got a little meth, and it’s under my mattress.”

  Jeffrey indicated the pen and paper.

  Fletcher started to write, offering a running narrative of his house. “There’s some pot in the fridge, in the butter-dish area. What’s that you call where the butter goes?”

  Jeffrey offered, “Butter compartment?”

  “Yeah, yeah.” Fletcher nodded, going back to his pad.

  Jeffrey stood, thinking he had better things to do than this. He left the door open so he could watch Fletcher from the hallway.

  Frank asked, “What’s up?”

  Jeffrey lowered his voice, telling Frank, “I’m going to go talk to Jill Rosen again, see what she can give me.”

  “How’s the kid doing?”

  Jeffrey felt his mood darken at the thought of Lena. “I talked to Nan Thomas this morning. I dunno. Maybe I’ll go by and see if she’s willing to press charges.”

  “She won’t do it,” Frank said, and Jeffrey knew he was right.

  Jeffrey said, “You could talk to her,” and Frank reacted as if Jeffrey had suggested he slap his own mother with a wet rag. Since Lena’s attack Frank had not known how to deal with his ex-partner. Jeffrey sometimes understood the other man’s reaction, but he could not imagine anything that would make him abandon his own partner. There were cops back in Birmingham that Jeffrey had not seen in years who could call him anytime and he would be in his car in seconds on the way to Alabama.

  Jeffrey said, “I’m not going to order you to go see her, but I think if you reached out—”

  Frank coughed into his hand.

  Jeffrey tried again. “She trusts you, Frank. Maybe you could lead her down the right path.”

  “Looks to me like she’s already chosen which path she wants to take.” He got a steely look to his eyes, and Jeffrey remembered how hard it had been to pull Frank off Ethan White yesterday. If Jeffrey had left him to it, White would probably be dead right now.

  “She’ll listen to you,” Jeffrey said. “You might be our last chance to get through to her.”

  Frank ignored this so smoothly that Jeffrey wondered if he had even said it.

  With a wave of his hand, Frank indicated Fletcher, who was already working on the second page of his confession. “You want me to toss his place?”

  “Yeah,” Jeffrey said, aware of the distinct possibility that Fletcher was a very convincing liar. “Go ahead and process him for the pot in his locker. We’ll see what sticks on him at the end of the day.”

  “What about White?” Frank said. “You gonna cut him loose?”

  Jeffrey had called on the Macon sheriff to keep White in lockup, not trusting his own people to leave the kid alone. “I’m going to hold him as long as I can, but if Lena doesn’t file charges, there’s not a hell of a lot I can do.”

  “What about DNA?”

  “You know that takes a week at least,” Jeffrey reminded him. “And even if it comes back, it doesn’t matter if she keeps insisting it was consensual.”

  Frank gave a tight nod. “You going to Atlanta tonight?”

  Jeffrey said, “Yeah, probably,” even though the last thing Sara had said to him last night was to leave her alone for a while. There was going to come a day when she’d say that to him and really mean it. He hoped like hell that was not now.

  Jeffrey walked to the Rosen-Keller house, needing the time to clear his mind. Guilt was piling up this week, from Tessa’s stabbing to Lena’s attack. Last night in the jail, all he had wanted to do was put his arm around her and make it better. He had known in his gut that this was the last thing Lena needed, and the next best thing Jeffrey could do was find out who had started all of this in the first place. No physical evidence had shown an intruder in the security office. There was no one who had a specific grudge against Chuck and, other than the general consensus that he was an asshole, no one could think of a reason for someone to kill him. Even if he was skimming something off the top of Fletcher’s drug trade, it was Fletcher who would be punished, not Chuck.

  The red Mustang was still parked in the driveway where Jeffrey had seen it last. He walked to the front porch and knocked on the door, tucking his hands into his pockets as he waited. A few minutes passed, and he peered into the window, wondering if Jill Rosen had really left her husband.

  He knocked on the door a couple more times before leaving. Jeffrey was halfway down the driveway when he changed his mind. He walked toward the back of the house, to Andy Rosen’s apartment. Fletcher had said that Andy wanted to celebrate Saturday night. Maybe Jeffrey could figure out what the boy was so happy about.

  Jeffrey knocked on the door to the apartment, not wanting to interrupt Jill Rosen if she was packing up her son’s things. He tried the doorknob.

  “Hello?” he called, walking into the small apartment. Much like the main house, whoever decorated the interior of Andy’s apartment had not been back since. An orange shag rug covered the floor, and the walls were a dark pine paneling that bowed out in places. There was a bathroom right beside the door with a sitting room behind it. Tattered posters for rap groups were taped haphazardly over the walls. Two
pyramids of beer cans stacked about three feet high flanked either side of a big-screen television.

  An easel by the window held a rough sketch of another nude woman, this one thankfully not in color. Jeffrey picked through the plastic crate of art supplies on the floor, finding several cans of paint thinner and a couple cans of aerosol paint. At the bottom of the crate, he found two tubes of airplane glue and a used-looking rag. He sniffed the rag and nearly passed out from the chemicals.

  “Christ,” Jeffrey said. Under the sink he found four more aerosol cans. In the small bathroom were four cans of spray toilet-bowl cleaner. Either Andy Rosen was a neat freak or he was huffing—inhaling glue and aerosols to get high. Sara would not have found that on the tox screen unless she had specified that the lab look for it.

  Jeffrey scanned the room for other signs of drug use. Scattered on the floor was paraphernalia for a video-game player and several CDs that were out of their cases. The entertainment center had a DVD player, a VCR, a CD player, an elaborate stereo receiver, and a surround-sound speaker. Either Andy was dealing or his parents had taken out a second mortgage to keep him in electronics.

  The bedroom of the apartment was sectioned off by a series of wooden screens. Behind them the bed was unmade and wrinkled. The scent of sweat and cocoa-butter hand lotion hung in the air. A lamp by the bed had a red scarf draped over its shade, as if to set the mood.

  The drawers and closet in the bedroom had already been searched, but Jeffrey felt compelled to check again. Three or four shirts hung in the closet, T-shirts overflowing from shelves built into the sides. Three pairs of worn-looking blue jeans were on the top shelf, and he unfolded them, checking the pockets of each one before throwing them back onto the shelf.

  Several shoe boxes were on the floor of the closet, most of them containing shiny new sneakers. One of them held a stack of photographs and a bunch of Andy’s old report cards. Jeffrey read the report cards, which showed a hell of a lot more promise than his own had, then looked through the photographs. Jill Rosen and Brian Keller remained pretty much the same in each picture, but the scenery behind them changed, from roller coasters to water slides, from the Smithsonian to the Grand Canyon. Andy was in very few of the photographs, and Jeffrey imagined that he had elected himself family photographer.