Dead Cold Mysteries Box Set #2: Books 5-8 (A Dead Cold Box Set), Blake Banner [readnow TXT] 📗

“Let’s get back to the station house, Stone. I want to review Rosario’s case file and see if I can find any link with this case.”

“There is something we are not seeing, Dehan. It’s there, right in front of our noses, but we are not seeing it.”

* * *

Back at the station, we didn’t get very far with Rosario’s case file. We had just pulled it and started reading when the desk sergeant buzzed me.

“Yeah, Maria, what’s up?”

“You ain’t going to believe it, Detective, but Akachukwu Oni is here. He says he thinks you might be looking for him.”

“OK, don’t let him leave.” I hung up and stood. “Akachukwu. He’s here.”

Dehan’s eyebrows rose up to her hairline. “What?”

“Let’s go get him!”

We pushed out to the front desk. The sergeant indicated Akachukwu with her head, but she needn’t have bothered. He was unmistakable. He was leaning against the wall, watching us with dead eyes. He was six-six if he was an inch, and built like a barn. But there was no fat on him. It was all solid muscle. I am not easily scared, but this man was terrifying. I tried not to let him see I thought so, stepped over, and said, “Are you Akachukwu Oni?”

He didn’t move, just watched me with his expressionless eyes. His voice was exceptionally deep. He said, “Yes.”

Dehan covered him and I turned him to face the wall.

“Akachukwu Oni, I am placing you under arrest for aggravated assault on Angela Rojas and the attempted murder of Detective Carmen Dehan. You don’t have to say anything, but whatever you do say will be taken down in evidence and used against you in a court of law.”

He placed his hands behind his back and as I cuffed him, he said, “I am here to cooperate.”

We frisked him. He was unarmed and we took him up the stairs to interrogation room one. There we sat him down on a chair and manacled him to the table. He dwarfed everything around him, made the furniture look like nursery toys. We sat opposite and I studied his face for a moment, trying to fit this new piece into an already incomprehensible puzzle.

I said, “You are entitled to have an attorney present…”

“I know my rights, Detective. I am not ignorant. I have already told you I want to cooperate. I do not need a lawyer.”

“OK. What do you want to find Moses Johnson for?”

He blinked. It was the slow blink of a giant iguana. “I am not looking for Moses Johnson.”

I frowned. “That’s not what Angela Rojas says. She says that when you beat her up, you asked where Moses was. What do you want with Moses, Akachukwu?”

“She is mistaken. I did not attack her, and I did not ask her about Moses.”

Dehan leaned her elbows on the table. She was frowning. She looked like she was having trouble believing what was happening. I knew how she felt. It was hard to escape the feeling we were being played somehow.

“Are you denying that you were at Angela’s house? Because we saw you, and you shot at us.”

He stared at her a long moment before answering. He managed to make expressionless look insolent as his eyes traveled over her face and her body.

“No. I was there. I went to visit and see if she was OK. Neighbors must look out for each other. She did not open the door, so I left.”

“You shot at us, Akachukwu!”

He gave a small shrug. “I have enemies. You came running at me, with your guns. I shot in self defense. I did not know you were police. If I had known you were police, I would have stopped.” He spread his hands. “You see, I am here. When I heard you were looking for me, I came of my own free will. I have nothing to hide.”

“Why were you wearing a ski mask?”

“I was not.” He smiled. It was not a nice thing to see. “You mistake my black face for a ski mask.”

I gave a small laugh and smiled on the wrong side of my face, where it looks sarcastic instead of ironic. “Akachukwu, you left traces of DNA at the scene. It’s being analyzed as we speak. It would go a lot easier for you if you confess.”

He gave me that direct, lifeless stare and I knew I was looking at a killer, a man who had no empathy and no compassion at all. “I cannot confess,” he said, “I have nothing to confess. You will not find my DNA at the scene of your crime, because I was not there.”

I was momentarily disarmed. I didn’t know how to tackle this guy. He was as cool as four rocks in a dry martini. With an olive. I shook my head at him and narrowed my eyes.

“You cannot be serious. There is no way you can walk away from this. You are going down for the attempted murder of a cop, Akachukwu. You need to cooperate.”

“You are mistaken, Detective. There will be no trial, because you have no evidence. You have no case against me. I will walk free.”

Fifteen

I was surprised to see Dehan smiling.

“OK, we’ll see how that plays out. Let’s talk about something else.”

He regarded her with the same dead expression he’d given me, and spoke in his slow, deep, deliberate voice. “What do you want to talk about? I want to cooperate.”

“Why did you kill Sebastian Acosta?”

“I don’t know who Sebastian Acosta is. I don’t know if I killed him or not. If I did, I do not know why, because I do not know who he is.”

Dehan now combined her smile with a frown. “You sweet on Angela? Is that