Show Me (Thomas Prescott 4), Nick Pirog [classic children's novels .TXT] 📗

a bold statement, but true.

“Everyone makes mistakes.”

“No, amateurs make mistakes. I’m no amateur. And neither are you.”

“What are you implying?”

“I don’t have any motive to kill Mike Zernan. I don’t know if I can say the same for you.”

“What did Mike tell you?” he blurted, louder and harsher than he probably wished.

I shrugged.

He composed himself, then opened up a file in front of him. He said, “According to Dina’s records, you paid for two club sandwiches and a bag of fries at 11:13 a.m.”

“That sounds about right.”

“It is right.”

“Okay.”

“How long did it take for them to make them?”

“I don’t know, ten minutes?”

“That’s what she said. So would it be safe to say that you left Dina’s at around 11:23 a.m.?”

“Sure.”

“Then you drove directly to Mike’s?”

“I took a wrong turn. Had to double back. But yeah, I drove directly to Mike’s.”

“What time would you say you got there?”

“I don’t know, ten minutes later.”

“So 11:33 a.m.?”

“Give or take.”

“So let’s call it 11:35 a.m.”

“Sure.”

“According to your statement, you knock on the front door, nobody answers. You go around back, don’t see him, then you peek in the window.”

“That’s correct.”

“Do you go peeking into a lot of windows when people don’t come to the door?”

“No, but his car was there.”

“He could have taken a different car, or been on a walk, or a dozen other things.”

“Yeah, but he wasn’t.”

He snorted, then said, “So you break the door down, then find him lying on the ground?”

I nodded.

“How long from when you arrive to when you find him?”

I finally saw what he was driving at, where he was going with all this. “I dilly-dallied in his backyard for a while. Checked out the hot rod. He’d put in new halogens.”

“That’s not in your statement.”

“Really? Well, it should have been.”

He knew I was lying. He knew I was trying to buy myself a couple minutes. Minutes that were unaccounted for.

“And how long would you say you looked at the hot rod?”

“I don’t know, five minutes.”

He smirked.

Damn.

I should have said longer.

“Okay, so even with you checking out the hot rod—which we both know you didn’t do—you would have broken down the door by, oh, say 11:40 a.m.”

I nodded hesitantly.

“So at 11:40 a.m. you break down the door and you find Mike. Do you know what time you called the police to report it?”

I tried to think how long I had poked around Mike’s house. At least long enough to eat a club sandwich.

“Probably a couple minutes later,” I said, crossing my fingers behind my back.

“12:04 p.m.”

Oh, bugger.

“Twenty-four minutes after you found him,” the Chief said.

“That doesn’t sound right.”

“Oh, it’s right. The record here and the call record on your phone. 12:04 p.m.”

I bit the inside of my cheek.

“Now, I’m curious,” he said, smiling for the first time, “what exactly you were doing for the twenty-four minutes between the time you found Mike dead and the time you called 911?”

“I took a shit.”

“What?”

“Dead bodies are my prune juice.”

He glared at me.

“Seriously, I can’t tell you how many crimes scenes I’ve taken a dump at.”

“What were you doing for twenty-four minutes?”

“I was playing Words With Friends.” I paused. “On the crapper.”

“I think you ate a club sandwich while you were poking around Mike’s stuff.”

I tried not to react, but my eyebrows betrayed me.

How did they know?

The Chief explained, “We found a piece of bacon on the floor in his garage.”

It must have come out when I pushed the door open with the side of my hand.

I said, “That could have come from anyone’s club sandwich.”

“What were you doing for twenty-four minutes?” he demanded.

I was testing his patience. I mean, I didn’t want him to go grab the phone book and start slapping me around.

“You want the truth?” I asked.

He crossed his arms and leaned back a couple inches.

“Mike was dead. He’d been dead awhile. I’m not a pathologist, but I have a pretty good idea of time of death. I’d guess the coroner said he died sometime the previous night. Maybe a three-hour window between 9:00 p.m. and midnight.”

The Chief didn’t say anything, which meant I was right or at least close.

I continued, “Whoever did it had ample time to make their way to Canada or Mexico if they wanted. So yeah, I waited twenty minutes to call the cops.”

“What did you do?”

“What do you think I did?”

He leaned forward, his chair rattling as all four legs found purchase on the concrete floor. “You worked the scene.”

I nodded.

It was more reflex than anything else. Once I realized Mike had been murdered, the switch flipped. Not calling the police was a conscious decision. I wanted to give myself five minutes to poke around. I could hardly believe I poked around for twenty minutes. I’d been careful not to leave any fingerprints. On the other hand, I had left a piece of bacon.

I was surprised when the Chief asked, “You notice anything funny?”

I had, but I didn’t want to share it with him. Still, I had to give him something.

“I’m guessing the person who did it was left-handed.”

His eyes narrowed.

I thought maybe another one of his officer’s would have noticed this.

I said, “He fell onto his right side, his left arm draped across his body.”

At the scene, I ran the simulation over in my head. Whoever killed him came up from behind him. Mike was a decent-size guy so I’m guessing it was somebody he knew, somebody he possibly invited into his home. Otherwise, it would have been hard to get the jump on him.

I said, “The killer got the cord or belt around Mike’s neck, cinched it tight, then waited for Mike to suffocate. When he was sure Mike was dead, he shoved him to the ground. If he shoved Mike with his right hand, Mike would have most likely fallen on his left side. But Mike landed on his right side, ergo, he was pushed to the right, most likely by someone’s left hand.”

“You might be onto something,” the Chief said.

“Yeah, or it could be nothing.”

But there was another tidbit