Tunnel Vision Page 10

  “I expect you to stick to that,” Betty said, “no matter how exciting the idea of the whole school talking shit about me might be. God! I can’t even believe we’re talking about this right now. I have to meet some cop friend of my mom’s tonight, and I’m going to look like a total asshole if I don’t have good questions to ask him. We need to worry about that, not Jake Norton or his stupid fucking ideas.”

  “I’m not even sure I can think about anything else,” said June. “I don’t care how stupid that sounds, either. This is the craziest thing ever, and I just want to soak it in.”

  “All right, I get it,” said Betty. “I still need help, though, I’m not going to have time after school to come up with good questions on my own, and we’ve already wasted twenty minutes of a fifty-five-minute class. We need to come up with something, and now.”

  June was nodding at her like she was totally getting her urgency, but when she spoke she said, “Will you keep Martinez, be a hyphen, or spend the rest of your days as Betty Norton?”

  She asked the question with a smile in her eyes, but Betty couldn’t take any more. She grabbed her bag from behind the chair and then stomped out of the library.

  Betty could hear June calling after her in a hushed voice, along with a librarian shushing her, but she didn’t care. She hated that she’d told June, she hated Jake for making a fool of her, and she hated that they were never going to figure out who had killed Mandy Reasoner.

  Betty walked from the library straight to her car and started it without a second thought. When she reached the security post she blew right through it, almost hitting the guard’s waiting arm. He wanted a pass that she didn’t have, but Betty didn’t care. She needed answers, but first she needed questions, and there wasn’t going to be time for any of those during school. No longer clouded by thoughts of Jake, skipping school, or the guaranteed rage of the moms, Betty stomped the gas pedal and drove, no destination in mind.

  TWENTY-ONE

  Betty’s mad dash from the high school ended at Riverside Park. She parked her car by a playground, then walked past a man wearing an eye patch and staring at the birds. He looked sort of scary to Betty, but also very comfortable in his surroundings, almost as if he belonged in the park. Betty settled on a bench across the playground from the man, and after giving him a sideways glance, slid a notebook from her bag. Betty flipped the notebook open, grabbed a pen from the bag, and then exhaled deeply before leaning back into the bench.

  I probably could have handled that better, Betty admitted to herself. It was a rough truth, but it was true, and there was no way this was going to help with the grounding. Worst-case scenario, the school called Ophelia at home, Ophelia called Andrea, and Andrea called her cop friend to cancel the meeting. Even worse, now that she was separated from June, Betty found it hard to even find fault with her friend. If June had been proposed to in such an awkward and ridiculous way Betty would have been the first one on board to give her shit over it, but when it was her turn to take a little medicine, she’d run off like a spoiled little brat.

  Forcing herself to accept the situation for what it was, Betty turned her attention back to the waiting notebook on her lap. The blank page was calling to her with the same siren song that a cursor in Word beckoned with, and Betty wanted nothing more than to fill the page with questions.

  Gripping the pen in twitching fingers, Betty added notes to remind herself to ask about the timeline of events from a police perspective, rather than the one listed on the Free Duke site. Next, Betty added inquiries as to whether there had ever been other suspects, whether there had ever been any investigations after the trial, and whether Duke was suspected of any other murders.

  Betty was so deep in thought that she didn’t even notice that someone was approaching her until a male voice said, “Shouldn’t you be in school?”

  When Betty snapped her head up at the sound, she found a redheaded boy with a scar under his right eye standing before her. He was wearing a Hot Water Music shirt and grinning at her in a sideways sort of way with a matchstick hanging out of his mouth.

  “Shouldn’t you be?” Betty asked, annoyed at the intrusion, but also intrigued. The boy was familiar somehow, but even more oddly, he was cute in a mutt puppy kind of way.

  “Nah,” said the boy. “Not really feeling school lately.” He cocked his head as if he were thinking and then said, “Rhino’s, right?”

  “Yeah, every now and again,” said Betty. “My mom is a judo nut, and I train with her sometimes. You go there too?”

  “Yep, I’ve been known to drop in and out on occasion,” said the boy. “What are you working on?”

  “A project for school,” said Betty.

  The boy looked from the notebook on her lap to the treetops. “Nature project?”

  “Not hardly. About the most unnatural thing ever, actually.” When he cocked his head at that, she found herself babbling away, filling him in. “No, it’s this thing for school. There was this girl killed fifteen years ago, but a lot of people think the cops busted the wrong guy for it. My mom set up a meeting with a cop after school, and I’m supposed to be able to ask him a bunch of questions, but I’m still working out what I want to say. I was supposed to be doing this with my friend June but we got in a dumb fight and . . .” Betty let the last word trail off and then looked at the boy and said, “Why am I telling you all of this? I don’t even know your name.”

  “My name’s Nickel. What’s yours?”

  “Betty,” she said, and then extended a hand. Nickel—if that really was his name—took it and gave it a quick shake. “It’s nice to meet you,” she said.

  “It’s nice to meet you as well. So what are you planning on asking your cop friend?” Nickel sat on the bench next to her, and then Betty quickly read him the words on the page. She still wasn’t quite sure why she was doing it, other than that the boy was nice and cute in that weird sort of way.

  When she was done, he looked at her and said, “Those are all pretty good. You’ve got a knack for this. You’re missing a couple, though. Do you mind if I give you a couple of ideas?”

  “Not at all,” said Betty, deciding just to roll with it. She didn’t know whether anything the kid had to say would be worth hearing, but he was the only one there to talk to besides the guy in the eye patch. The worst that could happen would be she just wouldn’t use any of his suggested questions.

  “Cool,” said Nickel. “First off, some advice: Don’t believe what the cop tells you, at least not one hundred percent. I’m not trying to say he’s a liar. I just mean the stuff he believes about the case might not all be correct. There are three versions of a story like that: the cop’s version, the criminal’s version, and the truth. And the only person that knew the truth for sure is dead.”

  “All right,” said Betty, not sure what else to say to the kid. He must have spent a lot of time thinking about this stuff, but what kid did that?

  “As for questions, I’d make sure to keep your focus on the roommates as much as possible. From what I know about the case, that was one of the most contested—”

  “Wait, you already knew about this?” Betty said, her voice incredulous, and her mind racing. “How is that possible? I just heard about all of this.”

  “I have an interest in this sort of thing,” said Nickel. “Just in general, but especially because it happened locally. Anyway, aside from the roommate, I think you need to ask about the man in the green jacket, the one Duke Barnes claimed to see leaving the house when he was first arrested. He recanted later, and none of that testimony made it too far, but if your cop knows about the case then he knows about that.”

  “But how do you—”

  “Like I said, it’s just kind of a hobby, but I can be very thorough. Also, I think you need to ask why the police disregarded the existence of those roommates so quickly. Unless your cop was really close to the investigation, he’s not going to know, but it’s still worth trying. That was one of the things Duke’s lawyers tried to
get mentioned in court, but it was barred as evidence. There was at least one other person in that house at the time Mandy was killed. That’s something Duke never wavered on, not even when he was first being interrogated and he was strung out on heroin and babbling out his confession. The only question is if the guy in the green coat was a roommate or some other guy.”

  “How can you possibly know all this stuff?” Betty asked the question with fear in her voice. Nickel looked to be the same age as her, but he spoke as though he’d been alive and watching the courtroom and interrogations as they happened.

  “I just do,” said Nickel with a shrug. “Like I mentioned, I find it interesting. I’ve considered looking into it further like you are, but I don’t have a friend in the police department, and there always seems to be something else to do.” Nickel paused and then said, “One more thing. Ask about Mandy’s diary. Duke mentioned it several times during his initial interrogation, but it never came up again. If it exists, it’s likely the cops either buried it or never took possession of it in the first place. If the latter is the case, and Duke didn’t destroy it himself, it’s possible it’s still out there.”

  “This is incredible,” said Betty, scarcely able to believe the wealth of information this mysterious boy was sharing with her. If he’s lying he’s damn good at it, and what reason could he possibly have to make all of that stuff up?

  “I have to go,” said Nickel. “The person I was supposed to meet is going to be here soon.” Nickel looked past her toward the parking lot, but when Betty turned to see what he was staring at, there was no one there.

  “Here,” said Nickel, a business card appearing in his hand as he stood. “It’s just e-mail, but I’ll get back to you if you send me something. Use it or don’t, it’s totally up to you.” Betty took the card from him. It was white with black lettering and it said nickel1138@gmail.com.

  “Thanks for your help,” said Betty as she pushed the card into her pocket. “I don’t really understand how you could know so much about this, but I really appreciate the help.”

  “I know,” said Nickel. “Let me know if you need anything.” Then he walked toward the parking lot without another word.

  Betty watched him go with the sort of wonder on her face that’s usually reserved for UFO sightings, and then Nickel disappeared into the parking lot. Betty shook her head, gave the man with the eye patch a look, and then stuffed her pen and notebook back in her bag. She doubted that her mother’s cop friend would be able to give her all the answers she was looking for, but the help she’d gotten from a very odd stranger certainly seemed like it might be of some use. Betty stood, gave another look to where Nickel had disappeared to, and then began the walk back to her car.

  TWENTY-TWO

  Betty was braced for the fury to begin when she walked into the house, but all she heard was the thump of funk rock coming from the basement. She hurried upstairs and gave her phone a look. There were three text messages waiting for her: one from Jake that said he was thinking of her—a terrifying thought—and a pair from June, both of which said she was very sorry for what happened in the library.

  Betty ignored the texts, too puzzled by the lack of enraged messages from the moms. She’d hoped against hope that the school hadn’t called, but had resigned herself to the fact that of course they would have, probably before she was even out of the school building, much less the parking lot. They’ll probably call during dinner, Betty thought, but she knew that they wouldn’t. The second fifth period started, there should have been an immediate red flag at her absence and then a call to her parents, but somehow none of that had happened.

  Suddenly her life was stuffed full of mysteries. The mystery of the missing call from school. The mystery of whatever the hell Jake Norton was smoking when he hatched the idea of them getting freaking married. And, of course, above all, the mystery of Mandy Reasoner’s death, which she’d only scratched the surface of. And then there was the mysterious stranger she’d met in the park, with his wealth of information.

  Betty spared a glance to the card on the desk and wondered how long she would be able to resist before sending him a message. Nickel was exactly the sort of guy that could make her swoon. He was smart, looked a little bit dangerous, and, judging by his T-shirt at least, liked good music. It was almost too good to be true. But Betty knew she’d never have the nerve to do much more than e-mail him. There was something dangerous about the boy that went far beyond his cryptic knowledge of Mandy’s murder, something Betty couldn’t quite put her finger on, and she didn’t think that she’d be figuring it out anytime soon.

  Trying to solve a puzzle for which she had so few pieces was impossible, so Betty grabbed her notebook and pen and left the card and thoughts of Nickel behind her as she headed back downstairs.

  Ophelia’s awful music was still blaring through the house, so Betty shut the door to the basement to at least muffle it a little and grabbed a water from the fridge. She had twenty minutes to kill before four o’clock and spent the time sitting at the table and staring at the questions on the sheet.

  When the doorbell finally rang, it made Betty leap from her near-fugue state. She’d been thinking of Nickel and his bizarre appearance and information in the park, but it was the suggestions that she’d scribbled onto the page that had her attention now. He had told her things that she wasn’t supposed to know, things that only someone with deep knowledge of the case could have known, and what was she going to do if the cop asked her where she had come by the information? Betty didn’t know for sure, but she had a feeling that telling the officer a cute boy in the park had given it to her wasn’t going to cut it.

  When Betty opened the door, she found a pleasant-looking man wearing a gray suit waiting for her. He was taller than she was, about six feet, and barrel-chested. His hair and thick mustache were both salt and pepper—salt was winning the fight, especially in the mustache. Betty couldn’t remember having ever seen the man before, but there was something oddly familiar about the half smile he gave her and the kindness in his eyes.

  “You must be Betty,” said the cop. “I’m Detective Dick Van Endel.” He stuck his hand out and they shook. His hand was big but softer than she’d imagined it would be. Then again, why would a detective have calloused hands? “I understand you think I might be able to help you out with a school assignment.”

  “It’s great you were able to make the time for me,” said Betty. “I really appreciate it.”

  “My pleasure.” He sounded like he meant it.

  “Why don’t you come in so we can talk? I don’t know how long you have, but I have quite a few questions.”

  “All right,” said Van Endel and followed Betty into the house and took the seat at the table she offered him. She sat down opposite him, the notebook a bridge between them. “Your mother has told me a great deal about you,” said Van Endel. “It’s been a good while since we worked a case together, but she and I have had a few adventures, and it’s nice to finally get to meet you.”

  “Yeah, Andrea can be a little braggy,” said Betty. “I hope it wasn’t too annoying.”

  “Not at all,” said Van Endel. “Any way we could get the music turned down?”

  “Sure,” said Betty, before pounding her foot into the floor. Van Endel grinned, and then a few seconds later the music became much quieter.

  “Better?”

  Still grinning, Van Endel nodded his head. “So,” he said, “Andrea said you and some friends were working on a project for school. Something about the Mandy Reasoner case. I should be able to answer just about anything you want to know, so when you’re ready just let me know.”

  “Did you work the case?”

  “No, I missed that one,” said Van Endel. “My partner at the time, a man named Phil Nelson, worked the case while I was on leave.”

  “Is there any way you could ask Phil if I have any questions that you can’t answer?” Betty asked this slowly, stalling as the wheels turned in her mind, searching for a
passable excuse that would help to explain away some of the insider information she was about to drop.

  “Unfortunately that won’t be possible,” said Van Endel. “Phil passed away a couple years ago, and though I often find myself talking to him still, I’ve yet to get an answer.”

  “I’m sorry about your friend.”

  “It’s all right, Betty,” said Van Endel. “At my age it’s pretty normal to have a few more friends underground than I would like. That said, Phil and I discussed that case over beers on more than one occasion, and I should be able to tell you anything you might want to know.”

  “OK,” said Betty as she grabbed her notebook off of the table. “First off, what do you know about Duke Barnes’s claim that he and Mandy may have had a roommate or two at the time of her death?”

  “Hardball right away,” said Van Endel with a chuckle. “I like that. Duke did claim to have a roommate—aside from Mandy—but other than some signs that other people slept there occasionally, there was no evidence they had any permanent roommates.”

  “Well, how could you tell?”

  “Remember, they were staying at the house illegally, squatting there. And people living like that tend to be pigs. They hoard anything they can get their hands on. Leave plenty of signs. Plus, these weren’t just poor people, remember. Duke, Mandy, and anyone they were associating with were hardcore drug users, who leave an especially recognizable brand of filth in their nests.” Van Endel cleared his throat and then coughed into a fist before saying, “The entire house was like that, garbage everywhere, with one exception. There was only one livable room in that place, even for a really desperate junkie.”

  “Then why was Duke so insistent that he and Mandy had a roommate? I read that he never changed his stance on that, and that even today he still insists he had a roommate in that house.”

  “Well, there are two possibilities: either Duke is lying, or they had a roommate named Jason, like he claimed, and he or some stranger left just before Mandy was killed,” said Van Endel calmly, but Betty couldn’t help notice that the cop’s brow was furrowed. He didn’t like that one too much. Van Endel’s face relaxed almost as soon as she’d noticed it, and then he said, “The problem is that we know Duke is and was a liar. He would have said or done anything back then to get out from under that crime, and the same thing holds true today. Regardless of what he might say about Jason, there is no evidence that definitively supports Duke’s claim that there were other people living there.”