Best Friends Forever Part 13

"Valerie and Adelaide."

"I didn't..." The words echoed in his head, rolling around like bowling b.a.l.l.s on a dance floor.

"'And the devil that deceived them was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet are, and shall be tormented day and night for ever and ever.'"

Dan shook his head, which made it ache even worse. He hadn't done anything wrong. He and Val had been kids, fooling around. Val had cried afterward-he'd remembered that-but that was because it had been her first time. At least that was what he'd thought, what he'd told himself for years, and when Addie had accused him, Val had said no. She'd backed him up. She'd sat with him at lunch for the rest of the year, for Chrissake, and was that the behavior of a girl who'd been harmed, who'd been violated? No. No, it was not.

Except, Dan thought as Merry continued to look at him. If that was true, why had Val been so angry at the reunion? You ruined my life, she'd hissed at him, her pretty face contorted. Dan lifted one hand to his head and rubbed at the sore spot there that felt disturbingly mushy, like a bruise on an apple.

"Repent," said Holy Mary. Her face was flushed, her eyes were alight. She fell to her knees beside the bed with a wall-rattling thump. "Repent," she said, and reached for his hands and gripped them, pulling him out from under the covers (he was indeed naked, he saw) and onto his knees. Milk and juice and tea sloshed over the edges of their cups and soaked the quilt. Dan Swansea knelt next to Holy Mary and squeezed his eyes shut.

TWENTY-NINE.

Back at the station, Jordan's patrol-people were hunched over their desks, fingers clattering over the keyboards, telephones tucked under their ears. They'd made progress, he learned as he hung up his coat and went to his office, with the three of them in their blue uniforms (Holly, he was sure, had hers specially tailored to make the most of her admirable a.s.s) following him like something out of Make Way for Ducklings, which the Nighty-Night Lady had read two nights before. Of the one hundred and eighty-seven registered attendees and thirteen walk-ins at the previous night's reunion, ninety-six of them were men, either members of the cla.s.s or spouses of women who were. Of those ninety-six, eighty-four had been accounted for-they'd answered their home phones, or their cell phones, or the phones at their parents' houses to say that they were fine and well and were not missing their belts or a significant amount of blood.

That left an even dozen. Of those, Christie Keogh, reached at her home, post-workout, pre-pedicure, told him that eight were out-of-towners, most likely on Sat.u.r.day-morning flights taking them back to California and Connecticut and an army base in Stuttgart, Germany. Which brought them to four.

Jordan stood in front of his desk as Holly Muoz fumbled with a folder. "Oops!" she cried as a folder of paper-clipped pages slipped between her fingers. Jordan crouched down, plucked the pages out of the air before they hit the ground, and handed them to Holly.

"Wow," she said, taking pains to make sure that their fingers touched as she took the folder. "Fast." If this kept up, Jordan thought, she'd show up at work one morning with i love you written on her eyelids, like that girl in the Indiana Jones movies. She was adorable, but she was also significantly younger than he was, and his subordinate. She deserved someone better, some-one who hadn't already f.u.c.ked up a marriage and did not have a fantasy life starring an icon of the non-potty-trained.

He sat as Holly read the list. "Scott Erhlich. Lives in Chicago. Unmarried, no kids, not answering his home or his cell phone. Eric Ramos. Lives in Cincinnati, married to Kelly Granville-she's the Pleasant Ridge grad. They've got three kids. No answer at home, and neither one of them has a cell phone. We're in the process of trying to reach the wife's family. We figure they might have gone there after the reunion. Kevin Oliphant..."

Jordan interrupted, remembering what Jon had said: Kevin Elephant. "Wait. Who was that last one?"

Holly repeated the name, then spelled it. "He lives in Pleasant Ridge."

"He got a record?" Jordan asked.

Holly flipped a page. "DUI times three, drunk and disorderly, disturbing the peace. Bar fights, it looks like, and one a.s.sault. Looks like he pushed his ex-wife down a flight of stairs, after she alleged that he'd hit her son with..." She paused, peering at the notebook. "A cast-iron frying pan?"

"My mother had one. You use them to fry chicken," said Gary.

"Or bake cornbread," offered Devin Freedman. "They're heavy."

"They sell them at Williams-Sonoma," Gary said.

"I know what they are," Holly said. "I just can't see someone using one as a weapon."

Jordan pressed his hand against his forehead. "Who's number four?"

"Daniel Swansea," said Holly. "He's not answering his cell or his home number. Single guy, lives downtown in a high-rise. His parents say he doesn't really keep in touch. Day doorman hasn't seen him; we left messages for the night guy. He works at a Toyota dealers.h.i.+p, but n.o.body there was expecting him until Sunday."

Jordan wrote the names down, then studied them. "Daniel Swansea," he muttered, and flipped through his notebook to confirm that Jon had mentioned that name, too. "Field trip." He pointed to Holly. "You take the first guy, Scott Ehrlich." He pointed to Gary. "You find Daniel Swansea. Go to his place, and if he's not there yet, talk to the neighbors and the people at the dealers.h.i.+p. Figure out who his friends are, where he might be cras.h.i.+ng. Both of you, bring a picture of the belt. Maybe one of them'll recognize it." He gave Eric Ramos to Devin and got Kevin Oliphant's information from the computer. An a.s.sault charge, a bunch of DUIs and bar fights, pus.h.i.+ng a lady, hitting a little kid. That sounded to him like a guy who could end his high school reunion minus his belt and some blood.

THIRTY.

Kevin Oliphant lived in a c.r.a.ppy apartment in a subdivided three-story vinyl-sided house behind the Discount Foodmart on the very edge of Pleasant Ridge. Jordan checked the name on the mailbox and located unit 1-C at the end of a dark hallway that smelled like garlic and wet wood. He banged on the flimsy wooden door and called "Police!" and eventually, Oliphant exited, chest-first. The chest in question was bare, covered by a few spa.r.s.e, dark curls. Oliphant's belly was slack and white, bulging above a pair of brown sweatpants. His bare feet were pale and surprisingly dainty, and he smelled not unlike the homeless men hanging around Jonathan Downs's bus stop: same signature scent of eau de Pabst and puke.

"Yeah?" he grunted, blinking at Jordan's face.

"You weren't answering your phone," Jordan said.

"Is that against the law?" He belched. Delightful fellow.

"Were you at the reunion last night?"

"So what if I was?"

"We found some stuff in the parking lot. You missing anything?"

Kevin Oliphant scratched his head. "If you've got papers, just go ahead and serve me."

"Why would you think I'm here to serve you?"

Kevin cleared his throat, a wet, rumbling sound. "f.u.c.k do you care?" It happened in an instant. One second Jordan was standing six feet away from Kevin Oliphant, and the next he had the man backed up against the rattling living room wall of the s.h.i.+tbox apartment that smelled like fried food and stale farts.

"How about you answer my questions?"

Kevin struggled, wild-eyed. Jordan shook him. "If I run your name," Jordan rasped, "what'll I find? Couple of restraining orders? Parking tickets? Your child support all paid up, Kevin?" He shook him hard enough to make his head bounce on his neck, but Kevin said nothing. "Belt," Jordan said, letting him loose.

The other man stared at him. "Huh?"

"Show me the belt you wore last night," Jordan said.

Kevin stared at him for a moment, then skulked down the s.h.i.+tbox's hallway. A minute later, he came out with a black leather belt in his hands. "Okay? Are we cool?"

"We are not." Jordan peered around the apartment. The living room had scratchy gray wall-to-wall carpeting, a single stained recliner, and a stack of yellowed newspapers beside it. There was a pair of crumpled pizza boxes in the corner, and a thirty-gallon garbage can overflowing with empty beer cans and Popov vodka bottles beside it.

Kevin Oliphant followed Jordan's gaze. "What?" he asked. "I recycle."

Jordan walked down the hall. The grimy kitchen's sink was piled high with dirty dishes, the counter crammed with Chinese take-out containers and an eight-pack of paper towel rolls (from the look of it, Oliphant used paper towels as plates, napkins, and probably toilet paper, too). The bathroom was exactly what Jordan expected, the toilet seat up, the floor in front of it showered in p.i.s.s droplets, a scroungy blue rug in front of the tub, which looked like it hadn't seen a sponge or a scrub brush in months, if ever. There was a coat closet off the hallway, empty except for a winter coat on a wire hanger, and some dirty T-s.h.i.+rts kicked into a pile. The bedroom closet was a tumbled mess of clothing. The bed was a mattress on the floor. It would have been depressing even if it didn't remind Jordan of his own place, which was cleaner and marginally better furnished but, for all that, still the place of a man who lived alone, a man who'd had a woman once, then f.u.c.ked it all up.

Kevin trailed behind him as Jordan made his way through the apartment. "What are you doing? Hey, don't you need a warrant?"

Jordan stopped in the living room and glared at the guy. There was a pair of photographs in cheap wooden frames perched on top of the television set. Two kids, a little boy and a baby, wearing swimsuits (the baby's swimsuit bottom was swollen with diapers underneath), and just the thought that this foulmouthed, s.h.i.+tbox-dwelling, kid-hitting a.s.shole had children, and that Jordan didn't and probably never would, was enough to make him want to grab Oliphant and shake him so hard that he'd need a construction-paper chart to remind him to wipe his a.s.s after he took a dump. "Where's the bas.e.m.e.nt?"

Kevin's mouth hung open. He shut it in a sneer. "Why? You think I'm hiding something down there?"

"Are you?" Jordan asked.

"Are you s.h.i.+tting me? I don't even have a bas.e.m.e.nt."

"Storage unit?"

Oliphant worked at one of his back teeth with his tongue. "They wanted thirty bucks a month extra."

"Show me."

Oliphant shrugged and led Jordan to a door next to the laundry room. The door led down a flight of wobbly wooden stairs that led to a coin-op washer and dryer and a half-dozen chicken-wire cubicles packed with people's stuff: rolls of Christmas wrapping paper, tricycles and baby swings, cardboard boxes full of old clothes and books, mildewed plastic lawn chairs, bundled magazines tied with twine. Jordan pulled out his flashlight and looked around, s.h.i.+ning the light into each cubicle as Kevin stood, s.h.i.+vering and barefoot, at the top of the stairs.

"Where's your car?" Jordan knew that Oliphant had one, or that at least there was a ten-year-old Ford Explorer registered in his name.

"Out front." Kevin c.o.c.ked a thumb. Jordan walked outside, looked the vehicle over, and saw a number of crushed coffee cups and empty soda bottles strewn around the front seat, but no blood, no dents, no body.

He marched back inside. Kevin Oliphant had pulled on a T-s.h.i.+rt reading CERTIFIED p.u.s.s.y INSPECTOR and a pair of grayish socks. His big toe poked through a hole in the right one. This guy just got better and better. "Who were you with last night?" Jordan asked.

"Chip Mason. We went to our high school reunion together."

"Just the two of you?"

"And Dan Swansea."

"What time did you get to the country club?"

"Around ten."

"Who'd you talk to?"

"My buddies."

"They have names?"

"Phil Tressler. Russ Henderson. Jamie Wertz. We played football." Kevin flexed his shoulders. "Won the conference junior year."

"Congratulations. You leave by yourself?"

"Chip took me home. Dan said for us to go ahead. He was talking to a bunch of girls. Probably figured he'd get a ride with one of them, if you know what I mean." He leered.

"Do you know where he is?"

"Probably hooked up."

"Hooked up with who?"

"s.h.i.+t, I don't know. Kara Tait, maybe. She was always a good time."

"Did you see Jonathan Downs last night?"

"Jonathan Downs?" Confusion flickered across Kevin's face. "No way. No way he'd show up. Not him or his fat freak of a sister."

"You know Adelaide Downs?"

"Know her?" Kevin's voice acquired a nasty edge. "That b.i.t.c.h ruined our senior year."

"What are you talking about?"

Kevin squinted at Jordan mistrustfully. "You know what? I don't have to tell you s.h.i.+t." He lifted his chin and then, with more dignity than a man wearing a p.u.s.s.y inspector T-s.h.i.+rt should have been able to muster, said, "I think you should leave now," and pointed at the door.

THIRTY-ONE.

Kevin Oliphant didn't have to tell him s.h.i.+t. But Christie Keogh was more than happy to oblige. She met him at the door, face drawn and worried, with her son and daughter huddled behind her. Jordan crouched down, smiling. He thought he remembered hearing that it was important to get down to kids' level when addressing them, but once he'd gotten in position, he thought maybe that was dogs. The little girl shrank back with her hands over her eyes, peeking at him from between her slitted fingers. The boy, who appeared to be seven or eight, looked him up and down. "Are you a policeman?" he asked. "Do you have a gun? Can I hold it?"

"Oh, G.o.d," Christie murmured. She hustled the kids into the family room, put a program on the TV (Jordan was relieved it wasn't The Nighty-Night Show), and walked him back to the kitchen.

This time she was barefoot, with Styrofoam toe-spreaders on her feet. She'd changed out of her workout wear and was dressed for the day in dark jeans and a gray cardigan with a silver zipper she kept tugging as she explained what Addie Downs had done to ruin Kevin Oliphant's life. "It was when we were seniors," she began. "Right after homecoming, there was a party at this guy Pete Preston's house. He was the quarterback on the football team." She looked up, stealing a glance at Jordan's face. "Anyhow. Valerie Adler hooked up with Dan Swansea, and they went off into the woods, and..." She peeked at the TV room, making sure the door was shut. "They had s.e.x, I guess. I wasn't there. This is just what I heard." She pulled the zipper up, then down. "Anyhow. Addie and Val were best friends. They lived on the same street. They'd been best friends forever. They were both at the party, and what happened was, Addie told her parents that Dan had raped Valerie. Addie's parents-her mom, I think-told the guidance counselor at school. But Val said that nothing had happened. She told the guidance counselor nothing happened-that it had been, you know, consensual-and she told her friends that Addie was jealous. That Addie had been the one with the crush on Dan and that she didn't like it when Dan hooked up with Valerie. And the boys..." She dropped her eyes. "People were pretty hard on Addie until we graduated."

"How do you mean?"

She tugged her zipper, looking unhappy. "Well. Addie had never been really popular anyhow-she'd been heavy and Val was really her only friend. After the party, after what happened, they weren't friends anymore, and everyone at school..." She paused. "Dan and his friends kind of ganged up on Addie. People would say stuff. They'd call her a narc or trip her in the halls. Write stuff about her in the girls' room. High school stuff. Her locker was vandalized a few times, and some of those boys got in trouble for painting things on her driveway."

"What things?"

Christie shrugged, with her eyes trained on her immaculate kitchen floor. "Nasty things. I don't really know. They got arrested-Dan and Kevin Oliphant, Russ Henderson and Terry Zdrocki. They got suspended from school for three days, and they couldn't go to graduation."

Jordan considered this. "Were any of them at the reunion last night?"

The zipper went up, the zipper came down. "Terry died in an accident after graduation. I think he climbed on top of a trolley-he was drunk-and he tried to grab the wires. He was electrocuted." She swallowed. "The rest of them were there."

"We've been able to locate almost every man from the party except for Dan Swansea," Jordan said.

Christie looked up at him. "You think something happened to Dan?"

"We don't think anything yet, ma'am. We'd just like to find Mr. Swansea. Do you know who he left the party with?"

Eyes wide, Christie shook her head.

"Okay. Let's back up. What time did Mr. Swansea arrive?"

"I'm really not sure. I think he came with Chip Mason, and I remember seeing him at the bar with his friends, but I don't know when he came."