Robin Burcell - Face of a Killer

“Not that you can blame the guy. They’re gonna flip the switch in what? Two days?”

“A little over one. But I still need to hear it from his mouth. I want him to admit it. To quit lying and-and I want him to know I know.”

“Okay. Do it. But I’m going with you. Surveillance in case you’re being followed.”

“Like some dipshit’s going to follow me to San Quentin? This is one interview I need to do on my own.”

“So I sit and drink a cup in the guard’s office. By tomorrow, I’ll be in serious need of caffeine anyway. Do me a favor when I get to the hotel. Since I’m going to be up watching you all night, try to get some sleep, so you can drive in the morning.”

The next morning, Carillo rode shotgun while Sydney drove to San Quentin, because she had to hear it from Wheeler before she could let it go. Hear that he was lying about this. She’d thought he was this innocent man, that her father had befriended him because of the relationship with Wheeler’s father, Francisco… But once again it occurred to her, what did she really know about her father anyway?

And therein lay the crux of the matter. She’d been so distracted about her father’s secret life and that damned photo that McKnight sent that apparently she’d grasped at any little thing that might turn it around, prove it was wrong, even Wheeler’s lies, even though his lies didn’t prove everything else was wrong. In fact, Sydney was still distracted by it all, still upset, so much so that she wasn’t even aware that Carillo was talking to Dixon on the phone. “I’ll let her know,” he said, then disconnected.

He tucked his phone on his belt, looked over at her, and said, “Not sure if it’s a good news, bad news, good news thing.”

“Okay…”

“They arrested Gnoble’s aide, Prescott. Interrogated the shit out of him, got the big deny, deny, deny, until the moment they walked in with his cell phone and pulled up your cell phone number and the time of your threatening call. That was all it took. He admitted to leaving that voice mail on Dixon’s phone, too, and then he confessed to starting the fire. Said he’d unlocked your window, then set up the can of turpentine the day before, when he and Gnoble went out to bring you flowers, so that he could come back, slide the window open, then light it on fire.”

“The bad news?”

“He says that Gnoble didn’t know a thing. Prescott hired a hit man without Gnoble’s knowledge, but decided to do it on his own when the guy kept missing you. So we got Prescott, but Gnoble’s untouchable. Bet you’ll never guess who Prescott did give up. Mrs. Gnoble.”

“Mrs. Gnoble?”

“The one and only. Seems she was worried about McKnight sending you this photo and opening up a big can of worms involving your father, McKnight, and Gnoble. The BICTT scandal. Thought it might interfere with her chances of becoming first lady, so she got Prescott to hire a hit man. They arrested her this morning.”

“Then what’s the good news?”

“The hit man that Prescott hired? Richard Blackwell. Supposed to be the best in the business? Well, just might be. Only he works for CIA. The guy you saw in court, then out on the street? That’s him. He’s the one who made that first phone call to you, pretending to be the Jane Doe killer in order to make Prescott think it was legit. His job was to prevent Prescott from killing you, by pretending to be the one who was going to take you out.”

Cute Guy from the elevator, she thought. How fitting. She glanced over at him, then back at the road, figuring that was why Scotty had gone along with them and not informed her of what was going on at first. She didn’t like it any better, but at least she understood. “Anything else?”

“No. He’ll call us the moment something comes up.”

“So, what exactly did you tell him we were doing?”

“Going out to breakfast.” He leaned his head back, closed his eyes. “Just don’t wake me until it’s over. Long night.”

All too soon, Sydney was seated opposite Wheeler in an interview room. Again.

She was hating this place. Hating that she’d ever walked in here.

“Yeah,” he said. “You got news?”

“I got news,” she replied, watching his face carefully. “I got news that a photo was taken of you climbing in the back of the pizza place, during your second visit, just before you ripped it off.”

He didn’t answer, and Sydney found her gaze drawn to his white eye, the one that couldn’t see, but seemed to see right through her. He looked away. “Don’t know what you’re talkin’ about.”

“They’ve made great strides with technology. They can enhance things that might not have been useful twenty years ago.”

“Yeah, they showed those photos in court. Couldn’t prove it was me. Couldn’t even prove it was the pizza deliveryman.”

“Oh, very funny. Did you go back in to take the money from the safe?”

He refused to look at her, and she realized that he had done that very thing.

“I don’t believe it. I broke every rule I held sacred, put my career on the line investigating this thing, trying to help you, and you lied to me.”

“I didn’t lie. I never said a thing. I didn’t steal nothing. Don’t even know what you’re talking about.”

“I’m talking about this.” Sydney laid the photos on the table. He looked at them, his gaze widening at the face shot that DOJ was able to enhance, his hand on the window frame, uninjured, unburned.

“So I went in the back way. That don’t make me a killer.”

“You ripped him off. That makes you highly suspect when you said that he gave you the money.”

“And he did. The money from the till. Never touched the safe.”

“But you went back for more.”

“No, I didn’t. Those pictures don’t prove shit.”

“They’ll speak pretty loudly when the governor is looking at your case for clemency. When’s the big day? Tomorrow? The next?”

He was quiet, looking like he was wrestling with something. His life, no doubt. And Sydney thought about the little things he told her, the things that he couldn’t have known unless her father had told him. Was she wrong? “You told me my father said that you could pay him back on Tuesday.”

“I don’t remember what day he said. I just said Tuesday, ’cause you asked, and it was the day after he was killed.”

And her heart sank. She supposed she’d been so eager to believe him, because by doing so, it meant her father was good, altruistic.. . She’d put her hopes in that he, Wheeler, had the most incentive to tell the truth. How was it that she’d overlooked that he also had the most incentive to lie?

“Why? You went back to steal the money from the goddamned safe! What happened? Did he catch you?”

“Just ’cause I’m a thief, don’t make me no murderer. No, he didn’t catch me. He was too busy talking to someone else.”

“There was someone else there?” Sydney said. “How convenient.”

“And true.”

“You forget to mention that to the cops? Sort of when you forgot to mention that you climbed into the back of the building after he’d already given you money?”

“I told them I saw that guy there. Probably the same guy I saw sitting out in the car when I show to get my green. They did that Identikit thing. I just didn’t say when I saw him, or where I was when I saw him that second time.”

“Why not?”

“You saying I was s’posed to tell them? Hey, by the way, while I was breakin’ in the back way to rob the place? That guy in the parking lot came in and blew away the owner? You nuts? I got my black ass breaking into a white man’s business in a rich white man’s town. I can’t go tellin’ them I was rippin’ the place off. They convict me for sure, I say that. ’Specially I say that after the fact. Like I’m makin’ it up, or somethin’.”