Karin Slaughter - Broken

“Back here.” Maxine gestured for him to follow her down the hall. Opposite the kitchen was a small bedroom that had been turned into a cluttered office. At the back of the house was a dingy bath with avocado green tile. Frank was lying in a hospital bed in the last room. The shades were all drawn but the sunlight glowed behind them. The room was dank and sweaty. Oxygen tubes were clipped to Frank’s nose but his breathing was still labored. His skin was yellow. His eyes were clouded.

There was a chair by the bed. Will sat down without having to be told.

“I’ll be in the kitchen,” Maxine told them. “You’uns let me know if you need anything.”

Will turned in surprise, but she’d already left the room. He turned his attention back to Frank. “Julie Smith?”

The older man’s deep baritone had been reduced to a low tremble. “I had her call Sara.”

Will had assumed something like this had happened. “You already knew Tommy had killed himself before Sara got there.”

“I thought …” Frank closed his eyes. His chest slowly rose and fell. “I thought it would be better if Sara found him. That there would be fewer questions.”

It could have easily worked out that way. Sara knew Nick Shelton. She could have unwittingly smoothed things over. “Why did you have Maxine say that Allison had a boyfriend?”

One shoulder went up. “It’s always the boyfriend.”

Will guessed that was true enough, but Frank had lied so many times over the last few days that Will didn’t know whether the man was capable of being honest. Lionel Harris had a point about change. Not many people could pull it off. There had to be something awfully bad or awfully good to compel a person to turn their lives around. It was obvious to Will that Frank was past any life-changing revelations. Even without the oxygen tank, he smelled sick, like his body was already rotting. Will knew that there came a point in every person’s life when it was too late to change anything. All you could do was wait for death to make you inconsequential.

Frank winced as he tried to get more comfortable in the bed.

“Can I get you anything?”

He shook his head, though he was obviously in pain. “How’s Lena?”

“The infection’s bad, but they think she’ll pull through.”

“Tell her I’m sorry,” Frank said. “Tell her I’m sorry about everything.”

“All right,” Will promised, though if he had his way he would never talk to the woman again. He didn’t think Lena Adams was all bad, but there was just enough of her that was tainted that left a bad taste in Will’s mouth. “Why don’t you tell me what happened?”

Frank stared openly at Will. His eyes watered. “You got kids?”

Will shook his head.

“Darla was always rebellious, pushing me, pushing Maxine.” He stopped to catch his breath. “She disappeared on us when she was seventeen. I didn’t even know she was back in town until I saw her outside the clinic.” He coughed. Fine specks of blood dotted the bedsheet. “She was taking a cigarette break.”

“Why did she call the police on Tommy?” The act seemed risky considering her criminal enterprises.

“I don’t know if she was trying to scare Tommy or punish me.” Frank reached for the glass of water on his bedside table. Will helped him, holding the straw so he could drink. Frank swallowed, the noise painfully loud in the tiny room. He sat back with a slow groan.

Will asked, “What did you do when you read the incident report about Tommy’s dog?”

“I went to the clinic and asked her what the hell she was doing.”

“Darla’s name wasn’t in the report.”

Frank didn’t answer.

Will was sick of pulling teeth. “You’ve done thousands of interviews, Chief Wallace. You know what questions I’m going to ask. You’ve probably already got a list in your head.” He paused, waiting for Frank to make this easy. After a full minute, Will realized nothing was ever going to be easy with this man. He asked, “What did Darla say when you confronted her?”

“She told me she was being blackmailed.”

“About the drug trial?”

“It wasn’t just the two kids she was lying about. It was a lot of them. She had a system going—getting them to double up on the rolls so it looked like more kids were in the study, then they’d split the checks when they came in.”

“Were they all blackmailing her?”

“Just Jason and Allison.”

“She told you their names?”

“No.”

Will studied him, trying again to figure out if he was lying. It was an exercise in futility. “What did Darla tell you about the blackmailers?”

“She thought she could pay them off, get them off her back. One of them was graduating soon. She thought if she gave them enough money they’d go away.”

“How much did she ask you for?”

“Ten thousand dollars. I didn’t have it. Even if I did, I wouldn’t’a given it to her. I spent so much money bailing her out so many times. I couldn’t throw away more.”

Will noticed the man had not considered a second option, which was arresting his daughter and sending her to prison for her crimes.

Frank continued, “She worked so hard to get her nursing degree. I never thought she’d …” His voice trailed off. “I didn’t know.”

“She’s been in trouble before.”

Frank would only nod.

“Bad checks,” Will supplied. Darla’s fingerprints were on file. They matched the print on the Windex bottle Will and Charlie had found in the dorm bathroom closet. Will made an educated guess. “She was in trouble before that.”

Frank gave a tight nod. “I’d get calls every now and then. Professional courtesy, one cop to another. Austin. Little Rock. West Memphis. She was taking care of old people, skimming their money. She was good. She never got caught, but they knew it was her.”

Will had found many times that there was a fine line between knowing someone was guilty and proving it. Being a cop’s daughter had probably given Darla an extra layer of protection.

“I was sure Tommy killed that girl. I just didn’t want anything to come back on Darla.”

“You did everything you could do to make sure Lena’s case was solid.”

He stared at Will with rheumy eyes, obviously trying to guess what he knew.

The truth was that Will didn’t know anything for certain. He guessed that Frank had hidden evidence. He guessed that Frank had delayed the call center in Eaton sending the audio of Maxine’s voice on the 911 call. He guessed that the man had impeded an investigation, acted with reckless endangerment, and blindly if not willfully contributed to the deaths of three people.

As Frank had said, there was knowing and then there was proving.

“I never wanted to get Lena involved in any of this,” Frank said. “She didn’t know nothing about any of it. It was all down to me.”

Will imagined Lena would say the same thing about Frank. As long as he lived, he would never understand the bond that held them together. “When did you figure out that Darla was involved?”

“When Lena—” He started coughing again. This time, there was so much blood that he had to spit into a tissue. “Jesus,” Frank groaned, wiping his mouth. “I’m sorry.”

Will fought to keep his stomach under control. “When did you figure it out?”

“When Lena told me there was another kid got killed the same way …” His voice trailed off again. “I couldn’t see Darla doing this. You’ll understand when you have kids. She was my baby. I used to walk the floor with her at night. I watched her grow from a little girl into …” Frank didn’t finish his words, though it was obvious what Darla had grown into.

“When’s the last time you saw her?”