Secrets to the Grave

81

“I did not kill Marissa,” Darren Bordain said.

Mendez got out of his chair. “Why don’t you have a seat for a little longer? I’ve got to step out and get a cup of coffee. Would you like one?”

Bordain looked at him like he had lost his mind completely. “Do I want a cup of coffee? No, I don’t want a fucking cup of coffee! No, I don’t want to sit down!”

Big sweat stains ringed the underarms of his blue oxford shirt with the neat little logo embroidered on the pocket: MEF.

“I’ll be right back,” Mendez said, unfazed.

He let himself out of the interview room and went across the hall to the break room where Dixon, Hicks, and Vince were watching the monitor.

Vince smacked him on the back. “Good job, Junior.”

“You’ve got him back on his heels,” Dixon said. “I can’t believe he hasn’t asked for a lawyer.”

“I think he wants to tell you something,” Vince said. “But he can’t quite do it.”

“If he confesses to killing her, then it’s out there,” Mendez said. “He can’t take it back.”

Vince went to the machine and rewound the tape. “Watch him when you ask about the nights in question. Watch what he does.”

Mendez stared hard at the monitor as the moments that had just happened unfolded again in front of him.

“Watch him here when you ask him about last night, if anyone saw him at home. Watch how he kind of closes his shoulders like he wants to wrap his arms around himself.”

“Protective?” Mendez said.

“And the same thing here when you press him about his alibis,” Vince said. “He’s hiding something.”

“The fact that he’s a murderer?” Hicks suggested.

“Press those points again,” Vince said. “See what he does.”

“Okay.”

Mendez poured two cups of coffee and went back across the hall.

“I brought you one anyway,” he said, setting the cups on the table. “It’s not half bad today. Someone brought Irish Cream beans in.”

Bordain had taken his seat and lit another cigarette. He ignored the coffee. His hands were still trembling.

“I did not kill Marissa,” he said again. “I had no reason to kill Marissa.”

“I’m thinking you got tired of her blackmailing you.”

“No one is blackmailing me.”

“It’s ironic, isn’t it?” Mendez said. “You say you toyed with the idea of going out with her because it would wind your mother up like a top—but you get her pregnant and have a child out of wedlock and you keep that information to yourself—and the old lady would really blow a gasket over that.”

“It’s not ironic. It’s not true.”

“You can’t account for your whereabouts the night she was murdered. Your name is on her daughter’s birth certificate. And you’re sitting here in front of me sweating like a whore in church.”

“I was at Gina’s house the night Marissa was killed,” Bordain said.

“Gina, who is still conveniently in a coma.”

“I didn’t try to kill Gina.”

“Is that why you wanted to go into her room this afternoon? To say your last good-byes and accidentally pull a plug?”

“That’s ridiculous.”

“She can’t help you, Mr. Bordain. By your own admission, you left her house and were home alone by eleven thirty.”

Bordain closed his eyes and swallowed hard. Mendez waited, watching his shoulders draw inward toward his chest, holding whatever it was inside.

“Darren,” Mendez said quietly, leaning across the table. “There’s nothing worse than murder. That’s the big enchilada. It doesn’t get worse than that. Whatever it is that you’re not telling me could not possibly be worse than that.”

Bordain smiled bitterly as tears came to his eyes. “You’re not from where I’m from.”

“I’m going to read you your rights and put you in jail. Does that go over big where you’re from?”

“You don’t have any proof that I killed Marissa.”

“Not as much as I’d like,” Mendez acknowledged. He tapped the edge of the file folder against the table. “But I’ve got a hell of a motive.”

“She’s not my child. She couldn’t be my child.”

Again the protective posture.

“Why?” Mendez asked.

“I didn’t kill Marissa.”

“Find me someone to corroborate your alibi.”

Bordain put his elbows on the table and buried his face in his hands.

“I can’t,” he said in a tortured voice.

That wasn’t I can’t because there was no one to corroborate his story, Mendez thought. That was I can’t because he wouldn’t reveal the name of the person who could.

Mendez found himself staring at the logo on the pocket of Bordain’s shirt. He’d seen it before. Not in a store. He didn’t pay attention to stuff like that. His sister Mercedes did most of his fashion shopping.

MEF.

He thought back over half a dozen conversations with different people over the week. Where was Darren Bordain the night of Marissa’s murder? Gina Kemmer had some friends over, including Darren Bordain and Mark Foster. Where had Darren last seen Marissa? At the Licosto Winery event—the same last place Mark Foster had seen her. Who had Mark Foster been having dinner with the night he saw Marissa having dinner with Steve Morgan in Los Olivos—Darren Bordain? If they asked Steve Morgan, would he say Bordain?

Not a logo. A monogram.

Mark Foster. Mark E. Foster, the “not gay” head of the McAster music department.

Darren Bordain had either accidentally or who knew why gotten up that day and put on the shirt of his lover, Mark Foster.

“You’re gay,” Mendez said. “You were with Mark Foster when Marissa was being murdered.”

Bordain didn’t answer. He apparently would have rather gone to prison as a murderer than admit it.

“You’re wearing his shirt,” Mendez pointed out.

“Am I?” Bordain said. He was rattled, but he wasn’t going down without a fight. “The laundry must have made a mistake.”

“Did Marissa know?”

“We never had a conversation about laundry services.”

“Did she think keeping the secret of your sexual orientation might be worth some cash?”

Darren Bordain was the only heir to Bruce Bordain’s fortune, and Milo Bordain’s only hope for a grandchild. He was being groomed for a big political career in a party that would never embrace a gay candidate. The scandal would be huge—worth killing over.

But Darren Bordain had kept that secret for a very long time, and he wasn’t going to give it up now.

“Do you really want us digging into this?” Mendez asked. “Tell me the truth now and it doesn’t have to go any farther than this room.”

Bordain laughed at that. “Right.”

“You’d rather we start digging around, asking your friends ... your enemies?”

“I don’t need an alibi,” Bordain said, pulling his composure completely back in place. “I never slept with Marissa, nor did I kill her. And since I know you can have no evidence of me having committed a crime because I have not committed a crime, I’ll be leaving now or calling my attorney. The choice is up to you.”

Mendez sighed. They had nothing to hold him on. If he called an attorney there would be no chance at any further conversation with him. Damn. He’d had Bordain on the ropes there for a minute. He wanted more time.

Mendez sighed and tapped the file folder against the table again. He still had Bordain’s name on Haley Fordham’s birth certificate.

“Am I supposed to believe there’s another Darren Bruce Bordain walking around Southern California?” he asked.

“Actually, yes,” Bordain said. “Yes, there is. He’s my father.”