Speak No Evil

TWENTY-EIGHT

Hi Scout:

I’m so sorry about Felix. How awful! If anything happened to my kitties, I would be so upset.

I’ve been visiting my mother for the last week and haven’t had time to e-mail you. My mom’s been sick and we’ve had a hard time with it. I just hope she gets better. The doctors are afraid the cancer has come back, but I’m praying it’s not that again.

If you want to talk about Felix, go ahead.

By the way, I’m really struggling in one of my classes. You really helped me with my midterms last semester, in calculus, remember? Do you think you have time today to help with another problem? I’ll hang out in the private chat area. I have Room 303 reserved and open on my computer. I’ll be studying here all day, so if you can help just pop in.

Elizabeth.

Dillon composed the e-mail from “Elizabeth Rimes” and sent it off to Scout’s public e-mail account through the MyJournal server.

“Smart kid,” Patrick said.

“Smart enough to not use her real name and to realize Scout was obsessing over her.”

Dillon had spoken to Elizabeth-real name Bethany Eggers-over the phone, and she had told him she’d stopped responding to Scout’s e-mails when she found out he’d lied about his cat dying. She’d found three other messages on the MyJournal board from him talking about “Felix” dying. “It was downright creepy,” she said. “When you’re done with my account, just close it down.”

Because Elizabeth had never responded to the cat message, Dillon composed it in a way to encourage interaction. He had the chat room window open, and Patrick had a mirror of the site on his computer screen.

“Now what?” Dillon asked.

“We wait.”

“How long?”

“As long as it takes.”

Dillon let out a sigh. “I’m a patient man, Patrick, but this tests even my resolve.”

“I’m going to call Carina and tell her we’ve set the trap and to be on alert.”

“Tell her to be careful, too.”

“I always do.”

Carina and Nick arrived at the Sand Shack after the dinner rush. Kyle Burns didn’t look particularly pleased to see them, but he approached and said, “What can I help you with, Detectives?”

“We’d like to talk to you about your father.”

Carina gauged his reaction, surprised at the intense anger that flashed across his face.

“I don’t want to talk about him.” Burns realized he’d spoken too loudly and looked around. Several of the waitstaff looked away. “Let’s go to my office,” he said through clenched teeth.

Carina and Nick followed him back. She assessed the situation. Kyle didn’t appear to be armed, but she wasn’t going to be crammed into that little office of his where he might be able to turn the tables on them.

“Mr. Burns-” Carina began.

“I don’t want to talk about my father,” he said again. “I have nothing to do with him.”

“Well then, maybe you’ll listen. We know that Mitchell Burns was a convicted rapist who disappeared eight years ago while under suspicion for rape. Have you seen or heard from him since?”

“No.”

“What about your mother?”

He gave a half-laugh. “She can have him. She’s no better than he is.”

“Are you saying that your mother may have had contact with her husband?”

Kyle rubbed both hands over his face. “No, he never contacted her.”

“How can you be so sure?”

“She would have told me.”

“You’re close?”

“No, but if she saw Mitch she would have told me.”

“What about your brother?”

“What about him?”

“Do you think he may have had contact with Mitch Burns?”

“No, never.”

“You sound certain.”

“Brandon would have told me.” Kyle shook his head. “Ask him yourself. He’s busing tables right now.”

Carina was surprised. “You didn’t give us any employee records about your brother.”

“He just helps out sometimes after school and on the weekends.” He sighed. “Look, I pay him under the table, okay? Is that a crime?”

“Actually, yes.”

Kyle frowned. “It’s just that-”

Carina put her hand up. “I’m not going to arrest you for IRS problems. But I’d like to talk to your brother. Maybe your father has contacted him.”

“You don’t understand what it was like. I was twelve when he went to jail. I sat in the courtroom during the trial and listened to what he’d done. Listened to my own mother lie for him.” Kyle grimaced. “And then the prosecutor didn’t go after her for perjury because he felt sorry for her. What a joke. She was pathetic. We were all better off without him.”

The amiable man they’d interviewed earlier in the week was gone, replaced by a bitter, angry son.

“But he was released.”

“Four years. Only four years for raping two women. He probably raped more, but they didn’t come forward. Why?” He looked at Carina. “Why don’t they come forward? He would have gotten more time.”

Carina said, “They’re scared. They don’t think the police will believe them. They think it’s their fault. There are lots of reasons.”

Kyle’s face fell. “All stupid reasons.”

“What happened when your father was released?”

“My mother took him back. Can you believe it?”

Carina had seen it many times. Either the women were blind or stupid, scared or complicit. Or all of the above.

“The police said he disappeared. According to the interview with Regina Burns, he left after dinner on April eight, eight years ago, and never returned.”

“That’s true.”

“That was the same night as the last rape.”

“I don’t know if I knew that at the time. When the police came, my mother sent us out of the room. I was eavesdropping but didn’t catch everything. And my mother never said anything when I asked.”

“Your brother was there as well?”

“Yeah. He’s now in high school. Amazing considering he still lives with that woman.”

“That woman?”

“Our mother.”

“Do you own a computer?” Carina asked, changing the subject.

“Yeah, why?”

“Would you object to having someone from the department come down and look at it?”

He tensed. “Why?”

“We believe Angie’s killer frequented her online journal several times before her murder.”

“I didn’t even know she had one…wait. You don’t think I-”

Kyle jumped up, irate. “Just because my father was a damn rapist, you think I could have done that?”

“Calm down-”

“I’ve lived with the guilt of what my father did for years! I hated him. I’m glad he’s gone. I hope he’s in Hell where he belongs.”

He stormed out of the kitchen.

“Well, that certainly was interesting,” Carina said.

“Maybe it’s in the blood,” Nick said. “Shall we go talk to Mrs. Regina Burns?”

“Absolutely. She sounds like a real winner. But you know what? I think I’d like to wait until Brandon Burns gets off work, chat him up a bit.”

“He’s seventeen.”

“If he says he doesn’t want to talk, I won’t push it. Maybe we’ll see him later tonight when we talk to his mother. I’d just like to get a read on him before then.”

Nick frowned. “Burns didn’t give us permission to search his computer.”

“I noticed. I’m going to make sure the twenty-four/seven surveillance on Burns has been approved while we wait for Little Brother to leave.”

Brandon Burns walked out of the Sand Shack alone shortly after nine-thirty that night. Carina recalled seeing him the first time she visited the Shack with Will. Brandon was tall and skinny, still growing into his awkward height. He was pleasant-looking, if a bit nondescript, and well-groomed with short brown hair and pressed clothes. Carina and Nick approached and showed their police identification.

“Do you have a couple minutes to talk?” Nick asked.

“Um, sure, I guess. Do you want to go inside?”

Carina didn’t want Kyle to interrupt her conversation with Brandon. “Here’s fine. It won’t take long.”

“Okay.” He looked from Nick to Carina. “You’ve been here a couple times this week.”

Carina nodded. “Yes, we’re talking to everyone who worked with Angie. Did you know her?”

“A little.” Brandon played with the change and keys in his pocket.

“When was the last time you saw her?”

“I don’t know. Last week sometime, I guess. I think we both worked on Wednesday and I worked Friday to set up for dinner, but Kyle doesn’t want me working more than four hours a day.

“That makes sense, since you’re in high school. Don’t want your grades to slip,” Carina said. “Do you like working for your brother?”

He nodded vigorously. “Yeah. He’s really great.”

“Do you know if your father has been in contact with your brother?”

He stared at them wide-eyed. “My dad? Do you know where he is?”

Nick’s heart went out to the kid. His father, a convicted rapist. What must it be like growing up with the weight of that on your young shoulders? He’d just been a little kid when his father was in prison, then nine or ten when he disappeared.

“No, we don’t,” Carina said. “But we’re trying to find him. Has he contacted you at all in the eight years since he disappeared?”

“Me? Why?” A hint of wariness, uncertainty.

“We’d just like to talk to him.”

The kid bit his thumbnail. “I haven’t talked to him since I was nine. He stopped coming home one day. I didn’t want to move here because how could he find us? But my mother said we had to.”

“Do you think your mother has talked to him?”

He shook his head. “No. She’s probably the one who chased him off, always yelling at him. Stupid this, dumbass that, pathetic fool. That’s what she called him and he didn’t like it. She’s the reason he left.”

“What about your brother? Do you think Kyle has kept in contact with him?”

No comment.

“Brandon?”

His face turned red with barely restrained anger.

“Kyle doesn’t like him.”

“Why’s that?”

“I don’t know.”

Whether Brandon really didn’t know about his father’s history, or was lying, Nick couldn’t tell. He did sense that Brandon was embarrassed, which suggested that he might have an idea of what had happened years ago, but maybe his brother or mother had tried to protect him.

Nick spoke up. “Brandon, do you know why your father went to prison?”

He stuck his lip out. “Yes.”

“Was Kyle angry with your father because he was in prison?”

Brandon shook his head. “Kyle was angry all the time when he got out of prison. He didn’t want him to come home.”

Carina handed Brandon her card. “I want you to call me anytime, day or night, if you hear from or see your father.”

“Why?”

“We really can’t say.”

Brandon’s face lit up with hope. “Do you think he’s here? In San Diego?”

“Brandon,” Nick said, “call if you hear from him, okay? Or if he contacts your mother or brother.”

The teen nodded absently, and Nick wondered if he’d even heard what Nick had told him.

They left to track down Regina Burns at her house in University City.

“What do you think?” Carina asked.

“I think he misses his dad and either doesn’t know why he went to prison or doesn’t care.”

“He was just a kid.” Carina frowned. “He’s the same age as Lucy. I can’t imagine what she would have felt if she found out someone she loved had done something like Brandon’s father did.”

“He may be a kid, but…” Nick paused.

“What?”

“Never mind.”

“I want to know what you’re thinking.”

He didn’t know if he could trust his instincts, but the last time he’d had a hunch and didn’t tell anyone, he’d almost been killed.

“Brandon’s reaction was odd.”

“To what?”

“To the idea that his father might be in town.”

Carina pondered that. “If you were a seventeen-year-old kid who hadn’t seen his father in eight years, forgetting that his father is a criminal, wouldn’t you be excited? Hopeful?” She paused. “I regret giving him false hopes, though. If Mitch Burns is in town, if he has anything to do with these murders, it means he’ll be going back to prison. But I don’t think he’s around. I’d guess he got himself a false identity and moved out of state.”

“Brandon has probably worked up some fantasies about his father. Made him into a hero, not a villain.”

“You sound just like Dillon, and I think you’re right. Brandon said that his brother was angry when their father was released. Because he thought he should stay in prison?”

“Do you know many kids who have that strong a sense of right and wrong? That they’d want their father in prison for rape?”

“Most would probably act like Brandon, put their criminal father up on a pedestal.”

“There may be something else going on here.”

“Like what?”

“We have a similar but not identical MO to Mitch Burns. We have DNA of a male relative of Burns. What if one or both of the brothers are involved?”

“A killing pair?”

“Kyle is a strong-willed, dominant older brother with a hair-trigger temper and huge chip on his shoulder about his father,” Nick said. “Brandon is quieter, reticent, looks up to his brother and worships a nonexistent father. He’d be very susceptible to outside influences.”

“There’s no evidence. I can’t just walk in and take Brandon’s computer without cause. He’s a minor. But maybe his mother will let us have the computer. At least we can rule him out if nothing else.”

It was after ten Saturday night by the time Carina and Nick arrived at Regina Burns’s house in University City, roughly halfway between downtown San Diego and La Jolla.

Mrs. Burns lived in a small, post-World War II cinder-block house in a quiet neighborhood. By the looks of the automobiles and neatly trimmed lawns, most of the houses’ owners were original, and were now well past retirement age. The houses that had changed hands were split between would-be mechanics with multiple cars in various states of assembly in oil-stained driveways, and young families with kids’ toys as lawn art behind chain-link fences.

Carina looked at the DMV report she’d run while driving to the University City home. “Regina Burns has two cars registered in her name, a 1996 Camaro and a 1990 Taurus.”

The house was dark and there were no cars in the driveway.

“What about Brandon Burns?”

“I’m waiting for a call back to see if there is another licensed driver at this address,” Carina said. “The registration database is separate from the licensed driver database.”

A sense of déjà vu filled Nick. The last time he’d gone up to a house where he hadn’t expected to find anything, he’d been attacked. He glanced at Carina, fearing he was growing paranoid. She looked alert, but calm. The events last year might be clouding his judgment, and he didn’t want to make another mistake. The thought of risking Carina’s life through his missteps was foolish, he knew: she was a trained cop, she knew what she was doing. Still, he couldn’t shake the feeling that something was about to go wrong.

They approached the house cautiously. Carina knocked on the door, then took a step back. No movement in the house. No sound whatsoever.

“Let’s talk to the neighbors,” Carina said finally. “Maybe someone knows when Regina Burns is expected home, or something about her kids.”

The house to the right of the Burns residence was brightly lit, the television loud enough to wake the dead. Carina rapped loudly on the door. No answer. She peered through the window, then used the doorbell multiple times.

A full minute later, the television went from ear-shattering to loud, and the door flew open. Instinctively, Nick’s hand rested on his gun. Towering over both of them was a sixty-something bald man with a large beer belly, to match his breath.

“What?”

Carina identified herself and Nick, learned the neighbor was Ray Grimski, then asked, “We’re looking for Regina Burns, your neighbor.”

The man narrowed his eyes, took a step out onto the small porch, shaking his head. “Don’t know where that bitch is. Probably working.”

“When was the last time you saw Mrs. Burns?”

He shrugged. “Whenever. Last week, maybe. I don’t know. She left Friday or Saturday. She works for a cruise line. Don’t know what she does for them and I don’t care. But she’s gone a week or more at a time, which is fine by me.”

“You don’t get along with her?”

“Hell no.”

“How long have you been neighbors?”

“Ever since she moved in six or seven years ago. Old-man Krauss croaked and his kids put the old woman in a nursing home, sold the house, and split the money, the fucking brats. She died there, don’t think those girls ever even visited.”

Carina and Nick glanced at each other. Sometimes, values weren’t evidenced by appearance.

“What about Regina Burns’s sons?”

“Sons? Oh, right, she has an older son. Don’t know his name. He goes to that college on the coast, I think. Works at a restaurant. Temper. Never comes by when she’s around. Sometimes he comes over to pick up the kid, Brandon. Last time I saw him with his mother was over a year ago. Maybe longer. They got in a huge shouting match. Thought he’d strangle her. The kid came out, everything sort of stopped, and the older kid took off.”

“Do you remember what the argument was about?”

Grimski shrugged, scratched his hefty stomach. “That was ages ago. But that woman has a temper, too.”

“Does she abuse her son?”

“Don’t know. Never saw anything like that.”

“You talk a lot to the younger boy? Brandon?”

“I hired him to fix my back fence. He’s pretty handy. I’ve paid him for odd jobs, though he doesn’t seem to have time anymore. He took a regular job working for his brother. Why? He’s not in trouble, is he?”

“Not that we know of,” Carina said carefully.

“Then why all the questions?”

“He worked with a woman who was recently murdered. We’re talking to all of her colleagues.”

Grimski frowned. “Brandon’s a good kid. A little weird, but with that bitch for a mother who wouldn’t be?”

“Weird how?”

“I dunno. When my son was in high school, this place was Grand-fucking-Central. I was glad. It kept him out of trouble if he brought his friends here. But no one visits next door. The bitch probably doesn’t allow it.”

“Have you ever seen Mrs. Burns’s husband?”

“Husband? Someone married her?” He barked out a laugh. “Never seen anyone else around. I can’t blame the guy for leaving that woman. I almost sold the house a year after they moved in, but the market wasn’t hot enough, and where would I go? I’ve been here forty years, since my wife and I bought the place, rest her soul.”

“What happened that prompted you to consider moving?”

Grimski’s face grew hard, though his eyes started to water. “My Peg was a sweetheart. She died two years ago this May, of cancer. But this was when she was still healthy. She was beautiful. Fifty-five years old and still looked terrific in a bikini.” He grew wistful for a moment, then scowled. “My Peg was sun-bathing in our backyard. Our property! In a bikini. That bitch next door yelled at her over the fence. Called her a whore and a slut and a slew of other indecent words. Peg tried to laugh it off, but she never went outside in a bikini again.”

Carina thanked Grimski. She and Nick went back to the car, but didn’t get in.

“What do you think?” she asked Nick.

Nick could too easily picture Mrs. Regina Burns and the sad homelife Kyle and Brandon Burns must have had. And, unfortunately, he could picture either of them as killers. Kyle with his anger problems; Brandon, an antisocial kid living under the overpowering presence of a woman who hated other women.

“I think we need to have another talk with Kyle Burns,” he said. “And Brandon Burns as well. Maybe watch their dynamic together.”

“We have two suspects.”

“They could be working together. A teenager might be susceptible to the influence of an older, forceful brother, especially since his father is out of the picture.”

“Or maybe the father came back, instigated the murders.” But even as Carina said it, it didn’t feel right. Rapists often escalate to murder, but she didn’t think they’d be dormant for eight years. “We need to check unsolved rapes cross-country,” Carina said. She almost laughed. There were likely thousands of such cases. “We were only looking into rape-murders.”

“But if Mitchell Burns was continuing his pattern, he may not have killed.”

“Before now.” She frowned. “Except we have no evidence that Mitchell Burns is in San Diego.”

In the car, Carina called the officers she had tailing Kyle Burns.

“Where’s Burns?”

“He went home with a waitress from the Shack.”

Carina tensed. “Did she look like she was in any distress?”

“No, but we’re sitting outside her apartment now.”

“Stay there. Watch his car. Don’t let him leave. I’m on my way.”

Then she called for backup.

When they arrived, Carina talked to the officers sitting outside the woman’s apartment.

“Where’s the suspect?”

“Still inside.”

“Do we have an ID on the woman?”

He nodded, flipped open his notepad. “Maggie Peterson, twenty-two, senior at the university and has worked for the Sand Shack for the last year.”

“Good stuff.”

“I went to talk to the manager. She lives with her younger sister, Leah Peterson, nineteen.”

“Do you know if she’s home?”

“No confirmation either way.”

Carina told her backup that there was one, possibly two potential hostages inside the apartment. “We’ll try to do this the easy way. Knock on the door and ask Kyle Burns to come down to the station for questioning.” She turned to Nick. “We should have done it earlier.”

“We didn’t have enough earlier. We need a warrant.”

“I know,” said Carina. “I’m going to try to convince him to come down and answer questions. We might be able to get his DNA that way.” There was a trick often used by law enforcement. If a suspect took a drink from the police and left the drinking container behind, they could collect it as evidence and have it DNA tested. Same principle if the suspect smoked and tossed his cigarette butt on the street. Evidence.

But if Burns didn’t voluntarily come down to the station they had no reason to hold him. They had no DNA to compare to the DNA found on Becca. And without evidence, they couldn’t get his DNA.

She looked at Nick. “Ready?”

Nick should have said no. They had been going all day and his knees were on the verge of giving out. But he’d popped extra ibuprofen and no longer felt the intense pain.

“Ready,” he said.

Maggie Peterson lived on the second floor of the four-story apartment structure. Carina directed two officers to stay with Burns’s car, and two to stake out the back and front entrance of the building. Carina rapped on the door.

No answer.

She knocked again. “Maggie Peterson? Detective Carina Kincaid with the San Diego Police Department. I need to talk to you again.”

She heard something in the back of the apartment, then nothing. She was considering ramming the door when she heard the rattle of the security chain sliding open.

“What’s wrong?” the woman asked. She was dressed in a robe.

“We’re looking for Kyle Burns.”

“Kyle? Why?”

“We know he’s here. We’d like to talk to him.”

The bedroom door opened and Kyle Burns walked out, buttoning his shirt, his face a hard mask. “I can’t believe you followed me here.”

“We have some more questions for you, Mr. Burns.”

“It’s nearly midnight. This can’t wait?”

“No, it really can’t.”

“I don’t believe you.”

Carina tamped down her own anger. It wouldn’t do her any good dealing with Burns. “Maybe you’d like to come down to the police station with us.”

“Are you arresting me?”

“No.”

“Then ask your questions here.” Kyle reached over and took Maggie’s hand.

Carina had hoped that Burns wouldn’t want to answer questions around his girlfriend, that he’d voluntarily come to the police station.

“Tell us about your father,” Nick said.

“Hell, no. I’m not talking about him. He’s long gone.”

Just the mention of Mitch Burns set Kyle off.

“It sounds like you don’t like him much.”

“Are you insane? Who would like him? The man was a bastard.”

“What was it like growing up with him? Did you know he was a rapist when you were younger?”

“What are you, a shrink?”

Kyle’s rage was building. Carina wondered if someone who had so little control over their temper could plan and execute such a meticulous crime.

The killer is immature. Carina remembered Dillon’s profile, and lack of temper control was a sign of immaturity. She just needed to play it all the way through. Make him lose his temper and tell her the truth.

“Would you like to talk to a psychiatrist?” she asked.

He didn’t say anything. He stared straight ahead, not looking at Nick or Carina.

Nick took over. “I understand exactly how you feel, Kyle,” he said.

“Bullshit,” Kyle muttered without looking at him.

“You hate your father for what he did. To your family, to you, to those women. And when you were just a kid, you couldn’t do anything about it. The anger and humiliation.”

Kyle didn’t talk.

“You probably wanted to kill him, didn’t you?” Nick said softly.

Something in Kyle’s eyes flickered.

Carina watched Kyle closely as Nick continued the questioning.

“The trial humiliated you, but your father was in prison. Away. Your mother lied, right? You told us earlier that she’d lied to give him an alibi. Yet you still had to live with her. That must have been Hell.”

“You don’t know the half of it,” Kyle said, looking at his hands.

“You wanted to protect your little brother, didn’t you? He was just a little guy, what, five years old? He didn’t know what was going on, and you didn’t want him to find out. So you took everything on your shoulders, tried to protect him.”

“You don’t know anything,” Kyle said.

“I know that you were angry when your father went to prison and were still angry when he got out of prison.”

“He should have been put away for life.”

“You’re right.” Nick paused, then asked, “Has he contacted you since he disappeared that night?”

Kyle shook his head.

“What about your mother? Your brother?”

“No! You don’t get it. He’s never coming back!”

“Why?” Nick quietly asked.

“He’s just not,” said Kyle.

Maggie spoke up for the first time, putting her arms around Kyle. “Why all these questions? Just because you can’t find out who killed Angie you’re coming after Kyle?” She stood straight and looked Carina in the eye. “Kyle was with me all last weekend, from when our shift ended at eleven Saturday night until we went to classes Monday morning at eight.”

Burns wasn’t talking anymore, so they left the apartment. Carina said to Nick, “Do you think she’s lying.”

“Maybe,” Nick said.

“Her alibi for Burns is too convenient.”

“I agree, but that doesn’t mean she’s lying. We never asked Kyle Burns for an alibi before.”

“Kyle’s reaction to his father is plain weird. Something’s going on there.” She glanced at her watch. “It’s after midnight. No way we can do anything more tonight.”

“Stop beating yourself up. We’ve done all we can.”

“Have we?” Carina rubbed her eyes and suppressed a yawn. “We’re close, but our hands are tied. No evidence, no arrest.”

“Do you want me to drive back?” Nick asked.

“Actually, that’d be great.”