The Competition

30

We pulled up just after six o’clock. Night had already squeezed all but a sliver of sunlight from the sky. I don’t know why I had the idea Luke worked at an ordinary gas station. It was actually a high-end auto-repair shop. The kind of place Jay Leno would go to have his Maseratis or Model Ts fixed. At the counter in the tiny office at the end of the repair bays sat a completely bald man whose coveralls looked like they’d been handed down by his much bigger father. The name Alfred Bedigian was stitched above the pocket on his left chest. A magazine lay open on his lap. I got a glimpse of a pouty, large-breasted blonde before he slapped it closed and stuffed it under the counter.

Bailey flashed her badge. “Mr. Bedigian?”

His eyes got big when he saw the badge, and he jumped up out of his chair. “Yes?”

I could see a smile twitching at Bailey’s lips. “We’re here to see Luke Jarvis.”

“I already gave his time card to those other cops. They told me it was just routine. Was that wrong? Is Luke in trouble?”

We’d had Luke checked out the moment Logan was identified as one of the shooters. Luke had been at work-confirmed not only by his time card but also by a couple of customers who’d come in on the day of the shooting.

“Not at all,” Bailey said. “We just want to talk to him about someone he knows.”

“Because if he is, I need to know about it,” he said. “He’s a great mechanic, but we don’t run that kind of place. He’s got problems, he’s out of here.”

“Really, Mr. Bedigian,” I said, “he’s done nothing wrong.”

He gave me a skeptical look. “Better not,” he muttered. “Come.”

Bedigian trotted around the counter and gestured for us to follow, the dirty rag stuffed into his back pocket wagging like a tail with every step. He stopped abruptly at the last bay, where a midnight-blue Porsche sat three feet up on the lift. Unless Luke was hiding in the trunk, there was no one there.

“Could he have left for the day?” I asked.

“Not without telling me.” Bedigian said. He took the rag out of his pocket and nervously wiped his hands.

A tallish man with short dirty-blonde hair walked into the bay, pulling on a fleece-lined denim jacket.

“Luke Jarvis?” Bailey asked.

“That’s me,” he said. He favored us with a smile that crinkled the corners of his eyes. He looked like a younger version of Treat Williams-handsome in a regular-guy kind of way.

Instead of badging him, Bailey put out her hand. “I’m Detective Bailey Keller and this is Deputy District Attorney Rachel Knight. We need to talk to you.”

Luke’s smile fell away. “Right.”

“Do you have a place we can go to talk?” Bailey asked.

Luke glanced around the bay. “Uh…”

Bedigian interrupted. “Use the office. It’s time to close up anyway.” He cast a glance across the three of us that was still mildly suspicious and told Luke, “Lock the door when you leave.” Luke nodded, and Bedigian trotted out.

Five minutes later, we sat down in the small waiting area in the office. Bailey took the lead. “I guess you’ve heard Logan’s been named as a person of interest in the Fairmont High shooting.”

Luke nodded, and looked from me to Bailey anxiously. “Have you found him?”

“No,” Bailey said. “I’m sorry to have to tell you, but Logan’s not just a person of interest. We’re fairly certain he was involved in the shooting.”

Luke sat back as though he’d been punched in the chest. He opened his mouth to speak, but for a few seconds nothing came out. “What-how do you know?”

Bailey told him what we’d learned so far. Ordinarily, she might not have been so forthcoming. Even though we knew Luke couldn’t have been the second shooter, he still might’ve provided some outside help. But there was no indication the brothers had spent any time together in the past few months. No one in Oxnard had seen Logan around, and no one in the Valley had seen Luke hanging out with his brother. We’d had unis track down all the checks Logan had written in the past year and go through the records of all the local auto parts stores. Logan’s dwindling bank account showed he’d been spending money all right, just not on his car. So Bonnie’s belief that they’d been refurbishing Logan’s car together had proven to be wishful thinking. The brothers hadn’t been in contact on any kind of regular basis in some time.

When Bailey finished, Luke stared out the window. Tears welled up, and he angrily swiped them away with his sleeve. “I just don’t get it,” he said. “Why would he do that? He was never, never someone who’d do anything to hurt anyone.”

Bailey shook her head. “We might never have the whole answer to that.” The expression on Luke’s face was heart-wrenching. She gave him a few more seconds to regroup, then continued. “I understand you enlisted in the Army when he was in fifth or sixth grade?”

Luke nodded. “Yeah. Had to. I was screwing up all over the place. Flunking out at Cal State Northridge, drinking, drugging. My folks finally kicked me out of the house-rightly so. The Army was my last shot to pull my head out of my ass. I can’t say I loved it, but it did the trick. And that’s where I found out I loved working on engines. From there, everything in my life just kind of fell into place.”

“How old was Logan when you got out?” Bailey asked.

“Let’s see, by the time I got back…I think Logan had just finished his freshman year.”

“Did you move back home?” I asked.

“Only long enough to find a place. I had a buddy from the service who was willing to share rent. So I moved out as soon as I landed a job at a gas station. Got a two-bedroom in Tarzana.”

“That’s pretty close to your folks,” I said. “Did you and Logan get to see a lot of each other?”

“In the beginning. Logan wasn’t driving, but I was just a short bus ride away. So we’d hang out a couple of times a week, but then…” Luke sighed. “Shane-that’s my buddy from the Army-turned out to be a great trench mate but a lousy roommate. He was into everything I joined the Army to escape. Booze, drugs, the wrong kind of women.” Luke shook his head, a disgusted expression on his face. “I’d come home from work and find the place just totally trashed, smelling like pot, and all these sketchy losers hanging around.”

“Shane didn’t work?” I asked.

“He’d work. And then he’d get fired. And then I’d get on his case about kicking in his share of the rent and he’d get hired again. No job ever lasted more than a couple of months.”

“How did Shane get along with Logan?” I asked.

Luke grimaced. “Total bromance. At least on Logan’s part. He started coming over just to see Shane. Shane was the cool guy Logan always wanted to be. Shane had tatts, he drove hot cars, and he was a babe magnet. Going to a party with Shane was like being the Invisible Man. Women you wouldn’t think would even spit on him would slide off their chairs.” His face reddened. “Sorry!”

I shook my head. “I get it. Was Shane into guns?”

“Oh, yeah.” Luke stopped and stared at me as the implications sank in. “And I’d bet he still is. I know he worked at a gun range for a while. I think he still helps out there now and then. But they didn’t give him enough hours to pay the rent, so he had to get a real job.”

“How good is he with guns?” Bailey asked. “Does he reload his own ammo? Can he repair them, alter them?”

“Yes. To all of the above. But I found out the hard way you have to watch out for his reloads. We used to go shooting together, and one time I guess he accidentally packed a double shot in one of my rounds. Thing had so much firepower it almost blew my hand off.”

“I take it you guys don’t see much of each other anymore?” Bailey asked.

Luke shook his head. “I had to get away from him. Too much temptation. That’s why I moved up here. I told him I had a job offer I couldn’t afford to turn down.”

“Did you?” I asked.

“No. I wound up sleeping in my car for a couple of months. But then I got a break. I came here looking for a job on the same day one of the guys gave notice.”

“Did you lose contact with Shane after you moved up here?” I asked.

“Pretty much. I let him keep the apartment in Tarzana for the rest of the month just to make sure he wouldn’t try and follow me here. But we stayed in touch for a little while. I didn’t want him as a full-time friend, but I didn’t want to dump him. We went through a lot together, being in the service and all.” Luke stopped and sighed. “At least, that’s what I wanted. But Shane couldn’t leave it like that. About a week after I landed this job, he said he was thinking about coming up here. Started talking about getting a place together again. That’s when I realized there was no halfway with Shane, so I stopped taking his calls. He still leaves me voice mails now and then, but I know better than to reopen that door.”

“Is it possible that Logan kept seeing Shane after you left?” I asked.

“I guess. He never mentioned it, but like I said, Logan had a real boy-crush on him.” Luke briefly closed his eyes. When he opened them, they looked pained and bewildered. The revelation about his brother was only just starting to sink in. It would probably take a while before he could really wrap his brain around the fact that his little brother was a mass murderer. If, in fact, he ever could.

“Would Shane have come by your parents’ place to see Logan?” I asked.

Luke shook his head slowly. “Doubtful. They only saw Shane a couple of times, but it was enough for them to get his drift. They didn’t care for him. I have to believe that if Mom knew Logan was hanging around with Shane, she would’ve done her best to shut it down.”

But as we’d already learned, there was a lot Mom didn’t know.

“Do you know where Shane is now?” I asked.

“Last I heard from him, he was working for a tree service up in Camarillo. I think the gun range is around there too.”

“Do you happen to know the names of those places?” Bailey asked.

Luke turned to stare out the window again, then looked at us apologetically. “Sorry, no. I’m sure he told me, but I don’t remember. I didn’t really want to know.”

But he did know Shane’s last name.