The Girl With No Name

Chapter Forty-Eight

Josie had a female officer stay with Kim until she was dried off, dressed, and ready to be transported to the police station. The sight of her so comfortable at Luke’s house was almost more than Josie could bear. A part of her still kept trying to give Luke the benefit of the doubt; he’d been protecting his best friend’s little sister from a monster, she had to make herself believe that’s all it was.

Patrol took Kim back to the Denton police station and booked her. Josie doubted that the charge in Denny Twitch’s murder would stand; Kim could easily get off with self-defense given the circumstances, and knowing the district attorney, Josie didn’t think she’d want to waste the county’s time or valuable resources trying a woman who would be acquitted anyway. But Josie needed something to keep Kim in custody until she found out what she knew.

Once again, Josie found herself about to face Kim in the interrogation room, wearing yet another pair of Luke’s sweatpants and a novelty T-shirt that Josie had given him for Christmas. She remembered the way she and Luke had laughed over it on Christmas morning. Above the outline of a large, open-mouthed trout, the shirt read: Men have feelings too… I mostly feel like fishing. It had been perfect for him. Somehow, seeing Kim wearing it felt like more of a betrayal than seeing she had been sleeping in Luke’s bed.

Josie jumped when Noah touched her shoulder. “You want me to talk to her?”

She managed a smile. “No. I’ll do it.”

As she pushed the door of the interrogation room open, she realized with a sudden pang that she really didn’t want Noah anywhere near Kim Conway. Kim shot Josie a sullen look and crossed her arms over her chest. Josie noticed her hair was still damp; the smell of Irish Spring soap filled the air. Luke’s soap. For a moment, Josie considered having Gretchen question Kim. But it would only help Gretchen agree with Noah that this had become too personal, that Josie was too close.

Kim said, “If you’re here to question me about Denny Twitch, I want a lawyer.”

Josie sighed and walked over to the table, taking a seat across from Kim. “I’ve already called the public defender’s office. But I’m not here to talk about Twitch. I don’t care about Twitch.”

At this, Kim’s gaze flitted up to Josie’s face. “Then why are you here?”

“I want to talk about Luke.”

Kim’s posture softened. “I’m sorry about what happened to him,” she murmured.

“What did happen to him?”

Kim looked away, her eyes traveling up and down the walls behind Josie. Josie imagined she was trying to figure out what she could safely tell her without implicating herself in more crimes.

Josie tapped her fingers on the tabletop, drawing Kim’s attention. “Here’s what I already know. You were in a relationship with Eric Dunn. He abused you. Maybe just once or twice, maybe a lot. He definitely put some burns on your back and punched you in the face hard enough to break your orbital bones.”

Kim’s eyes widened.

Josie forged ahead. “I know that at some point you left him. You came to Denton and stayed with your brother, Brady. You were pregnant. The night of the shooting, Eric sent Mickey Kavolis to Brady’s house to get you. Kavolis shot Brady and Eva, and either you or Luke shot Kavolis in self-defense.”

Josie gave Kim a meaningful look as she said the words “self-defense”. She wanted her to understand she had no interest in stirring up old cases—it was out of her jurisdiction anyway. She just wanted to find out what Kim knew.

Josie continued, “You and Luke took Kavolis’ body and buried it behind Luke’s barn.”

Kim let out a little gasp.

“I’m not done,” Josie said. “Luke hid you at his house for a few months. Then you went to Misty Derossi’s house. Misty says that for some reason, you helped her deliver her baby. To my knowledge, you’re not a midwife or a doctor, and Misty was planning to give birth at the hospital, so I’m not sure why you did that—or why you were there at all.”

Kim didn’t offer an explanation, so Josie continued, “At some point, Denny Twitch was there. Once that baby was born, he beat Misty half to death and took her baby. I also know that after Misty’s baby was abducted, you returned to Luke’s house, and you were there when Dunn sent more goons to get you. Luke was there when they arrived, or maybe they were waiting for him when he got home. I know there was a struggle and that Luke wounded one of them. Then they took him.”

Kim said nothing but chewed on her lower lip and hugged herself tighter.

“Here’s what I don’t know,” Josie said. “I don’t know what happened to your baby—if you were even pregnant to begin with. I don’t know why you were at Misty Derossi’s house or what you could possibly have wanted with her, or her baby. I don’t know why Dunn sent Twitch there—was it to get you or to take Misty’s baby, or both? I don’t know what Dunn would have wanted with her baby or why Dunn’s men took Luke and left you when they came to his house—unless you were hiding and, most of all, I still don’t know where Luke is.”

One of Kim’s hands reached up and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. “How did you—?”

Josie said, “It’s my job to find things out.”

“Is… is Eric really dead? I saw it on the news this morning, but I—it’s so hard to believe.”

“Yes,” Josie answered. “I watched him die. He is really gone.”

The air seemed to go out of Kim, and her body slumped in the chair. She closed her eyes and whispered some words that Josie couldn’t make out. A prayer? Words of gratitude? Her eyes sprang open again and she said, “There’s a warehouse in Atlantic City. I’ve never been there, but I’ve heard the guys talk about it. They take people there. People that are never seen again. I’m not sure where it is exactly, but maybe someone on his staff could tell you now that he’s dead. You should call the Atlantic City police. Maybe they took Luke there.”

Josie shook her head. “They didn’t take him there.”

“But how do you know?”

“They were holding him somewhere nearby. By the time we got there, Luke was gone, and Dunn’s men were dead.”

“So, he’s not… he’s not—”

“We don’t know where he is,” Josie said. “Or if he’s still alive. You were in a relationship with Eric Dunn for some time. I need to know if you have any idea who might have had it in for him. Who might have known where he was keeping Luke and been angry enough to kill his goons and possibly take Luke.”

Kim shivered. “Oh wow. I don’t know. Eric made a lot of enemies. You don’t understand how he was.”

“I think I have a pretty good idea.”

Kim’s face crumpled. Tears leaked from her eyes as a wave of emotion rolled over her. “No,” she said. “You really don’t. Eric sent Mickey to Brady’s house to teach me a lesson, not just to get me back. I was upstairs when he shot Brady and Eva. He was there to make it look like a murder-suicide and then take me. Eric wanted them killed so I would have no one left to run to—or so I wouldn’t run to my mom, ’cause he’d kill her too. Luke showed up just as the whole thing was going down. I came downstairs, and I was screaming. Brady and Eva were dead. Then Luke wrestled Mickey’s gun away from him and…”

“So, it was Luke who killed Kavolis,” Josie said. She couldn’t imagine what it had been like for him to carry that alone, especially after covering it up and, in doing so, making himself a criminal.

Kim nodded. “It all happened so fast. Eric didn’t have to have my brother killed, but he did it anyway. Don’t you see? He’s evil. Pure evil.”

“Was evil. He’s gone now. Why were you with him in the first place?”

“I wanted out from almost the moment I started seeing him, but no one walks away from Eric Dunn. The burns on my back—they were from a curling iron, all because he thought I was taking too long to get ready for an opening we were going to. He burned me, and then he made me put on my dress and my heels and smile through the entire thing, all while I thought I was going to die from the pain. That was the first time he used the curling iron. The broken eye socket? That is just the tip of the iceberg.”

“I’m sorry,” Josie said.

“I lied about the pregnancy,” Kim blurted out. “He was going to kill me. I’m trying to make you understand.”

“I’m listening.”