Famished - Meghan O'Flynn (learn to read books TXT) 📗

she’s dead?” Ronnie Keil stood blocking the front door of his apartment, staring blankly through Petrosky with the beady eyes of a reptile. The sweet haze of recently smoked marijuana wafted around Keil’s pasty face from the room behind him.

“Mr. Keil, I know this must be difficult for you, but we need to ask you a few questions about your girlfriend.”

“Questions about what? I didn’t do it.”

Petrosky exchanged a glance with Morrison. “No one said you did. But we do need to know where you were yesterday. You sure weren’t here.”

Keil’s snaggletooth scraped against his fat bottom lip. “I worked all day at the shipyard. After that, I went to the bar on Rosenthall for my cousin’s birthday.”

Petrosky had verified Keil’s work information the day before. “What’s your cousin’s name?”

“Gerald.”

“Last name?”

“Keil, same as mine.”

“Phone number?”

He told them.

Morrison flipped a page in his notebook.

“Tell me about Meredith. Anything you think might help,” Petrosky said.

Keil’s eyes were blank, more than marijuana stoned. Pills—downers, maybe. Down the hall, a door slammed, and someone cursed. Morrison glanced toward the sound. Keil stared, slack-jawed.

“Mr. Keil? What can you tell me about Meredith?”

“Oh, uh…she was real pretty. Nice to most people unless they looked at her the wrong way.”

“Had she mentioned meeting anyone new recently?”

“I don’t think so.” He paused. “She was kinda bitchy sometimes. You think someone killed her for that?”

“I doubt it,” Petrosky said. “Did she ever go out to clubs?”

“Nah, nothing like that. She mostly just hung around here. Do you think it was someone she…like…knew already?”

“We’re just covering all the bases, sir.”

“Oh, well, she didn’t know that many people anyway.”

“Did she have any family? Any friends?”

“Her mama died when she was little. Never had a daddy.”

No daddy. Not that a daddy would have been able to save her. Petrosky popped his knuckles against his hip and grimaced at the empty pocket where he used to carry his cigarettes. “No parents? Was she in foster care in Michigan?”

“Yeah. I dunno for how long or where; she didn’t talk about it.”

“How long were you together?”

Keil looked at the ceiling, thinking. “Maybe four years. Not quite.”

“And in all that time she never mentioned where she grew up?”

He scuffed his foot on threadbare carpet. “Once she said she had a foster father who beat her up, and she ran away. That was before she met me.”

“Brothers, sisters?”

“Just the kid, but she hasn’t seen him since we gave him up.”

“A kid?” Petrosky’s eyes snapped to Morrison. Morrison shrugged and shook his head. “What kid?”

“She was pregnant when we met. Had the kid, kept it here for a little, but she wasn’t cut out for that. She took him to the church downtown, I think. The one where they have the orphanage.”

“What was the child’s name?”

“She called him Jessie, but I don’t know if it stuck. He was only a few weeks old.”

Morrison’s pen scratched frantically against the notepad.

“The date?”

“No idea. Late August, maybe? September? She talked about needing to get the kid warmer clothes because it was getting cold. But we didn’t, just put him in a blanket with all these little ducks on it, and then she took him.” His bottom lip quivered. Either the drugs were wearing off, or the police presence was shocking Keil into sobriety. Or he felt guilty about the kid.

“Who was the father?”

Keil swiped at his eyes. “No idea. She didn’t either.”

“So, a boy. And she took him to the church?”

“Yeah, the big one right down the way. With all those troll things. I think it was the only one she could take him to. Not all of ‘em take kids.” He sagged against the doorframe. “She’s really dead?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Like, dead, dead? I just thought she found an overnight. She was happy when she got one of those.”

“I’m sorry for your loss.”

“Aw, shit.” Keil put a hand to his chest.

“Do you need to sit down?”

Keil lowered his hand to the doorframe and gripped it until the knuckles turned white, but he shook his head. “No. I’m okay.”

“We’ll make this as quick as possible, Mr. Keil. We need to know where she was the night before last. Who she was with.”

“Working.” Keil glanced at the wall and dragged his eyes to the floor, looking everywhere but at them.

“Mr. Keil, we have no doubt she was working the street. What I need to know from you is where she was standing when someone picked her up and killed her.”

Keil’s jaw worked, but sluggishly. “I’m not sure. Maybe Ventura? She was usually up there. If she went anywhere else, I dunno.”

“Tell me about the overnights.”

“Every now and then someone would pay her for the night, to stay there. Rich assholes with hotel rooms, I think. She always came home, not worried about money for a day or so.”

“Any idea who they were?”

He shrugged. “No, it was never the same person.”

“When was the last time that happened?”

“It’s been months.”

“She have friends that she hung out with? Anyone you knew?”

Keil shook his head.

“How did she not have any friends?” Morrison asked.

Petrosky cleared his throat and kept his eyes on Keil. “Often in domestic violence situations, women are isolated from their friends and family in order to keep them from revealing the situation.”

Keil stared at Petrosky but said nothing. Morrison turned back to his notepad.

“Anyone she might have seen that night?”

“I don’t know, man.”

“Where were you the night before last between the hours of twelve and three a.m.?”

“Um…I think I was here.”

“Anyone with you?”

Keil looked over Petrosky’s shoulder, into the hallway. “Yeah…uh…Darcy.”

“Last name?”

“Evans.”

“Who is she?”

“A…friend.”

“Meredith know you had a special friend, Mr. Keil?”

He stared.

“Did your girlfriend like poetry?” The bloody poem on the mausoleum wall was a wild card Petrosky didn’t want leaked, but Keil would be too nervous to tell the press…if he even remembered the question later.

Keil’s eyebrows lifted. “Poetry?” He shoved his hands in his pockets. Keil probably had cigarettes. He’d probably let Petrosky bum one.

Petrosky narrowed his eyes. “Where does Darcy live?”

Keil raised an arm, feebly pointing to a door three apartments down from his. “Wait…uh, just wait a little, man. Her husband’s home. Saw his car out the window.”

“That doesn’t bother me any,” Petrosky said.

Keil’s jaw dropped. He took the card Petrosky offered, but his eyes darted nervously toward the door across the hall.

“Sorry for your loss.”

Keil looked once more down the hall and closed the door. The lock clicked into place.

“What do you think, Boss?” Morrison asked as they walked toward the other end of the hallway.

“He’s a dick, but he’s telling the truth. Popping pills and coming off downers will make a person honest, if not a little confused. Good for us. He mentioned her overnights, then freaked out when we asked what she did. And the kid thing… He’ll probably regret sharing that when he sobers up. We’ll find out in a minute if his alibi checks out.”

“I liked the way you snuck the poem in.” Morrison lifted the knocker and dropped it. In a neighboring unit, a dog barked, and someone yelled at it to shut the fuck up.

The man who answered the door dwarfed them both, his dark shoulders as wide as the doorframe, button-down shirt stretched over biceps that would make Hulk Hogan jealous.

“Afternoon, sir.” Petrosky flashed his badge. “I’m Detective Petrosky with the Ash Park PD. I’m looking for a Darcy Evans.”

The man’s brows furrowed, but he backed up and waved them in. “Of course, officers. Come in.”

A black leather sofa sat against one wall beside a gleaming glass table with a Tiffany lamp that looked nice enough to be real.

“Darcy! Some visitors for you!”

Petrosky studied a series of black-and-white photographs on the wall that appeared to be the insides of abandoned buildings. Interesting. Perhaps they had some photos of abandoned mausoleums.

Petrosky turned from the wall as a woman emerged from the back room, her black hair braided in neat rows. Her smile faded when she saw the badge. “Isaiah, what’s going on?”

Isaiah shrugged his beefy shoulders.

“We’re looking for information on Meredith Lawrence, your neighbor across the hall,” Petrosky said.