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“James was part of my crew, which makes him family.” Dalton had to fight to keep his voice even. God, he felt gut-punched. Maybe it was the cumulative effect of Moore and then James. Maybe it was because of all the emotions that had resurfaced with Greer being here. Mostly, he figured it was the anger he was trying to keep in check. He wanted to tear the room apart. Throw things, smash the mug in his hand, anything to let loose the white-hot rage that burned in his gut. Someone killed a kid, for no good reason, and that fucker was going to pay.
Detective Haas was staring at him. He must have spoken, but Dalton had missed it.
“What?”
Detective Haas waved away Officer Moser, who had been standing next to the couch. Without a word, the officer turned on his heel and made his way over to the door, where he stood. Detective Haas watched him go, and when he turned back, his expression was one of sadness.
“Mr. Hughes, I know you’re upset. I can see this has affected you greatly, and you’re struggling. The sudden death of someone you know, someone you work closely with, is devastating. You have been through a lot in recent days, not just at the track, but back at home with the recent death of your father. A word to the wise: Don’t do anything foolish, no matter how tempting it might be. It will not help.” Haas smiled tightly. “Take it from one who has been there.”
Detective Haas’s eyes looked tired, and there was a deep sadness there. He was serious. He was also offering sound advice, almost as if he was concerned. He gave Dalton one last look and then waved Officer Moser back over. His sympathetic expression had disappeared as if it had never been there.
“What time did Mr. Macht text you?”
Dalton pulled out his phone and checked. “Just after seven.” He turned his phone so Detective Haas could see the texts. Officer Moser made a note of the time.
Detective Haas said, “You received the text message and then drove over. What time did you arrive?”
“Probably around seven twenty, seven twenty-five, somewhere in there.”
“And then what happened?”
Dalton rubbed his temples. “We couldn’t find James, so Greer and I were in the other garage, talking.” It suddenly occurred to him that if they ran forensics on the other cars, it could be bad. He should’ve wiped the hood down. No help for it now.
“For how long were you…talking?” Detective Haas asked.
“Er, maybe a half hour?” Dalton had no idea how long they’d been in there. He’d been way too distracted to pay attention to the time.
Detective Haas frowned. “Why didn’t you look for James immediately when you arrived?”
“We did. We went into the first garage bay, and he wasn’t there. I realized that his car wasn’t around, nor was your car, so I figured he’d gotten so thrown by the prospect of talking to you that he’d just forgotten to tell me and left. I thought I’d give him a bit to get back to his hotel and then see if he would send me a text or call.”
“So now it’s about eight o’clock, and you called his phone.”
Moser was scribbling away, and the scratch of the pen made Dalton nervous, which he suspected was exactly why the man did it.
“So going back to the text message. It said that I wanted to interview him and I would be coming tonight to the garage.”
“Yes,” Dalton agreed.
Detective Haas frowned. “And that was at just after seven?”
“As I’ve already said, yes.”
Detective Haas kept going over the details, but they weren’t going to change.
“Wait, what’s going on? How was James killed?”
Detective Haas sighed. “It appears Mr. Macht killed himself.”
A frigid wave of shock broke over Dalton’s whole body. That couldn’t be true. There was no way James would do that. “I…that…that’s not right. Why would James do that?”
“Why do you think he would do that?”
Blood roared in his ears as his lungs struggled to inflate. This was wrong. All wrong. “He wouldn’t. He wouldn’t do that. There was no reason to. I never told him about the wing. No one did. Only a few of us knew about it, and none of us would tell him. This doesn’t make sense.”
Detective Haas nodded. “Yes, I agree with you. It does not make sense. Mr. Macht was not a suspect in any way, nor do I think it was negligence on his behalf that caused Moore’s death.”
Dalton paused. This was a switch. “What changed? You told me earlier you thought I was behind all this.”
