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“You got it. The manager heard Bianca yelling about some lingerie Butch had purchased for the young lady next door. She’d found the receipt in one of his pockets.”
Francesca let Jonah hold the phone for them. “But why, after several years, would he kill her?”
“Maybe he tried to rekindle the romance and she rebuffed him. Or they had an affair and she threatened to tell his wife. Who can say? I only know she had a lot of very personal contact with Butch, but I can’t prove she even knew Dean.”
“You’re amazing, Dad. I can’t tell you how much I appreciate this.”
“I like doing it. Keeps me fresh.”
Jonah was so close. It would’ve been easy to melt into him, but Francesca resisted. “And it gives you a good excuse to skip out on antique hunting with Mom.”
He chuckled. “That, too.”
“Any chance you’d like to see what you can find out about a seventeen-year-old runaway from California named Julia? I’m having trouble digging up a last name. She went to work for the Wheelers, lived with them for a bit—”
“—and now she’s missing and likely dead.”
“That’s right.”
“I’ll get on it,” he said, and hung up before she could thank him again.
Jonah hadn’t heard the first part of the conversation. “What’d I miss?” he asked.
“I’ll explain in the car. We’ve got to talk to Dean.”
He climbed off the bed without touching her. “You shower and dress. I’ll make breakfast.”
* * *
Finch and Hunsacker refused to let them see Dean. Jonah managed to arrange it only by going over their heads to the sheriff, who ultimately agreed to the interview because of how bad the department would look if they prosecuted the wrong guy. Although Jonah prevailed in the end, Finch had insisted on being present. He made his displeasure obvious as he sat in the corner, glowering, while Jonah and Francesca took chairs across a small table from a bewildered and sleep-deprived Dean.
They’d also asked if Dean would like an attorney to join them. He hadn’t been at the yard when his family invoked that right. But his mother was still trying to select one she felt would be good, and he didn’t want to wait. According to Finch, all he could talk about was going home. He wouldn’t insist on anything he felt might delay that.
“Wh-what’s going on?” Dean asked. “What are you guys doing here?”
Jonah deferred to Francesca. Knowing Dean’s relationship with his mother was a close one, he felt Dean might be more responsive to a female.
“We’d like to visit with you, Dean,” she said. “You don’t mind, do you?”
Dean sat on his hands. “I wasn’t going to hurt you, Francesca. I—I was only doing what I was told. I had to get the panties back.”
Jonah wasn’t so sure he wouldn’t have hurt her, but neither was he convinced that Dean was the Dead Mule Canyon killer.
“Who told you to come to my house?” she asked.
Clamping his mouth shut, he ducked his head and began to rock back and forth like a fidgety little boy, making Jonah fear he might lapse into a psychotic episode.
“Dean?” she pressed. “Will you answer me?”
“I can’t.”
She bent to see his face. “Why not?”
“I—I can’t tell you that, either,” he mumbled.
“We’re trying to help you. You understand that, don’t you?” Jonah said.
“No.” His sulky response was also childlike.
