AllFreeNovel
Share Us
* * *
The kid looked scared out of his mind. Barely nineteen, in the crisp uniform of the bell staff for the Montmort Tower, he was seated at a table in an empty conference room and drinking from a plastic water glass. Sweat had beaded on his forehead, and he licked his lips constantly as he answered Settler’s questions.
His name was Robb Quade. He was a skinny nineteen-year-old, going to college part-time, and was pale as a ghost, his hands shaking on the glass, his already large eyes wide, the pupils dilated in fear.
Yes, he’d taken money to let a guy into the room next to Karen Upgarde’s on the day of her death.
No, he didn’t know the guy. Didn’t know that he was going to open the connecting door or that the woman in the next suite would do the same. He just couldn’t even believe it now.
Yes, he’d lied to the police the first time around because he was scared about losing his job, scared the police might arrest him for abetting a crime, even though, he swore over and over again, he had no idea what was about to go down, and now, oh, God, that woman had jumped. He’d witnessed the fall.
Why had he decided to come forward now?
Because several people knew about it, and he figured it was best to come clean himself.
“Do I need a lawyer?” he asked, looking as if he might break down and cry.
“That depends; do you think you need one?” Settler asked.
“No! I’m telling you everything I know,” he insisted, blinking. “I was stupid and should never have done it. I’m going to lose my job over it, won’t even get a decent reference, but, I swear, I had no idea the guy would do . . . well, whatever he was gonna do.” His face crumpled, and he had to strain not to cry.
“Is this the man?” Dani asked, and they showed him still shots from the security footage of the elevator that they’d gotten after the statement by Al Benson, the Montmort custodian.
Quade stared down at the photographs and swallowed hard. “Yeah,” he said. “Same guy, but he was dressed a little different. Sunglasses, yeah, okay, they look the same, but his hair was longer, and I thought it looked fake at the time. Don’t ask me how I knew; I just thought so. Too blond or something. And he was wearing a Mariners baseball cap. I remember because I come from Seattle. I’m a fan.” He swallowed again. “I’m so fucked.”
“What do you think he wanted to use the room for?”
“He didn’t say, and I didn’t ask. I figured maybe a hooker might come up, or he wanted to get high privately, or”—he shrugged, lifting his thin shoulders—“whatever.”
“Did you give him a time limit?”
“Yeah, oh, yeah. Two hours. That was it.”
“Fifty bucks an hour?” Martinez said.
Quade looked miserable. “Yeah. I did it for a cool hundred. Jesus, I’m a moron.”
She didn’t argue. He was. They asked more questions but got no new information. “If you think of anything else, let us know,” she reminded him at the close of the interview.
They were heading to the car, just stepping through the glass doors of the Montmort, when her cell phone buzzed. She picked it up, didn’t recognize the number, but answered, “Detective Settler,” just as a gust of cold wind blew along the street. Quickly, she tugged her collar closer.
“Hey, yeah. This is Leo Kasparian.”
The elusive Kaspar the Great. She pressed the phone to her ear with one hand, found the keys in her coat pocket with the other, and tossed the ring to Martinez. He caught them deftly on the fly.
“I’ve been wanting to talk to you,” she said.
“Yeah, I got your message and figured it must have somethin’ to do with Didi. She’s everywhere now these days; it’s kinda like she rose from the dead, if you know what I mean.”
“Is she dead? Do you know that?” She and Martinez were skirting other pedestrians, heads bent against the wind. She had to hold one hand over her opposite ear to hear Kasparian.
“Just a figure of speech, since no one’s seen her for years. It isn’t like Didi to hide under a rock. Not her style. So, if she’s not struttin’ her stuff, I figure she must be dead. But a shame about that Upgarde girl. What do you figure happened there?”
She ignored the question and, as they reached the car, slid into the passenger side as Martinez adjusted the driver’s seat. “You didn’t know her?”
“Never heard of her before. Didi and I, well, it wasn’t all that friendly when we split up, if you know what I mean.”
“I do.”
