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Now was not the time for such thoughts. Pushing the feeling aside, she stared ahead as Connor drove, occasionally taking a backward glance at Mario. But now that he was in the police car, he seemed silent and subdued. He was handcuffed and belted in place, but he was making no effort to struggle or escape.
She hoped that he would be as cooperative when it came to the questioning.
Connor and Cami arrived at the police department, and Connor scrambled out, looking as if he was all out of patience, and keen to get this case wrapped up now. He escorted Mario inside. The mechanic was still compliant and didn't seem to have anything to say, but Cami could see that he was listening and looking around as if he was taking everything in. He was aware of his environment, that was for sure. He wasn't in a blind panic but was rather thoughtful and alert. She didn’t know if that would be good or bad for them. Even when he was being processed, he remained surprisingly calm.
The first thing Connor did after fingerprinting this suspect was take a DNA sample. Carefully, he swabbed inside Mario’s mouth and then put the swab into the sealed packet.
“This needs to go off for analysis, urgently,” he told the officer at the front desk after completing the form.
This, Cami knew, would be used to compare with the DNA from the crime scene. The blood on Tracy’s knife and on the stairs would be conclusive evidence. Without a doubt, this match would either incriminate Mario or clear him, but the sample would take a couple of days to be analyzed and come back. They needed a quicker arrest than that, because if Mario was not their suspect, then two days was far too long a time, and by then, trouble would have landed from every direction.
This interview was critical.
Connor walked through to the interview room with Mario. They sat him down, and he sprawled in the chair.
Cami took her first real good look at him. He was slightly taller than average, about five-nine, and although slender, he was strong and fit looking. He had a heart shaped face and dark hair that curled around it. He was a surprisingly good-looking man, she saw, despite his oily overall and the smudges and smears on his face. His long eyelashes and pink cheeks were what made him look so cherubic. Now, close up, she could see those lashes clearly.
"Mario Donde, do you know why you're here?"
Seated in the chair opposite, he still looked reserved, though calm. "I don't know."
"Are you aware of the three recent murders in the area of Boston where you used to live?"
"I think I heard something," he muttered.
"You used to be neighbors with one of the victims. Things went wrong, didn't they?"
"Yeah, I guess they did," he said.
"You have a record of assault."
"It was a suspended sentence."
"You were sued by Tracy’s husband, weren't you? Did that happen after those charges?" Connor’s voice was intense now. Cami saw that he was leaning forward, pressuring his suspect.
There was a resounding silence. And then, cherub-faced Mario nodded in asset. "We settled on an amount for damages. It wasn't massively high. I sold up and moved away."
This was all adding up. In the face of unarguable evidence, Mario was agreeing with everything that Connor said.
Mario’s eyes flickered between Connor and Cami, and his face twitched. Suddenly, Cami wondered if he was really so icily calm or whether he was just making a supreme effort to contain his emotion. Because for a moment there, he'd looked like he was about to break down.
He was beginning to show his true colors now. Cami wondered if it was because he was feeling cornered.
“Do you know a woman called Shiree Williams? You used to work at the same company a few years ago.”
“I don’t remember that name at all.”
“Have you changed jobs much in the past few years?”
“Yes. A few times. I’ve worked for some big companies with hundreds of employees,” Mario pleaded.
"Do you have an alibi for last night?"
Now, Mario's face was like stone. "I don't, no."
"What about the previous afternoon? Any record of your movements then?"
Cami watched Mario's eyes dart back and forth. He looked anxious. "There's nothing to tell you," he said, eventually. "I don't really have any record of my time then. No."
