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“Call me when you get to the front lobby. I’ll walk you back to where we work.”
“Thank you,” Sosa said. “We’ll be there within the hour.”
Connie’s heart was racing as she ended the call. Who would have thought she’d ever be able to help with an attempted murder case?
She went back to work entering data, with her phone on vibrate and lying face up near her elbow so she wouldn’t miss the call.
Nyles had a stack of first-edition classics on his desk and was working on entering them into the system. They’d been bequeathed to the library after the collector’s death, and the simple fact that he was holding books ranging in age from three hundred to five hundred years old was a blood-rush.
He was so focused on the task at hand that he never saw the two strangers entering the room, or was alerted to the multiple footsteps coming his way. He only looked up when he realized two men were standing in front of his desk. Then when they flashed their badges, it was all he could do to keep his seat.
“Nyles Fairchild?”
“Yes?” he answered.
“I’m Detective Sosa, and this is my partner, Detective King. We’d like to ask you some questions.”
“About what?” Nyles asked.
“Is there somewhere we can talk in private?” Sosa asked.
Nyles frowned. “I’m sorry, but unless you tell me what this is all about, I’m not going anywhere.”
Sosa frowned. “It’s just a formality. You’ve been pointed out as a person of interest in a shooting in Kentucky, and we just need to eliminate you as a suspect.”
There was a moment when Nyles realized he should never have come home, but it was too late to redo thedecision. There were lots of tall, skinny men with ponytails and beards in the world. All he had to do was deny everything.
“How odd,” Nyles said, and then stood. “There’s a small meeting room nearby. Would that suit?”
“Yes, thank you,” Sosa said. “Lead the way.”
Nyles led the cops out of the room, unaware they’d seen the security footage that had been aired, and were taking notes on the way he was dragging one heel as he walked, and that he held one shoulder lower than the other. They walked all the way down a narrow hall and then into the room, Nyles turning on lights as he entered. There was a long table in the middle of it, with a dozen chairs around it, shelves of books lining the walls, and a framed photo of the current president hanging on the wall.
“Have a seat,” he said, and then purposely sat down at the head of the table. To his chagrin, both cops took seats flanking him and suddenly he felt pinned in, rather than as if he were leading the interview. Still, he chose to speak first. “Now, how can I help you?”
“The first things we’ll need are a DNA sample and fingerprints as part of the elimination process, and then we’ll need you to answer a few questions.”
Nyles blinked. It was the only sign he made of the shock he was feeling.
What the hell? DNA? Fingerprints?He didn’t leave any of that behind. He’d felt for a pulse on the kid’s neck. And he’d checked out of his hotel room long before thekid woke up. The hotel would have long since cleaned the room and rented it again and again before the kid woke up to give them a description.
He watched in quiet horror as Detective King opened the briefcase he was carrying. The first thing King did was take a swab from the inside of Nyles’s mouth to collect DNA. Then he pulled out their digital fingerprint scanner, connected it to their laptop, and slowly and carefully took prints of every finger and thumb on both hands, then sent the results into the system, and then sent an email with the scanned prints directly to Sheriff Woodley.
Detective Sosa saw the nervous look on Fairchild’s face but said nothing. Instead, he pulled still shots of the security footage Woodley sent him via email, and laid them in front of Nyles, one by one.
“I’d like you to take a look at these,” Sosa said.
Nyles leaned forward, looked at each one, then sat back and looked up.
“Is this you?” Sosa asked.
Nyles pretended surprise. “Of course not. I don’t look like that!”
“We’ve seen your DMV photo. We’ve seen your government ID. And we have witnesses here in this building that claim that, up until recently, this is exactly how you wore your hair. In fact, they state you still looked like this before you went on vacation, and when you came back, you’d cut it all off.”
Nyles shrugged. “I just wanted a change. I live alone.I don’t have a social life to speak of and I get lost in my work here. The days off gave me a new perspective on my personal grooming, that’s all.”
“Where did you go on your days off?” Sosa asked.
