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Simon saw a chance to rachet up thepressure a little. “What about Alice Chan? Did you mean to hurt her? Or didthings just get out of hand?”
“I never did anything to hurtAlice. Why would I?” Alonzo said. He strained against the cuffs that held himin his agitation.
“Perhaps because you were trying torun some kind of con on her,” Amber said. “That’s what you do, isn’t it,Alonzo? You take the information you get from your clients, and you see what elseyou can get out of them. What do you do with it? Do you blackmail them? Usetheir personal details to steal from them?”
Alonzo looked affronted. “Nothingthat crude.”
“Then what?” Simon demanded.
Alonzo was silent for severalseconds, and in those moments, Simon started to worry that he might not talk atall, that he might just shell up and refuse to say anything further. Instead,he seemed to come to a decision.
“It varies. Some of them, I giveadvice to. I can tell what they want to hear, and I tell them with just anotherfew sessions, everything will be clear. A couple of them, I’ve gotten to do mefavors. Nothing big. And sometimes… well, people tell things to theirastrologer they wouldn’t even tell to their therapist. There’s a stockbrokerwho likes to run his big trades past me.”
“And you jump onto anything thatlooks juicy,” Simon said. “So, what was the angle with Alice Chan?”
Alonzo shrugged. "She wasgoing to be famous. If she won at nationals and beyond, people were going toknow her name. And once it came out that she loved astrology, everyone wouldwant to know who the guy was who predicted all her big successes."
So it was a simple grab for fame onhis part?
“And did she say that she was goingto stop seeing you?” Amber asked. “Or did she find out about the small cons youran on your other clients? Was that why you killed her, Alonzo?”
“I never killed anyone,” he said.“You have to believe me.”
“What about Katrina van Nuit?”Amber asked.
“I don’t even know who that is,”Alonzo insisted.
“She was murdered here, two yearsago, in a similar way to Alice Chan,” Simon said. “So, when we go back throughyour files, we won’t find any mention of her?”
“I wasn’t even in Keystonetwo years ago,” Alonzo said. “In my line of work, you have to keep moving. Iwas in Sacramento.”
If that was true, it meant that hewas unlikely to be the killer. Unless he’d visited the town around that time,he’d gone from their best suspect to barely a suspect at all.
Amber seemed to realize the samething, getting up and walking out of the room. Simon went with her.
“It’s not him, is it?” she said.
“Not if it’s true that he wasn’there.”
“It is, I think. His business hasonly been running for a year or so. I knew he had a record before that, but Ididn’t think to just check where he’d been living. Is it possible that hesomehow killed Katrina while he was visiting Keystone, or something.”
“It’s possible,” Simon said. “ButI’d guess the odds are against it. Look, Keystone PD can hold him for theinjuries to his receptionist and for whatever cons he’s been running. That buystime to look at his movements. But for now… I’d say it isn’t him.”
Amber nodded, looking disappointed.Simon hated seeing that look, because he knew how personally Amber took everywrong turn in a case. He also spotted the moment when a fresh look ofdetermination came into her eyes.
“Even if it isn’t him, he can stillhelp us with one thing.”
She pulled out a copy of thekiller’s code and strode back into the interrogation room. She set it down onthe table in front of Alonzo.
“Alonzo, you say you didn’t do anyof this, and presumably right now, you want to show us just how cooperativeyou’re being?”
Alonzo hesitated, then nodded,obviously realizing that being able to help in any way might count in hisfavor.
“So interpret this birth chart forus. Give us any information you can about the person it’s about.”
“I can give you a date of birth,probably,” Alonzo said. “Maybe a location. I’d need to check a couple of onlinecharts, but I could do that.”
“Then do it,” Amber said, lookinghopeful.
