Simply Lies, page 3
“I didn’t even know this place was here. I’m a relative newcomer to the area. I was told it was built by some robber baron named Mason Rutherford back in the 1920s. And that a British Lord’s house used to be here before it was burned down during the Revolutionary War.”
Sullivan gave her another look that Gibson liked even less than the first one.
“What?” she asked.
“I’ve only been in this area a couple years, too. Came up from North Carolina. But I learn pretty fast. And I’ve never heard of a British Lord having a home here. Never heard of this Mason Rutherford, either. And I checked on this Stormfield place before I headed out here. Rutger Novak never owned it.”
Gibson looked perplexed. “I . . . I don’t understand.”
“Neither do I,” retorted Sullivan, giving her a sharp look that Gibson had given many suspects in her time as a cop and detective.
Shit.
Sullivan took out his phone and scrolled through some screens. “Stormfield wasn’t built in the 1920s. It was built in 1950 by a man named Richard Turner. He was the great-grandfather of the people who lived here before the current owner. He made his money in advertising up in New York, but he was from Tidewater and returned home to build this mansion. The Turner descendants owned it until about six years ago.” He stopped and eyed her.
“I . . . I don’t understand any of this. I was told that Laura Rutherford lived here until she was a hundred in 1998 and—”
Sullivan turned when a uniformed officer came out and called to him.
“Excuse me,” said Sullivan, standing up and joining the man for a minute. They had a whispered conversation that included several glances at Gibson, who was growing more uncomfortable by the minute. She looked at her watch and was expecting a call from her mother at any moment demanding to know where the hell she was.
After the officer went back into the house, Sullivan rejoined Gibson on the steps, his features grim but otherwise unreadable.
“Problem?” said Gibson.
Sullivan took out his cigarette lighter and clicked the top back and forth like his personal fidget toy.
“We called ProEye about you. They just got back to us.”
“And they confirmed that I worked for them.”
“Yes they did.”
“I sense a but coming.”
“But they never asked you to come out here to do an inventory on this place. They never called you at all about Stormfield. They have no idea what it is or where it is.”
Gibson caught a breath and gaped. “Who did your people talk to?”
“Fellow named Zeb Brown. He said he was your immediate supervisor.”
“He is.”
“So care to explain the discrepancy? Because one of you seems to be lying. And I’d like to know which one it is.”
“I told you. I got a call from Arlene Robinson from the Albany office—”
“There is no Arlene Robinson in the Albany office. There is no Arlene Robinson that works at ProEye, period. So let me ask you again, what are you doing here?”
Gibson looked at the old, ugly building as a number of scenarios played out through her mind.
“I got a call from someone identifying herself as Arlene Robinson a couple of hours or so after I spoke with Zeb about an unrelated case. The woman said she worked with him.”
“And you just accepted that at face value?” He held up his phone. “It took me all of five minutes to look up the history of this place.”
“Look, she knew that Zeb and I had spoken earlier and she even had numerous details of our conversation. She pretty much quoted a line that Zeb said to me this morning. So I just assumed that she worked there because how else would she know all that? And she also knew I had kids. She said that since I was local, which meant she knew I lived around here, they wanted me to come over and do an inventory of this place. She said the owner, Rutger Novak, had run out on some big debts and the creditors wanted to salvage what they could. And that’s basically what ProEye does, so I had no reason to doubt the authenticity of the call or the nature of the assignment.”
“As I already said, Rutger Novak does not own Stormfield.”
“I didn’t know that. Then who does?”
“The man you found in the secret room, Daniel Pottinger.”
“Then you’ve identified him?”
“Preliminarily. He had a wallet with a driver’s license. Photo matched the deceased. We’ll confirm that, of course.”
“Who is he?”
“Rich, obviously. I’ve never met him. He came here and bought Stormfield from the Turners. That’s all I know.”
“How did Pottinger die?”
Sullivan shook his head. “Can’t get into that. We’re going to need your phone records to confirm you got a call. Maybe we could trace it, if it actually happened.”
“I am telling you the truth. Why else would I be here? Why would I have called the police when I found the dead body?”
“I don’t know, Ms. Gibson. There are reasons on both sides why you would.”
“What do you mean, ‘both sides’?”
“Those that favor you being innocent. And those that favor you being involved in the murder of Daniel Pottinger.”
“So he was murdered? I could see no wound,” said Gibson.
“Your driver’s license says you live in Williamsburg?”
“Yes, with my two young kids, as I mentioned before. And my mother is watching them and will be expecting me back. This was a spur-of-the-moment thing and I had to call her in to be the babysitter. I thought I was going to be spending the day chasing down assets on the internet, not finding a murdered man in a gloomy old mansion.”
“Well, it would have been much better for you if you had stuck to being a digital detective. It’s a lot more dangerous out here.”
“What happens now?” asked Gibson.
“I’ll follow you back to your house. And then we can talk some more and I can check on some things that, hopefully, will exclude you from the suspect list.”
“Do you really believe I had something to do with this murder?”
“You were a detective once. How would you answer that?” asked Sullivan.
Gibson sighed. “Everyone’s a suspect until it’s proved conclusively that they’re not.”
“Good that you still remember that.” He took her firmly by the arm. “Let’s go.”
ON THE DRIVE BACK GIBSON kept looking in the rearview mirror at Sullivan in his sedan. She was trying to gauge whether the man seriously considered her a suspect in the murder or not. His look was focused yet distant, as though he had a great many scenarios flitting through his head. He reminded Gibson of herself on a case, consuming all the facts of a crime scene, but then taking the time and distance to weave them into plausible theories that might, or might not, turn out to be supported by the facts.
When they arrived at her house, Gibson introduced Sullivan to her mother, but didn’t elaborate on why he was here.
“It’s work-related, Mom. Can you hang around a bit to watch the kids? I have some things to go over with Detective Sullivan. Thanks.”
Dorothy Rogers eyed her daughter and then glanced at the tall and attractive Sullivan and smiled. “Well, I’ll just leave you two alone then.”
Gibson had to work extra hard to keep the groan inside her from coming out.
He doesn’t want to date me, Mom, he wants to figure out if I’m a murderer.
She took Sullivan into her office and slipped out her iPhone. “This is my business phone.” She scrolled down the screen. “Here’s the number she called me from. It didn’t have a name because it wasn’t in my contacts, or a location tag, but I usually answer because my job pretty much requires that.”
Sullivan punched in the number on his phone and held it to his ear. It rang and rang but no one answered. “Probably a burner or something like it. Or voice-over-untraceable-IP bullshit. We’ll try to track it, but don’t hold your breath.” He looked around at her office setup and the two monster screens. “So this is where the investigatory magic happens?”
“If you want to call digital drudgery that, yes it is.” Gibson sat down, took off her shoes, and rubbed her feet. “Sorry, not used to wearing even low-heel pumps anymore.”
Sullivan sat down across from her. “Anything else you can remember from the call?”
Gibson knew he could have asked her all this back at Stormfield, but he obviously wanted to see if her suburban mom story checked out or not.
“I’m naturally skeptical like any good ex-cop, but she played every beat perfectly. She threw in the conversation with Zeb first, which took away any doubt I might have had.”
“Which means either your boss is in on this—”
“—or she does work there, used a fake name and phone and overheard the conversation, or she tapped Zeb’s phone or mine and got the necessary intel that way.”
Sullivan nodded appreciatively. “You’re not showing any rust at all from your detective days.”
“Really? I think I need a full lube job after what happened. She reeled me in hook, line, and sinker. Like you, I would normally have checked out the place online, but she provided a history for it that sounded plausible, and they wanted this done really fast, or at least she said that. And she never told me the name of the place. That was probably so I wouldn’t check it out and determine everything she said was bullshit. And, on top of all that, she used the name Rutger Novak.”
“Why is that significant?” asked Sullivan curiously.
“Long before I joined ProEye they had a battle royale with Novak. He ended up winning because he disappeared and ProEye couldn’t find a single asset to grab for their clients. It was a big black eye for the firm, so every employee that they hire, during the orientation, gets a snootful of info on Novak, as if to say, you better work hard and cover every angle, or the big fish slips away. She must have known that about the firm and mentioned his name to me so I would have no doubts she worked there.”
“Mickey Gibson. It says that on your license. But isn’t it short for Michelle?”
“No, my given name isn’t Michelle. It’s Mickey.”
“Okay? Is there a story behind that?”
Gibson sighed resignedly. “To say my late grandfather was a diehard Yankees fan would be a gross understatement. He bled the navy blue pinstripes. Family lore has it that he threatened to strangle my father unless he named his first grandchild, regardless of gender, after Mickey Mantle. So voilà, here I am.”
“Well, it is different.”
“Very kind of you to say so. Growing up with that name I would have used a different word to describe it.”
“Made you tougher, I take it.”
“Made me something.”
“Which then leads us to the question of why you? Out of the entire universe of people she could have made that call to?”
“I thought about that all the way on the drive back. I didn’t come up with much other than I work for ProEye and live close to Stormfield. She obviously wanted me to go there and find that body. Today. The wall had been opened a bit and there was a fan just inside the space to create airflow and noise, and a vase had been placed on the shelf there to draw my attention. Chances were very good I would stumble upon it.”
“Any possibility you could know the woman under another name?”
“I didn’t recognize the voice, but she could have altered that. I don’t know all that many people around here, other than some other moms and dads in my neighborhood.”
“So you think the crime scene was arranged?”
“There’s no power on in that house; fan was battery operated. Wall left partially open, dead body, fan on. Yeah, it was staged and then the call came to me.”
Sullivan said, “And the techs estimated the fan had a decent charge left.”
“So whoever turned it on was there probably today. Maybe this ‘Arlene Robinson’ even called me from there. She knew where I lived and she knew how long it would take me to get to Stormfield, because I basically told her it would be about an hour after I left my house.”
“So the question becomes: Did she kill him?”
“How long has he been dead?”
“It wasn’t today. I can tell you that.”
“I could see that for myself. Why would anyone want to kill Pottinger? Did he have any enemies?”
“Early for all that. We’re checking out various possibilities.”
“I was told the place was abandoned. But if Pottinger was still living there, where’s all the hired help? He couldn’t have taken care of that place all by his lonesome. But it was empty when I got there, and the power was off. And the place didn’t really look lived in. There was stuff that I inventoried, but it just had the feel of being abandoned.”
“Checking into all of that.”
“So am I off the suspect list?”
“Not quite, but you’re getting there.” He rose. “We’ll be in touch.”
“Look, if you need another pair of eyes on this?”
“Not the way the Virginia State Police work, sorry.”
Gibson took a symbolic step back. “Of course.”
He eyed the computers. “I guess it was a big change. Going from the streets to this.”
“It was. But being a parent is an even bigger change in your life, maybe the biggest.”
He left Gibson there staring at the screens around which her work life now flowed.
What the hell have I just stepped in?
GIBSON PUT THE PHONE DOWN after having talked to Zeb Brown. He confirmed everything that Sullivan had told her. There was no Arlene Robinson. There was no assignment from ProEye.
Brown hadn’t been at all sympathetic with Gibson. On the contrary, he’d clearly been pissed that she hadn’t confirmed the assignment with him and saved the company and her a lot of trouble and egg on their faces.
“We do have a reputation to uphold,” he had told her in a scolding tone. “So if there is a next time, just call me, okay? Then maybe we can avoid being part of a freaking police investigation. And maybe you should bag going out tonight to celebrate the Larkin matter and get your head on straight.” He’d clicked off before she could reply.
She slowly set the phone down. Okay, he thinks I’m either an idiot or I’m involved in a crime, and I’m not sure which is worse, because I cannot lose this job.
Later, she fed her kids, played with them, bathed them, and put them to bed. She still had on her mother’s pantsuit. The waist actually felt a bit looser, and she realized she hadn’t had anything to eat other than the almond oatmeal cookie.
She went down to the kitchen, and pan-cooked her special and amazing Kraft Mac & Cheese and ate it standing up with a glass of cheap merlot to kill the taste.
Gibson looked out the window and saw nothing but darkness in the chilly springtime evening.
Darkness out there, darkness in here.
Darkness between my ears.
And then her phone buzzed. Her business phone. She looked at the screen. It was a text.
Can you talk? AR
She almost dropped her wine and then looked quickly around to see if she was being watched somehow.
She texted back: Okay. And waited.
The phone buzzed. She answered. The same woman’s voice came on the line.
“Can I explain?” she said.
“What a great idea,” snapped Gibson. “Maybe your real name might be the best place to start.”
“They found the body, correct?”
“I found the body. Daniel Pottinger. Murdered. How’d you kill him?”
“I need you to go to your front door.”
“Why?” said Gibson in a tense voice. She automatically looked up, to where her kids were sleeping.
The woman said, “You’ll find a phone there in a box. I’ll call it in thirty seconds.” She clicked off.
Gibson rushed to the gun safe, unlocked it, slid out her Beretta, and slapped in a mag.
She hurried to the front door and looked out one of the side lights. She lived in a working-class, cookie-cutter neighborhood of 1,500-square-foot homes with carports or one-car garages, built mostly in the eighties. There were lights on in some of the houses, and cars were parked up and down the street. She saw no one out and about. A dog barked from somewhere, making her jump. She slowly opened the door and saw the small box on the porch. Gibson gently opened it just as the phone inside started to ring. She stepped back into her home and locked the door.
And then Mickey Gibson decided to lose her shit.
“What is this load of crap?” she yelled into the phone. “I don’t appreciate getting sucked into whatever stupid game it is you’re playing.”
“It’s not a game, but I’d feel the same if I were in your shoes.”
“Easy to say since you’re not in my shoes. You almost cost me my job and you still might.”
“I’m sorry, but please let me explain.”
Gibson bit back her anger and turned to cop mode, which meant, above all, listening. And this might be the only way to eventually get to the truth. Plus, she was curious as hell as to what was really going on. Not that she expected this woman to tell her anything except lies. But Gibson was really good at tracking stuff down. She just needed a lead, one tiny morsel.
“Okay, go ahead,” she said in a calmer voice.
“I didn’t kill him and I don’t know who did. All I know is that I found his body and didn’t know what else to do.”
Incensed once more, Gibson barked, “How about calling the fucking police, that one ever occur to you?”
“I couldn’t call them.”
“You just had to hit 911 with your index finger, you didn’t have to give your name or just use a fake one, like you did with me.”
“I didn’t want to do it that way. I had my reasons. Good ones.”
“Then why involve me in your mess?”
“Because I had heard of you.”
“Heard of me from where?” demanded Gibson.
“When you were a cop.”
“That was back in Jersey. So you tracked me to Williamsburg?”
