“Yes,” Will said. “We’ve talked to her.”
“It’s not just blacks.” Gloria wasn’t finished. “She found out one’a the teachers at Wayne’s school was a lesbian and had her run out on a rail. And it takes a lot to get fired from the Clayton County school system.”
Faith shook her head, like she needed to clear it. “Where does Billie Lam fit into all of this?”
“That piece of trash?” Gloria stubbed her cigarette out by the others. “Like I said, I haven’t talked to any of them in years, but I hear she followed Doug-Ray up here when Wayne got him a job at the school.”
Amanda made it clear. “Billie followed Doug-Ray back to Forest Park, not the other way around?”
“What she wanted to do up here is beyond me. Same trailer, different park.” Gloria lit another cigarette. “Why are y’all looking at me funny?”
“Billie isn’t Maw-Maw’s granddaughter?”
She sputtered out smoke as she laughed. “Oh, hell no. Maw-Maw woulda drowned a girl before she raised her. You think she hates men? You should see what she does to women. I’m not sure why she talked Gilbert into hiring Billie to work at the store, but mark my word, Maw-Maw was working an angle. Don’t let her fool you. She’s a crafty old bitch.”
Will noted an absence of saliva in his mouth.
Faith said, “Gilbert Caldwell is Maw-Maw’s son, not his son-in-law?”
“By a different daddy from Wayne and Doug-Ray. Never married none of them, of course.” She pursed her lips. “My mama used to say Samantha Lewis had a rocking chair for an ass.”
Faith asked, “Did she have any more children?”
“Just the three boys, God bless their souls. And Pete, though like I said, he was her sister’s kid.”
Amanda pushed herself up from the table. She rarely showed her years, but today was an exception. “Thank you for your time, Ms. Pringle. We’ll follow up if we have any more questions. In the meantime, if you hear where Billie might be, we would appreciate a phone call.”
“No problem. You’ll be the first to know.” Gloria walked them toward the door. There was a look of concentration on her face. In Will’s experience, the best details always came out when an interview was over. Gloria Pringle was no exception.
“What about the house?” she asked, holding open the front door. “Did ya’ll check Doug-Ray’s house?”
“Yes,” Faith answered. “Doug-Ray’s house, Wayne’s apartment, Maw-Maw’s house.”
She didn’t mention that Maw-Maw had given them the slip, but Will could tell from the way’s Amanda’s jaw set as she walked onto the porch that the thought was prominent in her mind.
“What about Arthur’s?” Gloria smiled when they all stopped and turned around. “Arthur Pierce. He was a mailman. Died about three months ago.” Her smile started to falter. “Y’all know Doug-Ray’s daddy left him a house?”
--7--
Arthur Pierce had left his son a two-bedroom clapboard house located in a section of Forest Park that bordered Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport. The house wasn’t exactly on the runway, but Will felt the need to hunch his shoulders as a Delta jet came in for a landing.
He walked up the driveway on foot. There was a silver Pontiac Firebird parked in front of the closed garage. Will glanced in as he passed, making sure no one was hiding in the back. He headed toward the front porch. Weeds had grown through the cracked concrete, but Will could tell the house had been well maintained until three months ago when Arthur Pierce passed away. And he had really died, because they’d all seen his death certificate, tax returns, property deeds, and records on his closed pension account.
The day’s events so far had served as an unwelcome reminder of why they taught you at the academy to verify all witness testimony down to the last detail.
Arthur Pierce was without question deceased. They’d talked to the funeral home that buried him and his friends at the VA who’d been there when he clutched his chest and keeled over onto the poker table. By all accounts, the senior Mr. Pierce was a stand-up guy. He’d been a mailman, which explained why his mailbox was painted dark blue with an American flag on each side. The front door was a matching blue. There was another American flag hanging from a column that held up the small shed roof over the door. The material was tattered from the elements, which Will was glad Mr. Pierce did not have to see.
Will had planned to knock, but the front door was cracked open. He used the toe of his boot to push it the rest of the way. He had Faith’s Glock tucked into the back of his pants, but he didn’t pull the weapon. Maybe this wasn’t exactly wise. Every minute of Will’s day had been spent underestimating people.
The house smelled musty and closed up. Doug-Ray hadn’t bothered to clear out his father’s furniture or mementos, but he’d availed himself of all the copper in the house. Plaster had been hammered away in chunks. The ceiling looked like the world’s largest rat had bounced its way across the beams. Pipes, electrical wire – anything that could be sold for scrap had been removed long ago.
Which didn’t explain the coppery smell in the air.
Will felt the hairs on the back of his neck go up. He put his hand on the Glock, but didn’t pull it. There was only one thing he could think of that smelled like copper but wasn’t copper, and that was congealed blood. Something about the iron hitting oxygen brought about the scent. Every cop had a different description for it, but what it boiled down to was the smell of metal that hooked into the back of your throat like a fishing lure.
He walked through the front room as quietly as he could. Broken plaster littered the floor. The carpet was wet and moldy. There was a hole in the roof somewhere. Doug-Ray had probably talked to a real estate agent and realized very quickly that no one would be interested in buying his father’s house. According to the tax records, Arthur Pierce’s home was one of only three in the neighborhood that wasn’t in the process of foreclosure.
Will peered into the two bedrooms and a tiny hall bath before making his way to the kitchen. Something told him this was where he would find Billie, and he was right. Only, he hadn’t anticipated the state in which she would be found.
She was lying on her back in the kitchen doorway. Her bleached blonde hair flowered around her head. Her arms were out, hands open. Her eyes were deep blue. They were also glassy, most likely because of the large kitchen knife sticking out of her chest.
Will stood over the body. He didn’t bother to bend down and check her pulse. He didn’t want to give Maw-Maw the opportunity to jump him.
The old woman was sitting at the table smoking a joint. She blew on the tip, one eye on Will as he stepped over Billie’s body and entered the kitchen.
“She came at me,” Maw-Maw said, her voice raspy from the smoke. “I thought she was gonna kill me.”
Will looked at the scene. There was some evidence to support a struggle. Kitchen utensils were scattered on the floor. Drawers were open where someone had furiously searched them.
Only, it wasn’t just one or two drawers that were open, but every single drawer in the room. In Will’s lengthy experience with stabbings that occurred in the kitchen, he was hard-pressed to think of a case where someone searching for a knife started with the bottom drawers and worked their way up.
Maw-Maw waved at the chair across from her. “Sit down, sonny. Let’s talk.”
Will reached into his pocket. He took out his iPhone. “I’m going to record this.”
“Suit yourself.”
“As a police officer, I have to inform you that you’re entitled to a lawyer. You have a right—”
“To remain silent, et cetera, et cetera,” she interrupted. “I’m eighty-four years old. You think I haven’t seen my fair share of Murder, She Wrote?”
Will didn’t recall Jessica Fletcher ever making an arrest, but for the sake of the recording, he asked, “You’re waiving your rights, Ms. Lewis?”
“Yes.” She impatiently pointed at the chair. “Now sit.”
Will sat. He put the phone on the table between them. The little needle on the readout bounced back and forth as a jet roared overhead.
Will waited for the noise to fade, then asked, “Do you want to tell me what happened?”
Maw-Maw held a lungful of smoke before letting it out. “Poor Billie. She knocked on my kitchen door a while ago. I knew those cops were outside. I tried to get them, but she grabbed me.” She showed Will a mark on her wrist where he had no doubt Billie Lam grabbed the old woman, probably to keep the knife from going deeper into her chest. “She took me out the back and brought me here.”
“That’s her car in the driveway?”
“Gilbert’s,” Maw-Maw provided. “He let her drive it to work. That’s just the sort she was. Give her an inch and she takes a mile.”
“Was Gilbert the third man at the gas station today?”
She gave him a disappointed look. “You’re getting ahead of yourself.”
Will held out his open hand, indicating she should continue spinning her defense.
“I tried to help that sweet girl. Got her a job at the store. Took her into my home. And then she drags me here. Holds that very knife to my neck and tells me she wants all my money.” She inhaled deeply. “I don’t know how it happened. I managed to get the knife somehow. I wasn’t going to hurt her. I just held it out in front of me, and she ran toward me, and…” Her voice trailed off. She gave Will a cat’s smile. “Poor little thing. She was so young.”
“You said she was your granddaughter.”
“Well.” The smile still played at her lips. “She was just as good as. That girl felt like family. All I ever wanted to do was protect her.”
“Like you were trying to protect your sons?” Will leaned forward. “Wayne Walker and Doug-Ray Pierce.”
“Both dead,” she told Will. “I heard it on the news. Wayne died half an hour ago. Bless both their hearts.”
Will hadn’t heard about Walker, but he wasn’t surprised. “You don’t seem too broken up that two of your children are dead.”
“Wayne was sick for a long time with the cancer.” She blinked, and he wondered whether her moist eyes were for show. “He was an asshole, but he was my asshole.”
“And Pete McClendon?”
“Sweet, but stupid.” She chuckled as she took another hit from the joint. “So stupid.”
“He was robbing businesses on his own beat. We talked to the detectives on the case. They were about to arrest him.”
“I told him he’d get caught eventually – don’t shit where you eat – but that boy was a shit-eater from the day he was born.”
“What about the store today?”
She set the joint down on the edge of the table. Will watched it smolder against the linoleum. Her hand shook as she reached out to the phone. She was better at working the device than Will. A series of swipes turned off the recorder, then she pressed the button and powered it down.
She put the phone back on the table and picked up the joint.
She said, “It was Wayne’s idea. He knew he was dying, wanted to go out with a bang. Fly to Vegas, get some hookers.” She lowered her voice. “Let’s be honest, nobody was gonna sleep with that asshole unless they was gettin’ paid for it.”
Will had to take a moment to digest her words. It was very convenient that Wayne couldn’t dispute the charge. “What about Doug-Ray?”
“He was following Wayne’s lead. That’s just how they are, isn’t it? Always looking for the fast score, too lazy to make it happen on their own. I told him it would get him killed one day.” She puffed out a cloud of smoke. “Men never listen to reason.”
“Did you know Wayne was going to kill Doug-Ray?”
“They were brothers, but they never got along.” She added, “And Arthur’s pension from the post office died with him, so what’s the point?”
Will had always thought being able to live your life was a good point. “There was only a thousand bucks in that cash register.”
“A thousand twelve,” she corrected. “Never lie about money, son.”
Will shook his head. He still didn’t understand, and he wasn’t too proud to admit it. “All of this for a little over a thousand dollars?”
“Anybody ever tell you you’re just about as ignorant as a goat?”
Will didn’t respond. Amanda often compared him to farm animals. “What’s in it for you, Maw-Maw? I don’t get it.”
“Well, let me walk you through it, boy.” She counted off on her fingers. “Wayne got fired, but he’s still got his pension and life insurance policy through the school. Doug-Ray has about the same, but Pete’s the jackpot. A hundred thousand dollars for being killed in the line of duty. And happened just in time, I guess, if those detectives were as close as you say to locking him up.” She seemed pleased with herself. “I’m next of kin with his mama and daddy gone.”
“Pete’s not dead.”
“Yet.” She shrugged. “If he makes it, he’ll get disability. The investigation will go away – let’s be real, the county doesn’t need another scandal on top of the pile. I guess I’ll have to take care of little Petey again.” The wink she gave Will suggested what kind of caregiver she planned on being. “Poor boy.”
“What about Billie?”
Maw-Maw’s face twisted in disgust. “She pulled a baby-daddy scam on Doug-Ray. I saw it coming a mile away, but he was blind to anything had more than one hole between the legs. That girl was about as pregnant as I was. I let her live with me so I could keep an eye on her. She spun some story about losing the baby. Of course, I couldn’t kick her out after that. I’m a Christian.”
“You needed her as a witness,” Will realized. “The store really had to be robbed. She had to back up Pete’s line-of-duty death.”
“Which she would’ve done if everything hadn’t gone to hell.”
Will floated his theory. “Doug-Ray and Pete weren’t meant to survive the robbery. Shooting Pete in the chest wasn’t an accident. Neither was shooting Doug-Ray in the head.”
“Wayne had one foot in the grave. The melanoma was gonna take him in a few months. I told you, he never much liked Doug-Ray, and Pete always got more poon than he did, which can grate on a man. I’m sure you get where I’m coming from. Every single one’a y’all walk whichever way your compass needle points you.”
Will had to say, “For the mother of three sons, you really seem to hate men.”
“What can I tell ya? I’ve known too many of them to think otherwise. Present company excluded, of course.”
Will doubted he was an exception. Hate radiated off her like the heat lamp over the nachos at the Lil’ Dixie.
He thought of something that hadn’t stuck out before. “The surveillance camera was angled to the back of the store. Billie’s testimony about the robbery would’ve been the only thing the police had to go on.”
“Which would’ve worked great if the little bitch hadn’t run out the back screaming her head off. Took everything I had in me to keep her from going to the police.” She soured her face. “You don’t think I wanted to be up there this morning pretending like I saw the whole thing.”
Will was fairly certain Maw-Maw had seen a great deal. He asked, “What kept her from turning all of you in?”
“Money,” she said. “I threw the bag of cash on the roof of the store. Near about shocked me to death that y’all didn’t look up there.”
Will could only imagine the words Amanda would have for the agents who missed this. “Billie was supposed to get the proceeds from the holdup.”
“Now you’ve got it.”
“And Gilbert?”
“He’s the only one’a them ever added up to anything.” Her words were kind, but her expression said otherwise. “Not that that’s much, considering.”
“Where is he?”
“Dead eight days. Slipped and fell at the store. Cracked his head open like a walnut.” She shook her head. “I swear to God, if I’d known the police was this stupid, I would
a planned this whole thing a lot different.”
The woman had a point. Gilbert’s accident had happened in Clayton County. His death would’ve been investigated by the GBI medical examiner’s office. The autopsy report was probably making its way through the system.
“Poor Gil,” Maw-Maw said. “Little shit couldn’t run a business to save his life. Or my life, which is the part that matters. The whole damn place was falling down. Mortgaged out the wah-hoo. And then I find out he put my house up as collateral. I was gonna lose everything.” She pointed her finger in Will’s direction. “I’ll tell you what I told Billie: ain’t nothing you can get from a man that you can’t get better from a dog and a jar of peanut butter.”
Will felt light-headed.
She threw back her head and laughed. “Shut your mouth before you catch some flies, boy. I may be old as dirt, but I still got some life left in me.”
Will tasted blood in his mouth. His teeth had cut open the inside of his cheek.
“That it?” She pressed her hand to the table, making to stand.
“Sit down.” Will stopped thinking about what she’d said and concentrated on what she’d done. Her sons were dead – two of them by violent means; God only knew what had happened to the other. The boy she had raised was clinging to his life at the hospital. Billie Lam lay dead on the floor with a knife in her heart.
And Maw-Maw was certain she was going to get away with it.
Will reached for the phone. She clamped her hand over his. She was fast when she wanted to be. He could feel the sandpapery rub of her skin as he pulled his hand away.
He said, “The robbery was your idea, not Wayne’s.”
One shoulder went up in a shrug. The motion was almost lost under her loose-fitting dress. Will wondered what else she had under there. Faith’s earlier warning still echoed in his brain. He’d been played like a fiddle by this woman from the moment they’d met. Will took out his gun and put it on the table in front of him. His hand stayed on the grip.