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“Mr. Epps, your band does have a bass player, yes?”
Again, he didn’t answer. Frank stepped forward and wrapped one of his large hands around a bar of the cell. “Answer her, Mr. Epps. Don’t make this harder than it has to be.”
Carter couldn’t look at them when he did respond. “Yeah, we have a bass player.”
“What’s his name?” Ava asked.
“Robert Love. Pretty sure that’s not his real name, but that’s what he always calls himself.”
“And was he there yesterday?” Frank asked. “Was he there at the club when Monty Lincoln was killed?”
Carter eyed them both but seemed to look at Ava a bit longer. It almost looked like he was pleading with her, using just his eyes. “I’m sorry. I do want to help but I know how things in this city work for a black man. So…I gave you his name. But that’s all I’m going to say.”
“Fair enough,” Ava said, already starting to turn away. She noticed Frank giving her a perplexed look. He clearly didn’t think their interview was over. “But can you maybe at least tell us where he lives?” Ava added. “You told us yourself that you don’t even know if he’s using a real name?”
The look on his face—brow furrowed and sad eyes looking down—showed that he was wrestling with it, but in the end, he looked back up to her. “Yeah, I know where he lives. But please, don’t make me say anything else.”
“Deal,” Ava said.
Carter told them in a whisper and when Ava and Frank turned to leave, her heart broke a bit as she saw Carter crying. In his mind, he’d potentially just turned a friend over to the police. And it made Ava wonder just what they might find about Robert Love before the day was over.