Page 62 of Secrets Along the Shore (Beach Read Thrillers #1)

CHAPTER

SEVEN

The county jail is a block from the courthouse in downtown Riverview.

It’s one-half of the building that houses the sheriff’s department offices—a plain, two-story red brick structure with struggling landscaping and a pot-holed parking lot full of patrol vehicles.

The jail sits on the left side, which is where I am now, tucked away in an interview room, awaiting Kurt Fogerty.

The space is crying for a serious makeover.

Scratches and stains mar the worn beige walls, and the air is laced with a pervasive stench I can’t quite identify.

Between that, the unforgiving fluorescents, and banged-up metal furniture, the room itself seems ill, which ironically matches how I feel.

I don’t want to be anywhere near this man—duty or no duty.

Sheriff Vickers gave me permission to conduct this interview for his department as part of the investigation into the new murder.

District Attorney March wants me here, since I’m the one who’ll be working to bolster the case once it gets turned over.

They both told me to handle this however I see fit, the goal being to get Fogerty to confess.

It’s a tall order. Though on the outside it appears I’m doing nothing as I wait, inside I’m fervently praying that Fogerty’s confession is exactly what I’ll be able to deliver.

After ten minutes, the heavy metal door opens and Fogerty shuffles in, one set of chains securing his ankles, another his wrists, with the two sets linked by yet another chain.

The two officers accompanying Fogerty put him down in a chair across from me, on the opposite side of the table.

Using a small padlock, they secure a short chain extending from his handcuffs to a steel loop bolted to the table’s surface.

The whole time they’re doing this, Fogerty is grinning at me maniacally.

I wish I could walk out of here. Walk out and never lay eyes on Fogerty again. But this is our chance to hear straight from the mouth of the devil, and I’m determined to get him to tell me what he did to the poor woman lying in that sad, shallow grave at the cliff.

I don’t know the corrections officer on Fogerty’s right, a hulking man with biceps bursting from his shirt cuffs. He introduces himself as Officer Dalton and explains what’s going to happen next, and where I should and shouldn’t move within the room.

Basically, if I keep my seat and my hands to myself, Fogerty won’t be able to get to me.

Why doesn’t that make me feel better?

“You gonna be okay in here?” Officer Dalton asks me, as the other officer exits.

“She’ll be right as rain,” Fogerty says, still grinning, then winks.

“Hey!” Officer Dalton’s bark is so loud I twitch in my seat. The grin on Fogerty’s face doesn’t even slide. “I wasn’t talking to you! Keep your mouth shut until spoken to!”

Officer Dalton turns his attention back to me. “We’ll be right outside,” he says, jabbing a finger at the hallway. “If you need anything, if this guy does anything to make you uncomfortable, just call out. Same for when you’re ready to go.”

“Thanks.”

“And remember”—Officer Dalton eyes me intently—“no crossing the table, okay?”

I nod again. “Got it.”

He doesn’t have to worry. The three-foot gap between me and Fogerty is the closest I’ll ever be to this maniac.

When the metal door closes behind Officer Dalton, a chilly unease settles over the room, as if his departure has raised the stakes somehow.

Fogerty’s stare bores through me, but I straighten, drop my shoulders, and return it with everything I’ve got.

I refuse to let him rile me—or at least, I refuse to let him think he has.

You’ve got a job to do, Walsh. Do it.

“I’m glad you came,” he says before I can take the reins.

“I’ll bet. Why am I here?” I snap, hoping that getting to the point curbs his personal banter and shifts him to the only topic I’m interested in.

“Simple. I wanted you here, and you came. I usually get what I want.”

“Well…no. You’re sitting in jail, so I’m thinking you didn’t get what you wanted yesterday.” I shouldn’t antagonize him, but sometimes my mouth gets the better of me.

He snorts, apparently amused rather than put off. He laces his fingers and starts to rest his elbows on the table, but the short slack of the chain prevents it. Seemingly unfazed, Fogerty drops his hands, one corner of his mouth drifting up.

“Why am I here, Fogerty?” I ask.

“I heard you found another girl.”

“How did you hear we found another woman ?”

“Little birdie told me.”

“Care to share the name of this birdie?”

“Nah. Couldn’t do that. That’d be doin’ yer job for ya.” He cocks his head. “Your hair sure looks pretty today. Whad’ya call that color, anyway? Brownish, with them lighter bits?—”

I press into the back of the metal chair and inhale a deep breath. “One more comment about me— one —and I walk out the door along with whatever twisted satisfaction you hope to squeeze out of today’s meeting. You got me?”

Fogerty doesn’t answer. He just keeps staring that cold, soulless stare.

“I said, do you understand?”

When he makes no sound, I push away from the table, my chair grinding against the floor as I rise.

“Fine,” he says, shifting in his seat. He spreads his hands as far as the cuffs allow. “It’s your show. ”

I pause a beat before sitting back down. As I do, there’s a violent pounding on the door.

“You good?” Officer Dalton bellows, a flicker of apprehension in his voice.

“We’re good,” I reply, not looking at the door, but instead keeping my gaze on Fogerty. After several moments, when Fogerty still hasn’t said anything, I raise my eyebrows. “Well?”

“I didn’t do it.”

“Do what?”

“Murder her.”

“Who said you murdered her?”

“Come on, Sophie?—”

“That’s Detective Walsh to you.”

He sniffs. “ Detective Walsh … obviously if another girl’s body gets found off of 174, you people are gonna come looking for me.”

“Not necessarily. Could’ve been a completely different M.O. No reason for you to jump to that conclusion. Unless”—I narrow my gaze—“there’s a reason for you to jump to that conclusion.”

“I heard enough to know I’d be at the top of your list.”

“So why don’t you confess and save us all a lot of time and trouble?”

He taps the table with dirt-encrusted, nail-bitten fingers. “D’you stop to ask yerself why I don’t want my attorney here?”

“Crossed my mind.”

“’Cause I ain't gonna confess.”

Fogerty licks his lips. “Number Three was buried exactly like your girl this morning.”

“And?”

“Numbers One and Two weren’t. Ever wonder about that?”

“No,” I lie.

When Teresa Anders, the third victim, was found in a clear plastic tarp, it was a departure from the first two murders, where the victims weren’t wrapped in anything.

The difference in the manner of burial didn’t give us much pause, because it made sense there would be a learning curve.

We posited that Fogerty initially disposed of the bodies as soon as possible, not allowing himself time to do anything more than simply leave them.

It made sense that by the third murder, he realized burying the body deeper, further from the highway, and in something to minimize odor, would help avoid detection.

But I’m not going to give him a foothold by admitting it.

Fogerty dramatically taps his fingers on the table again. “Well, ya’ should.”

“That fact doesn’t change anything. You’re right, we are looking at you for this morning’s murder. You could help yourself,”—I bob my head back and forth as if reconsidering—“ maybe help yourself if you were to confess?—”

“You’re not listenin’. I’m not confessin’. I’m tryin’ to tell you that you’re looking in the wrong place. My attorney wanted me to confess too. Was here first thing this mornin’ after he heard ’bout the new girl?—”

That little birdie sure gets around. I’ll have to talk to Tasha about our leak.

“—and that’s why I didn’t want him here. I told him what I’m telling you now. It wasn’t me. And if you find the fella that did it, you’re gonna find the real murderer of those girls I’m ’bout to go to prison over.”

“There’s nothing you can say to make me believe you aren’t responsible for the murders of Aria Benner, Hailey Peterson, and Teresa Anders.” I rattle off their full names because anything less seems disrespectful.

Fogerty’s eyebrows rise, his head slowly leaning to the left. “Nothin’? You sure about that? I’d be willin’ to make a bet with you if?—”

Fogerty’s words are drowned out by an ear-splitting alarm originating from somewhere in the hallway. The door swings open, banging into the wall as Officer Dalton strides inside, his huge form bristling with urgency as he heads for Fogerty.

“Up! Now!” Dalton barks, unlocking Fogerty from the bolt on the table and grabbing his upper arm.

“What’s going on?” I rise from my chair and step back as Dalton maneuvers Fogerty toward the door.

“Riot in the common room. Don’t know more,” Dalton says, pushing Fogerty through the doorway. “I need to go help, and I can’t leave him here. You stay and I’ll lock you in until this is under control. Shouldn’t be long.”

The door locks behind him, and for several seconds I stand still, straining to hear what’s going on beyond this room.

The window in the door is one-way, so I can’t see anything in it but my own dim reflection.

Eventually, I take a seat and stare at the door.

The fleeting notion of propping the chair Fogerty vacated beneath the door handle occurs to me, in case one of the rioting prisoners manages to get their hands on the key…

but I stop myself. My imagination is a vivid one, and often prone to extremes.

Though, to be fair, I am sitting alone in a jail interview room in the middle of a riot, objectively an extreme situation. So…not sure how far-fetched that possibility actually is.

I reflexively reach for my phone, then remember I had to leave it at the front desk. No cell phones are allowed in the visitation and interview rooms. I’m dying to know if Goat has come up with anything during the forty-five minutes I’ve been in the bowels of the jail.

Maybe I can check it before resuming our discussion.

If Goat has discovered who our victim is, that would definitely give me an advantage when trying to finagle a confession out of Fogerty.

Or maybe I should hold off continuing this until after we’ve had a chance to build a file on our victim. Then ? —

The lock clicks and the door flies open. Dalton rushes inside, and though he doesn’t say anything, his pinched expression and the shock traced in the lines of his face speak volumes.

Something out there has gone really, really wrong.