Page 71 of The Bright Lands

Still listening to Mayfield’s conversation, Clark began running searches through the department’s system. She pressed Enter and discovered there was no official record of any kind regarding KT Staler, whom Wesley Mores had told Joel“got into some kind of trouble”over the summer. No arrests, no tickets, not even a citation.

She discovered a moment later that there was no record of any investigation into the distribution of those dirty photographs of Joel ten years ago, the investigation the Whitley family had been promised was still ongoing.

Out of curiosity (Clark was long past caring that all of these searches were tracked), she pulled the record of Joel’s arrest in 2007 and discovered it was so thinly written it was almost laughable. Old Officer Grissom had written:

Two men interrupted at Milam Municipal park in midst of sexual act...unidentified man between 5'8 and 6'2 (really?) fled the scene... Whitley, nude, produced wallet from pants on the ground stating quote “we can figure something out” end quote but...

Clark found all of this doubtful. She struggled to imagine Joel Whitley, aged seventeen (and no doubt terrified), possessing the wherewithal to offer a uniformed sheriff’s deputy a bribe to avoid arrest. For that matter, she struggled to imagine fat, fidgety Officer Grissom turning the money down: before his accident this past summer, Grissom had possessed a reputation for being almost endearingly corrupt.

But it begged the question: why would dirty Officer Grissom write a false report? To cover for the other man, the one who had allegedly escaped unidentified?

“That was the Dallas PD,” Mayfield said, hanging up the phone at his desk. “They arrested KT Staler for drug possession at a traffic stop on Tuesday night. Apparently they received some new APB this morning describing his Tacoma as ‘aquamarine’ and it flagged him in the system.” Mayfield raised an eyebrow. “I’d have thought ‘green’ would have covered all our bases.”

Clark’s heart fluttered. That had been her APB.

“They say KT’s ours for the taking if we want him. The new mayor up there put in a catch-and-release policy for the possession charges. They was about to cut him loose again.”

Clark reached for her keys. “Are we going now?”

“You’re going over to South Street,” said Sheriff Lopez. Clark spun in her chair. She hadn’t heard him stepping up behind her.

“But, sir—”

“But nothing. A car just drove into the bank and cracked open the vault.”

Clark stood. “Sir, with all due respect, we have a suspect in custody in—”

“Indeed we do. In our station.” Lopez narrowed his eyes at her computer screen. “If Mayfield wants to be a good Samaritan and bring Mr. Staler home, that’s his prerogative. We’re considering the Whitley case as good as closed, Deputy. And you’re out of line.”

Clark’s cell buzzed. She slipped it far enough from her pocket to see the name on the screen. She swallowed her anger. “Excuse me, Sheriff,” she said. “It’s my father’s home.”

It was Joel. She stepped into the woman’s restroom.

“Luke Evers wasn’t home Friday night.” Joel didn’t bother with hello. “Where did he say he was?”

Clark ran her mind over all the alibis the boys had given them on Tuesday. “He went home to his mother straight after the game. We followed up with her—she said he was in by ten forty.”

“T-Bay Baskin, the tall kid on the defensive line—you know him?”

“Of course. He was at home on Friday night too. We checked.”

“Precisely. Which is how he knows that Luke Everswasn’t.” Earlier this morning Clark had heard a calm in Joel’s voice she didn’t trust, the quiet of a coiled spring. It had gotten tighter. “T-Bay’s family, apparently they live down the street from the Evers place—the guy can see Luke’s driveway from his upstairs window. T-Bay told Kimbra Lott he was up late with Whiskey Brazos on the Xbox and by the time they fell asleep at four o’clock Luke’s truck still wasn’t parked at his family’s house. T-Bay said he noticed because Luke’s mother is so ‘psycho’—his word,notmine—she never lets Luke stay out late. T-Bay even mentioned to Whiskey that Luke would have hell to pay when he came home. Luke lied to you, Clark. And his family fucking covered for him.”

“Or T-Bay lied to get Luke in the shitter.”

“Why would he lie?”

“Why would Luke kill Dylan?”

“You saw how the two of them were fighting at the game. Those kids had bad blood.”

“They could have been disagreeing on a play.”

“Can you talk to Luke? Shake him a little?”

“I’m not shaking anybody,” she said, then added, “They’re putting me back on street duty. It’s a wild day over here.”

Joel was silent for a moment. “Then I’ll talk to him.”