Page 105 of Thick as Thieves

“He did.” The doubt in her expression made him angry. “Fuck it. Crystal wasn’t convinced, either.”

“You’ve talked to her about this?”

“Last night. She shared something I didn’t know that lends—”

“You saw Crystal last night?”

Her voice had gone a little thin, and he enjoyed the tinge of jealousy it conveyed. “Yeah. Straight from you, I went to her.” He relished her mi

ffed expression for only a second or two, then pulled himself back on track. “She told me quite a story about the night Foster was killed.”

“The night he died. According to the report, it never was determined if it was intentional or an accident.”

“All right. The night Foster died, Rusty went to Crystal’s house.”

“A tryst?”

“You decide.” He related to her everything Crystal had told him about Rusty’s bizarre visit. He finished by saying, “At first, I was mad at her for keeping this from me for all these years. But I know how Rusty operates, how persuasive he can be. He convinced her that if she ever failed him, I would be the one to catch hell.”

Arden asked, “Had you beaten up her stepbrother?”

“I plead the fifth.”

“Why did you?”

“I had a reason. But we’re not talking about that. We’re talking about why Rusty needed an alibi that night.”

“You didn’t fight him?”

“No. But he couldn’t have faked his injuries.” He raised his hips in order to reach into his back pocket for the envelope Marty had hand-delivered.

“I wondered what that was about,” Arden said. “It seemed very secretive.”

“Rusty’s medical chart. She filched it from hospital records. I haven’t had a chance to look at it.”

“I want to see, too.”

He turned on the map light and spread the folded sheets open across the console. “Time of arrival in the ER, five fifty-two a.m. That’s consistent with the time Crystal estimated he left her house.”

He ran his index finger over the sheet. “X-ray on left arm showed a fractured ulna, fractured humerus. Contusions on face, neck, lower abdomen.”

“Lower abdomen?”

“Can’t figure that, either,” he said, frowning. “CT scan of torso. No organ rupture or internal bleeding, but blunt trauma to spleen.”

“What does that say?” Arden squinted at a notation. “Splinters?”

“Removed from palms of hands,” Ledge said, reading from the attending physician’s notes. “Treated for superficial scratches on arms and hands.” He looked at Arden. “Sounds like defense wounds.”

They went back to the notes. Rusty had been admitted. He wasn’t discharged until Tuesday morning and was sent home with instructions to continue bed rest for several days, take prescribed pain medication as directed, and apply antibiotic cream to the scratches four times a day.

“I wonder how he explained his injuries to the medical staff. His parents.”

“He’s fluent in lying,” Ledge said as he refolded the forms and returned them to his pocket. “Making up an excuse wouldn’t have been a problem for him.”

He glanced toward the lake, then reached across Arden’s knees, popped open the glove box, and took out a large flashlight. “You want to come, or stay here?”

“Where are you going?”