Gracie's Game: Sudden Anger, Accidentally on Purpose (30 page)

Gracie's jaw tightened with determination. "Guess I should tell you that Dad told me about your girlfriend in college, how she got pregnant and you had to pay child support for a son you never saw."

Bill smiled a little ruefully. "It's no big secret. I'm a little surprised he'd tell you about it, though. It's a pretty serious story to tell a young lady. That doesn't mean some student asking for a teacher is my long-lost son."

"So you don't see any connection?" she asked sternly. "A guy comes in saying he's your son and he looks just like your best friend? You suddenly realize you've spent years wishing you could know this son, and supporting him, and he never
was
your son? Did you tell Jesse it was all a big mistake too? I saw a picture of you and your girlfriend at a party; Dad was right, she sure was a pretty girl."

Bill dropped his head into his hand, a look of pain on his face. He began speaking in a quiet voice but quickly, almost running the words together. Now that he could finally tell the story he needed to get it out.

"Connie and I met the first week we were at school. We were perfect for each other, we liked the same things and had the same dreams. She
was
pretty, but it was her mind that I really loved about her. We were so happy together. At the end of our first year of college Connie went back to her parents' home out of state for the summer, saying she didn't want to leave and couldn't wait to see me again in the fall. Her folks were kind of strict, they didn't want us to move in together, and neither of us had much money so we really couldn't afford to anyway."

Gracie nodded, but was afraid to say anything to interrupt him.

"She sent me a letter saying she was pregnant. Her folks wanted me to sign support papers, and I did. I wanted to, it was the right thing to do. Connie didn't come back to school. She wrote another letter, told me she'd had a boy and named him Jesse. I didn't have the money to go see them, especially with having to pay support. Your father helped me get a part-time job so I could send her the money. I got a few more letters and a couple of pictures, but after a couple of years they tapered off and eventually stopped coming altogether."

"After I graduated and got a job I wanted to go see them both. I wrote to Connie, and even called her parents' number, but never got an answer. Not from her, anyway. I did get a letter from a law firm directing me to send all future support payments to them and requesting that I cease trying to make contact. I assumed that Connie had married someone else and wanted to get on with her life, put this all behind her."

"That must've
really
hurt," Gracie said.

"Yes, it did," Bill replied. "But at the same time I could understand. I'd have liked to get to know my son, even if Connie didn't want me anymore. I blamed her parents for poisoning her against me because of the pregnancy, like it was all my fault. But time went on and I found someone else and had a family of my own. Except that teaching and research isn't exactly lucrative, and my prior obligation took money away from our kids. That was just one of several problems between us."

"Don't get the idea that life was terrible for me. I get to see the kids, though not as often as I'd like. I love my job, and the research is rewarding, even if I haven't made any big breakthroughs yet. I wasn't unhappy at all. But then one Friday a young man walks into my office saying he's my son Jesse - and he's the spitting image of Charles."

Bill finally looked up at Gracie, his eyes pleading with her to understand. "He told me his mother had never married because she still loved me. She'd needed her parents' help with a baby to raise and they didn't want her to have anything to do with me. She'd written a lot of letters, but never once got one from me. After awhile she stopped writing, thinking I didn't care."

"Jesse said his mother had been killed in a car crash, last year. She'd never even told him my name, but he found out from the lawyer. He wanted to meet me, he said he didn't expect us to be family after all this time, but maybe friends."

"Bill, I am
so
sorry," Gracie said. "But I don't understand. You wrote to Connie, you just said you did."

"Here's what must've happened," Bill said. "Connie's folks must've thrown away all my letters, and most of hers to me as well; easy to do if she just put them on the mailbox for the postman to take. They thought they were doing her a favor. I guess she took a walk and mailed the few I got without them knowing."

"As Jesse grew up she saw the resemblance to Charles.
He
told me he'd wanted her from the first time I introduced them; he'd taken her home after a party; she was tipsy, he made advances but she told him 'no'. He kept it up and eventually got what he'd wanted. She never told me about it, Gracie. I think she was embarrassed. When she realized Jesse was
Charles'
child she didn't want me to know the truth, didn't want to hurt me. She didn't want me to think she'd cheated on me. She hadn't, not really. So she stopped writing and refused to tell Jesse anything about his father – either the legal one, or the blood one."

"You told my Dad about it at the party," Gracie said. "He admitted sleeping with her, and then what?"

"He
bragged
about it," Bill said. "He seemed to think it was funny that I'd had to pay in so many ways for something I never did. He didn't
care
. In fact, he acted like he'd gotten away with murder or something."

"Just what did you expect him to do about it?" she asked. "Even if he said he was sorry it wouldn't change anything."

"I told him the very least he could do was to pay me back for all the child support," Bill told her. "I knew it wouldn't make things right, but he had so much money and I'd struggled for years because of it. I was
angry
, I wanted something to be made right. At least I could've sent my kids to college. But he just laughed at me."

"So you decided to shoot him."

CHAPTER 25

"Gracie, I was hurt and angry, you bet," Bill said. "I walked out of his house and vowed never to speak to him again. I was going to tell Jesse the whole story, too. Jesse was in town for some training classes for his job; he was leaving Tuesday evening. But I spent the afternoon here in the lab and by the time I looked at the clock he'd already checked out of the hotel and I didn't have his cell number. I couldn't have shot your dad, Gracie – I was
here
all afternoon."

"Jesse came by to see you," Gracie said. "He'd come by to see you before he went home, and you didn't answer his knock. You didn't answer mine, either. You weren't in the lab."

"I told you, I'd gone to the men's room," he explained. "You must've come along just after he left, if you saw him. It took me a few minutes to clean up my shirt, I obviously missed you both. Lots of people would've seen me if I'd left the lab and come back again. I know the police checked, and no one did."

"Not if you used the back door," Gracie told him. "I checked it yesterday, the alarm's been disabled. You could've slipped out and driven to Bixby's estate, shot my father, and slipped back in again. The parking lot out there," she pointed to the back wall, "is for the Business Building. Anyone that saw you probably wouldn't recognize you, and Lieutenant Freeman believed your story about being locked in here so he didn't look for witnesses very hard."

"Gracie," Bill was trying to sound reasonable. "Your dad was shot with his
own
gun. A gun that that nutcase colleague left on the front seat of his car after he'd tried to blow it up. I was talking to Rita when that happened, just before I came in here. I couldn't
possibly
have gotten hold of that gun. Someone else took it and followed him out to the country and killed him with it."

"You want me to tell you how you did it?" she asked.

"Sure, go ahead," he said. "Last I heard the police hadn't found the gun – or any other clues. You can make up any story you want, but that doesn't mean it's true. It doesn't mean I shot him."

Gracie stood up and began slowly walking around the lab. She was nervous and couldn't sit still. Bill was right, she had no hard evidence, and she didn't know how he might react to what she was about to say.

"You'd made up your mind you'd kill him for what he'd done. You'd heard his speech about the presentation to Mr. Bixby, and you knew the mansion was out in the boonies. It wasn't likely anybody would be out there to see you. You knew the area, too, it's out by the lake where you used to take us camping. I suspect you drove out there on Sunday to reconnoiter, just to get all your ducks in a row. Making two trips out there was why your gas tank was empty, and you couldn't afford to fill up after your purchases."

"What purchases?" he asked, a little harshly. "I'd run out of money before month, I was broke and couldn't afford gas. Had to ride my bike to work."

"I'll get to that in a minute," she said. "This worked out perfectly for you because Tuesdays were your regular days in the lab. Everyone knew that, so they'd feel sure you were really in here because that's where you went every Tuesday. I'd come by the week before so you probably didn't expect me, either. You went to Wal-Mart and bought a black-and-gray plaid shirt and a pair of black slacks."

"You're getting confused!" Bill said. "I bought those clothes a week before the murder. I wore them to the party on Saturday, remember? That was part of why I was low on cash."

"I remember, Bill. I remember telling you I could tell they were new because they weren't faded. Which means you could buy a duplicate set and no one could tell the difference. You would've paid cash so there'd be no credit-card charge for the police to check. You're thorough, you probably pulled the price-tags off and dropped them in the trashcan outside the store. If the police looked they wouldn't find tags in your trash for clothes you'd bought a week ago. After my comment you ran the new clothes through the washer a couple of times just in case."

"Why would I need duplicate clothes?"

"In case you got blood on them, or hairs or fibers or even gunpowder. If the police should suspect you and decided to check your clothes the new ones couldn't
possibly
have any incriminating evidence on them. And no one would notice that you'd changed clothes during the day. You got everything together Monday evening and put it in your car. Oh, you put your gun in the car, too."

"My gun hasn't been fired in months, the police
did
check it out," he said.

"You didn't use your gun," she replied, calmer now that she was laying it all out. "Tuesday after lunch you stopped by to say 'hi' to Rita, so she'd remember seeing you go into the lab. You set up your experiment, then went out the back door and drove to the Bixby mansion; you parked the car on a side road nearby and rode your bicycle to the gates. You stashed it in the fir trees by the gate and waited for Dad to come out."

"If I knew where he was going to be at 2:00 why didn't I get there first and shoot him before he went in?" Bill asked.

"Two reasons, either of which would explain it," Gracie told him. First, you weren't sure you'd have time to lock yourself up in here and still get there by 2:00. It's a long drive. Second, you knew Bixby was expecting him at 2:00 and might be watching for his arrival. That meant there'd be a bigger chance they'd see you riding away on the bike after you shot him."

"Yeah, I know the cops found bike tracks at the scene," he said in a reasonable tone. "They could be anybody's. Just because I've got a bicycle doesn't mean I was out there."

"That night, when everyone was at Dad's house to talk to the lieutenant, I wanted to get away from all the people for a few minutes. I was walking around the driveway and saw a little evergreen branch stuck under the tag bracket on your bike. I remember thinking how neat you always are and that you'd have pulled it out if you'd seen it. Guess you didn't see it."

"I ride that bike all over," he told her, a little angry now. "Big deal. So I had a few leaves in the bracket, that doesn't mean they came from Bixby's place."

"The trees around your house
and
the college are elms, maples, oaks. They're
deciduous
. There are fir trees near the lake, but not many in town," she told him. "You don't get branches caught in the back of the bike by riding it down the road, but it could happen if you pushed the bicycle into a thick stand of trees to hide it. So you waited until you saw the automatic gates open and Dad's car come out."

"But it wasn't your dad's car," he said. "You're forgetting the details. He'd borrowed a car, remember?"

"Yes, but they looked pretty much alike," Gracie said. "You were expecting his car and you could see the driver before you jumped out of the bushes. You came out and got his attention, maybe pointed your gun at him, maybe just waved your arms, it doesn't matter. He got out of the car and you continued the argument. I'm assuming he didn't give in and at some point you pulled your gun and threatened to shoot him."

"Why didn't I just shoot him and be done with it?" Bill asked. He sounded sarcastic, as if her ideas were stupid.

Gracie knew – or hoped, at least – that it meant she was on the right track. "Because you really wanted him to admit what he'd done and apologize for all the grief it'd caused you. If he refused, you wanted him to
know
why you were shooting him."

"OK, so I've got my gun pointed at him – how did I manage to shoot him with his own gun?" Bill was trying to punch logical holes in her theory.

"Dad had his gun with him. Maybe he'd stuck it in his jacket pocket when he saw you; he knew you were mad at him, flagging him down out in the country like that had to look suspicious. Maybe he even had it in his hand when he got out of the car."

"So either he would've shot me first, or it would've been a Mexican standoff.
How'd I get his gun away from him
?" Bill asked harshly.

"Something happened to distract him for a second," Gracie answered. "You had your bike helmet with you, you hit him with it so he'd drop the gun. The coroner said there was a faint straight bruise on the inside of his right forearm. I suppose it could've been a stick, but I don't know why you'd have a stick when you had a gun; the helmet makes more sense. At any rate you got his gun and shot him with it. That worked out better for you because now you could let the police examine yours knowing it hadn't been fired recently."

"And I suppose I rode the bicycle back to the car and drove back here, tossing the gun along the way somewhere," he said. "You've put together a lot of little things that aren't connected and come up with this crazy idea. New clothes, bicycle tracks, action-movie heroics. You've got an over-active imagination."

"But you didn't drive straight back to the school," Gracie said, completely ignoring the rest of his statement.

"What else would I do?" Bill asked. "If I'd just committed a murder wouldn't I want to get back as soon as possible so I could pretend I'd never left?"

"I think you went to the campground first, Bill," she said. "It was close by and you were familiar with it. You knew there wouldn't be many people out there on a Tuesday afternoon. You could use the public shower and change into your clean clothes, then burn the ones you'd worn. Throw the ashes with any metal or melted plastic into the lake so it wouldn't be obvious that clothing had been burned.
Then
you could head back to town."

Bill was shaking his head like he didn't believe it. "Why not throw the gun in the lake too?"

"You could've, but I don't think you did. I suppose you didn't want to take the chance that someone saw you burning something and then leaving – that might look suspicious. The police might've sent divers into the lake looking for the gun."

"But I'd have wiped my fingerprints off the gun," he said. "And according to your story it was Charles' anyway, it couldn't be traced back to me. So what did I do with it?"

"You used a cordless drill to get rid of the serial number and threw it in the trash at a drive-in," Gracie replied steadily. "When I borrowed your car I saw the drill in the back floor, and found a French fry under the seat. You keep your car clean, you wouldn't leave a greasy fry in the floorboard. Besides, you told me you'd have to take your lunch after buying the clothes so you wouldn't have stopped by a drive-in anytime lately. There was no bit in the drill, I guess you threw it out the window somewhere just in case it had metal shavings in it or something. Then you drove back here and slipped in through the back door. Rita remembered you leaving, you didn't stay late because you wanted her to remember."

"That's the craziest story I've ever heard!" Bill said. "I suppose you kept the French fry so the police can find my DNA on it. It doesn't prove a thing! It's almost like you've gone out of your way to concoct a story that
can't
be proven."

"No, but you did a great job of covering your tracks. You're right, I don't have a shred of proof – no blood-spattered clothes, no French fry, no gun. I
know
you did it, Bill. I can't go to the police with a story like this, they'd laugh at me; but I need to know what really happened to my father. Be a bigger man than he was, and tell me I'm right."

Bill looked shaken at that. She'd deliberately pointed out that he was acting the same way her dad had when Bill had wanted justice. Gracie held her breath, hoping he wouldn't decide to throw some dangerous chemical on her and claim it'd been a horrible accident.

Bill sighed heavily. "You're right, Gracie. I did it, I killed Charles. I can't believe you figured it all out; like you said, I thought I was being careful. You got a few details wrong, but the bulk of it is correct."

Gracie let out the breath she'd held. She knew she'd have to be careful, she wasn't out of the woods – or the lab – yet. "What kind of details? I knew I couldn't think of everything, I'd like to know how close I got it. Just for my own knowledge, since it can't be proved."

"I planned the whole thing out, but I had a little luck. The fact that I knew when he'd be in an out-of-the-way place
and
at a time when no one would miss me, and the clothes that could be seamlessly replaced. Monday afternoon I happened to find a big baggie in the trash bin in here. The kids aren't supposed to eat in the lab, it's not safe, but it looked like someone had. It was big enough to hold the gun, and it would have someone else's fingerprints on it if it
was
found. I picked it up with a paper towel, I tried to think of every eventuality."