Chapter 14

“I’m a busy guy, gentlemen. I don’t have a lot of time to waste today. Please, ask your questions so we can get this over with,” Billy said. He seemed completely annoyed by the fact that we wanted to talk to him. He came into the station like a cyclone. His arms were flapping around like a bird trying to take flight, and he was boisterous when he asked to talk to Jones. We got him moved into room one rather quickly before he changed his mind.

My initial assessment of Billy was unfavorable. He was an arrogant little asshole. He was five-foot-eight on a good day, and his shoe size looked to be no more than a child’s size six. If he hadn’t immediately just rubbed me the wrong way with his smart-assed comment when he walked through the doors of the station, I could have told him to leave and not wasted my time. But fuck him and his shitty attitude. I was going to see this interview through and hopefully piss him off for being such a jerk.

“You know why you’re here, right?” Jones asked. He must have seen the steam rising from my collar and jumped in to get us started.

“No. As a matter of fact, I don’t. Please, Officer, tell me. Why am I here?”

Fucking jerk. “We’re detectives.” Clark rolled his eyes, shook his head, and shrugged his shoulders at my correction. “We’re investigating the murder of Professor Chase Effridge. Did you know him?” I blurted out before Jones could reply.

“Yeah, I know him. I didn’t kill him, but I’m not sorry he’s dead, either. Why are you talking to me?”

“Your name came up in our conversation with your girlfriend,” I said.

“And?” His smugness was relentless, and unsettling. I guess I could see his aggravation since he was claiming his innocence, but I had yet to meet someone who was guilty just flat-out admit they did something.

“She mentioned you had a pretty quick temper and that you were suspicious of her relationship with Effridge,” Jones said, calmly.

“Look. Get this shit straight. McKenzie didn’t have a relationship with that fucking douche. She had a relationship with me. Only me.” Billy’s face was beet-red. He was livid. He clenched and unclenched his fists repeatedly. This guy had a very short fuse.

“I hate to say this, but she admitted to us that she went out with him twice. She said you knew about both times. Sounds like there was something there to me. It may have just been a fleeting attraction,” I said. I wanted to see if I could get him to react in a way to make me believe he could possibly be involved.

“I know what you’re trying to do.” He waggled his finger in front of my face. “That low- life worthless Chase was the boss’ plaything. He liked to fuck around on Carlotta, and she let him get away with it. But I can guarantee you he got nowhere with my girl.” He huffed out a breath along with his sigh. “I’m fucking done talking to you. I didn’t kill him. I’m not happy or sad he’s dead, either.” He turned his back to us to walk right back out the door.

“We aren’t done, Billy. I still have a few more questions for you,” I said.

He spun on his heels and screamed, “What, man?” He shook his head. “I already told you I didn’t kill him. What more can you possibly want to know?”

“Since you work around him, can you think of anyone who might’ve had a problem with him enough to want to kill him?”

“Probably everyone who wasn’t female. Now that I think of it, they probably did want to kill him, too. He wasn’t the most liked guy around. And that ‘coming on to women in front of us’ really set a few of us off.”

He had my full attention. “Who are the ‘us’ you’re referring to?”

“Let’s just say, the guy was a tool. He treated Carlotta like dirt. You can start with her, I’m sure. Her son hated him. And I guarantee you he wasn’t on anyone’s list of favorites. Not even Larissa,” Billy said.

“Why would you say that about Larissa? She was his mistress and they had a child together,” Jones said.

“That guy wasn’t faithful to her. Yeah, they had a kid, but he was always looking for the next girl to be a notch in his belt.”

“Like he was doing with McKenzie,” I said.

“He might have tried, but I know he wouldn’t have succeeded. McKenzie loves me. And unlike all these other women who threw themselves at that male whore, she didn’t.” He inhaled and tossed his head back, his long red hair flying back over his shoulders and down his back. He was confident Ms. Sims wouldn’t have given Effridge the time of day, but she did go out with him.

“I have another question for you,” I said. “A red hair was found in Effridge’s bed.”

“What are you trying to say? Are you trying to imply that he and McKenzie …” The color disappeared from Billy’s pale face. He became as white as a sheet of paper in two seconds flat.

“No. That’s not what we’re saying at all. But we did get a DNA match on the hair. It actually matched you.” Jones had taken over the conversation, and I was relieved. He was definitely having a better impact with Clark.

“How the hell did my hair get in his bed?”

“We were hoping you could help shed some light on that for us,” Jones said. “Were you ever in the apartment? Maybe you’d been in contact with Effridge and the hair got on him, then transferred to his bed.”

“I’ve never been in that apartment, and the only conversations I had with that clown were over the phone when I warned him to stay away from McKenzie.” He rubbed his hand over his chin. It was at that time I noticed the long scraggly beard he had in the photos on file had been shaved off. I looked down at his feet.

“What size shoe do you wear, Mr. Clark,” I asked.

“Size nine. Why?” He was very defensive.

“Just curious. What brand of sneaker is that you’re wearing?” I suspected it wasn’t a New Balance shoe. There was no NB on it anywhere.

“Prada.”

“Do you own any New Balance sneakers?” I asked.

“Are you joking? Fuck no,” Billy spat. “Do you have any more silly questions?”

I was biting my tongue so as not to respond as indignantly as he had to me. “No. I don’t have any more questions. Jones, do you?”

“No, I don’t. We may reach out to you if we think of anything else, but right now, I think you’ve provided some valuable information. Thank you.”

“Yeah, sure.” Billy turned to walk away, but stopped just shy of the door and turned back to face us. “Hey, before I go, I have another mystery for you to solve. I got a manila envelope delivered to my house with pictures of McKenzie and Effridge. Maybe you guys can figure out where it came from.”

“Do you still have it?” I asked.

“Against my better judgement, I do. At first I thought that low-life Effridge had someone follow him and take them. Nothing would surprise me with him. He had no damn respect for anyone, not even his own damn wife. And she always defended the piece of shit. I don’t get it.”

“We’d love to see the pictures and the envelope, if you don’t mind,” Jones said.

“Yeah. Whatever. I’ll bring it all by later.” Billy abruptly left the station.