CHAPTER 33
Dylan
Zoe, much to my dismay, straightened out her mussed hair and pulled her clothes back on. A shame. She looked pretty fucking good without them.
“You ready?” I asked.
“Oh yeah,” she affirmed.
“Then let’s do this.”
I held the door open so that Zoe could walk out of the office and I followed close behind her. Anticipation fluttered in my chest, as it always did when I was on the edge of a big discovery. Once you’d been in the force for long enough, you developed a second instinct for catching criminals. Maybe it was something in peoples’ micro-expressions. Maybe it was a power too big for my understanding. Either way, I was grateful that I could scent promising blood in the water.
We walked the couple of feet out of the office and into the main dining area. Samuel and Donovan were still hard at work, and Kelly was still messing around on her phone behind the counter.
Zoe called to the boys, “You can leave for the day, we’re closing up shop. Kelly, can we have a word with you.”
Samuel replied, “Are you sure?”
“Yeah, totally. Thanks so much for all our help, I can’t tell you how sincerely I appreciate it.”
They nodded and wiped their hands off on their aprons before hanging them up in the back, coming to the front to grab their coats. Samuel and Donovan said their goodbyes and walked into the brisk morning air.
“The fuck was that about?” Kelly whined. “Why do they get to go home?”
I could see anger steaming in Zoe’s eyes as she shot back, “Yeah, and you’re somehow getting paid to text. Funny how that works, isn’t it?”
“Hey Kelly,” I interjected politely, hoping to steer the conversation somewhere more productive. “Could we please talk to you?”
“You’re already talked to me,” she said.
“Yes, I know that,” I said with some difficulty. No wonder this girl drove Zoe nuts. “But I have just a few more questions to ask you.”
I saw the teenager’s eyes flicker with doubt, and I knew my instinct from earlier had been spot on. Kelly was gonna crack like a nut.
“Fine,” she grumbled at last. “I guess you can talk to me. But I have stuff to do.”
Zoe guffawed, and muttered, “Since when do you do anything? There are no customers in here.” Her eyes seemed to burn like lasers through Kelly.
But I was an officer of the law and I couldn’t let this get out of hand. I knew Zoe’s hackles were raised — she was a mama bear protecting the bakery, her cub — but Kelly would clam up if we didn’t ease into it.
“Okay,” I inserted hastily, before things got out of hand. “Kelly, pull up a chair and we’ll chat.” I indicated a nearby round table, and Zoe and I sat down expectantly.
Kelly groaned in the way that only a teenager can groan, and came around the counter, her dirty, dilapidated sneakers clopping across the tile floor. Do these even meet the health code? I wondered.
She grabbed a chair from around its circumference, and slowly dragged it across the floor to where Zoe and I sat.
Kelly plopped the chair alongside us and leaned back, crossing her arms over her chest and bringing an ankle across her knee. She was the picture of repose and ‘no shits given.’ I noted that she seemed to have carefully constructed the expression she wore now, as though it were painted on by a drag queen. Something about it was too extreme, too literal.
“So, Kelly,” I started. “Why don’t you tell me what you think happened that night?”
She muttered, “I dunno, some fucking dude broke in and jacked the stuff.”
“Please be more specific.”
“Like what?”
Zoe interrupted, “Try giving us a singular detail about what you were doing that night, let’s start from there.”
Kelly flipped her hair and replied, “I don’t remember.”
Yeah, that was pretty much what she had said to me before, and what I had come to expect from her. Silence and sassiness.
“It was less than a week ago,” Zoe argued. “Unless you were stoned off your ass the whole day, you must remember something. Were you high?”
Kelly looked askance, shook her head and mumbled something.
“What was that?”
“I don’t do drugs,” Kelly said louder.
I was ready to let that line of questioning go — even though I was a cop, I didn’t approve of the ‘scared straight’ programs — but Zoe hopped in with, “Are you sure?”
“Yeah.” Kelly’s foot jumped up and down on her knee, and her lip trembled. Oddly enough, though, I didn’t think she was lying about the drugs.
While I loved watching Zoe play bad cop and was getting some role play ideas for some later date, I had to streamline the interview. Or, more aptly, the interrogation.
“Okay,” I said. “I believe that you don’t do drugs. We’re on the same page. But if that’s the case, why don’t you remember what happened the day of the robbery? Was something else going on at that time we should know about?”
“No.” Her lips tried to close tightly, but the quivering bottom lip betrayed her.
“No what?”
“No, nothing else was going on.”
I sat back, frustrated. Silent suspects were the worst, you couldn’t get anything on someone who refused to even open their mouth.
Zoe picked up where I left off, asking, “Kelly, why are you lying to us?”
The young girl shivered and crossed her arms tighter. “I’m not.”
Zoe pressed. “Yes, you are. I know you are. You better quit it, and stat, or there will be consequences. Like jail time.”
Oh boy. I jumped in to prevent any more overreaches by Zoe, telling the teenager, “If you tell us what you know, no matter what that may be, it’ll go easier for you down the line. Even if you were somehow involved, provided you cooperate, I swear I will do my utmost to protect you.”
I saw out of the corner of my eye that Zoe was about to jump in, but I held up a finger, calling for her to remain silent.
Kelly faltered, and asked quietly, “Really?”
“Really,” I assured her. “You’re safe with me.”
Zoe softened, and added, “He’s not kidding. Officer Robertson is a man of his word.”
Kelly’s eyes fell to her lap, and her arms began to uncross, until they floated limply down to her sides. She appeared to consider the offer for a few more seconds, and at last said, “Okay, I know who did it.”
I heard Zoe’s rapid intake of breath and I had to put a hand on her knee to keep her from lunging across the table and shaking the truth out of Kelly.
“All right, Kelly,” I said in the paternal tone I used to get Danny in the bath. “Who did it?”
She whispered, “Zach.”
“Your boyfriend?!” Zoe questioned incredulously.
Kelly nodded miserably. “Yes.”
Zoe cried, “Jesus fucking—”
“Shh, Zoe,” I interrupted, staving off a tirade. “That’s okay, let her tell the story.”
Zoe pushed back from the table, stood up, and began pacing, letting off the steam of the discovery. “Fine,” she replied. “Go ahead, Kelly.”
The girl hesitated, and began, “I didn’t want him to steal anything.”
I could almost hear Zoe roll her eyes, so I quickly urged Kelly on, saying, “Yeah?”
“Yeah. He told me he was hard up for money, and that he needed it real bad or there would be big trouble. And he, like, y’know, hung around the shop a lot, and saw that there was okay business going on here, and that I had the cash register code and everything—”
“Of course,” Zoe muttered, putting it together. “I’d been letting you use my code when you forgot it.”
Kelly replied quietly, “Right. So, Zach said that we should rob the bakery, and we’d have the money, easy-peasy, and no one would get hurt because insurance would cover it.”
“And do you know what Zach wanted the money for?” I asked.
Kelly curled a strand of her hair around her finger and put it to her mouth, running her lips over her hair. “No.”
“Are you sure?”
“I have no idea what he wanted the money for.”
“Okay, I believe you,” I replied. And I did. This girl obviously wasn’t the smoothest liar, she’d cracked after only minutes of pressure. “Go on.”
“Zach said that I needed to help him, that he couldn’t do it without me. And like, he was right, he couldn’t have. I showed him which stuff was nicest and gave him the code. Even reset the alarm for him.” She reddened, presumably realizing she’d just admitted her own total guilt. “Will you still protect me in court, Officer?”
I was about to reply, when Zoe interrupted with, “Why did you do it? Why’d you help him steal from me? After I’ve given you a nice job and fair hours?”
Kelly shifted back and forth in the seat, while Zoe loomed over her like a hawk. It was a fair question, so I nodded at Kelly to answer it.
Forlornly, she replied, “He said he would break up with me if I didn’t do it.” Tears had begun to dazzle her eyes, and I couldn’t help but think how young she looked. Young, and in love with a no-good asshole.
“Will you protect me?” she repeated in my direction.
“Well,” I began, hedging a little, “I think we can get you a plea deal because you’re a minor and you’ve cooperated very well. I’d bet that if you agreed to testify against him, we could keep the consequences down to community service hours. Nothing on your record.”
“But if I testify against him,” she countered, “he won’t date me anymore.”
“Oh, honey,” Zoe sighed, the mother in her emerging as the bad cop act fell away. “He’s a piece of shit. You can do better than him.”
“No, I can’t!” Kelly cried.
“Yes,” Zoe contradicted. “You absolutely can. You’re just a kid right now, and you think that your first love is your only love, but it’s not true. There will be so many other men, so many better men, in your future.” She broke off and looked at me. “Men as good as Officer Robertson.”
Kelly surreptitiously wiped some of the tears off her bottom lashes. “But now I don’t have a job anymore.”
“Who said that?” Zoe inquired.
“My boyfriend robbed your bakery. You love this place. There’s no way you’d keep employing me. Like, I understand. I wouldn’t hire me either.”
Zoe exhaled, and quit her pacing, sitting back down in the chair. She leaned over the table and looked Kelly in the eyes. “Do you promise to work hard?”
Kelly’s face darted up quickly, and she said, “Yeah.”
“And to come to work on time?”
“Definitely.”
“And to not help any other boyfriends rob me of my life savings?”
Kelly’s face was ashen and she nodded vehemently. “Yes, yes of course.”
“All right,” Zoe said, reclining against the seat. “You can keep your job.”
Kelly burst into a squeal of delight, a sound I never thought I’d hear from such a teenager.
“On one condition,” Zoe continued.
Kelly’s face scrunched up with nerves. “What?”
“You gotta do what Officer Robertson said — you have to help us take Zach down.”