LITMIR.BIZ

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Sounds like a stretch to me. How about he, Rourke, killed Kiera, and Frank knew it. Rourke thought Frank was going to report him, so he had to silence him.”

      Dion shook his head. “Everything we said up there pointed to a mercy kill. Or that’s the way it looked to me at the time. I figured the only thing that might stop him was my promise that I’d keep Frank out of jail. For personal reasons. So I ad libbed.”

      “You think he would have actually shot him?”

      “No, I don’t,” Dion said glumly. “I should have just sat at the crossroads and waited, and they’d have probably wrapped up their drinking party and come down and met us. But I did what I did, and what happened happened. I don’t expect any medals. I’m just glad nobody got killed, because then I’d really be up to my neck in it, wouldn’t I?”

      Leith agreed. He said, “There’s a lot more we have to talk about yet. You and Scott Rourke, and his girlfriend, Doyle. I don’t know you’ve broken any rules, fraternizing with witnesses, but you’ve sure bent common sense out of shape. Pretty soon you’re going to have to tell me all about it.”

      “Sure,” Dion said. He felt unburdened, empty but free. It was all coming together, reaching a conclusion. Things were wrapping up, and he could walk away with few regrets. He thought about his watch, running slow, the source of all this mess. The watch lay on an icy riverbed now and would rust there till eternity. Looch was dead, which had its advantages, and Cloverdale was worlds away. Everything seemed good. He could breathe.

      “But for now,” Leith said, having ended the interview, turned off the tape recorder, and signed off on his notes, “We’re going to have another chat with Chad Oman. I want you to sit in and pay attention, and maybe you’ll catch it again, whatever you thought he was lying about the first time, for what it’s worth. And just one more thing. You called Spacey last night, and we know the time of your call from the records. I just can’t figure out how it took her an hour to get things moving. She says your message was garbled or unclear, and she had a helluva time trying to locate Evangeline and find out what was really going on. Any comment?”

      “It wasn’t complicated. I was clear as I could be. She doesn’t like me, and she lets it get in the way. When can I get off this case and go back to Smithers? You must have it figured out by now, I’m not much help here.”

      Leith nodded. “I’ll see if I can get you back on the road tomorrow. You might have to return to give further statements, but maybe we can get ’em over the phone. Now, go grab a bite, and I’ll get Thackray to bring Oman in. Report back here at eleven twenty. Okay?”

      He gathered his things and left the room. Dion remained for a few minutes, trying to program his watch to beep at eleven, giving himself a good margin of error, but couldn’t get the sequence right. Too many buttons, too little brains. So he wrote it in ballpoint on his palm, “Oman 11:20.” If that failed, he thought, he’d throw himself in the river too.

      * * *

      The band’s drummer seemed to have lost weight since his first interview, and a good deal of vim, too. But hey, Leith thought, reality’s finally set in. Kiera’s gone, and she’s not coming back. Before her disappearance, these kids were just embarking on an endless party, fun, fame, and good times. Now it was the brink of humdrum for Oman. A slow climb to department manager at the local Home Hardware. Two-inch nails and miscellaneous fasteners. Even without Kiera they could have carried on, led by Frank. Mercy Blackwood seemed to think it was possible, maybe even better, to carry on without Kiera. But now Frank was possibly going away too, and that left, what? Not much. Oman was just a drummer, and no matter how good he was, he would never be the next Ginger Baker.

      Quite a shock to the system to lose all that in the space of two weeks.

      Yet the guy seemed somehow okay with his lot when they first sat down, exchanging the small talk. Maybe he was a flat-bottomed boat, a survivor. Doggedly upbeat, with that off-centre smile on his round, healthy, brown face.

      Dion sat in, as agreed. He looked physically unfit, still suffering from the stitches and the drugs, but he was doing his best to listen. Oman stuck faithfully to his story the first time around, and Leith could find no cracks to get a fingerhold in, to flip him upside down and get to his vulnerable side, so he did what he had to do, as rotten as it felt, and got mean. He eased into meanness with, “I hate to say it, Chad, but I’m finding it hard to believe what you’re telling me here.”

      Oman looked stunned, and being a bit of a ham, he overdid it, eyes agog, mouth dropped open. “About what?”

      “About Kiera leaving the house without her coat on, for one. It was a bitch of a cold day, as I remember it. Snow was bombing down. Temperatures well below zero, right?”

      Oman’s eyes roved the room and settled back on Leith with some indignation. “She was wearing a pretty good sweater. I figured she was going to jump in her Rodeo, go to town, get something, come back. We’re all of us born and raised in the snow, hey? So that’s what I figured, she was just hopping out for something.”

      “So you clearly remember her leaving without a coat?”

      “Yeah, I do. She turned around, put her hands in her front pockets, her jeans, like this, said see you later, or back soon, or something like that, and she stepped out backward, kind of, and shut the door. I can see it like it’s happening right now.”

      “But when she arrived that day she came in wearing a coat, right?”

      “I don’t know. I got a pretty good photogenic memory, but to a point, eh.”

      Leith didn’t break the flow to correct the kid’s vocabulary and went on ramping up the tension. “It was a rough day. Everyone was upset, including Frank. Kiera didn’t leave on her own, did she? Frank went with her.”

      “Yes, sir, she left on her own.”

      “You sure of that?”

      “Yes, sir.”

      And there’s the tell, Leith thought. The yes sir, yes sir, three bags full, sir. His own bad cop routine was a well-worn thing, simple and not very imaginative, but effective, especially with the young and the inexperienced. It was the arctic blast stare-down. He stared Oman down with icicles and said, “You know where this is going to lead, Chad? You don’t tell me the truth, it’s not going to be good.”

      “Yeah, how so?” Oman snapped back, maybe more aware of his rights than Leith gave him credit for, maybe knowing where threats and inducements would lead, eventually. Nowhere.

      Leith crossed his arms but toned down the bullying. “How so in that you’ll be charged with obstruction, is how. It’s not the kind of thing you can wiggle out of, you sitting here telling me she left alone, then later it comes out she didn’t. You’re going to turn on your heels then? How?”

      “It’s what I saw,” Oman stated.

      “You actually watched her walk out the door alone?” Leith asked, and held up a warning hand. “Here’s where you better be damned sure you’re telling the truth, because here’s where there’s no going back. Understand?”

      Oman hesitated. He said, “Yeah, she walked out the door alone, cross my heart and hope to die.”

      “Where was Frank when she walked out the door alone? You might want to cross your heart again, now.”

      Oman was silent. Leith watched him, still as a rock, like he would sit here still as a rock all day and all night, if that’s what it took.

      Oman said, “I think he …”

      “He what, Chad?”

      “I think he might have stepped out too, a minute or two before her. For a smoke, maybe. But I’m not a hundred percent on that.”

      “Right,” Leith said. He was buzzing within now but speaking calmly, as if he was merely hammering down the details of facts he already had. “And Stella Marshall, where was she when Kiera walked

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