Faith frowned.Meadows was white as a sheet.She definitely didn’t want to leave him alone.“Bring it down here.”
“All right.”
A moment later, Jessica returned downstairs, carrying a stack of paper.Meadows was trembling like a leaf, lips working as he watched.
Faith stared coldly at him.“You want to tell me what I’m about to find?”
“It’s not illegal,” he whispered hoarsely.
Turk trotted downstairs and positioned himself between Meadows and the door, so Faith released him and looked at the papers Jessica carried.Her eyebrows raised.“Why Mr.Meadows.You’ve been a very busy boy.”
“It’s not illegal,” he insisted.“I’m just exercising my right as a concerned citizen.”
Faith flipped through the papers.Detailed recordings of what Meadows termed “violations” were recorded along with extensive photographic evidence of Iris Caldwell’s and Mark Peterson’s crimes.He had been following them for weeks, starting from the dates of his first complaints against them.
“I have a right to record what I observe in public places,” Meadows said.“It’s not illegal.”
He didn’t have a right to take pictures of people without their consent, but Faith wasn’t here to quibble over the small things.“You’ve been following our victims,” she said.“Including to the dog parks where they walked their animals and where they were both killed.”She lifted her eyes to him.“Care to explain that?”
“It’s not… I didn’t kill them.I was watching them, yes, because they needed to be stopped.Iris Caldwell’s dog barked all night long.She was a nuisance.Mark Patterson allowed his animal to walk off a leash where he could maul anyone to death at any time.It wasn’t safe.The police should have done something to stop them, but they didn’t, so I was taking it upon myself to gather evidence of their illegal activity so that the police would have ample reason to ensure that they complied with all applicable safety laws.”
He kept his eyes averted from Faith as he rambled.His lower lip pooched out like a child who had just been caught with his hand in the cookie jar.
“I’m going to give you one more chance to be honest, Mr.Meadows,” Faith said softly.“Do you have a gun?Maybe a .22-caliber pistol that fires ceramic bullets.”
“No, ma’am, I have no firearms on my property.As I said, I have the right as a God-fearing American to bear arms per the Second Amendment, but that is a right I choose not to exercise.”He frowned.“What’s a ceramic bullet?”
Faith and Jessica shared a look.“Call Meyers,” Faith said.“Have him send some people over to perform a more thorough search.Turk, find the gun.”
Turk barked firmly.He was very attuned to the scent of gunpowder, and it was next to impossible to clean a firearm well enough to remove all traces of that odor.
Faith handcuffed Meadows, who trembled like a leaf but didn’t resist.“At this time, Mr.Meadows, you are not under arrest, however for your safety and mine, I am placing you in handcuffs—”
“Oh, spare me,” Meadows spat.“You don’t have to go through the rigamarole.I get that you’re going to keep me tied up until you finish digging through all my stuff.Got it all organized and exactly where it should be, and now some assholes are going to tear it all up because some bitch and some asshole can’t keep their goddamned wild animals at home where they belong.”
He continued to mutter under his breath as Faith checked the living room carefully, looking under furniture and along the baseboards and floors for any sign of a hidden compartment.Jessica headed upstairs to look there, opening the back door first so Turk could look through the yard.Meadows didn’t react to any of it.The fight had gone out of him after Jessica found those notes.
When Faith’s search failed to turn up anything of interest, she sat on the easy chair across from Meadows and said, “I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt and say you had an innocent reason for fixating on these two, one of whom wasn’t even close to being your neighbor.You mind telling me why you spent so much of your time focusing on them?Of all the things youcouldhave been doing?”
Meadows lower lip trembled once.Then his eyes narrowed.His face hardened, and when he lifted his eyes to Faith, his voice was firm.“People think they can do whatever they want.They don’t care how their actions affect other people.They don’t care about being proper or sensible or following the rules put in place to make society safe and fair.They just do whatever they want.It’s not fair.It’s not right.They should be punished.Wipe that look off your face.Ididn’t punish them.I just wish someone would.”He looked past Faith at Turk, who was sniffing through his flower planters outside.“It’s just not fair.”
“Not worth killing them over either,” Faith pointed out.
Meadows didn’t reply.He just continued to stare at Faith, scowling deeply.Faith sighed and got to her feet.“If we find a weapon on this property, Mr.Meadows, we’ll be pursuing charges.I’m going to be honest.”She nodded at the papers on the coffee table.“That might be enough to get them with or without the weapon.”
Meadows chuckled bitterly.“Whatever.”
“Not to the family of the dead.”
A wisp of something that might have been humanity crossed Meadows’s eyes, but it was gone before it had a chance to alight.He was too wrapped up in his own sense of right and wrong to bother with a trivial matter like murder.
Faith pushed her emotions aside and waited for the police to arrive and finish the search.Either they would find something that would prove Meadows was involved, or they wouldn’t.
In the latter case, Faith would have to let Meadows continue to be an asshole just like he had to let Iris Caldwell’s dog bark and Mark Patterson’s dog walk without a leash.She wouldn’t have a problem with that.
But letting their killer roam free where he could harm someone else?She very much had a problem with that.
So, for that reason, she prayed,Please let us find something.Please let us find that gun.
