“Incarcerating?” says Steph. She is on the verge of tears.
“Just be quiet,” says Wags. “The cops are putting on theirshow. Let ’em do their little song and dance. And Thomas, listen to your lawyer. She’s the best chance you got.”
“All good advice,” says Zoey. “We’re just giving you an opportunity, Thomas, to make this as easy on yourself as possible. Murder is the most serious charge of all. And combined with your extortion plot to relieve Judd Hawkins of forty-five thousand dollars, you’re in some serious shit. You’re likely to be tried as an adult. And the DA and judges go a lot easier on suspects who cooperate. You help us, you could be out of jail by the time you’re thirty.”
“Thirty?!” says Steph. “My son didn’t do anything!”
“Steph,” says Clay. “Please let Chief Jensen speak. And let Caroline do her job.”
“I’m his mother, Clay!” Steph’s voice echoes in the cinderblock basement. “His mother. My job is to protect my son!”
“Mom,” says Thomas. “You’re not helping.” He turns to Zoey and says, “I admit we lied about Teddy not being there when we found his stuff. And you know we tried to pretend that we kidnapped him. But we didn’t kill Teddy. We found him already dead. I swear that’s the truth. We had nothing to do with however he died. Nothing.”
“You’re sticking to that…” says Zoey.
“Yes! Because it’s the truth.”
“I believe my client is making himself quite clear,” says Caroline Roth. “Which he’s doing in the spirit of cooperation. If you want to browbeat a confession out of someone, I suggest trying elsewhere. But if you insist on taking the same tack, it would help if you provided evidence.”
Zoey says, “We have eyewitness testimony—”
“Bullshit,” says Wags. “You got nothing.”
“Wait,” says Thomas. “What eyewitness? Because whoever it is, is lying.”
“All right,” says Zoey. “This is going nowhere. Just remember, I gave you a chance to cooperate.”
“Heiscooperating,” says Caroline. “He’s just not confessing to a crime he didn’t commit.”
“I got something to say,” says Judd, stepping forward off the chain-link fence. “Thomas, if you cooperate, I won’t press charges for assault and I won’t press charges for extortion. And Clay won’t press charges for you boys stealing his truck. That will leave just the murder charge, which could knock a few years off your sentence. My advice is to come clean now, and you’ll be one step closer to a clean start.”
“But…” Thomas begins to cry. “We didn’t kill him. I swear that’s the truth. We went to Miller’s Bluff to ride our bikes and we just found him there. Already dead. If he wasn’t dead, we would have called for help.” He wipes his eyes on his sleeve and adds, “Yeah, we were stupid. The kidnapping thing wasn’t my idea but I went along with it. So I admit it. I’m guilty. But not of killing Teddy. We didn’t do that. Why won’t you believe me?”
“Good question,” says Zoey. “And I’ll answer it. The reason we don’t believe you is that someone removed Teddy’s body from the place you claim you found him. It’s a nice story that you found him already dead—”
“It’s not nice—it’s true!” says Thomas.
“But without a body, we can only assume that you and your friends disposed of it to cover up what really happened. Because who else would have a motive to move Teddy’s body?”
“Youassumethe boys moved the body?” says Caroline. “Good luck with that in a court of law.”
The old wooden stairs creak as Officers Wahlquist and Kimmich descend into the basement. Zoey turns to them and says, “Do we have what we need?”
“Yes, ma’am,” says Wahlquist. “Both suspects have been interrogated and are detained upstairs.”
“Well, then that’s that,” says Zoey. She turns toward Thomas and says, “Thomas Becker, you’re under arrest for the murder of Teddy Hawkins. You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law. You have a right to an attorney. If you cannot afford—”
“He didn’t do it!” Steph is on her feet, red-faced and screaming. “Thomas had nothing to do with Teddy Hawkins’s death or removing the body.”
Clay says, “Steph—”
“Shut up, Clay! Shut up and listen! I know what I’m talking about because…” She points at Wags and says, “Get him out of here. Get him out of here and I’ll tell you everything.”
Braedon and Mei sit at Judd’s kitchen table, Braedon’s laptop open before him. “Do you think I should?” says Braedon.
“I do,” says Mei. “But maybe not right away. You’re going to talk to a therapist first, right?”
“Maybe,” says Braedon. “But I keep writing to my mom in my head. I can’t stop it. It’s all I can think about. Even at night. I wake up, and that’s what I think about. Writing a message to her. Telling her I know who she is and where she is. And that I wantto see her if she wants to see me. I can’t even be sad about Uncle Teddy because I’m thinking about it so much.”
