Page 50 of The 1 Lawyer

Sweeney sent a dismissive glance his way. “Get back out front, Officer.”

“Are we gonna make an arrest—”

Sweeney cut him off. “Go!”

After the young guy disappeared, Sweeney sidled up to me and said in an undertone, “The third body, the one on the floor. We didn’t have any trouble identifying him. Did he give any indication that he was planning something like this?”

Before the detective mentioned it, I hadn’t even been aware of the third corpse, splayed on the floor by Carrie Ann’s side of the bed. I stepped farther into the room, passing an officer taking photographs, to get a better look.

The third dead body was fully clothed in the suit he had worn to court yesterday. A semiautomatic pistol rested on the rug close to his right hand.

CHAPTER 38

I STEPPED over Benjamin Gates’s feet and stood beside Carrie Ann, seized by a protective impulse to pull the bedsheet over her naked body. When I reached out for the cotton sheet, Sweeney stepped up and grasped my elbow.

“Stafford Lee, you can’t be in here right now.”

A surge of anger blurred my vision. “It’s my wife. My house.”

His voice was stern when he said, “It’s a crime scene. Can’t let you contaminate it—you know that. We need to collect evidence. Come on out.”

Firmly holding my elbow, he steered me out of the room. I paused in the doorway and turned to take a final look at Carrie Ann’s face. I wished they’d let me close her eyes to erase the dazed expression she wore.

But I permitted the detective to escort me away; my feet moved automatically as he led me down the hall, through the kitchen, and out the back door.

Our patio furniture sat in the yard, and Sweeney ushered me to a lounge chair, the one Carrie Ann used to sunbathe in the summertime. I closed my eyes, trying to envision her soaking up the sun.

He took the seat next to mine and said, “Can we get you something? You thirsty, want a glass of water?”

I shook my head. I didn’t need anything that he could provide. The image of her face and those staring, unseeing eyes had been burned into my brain.

“I know you’ve had a shock. But I need you to help us out. One of the officers has a boy at Biloxi High, and he was thinking that it’s the coach in there with your wife.”

I wasn’t following him. I just repeated some of his words. “The coach.”

“That’s right, the football coach from the high school.”

His statement finally penetrated the fog. I sat up straight in the chair. “The football coach?”

“That’s what we’re checking out now.” He pulled out a pack of cigarettes, shook one out, and lit it. “Finding out that your wife’s fooling around can break people. I’ve seen it happen.”

Even in my befuddled state, I understood what he meant, and my guard went up. I’d practiced criminal law for years; I knew the statistics. Most murders aren’t random acts of violence committed by strangers. Eighty percent of the time, victims are killed by someone they know. And when a woman is murdered, the likeliest perpetrator is her husband or boyfriend—an argument gets heated, and a firearm comes out. According to the surveys, the deadly arguments often involve accusations of infidelity.

The detective looked away so I couldn’t read his expression in the near darkness, but his meaning was clear. Shaking his head, he said, “Hell, nobody knows how they’d respond under that kind of stress until it happens. I’ve seen men react by doing things totally out of character.”

So, I thought. That’s where we’re going. Sweeney was dangling a hook.

Because I was a suspect.

But if this was an interrogation by the Biloxi PD, why hadn’t the detective recited the Miranda warning? He wasn’t permitted to assume that I knew, as I reeled from bereavement and loss, about my right to remain silent. Maybe he was clever enough to hope that I’d say something incriminating and he could claim I’d volunteered the statement out of the blue while we were having a cordial conversation.

It caused me to reconsider my opinion of Sweeney. Maybe the detective wasn’t such a good guy after all.

I had opened my mouth to ask him what the hell he was up to when I heard footsteps pounding up the driveway. The gate jerked open and my old man raced into the backyard. I hadn’t seen him move that fast in years.

He shouted at me, “Shut up, shut up, shut up! Damn it, boy, you’re a lawyer! Shut your damned mouth!”

PART II

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