Page 88 of Gem Warfare

This time, Huff’s head shot up. “Say what now? That so? Guess those Mafia guys caught up with him. Yeah, I think he might have taken out a loan with them or maybe he was gambling down in Atlantic City. Yeah, that’s right. He’d taken a loan out and they kept hiking the interest. The crew and I went down to Atlantic City a couple times after we got our bonuses. Maybe Tim came with us. I know I didn’t have any luck. Guess I never do.” He shrugged. “So I’m here thinking you’re asking me about Tim and the museum robbery for a reason. Do you think he did it?” He studied the candy bar like he was calculating exactly how many bites he had left, apparently more interested in that than the question. Yet I was sure he watched us from under his lashes.

“It looks that way. He was buried in a shallow grave,” said Garrett.

“Horrible way to go.”

“A pouch of jewels was found on him.”

Huff froze. “Uh huh?” he forced out.

“They look very similar to the stolen, unrecovered jewels from the museum.”

“That so?”

“We think whoever killed him didn’t realize Timothy had the jewels on him.”

“Then they’re a damn fool,” said Huff softly before he crammed the rest of the candy bar into his mouth.

Chapter Nineteen

“What did you make of that?” asked Garrett. “You were awfully quiet in there.”

The door sounded loudly as it opened and I winced. Then it was shut, leaving us in silence once more.

“He was lying,” I said.

“Which bit?”

“Most of it. The Mafia guys, the convenient loan, the gambling, the kid.”

“I wondered if you picked that up. The kid.”

“You didn’t say our dead guy had a boy, just that he had a kid. Huff knew though, even though he said he didn’t remember. He gave us the loan shark story to throw us off and then he made a slip-up. Or he thought throwing a few red herrings at us would give us other avenues to explore and waste our time.”

“At first, I didn’t see him as a killer but the longer he spoke… I’m seeing him for it now. I thought he was just a patsy Black took advantage of to get into the museum so he could pull his real job, and maybe hewasat first. Now I think Huff either knew about the heist or had an inkling about what was really going on before it happened or maybe soon afterwards. Perhaps he wanted a cut for keeping quiet.”

We had our backs to the prison as we passed through the final checkpoint, and walked towards the parking lot. Garrett was playing with his keys. I was thinking about Charlie Black’s last moments. Black knew he had the jewels in his pocket but did he think about handing them over to his killer to potentially save himself? Or was keeping them his last defiant act?

“Did you see his face when you said the jewels were found on Black’s body?” I asked.

“Yeah, he was startled.”

We paused to get into the car and pulled the seatbelts around us. As I popped the buckle in, I said, “More than that. I think he was shocked. Like it would never have occurred to him that Black had the jewels on his person.”

“What’re you thinking?”

I thought harder about it, puzzling out probable events in my mind. “I think Huff knew Black was dead and he knew about the jewels. He thought he was being poker-faced and drawing out information from us. My guess is he figured out what Black did, tracked him down and confronted him. Black probably told him the jewels were someplace safe to get rid of him and that he’d cut him in, when what he most likely intended to do was abandon his life here and start over somewhere new.

“For some reason they fought. Maybe Huff realized it was a double-cross and wanted his cut now for keeping quiet. Black gets killed and Huff buries him in a panic. Huff decides to lie low for a little bit until he can get the jewels. Or figure out where they were, not knowing Black had them on him all along. Unfortunately, he doesn’t keep his nose clean and gets pinched for the robbery. He’s probably been sitting inside the whole time, waiting for the day he can collect. He now thinks he’s only got a week left until he can retrieve them. He must think he knows where they are but now he knows we have them. Well, you do in MPD’s evidence room.”

“It could mean he was in on Black’s theft. They did it together and somehow Huff gets double-crossed. Black told him a lie about where the jewels were or told him they had to lie low awhile.”

“Or maybe Huff really didn’t know anything until long after. Timothy Wright stuck around for at least two months after the heist, remember? In trying not to draw any attraction, Black made a mistake. Huff figured it out and followed Black to Montgomery where Black had his nice, new, anonymous lifefar from the grind of maintenance work. Finding Black under an assumed name clinched his guilt in Huff’s eyes and he threatened him with exposure in return for a cut of the jewels. They fought and Black was killed.

“Huff panicked, buried him and hightailed it back to New York until he was sure the murder wasn’t discovered. Back in New York, thinking he was the new big guy of high-end theft, he plans a heist of his own but he’s not as smart as Black. That went wrong and Huff got sent down. He couldn’t return to get the jewels or the payout but he thought he knew where they were. Maybe Black told him they were hidden somewhere! All Huff had to do was sit tight until he could retrieve them. He gets transferred here where it’s easy for him to get released.”

“I like this theory,” said Garrett. “But I have no idea in heck how I’m going to prove it. We need the gun, we need to place it in Huff’s hands, we need to place Huff in town when it happened. At the very least, we need Huff bragging about coming into money. There’s no way he kept that quiet all these years. Wait here.” Garrett unbuckled and reached for the door handle.

“Where are you going?” I asked, which sounded better than what I almost said:sounds like a you problem. I was pretty sure my brother wouldn’t appreciate that. Plus, I wouldn’t have meant it. We were a team. Any problems wereusproblems, right up until it went to court.Thenit was Garrett’s official problem.

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