Page 34 of Nothing Watching

Juliette immediately saw that she was older than the average student. She looked in her early thirties.

“What’s going on here?” Juliette asked. “We heard sounds of a disturbance and a scream as we approached. Ma’am, you seem upset. What happened in here?” she asked her.

The woman looked down, taking a deep, shuddering breath.

The professor glanced at her, and now Juliette saw a distinct expression of threat in his eyes.

“Nothing,” he said smoothly.

“Really?” Juliette raised her eyebrows.

“I was here coaching her,” he further explained.

“Excuse me,” Juliette interrupted, now starting to feel angry. “I need to hear from her, not from you. Starting with your name, please, ma’am.”

The woman looked up at Juliette, tears streaming down her face. “I’m Heidi Gerber. And he...he... well, he was my part-time boyfriend. We fought and broke up a while ago. Now he came around here wanting to start things up again. I said no, and he began fighting me, and threatening me with what he’d do if I resisted,” she said, her voice barely above a whisper.

This was wrong on so many levels, and Juliette wasn’t going to leave it alone.

“I would strongly advise you to press charges of assault, ma’am,” she said. “He has acted way out of line. Don’t let him get away with violence. And I should also tell you that we’re here to ask questions about a string of recent murders in the city.”

Now, Professor Dietrich was looking horrified.

“I assure you, Officer, I had nothing to do with those murders,” he said, his voice cracking slightly.

“I’ll press the charges,” the woman said in a small voice.

“You’re doing the right thing,” Juliette said. “Professor Dietrich, you are under arrest for assault. We will assist your victim in pressing the charges, and she’ll come in with Agent Wyatt. So will you, so that you can answer our questions on this case.”

But Dietrich wasn’t yet cowed.

“You won’t say a word,” he hissed to the tearful woman as he passed, in tones so quiet that Juliette only just picked them up. “Or there will be consequences, I promise.”

*

Under the harsh lights of the interview room, Dietrich didn’t look as smoothly controlled as he had earlier. He now looked a lot more scared, and that insolent, contemptuous expression had been replaced by a threatening scowl.

“You framed me for this,” he said, as soon as Juliette and Wyatt walked in. “You tracked my phone and have blown this incident all the way out of proportion!”

“Just because you got away with similar behavior in the past, and the university protected you, doesn’t mean you can keep doing that,” Juliette said. “Intimidating and physically threatening students is absolutely unacceptable and you’re facing charges regardless, pressed by Ms. Gerber. In my opinion, it’s about time. But now we need to know something different. We need to know if we’re going to add murder charges to the list. Because that’s why we were at Ms. Gerber’s door.”

Dietrich’s face went ashen. “I didn’t kill anyone,” he said, his voice barely above a whisper. “I know I can be impulsive, that I have a temper, but I’m not a murderer.”

“Where were you last night?”

Dietrich shook his head. “I was alone last night. I can’t prove it, but I was alone.”

“That’s not good enough,” Juliette said firmly. “We need something more concrete than that.”

Dietrich leaned back in his chair. “I know I didn’t commit these murders. And I won’t let you ruin my life because of your suspicions. I was alone. What can I say?” He shrugged. Now there was a note of self-pity in his voice that Juliette found decidedly odious.

“What about the night before?” Juliette asked. That had been the night when Hannah was killed.

“I was at home, grading papers,” Dietrich said, his voice growing more agitated.

Juliette exchanged a glance with Wyatt. The man seemed to have no confirmable alibi for any of the killings. Unless he’d been out, sleeping with students, and didn’t want to say so because that would unleash a whole different level of trouble.

“The night before that?” Wyatt asked.

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