Homewrecker Ch. 04

This story is part of an ongoing series. The chronological order of my stories is listed in WifeWatchman's biography.

Feedback and constructive criticism is very much appreciated, and I encourage feedback for ideas.

This story contains graphic scenes, language and actions that might be extremely offensive to some people. These scenes, words and actions are used only for the literary purposes of this story. The author does not condone murder, racial language, violence, rape or violence against women, and any depictions of any of these in this story should not be construed as acceptance of the above.

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Part 18 - Custodial Engineering

10:05am, Sunday, November 17th. We landed at the State Capitol Office Building helipad in Midtown. Detectives Nell Bell and Steve Ruger were there with a Midtown Police van.

"Where to?" Ruger asked as he got behind the wheel of the van. Nell Bell had allowed me to ride shotgun.

"The office of Prodder, Ryder & Reems." I said. "Darryl Dawson's cell is pinging from there. I am hoping he really is there."

"We have units at his apartment home." said Nell Bell. "Your warrant allows us to search the place. They'll go in if we arrest Dawson at his office, or they'll go in looking for him at his home..."

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Arriving at the office complex, we clambered out of the van. "There's his car." said Nell Bell, pointing at a vehicle, one of two in expensive models in the otherwise empty lot. We rushed for the front door. Nell put in the code, and we rushed inside, and to the offices of Prodder, Ryder & Reems, P.C. Nell entered the he manufacturers code, but it no longer opened the door to the suite.

"And people wonder why I carry a crowbar." I said, producing the useful tool. Everyone else had their guns drawn as I fit the end in the crack between the doors and applied pressure..

*SNAP!*

The door flew open, and Ruger and Roark quickly went in to clear the office, followed by Julia and Nell. I came in last, and walked up to the office door of Darryl Dawson.

"No one else here." whispered Steve Ruger as they all came up to me. I motioned for them to hold back, then I slowly pushed open the door to the office, holding my crowbar, my weapon still holstered. I saw that Darryl was sitting in is chair behind the desk, looking out the window, seemingly lost in contemplation.

"Darryl Dawson?" I said from the doorway.

"Who wants to know--- oh, I wasn't expecting you." Dawson said. "A long way from home... and your jurisdiction... aren't you, Mr. Iron Crowbar?"

I came on inside the office... and saw that Dawson was not alone. "Well, look who's here!" said Gwen Munson, who was sitting on the sofa to my left and Dawson's right. She had initially been hidden from view.

"And how did you get in here?" Dawson said as he turned around in his chair. "I changed the codes."

I held up the red crowbar. "Who needs codes?" I replied. "And yes, I'm Donald Troy... Inspector Donald Troy of the SBI. So I'm well within jurisdiction."

"And breaking and entering." snarled Gwen Munson.

"Legally serving a warrant." I replied, holding up the folded piece of paper. "You see, Mr. Dawson, it seems that the killer took a shower after murdering Beverly... to wash her blood off. And in doing so, some DNA was left behind." I reached into my trenchcoat and pulled out the DNA test kit. "We can eliminate you as a suspect, if you'll just provide me with a sample now."

Dawson looked skeptically at me. "Don't you need a warrant for that?" he said.

"What do you think this is?" I asked, holding up the document again. "This warrant authorizes me to take a DNA cheek swab as well as other physical characteristics. It also allows me to search this place of business and your home for physical evidence, such as the clothes you and Beverly were wearing when you killed her."

"Is my client under arrest?" asked Gwen as Julia Rodriguez and Steve Ruger came into the office, weapons drawn but pointing at the floor. "And yes, Inspector Troy, you may consider Mr. Dawson to be my client."

"His arrest status depends on his level of cooperation." I replied. "Detective Rodriguez, take the DNA sample, if you will."

"With pleasure, sir." said Julia as she holstered her weapon and put on latex gloves. She approached Dawson with the DNA testing kit. "Open your mouth, please, Mr. Dawson?"

"Hand it here. I'll do it." said Dawson. He took the long Q-tip and swabbed inside his own cheek, then gave the swab back. Julia secured it in the plastic tube, sealed it, and made the evidence notations, which I countersigned.

"So, shall we go to Police Headquarters?" I said. "Town & County Police Headquarters?"

"What?!" gasped Gwen Munson. "How about Midtown PD Headquarters, if anywhere at all?"

"I'm taking him back to the jurisdiction where the murder took place." I said. "You get a free helicopter ride out of it, Mr. Dawson. Ms. Munson will have to follow in her vehicle. Perhaps Detectives Bell and Ruger will give you a ride..."

Part 19 - Legal Maneuvers

12:30pm, Sunday, November 17th. Darryl Dawson had been taken through full booking and was sitting in Interrogation-1. Next to him was his attorney, Gwen Munson. On the other side of the table was Your Iron Crowbar and ADA Paulina Patterson. You get one guess who the Uniformed Presence was, and that guess had better be 'Lieutenant Micah Rudistan'.

"I don't understand why this could not have been done in Midtown." snarled Gwen Munson. "And to have taken my client through full booking while I was driving up here? That's dirty pool, and you know it."

Gwen had driven herself to my County, and very fast. I was surprised that she was not stopped in Coltrane County, especially since I notified Deputy Strait to be on the lookout for her vehicle violating speeding laws in his county.

"I know nothing of the kind." I said witheringly. "As an SBI Inspector, I have the right to act on behalf of a jurisdiction to bring a wanted suspect to that jurisdiction for them, and that's exactly what I did. Furthermore to this subject, your client is now under arrest for suspicion of the murder in the first degree of Beverly DeAngelo, a human being."

Gwen replied: "I guess we'll see if all that crap you're spewing holds up when I make my motions to dismiss the charges."

"I guess we will... especially once the DNA tests come back." I replied. Having already read Dawson his considerable rights from the card, I said "You're in a world of hurt, Dawson."

"Pul-eeze!" said Gwen Munson. "Stop your intimidation tactics. You don't have crap on my client. Not a damn thing!"

"And there it is. The whine about 'intimidation'." I replied. "You tend to use that when you know your client is totally busted. So, Mr. Dawson... why don't I tell you what you did last Thursday night, and you just fill in the gaps where I go astray."

I could almost feel Cindy's vibe of happiness as she watched in the Monitor Room. I began: "You came up to my Town & County in a car rented in the name of MegaTech Industries. You arrived in the early evening and was given the key to Suite 802... as MegaTech's, and specifically Elliot Sanders's legal counsel while he was in this State."

"So what?" snarled Gwen Munson.

"Interrupt me again, and we'll go back to 'Don't speak until spoken to.'." I said severely to Munson, my eyes boring right through her. She could not hold my stare, and when her eyes dropped in capitulation, I continued:

"As is MegaTech events custom for any events in this State, you were given the room next to Elliot Sanders, in this case Suite 802." I said. "You wore a sweater with a hoodie, you had a device that scrambled the video feed in the elevator, and the videocamera in the hallway was sabotaged, so there was no clear recording of you when you entered the facility. But I do have video footage of a man in a hoodie sweater and bringing a big gym bag into the hotel. Fortunately, I don't need that to prove my case."

Your Iron Crowbar: "You stayed in the room until around 11:00pm, when there was a knock on the door. You opened the door to admit your confederate, who texted Beryl Angel to come up to Suite 802. You hid in the back bedroom, and your confederate let Beryl into the room and had her begin undressing. A moment later, you sprang out of the bedroom, surprising Beryl, who had no chance to run. You forced her to her knees, slit open her throat, and dropped her dead on the floor."

"Who is this confederate? Or are you making her up?" Gwen asked. Both Paulina and I looked wide-eyed at her slip.

"Her?" Paulina asked, pouncing hard. "So you know it's a woman?"

"Him or her. Whatever." Gwen said, trying to backtrack, though her face had turned deep red. "And it doesn't matter. This is all pure fantasy. And I insist that you stop badgering my client with this garbage."

"If you think it's fantasy," I said, "then it shouldn't bother you that I speak of it. But this is a formal Police interrogation, and your client is required to listen to it. It might also serve his best interests to hear it."

I looked at Darryl Dawson, whose face was not red but almost gray with mortification. I said "As I was saying, you murdered Beryl, then executed the second and dramatic part of your plan. You piled some clothes you brought with you on the floor, to make it look like she was in the act of stripteasing before a client sitting on the sofa. You took Beryl's bloodied clothes and put them in a plastic bag, and you were about to change clothes yourself, when you realized some of your blood was on you. So you hurriedly showered, changed to fresh clothes, and put your bloodied clothes and the towel you used to dry off in the bag, and you and your confederate left the room."

"So how did my client manage to walk out of there without being seen or videotaped at all?" Gwen snottily asked.

"Once again speaking out of turn, you are." I said. "Of course the confederate opened the door to Elliot Sanders's suite, knowing that Sanders and his wife were at the reception downstairs. You, Mr. Dawson, went down the stairwell to the ground floor and out to the parking lot, got in your rental car, and drove away. And we have night camera footage of that. Will it hold, Mr. Dawson?"

Dawson was in shock, as was Munson... as was Paulina and I'd imagine a lot of Detectives watching in the Monitor Room and in Classroom 'E'. Lt. Rudistan looked massively jovial.

"Don't say a word." Gwen hissed to Dawson. "Don't give this man and his bluffs the courtesy of acknowledgement."

"Oh my." I said, looking at my wristwatch. "I almost forgot. It's lunchtime for the prisoners in our holding cells. Mr. Rudistan, would you mind taking Mr. Dawson to his holding cell so that he can eat?"

"Certainly, sir." said Rudistan, growing even more jovial. He knew what was coming... and you do, too, if you've been following Your Iron Crowbar all this time.

Rudistan cuffed Dawson and led him to the jail side door, with Gwen following. When it opened and they went out, Dawson gasped out loud. Being led out of Interrogation-2 simultaneously was Deborah Wilkins!

"What the hell?!" Gwen Munson gasped in shock. She turned around and yelled "You son of a bitch!"

"Take them away, Mr. Rudistan." I said. He did so, following Vice Sr. Patrol Officer Joan Laurer as she escorted Wilkins to her holding cell.

"You arrested my client and didn't inform me?!" Gwen yelled. "I'll have your fucking badge for this!"

"We haven't interrogated her at all." I said. "She was sitting alone in I-2, with the Uniformed Officer watching over her."

"Judge Nance dropped the charges!" Gwen stammered. "How dare you defy his Court Order releasing her!"

"He dropped the charges without prejudice." said Paulina.

"And we re-arrested her on new and improved charges, with a new warrant issued by Judge Watts." I said, standing up. "Yes, Ms. Munson, you're going to have to do some work today... representing both of your clients..."

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *

"I guess I better go order some ice cream." Tanya Perlman said with a grin when I stepped into Classroom 'E'.

"Yes, and have a blue crowbar ready to be awarded. Actually, make that two." I replied. "But we're not done yet; there's still a confession to extract, or a case to build in its absence.

"Sir," said Jerome Davis, "how did you get Deborah Wilkins back here?"

"Oh, that was thanks to our Federal friends." I said. "I owe Special Agent In Charge Jack Muscone an extra helping of ice cream for that. He had the Federal Marshals arrest Deborah in California and fly her back here on a fast jet. They landed at County Airport at dawn."

Just then Gwen Munson came up behind me in the hallway. "I want to talk to you... NOW!" she demanded.

"Excuse me, folks." I said. "I think I'm being asked out for a date." Detectives laughed as I closed the door and followed Gwen down the hallway to the Main Conference Room, Paulina in attendance.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *

"Heh heh heh heh." laughed Chief Moynahan, who was waiting for us in the Main Conference Room, along with Sheriff Griswold. "It would seeeeem, Ms. Munson, that you have walked your clients straight into the Iron Crowbar's iron grip, from which there is nooooooo escape."

"Really!" Gwen snorted. "He can't prove a God damn word of any of that horse shit he was spewing out!"

"Oh, Gwen!" I said. "Language!"

"You fucking bastard!" Gwen snarled. "This is just another of your tricks! It won't work! You said yourself you have no videotape. You have no witnesses, you have nothing."

"Yet..." I said, "I have enough to get both of your clients put on Death Row. You'll see how much... during the discovery phase of the trial. So, who do you want to talk to first, before I begin the interrogations again?"

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *

An hour later, I went into I-1 to face Darryl Dawkins again, forcing Gwen to stop talking to Deborah in the other Interrogation Room and come in to sit with Dawson.

"I wasn't finished talking to Deborah---" Munson began.

"Sit down and shut up." I said harshly. "You're here to represent your client, the one I've chosen to talk to now. I dictate the terms here, Munson, not you. Okay, Mr. Dawson, as you can see, I know that your confederate in the murder of Beverly DeAngelo is Deborah Wilkins---"

Gwen Munson said "So is this the part where you try to play two innocent persons against each other? Is this where you say you only have one plea deal to offer, and whoever talks first gets it? There's just one problem: they'll both tell you to pound sand, and then you're going to have to try to prove the most ridiculous accusation you've ever made!"

Darryl Dawson was looking at me with a smirk on his face, as if he thought he had something over me.

"Well, I guess it was that time of day." I said, meaning the plea deal offers. "However, Ms. Patterson, I'm beginning to think that no plea deals are in order. Let's let them both stand trial" I got up. "Why don't we go give Ms. Wilkins the courtesy of a moment's conversation, though."

"Sure." Paulina said, getting up. We went out the anteroom door, seeing the Sheriff and Police Chief in there, having watched us. Gwen Munson followed us as we went into Interrogation-2. Joan Laurer was the Uniformed Presence. Paulina and I sat down as Gwen sat down on the other side. I noticed that Deborah did not look nearly as scared as he had looked the last time we'd talked.

I re-read Deborah her rights from the card, then said "Ms. Wilkins, why don't I just tell you what your role in this has been, and you correct me where I go astray, okay?"

Gwen Munson rolled her eyes, and then said softly to Deborah "Don't speak. Don't answer any questions. Let me do the talking."

"No," I said, "let me do the talking. First of all, did you meet Beverly DeAngelo, a.k.a. 'Beryl', at the Palmyra County with Kara Zorn last summer? Or before then?" After a long enough pause to show Deborah wasn't answering, even though her eyes lit up with anger just a bit, I started.

"Well, that doesn't really matter all that much." I said. "What is important is that I had this nagging question in the back of my mind... what in the world would entice Beryl to come up to my Town & County? And the answer is that you enticed her to come up... to be introduced, or re-introduced, to Mr. William 'Bill' Dalton, Chief Financial Officer of MegaTech Industries."

Yep, she couldn't keep it out of her eyes, I thought to myself with a gleam in my own eyes as I continued: "You pitched him to Beryl as the latest man she could seduce and keep her as his mistress. And that would work for you for a couple of reasons: by potentially blackmailing him, you keep him welded to you, and your job would that much safer; but more importantly, you could get him to funnel you money until BigBenefitInsurance was forced to pay off the policies on your parents and their home, and get you out of that crushing student loan debt you accumulated."

"You should begin writing fiction stories for the Literotica website." Gwen Munson suggested sardonically.

"An excellent idea." I said. "But under the 'true crimes' section, of course. And Ms. Wilkins, after this is done, I'm going to fly up to Racine, and see what light I can shed on that situation, and give my findings to BigBenefitInsurance." Deborah's eyes wilted at that, and I saw a glimmer of both hate and defeat in them.

"Anyhoo," I said, "Beryl bit on your bait, and you got her up here. You took her to Suite 802, for which you had the key. You knew Kara Zorn wasn't coming up here, so you assigned that suite to your lover, Darryl Dawson. But you told Beryl that it was Dalton's room, and he'd be up after the reception. Unfortunately for her... Darryl Dawson was already in there, and lying in wait for her."

"You met Dawson some time ago." I said. "He's the lawyer in this State that MegaTech Industries hires to lobby the State Legislators and possibly Executive Branch officials as well on MegaTech's behalf. He seduced you, and probably rather easily. He told you a sad, sad story about a woman that had wronged him, that he wanted to get revenge against, and you agreed to help him, since it also served to solve your financial problems. My only question is whether that was your idea, or if he whispered it to you while you were cuddling in bed with him----"

"Stop that!" Gwen Munson yelled. "That's sexual harassment, as well as badgering my client."

"Pul-eeze." I said. "But let's not fall for the distraction, Ms. Wilkins. Of course, you were able to let Dawson into Elliot Sanders's suite to get away via the stairwell that isn't really known about: you knew Sanders wasn't in there, since he was at the reception downstairs. And you used Bart Bell as your alibi--- oh, that's right!"

I looked triumphantly at Gwen Munson. "Perhaps, Ms. Munson, you have been telling your clients that you can create 'reasonable doubt' during their trials... by floating Bart Bell as an alternative theory. I'm so sorry, I've been so slow about this... you Ms. Wilkins, or perhaps Mr. Dawson, brought Bart Bell into the picture, to set him up as the patsy, or at least as an alternative that could provide that reasonable doubt."

"And it's worked." Gwen Munson said, trying hard to sound haughty, though she was clearly rattled. "Bart Bell is who you should be talking to now, not Ms. Wilkins or Mr. Dawson. How in the world do you think you can get around the very reasonable doubt, there?"

I couldn't hold back. I gave Gwen Munson 'that' smile, the smile the people do not want to see on Your Iron Crowbar's face. "By showing that he wasn't there. Bart Bell's DNA was not found at all, despite our Crime Lab doing an excellent job with their advanced evidence collection. If Dawson's DNA does come up, it's all over for him, but we know Bart's wasn't there."