Dead Cold Mysteries Box Set #2: Books 5-8 (A Dead Cold Box Set) Blake Banner (read out loud books txt) 📖

“But Coy wasn’t happy with that arrangement. He wanted to make an example of somebody.”

“Coy is full o’ shit. He talks big, like he was a hit man for some big Mexican gang. But he’s just a junkie loser like Sly. I told him stay away from Pat and that was the end of it.”

I shook my head. “Your story doesn’t make any sense, Greg. If Coy wasn’t threatening Pat, then why the hell did Kathleen come to the Shack?”

“I don’t know. It’s what I keep tellin’ you. I didn’t even know she was comin’.”

“Would she have told you?”

“’Course she would’ve! Especially if it was to stop Coy hurting Pat!”

I stared at him a long while. “I have a witness who is willing to testify that you drove down to Boulder on Sunday, 8th July, to pick Kathleen up from the bus station and deliver her to the Shack.” He was shaking his head. I raised my voice, leaning forward, “You yourself corrected me when I said she’d arrived by train. You told me she would have had to go to the bus station! You picked her up and you delivered her to her executioner!”

“No!” He made to stand but couldn’t because of the cuffs. He shouted again, “No! Goddamn it! I wouldn’t do that to Kath!” He sat staring at me, breathing heavily. “It never happened!”

There was a knock on the door and Dehan poked her head in. “Sly’s gone down.” She glanced at Greg. “He made his statement. Coy is on his way up.”

I studied his face. “Think it over.”

He shook his head. “I ain’t sayin’ another word without my lawyer.”

I nodded to Dehan. “Have a deputy call Mr. Carson’s lawyer, will you?”

“He’s on his way already.”

I stood. “See you at trial, Greg.”

I stepped into the corridor. El Coyote was led past to interrogation room two and then they took Greg down to his cell. I stood staring at Dehan, chewing my lip. Eventually I said, “There is something wrong.”

She frowned. “Sly was pretty convincing. You don’t believe him? He confirmed your theory.”

“Let’s talk to Coy.”

We went in and Dehan leaned against the wall while I sat. He watched me with his pale blue eyes. The scar gave him a twisted look of contempt, but it was there in his eyes too. It was almost a palpable thing.

“I’m going to make this easy for you, Coyote. All three of you are facing the death penalty. You understand that?” He nodded. “Your pal Sly is trying to cut a deal with the DA. Greg is waiting for his lawyer, and you and I both know what his lawyer is going to advise him to do.”

“What deal?”

“I need the name of the man who killed Kathleen.”

“So you gonna seek the death penalty for two of us, but the one who gives you Kathleen’s killer, he gets life?”

“That’s the deal.”

He nodded. “That’s what I figured. It was Greg.”

“What?”

“Greg killed Kathleen.”

Dehan spoke from behind me. “Bullshit.”

He stared at her with no expression. “What, you want me to say it was Sly? It weren’t Sly. Sly don’t go killin’ people. That ain’t his scene.”

“How about you?”

He looked at me like I was crazy. “Me? What the fuck do I wanna kill that bitch for? She ain’t nothin’ to me.”

Dehan came and sat next to me, leaning across the table. “She disrespected you. She didn’t pay what she owed you.”

“You confused, Detective. That was her sister, not her. Pat didn’t pay. But Greg paid for her. All square.”

“But you wanted her punished.”

“You crazy. We got the farm on Greg’s land. We growin’ the crop on Greg’s land. He’s supplyin’ the seeds. Greg says ‘leave Pat alone,’ we leave Pat alone. I ain’t gonna jeopardize a sweet thing like that to punish a stupid bitch. She’s Greg’s bitch, that’s cool with me. So long as he pays.”

I stared at him a long time. Finally, I asked him, “So, what happened?”

He shrugged. “Is like you said. He went down to collect her from the bus station. He brought her to the Shack. He was mad at her. I don’t know why. I think he liked her and she went and married another guy. I don’t know. I wasn’t interested…”

I interrupted him. “But, if she wasn’t there pleading for Pat, why the hell was she there?”

“Don’t ask me, man, ask Greg. All I know is, Sunday he went to get her from Boulder. Then he brought her to the club. He raped her right there on the floor. Then he stabbed her with his knife, cut off her head and took her out to the woods.”

“And you witnessed this?”

“Yeah, man. I saw the whole thing.”

“You understand that if you are lying, perjury will be added to the charges against you.”

He spread his hands. “What you fockin’ want, man? You ask me to tell you who killed Kathleen. I’m tellin’ you and now you say I’m lyin’! What the fock is the matter with you?”

I made him go over the story another couple of times in more detail, then got a deputy to come in, take it down and have him sign it. Then I sent him back down to his cell. I grabbed some coffee and me and Dehan went to the small office where I’d put my laptop. This time there were two emails. One contained the phone, email and credit card records. The other was from Frank at the lab. I had them printed and ten minutes later, we sat at the table and went through them.

The phone records for the end of June and early July showed no communication between Kathleen and anybody in Colorado. She had not telephoned, or been telephoned by, her in-laws,