5. Player
Chapter five
Player
After we eat, I drop Molly off at her car in the clubhouse parking lot.
She tries to question me about Taylor, but I cut her off with a twist of my throttle. I don’t even climb from my bike, just sit there waiting until she gets in her car.
She picks up my mood and doesn’t push, giving me a quick peck on the cheek. I think she reads me enough to know I’d shove her off if she tried to kiss my mouth right now.
Once she pulls out, I meet with the guys at a nearby gas station.
I pull up to a pump, slide my card and shove the nozzle into my tank.
“Dad wants to ride to the casino.” Beck says, walking over and leaning a shoulder against the pump. A toothpick hangs from his mouth. He shifts it and studies my eyes. “You heard from Sissy?”
My little sister’s name is Cici, but she’s always been Sissy to us.
I check my phone for missed calls or texts. “No. Why?”
“She’s not answering Dad, and no one’s heard from her.”
“I’m sure she’s fine. She always is.”
His gaze shifts to the horizon. “What do you think about Dad selling the place?”
I shrug. “It’s a big house, and soon it’ll just be him. I get it, Beck. It’s why I left the place I shared with Debbie. It’s hard with memories hitting you in the face in every room you walk into.”
“Guess so. Still, it sucks. It’s like losing Ma all over again.”
“I know. I feel the same, but I can’t tell him not to do it.”
“Sissy’s gonna flip out.”
“Maybe not. Maybe she wants out of there, too. Besides, the beach? She’ll love it there.”
Beck huffs. “He spoils her. Now she gets to live at the beach. How fair is that?”
“You and I had a mom at her age. Cut her some slack. Besides, Dad spoils her out of guilt. You know that, right?”
“I guess.”
Glancing over several pumps, I spot my father. “So how long you think he’s going to keep on going to the casino every anniversary?”
“Who knows. Ma loved the casino. He always plays a round of craps and bets a $100 on sixteen.”
“Ma’s birthday.”
“Yep.”
A sharp whistle splits the air.
“Let’s go,” Gage barks.
I return the nozzle to the pump and screw on the cap.
Beck walks to his bike, and I fire mine up, and we all roll out onto the street.
On the way, we pass through a side street and spot a bunch of squad cars with flashing lights halfway up the street.
My father pulls to the side, staring toward them.
I maneuver my bike alongside his. “Isn’t that your buddy’s house?”
They’re rolling yellow crime scene tape around the perimeter. A CSI van is parked in the drive.
It’s Jimmy Jack’s house.
Gage tells the rest of the MC to head out, and he and I approach the perimeter. We get as close as possible, park our bikes and climb off.
“What’s going on?” he asks an officer.
“Move along. This is a crime scene,” the cop replies.
“Is Sheriff Edwards here?” Gage asks him.
“He’s inside.”
“Tell him Gage is out here. He’ll want to talk to me.”
The guy looks put out but hits the radio on his shoulder. “Tell the sheriff a man wants to talk to him. He’s with the Kings of Anarchy.”
A minute later, Sheriff Edwards emerges. He and my father shake hands over the yellow tape.
“Gage.”
“Ronnie. What the hell is going on? Is Jimmy okay?”
“Jimmy’s dead.”
“What?” My father’s chin pulls to the side as those words hit him. “How? Did he have a heart attack or something?”
“Nope. It looks like a gunshot to the head. We thought suicide, but when we rolled the body over, there was no gun.”
“Who the hell would want to kill Jimmy?”
“No clue. You got any ideas?”
“Hell no, everybody liked Jimmy.”
“When’s the last time you saw him?”
“When I closed the deal on my house yesterday. He met me out there and gave me the keys.”
“That the last time you talked to him?”
“No. He was excited about the commission, and he went to the casino last night. He called me at one am and told me he’d won at craps.”
“How much?”
“A thousand bucks.”
“With that amount, he probably got his pay out in cash.”
“Yeah, I guess so,” my father concedes.
“Given the time, I’d guess he didn’t stop at the bank and make a deposit.”
“Probably not. So, it should be in there. You find it?”
“Nope. Least not yet.”
“He used to keep his cash in his cookie jar.”
“I remember.”
“I always told him that was fucking stupid.”
“I did, too.”
“A thousand bucks. Enough to kill a man over, I suppose.”
“Hell, I’ve seen people murdered over twenty,” the sheriff replies.
I’ve heard the story of these men before. The three of them were best friends in high school until my father took up with the MC and Ronnie Edwards became a cop. Jimmy was the one person who kept them connected. Now he’s gone, and I wonder how long the connection will last.
“Who found him?” my father asks.
“His son. But get this, he left the scene, went to his girlfriend’s place, and didn’t call it in for almost an hour.”
“That sounds shady as shit.”
“Yep.”
“You think he killed his ol’ man?”
“I don’t know. If you’d have asked me yesterday, I’d have said hell no, but things are pointing to him. Maybe the kid needed money, and maybe you weren’t the only one Jimmy called to talk about his winnings last night.”
“Christ, man. To think he’d kill his own father. That’s some bullshit.”
“I’ve seen it before.” Edwards cocks a brow at me. “You’ve probably thought about it, right, kid?
I look at my ol’ man. “A time or two.”
“Shut the fuck up,” Gage snaps, then returns his attention to Ronnie. “Have you talked to the kid?”
“No. Now that the medical examiner is here, I was just going to go do that now.”
There’s motion at the front door, and we all glance over to see them rolling the cart out with the black body bag strapped onto it.
My father’s gaze follows it until they load it in the rear of the paramedic wagon.
“I can’t believe this.”
Ronnie shifts on his feet. “Yeah. Well, I guess I’ll go talk to his son.”
“You know the kid?” my father asks.
“No. Do you?”
“Yeah. Had lunch with him and Jimmy a time or two. Let me come with. Maybe I can get him to talk more easily than you can.”
“I suppose it’s worth a shot.”
We follow the sheriff across town and pull into an apartment complex. We climb the stairs to a second level, and the sheriff bangs on the door.
A slim young girl answers. We see the son sitting on the couch behind her, his head in his hands.
When the sheriff tells her why he’s here, she opens the door and steps aside. We troop in, and her eyes hit our cuts, frowning.
“Kevin,” my father murmurs, and the kid lifts his head like he just became aware we’d entered the apartment. He seems a million miles away, but his eyes sweep over us.
“What are you doing here?”
“Sorry to hear about your ol’ man. He and I were good friends,” my father says.
Kevin nods. “Thanks. I still can’t believe it.”
“Got a couple of questions for you if you don’t mind,” the sheriff says.
“Okay, sure.”
“The first thing I need to know is why you waited to call it in? Why did you drive all the way over here before calling 911?” Ronnie asks.
“I was scared. In shock, I guess.
“Are you having money problems?” Ronnie asks, getting straight to the point.
“What? No. What’s that got to do with anything?”
“Your father had a grand in cash on him. He told me he won at the casino last night. The money is nowhere to be found,” my father says.
“You found him, Kevin. You also left the scene before calling it in. Did you take the money?” the sheriff asks.
“Fuck no. I didn’t even know he had any money. Whoever killed him must have taken it.”
“Kevin, I’m gonna ask you straight up, because we need to know the truth here. Did you kill your father?”
“No. I swear. I’d never hurt my father. He was my hero. I loved him.”
I study his facial expressions and body language. He seems upset in a way that’s not fake. I believe what he’s saying.
Sheriff Edwards gets a call and steps aside to take it in murmured voices. When he returns, he meets Kevin’s eyes and then my father’s.
“That was the medical examiner. It wasn’t a gunshot that killed him. Jimmy had massive head trauma from a blunt instrument.”
Kevin surges to his feet. “You mean someone beat him to death?”
“Looks that way. Know anybody who’d do that to him?”
“No. Everyone loved my father.”
“Well, not everyone. Someone wanted him dead.”
“You think it was a robbery? For the money you talked about?” Kevin asks.
Ronnie connects eyes with my father. “Don’t know. Seems like overkill if this was just about theft. They could have stopped at one blow; this guy kept going.”
“It seems like it was personal. Like the person knew your father. You don’t kill a random stranger with that amount of viciousness,” Gage says.
“Guess you’d know about that,” Kevin snipes.
I take a step forward, not liking how this kid is talking to my father, but Gage lifts his hand and shakes his head. I know he’s cutting him slack, but if it were up to me, I’d punch his lights out.
“I’m returning to the crime scene,” Sheriff Edwards says. “Gotta look for the murder weapon, now that we know it wasn’t a gunshot.”
“Mind if we come with?” my father asks.
“Suit yourself.
We return to the scene. The chief tells the officers to fan out and search the yard for something that could be used as a weapon to bash the victim’s head.
He leads us into the house, lifting the yellow tape for us to slip under.
A CSI tech points out a blood smear on the bedroom door frame. “That’s a blood transfer stain. Probably the killer on his way out.”
We take in the bloody scene. The bedroom is where they found him, apparently, since that’s where Ronnie leads us. The mattress is covered in blood.
Ronnie gestures to it. “He was face down diagonally. Probably was standing when the first blow hit him.”
Looking up, I see blood spatter on the ceiling. “Jesus Christ,” I mutter.
“I’m betting whoever did this has blood on their clothes,” my father says.
An officer comes down the hall. “Sir, I think we found something.”
We all move outside and follow the man to the backyard.
A sledgehammer lies in the weeds near the bushes.
We squat next to it.
“There’s blood on it. Hair, too,” the officer says.