Chapter 11
ELEVEN
Josie rolled the cold water bottle across her forehead, letting the condensation mix with her sweat.
It shouldn’t have felt so good, but the ride to Denton PD headquarters crammed inside her SUV with Turner and Charles Barnes and a broken air-conditioning unit had caused perspiration to collect in creases she didn’t even realize she had.
“I hope that’s not for that asshole. I don’t want him comfortable.” Turner strode down the hall, stopping at the door to interview room two, where Charles Barnes had been waiting for the past half hour.
In answer, Josie twisted the cap off and downed half of it. Wiping her mouth with the back of her hand, she said, “When you interviewed him after the domestic call, how did he act?”
“You didn’t read my report?”
“I want to hear it from you.”
She had read all the reports related to the incident; Turner’s had been far more thorough than usual.
“He was cocky,” Turner said. “I think he knew Maxine wouldn’t press charges and he was gloating over it. I wound him up a little, but he stuck with his story that the whole thing had been a misunderstanding. Said his daughter was a dumb teenager who liked to stir up drama.”
“Jesus.”
“Yep. He’s garbage.”
That was all Turner had to say about the incident, apparently. A minute ticked by. Then another. Finally, Josie sighed. “Are we going to talk about what happened at the glamping office?”
Turner dug inside one of his jacket pockets and came up with a can of the disgusting energy drink he seemed to survive on. He popped it with a flourish and poured it down his throat. Then he belched, crumpled the can and stuffed it back into his pocket. “No.”
“Not even how you knew that statute off the top of your head?” Josie asked pointedly. “The one you used to manhandle Charles Barnes?”
Turner scoffed. “Like you don’t want to kick that guy’s ass.”
“The only thing I want is to find the person who killed Maxine and Haven Barnes.”
“Don’t get all holier than thou, Quinn. I’m not here for it today. Come on.”
Before Josie could respond, Turner threw the door to the interview room open.
Its aesthetic was almost as depressing as the morgue.
The cinderblock walls had been painted a periwinkle blue, which was supposed to be soothing and encourage openness but only succeeded in making the room feel like a cell.
The metal table had more blemishes than a hormonal teenager.
The laminate floor tile, which had been white with gray specks but was now gray with black specks, had chipped in several places.
Charles Barnes sat sullenly in one of the chairs, arms crossed over his chest, his knees spread wide. Manspreading, as Gretchen liked to say.
Turner plopped into a seat diagonally from him and matched his pose. “I’m sorry for your loss.”
Josie tried to remember an interview in which Turner hadn’t antagonized the subject. They were few and far between.
If Barnes caught the undertone of sarcasm in Turner’s tone, he didn’t show it. “Thank you,” he said quietly.
Josie took the seat directly across from Barnes. She made introductions and read him his rights. When she asked him if he understood them, he said, “Yeah. I didn’t do anything, though.”
“We’ll see,” Turner said. “How long were you and your wife married?”
Charles’s brow furrowed, as if he was confused by the question. “Didn’t you ask me that last time you questioned me?”
“Maybe, maybe not. We’re starting over. How long were you and Maxine married?”
Barnes studied Turner, his lips twisted in contempt. Josie could practically hear him mentally selecting whatever response would piss Turner off the most.
“Mr. Barnes,” she interjected. “We’re not here to talk about what happened today. I know this is difficult for you, but we need to discuss your wife and daughter. We’d just like to get a little background information first.”
“How long were you married to Maxine?” Turner repeated.
“Eighteen years.”
“So you got married because she got pregnant,” Turner said bluntly.
Josie suppressed a groan. Turner’s interview strategy was to be as blunt and crass as possible.
She’d lost count of how many witnesses he’d riled up.
If they hadn’t walked into the room feeling homicidal, ten minutes with him would change that.
His first impression of Charles Barnes had clearly made him even punchier than usual.
Charles sighed and rubbed at his chin. In this well-lit room, with all his rage quieted, Josie saw that his eyes were glassy and red-rimmed, just as Taulara from the glamping office had said.
“No. That’s not why we got married. Yeah, the pregnancy wasn’t planned.
Maxine thought it was way too early, but she was going to have it anyway so I said we should get married. ”
“Did you want to get married?” asked Josie.
“Well, yeah, that was the whole idea. I didn’t see the point in waiting once she got pregnant.”
Turner said, “Did Maxine want to get married?”
Charles scoffed. “We got married, didn’t we?”
Alarm bells rang in Josie’s head. Had Maxine wanted the marriage, or had she felt pressured into it?
Reproductive coercion was another form of intimate partner abuse.
It came in many forms, but in this case, Josie wondered if Charles had sabotaged Maxine’s birth control so she would get pregnant and then he could coerce her into marriage.
Not all intimate partner abuse was overtly violent.
“That doesn’t answer my question,” said Turner.
Charles waved a hand in the air. “If she didn’t want to marry me, she wouldn’t have gone through with it, now would she?”
Unless she’d felt immense pressure or Charles had made life as a single mother sound unachievable. Maxine had been ten years younger than him, only twenty years old when Haven was born. “Where did you two meet?” asked Josie.
“Doctor’s office,” he said. “She was a secretary, and I was a patient. I asked her out a dozen times before she agreed to go out with me.”
Turner said, “A dozen times. How long a time period are we talking?”
Charles looked suspicious of the question but answered anyway. “I don’t know. A year?”
A sour feeling settled in Josie’s stomach. He’d pursued a young woman barely of age for a year until she agreed to date him. Two months later, she was pregnant.
“Listen,” Charles said. “I had good insurance and enough income that she could quit when the baby came, at least for the first year or so. It was the best thing for her.”
“And for your baby?” Turner said pointedly.
“Yeah, of course. I wanted everything to be perfect for when Haven was born.”
There was no smile, no sparkle in his eyes like most parents when they recounted the arrival of their children. Charles looked haggard and exhausted.
“It’s something else, isn’t it?” Turner said. “First time you hold your kid.”
The ghost of a smile lifted the corners of Charles’s mouth. “Yeah, pretty wild.”
“How long have you and Maxine been separated?” asked Josie.
“About three, four months.”
“The day that Haven called the police while witnessing the argument between you and Maxine, was that the first time things got heated?” Josie asked.
“By heated, you mean yelling at one another?” Charles asked.
According to the reports Josie had read, there had also been broken dishes in the kitchen and Haven had heard a loud thud, followed by her mother calling out as though she was in pain, but there wasn’t a chance in hell that Charles Barnes was going to admit to more than yelling.
Unless maybe Turner goaded him into it. “Sure,” he said. “Yelling, screaming, throwing shit, pulling hair, pushing your wife, knocking her to the ground.”
Charles narrowed his eyes. “We got loud, okay? Maxine dropped a couple of dishes before I even came into the kitchen. She was feeling dizzy. Not sleeping. She’d been a klutz for a few weeks before that but to answer your question, yes, we argued sometimes, just like any other couple.
Yes, we raised our voices every now and then. What married couple doesn’t?”
“How often?” Turner pressed.
“Why does this matter?”
“We’re asking the questions here,” Turner replied. “How often did you argue? Once a year? Once a month? More frequently?”
“What do you want me to say?” Charles said.
“We were together eighteen years. Not everything is going to be perfect all the time. Things were great in the beginning but as time went on, yeah, we fought a lot. Sometimes once a week. Maxine wanted a divorce since Haven was little. She used to bring it up all the time. I told her it wasn’t going to happen. ”
“Why not?” asked Josie.
He looked at her like she was stupid. “Because I didn’t want one, that’s why.”
“She didn’t need your permission to divorce you,” Turner said. “Did you threaten her?”
“I didn’t need to threaten her. She knew she’d be ass out if she left me. She never made as much as I do, even when she got promoted to office manager.”
“She’d be entitled to child support,” Josie pointed out. “Perhaps even alimony.”
“No kidding,” he said. Had he wanted to wait until Haven turned eighteen to agree to a divorce so he wouldn’t have to pay child support?
“You were separated, though,” said Josie. “What changed your mind about getting divorced?”
“Honestly? It just got to the point where nothing I did satisfied Maxine. She wasn’t the same girl I married, okay? She changed.”
Josie was willing to bet that Maxine had matured and figured out that she deserved more out of life than a relationship where her husband refused to consider what she wanted, but Josie didn’t share that thought.
“Plus,” Charles said, lifting his head, “coming home from work or from business trips was like walking into a stranger’s house.
I didn’t feel welcome in my own damn home anymore.
The older Haven got, the less she liked me and the more she wanted to spend time with Maxine.
Then it was just those two and I wasn’t part of the club. ”
“Did you want to be part of the club?” asked Josie.