Chapter 32. Trent
CHAPTER 32
Trent
The Wednesday After the Conference
I was still in my bathrobe and underwear when we got to the station, but the police at least did me the dignity of offering some jail-issued clothes and moving my arms around so they weren’t cuffed in back anymore, just in the front, slightly more comfortable. Then they sat me in an interrogation room.
My head couldn’t compute what was happening. I was numb. Going along with their orders like a robot, I figured Bill would show up soon and rescue me and this whole giant mess would be cleared up. I couldn’t wait to get out of here, to get a lawyer and hold a triumphant press conference where I made them look like absolute shit. I’d be the hero. I just had to survive this craziness first.
Plopped in a hard-backed chair, I was across a small table from two detectives. I decided to speak first and not wait for them.
“This is a terrible misunderstanding. I haven’t done a thing. Not one thing. It’s unbelievable. I’m an innocent man and you’re making me out to be a criminal.”
“Be quiet and answer our questions,” said the first detective. He had a portly belly and thinning brown hair flecked with gray. His partner, who had a full head of dark hair and an accent that sounded as if he was from some Latin American country, started in.
“Is your name Trent Jonathan McCarthy?”
“Yes.”
“Do you live at 4240 Horizon Lane in the Peachtree Village neighborhood of Atlanta?”
“Yes.”
“Do you know a woman named Stephanie Monroe?”
“No. I mean I met someone with that name at a conference last week, but I never saw her again! We barely crossed paths.”
“So you have no idea how her wallet and cell phone might have been buried in your backyard?” Officer Spanish sounded combative now.
“ No! Good God, no! I told you that already. This is a giant setup or a hoax or something. Is she trying to frame me? Is it my ex-wife, Katrina? Have you asked her, for fuck’s sake? She’s after my money.”
“Trent, why don’t you start by just telling us what happened when you left the conference?” Officer Portly Belly said in a gentler tone. That calmed me for a minute, and I took a long, ragged breath.
“OK, nothing happened. I got on a plane, came home, went to a bar that night for a couple of nightcaps, came home, fell asleep, felt sick actually on Sunday and stayed in. I even had to call in to work Monday I was so sick, and I never do that. Then I went to work Tuesday, and all this shit started happening. Police showing up at my door and dragging me out of bed and accusing me of something I didn’t do. It’s fucking bullshit, and you all will pay through the nose! I’m going to sue your asses off! ”
My blood pressure was rising again, and I thought of my doctor and his warnings.
They ignored my comment about suing and just kept going.
“So you never saw this Stephanie again?”
“No!!”
“She didn’t return to Atlanta with you?”
“Hell no! I got on a plane and came home by myself. I told you, I knew that chick for only a few hours. She even bailed on the conference early. You can ask anybody who was there. In fact, do. Ask Dorothy from Boston and Alan from Kalamazoo. They both met her too and then saw her take off. I’m not crazy. She disappeared and I never fucking saw her again .”
“Trent, did you see anyone else on Sunday or Monday when you were home? Go anywhere? See any friends, family, coworkers?”
“No, I told you I was sick. I stayed in.”
“So you have no alibi other than the fact that you were home sick?”
“It’s not an alibi. I was home sick. ”
From there, they just kept asking me questions and questions and questions until I almost lost my mind. I had to describe my job, my relationships, my childhood, and reenact every second of the conference and my return back home.
I decided not to tell them that I had skipped the mental health session, though. One, it would place me and Stephanie out of the conference at the same time, and two, it would tip off Bill, my boss, that I had lied to him. His cardinal sin was lying and people had been fired for doing so. I figured if Dorothy or Alan opened their big mouths and said I wasn’t at the session, I would explain that I had needed some air and got up for a moment, then watched it from the back of the room. Dorothy and Alan wouldn’t know if it was true or not—their backs would have been to me the entire time.
As the questioning droned on and on, I just kept trying to make sense of anything, literally anything, that was happening. Stephanie Monroe? That bitch had to be framing me. There was no other possible explanation.
About two hours into questioning, Portly Belly decided to drop the biggest bomb, though.
“Trent, can you explain why blood and hair were found in your apartment?”
“Whaaaat? What are you talking about?” I was in a panic now. What the fuck was happening?
“We found blood, hair, and this…” Portly opened a manila folder, took something out, and pushed two photos across the table at me. “Can you explain why these were in the breast pocket of your sport coat?”
They were pictures of women’s underwear. I had never seen them before.
I began to stammer. “I… I… I swear on my children’s lives. I have no… no… no idea.”
“Trent,” said Officer Spanish. “Semen was found on the underpants. And there’s something else: Investigators found a second woman’s ID buried in your backyard and DNA from that woman, Jasmine Littleton, in your suitcase. Can you explain that?”
Jasmine? Wasn’t that the name of the chick I met in the corner bar the night I returned from the conference? The one who stiffed me on the sexy picture?
I opened my mouth, but words would not come out.
“It’s not looking very good for you, Trent. Why don’t you just tell us what really happened?”