Chapter Archer
ARCHER
The Prims live in a mid-century modern single-story house on the fringes of town where, to their left, the more affluent, snobby, HOA loving folks cling desperately to their bank accounts and neighborhood society hierarchy, but to their right, kids are going hungry, yards are overgrown, cars are used as lawn ornaments, and the haves and have nots spend all their time hating each other and wishing those people would just move out of the neighborhood so things could go back to the way they were.
It’s a system everyone loves to hate, and a social construct in which both sides believe their misfortunes are the result of the neighbors they loathe, and not because of the government that put them there.
Inside the Prims’ home, the walls are painted crisp white, family portraits sit proudly above the mantel, the carpets are about a decade old, but because they’re so clean, it’s easy to see which sections experience higher foot traffic and which sections get none at all.
Mrs. Prim nervously bustles from the kitchen and sets a jug of iced tea and a stack of glasses on a small coffee table in the middle of the room, and on her second trip back, she places a plate of cookies beside it.
Drake and I consume neither.
We sit on the three-seater leather sofa, while directly across from us, Geoffrey Prim glowers.
Because he’s a cranky fuck, I guess.
He’s one of the haves, terrified of losing even an inch to the have-nots.
“Is this gonna take long?” Scott Prim, the male half of the boy-girl twin duo, sits on the second single recliner right beside his dad and sports a matching scowl.
No DNA test required.
“I have something going on with my friends this afternoon.”
“What kind of thing?” Drake perches on the edge of the couch, exactly like I do, and rests his elbows on his knees. Like I do. “A girl is dead, Scott. Surely your thing isn’t as important as finding whoever hurt her.”
“My social obligations can still be important.” He doesn’t need his parents to speak for him. The prick broadens his chest and squares his shoulders. “It sucks she died, but that doesn’t make my thing irrelevant.”
“Why don’t you tell us about your relationship with Josey?
” I bring my focus across to his father, but I keep the shaky Rhonda Prim in my peripherals, and the shakier Tara Prim, too, as she wanders into the room.
Neither of the women sits, since brother and father take the recliners and don’t seem all that inclined to move for them.
“Josey’s worked for your family for eight months, is that right?
” I take out my notebook purely for something to hold.
A prop that always makes folks nervous. “Since Christmas break, correct?”
Clueless, Geoffrey simply looks to his wife.
“Y-yes, Detective. Since Christmas break.”
“Scott received an early offer to Copeland U,” Geoffrey inserts gruffly. “Full-ride scholarship, but only if he maintains a 4.0 and doesn’t get injured.”
“Injured how?” Drake’s brow shoots high on his forehead. “Sport?”
“Football,” Scott inserts smugly. “I’m the best damn quarterback this side of the country. So long as I keep up with my grades and training schedule, and don’t bust my shoulder, I’m a shoo-in for the NFL.”
“He’s ambidextrous,” Rhonda gloats, haughty despite the tremble in her hands. “He can throw from both sides. The coaches really like that.”
“No way.” Drake is like a fuckin’ shark, zeroing in on the kid and showing his teeth. To outsiders, it might look like a smile. To those of us who know, he’s on the hunt. “Both sides? That’s pretty rare, huh?”
“It’s unheard of,” Geoffrey rumbles. “He’s strong on both sides. Has been since he first held a rattle.”
“So that’s why you hired Josey?” I bring us back to her. To the woman whose throat was slit. To the life ended by a coward. “To keep his grades up?”
“I’m hoping to qualify for a scholarship, too,” Tara adds nervously.
If Geoffrey and Scott are the loud men of the house, and Rhonda is the woman who irons their shirts and ensures a hot meal on the table every night, I reckon Tara might be the quiet, forgotten child.
The mousy, unobtrusive, rule-following one.
She didn’t even have the good fortune to be born years before or after Scott.
To have her moment to shine. She was just one of two born on the same day, and unfortunately for her, I doubt that rattle her father speaks of was ever shared with her.
“I want to work in forensics, too. Like Josey.”
“Did you talk a lot during your study sessions?” Drake asks, even as she steps forward and pours a glass of tea—with her right hand. “Lots of girl chat?”
“Sometimes. About school stuff.” Like the good little Cinderella she is, she sets the jug down and offers the full glass to her father.
He accepts, so she pours a second. For Scott.
“Josey was only a grade ahead of us, so it didn’t always feel like a tutor/student relationship. Sometimes we even said hey at school.”
“Did you hang out socially?” I decline her offer of a drink with a gentle shake of my head. “No, thank you. Did you and Josey go places for fun?”
She takes the tea for herself and backs up to stand beside her mom. “We had different social groups. A year in the real world doesn’t seem like a lot, but in school, it can feel huge. We never had classes together. Never had a sport together. Didn’t run track together. Nothing like that.”
“Do you run track?” Drake looks her up and down. Not like he’s checking her out, though I dislike him enough to wish I could accuse him of ogling a kid, but like he’s searching for the athletic lines her brother boasts. “Run a lot?”
“Yes, sir, my whole life. Not competitively or anything. But while my dad and brother bonded over football, my mom and I ran. It’s quieter,” she murmurs. “Calmer.”
It’s not charging face-first toward a two-hundred-and-fifty-pound dude who wouldn’t mind breaking your neck for a ball.
“Our tutoring sessions weren’t always work, work, work,” she admits, “since we still knew each other at school. I know who her friends are. Who her boyfriend is. Things like that. But it was always surface-level.”
“She was a professional,” Rhonda adds. “Sessions typically went for an hour each, so she’d dedicate the first five minutes to checking in with us all. But once they’d settled in, she was always on task and very detail-oriented.”
I bring my eyes across to Scott. “Did you and your sister double up and sit with Josey for the full two hours, or were your sessions always separate?”
“My sister’s a friggin—”
“Separate,” Geoffrey cuts in firmly. “Our children have different interests, Detective. Different goals. Different social aspirations. Combining their time to get a single two-hour slot proved useless, because their strengths and weaknesses differed inside the classroom.”
“Scott doesn’t like it when anyone else can listen to his sessions,” Tara adds. “Like, he gets embarrassed when—”
“I’m not embarrassed! I just don’t like to see your ugly face when I’m trying to concentrate.”
“Scott…” Rhonda hums her disapproval, shaking her head to shut him up. “Don’t be unkind to your sister.”
“I don’t mind if people can hear us,” Tara continues. “But it made Scott uncomfortable sometimes, so then he asked if they could study in his room.”
“Shut the fuck up, you freak! This is why I can’t study with you around. You don’t know how to mind your own damn business.”
“Enough,” Geoffrey snaps, his reprimand coming out like a whip.
“Who said twins were supposed to be close?” Rhonda laughs nervously. “I was so sure they’d be best friends.”
Scott scoffs. No fuckin’ chance, Mom.
“My son has a girlfriend,” Geoffrey adds. “They’re pretty serious, so even though he prefers privacy when studying, he realized being in the room alone with Josey could be construed poorly, so he brought things back to the dining table after just one session away from it.”
“Beth is a really sweet girl,” Rhonda murmurs. “Very affluent family. Geoff’s been talking to him a lot lately about how perception matters. Like, if you hang out with rough kids, you might be perceived as one of the rough kids. If you spend your time with losers…”
“You might be perceived as a loser,” Drake finishes. “Got it. So if he hangs out in a private space with another girl, it might be perceived badly by his girlfriend.”
“Exactly. He’ll be eighteen soon. The higher someone rises and the more successful we become, the more intensely those looking in from the outside will scrutinize.”
“It matters to us that our children conduct themselves accordingly.”
“Great. Are we done now?” Scott pushes off the recliner and slams the three-quarters-full glass of tea back on the table. “I have things to do, detectives. But maybe you could arrest my sister for being a freak.”
“Who needs enemies when you have a brother like him?” Drake beats me to the driver’s side of our cruiser, takes the keys, starts the engine, and says nothing of the twitching curtains at the front of the Prims’ house.
Pulling away from the curb, he watches from the corner of his eye as I bring up Josey’s best friend’s address on my phone and set it in the cradle on the dash.
“I wonder if that prick has a sealed juvie record already stinking up a judge’s filing cabinet?
He’s got a terrible attitude toward women in general, can’t stand his sister’s existence, treats his mother like a maid, bows down to the almighty father figure, and considers himself a real fuckin’ catch with the ladies he hates so much. ”
“Add in that he uses both hands interchangeably, and shit’s starting to look a little dicey for him.
” I pluck the notebook from my back pocket and scan the scribbles I jotted down while inside their house.
“No alibis to speak of, except each other. Father and son claim they were at home watching college football highlights. Tara and Rhonda were at the mall.”