“It’s certainly possible. They had motive and means and maybe opportunity if their alibis don’t hold up. So we have to follow that through. Especially since we now know Davidson knew how to avoid the security gate.”
“Okay but if Davidson’s gun comes back as the murder weapon on Draymont and Lancer? What then?”
“Then maybe I’ve been looking at this case completely wrong,” conceded Decker.
Chapter 64
T?HE CALL CAME IN AS Decker and White were having breakfast at the hotel the following morning. Decker listened and then put his phone down.
“Well?” asked White.
“That was the U.S. attorney’s office. Based on the ballistics test, they went before a federal magistrate and had an arrest warrant issued for Barry Davidson for murder. The Feds are leading the prosecution because of Cummins’s connection. Their theory is Davidson killed all three.”
“So the ballistics matched on Draymont and Lancer. Which means you were looking at this case all wrong.”
Decker finished his coffee. “The U.S. marshals are making the pickup on Davidson. I do want to talk to him. Hopefully he’ll be sober.”
“What about Tyler?”
“Shitty all around. If his father gets convicted he’ll go off to college with an albatross wrapped around his neck.”
“If he even goes after all this.”
“Maybe the best thing for him to do is to get away from this place.”
*
Later that day, Decker and White arranged to interview Davidson at the federal lockup in Fort Myers, where he had been processed and jailed. They met him in a small, windowless room. He was in his prison-issued one-piece, his wrists and ankles shackled.
The man was stone-cold sober and also looked utterly bewildered. And he had, surprisingly, not requested a lawyer, at least not yet.
Decker had confirmed this with the marshals, and then with Davidson himself.
As he settled in across from Davidson, Decker couldn’t help feeling sorry for the man. He was either innocent or the most hapless murderer Decker had come across. And he had confronted some real doozies.
“They…they tell me my gun killed two people,” he began.
“Ballistics matched, yeah,” said Decker. “It’s why you were arrested.”
“I didn’t kill them. I didn’t even know them.”
“Well, one of them was in your ex’s house. He was killed at the same time she was,” pointed out White.
“And I didn’t kill Julia,” Davidson snapped.
Decker said, “How did you end up in her house last night?”
“We have a key in case Tyler needed to get in. I went in the rear door because there was a funny lock on the front door.”
“A police lock,” said White. “So same door that was left open by the killer.”
“I didn’t kill anyone!”
“Okay, but why were you there?” asked Decker.
“With a gun,” added White.
Davidson sunk his face into his hands. “I was drunk. I was…out of my head. I guess I just…missed her.”
“Why’d you take the gun?” asked Decker. “Why would you need it?”
Davidson shrugged and didn’t answer.
“You put the muzzle against your cheek. I was afraid you were going to pull the trigger and that would’ve been the end of you.”
Davidson again didn’t reply. He rubbed at his shackled wrists.
White said, “Some might see your wanting to kill yourself as a guilty conscience.”
Davidson shook his head but remained silent.
Decker said, “Tyler mentioned that your car’s security pass had expired?”
Davidson glanced up. “What? No, it hadn’t. It’s on auto renewal.”
“Then why not just come in through the gate?”
Davidson looked confused and troubled by the question. “I…I don’t remember.”
“Tyler intimated that you had previously cut through the golf course parking lot on foot to avoid the gate. Why do that, Barry? You must have had a reason to go to all that trouble.”
Davidson’s features were now guarded. “I don’t remember.”
“Did you make a habit of going over to her house, to check on things?” asked Decker.
Davidson glared at him. “You mean spy, don’t you? You think I was stalking her?”
“I think you hadn’t gotten over the divorce. My partner here feels the same.”
Davidson shot White a questioning glance but said nothing.