Shoemaker said, “You could have killed her that night, taken the train home, and come back into town on the six twenty.”
“But again, the train station may have cameras, and the office building has a security guard.”
“You didn’t have to take the train,” Ekman pointed out. “And the guard makes rounds.”
“But you need a security card to get in the building. There’s a record of coming and going because of that.”
And it shows me coming and me going at the critical time in question, so why are you jerking my chain on all this other crap? wondered Devine.
“We’re checking all that,” said Shoemaker. “It’s taking a little time to pull the records.”
And I won’t be happy with what you find.
“You get up at four a.m. to work out?” said Ekman.
“Doesn’t everybody?”
“Anybody corroborate this?”
“No. I slept alone and I worked out alone. Nobody else around.”
“No roommates?”
“Yeah. Three. But they were asleep at that hour, like most normal people. They can’t alibi me.”
“How do you know?” asked Ekman.
“Because I asked them if they could when this Hancock guy showed up and seemed to be trying to pin all this on me. But they couldn’t. And I wouldn’t ask them to lie.”
Shoemaker studied him so closely that Devine was sure the man was going to read him his rights and cuff him. “What a nice guy you are,” he said, but there didn’t seem to be much acid behind it. The big cop just looked truly confused.
“If you saw this Hancock again, would you recognize him?” asked Ekman.
“Hell yes I would. I don’t like getting played. And why pick on me in the first place? That’s what I don’t get.”
“Well, maybe there’s something special about you, Devine, at least when it comes to Sara Ewes,” said Shoemaker.
Devine didn’t like any bit of that remark.
The two men rose as though connected by string. “You don’t leave the area,” warned Shoemaker.
“I have no intention of doing that. I have a job to do.”
Shoemaker looked around. “Yeah, making dough at this place.”
“That’s not the job I’m referring to.”
And it wasn’t. He was thinking about Emerson Campbell and the mission. He was also thinking about dead Sara Ewes.
Shoemaker and Ekman exchanged curious glances and then left.
Devine sat there for a few minutes digesting everything that had just happened and trying to place it neatly into certain boxes in his mind that would make the most sense. Some of it did, much of it didn’t.
Sara was pregnant and then had an abortion? This news was staggering to him.
He ran a hand through his hair and closed his eyes for a moment, trying to process all this: Was I the father? We slept together once. I didn’t use protection because she said she was on the pill, but maybe she wasn’t. They didn’t say when she had the abortion. Did I lose a child and not even know about it?
He rose and looked out the small window. Staring back at him was another building of equal height. He felt boxed in, trapped, blindsided beyond all reason.
And they’re going to look at the entry log and they’re going to see my name as the only one. And then they’re going to be back. With an arrest warrant. And who the hell is Karl Hancock?
But now it made sense why the guy had approached Devine away from the office both times. If he wasn’t a real cop, it was much safer that way.
He lifted his lanyard from around his neck and looked at his security badge. He had not been in the building when Ewes had been murdered. So maybe someone had stolen his badge and then returned it before he woke up at his home in the suburbs, which he did not think was likely at all because the timing was just too tight. Or maybe someone hacked into the system and set me up as the fall guy. That was also not easy to do. But for the person who had sent an email that could not be traced by the best in the business, it might be a piece of cake.
He shuffled back to work, with what felt like a knife sticking right in his gut.
CHAPTER
29
WHEN DEVINE RETURNED TO HIS office, he found several of the other Burners staring daggers at him as he walked in. He retook his seat. Something was up. Somebody knew what was going on and had shared it with others. Emails and texts must have been flying since he’d been gone.
Devine had a few people here he’d gone out with on occasion for beers or meals and a couple of concerts, and he counted Wanda Simms as a friend. His direct supervisor had lots of newbies just like Devine to oversee, and the unwritten rule at Cowl and Comely was you never got close to any Burner because chances were very good they would be gone in less than a year. And the competition here was so fierce that close friendships were just not possible, at least that was the perennial vibe around here.