my hard blue eyes—and he took it to heart.
He said, “I met Carly at the Bridge one night about three months ago. I was sitting at the bar. Carly was a couple stools down, and I started talking to her. She was very cute. I moved over next to her. I bought her a drink. I asked her what kind of work she did and she told me. She said she didn’t make a lot of money and was trying to pay off her college loans.”
He shrugged. I drummed my fingers on the table. I wanted him to get to it. Faster.
Lopez said, “I told her I’d be happy to help her work off the loan and I’d give her a pretty good deal, a fifty-fifty split after taking out for expenses. She laughed. Asked me what I meant. I told her and she told me I was crazy.
“So about a month after I made that offer, she called me and said she wanted to do it.”
Conklin said, “She agreed to be a prostitute?”
Lopez said, “She had decided. I didn’t pressure her. Not at all. She said she wanted to try. I made a date for her. I drove her to the Big Four. I like that place because they don’t ask any questions.
“I stayed in the parking lot while Carly was having her date. I had told her I would be lookout in case of trouble. She made a couple hundred bucks and told me to make another date for her.”
“And you did?” Conklin asked.
Lopez said, “Once or twice a month. That was all she would do. Hey. To be honest, Sergeant, I don’t know for sure that she even liked guys.”
“Explain,” I said.
“Just a feeling I had. Look. A lotta girls who turn tricks hate men, don’t you think?”
“Go on with your story, Denny. There’s a line forming outside, people waiting for this room.”
He looked up at the two-way mirror and waved.
I slapped my hand down on the table and his attention came back to me.
Lopez said, “I picked guys who weren’t too gross, and she seemed fine with it for a month or so. Then, a few weeks ago, she said she didn’t want to do it anymore.”
I said, “Is that right?”
I took out my phone, showed Denny the pictures of him coming down the stairs at the back of the motel.
“You recognize this guy?”
He looked at the picture, eyes moving over the small screen, pausing, clearing his throat, then saying, “That’s me.”
“That was a week ago,” I told him.
“I was there,” he said, “but not with Carly.”
I was ready with my follow-up questions. I asked him if he knew Adele Saran and Susan Jones. I showed him the picture I had of all three of them together at a table at the Bridge.
Lopez said he’d seen them there but never spoken to Adele or Susan.
He added, “Those are the missing women I heard about?”
“I think you know that.”
He stood up from his seat and yelled in my face, “You’ve got the wrong man. You’ve got the wrong man! I didn’t hurt anyone. And now I’m getting out of here. Adios.”
CHAPTER 60
Conklin stood up and said to Lopez in his very reasonable and patient voice, “Hey, Denny, you’re free to leave, okay? But come on. We’re not trying to pin anything on you. We’re trying to save some lives here.”
I left Denny to Conklin and went to get our person of interest a soft drink. By the time I had returned to the box, Lopez was chatting with Conklin as if they were old friends.
That was a good thing and I hated to break the mood, but I was still half crazy worrying about two missing schoolteachers. I took my seat, pushed the can of soda over to Lopez.
He popped the top, took a swig.
I pulled out my phone again and said, “Denny, here’s the timeline. Carly checked into the Big Four on Tuesday night a week ago. On Thursday she was found dead in room 212. Murdered. This picture of you is time-stamped 11:23 p.m. Tuesday, the night we think she was killed. You were coming down from her room. What were you doing there? Make me understand.”
Lopez heaved a sigh.
“I didn’t go to her room,” he said. “Actually, I was waiting for Daisy, my new girl. Daisy was in room 314, the top floor. I was in the parking lot, and I saw some man in a sports jacket leave 212, the room Carly always