barks, howls, coughs, cackles, and a high-pitched keen, like manic ghosts. Carlo told me once they do that when they’ve killed something.
Sixteen
Still rattled from my experience of the day before, brooding about who had hired the killer and how I was going to find out, yet knowing that I was going to have to appear knowledgeable about Coleman’s continuing the investigation of Lynch, I pulled the DVD labeled “Lynch Interrogation: Session 12,” from its pocket in Coleman’s report. Because the case was so big they hadn’t relied on just recording him but videotaped every session for posterity. The date on it was August 7, three days before Coleman had gathered us all together to go find Jessica’s body.
To avoid Carlo’s hearing any of the interrogation I got up and shut the door of my office, and for good measure kept the volume so low that I had to lean forward to catch the dialogue. The video loaded to reveal an empty room, standard interrogation, like a white box with two chairs and no table to hide their body language.
As I watched, the door to the room opened and a jailer led Lynch in, dressed in his orange prison suit and handcuffs. Lynch shuffled immediately to the far chair as if he’d done this enough times to know the drill. After spending so many hours in this room, he had also discovered the camera mounted in the corner near the ceiling. He waved at me, then apparently forgot the camera was there and lifted his cuffed hands to run his upper lip back and forth over the wart on the back of his hand the way he had when we were at the crime scene. When he bit down on it, he didn’t show any pain.
I stopped the film and studied him more closely than I had been able to at Jessica’s scene. There was the dark curly hair I remembered, the ski nose, and the wire-rimmed glasses. Now I noticed other details, how his upper lip was more prominent than his jaw. How his fingers showed he was a fine-boned man. I noticed again that scabby patch on one cheek that looked like it got picked at when he was bored with biting his wart. How his ears stuck out from his head.
After a few minutes Coleman and Max Coyote entered the room. I couldn’t see them, but Lynch said hello to both. I heard the skreek of the other chair on the tiled floor as Coleman took the chair facing Lynch. Max would stand, leaning against the wall by the door, the usual stance. Lynch rose just enough to make a little bow, convincingly respectful without threatening Coleman, and sat back down. While he was the only one I could see throughout the interrogation, I imagined both of them sitting there with their little wire-rimmed glasses, looking like social studies teachers in conference.
Lynch lifted his hand to show a small smear of blood. Did he do this to create the sense that he had some control over his captors?
I heard Max open the door, speak to the jailer outside, and come back in with a tissue. He appeared briefly in front of the camera while he handed the tissue to Lynch and then retreated back to his spot near the door. Lynch dabbed the wart and balled up the Kleenex in his fist so the blood didn’t show. When he was done, Coleman spoke:
COLEMAN: Good morning, Floyd.
LYNCH: Good morning, Agent Coleman.
COLEMAN: Did you sleep well?
LYNCH: Not too bad. My cell is bigger than the cab of my rig. Want to know something else?
COLEMAN: What’s that?
LYNCH: I was thinking some, talking to you has made me think a lot, and decided I must’ve talked more to you than anybody else in my whole life.
COLEMAN: Why do you think that is?
LYNCH: Not much of a talker, I guess.
COLEMAN: Did you talk to the girls a lot, Floyd?
LYNCH: No, not much. I didn’t want them to talk. (Closes his eyes and with his fingertips makes a circular motion on his thighs, as if he’s lost in the memories. The cuffs make his hands move in sync with each other.) Girls never said anything nice to me.
COLEMAN: Please open your eyes, Floyd. (He does, but looks slightly off to the right, a dreamy expression on his face.)
COLEMAN: Is that why you switched to having sex with dead girls, Floyd? Because they didn’t talk?
LYNCH: I thought we went over all that already.
COLEMAN: Do it