Page 5 of Red Snow
“JERRY, I REALLYdon’t like being lied to. In fact, I don’t even want to be here. I’d much rather be at home with my girlfriend, watching reruns ofGame of Thronesbecause the next season is taking so damn long to come out. But instead, I’m sitting in a fucking interrogation room, listening to you tell me lies about where you were the night Douglas Mitchell was murdered. So, do us both a favor, and tell me the truth, Jerry. You couldn’t have been at home because your DNA was found at the crime scene. Your blood, Jerry. Your skin. Stop bullshitting and tell me the truth, before my partner comes in here and turns this room upside down.”
I stand on the other side of the one-way mirror listening to my partner, Marcus, trying to get Jerry Bales to confess to killing his ex-girlfriend’s boyfriend, and with every passing second, I feel my blood starting to boil. Right about now, those little bubbles are multiplying and I’m feeling more and more on edge.
I love my partner to death, but he’s the nice one. Marcus Phillips and I have been partners at the Anchorage Police Department going on two years now, but we’ve been best friends since we were in the eighth grade. Marcus’s father was stationed at the military installation, Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson, when he was fourteen years old, and he and I hit it off right from the jump. After we graduated from Bartlett High School together, we joined the academy at the same time. We’re partners through and through, even though we didn’t officially become partners until a couple of years ago, after I lost my last partner. That’s a long story in itself, so I won’t go there right now. Let’s focus on the positive, shall we? Moving right along.
Marcus and I are the perfect example of how opposites attract. Our personalities are on opposite ends of the spectrum, and I think that’s why we make such a good team for the APD, Homicide Unit. Marcus is the thinker. While he looks like he’ll slap the shit out of you without even thinking twice, he’s actually the one who wants to take things slowly and exhaust all options before becoming too drastic. He always keeps his cool, and he’s a fantastic police officer. I’m not just saying that because we’ve been friends for seventeen years, either. I really mean it. Marcus is probably a better police officer than me, but I get better results.
My name is Detective Jarrod Granger, and once upon a time, I tried to be like Marcus. I tried to take my time and ease my way into situations, but my career was going nowhere because that’s just not who I am. I used to be seen as the guy who couldn’t get things done in the APD, but one day I had a big case fall to me, and everything changed. I stopped relying on trying to be like everyone else, and I just started being Jarrod. The next thing I knew, I’d solved Alaska’s first serial killer case since the eighties, and I was never the same again.
See, I’ve learned over the years that you can’t try too hard. You have to be who you are, even if that means rubbing a few people the wrong way, or pissing off your sergeant, or fucking up relationships because you’re too dedicated to your job. You have to be who you are, and I’m a bit of an asshole. Yeah, I admit it because I don’t give a fuck. I’m proud of who I am and what I’ve been able to accomplish in this life and in my career since I started being myself, and there isn’t a spec of shame in my bones. I’m Jarrod Granger, a confident, brash, smartass who gets shit done. If you don’t like me for me, fuck you. Your hate won’t stop me from fucking the next girl, or solving the next case. I’m untouchable.
This Jerry Bales case—the one we’re about to wrap up now—is nothing compared to what put me on the map in in this department. Remember that thing I said about losing my last partner? Well, my first big case had a lot to do with that.
The killer was dubbed the Tongue Snatcher by the media because all the victims had been stabbed nineteen times and had their tongues cut out of their mouths. It was fucking brutal, and the asshole had already claimed three victims by the time my old partner, Misty Lawrence, and I finally caught on to what exactly we were dealing with. The case was a gigantic web of lies and deceit that was thicker than anything I could’ve ever imagined, and it nearly cost me my job, my friendship with Marcus, and my life. And it actually did cost me my partner.
Sometimes I think about it all, and I don’t know how I came out of it alive. I wasthisclose to dying, and so was the woman I met while investigating the case—the only woman I can honestly say I’ve ever loved—Stacey Alexander.
My commitment to my job ended up being a dagger in the heart of our relationship, but Stacey and I had a good thing going for about a year. Unfortunately, she couldn’t handle the long hours and the unpredictability. She ended it and set me free to do my own thing, but I’d be lying if I said I don’t think about her from time to time. Yeah, Stacey’s amazing.
Anyway, the same thing that was poison to my relationship with Stacey, is the very thing that makes me a great detective. I love what I do, and I dedicate myself to it completely. Plenty of people can say plenty of things about me, but they can never say I’m not good at my job. It’s true, I fuck a lot of girls, I drink quite a bit, and I’m a fucking loose cannon, but it all makes me who I am, and I’m good at what I do because of who I am. So, as I stand here listening to Marcus and Jerry bickering back and forth, I take pride in the fact that I’m able to get results, because it’s time to make results happen right now.
I give Marcus another minute to try to trap Jerry in a lie about his bullshit alibi, but when I see it isn’t getting him anywhere, I know it’s game time. I take off my black coat and hang it on a chair behind me, making sure both of my guns in my shoulder harness are visible when I stride through the door and sit down on the table between Marcus and Jerry.
Both men stop talking when I walk in. Marcus looks amused. Two years of being my partner has given him a pretty good sense about how things are about to go. Jerry, on the other hand, looks uneasy. We haven’t had to talk much because I let Marcus do the politicking, but Jerry already knows which of us is the “bad cop.”
“What’s going on, Jerry?” I ask him, cutting my eyes to glare at him.
“Detective Granger,” is his only reply as he breaks eye contact and looks at Marcus, while I press thestopbutton on the tape recorder the same way I did on the video recorder before I came into the room.
“There’s no need to look at my partner now, Jerry,” I snip as I lean over to make him look at me. “You had your chance with him and you blew it. Now you’re talking to me, and what I want to talk about is your DNA being at the crime scene.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. That ain’t my blood,” Jerry says in defiance.
“Not your blood? How the fuck could itnotbe your blood? You think we went to your house, pulled some of your blood out of your body while you were asleep, and planted it at the scene of your ex’s boyfriend’s murder? Do we look like evil geniuses to you?”
Jerry doesn’t answer.
“I’m not in the mood for playing fucking games, Jerry, so I won’t beat around the bush with you,” I continue. “Here’s my take on this whole thing. When Suzanne broke it off with you, you had some trouble dealing with that, which is obvious based on the police reports she filed and the restraining order she put on you for being a fucking creepo stalker. After we got involved, you backed off, probably still watching her from afar with binoculars and shit. That is, until she got a new boyfriend. Oh I bet that just ticked you right off, didn’t it, Jerry?
“You fought it for as long as you could, but eventually you knew old Douglas had to go, so you followed him on his run through Mountain View. We all know Mountain View is a bad neighborhood. People get jumped, beat up, shot and stabbed there all the time, don’t they? So you figured you could beat the guy up in Mountain View and it wouldn’t raise suspicion. But he put up a fight, didn’t he? Yeah, old Douglas wasn’t going down without a fight, so you had to stab him in order to win. He fought you off, he scratched you, and he punched you. That’s why he had your skin cells under his fingernails and your blood was on the ground next to his body.”
Jerry never looks up at me, choosing only to stare at the metal table in front of him.
“You flipped out because he was messing with Suzanne, and you killed him. The three of us in this room know it’s true, so let’s not act like we don’t. But the part that’s important to me is what comes after this. After we leave this room. You see, I’m not too big on wasting time, not mine and not anybody else’s. So, the last thing I wanna do is go through some lengthy trial where you pay some asshole lawyer a bazillion dollars to claim self-defense or some other crap. We know you killed Douglas Mitchell.Youknow you killed Douglas Mitchell. And you’re gonna admit that you did it.”
Jerry’s eyes leap up to meet mine as shock spreads across his thin face. He almost looks amused by what I just said.
“Excuse me?” he says behind a light chuckle. “I’m gonna do what?”
I look over at Marcus who smiles and shrugs, egging me on.
“Did I not say it right?” I ask Marcus, half joking. “Am I speaking Chinese again? Oh wait, that’s right, I can’t speak fucking Chinese, so I know I said it clearly in English. You’re gonna admit that you killed Douglas Mitchell. You’re gonna confess and plead guilty.”
“Holy shit!” Jerry exclaims with a wide smile. “You guys really are crazy. I mean, I heard about you, Detective Granger. I heard you were a bit off your rocker and that you liked to toe the line between edgy cop and criminal, but this is downright hilarious. You think I’m gonna confess? You’re outta your mind.”
Jerry actually has the audacity to start laughing out loud, making a mockery of me and my partner to our faces. I let him enjoy the moment, putting my hands in my lap and grinning at Marcus, who subtlety shakes his head, waiting for Jerry to stop. We don’t even interrupt the guy, and it takes him about a minute to finally get it out of his system.
“Well,” I begin as Jerry clears his throat and really sells the amusement. “I’m really glad you’re in a good mood, Jerry. I am too, which makes this whole thing that much more fun. But before we go any further, I need some more information. Which hand is your dominant hand?”
