Thin Luck

Chapter 9

Chapter 9

Detective Joseph Turner

TURNER LOOKED OUT the window to the sun and puffy clouds. Today would have been a good one for golfing. The temperature had dipped down to the mid-forties, but then the greens would be less crowded with fair-weather golfers.

He'd been up all night with the victims of Robyn's assault. The best way he knew to track a fugitive was to work their crimes backward, starting with the most recent. Turner separated the husbands, Steve, and the victim, Addison, into two different interview rooms. The story Lena documented was sketchy at best. He never documented how Steve recognized Mrs. Hughes if he wasn't there for the assault. Steve crumbled under fifteen minutes of interrogation. He suspected his husband of cheating, and had followed him that night after dropping their son off to his sister's house. Steve was shocked to learn that his husband cheated on him with a woman. Addison drove around in circles for almost an hour after leaving the bar. When he and that woman pulled over at a park, Steve gathered up all his strength and went to confront Addison, but he had to pull that woman off of his husband. She was beating him, and took a swing at Steve too, but he pushed her out of the car and drove Addison to the hospital. Steve had convinced Addison they needed to go to the police with a story about the assault before that woman told her side of the story. Only when they walked into the police station did Steve recognize Robyn from the picture on Detective Lena's computer.

Addison kept to the fable he had concocted with his husband until Turner pushed Steve's confession in front of him.

The next morning Turner read through all of the reports concerning Robyn Hughes, including her time at York. He wanted to know what exactly what he was getting into. The pressure for finding her was greater than he'd ever experienced or expected for a parole violator. They fell through the cracks all the time. He'd never seen such a manhunt-or rather woman hunt-on the basis of a parole violation. But after the talk with his Lieutenant, the situation became clear. The state prosecutor, Nathan Welch, was taking a run for State Attorney General. He based his entire platform on cleaning up the prisons. He'd given a number of speeches on drug use in prison and how he planned to stop the flow. Unfortunately, his first witness in the women's prison could no longer speak since her voice box was crushed. Although Welch ardently denied it, someone found out she was a snitch and tortured her for it.

Robyn, a former investigative reporter and model prisoner, would be a star witness with her charisma and attention for detail. She also happened to be the former cellmate of Carla Brooks, the woman under indictment. Welch needed Robyn, but not to put her back in prison. She needed to be the reformed prisoner in the jury's eyes. Welch hadn't done his homework, however. He didn't know Robyn's husband wasn't going to be there to pick her up, or he would have put her in protective custody right away. Even now, if Turner could find her, he was instructed to put her in custody, not in jail. He was specifically given instructions from the Lieutenant not to charge her with anything. But none of the other cops were supposed to know that.

The fact that her husband, Nick, wasn't there to pick her up needled at Turner. Most of his investigations were with missing persons or homicides. He was interested to hear in this case, at least eventually, both sides of the story. So often he only got to hear one side, and had to infer from everyone around the homicide victim or missing person what they were really like. More often than not, those stories left more inconsistencies and questions, than answers. But once he found Robyn he'd be able to ask her what was really going on from her perspective.

The pimply-faced uniform officer standing in front of Turner's desk broke his train of thought. "Sir? I think we found him."

"Who?" Turner asked.