A Deadly Game by Catherine Crier Read Free Book Online Page B

any?"
    "Yeah."
    "Yours?"
    "There were three, two from me and one from Ron, her stepfather, asking for whipped cream when we came over." With an air of annoyance, he added, "That's when I said, hey man, he's calling me for whipped cream?"
    "Did you erase them?"
    "No."
    The detective made a mental note. Most people would erase unnecessary messages unless there was some other reason to keep them . . . like an alibi. "Okay, so then you called over to her mom's?"
    "That's right."
    "Had they heard from her?"
    "No. Not all day."
    "Was that unusual?"
    "No. I think we were supposed to be there for dinner at six or six-thirty."
    "Okay, so you told Sharon, or did you talk to Ron?"
    "Talked to, ah, talked to Mom, Sharon. I asked if Laci was there. She told me no."
    "Who called us?" the detective asked.
    "Ron."
    "Did he tell you he was gonna call?"
    "Yeah."
    "Who all did you call, other people then?"
    Scott said he had immediately called Laci's closest friends, Stacey and Renee. He pointed out that he'd opened the phone book to start calling hospitals when Sharon rang back, but admitted that he wasn't sure about the sequence. According to Scott, Sharon said they would call the police. He should check with the neighbors and then look in the park. "I mean, I may have checked the neighbors, then come back and got on the phone."
    "Had any of your neighbors seen or heard anything?" Brocchini asked.
    "Ah, first neighbor I checked with was directly across the street; her name's Amy." He was referring to Amy Krigbaum, who lived at 520 Covena Avenue with her roommate, Tara Venable. Scott left a note with his next-door neighbor, Karen Servas. She was the person who later told Scott about finding McKenzie running loose with his leash on. Whatever the actual order of events, less than fifteen minutes transpired between Scott's first call to Sharon and her insistence that he go to the park.
    "Was   there anything unusual,   out of the ordinary in your house?"
    "The only unusual things, ah, were the leash . . . and the door unlocked."
    "How 'bout the gun? How, how long has that been in your car?"
    Scott explained that the Llama .22-caliber had been in his glove box for about a month. Scott had brought the pistol on a trip to Lone Pine with his father to shoot pheasant. "I tried to shoot it once on the trip but it didn't go off."
    The detective shifted the focus. "Have you guys had any problems, ah, marriage problems?" "No," Scott assured him. "Everything is good?" "Uh-huh." "And you have been married four years?"
    "Yeah, four or five, I'm thinking. I think this is five. I got married in '97."
    Shifting again, Brocchini asked about the park. "Times you've walked in the park you said that, ah, you have seen campers, bums or whatever. Has Laci ever complained to you about somebody bothering her?"
    "Naw," Scott replied. "I mean, like I said, I don't think they'd come up to her and accost her in any way. You know, she has times she's felt uncomfortable and thankfully she has the dog. We've called the police a couple times about people down there just to get 'em to move on, you know, and it's not uncommon for Laci or myself to wake one of these guys or ladies up and tell him to get lost." At this point, Scott still seemed convinced that McKenzie would have warded off any attackers. Later, he would change his story and assert that his wife was probably accosted in the park for her jewelry.
    The interview moved on to the Peterson's housekeeper, Margarita.
    "Maggie or Margarita, she was there on Monday . . . and obviously she did a lotta work because the house wasn't filthy.
    "Why was your wife mopping on Tuesday morning?"
    "I don't know. Got me-I mean, she was pretty fastidious about it, though," Scott replied-describing his wife in the past tense.
    "Was she?" Brocchini asked.
    "With the dog and the cats and her doing, ah, the Christmas deal, that was pretty common." He added, "Yeah, she always had the vacuum or mop out." The past tense again.
    "You haven't