“Saturday, August 25,” Mike replied. “The same day you gave her the beer and asked if you could come to the party.”
“Okay, I admit it. When I brought her the beer, I asked about going to the party. But I can prove I didn’t go to her house that night.”
“How? Where were you?” Mike demanded.
“I drove down to Atlantic City that night. I stayed at the Tropicana. I gambled most of the night.”
“What time did you get to the Tropicana?”
“I checked in around ten o’clock.”
Mike quickly did the math. Atlantic City was 140 miles from Saddle River. Even if Dietz was really pushing it, it would have taken him over two hours to get there. If he murdered Kerry at 11:15, the earliest he could have gotten to the Tropicana was about 1:30 A.M.
“In that garbage pail that you call a wallet, I didn’t see a receipt for the Tropicana.”
“I don’t save everything.”
“Did you drive to Atlantic City?”
“Yes.”
“Alone?”
“Yes.”
“Whose car?”
“Mine.”
“Do you have an E-ZPass?”
“Not since I lost my credit card. I pay cash for my tolls.”
“How did you pay for your hotel room?”
“Cash.”
“Okay, Eddie, I’m gonna check out your Tropicana story. I know where to find you if I need you.”
? ? ?
As Mike walked quickly toward the door, the desk sergeant called out to him. “Detective, Officer Fitchet asks if you could wait a few minutes. She wants to talk to you before you leave.”
“Okay,” Mike said as he moved over to a chair and sat down. He dialed Artie Schulman, who picked up on the first ring. “Artie, I’m still at the Lodi police station. The guy they picked up is the tow truck driver we’ve been looking for. He’s claiming he was in Atlantic City at the time of the murder. I’m checking his story.”
“Good work. I’ll ask if we have any contacts here that can move things along more quickly. Keep me posted.”
Out of the corner of his eye Mike spotted Sandy Fitchet heading toward him with a piece of paper in her hand. She took the seat next to him. “I just spoke to my uncle, Herb Phillips. He’s a lieutenant with the State Police in South Jersey. He works closely with security people at the casinos. Uncle Herb said he and the Tropicana’s director of security can meet you or one of your people tomorrow morning at ten to look at surveillance footage. Here are their phone numbers.”
“I’m in court tomorrow morning. I can’t go myself. I’ll send one of my investigators. I owe you a dinner. Thanks so much,” Mike said as he hurried out to his car.
His first call was to Sam Hines. After briefing him on the Dietz questioning, Mike said, “Set your alarm. You need to be in Atlantic City by ten o’clock. Call Artie and fill him in.”
? ? ?
Mike was in his office the next morning doing paperwork. A delay at the trial had pushed his testimony to the afternoon. When his phone rang at eleven-thirty, the ID screen showed Tropicana Hotel. He picked it up.
“Sam, what have you got?”
“Reservations records show a single room for the night of August 25 booked by a Mr. Edward Dietz. The room was paid for in advance with cash. Security footage shows a young white male who I’m absolutely certain is Dietz entering the hotel at 9:49 P.M. There’s more footage I can go through from inside the casino but—”
“Don’t bother,” Mike said. “If he’s in AC at almost ten, there’s no way he’s back in Saddle River at eleven-fifteen. Thank the guys down there for me.”
Mike hung up the phone and exhaled. He was not looking forward to telling Assistant Prosecutor Artie Schulman and Prosecutor Matt Koenig that once again their only suspects in the Dowling murder were Alan Crowley and Jamie Chapman.
68
Marina Long had begun to worry about whether she should give up her job. She had always had a flair for fashion and had gone to work at a dress shop in nearby Ridgewood. She had an innate sense for helping customers choose the right style for their body type and personality. She already had a number of regular customers.
It was a job she had found shortly after she moved to New Jersey. She liked it, and it paid reasonably well. But now her concern about Valerie had deepened. Her daughter’s mood over the last few days was even more somber; she was even more detached, if that was possible. The change convinced Marina she should be there in the afternoons when her daughter got home from school.
Everything she said to Valerie seemed to upset her. Marina decided that it would be better to bring up the subject by saying, “I’ve decided I want a job with different hours, and I’m going to start looking around.”
As usual Valerie’s response was “Whatever,” dismissing the subject.
On Friday morning, when Valerie didn’t come down the stairs to breakfast, Marina went up to her room. Valerie was in bed, curled up in a fetal position, sound asleep.
An instinctive sense that something was wrong made Marina rush to her bedside. A prescription jar was on the night table. The cap was off. Marina picked it up. It was her prescription for Ambien, the sleep aid she used occasionally. The jar was empty.
She shook Valerie’s shoulder and flipped her over onto her back as she called her name. She did not stir.
Marina looked down at her. She was very pale and her lips were blue. Her breathing was shallow.
“Oh, my God no!” she screamed as she grabbed the phone and dialed 911.
69
Fran and Steve left for Bermuda before lunch on Friday morning. They had decided to extend their trip to a full week. Aline was glad that her mother agreed to the extension. She could see that Fran was getting more and more depressed and desperately needed to get away.
When she returned home from work on Friday, she remembered to bring in the mail. She stopped at the box at the end of the driveway, pulled it out and dropped it on the kitchen table. An envelope addressed to Ms. Kerry Dowling caught her eye. It was from MasterCard.
Aline remembered her parents giving her a credit card just before she had left for college. “For emergencies only,” her father had said with a smile, knowing his idea of what constituted an emergency would differ from hers. They must have done the same for Kerry.
Ordinarily she would have left the envelope for them. With her parents away, she decided to open it.
There were only two entries on the bill. ETD, a tire service center. That had to have been the new tire Dad had told Kerry to get, Aline thought.
The second entry was for Coach House, a diner in Hackensack. The charge was $22.79. That’s odd, Aline thought. There are diners in Waldwick and Park Ridge, both a lot closer to Saddle River. Why did Kerry go all the way to Hackensack?
When she looked at the date Kerry had gone to the diner, her eyes widened. It was August 25, the day of her party, the day she had been murdered.
Aline pulled out her cell phone and opened her text messages file. The text about something “VERY IMPORTANT” was sent to her at 11:02 A.M. on the same day.
She looked at the bill again. Almost twenty-three dollars is a lot for one person. Kerry might have met somebody for breakfast and picked up the check. Shortly thereafter, she sent me the text. Could there be a connection?
Kerry went to the diner on a Saturday morning. Tomorrow is Saturday. Odds are the same waitstaff will be there, including whoever waited on Kerry.
Who could she have met? Maybe it was Alan. Or if it was one of Kerry’s girlfriends, maybe one of the girls on the lacrosse team, I want to talk to her.
Aline went to her computer. She opened Kerry’s Facebook page and began to print some of the photos.
This might be a waste of time, she thought, but it could be important to know what Kerry was doing the last day she was alive.
The thought that she might have a chance to discover what was very important kept Aline up most of the night.