Badlands Read Online Free PDF Page B

ear as she entered the stark white and windowless interrogation room.
    The door shut behind her.
    He was seated with his manacled wrists on top of a brushed metal table. He was a big man, bigger than she realized. His hands were pink and the size of hams. He had thick stubby fingers with dirty fingernails.
    She had the strange feeling that she was watching herself enter the room from above, as if she wasn’t really in her own body. She could see her disheveled hair, her too-tight suit. And she could see the man sitting at the table.
    When he looked up at her his eyes blinked. There was no other gesture or tic to indicate he knew who she was. He sat absolutely still, breathing slowly with the slight wheeze of a fat man, his dead eyes fixed on her. But she saw it. He blinked.
    She hoped the camera caught it, too.
    â€œHello, Ronald,” she said. “It’s been what—two years?”
    Suddenly, she was no longer viewing the scene like an outsider. She was all in.
    He cocked his head slightly to the side and he looked at her warily.
    â€œTwo years ago on the street in Gardiner, Montana,” she said. “I was inside a quilt shop interviewing the owner. But I heard your truck and looked outside just in time to see you leave a package of videos on the seat of my car that would implicate your partner so you could get away. It looks like you’ve really gained some weight since then. Don’t tell me—too much truck-stop food?”
    â€œI don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said. His voice was higher than she would have guessed. His tone had air in it, as if his throat was constricted by the rolls of fat.
    â€œI’m Investigator Cassie Dewell from the Lewis and Clark County Sheriff’s Department in Helena. But you knew that, right?”
    â€œAgain,” he said, “I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about. I’ve never met you and you’ve never met me. And all I know about Montana is it’s a big-assed state that takes too damn long to drive across.”
    She shook her head as if disappointed and sat down in the chair directly across from him. When she tried to scoot the chair closer she realized the legs of both the chair and the table were bolted to the floor. So she shifted forward until she was on the edge of the chair. She leaned in as close as she could to him and looked directly into his eyes.
    He was slumped back and didn’t react to her closing in on him.
    â€œI saw in your eyes that you recognized me when I walked in,” she said. “Quite a surprise, huh, Ronald?”
    He sighed and shook his head. “Them dumb rednecks out there either need to arrest me or they need to cut me loose. They can’t just hold me in here without any charges being filed.”
    He lifted his chin and addressed the camera in the ceiling over Cassie’s head, “Yeah, I know you heard me, you dumb rednecks. I know my rights. You can’t detain me without charging me with a crime. And you better damn figure out who is going to pay for the load I got screwed out of too, not to mention the time and money I’ve lost since you dumb rednecks brought me in here.”
    She was about to speak but he wasn’t done talking to the camera. He said, “And come get this goofy bitch out of here. I don’t know her and I’m not talking to her. She thinks I’m somebody I’m not. If you don’t come drag her out of here I’m gonna get a lawyer to sue your ass for harassment.”
    â€œAre you through?” Cassie asked.
    He lowered his chin and glared at her.
    â€œYou can deal with them later,” she said. “Now you need to deal with me.”
    Was that a slight smirk on his face?
    â€œWhen I saw you last in Montana you were driving a black truck—a Kenworth or a Volvo or something, right? Now you’ve got a new one.”
    She’d hoped he’d correct her and say it was a