Presumed Guilty: (A Jefferson Winter novella) Read Online Free PDF

father.’
    Yoko stared for a second, then continued like he hadn’t spoken. ‘When the Hare Checklist is applied he scores a thirty, which, although high enough to get himself classified as a psychopath, isn’t that spectacular. There are CEOs who score higher.’
    ‘And plenty of movie stars and rock singers, too. Heaven forbid we forget them. Do that, and it might be enough to tip them over the edge. Can you imagine? A lead singer going postal and shooting up the front row with an automatic rifle. That would definitely cause a stir. Look how upset everyone got when Jim Morrison flashed his dick in Florida that time.’
    ‘However,’ she continued, ‘some researchers believe that the elements relating to antisocial behaviour should be removed from the checklist. Now, when you do that something really interesting happens. Your father’s score jumps to a hundred per cent. In other words, your father is a pure psychopath.’
    Winter’s eyes narrowed. His lips were tight, his mouth shut even tighter.
    Yoko wondered if she’d pushed too hard. She reached for her coffee and took a sip. She’d got him talking, but that didn’t mean he wouldn’t clam up again in a heartbeat. She considered what to say next, weighing the pros and cons. Interviewing Winter was like walking a tightrope. One wrong step and you were going to plunge into the abyss. At the same time, if you didn’t take risks and try to move forward then you were never going to get to the other side.
    ‘You do have a father, Jefferson,’ she said finally. ‘Although, given where he resides right now, you might not have one for much longer. Your father talked about you when I went to see him. He told me all about the hunting trips you used to take. He said you were a natural.’
    Winter stared a while longer, then smiled. ‘Where are you going with this? Nature versus nurture, is that it?’
    ‘What do you think?’
    ‘I think that frogs should be wary of helping scorpions to cross rivers.’
    ‘And which one are you, Jefferson?’
    He reached for the Coke can and turned it through another full three hundred and sixty degrees. ‘And how high do I score on your charts, Agent Tanaka? Am I a psychopath?’
    ‘Without a shadow of a doubt.’

Chapter 7
    They fell into another long silence. Winter was staring at his hands again, while Yoko was staring at the scratched brass Zippo on the top of her cigarette pack, and watching him in her peripheral vision. She was fascinated by how smooth the skin on his hands looked, how wrinkle-free and unblemished it was. Once upon a time, she’d had skin like that.
    Why was it that age showed up on your hands more than any other part of the body? What was that all about? People thought that she looked much younger than forty-two, but that was because they weren’t observant enough. If they bothered to look at her hands, they’d see the truth in every line and wrinkle.
    Faces lied. Hands didn’t.
    Yoko was happy to wait this one out for as long as it took. If Winter wanted to play mind games, that was fine by her. Bring it on. She’d eat him alive.
    While she waited, her thoughts drifted back to that morning. In her mind’s eye she could see the crowd that had gathered on Darnell Avenue. The police barriers were up and there had to be more than a hundred people. And all this had happened during the short time she’d been in Alice Harrigan’s apartment.
    The neighbours who’d been happy to stand by their front doors earlier were now part of the throng, jostling and gawping with the rest. There were plenty of cops milling about. Most were from the Greenbelt Police Department, but there were half a dozen men from the Prince George’s Sheriff’s Office.
    The media were out in force, too. TV, radio and print. The reporters and their technical entourages were fighting it out for the best positions, pushing the locals out of the way.
    Their vans were parked as close as they’d been allowed to get. The larger