Free How Do You Like Your Blue-Eyed Boy? by Barry Graham Page A

industry. Tim had run an article on him and he’d lost his license to operate in Maricopa County. But he’d gotten around that by declaring his wife to be the owner, and the centers stayed open. You might have expected him to clean up his business after that, but Tim was able to follow up with a series of articles detailing both awesome incompetence by Fallowell’s staff, and the kind of punishment of little kids that was supposed to have gone out along with top hats and tails.
    The daily papers didn’t investigate, and neither did the local TV stations. I don’t know whether Fallowell bought them off or scared them off. I do know that he tried to buy Tim’s silence, and was told to fuck himself. Tim didn’t leave him alone after that—he reported new findings in just about every issue of the Weekly , and if there were no new findings that week then he summarized all that had happened so far. Fallowell tried threatening him, and found that to be as effective as his attempts at bribery.
    “You think it’s him?” I said lamely.
    “I’m certain it’s him.”
    “But he’d been threatening Tim for months, and nothing happened.”
    “Something’s happened now.”
    “But why leave it so long? Why do it now instead of months ago?”
    “Why do it months ago instead of now? Because he’s not a professional, Andy. He’s just a thug with money. So people normally do as he tells them. He’s used to getting his way. He’s not like Symington. Symington’s every bit as evil, in my opinion, but I don’t believe it would even occur to him to have a person murdered. Not because he’d have any moral compunction about it, but because it’s not what he does. He’s a politician, a professional. He doesn’t let his ego get involved. When you publicly call him a scumbag, he doesn’t react—because he knows he’s a scumbag. He expects to be reviled, and he doesn’t care. Fallowell, however, isn’t used to being stood up to, in public or in private. Tim’s articles weren’t really much of a threat to him—there are plenty of legal maneuvers that would allow him to stay in business—but he still threatened him. He didn’t like these things being said. He wanted Tim shut up.”
    “Have you told the cops what you think?”
    “I mentioned it to them. Whether they take it seriously is up to them. The police don’t like journalists telling them their business.”
    I don’t know how seriously the cops took Spike’s theory. Janine didn’t take it seriously at all.
    “So Spike’s a psychologist now,” she said when I told her.
    “You think he’s wrong?”
    “He may be absolutely right, for all I know—and for all he knows.”
    “What do you mean?”
    “I mean it may be Fallowell who did it, just like Spike says. But there’s no reason to think so. Look at it—Spike’s come up with a whole story, motive, the lot. But he doesn’t know Symington, and he doesn’t know Fallowell. He’s making up psychological profiles and deciding who did what. But is he qualified to do that?”
    I didn’t say anything.
    “Look, I know he convinced you. But think about it. You really want to believe him, or believe something, just so it makes sense. You really respect Spike—I think he’s kind of your hero. But look at him—he’s just a sad old man. He’s kind of pathetic, and he knows it. I don’t even know if he really believes what he told you—maybe he just feels important if he can pretend he knows for sure who the killer is, and have somebody as smart as you take him seriously.”
    I nodded. “Yeah. You’re making more sense than he did.”
    She put her arms around me. “Nothing about murder makes sense, babe. Stop trying to understand it.”
    We went out that evening. I didn’t want to, but Janine said she wasn’t going to let me sit home and brood. We went and saw a movie, then met up with some people at the Five and Diner. George and Ricky Retardo were there, and Laurie showed up later. We just hung