Free The Boom Room by Rick Blechta Page B

wouldn’t do that to Jamie.”
    â€œEven though you tried to sneak out quietly, both of the other band members saw you leave. They also heard you earlier in Master’s room.”
    â€œAll lies!”
    â€œWould you submit to a vaginal swab to prove that?”
    She squeezed her eyes shut and took a couple of deep breaths. “Okay. I was with Mike last night.”
    â€œThe fact is, you’ve been with him many times, haven’t you? Don’t bother telling me they’re lying. They’ve signed statements confirming it.”
    Again a pause. “Yes…”
    â€œEarlier today, I found another knife at The Boom Room. It was attached to the speaker magnet on one of the band’s amplifiers.”
    â€œSo? What does that have to do with me?”
    â€œQuite a great deal. You see, while the knife had been wiped clean of fingerprints, there were a number of other prints and smudges on the speaker magnet.” Pratt raised his voice. “None of them were Mike Master’s, but they were all from the same person.”
    Carolyn’s eyes were big. “Jamie?”
    Pratt shook his head. “No. You. You put that knife there.”
    â€œI didn’t!”
    â€œThen how did your prints get there?”
    â€œI don’t know. I must have touched the magnet on Mike’s amp sometime at a rehearsal or something.”
    â€œI didn’t say it was Mike’s amp, so how could you know that?”
    â€œI just assumed—”
    Now Pratt’s voice was stern. “You put it there on purpose. You needed to get rid of that knife so it wouldn’t be found when we searched. You thought it would be undetectable there, and you were almost right. You nearly got away with it.”
    â€œLies! All lies!”
    â€œYou stabbed Joseph Lewis like you promised Mike you would. He wanted to take over the band, but to do that, he needed to get rid of Jamie. So you had to make it look as if Jamie had done it. That’s why you used the second knife to kill Lewis. If you’d used Jamie’s—which you’d taken earlier—you would have wiped off all his prints when you wiped off yours. You needed Jamie’s prints on that knife. After Lewis was dead, you carefully stuck Jamie’s knife into the wound to get blood on the blade. Then you chucked it under the photocopier. You had to hide the fact there was a second knife.”
    â€œYou’re crazy! Why would I do that? I love Jamie!”
    â€œNo, you don’t. You latched on to Jamie because you thought he’d become famous. Then you found he didn’t have the same fire in his belly that Mike Master had. You said you knew nothing about Mike Master’s past, but you knew all about it. Lying with you after sex, he told you his whole story, didn’t he?”
    â€œHe told me he once killed someone, but I didn’t believe him.”
    â€œThen, after you’d done just as he’d asked, you found out Master had lied to you. I’ll bet it was something like, ‘What do you know about managing a band, Carolyn? That’s a laugh! I’ve spoken to Carl Thomson. He’s going to be managing Rotten Attitude. He actually knows something about managing a band.’ I’ll bet that really stung, didn’t it? Master had set you up and used you. He was very good at stuff like that.”
    Carolyn started to speak, then flopped back in her chair, glaring at Pratt.
    He continued speaking.
    â€œYou had an ace up your sleeve though, didn’t you? All you had to do was plant a little bug in Jamie’s half brother’s ear. Jamie had told you he was a straight-arrow cop. He’d make sure Mike Master got his due. Master’s knife was still where you’d hidden it, but then we didn’t find it. You’d hidden it too cleverly. So today you took matters into your own hands. You set Master up. You were lying in wait for him at your apartment. You stabbed