“Better us than some defense lawyer doing it later and making us look like idiots,” Willy restated, forever the pragmatist.

Joe pointed at him approvingly. “If that’s your motivation, then exactly right.”

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

A local Vermont joke counters, “How’s your job?” with, “Which one?” Barely funny, and often evoking an appreciative look from people in the know. Of the many things associated with the state, “upward mobility” is rarely one—especially among those in Robin Whiteman’s income bracket.

As a result, Joe did not drive to Taco Bell to find her at night, but to one of Brattleboro’s supermarkets during the day, where she worked as a bagger. This was a job with which he was familiar, if only because more than one cop had moonlighted at such places for extra cash. Pride of social stature was not a broadly practiced regional affectation.

He’d called ahead, knowing how disposably management saw such positions, and not wishing to get the poor woman fired just because he pulled her aside at the wrong time. He therefore went straight to the break room at the prearranged time and found her sitting down at a small table, a mug of coffee in one hand, the ubiquitous smartphone in the other.

“Miss Whiteman?” he asked, sitting opposite.

She nodded, midway through her first sip. “Yes,” she said, wiping her lip with the back of her hand.

“Sorry,” he apologized. “Joe Gunther. I called?”

“Sure. This about Don again?”

“It is. You may know that we sometimes conduct follow-up interviews, especially on big cases like this.”

“Sure. Whatever,” she said without interest.

“You told my colleague Special Agent Kunkle that you’d known Don a few months, had ridden in the stolen Mercedes at least once, and had even been to a house in Stratton that he burgled.”

She put the mug down, frowning. “Am I gonna get in trouble for that? I didn’t do anything.”

“We know that,” Joe reassured her. “What we’re less sure about is whether you told us everything you did with him.”

She looked startled. “At that house?”

“No. In total. I suspect you might not have been quite as bored by that experience as you said and that you may have joined him on a shopping spree more than once.”

Her mouth tightened slightly before she said, “I told you what happened.”

Joe placed his forearms on the table and leaned in for emphasis. His voice was too quiet to be overheard by the two other people sharing a table in the far corner. “Miss Whiteman, we don’t usually ask questions we don’t know the answers to. We ask them to confirm what we’ve learned and expose who we’re talking to as a liar.”

It was a Kodak moment, as the saying once had it—her chance to either burst out in outrage and stomp off, or admit defeat and cooperate.

She thankfully chose the latter.

“What do you wanna know?” she asked, her voice flat.

“Did you ride with him in the Mercedes on any other occasion?”