Fear Itself by Duffy Prendergast Page B

fishing again, but in the wrong pond and with the wrong bait.
    “Why don’t we ask Sarah?”
    “Why don’t we leave my daughter out of this?” I stood up again, the blood rushing to my head and all thoughts of fear gone, replaced in the time it takes for a flame to ignite gasoline, by anger. I took a step toward him and staggered him backwards into the soft folds of the blue leather recliner. He looked up at me, cigarette smoke trailing across his face, with a mixture of fear, shock and confusion.
    “I’m only suggesting that…”
    “Sarah is my daughter. Anything you do to try and take her from me might result in your untimely death!”
    He stared back up at me. His eyes studied my face. He looked puzzled. He couldn’t seem to figure out how our positions had reversed. He had such a perfect plan, how had it backfired, I could see him wondering? I felt completely empowered for the first time since I found myself inside of his interrogation room. He looked into my face and I could tell that he knew that I was innocent. But he didn’t like getting shown up.
    “Have a seat Mr. Derrick.” He had regained his equilibrium, if not his sense of power.
    I stepped backwards and sat back down on the sofa and glared at the menace who had dared to threaten my life.
    “The fact remains that your wife was poisoned. Your fingerprints are on the carafe of wine where the poison was found. You’ve got some splainin to do Mr. Derrick.”
    “I poured her a glass of wine. Of course my fingerprints were on the glass.” I could feel my jaw clenching, “And what sort of poison is it that you found?”
    “A household product. Something you put in your car every so often.” Again he was trying to read my face. He drew a long pause, “Antifreeze.”
    “Antifreeze?”
    “Your fingerprints were also found on a bottle of antifreeze in the garage.”
    “Yes, I’m sure they were, along with the cap to the radiator. Why don’t you dust that for prints as well?”
    “What would that prove?”
    “It wouldn’t prove a thing, just like my fingerprints on a carafe of wine and a wineglass doesn’t prove a God-damned thing. My prints were on the bottle as well. Did you get that too?”
    “No. We couldn’t find an opened bottle of wine.”
    I shook my head. I looked him in the eye. “I didn’t kill my wife. Now why don’t you get up and leave me and my daughter alone to grieve the death of my wife and go find her real killer?”
    Detective Bergant pulled the half burnt cigarette he had been lipping from his mouth and he drew a deep breath. “If you’re innocent then you won’t object to a paternity test for your daughter, will you?”
    “Yes, I do object! I won’t dignify your request with that option. You insult my wife’s integrity while she lies in her grave, unable to defend herself? Well who’s going to defend her if I don’t?”
    “Well then, how about we start with a lie detector test then?”
    I weighed the question. “I thought those tests weren’t reliable?”
    “Reliable enough to get me off your ass if you pass.”
    I paused, pondering the ramifications of such a test. What did I have to lose? “Then fine. I’ll take your lie detector test. But you lay off when I pass.”
    “How does tomorrow at nine in the morning sound?”
    “Where?”
    “Down at the station.” “I’ll be there.”
    As I watched the Crown Victoria pull out of my driveway I had a flash-back to an evening a few nights before Catherine died. It nearly buckled my knees. Sarah and I were in the kitchen doing a science project for her second grade class. We were testing antifreeze to see at what temperature it began to freeze. It was a simple enough project. We poured some antifreeze from the container in the garage into a coffee mug and put a small thermometer into the solution and placed it in the freezer. Then we checked on it every few minutes. The antifreeze began to freeze at minus forty-two degrees Fahrenheit. While I was pouring