Fenway walked through the gallery gate and back to the judge’s desk. Piper was scrolling through a spreadsheet on the screen, but stopped when she glanced at Fenway’s face.
“What’s wrong with you? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
“I don’t—” Fenway coughed and cleared her throat. “Can you—can you look up some stuff for me? You’re all about tracking payments and stuff, right?”
“I wouldn’t put it that eloquently, but yeah.” Piper smirked, but her smile faltered when she saw Fenway wasn’t laughing.
“My father says he paid my mom ten grand a month for child support. Starting about twenty years ago. But, uh, I don’t think I got a dime. Can you see if any payments like that were actually made from any of my father’s accounts? And—uh, if they were, and if Joanne Stevenson Ferris was the recipient, can you tell me, uh—you know….”
There was silence between them, looming like a cold shadow.
“You’d like to know what happened to it?” Piper finished.
“Yeah.”
Piper shifted in her seat.
“Oh. You’re uncomfortable with that.”
Piper held up her hand. “I would help you. I really would. But I work for your father now. I can’t use his bank account information like that.”
Fenway frowned and sighed.
“I mean,” Piper continued, “if the shoe was on the other foot, wouldn’t you be pissed off if your employee did something like that?”
“No, I get it, Piper. You’re right.” Fenway massaged her own neck with her right hand. “I could get you my mom’s information, though, right? Bank account numbers, that kind of thing?”
“Sure, that’s fine. I won’t even charge you my special Ferris ‘Friends and Family’ hourly rates.” She smiled.
Fenway tilted her head up and stared at the elegant brushed nickel lighting fixtures over the courtroom. Whoever designed the courtroom had studied Frank Lloyd Wright’s designs closely. The room had a stateliness to it, but also a certain art-deco panache.
“Seriously, Fenway? Not even a tiny little smile?”
Fenway put her palms on the desk and leaned forward. “Sorry, Piper. I—I just don’t know what to believe right now. I thought my mom….”
Silence for a moment. Then Fenway hung her head.
She felt a hand on her shoulder.
“I’m sorry, Fenway,” Piper murmured, and Fenway leaned into Piper’s hand. “You, uh, you need anything?”
Fenway guffawed. “I need another clue, Piper. I need to solve this—not just Cygnus’s murder, but the whole thing. I need to know who’s behind the money laundering. I need to know who paid Peter Grayheath to kill my professor at Western Washington. And I need to know who’s making it look like my father is responsible for everything.” She sighed. “And I’m stuck in this courtroom without most of my tools. Without being able to talk to witnesses.”
“Sorry.”
“It probably wouldn’t matter anyway. Everywhere I turn is a dead end. I thought maybe with the right leverage on Professor Cygnus, we’d get a name.”
Piper lowered her voice. “We got Jessica Marquez’s spreadsheet with all the transactions into the scholarship account. And I found a way into the master ledger. I’m checking and correlating and doing all the things I’m good at. Something will shake out, Fenway. You’ve got to believe that.”
Fenway shut her eyes. For years, her mother had done her best, and had always put Fenway’s welfare and well-being first.
Except now there was a million dollars missing from her childhood.
Her mother had let her go to bed hungry. Not just once. Not just twice. Over and over and over again, for months.
“Yeah,” Fenway said, opening her eyes. “Something will shake out. I’ve got to believe that.”
“I did get some information on Heissner’s Navy career.”
“Anything interesting?”
“A couple of items, actually. He spent the first part of his naval career in Indonesia, but requested a transfer in the mid-nineties.”
“Do you know why?”
Piper shrugged. “Those records are sealed.”
“Sealed?”
Piper raised her hands. “Doesn’t necessarily mean anything. I just don’t have access.”
“Can you get it?”
“Not today.”
“Anything else?”
“When he was honorably discharged from the Navy, he started working at Petrogrande too. Not their Western Division, but it looks like he spent most of his time in South America.
Fenway perked up. “Does it say if he worked in La Mitad?”
“I haven’t gotten that far—and I’ve got a lot of research on everyone else. He landed at Ferris Energy about five years ago, after the Western takeover. That’s barely scratching the surface.”
Fenway put her chin in her palm. “I wonder how many other employees of Ferris Energy have a background with the Navy.”
“I’m looking to see who at Ferris Energy has connections to La Mitad. I started with their personnel files, but I’ll go through their personal histories too—what I can find online, at any rate.” Piper turned back to her laptop. “And I’ll see if McVie has an update for us.”
“I suppose I could interview Xavier. He’s the only one I haven’t talked to yet. Well—Rose, but she’s not talking to anyone.”
A ding from Piper’s laptop.
“What’s that?” Fenway asked. “Did McVie respond? Can I text him?”
Piper shook her head slowly. “No—that’s weird. It says my last message wasn’t delivered.”
“Maybe McVie is somewhere he can’t get a signal.”
“Maybe.” Piper typed and stared at the screen. “I still have internet access, so that’s not it.” Then her face fell. “Oh. No, I don’t. It just—it just went offline. So it’s not him, it’s me.” She craned her neck around to the back of the laptop and checked all the connections and adapters. “Everything looks okay,” she murmured. “I better make sure.” She pushed her chair out and was under the desk a moment later.
“Hey,” Fenway said, “do you need me to pull on any cords up here or anything?”
“No,” Piper said from under the desk. “You go ahead. I bet the problem isn’t even in this room.”
“Holler if you need me.” Fenway made the trek around the witness stand again, and an image came into her mind of a cartoon character wearing a track into the carpet. “I put the over-under at twenty more times,” Fenway mumbled to herself. She made eye contact with Xavier, who was leaning back in his chair. He sat up and flexed his fingers in both hands.
Suddenly, Cynthia Schimmelhorn was in front of her. “Okay, Coroner, you’re the closest to being in charge here. It’s almost noon. I can’t speak for everyone else, but we need to get out of here. I’ve already missed several meetings today. Obviously the sheriff’s department won’t find the murderer today, and we haven’t even had water. I’m now very glad I went to the ladies’ room before the arraignment began this morning.” She motioned toward Judith Cygnus. “You have a sick woman in here who’s being kept from her medication. You have university students who are missing class. A professor who can’t teach today.” She pointed a finger that came close to Fenway’s chin, and her voice was firm and loud. “You need to let us out.”
“Do I look like I want us to be stuck here?” Fenway said. “I’m going crazy in here too. I want to get back to my desk where I have internet access and a phone where I can actually do research. I want to get the evidence I’ve collected over to the lab in San Miguelito. I want to get back to work. I’m not catching a killer in here, that’s for sure. And I want to go to Dos Milagros and get a couple of lengua tacos. Maybe even three or four.” Fenway shook her head. “You think I have some magic wand I can wave and unlock the door? Maybe have some sort of space-time-continuum portal appear in the wall so everyone can get out?” She turned toward the wall and held her hands up in clawlike shapes. “Abracadabra! Shazam! Electric-boogaloo! Presto-change-o!”
She stared at the wall for a moment, then turned back to Cynthia. “Sorry, Ms. Schimmelhorn. Must be the electromagnetic paint interfering with my hoodoo voodoo. I can direct you to a complaint form when we get out of here.”
“There’s no need to take that tone with me.”
“Oh, but it’s fine for you to take it with me?”
Schimmelhorn glared at Fenway.
“You think if Sheriff McVie thought it was safe for us,” Fenway said. “he’d keep us in here just for his own amusement?”
Schimmelhorn shook her head. “You seem to be able to contact the sheriff. So contact him and tell him that we all need to be let out.”
“The internet’s down,” Fenway said. “We have no cell service in here, we have no way to get out, and now the internet’s down. I don’t know how long it’ll be out.”
“I have no use for you anymore,” Schimmelhorn said coldly.
“Oh, that hurts my feelings,” Fenway snapped. “Another nice rich white lady who has no use for me.”
Her father’s voice sounded next to her. “That’s enough, Fenway.”
Fenway turned to her father, standing next to her. “Oh—now you decide to participate, Dad? What do you care? She’s already told you Ferris Energy is firing you. She doesn’t care if you’re guilty or not. The other shoe has already dropped. The fat lady has sung.”
“Please,” came a voice from behind them. “I need my medicine.”
Fenway turned around. Judith Cygnus was holding on to the back of a chair for balance. “I’m supposed to take it within a very specific time frame. It’s important.”
“I’m sorry,” Fenway said. “I don’t have any way—”
Leda Nedermeyer jumped out of her seat and ran down the center aisle to the double doors. She pushed the handle and threw her body against it with a loud thump. The doors didn’t budge. “Let me out!” she screamed. “Let me out!” She threw her body against the doors again. “Get me out of here!”
Xavier jumped out of his seat and ran to the double doors, grabbing Professor Nedermeyer by the shoulders before she could heave herself into the doors again. He spoke into her ear in low tones as the professor was still shaking, and slowly, Professor Nedermeyer calmed down. Xavier still spoke quietly and calmly to her, and then led her to a seat in the back row.
As if choreographed, everyone’s head swiveled from staring at Professor Nedermeyer to staring at Fenway.
Fenway cleared her throat. “Well,” she said, “that ought to get their attention.”
Judith Cygnus sat down heavily in the chair behind her.
“I hope you think of something,” Schimmelhorn hissed, then turned to walk to the last row.
Fenway stood for a moment, her potential interviewee still talking with Leda Nedermeyer. She took a step forward, then hesitated. Was there really any need to talk to Xavier? What could he possibly tell her that she didn’t already know?
She mentally kicked herself. Anyone could provide more insight. Hadn’t she thought the same thing about Amanda? And hadn’t Amanda been the one to provide the scholarship fund’s master spreadsheet, the one where all the bodies were buried?
Xavier stood up and hurried over to Fenway. “Miss Stevenson—something’s wrong with Professor Nedermeyer.”
Fenway rushed over to Leda Nedermeyer, Xavier following close behind. The professor looked punch-drunk, her head not quite staying upright as she tried to track who was in front of her.
“Professor,” Fenway said, kneeling in front of her, “are you all right?”
“I—I will be fine.” Nedermeyer slurred her words, and tried to push Fenway away, but missed her shoulder completely. She regained her balance, and then stared Fenway in the eyes. “It’s nothing. I just need to eat, is all.”
Fenway’s stomach growled in empathy, and Fenway ignored it. She remembered that Nedermeyer had dry-swallowed something a couple of hours ago. “Have you taken any medication today?”
“I’m perfectly fine. I don’t need any more medication.” Nedermeyer’s pupils were dilated, her eyelids heavy.
“No, no, Professor, I meant did you take medication already?”
“Well,” Nedermeyer said haughtily, if unsteadily, “you have to understand that this situation is very stressful. It makes me highly anxious.” She leaned forward, her elbows on her knees, and this seemed to stabilize her a little more. “I’m sure my doctor would understand if I needed to take an additional dose or two.”
“Or two?” Fenway leaned over to Xavier. “Go get Professor Nedermeyer’s purse and bring it here.”
“You’re looking for medication?”
“Yes. Anti-anxiety meds or something. Then I’ll know what I’m dealing with. Not many of these meds are supposed to make you loopy like this.”
“Loopy?” Xavier asked, grinning. “Is that the technical term?”
Fenway narrowed her eyes. “Just get the purse, Xavier. And hurry.”
Xavier dropped the smile from his face and rushed off to get Leda’s purse.
“Professor, what are you taking?”
“I’ll tell you what I’m taking,” Nedermeyer said, snapping to lucidity. “I’m taking too much bullshit from everyone, is what I’m taking.” Then her eyes unfocused and she giggled.
“That’s a good one, Professor,” Fenway said. “But I’d really like to know. Is it Zoloft? Prozac?”
“Oh, I bet you’d like to know. They’d fetch a pretty penny on the black market. No sir, I’m not going to tell you.”
Black market? “Dammit,” Fenway murmured, “it’s divenamine.” She pushed herself up from her kneeling position and stood up. “Okay, Professor, it’s time to go for a walk.”
Xavier appeared at her side, holding a beige plastic bottle with a white cap, a telltale prescription label taped around it. “I found the pills—they’re, uh, divenda—no, divena—”
“Divenamine,” Fenway said, taking the professor’s hand in hers and lightly clapping her palm across the knuckles. “And it’s got a ton of side effects. And if she took more than three of these in the last eight hours, and I think she did, we’re looking at a potential comatose patient if she goes to sleep.”
“What?” Xavier’s jaw dropped.
“I don’t have time to explain the whole list of symptoms right now,” Fenway said. “We just have to keep her moving until she starts to come around.”
“How long will that be?”
Fenway tried to look in Nedermeyer’s eyes, but her lids kept drooping. “Depends how much she took. With her size, and if she only took a triple or quadruple dose, maybe a half-hour. Moving around will get it out of her system.”
Xavier nodded. “Sounds a lot like what you’d do if someone took too much Dive Bomb.”
“Oh—if you know Dive Bomb, this is essentially the same stuff, only in official pharmaceutical form. And you know what happened to some of those kids.”
“Yeah, but not the coma thing. I had a kid at my high school stab someone while he was on it.”
“Right.” Fenway nodded. “It can trigger violent reactions as well as imitating the symptoms of drunkenness. Doesn’t destroy the liver quite as badly as years of heavy drinking, but the unconsciousness after an overdose can be worse than alcohol poisoning.”
“What do we need to do?”
“Get her up and walking.”
“Okay, Professor,” Xavier said loudly. “Let’s get up and move around.”
“I don’t feel like it,” Nedermeyer said, sticking out her bottom lip. “I want to take a nap.”
“Nope,” Fenway said, sitting in the chair to Leda’s right and placing the professor’s arm around her shoulder.
“Let me help,” Xavier said, moving to Leda’s left, wrapping his arm around her back. “You’ve got stuff to do, don’t you?” He looked up at Fenway. “Is there any more water?”
“I’ll check,” Fenway said. “Do you have her?”
“I got her. She’s light.”
Fenway rushed through the gate and up the steps next to the witness stand. The first cabinet she checked held the walkie-talkies. The second was empty, as was the third.
In the fourth, she found two flats of bottled water with heavy plastic wrap.
She pulled the first flat out and lifted it on top of the back counter. Pushing a finger through the plastic on the top, she started to tear a hole—then she stopped.
She ran to the judge’s bench and pulled a black pen and an old receipt from her purse.
“You need anything?” asked Piper, looking down from her computer.
“I’ll tell you later.” This was crazy—but it might work.
She made the hole larger and pulled a dozen bottles out. She looked over her shoulder, but no one was watching her. Uncapping the pen, she debated for a moment, then marked eleven of the twelve bottles, putting them back and arranging them to look like they hadn’t been removed. She made the same marks on the receipt—and then a letter next to each mark. L, R, B, K, W, E, S, M, N, X, A.
“It’s like Murder Wheel of Fortune,” she said under her breath.
She hefted the flat of water and held it steady with one arm. She steeled herself, took a breath, and then descended the steps.
“We found some water!” she announced as she pushed the gallery gate open.
“Great,” Xavier said. “Professor—why don’t you take some water?”
Fenway hooked her fingertips under the screw top of the first bottle. “Here you go.”
Leda grabbed it out of Fenway’s hand. “Oh, thank you, dear—I’m so thirsty.” She struggled with the cap.
Fenway held her hand out. “I can help—”
“No, no, don’t take my water. I’m perfectly capable of doing it myself.”
Xavier shook his head. “Come on, Professor. We’ve got to walk some of this off.”
“Would anyone else like some water?” Fenway said, and Bryce Heissner practically snatched a bottle out of Fenway’s hand as she pulled it off the flat.
Fenway passed out water to each of them. Amanda politely declined, and Xavier was too busy with Professor Nedermeyer, but Fenway returned to the open cabinet with nine fewer bottles. She set the flat down on top of the cabinet and watched everyone open the water bottles and drink.
“What are you up to?” Piper whispered, appearing at her side.
Fenway chuckled. “I’ll tell you in a minute.” She watched as Nedermeyer tripped over her feet, and she hurried down to the center aisle.
“I didn’t mean to be the other woman,” Nedermeyer was saying as Fenway steadied her on the opposite side. “I just—he was just too good. I never met anyone I could talk to like that.”
“I get it,” Xavier said, taking a few tentative steps with the professor. “Don’t worry, no one thinks you’re a ho.”
“Ha!” Nedermeyer said loudly, taking a couple of unsure steps forward. “Me! A ho! I’d be lucky to be considered a cougar.”
Xavier winced at the term. He cautiously walked forward, trying not to step on Nedermeyer’s toes.
“Yeah,” Fenway said, “we all have lapses in judgment.”
“Right,” Xavier said, “I know that. I’m not naïve enough to think I’m the only one who’s ever screwed up.”
Fenway laughed as she tried to move Nedermeyer’s arm to a more comfortable position. “Yeah, well, I remember being twenty—it wasn’t that long ago—and thinking that everyone was judging me for every single mistake I made. The truth is, people just don’t care that much, and the people who do watch you will criticize everything you do anyway, whether it’s a mistake or not.”
“My mom says being a grownup sucks,” Xavier said
“Yeah, it kind of does,” Fenway admitted. “And being able to eat cake for breakfast doesn’t make it a fair trade.”
“I like cake,” Professor Nedermeyer said. “But not carrot cake. That’s not real cake.”
“What’s your favorite cake, Professor?” Xavier asked, again in the loud voice.
“She can hear you, Xavier,” Fenway murmured. “You can use your inside voice.”
“Sorry.”
“My very favorite cake,” Nedermeyer declared, “is a snickerdoodle cake.”
“Snickerdoodle?” Xavier asked.
“That’s what I said.”
“Isn’t a snickerdoodle a cookie, not a cake?”
“Well,” Nedermeyer slurred, watching her feet as they shuffled forward, “it’s true that a snickerdoodle is a cookie, but it’s—it’s quite a delicious, tasty cake as well.” Her head rolled slightly. “You know, I had it when Virgil and I took a trip several years ago. Wonderful. To the Oregon Shakespeare Festival.”
“I hear that’s a great festival,” Fenway said.
“The cake,” Leda proclaimed, soldiering on, “is made by a bakery just south of the Oregon border. It is a delightful vanilla almond sponge in three layers, filled and frosted with cinnamon buttercream, and dusted with brown sugar. Virg and I purchased one on the way up, and we demolished it before the second act of Henry V. Just before leaving Ashland, we stopped at a small restaurant that specialized in wild game, and I almost choked on the buckshot that was still in my pheasant.”
“Oh, that sounds awful,” Fenway said, commiserating.
“So Virg promised me another snickerdoodle cake on our return trip. And, true to his word, we ordered another on the drive home, this time with a white chocolate ganache, but I think the cinnamon buttercream is the superior choice.” Her eyes turned dreamy and she stopped moving her feet. “The bakery closed last year. It pains me to think I’ll never eat another snickerdoodle cake like that again.”
“Nowhere else makes it, huh?” Xavier said, gently prodding her forward.
“Really, Mister Gonsalves, it’s not that uncommon.” Leda giggled again. “I hope you don’t keep that ridiculous new surname of yours.”
“You mean changing my name to Xavier Go?”
Leda sputtered with laughter and nearly tripped. “I don’t care what your agent told you. It makes me think of, well, you know.”
Xavier arched an eyebrow.
“The toilet,” Leda said in a stage whisper. “’Oh, look, Xavier has to go.’”
“You said there were lots of side effects with this medication?” Xavier said softly to Fenway. “Is ‘turning into a six-year-old’ listed?”
No, but violent outbursts can be. “Keep moving, Professor,” Fenway said.
“I’m not a child,” the professor said.
Fenway turned her face so Nedermeyer wouldn’t see the grin touch her lips. She glanced up at the judge’s bench and Piper beckoned her. “Oh—something must have come up in our research.”
“I’ve got her,” Xavier said. “If you want to go be a detective again.”
“Remember, keep her walking until she comes around. Then she won’t be a coma risk.”
“What if she wants to go to sleep after she comes around?”
“That should be fine. Just not while she’s acting drunk.” Fenway dropped Leda’s arm and took two strides—then ada Kim blocked her path.
“Hi, Jennifer—” Fenway started.
“You are being far too chummy with your father,” Kim snapped. “Do you know how many people watched you take a check from him about ten minutes ago?”
“That wasn’t—”
“What? That wasn’t what, Fenway? That wasn’t for looking the other way when you found out he hired someone to kill Professor Cygnus, just like he hired someone to kill your professor in Bellingham?”
Fenway set her jaw. “You’re not even making sense. Talk about going after someone without evidence!”
Jennifer Kim pursed her lips.
“Yes, that’s what I said, Jennifer. The fingerprint doesn’t match my father’s, so now you’re throwing wild accu—”
“They’re not wild accusations. He did it once, he can—”
“This will be easily resolved once we try to match that fingerprint. Look, the gun and the bullet are both in the safe right now. I don’t have them—”
“You are the one who knows the combination, Fenway! Of course you have access to them.” She tapped her foot and pressed her lips together. “And taking a payment from him in front of everyone? Do you have any idea how guilty this makes you look? How guilty it makes him look?”
“Fathers give their adult children gifts every day,” Fenway said, backing away from Kim.
“Don’t you walk away from me, Fenway! This looks like a breach of ethics! You just got elected, but don’t think this will get swept under the rug.”
“I’ve got an investigation to conduct,” Fenway growled. “If you don’t think a father can pay for her daughter’s education—”
Kim gasped. “So you actually admit it? You admit you took a payment for going easy on him?”
“I did no such thing,” Fenway snapped. “He’s owed me that money for years.”
“So—rich guy finally pays off his debt to his daughter if she doesn’t interview him too harshly?”
Fenway clenched and unclenched her fists. She closed her eyes and stepped outside herself, and for a moment saw herself take the check from her father.
How incredibly stupid. And how horrible that must have looked to anyone else in the courtroom.
“Okay—okay, Jennifer. I get how it must have looked, but I swear, we weren’t talking about anything but family stuff. You know I didn’t see him for twenty years. He’d made a promise to pay for my school to my mother, and he didn’t. That’s all.”
“I don’t give a damn, Fenway!” Jennifer’s voice raised, and a few of the others in the courtroom were starting to pay attention. “You took a payment from a murder suspect.”
Fenway looked across the courtroom. Everyone but Leda had their eyes on her.
Jennifer Kim folded her arms. “You need to recuse yourself now—or I’m opening an investigation into you accepting bribes.”