Frankie opened her eyes to the dawn light illuminating the room. The clock read 6:32 am. She sat up in the bed feeling stiff and cold. She’d fallen asleep in yesterday’s clothes with a pen still in her hand from making notes on the Finn Adams case. Her mobile beside her pillow showed a 3:00 am text from Billy saying he would be back in the office by seven. She came to her feet, stuffing files and her notes into her satchel. Billy’s text had sounded like a challenge. If he was in early to the office, she wanted to be earlier. Competition makes for a great detective team or it kills the deal.
Five days’ worth of work outfits hung in the closet set to go. She snatched a hanger and hurried to the bathroom. Her short hair and minimal makeup allowed her to shower, dress, and walk out the door in fourteen minutes. She knew because she’d road tested her routine until she had it down. This time she was backing out of the driveway and munching a PowerBar in record time, thirteen minutes and three seconds.
Details of the Adams case ran through her mind as she drove. Finn had disappeared eight days before his twenty-first birthday. A black-and-white headshot included in the file had given her the impression of a young nineteenth-century scholar, his coat collar turned up, long hair, chiseled romantic features, and a grave, earnest expression. He struck her as someone who hadn’t engaged in conversation. He debated.
A crime scene photo showed an Arkansas rice field flooded after the harvest to protect the soil. She knew the fields became a habitat that attracted thousands of ducks migrating south. Duck hunters leased the fields during hunting season. Good income for the farmers, deadly for the ducks.
A second photo was of Finn’s clothing—pants, a shirt, a jacket, and underwear, folded and neatly stacked beside the water’s edge. A pair of blue Nike Free Trainers had been placed on top.
A third photo was of a 1968 Chevy Camaro that had been found abandoned at the scene, the same car Caroline had driven to her death.
The Sherriff’s Office investigation appeared to be thorough at the outset, but once it was determined that the disappearance was due to accident or suicide the investigators had moved on. Judd had hired Walker Investigations, a top agency; however, even Walker couldn’t prove what had happened to the young man.
In the last file, she’d found a transcript of a telephone interview between Caroline Lee and one of Walker’s investigators that had been taped a few months after Finn’s disappearance. The investigator had first made Caroline comfortable with a few softball questions. Then things got interesting.
Investigator: I understand you and Finn were close while attending Rhodes College.
CL: Oh, sure. We had a great time until I left for Vanderbilt Law. Finn was in his last semester when he disappeared. I was first year law, so we were both busy. God, I wish we’d stayed in touch.
Investigator: Do you know anyone who had reason to harm him?
CL: Not Finn. He had strong opinions, but he’d back off before he made someone too mad. He had these high standards, especially for himself. He would’ve made a great prosecuting attorney. Or a priest. (laughter) But he was determined to join the Lee Law Firm. He was old school when it came to family and tradition.
Investigator: What do you know about Clive Atwood?
CL: Clive? He’s great. The three of us hung out together. Clive flew in from Miami when Finn disappeared. He helped with the search.
Investigator: We’ve been looking into Atwood’s background. I’m sorry to tell you, he’s not who he claimed to be.
CL: (long silence) That’s crazy. Clive graduated from Princeton and completed the Stanford Journalism Program. He was the one who convinced Finn to apply to Harvard Law. I don’t understand. Judd told me you people were good investigators.
Investigator: Atwood was kicked out of Princeton, and he never attended Stanford. He’s a con artist and a drug dealer.
CL: For God’s sake. He smoked pot and sold a little on the side. That doesn’t make him a dealer.
Investigator: What do you know about his sexual relationship with Adams?
CL: That’s disgusting. Finn wasn’t gay. Neither is Clive. Where are you getting this crap?
Investigator: Judd Phillips, your cousin. He claims Finn and Clive were lovers. Finn’s roommate verified it.
CL: You should call Clive. He’ll straighten this out.
Investigator: We tried. His number’s been deactivated.
CL: That can’t be. I’ll call him.
Investigator: You two stay in touch?
CL: We talk sometimes.
Investigator: It’s my understanding he’s left the state.
CL: Judd’s behind this. You tell him to call me immediately.
Interview terminated by CL.
Frankie walked into the squad room at 7:05 am. Billy was at his desk with a coffee in front of him, his head down, frowning over a file. After several minutes, he looked up from the pages and gestured at Judd’s files she was unpacking from the satchel.
“Come up with anything useful?” he asked.
“Interesting reading. I spoke with the producer of Nighttime Poker last night. He confirmed Judd was taping a show on Monday.”
“Good to know.” He leaned back and locked his hands behind his head. “I left a message for Vanderman. He’ll call back, but I’m sure he won’t budge on Sharma giving a statement. I’d love to see the doc drag Vanderman in here and try to clear himself. Defendants like Sharma won’t listen to their attorneys. Their egos usually take them down.”
“What’s our plan for the doctor?”
“We’ll talk to the hospital staff and other doctors Sharma works with. I’m sure he’s crossed swords with a number of them. Maybe one will rat him out.”
“I’ll give Martin Lee’s girlfriend a call and check his alibi,” she said.
“Good. I’ll have another conversation with Zelda Taylor.”
She wondered if this was the time to jump into the Adams case. Actually, she felt like an idiot for hesitating. “I have something else.”
“Yeah?”
“A transcript of a conversation between Caroline and Walker’s investigators.” She gave him a pared down version, emphasizing Caroline’s emotional responses to the investigator’s questions about Clive Atwood. “It’s nothing we can take to court, but in my mind it creates reasonable suspicion,” she said.
He dropped his hands from behind his head and got this serious look. “Director Davis called this morning. He’s catching hell from every quarter. That means you need to focus on what we have in front of us, not a cold case out of our jurisdiction.”
“That’s not fair.”
He gave her a hard look. “Fair? What are you, in third grade?” He picked up the phone as a backhanded way of ending their conversation.
Her cheeks burned at being dismissed. She was the skeptical one. She relied on analysis and logic. Billy was the one who lived off hunches. Now she had a hunch that the cases were connected. She just didn’t know how.
Day shift detectives drifted in around eight. They picked up the natural deaths cases, suicides, and accidental deaths like the one last week where an old man shot his grandson out of a tree because he mistook the kid’s red ball cap for a cardinal. Ten detectives handled the whodunit murders. She and Able were two of them, and they were the best.
Nationwide, cities were competing for the highest murder clearance rates. The top-ranked squads saw promotions for management and detectives. That was Frankie’s objective. Advancement. Coming to Memphis, her goal had been a spot on the homicide squad. Now she was quietly enrolled in Boston University’s online Masters of Criminal Justice degree program. With the squad’s clearance rate keeping them in the top ten in the country, she hoped to move up in rank. If that didn’t happen, she would see what TBI or the FBI had to offer.
Was she being disloyal to the department? No. To Billy? She considered that. She was being loyal to herself by focusing on goals instead of dwelling on mistakes, like what had happened with Vanderman. She would never allow another lawyer to use her that way again.
The computer techs had worked through the night to hack Caroline’s FileVault encryption. They sent two thumb drives to the squad room. Frankie handed off the drive with Caroline’s banking and credit card information to the economic crimes division. She took the personal documents, her e-mails and iCalendar. Scanning subject lines, she found the majority of e-mails, five hundred of them, dealt with the wedding.
The guest list had run over two hundred, many of them living overseas. After the cancellation, Caroline had to unwind contracts with caterers, hotels, dressmakers, florists, and reservations at restaurants for pre-wedding parties. After the breakup, e-mails from the groom’s side had admonished her, one calling her a self-involved American bitch. Frankie was beginning to understand how Caroline had ended up on anti-depressants and watering her roses at night.
Not much evidence of a social life—no book club dates or meeting friends for cocktails and dinner. Wedding plans and physician appointments for her father and herself had dominated the last six months of her life.
Frankie had fifty emails to go when she stopped to make the call to Martin Lee’s girlfriend. She hung up from the conversation to see Billy on the phone, his back turned to the room. He finished the call and turned around.
“That was Vanderman,” he said. “No contact with Sharma unless we bring charges. No statement and no alibi.” He scribbled something then slammed his hand on the desk.
“Vanderman knows how to play the game,” she said. “We’ll crack Sharma some other way. The techs sent up thumb drives from Caroline’s laptop. Other than the wedding eruption, she led a boring life. Of course she could have a secret account on her mobile for the racy stuff.”
Billy huffed. “That son of a bitch Sharma. The attorney’s assistant sent over Caroline’s file on the harassment. She recorded some of Sharma’s calls, very manipulative stuff trying to break her down. She saved his texts. He sent up to twenty a day. She has photos of his car in front of her house at 2:00 am. The file confirmed Zelda’s story that he tossed her place looking for evidence of a rival.”
“Any physical abuse or threats?”
“Intimidation and emotional abuse. The attorney believed Sharma was escalating toward violence. Caroline was dragging her feet on the protective order. I’d like to talk to this attorney, Robert Highsmith. His assistant needs to get him in touch with me.”
“While you were talking with Vanderman, I spoke with Martin’s girlfriend. She’s Italian, here on a visitor visa. She insists Martin was home with her on Monday night.”
“Did you press her on it?”
“Sure. The lady didn’t budge,” she said.
“That’s too bad. I would love to break that punk’s ass, but Sharma is a better bet.”
She stood. “The fibers recovered from the car’s seat protector were wool off of some type of clothing or a blanket. I’ll go by Caroline’s house to look for a match. And I’ll try to find the cat. After that, I’ll do a search of Caroline’s law office. While I’m there, I’ll ask Highsmith’s assistant to have him contact us.”