TEST POINTED TO the printed-out e-mails she’d organized on the table. North caught her eye lingering on his waist; he’d missed a belt loop. A grease stain smeared his shirt pocket, and his face was unshaven. He never left the house without shaving; it made him feel conspicuous, vulnerable.
“We’ll need our people to do a deep dive on the library computer,” he said and slumped in a chair. He was sweating, and stank of sweat.
“We have about fifty e-mails sent to tothevictor,” Test said. “I’ve arranged them in chronological order, so you can get a feel of the ongoing exchange. Read them and see what you conclude, and I’ll fill you in on what I found at the town hall.”
She was thorough, he’d give her that. He took his time reading each e-mail, taking notes. Then he read each e-mail again and wrote more notes.
His mind was working now, clearing out the clutter of the personal life and regaining focus.
“Whoever this is,” he said, “he was sleeping with her. And he had the power. Most of it, anyway. Wanted their relationship hidden. Because he’s of age and she was fifteen.”
“Right,” Test said. “The only lead I could glean was Jessica mentioning in the one e-mail about V and Family Matters.”
“What did you find?”
Her look was inscrutable. An admirable trait in a detective. He’d not want to be interrogated by her.
“Besides a pack of lunatics from each end of the political spectrum?”
North looked at her quizzically.
“A ‘town hall’ meeting about the gay marriage legislation,” Test said.
“Lovely, those. What did you find?”
“I cross-referenced all the names with any initial for V. I found one. Victor Jenkins—”
“Shit. To the Victor,” North said.
“Jenkins was at the previous three Family Matters meetings. But he wasn’t at the one held last night, when Jessica was killed.”
North walked a slow circle as he pondered. Victor Jenkins. Jenkins and his wife were the vocal, strident evangelical type, strong proponents of the Defense of Marriage Act. North understood their position. Agreed with it. To a point. Though publically, North kept his personal views unknown.
He’d seen Victor and his wife in church, spoke with Victor on occasion in the rectory after mass, over weak coffee and cakey, store-bought donuts. While Jenkins was devout and more than a touch too literal in his biblical interpretations for North, he seemed a good man. It was hard to imagine him killing Jessica. Impossible, really. But, it had once been impossible to imagine a fifteen-year-old boy stabbing his father twenty-seven times, too.
Victor. His name had come up with Gregory and Scott earlier in the day. Had it really been the same day? It felt like weeks ago.
“I just don’t see it,” North said, finally.
“Victor?” Test said. “To the Victor? What’s not to see?”
“I see the connection between the name and the e-mail. I just can’t imagine Victor doing such a thing.”
“Sir. Your imagination doesn’t figure into the equation. Victor Jenkins is a radical.”
“That’s an opinion.”
“Held by most.”
“Some.”
“He runs with Jed King. He testified at the state legislature last year about—”
“Political activism does not make a murderer.”
“Is there a history between you two?” she said, eyes sharp. “What am I missing?”
No, North decided, I definitely would not want to be interrogated by Sonja Test.
“Victor Jenkins works at the same school Jessica attended,” Test argued. “That put him in proximity to her.”
“I understand all that, what I don’t understand is—”
“We need to check this lead,” Test said.
“We will. The problem is—”
She fidgeted, tense, ready to put forth more evidence. Prepared to counter.
“Even if I could imagine Jenkins killing the victim,” North said, “which I can’t—”
“You keep calling her the victim. Why don’t you call her by her name?” Test said. Her tone was increasingly combative; a quality that undermined clear judgment, in North’s experience.
“You know why,” North said. Avoiding names that might create an emotional connection to a victim or a perp, and cloud judgment in a case, was a tactic cops used to remain objective.
“This isn’t Boston,” Test said. “We don’t have an onslaught of murders every other day. We don’t have dozens of open homicide files to guard against emotional overload.”
“No, it’s not Boston,” North said. “It’s my home.”
This seemed to hit a nerve with Test, as she refrained from a retort.
“I think,” North said, “the victim being essentially a neighbor to us both, there may be more reason than ever to maintain that distance. Don’t you?”
“No,” Test argued. “I’ll to call her Jessica. Because that’s who she was. She was made a victim and I don’t care to give the person who did that the power to take her name away.”
In all his years, North had heard dozens of pleas for calling a victim by her name. None convincing. Except this one.
He’d forgotten what they’d been talking about and was trying to pluck the thread of conversation from his mind.
“Why don’t you think Victor Jenkins is our guy?” Test asked, as if recognizing his memory lapse.
“I don’t put anything past anyone,” North said. “Given the right motive or emotional context. And, as you said, whether or not I can imagine a suspect being capable of or not, is moot. For the most part. But what I can’t see is a young girl like Jessica being taken with Victor Jenkins. That’s my snag. Those e-mails are love letters. To Victor Jenkins? No. No way. The man is in his fifties. It makes no sense. That’s what gives me most pause.”
“Unless,” Test said, “he had something over her.”
North considered this angle. “No. If he had something on her—and what could he possibly have over a fifteen-year-old girl?—and took advantage of that, that’s possible. But again, the e-mails express adoration. She certainly isn’t going to adore a man like that.”
“Right,” Test admitted, clearly resenting having to do so. “So how does he fit? Because, he does fit. Somehow. He has to fit.”
“Let’s go ask him.”
“It’s eleven o’clock.”
“It’s best to take possible suspects off guard. Besides, you got somewhere to be?”
Home, she thought.
“No,” she said.