Snap Judgment (Samantha Brinkman Book 3)

by Marcia Clark

  Dale glanced at me—a signal that he wanted to jump in. “Did she get any counseling in juvenile hall?”

  He’d taken a shot in the dark—but it was a safe bet Tracy had been to juvenile hall, and probably more than once. Sure enough, Shelly replied, “They said she did, but it definitely didn’t help.” She gave Dale a weak smile. “That’s why I’m so hopeful that we can qualify for help from your center.”

  This time, I didn’t feel guilty about giving her our fake story about the counseling center. I was pissed. Shelly’s uselessness in the face of Tracy’s obvious anguish proved yet again that neglect—no matter how benign—could be just as devastating as active abuse. “Are you still in touch with Tracy?”

  Shelly had a weary look. “I haven’t spoken to her in months. I called her a few times, but she never returned my calls. Eventually, I gave up.”

  I wondered how long “eventually” was. A month? A week? “Do you know where she lives?”

  “I know where she lived when she first moved out,” Shelly said. “But that was almost two years ago, and I found out she doesn’t live there anymore because I went there when she stopped returning my calls.”

  Dale cleared his throat. “Did you report her missing?”

  Shelly looked down at her hands, which were folded in her lap. “No, I . . . I guess I should have. But she disappears so much, I was sure she’d turn up again.” She gazed over Dale’s shoulder. “She always does.”

  I’d noticed a few family photographs in cheap metal frames on a side table. One showed Shelly with a man—her current amour, Benjamin, I surmised. The second was a photo of her two boys, and the third showed a dark-haired girl with a hand on the shoulder of a shorter blonde girl. Both the photo Cabazon had given me and the DMV photo Dale had pulled up showed Tracy to be blonde. I pointed to the photo. “Is the little one Tracy?”

  Shelly glanced at it. “No. That’s Tammy. My youngest.”

  I didn’t see any other photos that seemed to be of Tracy on the table. “Do you have any photographs of Tracy?”

  “I suppose I must have a few somewhere. I can’t recall where at the moment.” Shelly looked perplexed. “I don’t understand why that’s important.”

  And I didn’t understand why a mother would have photos on display that showed all but one of her children. I was trying to come up with a reason to ask that question when footsteps on the flimsy wooden porch announced the arrival of another member of the tribe. A man in his forties, with longish, stringy brown hair; big, round blue eyes; and the ruddy complexion of a drinker came in and slammed the front door behind him. He stopped at the entry to the living room and glared at Dale and me, then at Shelly. “Who are these people?”

  Shelly made the introductions. Not surprisingly, this phenomenal catch of a man was Benjamin Posner. She gave him a shaky smile. “They’re going to try and get us into the counseling program.”

  Benjamin snorted. “Counseling. What a crock.” He nodded toward the kitchen. “We got any of that pot roast left?”

  He was the prototypical angry white male, and I just couldn’t help but bait him. “Don’t you think Tracy might’ve been better off if she’d had counseling?”

  His face darkened. “That girl was nothing but trouble from jump. Counseling wouldn’t have done dick for a piece of work like her.”

  Shelley recoiled as though she’d been slapped. “Ben, please don’t talk about her like that. Tracy had her problems but—”

  “But nothing.” He sneered at her. “Face it. The girl was a friggin’ whore.” Benjamin shot a heated look at Dale and me. “She didn’t tell you about that, did she? About how every time she ran off, the cops caught her tricking?”

  Shelly looked miserable, and even though I still thought she was a piss-poor excuse for a mother, I wanted to slap this asshat across the face. Fortunately for both of us, Dale saw the danger signs in my eyes and stepped in. “Mr. Posner, the program will want to know a little more about what was going on with Tracy. Do you happen to know who any of Tracy’s boyfriends were?”

  He spoke with bitter sarcasm. “Anyone who had ten bucks to spare.”

  His words were calculated to wound Shelly, and I could see that they did. But I needed a real answer. “When she left for the last time, did she move in with anyone?”

  Shelly grasped her knees and tried to recover, but her voice shook as she spoke. “I think she was seeing a boy named, ah . . . Corey?” She nodded to herself. “Yes, Corey Washington. He came by one day not long before Tracy left for the last time. But we only spoke for a few minutes, and she didn’t say she planned to move in with him. So . . . I don’t know if she’s with him now.”

  Shelly was pathetic. Benjamin was a pig. I’d had enough. I’d considered asking how the youngest daughter, Tammy, was doing. After what I’d seen in that house, I was more certain than ever that her bust for possession of alcohol was a symptom of some kind of abuse. But I didn’t think I could stand to hear the clueless lies I knew I’d get from Shelly and her amour, Benjamin. I caught Dale’s eye. He nodded and stood up. “Thank you very much for taking the time, Ms. Connor. We’ll be in touch.” He looked at Benjamin but didn’t offer to shake. “Mr. Posner.”

  I thanked Shelly, gave her asshole boyfriend a curt nod, and followed Dale outside. The moment we got into the car, Dale said, “Don’t start yelling till we get out of range, okay?”

  We buckled up, and Dale pulled away. I managed to hold off for two blocks, but then . . . “Fuck those two! Both of them! What on earth is that idiot mother doing shitting out a million babies when she can’t be bothered to even figure out where the hell they are? And that crap excuse for a human Posner. I bet he beats the shit out of her on a daily basis. Not that I mind!” Dale wore a little smile. “What? Don’t tell me I’m wrong!”

  Dale shook his head. “You’re not wrong. I agree with everything you said.” He steered onto the freeway. “Tell me, did you get a molest-y vibe off him?”

  I’m usually a little too good at spotting the pedophiles. “Honestly, I was so pissed off by the time he walked in—and he was such an obvious asshole—I don’t know. I could go either way.”

  Dale looked troubled. “Well, something went on in that house.” He drummed his fingers on the steering wheel for a moment. When he spoke, his tone was soft, tentative. “How come you never ran away?”

  My stomach tightened. Dale was the only one I’d ever told about exactly what I’d gone through during the year I’d spent living in hell, AKA Sebastian Cromer’s mansion. He’d wondered why I hated Celeste, so I’d had to tell him what Sebastian had been doing and how she’d accused me of lying and turned a blind eye to it all. Even when I’d shown her the photo I’d managed to take of Sebastian reaching for me as I lay in my bed, she’d simply claimed I’d “set him up.” But I’d never spoken to Dale about it since. And until now, he’d never brought it up. I knew it wasn’t just because he wanted to save me the pain. It was also because it made him lose his shit. Dale had been in custody during his murder case when I told him what Sebastian had done to me, and Dale had gone so crazy they had to carry him out of the visitors’ room.

  I gave him a sidelong glance. I wasn’t sure he’d want to hear about my runaway days, but since he asked . . . “Who says I didn’t?”

  He almost did a double take, then asked, “What made you go back?”

  I couldn’t keep the bitterness out of my voice, and I didn’t try. “He did. He couldn’t risk letting me out of his sight. Couldn’t risk my telling people what he’d done to me. He knew that at some point I might find someone he couldn’t buy off. And he had the money to pay for the best to track me down.” Not that it took investigative genius to track down a thirteen-year-old with no money and few friends.

  Dale gripped the steering wheel so hard I heard it squeak. “Where did you go?”

  “The street, the park, my English teacher’s house.” I couldn’t go to Michy’s place. That was the first place they’d look.

 
Dale glanced at me. “Your English teacher? Why didn’t she call the police?”

  I stared at him. “That was the last thing he wanted to do.” Mr. Pruitt—“call me Bobby”—was just a kinder, gentler version of Sebastian. But anything was better than that sadistic monster. Just thinking about that time made me feel like I was drowning in the darkness again. I didn’t want to talk about it anymore. “Do you think Tracy really was hooking? Or was the jackass just trying to piss Shelly off?”

  Dale glanced at me again, saw that the subject was closed. He swallowed, then set his jaw, his expression grim. “I don’t know. And since I can’t access her information in the database, the only way to find out would be to find people who knew her back then. But—and I don’t want to sound like a callous jerk here—we’ve got a much more immediate problem to solve.”

  True. We had a life-or-death problem, and limited time to solve it. Just because Cabazon had deputized us to find her, that didn’t mean he wasn’t deploying his own resources as well.

  And if they found Tracy before we did, she’d be dead. I’d been committed to saving her before, but I was twice as determined now.

  Tracy deserved to have someone in her life care whether she lived or died.

  TWENTY-FOUR

  We’d stopped for lunch on the way back and wound up hitting the usual Saturday evening traffic, so it was almost six thirty p.m. when Dale dropped me back home.

  He was going to track down the reports on the murder, but he didn’t want to be seen at the department on a Saturday. It’d raise too many questions, since he wasn’t working an active case.

  But we couldn’t afford to lose a whole weekend, so Dale was going to try and get in touch with Tiffany, the eldest sister, who lived in Redlands. We were hoping she was in contact with Tracy—and that she’d be willing to cooperate. If not, I’d have the rest of the weekend off.

  I needed it. It’d been a tough week and an even tougher day for me. I went through my e-mails for a couple of hours, scanned the news programs I’d recorded to see if there was any mention of Graham—and only finally exhaled when I saw that no more bombs had exploded. After a shower and a double shot of Patrón Silver, I got into bed and checked my e-mail on my phone. Niko was supposed to be back from New York tomorrow, and we’d planned to have dinner. But he’d written to tell me that he couldn’t make it; they’d asked to extend the master classes he was teaching for another week. I was relieved. After my visit with Tracy’s mother and her cretin of a boyfriend, I had no appetite for sex or romance.

  I went to bed feeling drained and wound up having a horrible night. Not surprising given the visit with Tracy’s mother.

  On Sunday morning, Dale called to tell me he hadn’t reached Tiffany, so I could stand down for now. I dragged myself through the usual chores on Sunday: laundry, the dry cleaners, some minimal grocery shopping, and all the dusting, scrubbing, and vacuuming—the latter of which I always found soothing. The rest, I just held my nose and powered through.

  Sunday night, I celebrated by getting together with Michy and Hank, AKA Harriet—a great cop who’d turned into a great friend, an irony Michy never failed to mention—for some Christmas shopping at the adult Disneyland known as The Grove. We capped it off with dinner at The Whisper, a casual speakeasy-style lounge with live piano music. It was icy-cold outside, but the patio was enclosed and had good heaters. And we all had shots of Glenlivet—the best heater of all.

  We’d just ordered dinner when Michy’s phone dinged. She frowned as she reached into her purse. “That’s the Google Alert for Graham’s case.” She looked at me as she fished out her phone. “How come your phone didn’t ding?”

  I sighed. “’Cause I put it on silent.” I’d just wanted one quiet day. Was that too much to ask? Apparently so.

  Michy scrolled for a second, then put a hand to her forehead. “Oh my God.”

  Hank and I exchanged looks. As I pulled my purse onto my lap and dug around for my phone, Hank asked, “What?”

  Michy stared at the screen. “Audrey Sutton must be paying off someone at TMZ.”

  I fished out my phone and found the story. “Graham got fired for sexually harassing his paralegal when he was a first-year associate.”

  Hank rolled her eyes. “Well, that sucks. Did he respond?”

  I nodded as I read. “He swears it was just a misunderstanding. He thought she was interested, so he made a pass at her at an office Christmas party—”

  “How timely,” Hank interjected sarcastically as she glanced at the red-and-green lights strung around the restaurant. The whole Grove had been decked out for the holidays, which were fast approaching.

  Michelle added, “He says he apologized to her at the time and that it all would’ve blown over if the managing partner’s son hadn’t wanted him out.”

  Hank folded her arms and sat back. “So it was just office politics, not the fact that he couldn’t keep it in his pants? I’m not buying it.”

  But Hank was a cop. There wasn’t much she did buy. Not that I blamed her. “And I’m sure you’re not alone.” Some might believe Graham, but I’d bet most wouldn’t.

  In the battle for the hearts and minds of potential jurors, my side had just taken another body blow.

  Not the best way to end the weekend.

  When I got in to the office Monday morning, Alex came out to tell me that he’d made some progress in my absence. “Remember that Italian cinema teacher Nomie mentioned?”

  The “hottie” professor. How could I forget? Every school had at least one. And I was sure that a film- and TV-oriented school like USC had many more than that. “You talked to him?”

  “Just briefly on the phone. I said we were looking into Alicia’s murder, and he seemed willing to talk, but I think we should see him in person.”

  Using Alicia’s murder—not Roan’s death—as our entrée was a deliberate choice. It immediately made us more sympathetic—translation: encouraged more cooperation. No one wanted to look like they were stonewalling an investigation into the murder of an innocent, and well-liked, young woman. “Nice job, Alex. Did you set up a time?” Intuitive instincts like his were what set the talent apart from the hacks.

  Alex glanced at his watch. “I made an appointment for ten thirty. He said he could give us half an hour.”

  I noticed that his watch looked new—and suspiciously like a Baume & Mercier. “Nice watch. Is it real?”

  His smile, part proud, part embarrassed, said it all. “Yeah. It’s a gift from Paul. He gets great deals on duty-free.”

  Yet another perk of dating an airline pilot. “Sweet.” I hoped this worked out. Because if Paul hurt Alex, I’d hunt him down and wear his skin as a cape.

  I checked in with Michy. “Any more news from TMZ?”

  Michy held up her hands and raised her eyes to the ceiling. “Thank God, not so far. But the day is young.”

  I thought about calling Graham to get the full story but decided against it for now. The full story didn’t matter, and the last thing I wanted to do was give him the impression that it did. It’d only encourage him to talk to yet another reporter. I’d warned him repeatedly not to do it, and he’d repeatedly ignored me. My only hope was that the story would play itself out. It really was the very definition of old news.

  I looked up Jorge Maldonado’s case on the court website and found the name of his attorney—Diego Ferrara. I’d never heard of him. I didn’t know the prosecutor, Rick Moringlane, either. He must be new to the downtown courthouse. I’d have to find a nonsuspicious way to get his take on Ferrara and on the murder case. That was all the progress I had time to make on Tracy’s case for now, so I spent the rest of the next hour working on some of my other cases.

  At nine thirty, Alex came to my office and knocked on the doorframe. “Ready?”

  I picked up my purse and glanced out the window. The view it gave of the side of a brick building wasn’t inspiring, but it did give me a sliver of sky that let me check on the weather. The leather jacket
I’d brought, because the sun had been shining when I left that morning, might not cut it now. Clouds had moved in, and the sky had darkened. It looked like it might rain. I kept a black wool scarf and spare raincoat—one that had wool lining—in the bottom drawer of my desk for emergencies like this. I shook out my coat, put it on, and wrapped the scarf around my neck.

  Alex smirked. “Nice look, Nanook.”

  Alex was one of those people who never got cold. I glared at him. “Shut up.”

  I told Michy we’d be back after lunch, and we headed down to the garage. Since we expected to be done with the interview way before dark, Alex said he’d drive. “The less you drive that clunker, the better.”

  We were just ten feet away from Beulah. “You may not insult my ride. She’s a classic.”

  Alex hit the remote to unlock his car and opened the driver’s door. “No, she’s a relic. There’s a difference.”

  I held up a hand as I opened the passenger side door. “I am not even listening.”

  We got in, and as Alex pulled out of the garage, he said, “She can’t hear you, you know.”

  I gave an exasperated sigh. “I know that.” But Alex raised an eyebrow. I didn’t bother to argue, because it was true. I did have a weirdly superstitious, overpersonalized attitude about Beulah. It wasn’t healthy.

  I spent most of the ride privately obsessing about whether Dale had learned anything new since Saturday. I’d expected to hear from him first thing this morning, but he hadn’t called, and when I’d called him, it’d gone straight to voice mail. I couldn’t stop worrying that Cabazon had decided to contact Dale personally to put more pressure on—and what form that pressure might take. Guys like Cabazon weren’t long on patience. They solved problems with bullets, not brains. I had to make sure Dale and I didn’t become two more problems he needed to solve.