Jessie Black Legal Thrillers Box Set 1

by Larry A Winters

  “People have secrets, you know? And I respect that—everyone would tell you that you can trust me to keep a secret, normally. But I just think when there’s been a crime and people are dead, you can’t keep secrets anymore.”

  “I agree,” Graham said. “I don’t think anyone would argue with that. Right, Detective Novak?”

  Novak nodded. “Better to get everything out in the open.”

  Arabella beamed. Jessie sensed that the detectives’ permission was all the excuse she needed to blurt out the juicy info she’d been bursting at the seams to reveal.

  “For example, Jordan Dunn. She had a big secret.”

  Graham glanced at her notes. “Jordan Dunn, junior, age 16. One of the victims.”

  “Right. She was, like, super pretty. If you asked anyone on the street to describe what a cheerleader should look like, they’d describe Jordan. She could have any guy at Stevens Academy for a boyfriend. She could have college guys.”

  “But she didn’t?” Graham said. There was a little bit of discomfort visible in her expression, and Jessie thought she probably found the girl’s gossipy tone distasteful, too.

  Arabella leaned forward and lowered her voice to the point that the room’s microphones barely picked it up. “Jordan was hooking up with a teacher.”

  “Really?” Graham said. “What was this teacher’s name?”

  “Jordan wouldn’t tell me.” Arabella rolled her eyes theatrically. “I know, right? Total drama queen.”

  The irony of this girl labeling anyone else a drama queen was too rich to ignore, and Graham shot a covert smirk toward Jessie through the one-way glass.

  “But she told you she was having an affair with a teacher? A member of the Stevens Academy faculty?”

  “Well, she didn’t call it an ‘affair,’ but yeah. They were hooking up.”

  “Was this person one of Jordan’s teachers, or just a teacher at the school?”

  “I’m not sure.” Arabella frowned. She looked a little disappointed in her own lack of details. “It was a man, though, a male teacher. She definitely called him a him. So it wasn’t, you know, a lesbo thing.”

  “Okay,” Graham said. “So one of the victims, Jordan Dunn, was involved in an affair—or, let’s call it an inappropriate relationship—with a male teacher at the school.”

  “Crazy, right?” Arabella said. Some of her enthusiasm was returning. “You think that only happens on TV, but it happens in real life, too. Probably all the time.”

  “Did Jordan give you any other details about the teacher? What class he taught, how old he was, whether he was single or married?”

  Arabella suddenly blushed, her cheeks reddening so much that Jessie could see the change through the one-way glass. “She said he was great, you know, at doing it. Is that helpful?”

  Graham, in a tone of grave seriousness, said, “It’s extremely helpful, Arabella.”

  The girl smiled ear-to-ear. “I have more information. Do you know about Kaelee Teal?”

  Graham looked confused. She flipped through her notes, then shook her head. “Her name hasn’t come up in the investigation. She wasn’t one of the victims.”

  “That’s because she was cut from the cheerleading squad two weeks before the shooting.”

  Graham shot another quick glance toward Jessie through the one-way glass. “How did Kaelee feel about that? Do you think she held a grudge against the rest of the team?”

  “Oh, she definitely did. She said they were a bunch of stupid whores who didn’t know anything about cheerleading. She said they didn’t know a cupie from a basket toss. She said Ms. K. didn’t care about the sport and that’s why she let Kaelee get cut.”

  Jessie noted the use of the word “whore,” and was sure Graham did, too. Echoes of True_Man and the Manpower forum.

  “And by Ms. K., you mean Ms. Kerensa, the coach,” Graham said.

  “Uh-huh. Kaelee said she was as stupid as the rest of them and wasn’t qualified to coach a pre-school dance class.”

  “Sounds like Kaelee was very angry.”

  “Yup. She said they’d regret it. She said she was going to get back at them.”

  Graham arched an eyebrow. “Did she say how?”

  “No.”

  “Why was Kaelee cut from the squad?”

  Arabella shrugged. “Grades. You need at least a B average to participate in varsity. There’s a rule about it. But Kaelee said that’s bullshit because the school breaks the rules for the football and basketball teams all the time. She said she’s just as much an athlete as those guys, and more of an athlete than any of the other girls on the squad.”

  “The ‘stupid whores,’” Graham said, reading from her notes.

  “Her words, not mine. I like the other girls. I mean, liked. It’s still hard to believe they’re gone.”

  “Is Kaelee good with computers?”

  Arabella looked surprised by the question. “I don’t know. It’s not like she’s making her own apps or anything.”

  “Does she have any family members who work with computers? A boyfriend, maybe?”

  Arabella laughed. “She doesn’t have a boyfriend. I don’t know her family.”

  Graham paused. Jessie could see her processing all of the new information, thinking of follow-up questions. Jessie didn’t need to be a mind reader to know what the detective was thinking. Both the salacious rumor about Jordan Dunn and the existence of an angry, former member of the cheerleading squad both had the potential to be important leads.

  24

  After a brief conference, Jessie Black left the Roundhouse to catch up on her work at the DA’s office, and Graham and Novak went to Jordan Dunn’s house to follow up on the lead Arabella Minsky had provided.

  Novak drove. In the passenger seat, Graham silently cautioned herself not to get too excited. This case seemed perpetually on the verge of breaking, yet they never managed to make real progress. The dead bodies were piling up, but were they any closer to making a solid conspiracy case against True_Man, a person they still hadn’t even identified?

  Novak parked and they got out of the car. The house was a two-story colonial, light blue, sitting on a quiet street in the suburbs. The mailbox at the foot of the driveway was in the shape of a sailboat.

  Graham led the way to the front door. A small army of wind chimes tinkled in the breeze. She and Novak exchanged a look.

  Then they heard screams through the front door.

  Not the type that gave rise to probable cause, thankfully. These were happy screams, high-pitched and full of gleeful energy. Kids.

  Graham rang the bell. A few seconds later, a woman opened the door. It seemed to take her a moment to focus on Graham and Novak. Her eyes were red-rimmed and the bags under them were puffy.

  “Ms. Dunn?” Graham said.

  “Yes?”

  “We’re from the Philadelphia Police Department. My name is Detective Graham. This is Detective Novak. We’d like to ask you some questions about your daughter. May we come in?”

  “Questions about Jordan?” the woman said. Her voice cracked on the last syllable.

  “Yes. It could be important.”

  “But she’s … already gone. All those poor girls are. What could be important about asking questions now?”

  A squeal of laughter issued from inside the house.

  “Please, Ms. Dunn,” Novak said. “We only need a few moments of your time.”

  Dunn cast a look behind her into the house. “I have guests. My younger daughter is having a play date.”

  “We won’t be long,” Graham said.

  The woman hesitated for another second, then gestured for them to enter. She led them through a cheerful-looking entryway, but her bearing was anything but cheerful. Her walk seemed slow, dragging. Her grief was almost palpable. “We’re sorry for your loss,” Graham said, wishing she’d said it earlier.

  “Thanks.”

  There was a carpeted staircase leading upstairs, with a few stuffed animals scattered
on the steps. Dunn led them past the stairs and into a brightly lit kitchen. Two children streaked past them, barely as tall as Graham’s knees.

  “That’s my daughter Ellie,” Dunn said. “And her friend from down the street.”

  A woman entered the kitchen from another room. “Everything okay?”

  Dunn nodded. “These are detectives. They want to talk about … you know. Do you mind watching the girls?”

  “Of course not. Take your time.” The woman smiled awkwardly, then disappeared as quickly as she’d appeared. Dunn looked like she wanted to disappear, too.

  “Is there a place we can sit down?” Graham said.

  “I’d rather not.” Dunn crossed her arms over her chest and leaned her back against the refrigerator. It was a white fridge, not the fancy stainless steel kind, and it was covered with drawings and notes and magnets. Dunn’s shoulder brushed against a magnet shaped like a watermelon, and it dropped from the fridge and clattered on the tile floor. Dunn didn’t seem to notice until Novak bent to pick it up. “Thanks,” she mumbled.

  “I don’t know if you’ve been following the news,” Graham said. “We’re investigating the possible involvement of a second person in the shooting, someone who may have been helping Russell Lanford. We think this person may live in the area and may have had a personal motive for wanting to hurt these young women.”

  Dunn nodded. “I saw on TV. You got a subpoena for that website.”

  “A warrant, yes.” An unwanted image flashed through her mind. Wesley Lanford turning toward her with his rifle. Her mouth went dry. She swallowed. “Did Jordan have any enemies?”

  Dunn’s face twisted, and Graham thought she might laugh out loud. She wouldn’t be the first person to laugh at that question. The word “enemies” was so overly dramatic, and the context of a murder investigation so stressful, that a lot of people burst into giggles just from sheer nerves. Dunn didn’t, though. She wiped her eyes and shook her head. “No enemies.”

  Graham glanced at Novak. He looked as uncomfortable as she felt. They both knew what was coming next wouldn’t be easy for anyone in the room. “I know this is difficult,” Graham said, “but we only have a few more questions. Was Jordan seeing anyone?”

  “Like … a boyfriend?” Dunn said. She wiped her eyes again. “No. She went to parties, stuff like that. We gave her freedom as long as she came home by eleven. But no boyfriend.”

  “Are you sure? One of the other students at Stevens Academy seems to be under the impression that Jordan was seeing someone.”

  Dunn shrugged. “I don’t know why she would keep it a secret. She was very open with me.”

  “Well,” Graham said, “what if the person she was seeing was older? Do you think she might keep that a secret?”

  “Older?” Dunn’s shoulder knocked another magnet off the fridge. “What do you mean? How much older?”

  “A teacher,” Graham said.

  Dunn shook her head so vigorously that her hair fanned around her head. “Not possible. Jordan would never. She … no. Whoever told you that is a liar.”

  “I know this is difficult to hear—”

  “It’s not true.”

  “Would it be okay if we had a look at Jordan’s bedroom?”

  Dunn stared at her as if Graham had requested to deface her daughter’s grave. “No. Absolutely not. I want you to leave my house right now. This is ridiculous!”

  “We can get a warrant,” Novak said, “if we have to.”

  She wheeled on him. “Are you threatening me?”

  “We’re just looking for answers,” Graham said. “Don’t you want the people responsible for Jordan’s death to be brought to justice?”

  “I’m calling my husband.” She moved to the kitchen counter and detached a cell phone from its charging cable, then started tapping the screen.

  Graham chewed her lip. “Okay. I think that’s a good idea. We should talk to your husband, too. While you get him on the phone, would it be alright if we went upstairs?”

  “No! It would not be alright!”

  Graham gave Novak a look. He turned his back on the kitchen and pulled out his own phone. Started the process of getting a warrant based on Arabella Minsky’s statement. Meanwhile, Dunn was talking into her phone, her voice edging closer to hysteria. Graham could just barely hear a male voice on the other end of the line, loud and angry.

  Dunn ended the call and glared at Graham defiantly. “My husband is on his way.”

  “Warrant’s in progress,” Novak said, putting away his phone.

  “It’s going to take longer this way,” Graham said, trying one more time. “We were hoping to have a quick look around, then get out of your hair.”

  Dunn glared at her. “And he’s calling our lawyer, too. I heard all about how you bullied that website into releasing the private information of its users, and you got that guy Truman killed trying to protect his users’ privacy. All for some witch hunt when everyone knows the only person to blame here is Russell Lanford, and he’s dead! Now you come here and accuse my daughter of…. Enough is enough!”

  The other woman poked her head into the kitchen again. “Are you okay?”

  “Just watch the girls!” Dunn snapped. The woman hurriedly backed out of sight. Dunn shook her head. Tears streamed down her face. “What do you think you’re going to find, anyway?” she said to Graham.

  “I don’t know. Maybe Jordan kept a diary. Maybe there are love letters, or—”

  “You people are shameless!”

  The husband arrived before the warrant. He had thick silver hair and wore a dark gray power suit. He didn’t really look anything like Wesley Lanford, but that didn’t stop a chill from dancing up Graham’s spine. He was an angry father, and his entrance triggered something in her—post traumatic stress?—left over from her rooftop shooting. Novak, seeming to sense this, touched her arm and stepped forward to take the lead.

  “Mr. Dunn, my name is Detective Novak. This is—”

  “I want you out of my house right now.”

  “Mr. Dunn,” Novak said, “we’re here because your daughter may have been involved in a romantic relationship with one of the teachers at Stevens Academy. If that’s the case, that teacher may have had something to do with the shooting in which she died.”

  “I don’t see how that makes any sense—”

  The two little girls burst into the kitchen. The one in the lead yelled “Daddy!” and crashed into her father’s legs, hugging him. The woman followed the girls, an apologetic look on her face.

  “They heard his voice,” she said. “Sorry.”

  “It’s okay,” Ms. Dunn said. She crouched beside her daughter and peeled the girl away from her father’s legs. “Ellie, Mommy and Daddy need to do grown-up things now, okay? Why don’t you show Susie the new doll Grandma gave you?”

  Ellie looked at her mother, and for a second, Graham was taken aback by the expression on the little girl’s face—old beyond her years, tired and skeptical and even cynical. Then she was beaming, and excitedly telling her friend about her new toy, and the two girls took off like rockets out of the kitchen.

  “Jordan wasn’t having a relationship with a teacher,” Mr. Dunn said. His voice was thick with anger.

  His wife’s gaze was still on the spot where Ellie had recently stood hugging her father’s legs. “You know what she asks me every morning?” she said, looking at Graham as if daring her to ask.

  “What?”

  “She asks me if Jordan is still dead. Every morning, it’s her first thought. Her first question. Is my sister still dead?” The woman’s voice broke. “I can’t stand this anymore.”

  “Go lie down,” her husband said. “I’ll handle this.”

  Ms. Dunn seemed to hesitate. Her husband nodded reassuringly. She cast a final scowl at Graham and Novak, then left the kitchen to join her friend and the kids.

  Mr. Dunn regarded them with barely concealed rage. “I’m going to file a complaint with the police department. Har
assment. How dare you come into our house and upset my wife? Our daughter was just killed, for God’s sake. We’re grieving.”

  “And we respect that,” Novak said.

  Graham said, “We’re not here to upset anyone. We’re trying to find the other person responsible for Jordan’s death.”

  “Don’t say her name,” he snapped. Then, with an angry laugh, “Other person? What a joke. As if there’s a shadowy conspiracy to kill cheerleaders.”

  “In this case, we believe there was,” Graham said.

  Something about her tone must have affected him, because his harsh laughter cut off as sharply as if someone had flipped a switch. “This is ludicrous,” he said.

  “Why don’t you show us your daughter’s bedroom?” Graham said. “If it’s ludicrous, then we’ll find nothing and that will be the end of it.”

  “Fine.” His teeth flashed. “This way.”

  They followed him upstairs. There were four bedrooms. The master, one for each daughter, and a guest room, Graham supposed. The doors all stood open, but Mr. Dunn stopped at the threshold of Jordan’s room as if stopped by an invisible wall. Graham heard him suck in a long, shaky breath, and then he stepped inside. She and Novak followed.

  “This is Jordan’s room?” Graham said.

  Dunn nodded. He wiped a finger under one eye, looked away from them.

  “It’s very … neat,” Novak said. “I have a daughter. She’s an adult now—a mother—but when she was a teenager, her room was always a mess.”

  Graham took another step into the room. The double size bed was made. There were no clothes on the floor or draped over the furniture. The closet doors were closed, as were the drawers of the dresser. Graham didn’t have a teenage girl, but she’d been one herself not long ago. Compared to this, she’d lived like a hobo.

  “Did you clean up in here?” she asked.

  Dunn wiped his eye again. “A little bit. Not much. Jordan was very neat.”

  Not just neat, Graham thought. Mature. Framed prints from the Philadelphia Museum of Art adorned the walls where she would expect to find posters of bands or movie stars. There were no stuffed animals on the bed, no magazines on the nightstand. On a small desk under a window, there was a stack of SAT prep books, an Asus laptop, and a Kindle. Graham picked up the ereader, turned it on, and looked over a library of literary works. Not your typical teenage reading material. She put the Kindle down. Through the window, she could see the backyard, where a swing set had been erected.