necessarily
heard a scuffle in another room.”
“Lee swears he’s innocent, every
time they talk to him, in all the pages I’ve read,” Sam said. “Yet no one
seemed to be listening to him. Every question from Padilla comes back at Lee
with the fact that Jessie Starkey told them Lee was guilty.”
“Are Jessie’s statements there?
With your pages?”
She shook her head. “Haven’t come
across them.”
An hour later, Sam’s eyelids felt
like they had lead weights attached. “I’m not making sense of this anymore,”
she said. “Nothing seems to be filed here in sequential order and my brain
isn’t working. It’s been a long day.”
Beau smiled up from his set of
pages. “I know, darlin’. Go ahead upstairs—I’m right behind you.”
He didn’t have to suggest it
twice. Sam set her pages down and trudged to the kitchen with their coffee
cups. She’d brushed her teeth and smoothed the sheets from their earlier visit,
and was about to settle herself into sleepy bliss when she heard his footsteps
on the stairs.
“Well, this adds an interesting
wrinkle,” Beau said, coming into the room. “At the time Jessie Starkey
confessed, he tested positive for cocaine.”
Sam gave a puzzled look.
“That little fact never came up at
the trial,” Beau said. “And the lab report was shoved between two other pages,
in a spot completely unrelated to the confession.”
“So you think someone tried to
cover it up?”
“That would be my guess.”
Chapter
10
The revelations in the Angela
Cayne case file might have kept Sam awake but that didn’t turn out to be. Her
head hit the pillow and she didn’t even roll over until gray dawn began to
filter into the bedroom. When she reached out for Beau she discovered that he
was not in bed. No light from the bathroom; he must be downstairs. She found
him at the dining table with pages from the file spread out in stacks.
“Morning, baby,” she said. “Did
you actually settle into bed last night at all?”
“Oh, yeah. A few hours. Kept
waking up though. Finally, it made more sense to let you sleep without all my
tossing and turning.”
She kissed the top of his head.
“Coffee?”
Not waiting for his answer, she
went into the kitchen and found that he’d already brewed some, just hadn’t
remembered to pour it. She doctored two mugs and carried them to the table.
“I’m trying to organize all this
into a timeline,” he said. “It’s almost as if somebody took a dozen little
folders and a hundred loose pages and just gathered them up any old which way
and stuck them together with a cover over it all. There’s no sequence to it
whatsoever.”
“Glad you said that. Last night I
was beginning to feel like it was my fuzzy head that wasn’t making sense of
it.”
“Wasn’t you.” He paused for a sip
of his coffee. “You know, taking over this job, half the time I wonder how much
of this stuff was Padilla’s incompetence and how often he might have been
purposely covering up something. I find this kind of sloppy work all the time.
If the defense lawyers were never given Jessie’s drug test results, that alone
could have changed the outcome.”
“If money were no object you could
hire a staff just to go through files and organize them all.”
He snorted. Money was always an
object and he was lucky his current staff hadn’t been cut further. Two of his
older deputies had retired within the last year and he’d been informed that he
couldn’t replace them. Let the rest of the department pick up their duties. So,
no. Finding someone to go through old case files wasn’t going to happen.
“How can I help?” Sam offered.
“Looks like you have a system going there.”
“Yeah, kind of. Once I get each interview,
report, evidence list, etcetera, put into one of these piles, we can both read
through them.” He looked up and sent her one of his winning smiles. “Maybe
something to eat?”
“You got it.” Food wouldn’t be
such a
heard a scuffle in another room.”
“Lee swears he’s innocent, every
time they talk to him, in all the pages I’ve read,” Sam said. “Yet no one
seemed to be listening to him. Every question from Padilla comes back at Lee
with the fact that Jessie Starkey told them Lee was guilty.”
“Are Jessie’s statements there?
With your pages?”
She shook her head. “Haven’t come
across them.”
An hour later, Sam’s eyelids felt
like they had lead weights attached. “I’m not making sense of this anymore,”
she said. “Nothing seems to be filed here in sequential order and my brain
isn’t working. It’s been a long day.”
Beau smiled up from his set of
pages. “I know, darlin’. Go ahead upstairs—I’m right behind you.”
He didn’t have to suggest it
twice. Sam set her pages down and trudged to the kitchen with their coffee
cups. She’d brushed her teeth and smoothed the sheets from their earlier visit,
and was about to settle herself into sleepy bliss when she heard his footsteps
on the stairs.
“Well, this adds an interesting
wrinkle,” Beau said, coming into the room. “At the time Jessie Starkey
confessed, he tested positive for cocaine.”
Sam gave a puzzled look.
“That little fact never came up at
the trial,” Beau said. “And the lab report was shoved between two other pages,
in a spot completely unrelated to the confession.”
“So you think someone tried to
cover it up?”
“That would be my guess.”
Chapter
10
The revelations in the Angela
Cayne case file might have kept Sam awake but that didn’t turn out to be. Her
head hit the pillow and she didn’t even roll over until gray dawn began to
filter into the bedroom. When she reached out for Beau she discovered that he
was not in bed. No light from the bathroom; he must be downstairs. She found
him at the dining table with pages from the file spread out in stacks.
“Morning, baby,” she said. “Did
you actually settle into bed last night at all?”
“Oh, yeah. A few hours. Kept
waking up though. Finally, it made more sense to let you sleep without all my
tossing and turning.”
She kissed the top of his head.
“Coffee?”
Not waiting for his answer, she
went into the kitchen and found that he’d already brewed some, just hadn’t
remembered to pour it. She doctored two mugs and carried them to the table.
“I’m trying to organize all this
into a timeline,” he said. “It’s almost as if somebody took a dozen little
folders and a hundred loose pages and just gathered them up any old which way
and stuck them together with a cover over it all. There’s no sequence to it
whatsoever.”
“Glad you said that. Last night I
was beginning to feel like it was my fuzzy head that wasn’t making sense of
it.”
“Wasn’t you.” He paused for a sip
of his coffee. “You know, taking over this job, half the time I wonder how much
of this stuff was Padilla’s incompetence and how often he might have been
purposely covering up something. I find this kind of sloppy work all the time.
If the defense lawyers were never given Jessie’s drug test results, that alone
could have changed the outcome.”
“If money were no object you could
hire a staff just to go through files and organize them all.”
He snorted. Money was always an
object and he was lucky his current staff hadn’t been cut further. Two of his
older deputies had retired within the last year and he’d been informed that he
couldn’t replace them. Let the rest of the department pick up their duties. So,
no. Finding someone to go through old case files wasn’t going to happen.
“How can I help?” Sam offered.
“Looks like you have a system going there.”
“Yeah, kind of. Once I get each interview,
report, evidence list, etcetera, put into one of these piles, we can both read
through them.” He looked up and sent her one of his winning smiles. “Maybe
something to eat?”
“You got it.” Food wouldn’t be
such a
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