by Hy Conrad
“You can’t find out anything unless you join.”
“I understand. It was a dumb move on your part, but I understand.”
“I didn’t even join. Your son joined.”
“Yes, he owned that move; he wanted sugar. I had a tougher time trying to explain the daytime drinking through a straw.”
“It was a bad day, okay? Yolie doesn’t have bad days?”
State shuddered. “She’s pissed about that, too. I know, I know. It slipped out.”
“It did. Can we change the subject?”
“No, we can’t. Are you all right? You look like shit.”
“Jesus. I will wash my hair! And get more sleep. And not use straws when I drink.” She could feel his eyes boring into her. “Joking. No daytime drinking, I promise. Now can we change the subject?”
“Fine.”
“Anything new on the Crawley case?”
State massaged the bridge of his nose, a habit he’d picked up from their father. “Is this what you call changing the subject? What is it? You want a murder to play with? This morning a kid drowned in a backyard pool, except it was a chilly day and there are pre-mortem bruises and we’re looking at the step-mom. Any interest?”
“Is Dad involved in that one?”
“No, but the kid’s still dead. So, it must be the fact that Dad’s involved that makes her worthy of your attention.”
“That’s not true.”
“It sure looks true.”
Her brother had a point. “Okay. Look, if the woman killed her step-kid, you’ll catch her. No problem. But if our own father is shielding a killer… And his alibi? By the way, Dad told me. A Skype call. A freaking Skype call.”
State paused and wagged his head. “Why the hell is he telling you anything? The man must be going senile.”
She could tell he didn’t mean it, that he still didn’t have a clue. Why couldn’t her brother pay attention and take some of the burden off her?
“Cal.” He saved the name Cal, using it only when he was desperate for her to listen. “Why are you pitting yourself against Dad? If you print anything about Blackburn and you’re wrong, you’ll get sued and run out of town. And Dad will hate you. If you’re right, Dad will see this as another betrayal. And he’ll hate you.” State raised a hand. “I know, not your fault. But that’s the way he’ll see it. That’s how everyone will see it. So, why? Tell me why?”
Everything he’d just said was true, and yet… “Because there’s a dead girl.”
“And you don’t trust me to figure this out. On my own. That’s what you’re saying.”
“I’m not saying that.”
“Cal, I’m a good detective.” State stared straight ahead into a wall. “Maybe not the best. Maybe it took some of Dad’s juice to get me on homicide. I wasn’t savvy enough to follow him into politics, and I don’t have your brains. But I don’t need you peering over my shoulder, second-guessing me. Getting to restaurants before me. Knowing more than you should.”
“I’m sorry. I… I just…” She edged him over and settled in beside him on the top step. “I had never seen a body laid out in a morgue. It was worse than I thought. She was so young, and it was so heartbreaking. And her folks…”
“I know, I know.” He said it as a sigh. “My first homicide was a boy, three years old, suffocated with a pillow. Looked totally asleep, surrounded by his toys. His grandmother gave me a photo of him. I used to carry it around.”
“Oh, my God. The Crawleys did the same. I have Briana’s picture taped to my laptop.”
“It’s not uncommon. They want us to remember, like we need any help.” State wriggled sideways on the step. It reminded Callie of the two of them in the back of the Cadillac, with him squirming to get more room on the leather seat.
“Anything about the MySugar website?”
State refused to meet her gaze. “I am not your police source.”
Callie didn’t reply, just remained seated, nudging him gently with her elbow. She kept doing it until they both started chuckling. “I’m not going to stop,” she teased. Just like the old days. ‘Mommy says you can’t hit me back ‘cause I’m a girl.’”
State could have ended it by standing up, but he didn’t. Instead, he licked his finger and stuck it in her ear.
“Augh,” Callie screeched, jumping to her feet and swatting it away. “That is so gross.”
“Wet Willie!” he announced. “Remember?”
“God. That is no way to win an argument.”
“It worked when you were eight.”
She wiped at her ear. “I’m going to teach it to your sons. It’ll serve you right.”
“Dad already taught them. The boys rushed off and taught everyone in class. Pandemonium. They nearly got expelled.”
“Did Dad fix it? Sounds like the kind of thing he could fix with a two-minute call.”
“He actually showed up in person, at his most charming self.”
“Of course.” Callie kept one hand over the moistened ear. “So, tell me about MySugar. I’m a member now. Maybe I’ll have some insight.”
“Not much to tell.” He reached over and gently lowered her hand. “These websites encourage their hook-ups to exchange emails and phone numbers, to start communicating privately. It’s smart policy, especially when they start talking pay for play. We have a list of the men who contacted Ms. Crawley on the website. Also their pics. But a lot of guys, especially the married variety, use fake pics. And some of their email addresses are burners.”
“Burners?”
“Like prepaid burner phones. Addresses you can create with fake information, in case your wife is nosing around your emails. They leave no trace. We contacted all the non-burners on her list. To a man, they denied ever setting up a date with her.”
“What about checking the men’s emails?”
“Not without a court order.”
“What about Briana’s laptop?”
“We retrieved her deleted history, including the back-and-forths with her sugar daddy.”
“You know who the daddy is?”
“We know what was in his emails. He called himself Dr. Feelgood. He never mentioned his other life and we have no way of tracing him. A burner address.”
“What about Briana’s phone? They must have called each other.”
“We don’t have her phone, remember? Verizon has a record of her calls but we have no access.”
“This is a murder case. You can’t get a court order?”
“The first thing a judge will ask is probable cause. True, we have a hunch that her death is connected to her sugar status, but there’s no probable cause.”
“What about the guy who emptied her bank account? Dylan Dane. He withdrew it in person, so the bank must have footage.”
“Gee whiz, why didn’t I think of that?”
“No need to get snotty.”
“I’m just saying I do my job. We lifted the footage from Horizon Bank. This Dylan Dane knows his security cameras. And while there are rules about not wearing a hat in a bank, this is Texas. Getting a Texan to remove his hat, even in a bank, can be like…” He paused, trying to think of an analogy. “You know. Something hard.”
“I know.” She gave it some thought. “Like getting a French baker to go gluten-free.”
“What?” State crinkled his nose. “What the hell? Where did that come from?”
“You know, French baguettes. Brioche. They all have gluten. I was trying to come up with some national trait that people won’t give up even if you try to force them. Like Texas hats.”
“Jeez Louise. Ain’t you the fancy one.”
“Never mind. Sorry.”
“Gluten-free and French bakers. Ooh-la-la.” He pursed his lips and waved his fingers, making his sister shake her head and roll her eyes. “Anyway, between Dylan’s hat and his mustache, the security footage isn’t helpful. He’s a large fellow, we got that. But the teller can’t remember the transaction. And the image is black-and-white, so
weren’t not even sure about race.”
“Can I see it? Send it to my phone.” She was reaching for her phone and didn’t see her brother wetting his finger again. The second Wet Willie was even more annoying than the first. “Augh, augh. State. Come on.”
“What are you going to do with a bank photo? Print it in your rag? Try to track down the guy yourself?” He handed her a handkerchief from his jacket pocket. She took it, thoroughly wiped her ear and handed it back.
“So, you’re not even going to let me see it?” Callie’s disappointment was tempered by the fact that she’d never expected him to share as much as he already had.
“Nope. I think that’s the limit of my cooperation with the fourth estate. Remember? Dad used to call the press the fourth estate.”
“No, he called it the goddamn fourth estate. And now I’m a card-carrying member. Gotta love it.”
Almost in unison they pushed themselves up from the stairwell steps. Before Callie could open the door, State placed a hand on her shoulder. “Does Dad have anything to worry about with you?”
“Worry about?”
“Don’t repeat.”
“Repeat?”
“Come on. That’s a stalling tactic.”
“Dad doesn’t have to worry,” she assured him. “I just don’t want him getting into trouble.”
“Buddy McFee can take care of himself. He’s been doing it all his life.”
“But now it’s different.” She hadn’t meant to say this.
“What do you mean, it’s different?”
“I mean… I mean he’s been bending the law for years. Someday the odds are going to catch up with him. He should retire.”
State erupted into a laugh, a genuine laugh, one that rattled down the stairwell. “He can never retire. You know that.”
Callie pulled open the door and they stepped back into the world. “Yeah, I know.”
CHAPTER 15
Briana’s suitcases were piled in the living room, ready for tomorrow’s flight, along with three boxes that Sherry Ann promised to have shipped. Every time Callie looked at the pile, she couldn’t help thinking about the smallness of a life, the scant physical evidence someone leaves behind. All of Briana – her past, her plans, her studies, her dreams, the little pieces of artwork she’d taken the trouble to have framed, even the shoes and the Hermes handbags she had probably lusted over and debated with herself about buying – were all reduced to the size of a coffin, a few pieces of luggage and three boxes waiting to be picked up by the UPS man.
Helen and Sherry Ann had gone out for a farewell dinner. Callie didn’t mind not being invited. She didn’t have the same history with them and had never even met the girl who now preoccupied her every waking hour. Plus there was the sad fact that Callie had probably come to represent Briana’s death. She had first met Helen at the morgue, viewing Briana’s body, and every meeting thereafter, every conversation, had been focused on the unsolved case.
She was in the process of making her own dinner, a Lean Cuisine, when she happened to notice the Kindle in a red cover, half-wrapped in a T-shirt near the top of one of the boxes, the one Helen had left open just in case they ran across some forgotten item at the last minute.
Seeing the e-reader made her suddenly curious. What kind of things did Briana read? Traditional chick lit? Artsy millennial fiction? Sci-fi with political overtones? That was Callie’s favorite, but she doubted Briana would be into that. It occurred to her that, for all of her delving into Briana’s death, she knew almost nothing about her life. Would they have hated each other? Would they have been friends?
Callie ignored the ding from the kitchen. Reaching into the box, she unwrapped the Kindle from the T-shirt. For a second, it felt like a violation of privacy, but of course it wasn’t, no more than looking on someone’s shelf and discovering their taste in books. There was still a fair amount of juice in the Paperwhite, the same model that Callie herself used. An ad flicked on the screen as soon as she opened the cover, for a romance novel about a duke and a peasant farmgirl. Ugh. But then Callie often got this kind of Kindle ad. Swiping right got her into Briana’s library.
A second ding reminded her that the Chicken with Pasta in Ranchero Sauce was cooling in the microwave. She retrieved it then set herself up on a stool at the counter with a glass of white wine and a paper towel for a napkin, realizing as she sat that this was perhaps the most pathetic dinner ever in history. She should take a photo and put it on Instagram, just to commemorate it.
Propping up the e-reader, she proceeded to scroll through Briana’s books. There were the familiar best sellers, summer reading as her mother used to call it – legal thrillers and dark mysteries featuring damaged female leads. Peppered throughout were non-fiction titles like “U.S. Diplomacy, a History” and “The Wise Men.” She checked this last book’s description and found it about a group of U.S. policy makers who had tried to contain the U.S.S.R. during the Cold War – obviously related to some of Briana’s course work. Another title, near the top of her list, was “The Architect’s Legacy, A Memoir.” It stood out as an unusual purchase, an anomaly nestled among the predictable. Why would a prelaw student majoring in International Relations buy an architect’s memoir? It wasn’t a textbook. Or a best seller.
Callie clicked on the title, accessing the book’s title page. It was from the University of Texas Press, published three years ago, and the author’s name, Dr. Samuel Paget, strongly suggested a faculty member. When she pressed forward to the author’s page, she found a grainy, black and white image of a middle-aged black man with a shaved head and a sad smile.
Callie put down her fork and wiped her mouth. Did Briana have some great love of architecture that no one had mentioned? On a whim, she fetched a pair of scissors from the kitchen, found the box labeled “Books, Etc.” and slit through the packing tape. Inside were a dozen or so books, mainly textbooks, a few fashion magazines, a framed photo of Briana’s parents in the stands of a basketball game, and other memorabilia, the reminders of a young life. Callie checked the covers.
In the very bottom of the box was a surprise. It was indeed another book on architecture, but the same one that was on the Kindle. “The Architect’s Legacy, A Memoir” by Dr. Samuel Paget. Having both an e-copy and a hardcover of such an obscure book seemed odd. But then Callie recalled a friend who had self-published a novel. Callie had bought an e-copy of the book, to show support. And then a month later, for Christmas, the friend gave her a hardcover copy, nicely autographed. She had never gotten beyond page ten in either copy.
Callie flipped to the title page and was rewarded with something she was fairly sure her brother, the great homicide detective, hadn’t seen. “To Bri,” read the inscription in a small neat hand, “A student of all that life has to offer. Sam Paget.”
She sat cross-legged on the floor in front of the box, staring at the mentor-like, quasi-intimate inscription, trying to figure out what exactly to do. Should she turn this over to State, or just follow up on her own? After all, she was the one who’d found it. The book would have been sent on to Phoenix and eventually, probably thrown out, if she hadn’t done a little snooping.
Callie slipped the book in with her own things, then re-packed and re-taped the box.
The saving grace of a depressing meal is that it doesn’t involve much clean-up. Her plate and silverware went in the dishwasher, her paper towel in the trash and the Lean Cuisine box and its plastic container in with the recyclables. Her empty wine glass she was saving, just in case. Then she considered the rest of her evening. Should she call State? She would have to think about this.
Her usual distraction on a lonely evening was an hour or two of Netflix on her laptop. But ever since her nephew enrolled her in MySugar, Callie had taken to checking her profile, tweaking it here and there. Just last night, she’d switched out her photo to a sexier one, making sure her face was still obscured. She hadn’t received many responses with the original photo, which was something of a blow to her
self-esteem. Was it not provocative enough? Was she just not sugar material? Did her profile make her sound too dumb or too smart or not fun enough? Her guess was not fun enough. That had always been a problem. Even her sugar avatar was turning out to be a downer.
Of the few responders, the only one to show real enthusiasm, went by the screen name “Iwill4you”, a cleverish handle. He’d seemed charmed by her profile and listed himself as 32 and a successful entrepreneur. The man in the photo could have been 32, or a few years older. She had sent him a tepid response and was now logging on to see what, if anything, was new.
The first thing Callie noted was that her banner ads had changed, not just on the MySugar site, but everywhere. She’d had no idea that Frederick’s of Hollywood still existed. But Frederick’s and several other lingerie companies were now paying Google good money to tempt her into buying the skimpiest, most over-the-top outfits she’d ever seen. Great!
Just how long would these ads follow her around? Would they pop up on her Facebook page, too? And what other marketing surprises were awaiting her? A twofer condom sale at Trojan.com? A half-page ad for edible underwear?
Callie toggled through to Heather111’s home page. There were two new contacts. One called himself Glenn and was posing in front of a Bentley, which probably wasn’t his. The other called himself ClarkKent14 but didn’t look at all like Clark Kent, at least from his soft-focus, off-center profile pic. Clark described his body type as athletic and stated in his headline, “I have a glass slipper. Let’s make it fit.” She crafted a “sounds intriguing; let’s meet” kind of reply to both and sent them off before she had a chance to change her mind. What exactly was she looking for, anyway? To satisfy some cheap curiosity? To make some soulful connection to Briana’s life? Or was it just a harmless fantasy game, a diversion from one more Netflix original movie?
Iwill4you had also left a message. Callie retrieved the last of the white wine from the fridge and made a mental note to (a) apologize for stealing half a bottle of wine and (b) buy two bottles of the same wine. That way she could save one for herself. Then she returned to the message. Iwill4you hadn’t been put off at all by her lukewarm response and suggested that they switch from conversing on the site to using personal emails. “Then we can arrange a romantic meet-and-eat at the high-end restaurant of your choosing.” She loved the phrasing – so cute but awkward.