Undetermined Death : A Legal Thriller (Ashley Montgomery Book 2)

by Laura Snider

  Her cell phone began buzzing in her pocket. She picked it up and looked at the screen. The name Josh Martin filled the screen along with Josh’s face, wide with a toothy grin. Katie shook her head, but a small smile crept into the corners of her lips as she picked up.

  “Yes?”

  “Is that how you always answer the phone or is that a special greeting just for me?”

  Katie rolled her eyes. “Nobody annoys me quite like you do.”

  “So, you’re saying I’m special.”

  “Is there something you wanted other than to waste my time?”

  Truthfully, it didn’t matter. Katie had thirty minutes left in her workday and only one task to complete. The rather dismal and depressing chore of briefing George on her ongoing work with Ashley’s poisoning and the leads left to follow in Rachel Smithson’s case. Neither were cases that she wanted to hand over to him. There was a good chance that he’d already screwed up Rachel’s case. She wasn’t eager to see what he would do with Ashley’s poisoning.

  “Yes. There’s someone here who would like to speak to you.”

  “Who?”

  Josh didn’t answer. Katie could hear the rustle of the phone as it was passed to someone else.

  A throat cleared, a deep, guttural sound. Then an unknown voice said, “Miss Mickey?”

  “Yes. This is Katie Mickey.”

  “This is Chief Canterbury. I’m the chief of police here in Waukee. I hear that Brine has suffered some budget cuts and had to, for lack of a better term, cut you loose.”

  There were plenty of better terms, but Katie didn’t correct him. “Yes. That’s true.”

  “Would you like to interview with our department? We are always looking for good, diverse people. And our city council supports us.”

  Katie knew what he meant by diverse. Women. Less than one percent of the Waukee Police Department was female and most of them were secretaries, dispatchers, or office managers. Katie had already looked it up.

  “I’d love to interview,” Katie said, trying to force some excitement into her voice.

  “Great. How about this upcoming Monday? Will that work?”

  “Yes.” Katie would be out of a job by then. “I’m free anytime.”

  “Let’s say 11:00 a.m. See you then.”

  “I’ll be there.”

  Katie hung up the phone before Josh could get back on the line. There wasn’t time to do their usual song and dance—Josh flirting while Katie feigned annoyance. She only had twenty minutes left in her last day and she still needed to talk to George.

  Procrastination. That was what she had been doing when it came to the task of briefing George. But now it had come to the end of the day and she couldn’t put it off any longer. Katie stood and headed toward George’s office. No other officers were around. They had been avoiding her since they learned the news. It was like they thought her termination was airborne. Contagious.

  “George,” Katie said. His office door was open, so she knocked on the frame three times.

  “Come in. Come in.”

  Katie stepped across the threshold. It was far warmer in George’s office than in the rest of the building. A shiver ran through her as her body acclimated to the temperature change. George remained seated at his desk, looking down at a document, his readers perched near the tip of his nose. Katie waited for several moments, but George kept on reading, ignoring her.

  Screw him, Katie thought, marching further into his office and dropping into one of the two chairs directly across from his executive-style desk. She’d spent years standing in doorways waiting for men to invite her to take a seat at the table. But she didn’t have to do that anymore. Those same men had fired her.

  “I’m here to brief you on the final strings left to tie up in Rachel Smithson’s case as well as the Montgomery attempted murder.”

  George kept his eyes on the document, then put up a finger in the universal one moment sign. Katie had no intention of waiting. Not anymore.

  “I’ll start with Rachel’s case.” If he wasn’t going to pay attention, Rachel’s was the less important case. At least to Katie. “I have emailed you the calls to service that Officer Josh Martin sent to me. I have also included a brief summary of them along with it. There are a few important things to garner from my follow-up investigation into the calls as well as Rachel’s parentage.”

  “Parentage?” George finally looked up.

  “Isaac Smithson is Rachel’s putative father, but I don’t believe he is Rachel’s actual father. Lyndsay, Rachel’s mother, gave birth to her in secret, in Brine.”

  “I don’t see why that matters.”

  “It matters because he has physically and mentally abused Rachel Smithson her entire life. There is also a question as to whether that abuse extended to sexual abuse.”

  “I still don’t…”

  Katie cut him off. “I think Isaac is the father of Rachel’s baby. You should get a DNA sample from Isaac and compare it against the baby’s. I think you’ll find that they match.”

  George removed his glasses and tossed them on his desk. “I don’t see why I would do that. It makes no difference who fathered Rachel’s child. It doesn’t change the fact that she killed her baby.”

  Katie rolled her eyes. George had grown lazy and complacent in his detective role. “If you don’t, Ashley will. She’ll use the physical and sexual abuse to justify Rachel’s choice to give birth alone in a hotel room. It will make Rachel look like a concerned mother, not a villain. Then we have the problem of the medical examiner’s report.”

  “Yeah,” George cut her off, “I was just looking at that.” He gestured to the document he had been reading. “I’m not all that worried about it. It doesn’t say that the baby was born alive, but it also doesn’t say that the baby wasn’t born alive. And if you recall, Rachel admitted that she heard the baby cry once before placing him in the bathtub.”

  “I recall Rachel agreeing with you that the baby cried. I don’t think she ever said it in her own words.”

  “Same difference.”

  It wasn’t the same. If George couldn’t tell the difference, then that was his problem. Katie felt certain that a judge and jury would. And then there was Ashley’s motion to suppress. If the judge ruled that interview inadmissible, they had no evidence of live birth. But Katie could see by George’s uninterested expression that he didn’t care. She shrugged. It wasn’t her problem anymore.

  “Moving on to Ashley’s poisoning. We have preliminary reports from the forensic lab in Ankeny. Fingerprints found on both letters contained inside the boxes of chocolates match Tom and Ashley. There are no other identifiable fingerprints. The handwriting on the letters also matches Tom’s. The report confirms that the package found in Ashley’s car contained traceable amounts of rat poison. The chocolates in the box found in Ashley’s trash can were also tested. There were ten chocolate peanut butter balls remaining in the package. All of them tested positive for rat poison.”

  “Great work,” George said, flipping his pen around his index finger.

  “The hospital sent a sample of Ashley’s hair for testing, too. The lab was able to determine that Ashley had been exposed to the same poison multiple times, but they couldn’t pinpoint exact dates. The criminalist did say that there is evidence that the first date of ingestion was within the last month.”

  “Wow. I never thought I’d be saying this, but poor Ashley.”

  Katie leveled him with a challenging glare. “You don’t sound all that sorry.”

  “You’re right,” he said, chuckling. “I’m not. She sucks. But I’ll start working on an arrest warrant anyway. It’ll be good to get that one behind us.”

  “That’s the problem, though. I think Tom was set up.”

  “Why?”

  “I don’t know.” Katie looked down at her fingers. “It’s a hunch. But I think there’s more to this than we think.”

  George waved a dismissive hand. “Nine times out of ten the simplest option i
s the right one.”

  “Yes,” Katie said through gritted teeth, “but that still leaves one time when it isn’t.”

  “Katie, Katie.” George stood and came around the desk. “I know it’s hard for you to believe because Tom is your friend. But you haven’t always been the best judge of character. You know, with your father and all.”

  If Katie had misjudged anyone’s character it had been George’s. She could hardly believe that she had once considered him a friend.

  “Don’t be a lazy ass,” Katie said, unable to control her temper any longer. “Tom has no motive, and you know it. Tom’s roommate, however, does. She’s Ashley’s former foster sister. You need to follow up on that angle before you go issuing arrest warrants. If you don’t, Josh will, and Waukee will make Brine look like a lazy police department in a Podunk town.”

  “The good news, Katie, is that you don’t have to worry about this police station anymore. Or either of these investigations. They are closed as far as I am concerned, and the guilty parties will be held accountable.” George’s nostrils flared as he spoke. He marched toward the door and motioned for her to leave.

  She’d pissed him off. It was an unplanned bonus. “Fine,” Katie said, balling her fists.

  As she passed him, she had to fight a very real urge to punch him square in the jaw. She grabbed her box of belongings as she passed her former cubicle and marched out of the building. She didn’t stop to say goodbye to anyone. In that moment, she hated that entire police station. It was full of misogynistic pigs.

  Despite her anger, her mind still whirred. She needed to find a way to prove Tom’s innocence. Throughout the entire investigation into Ashley’s poisoning, she’d kept her distance from Tom because of her position as a police officer. For the first time in over six years, she no longer held that position. She was free to do whatever she wanted.

  Katie pulled her phone out of her pocket, dialing Tom’s number while balancing the box from her office in the other hand.

  “Katie.” Tom sounded exhausted, his voice on edge. “What’s going on? I haven’t heard anything from anyone. How is Ashley? What’s happening with the investigation?”

  “Oh, nobody told you. Ashley’s out of the hospital and back to her usual shenanigans.”

  “Thank God. Can I talk to her? Call her?”

  “Umm, I wouldn’t just yet.” Katie pursed her lips. “Listen, I don’t know how else to say this so I’m going to come right out with it. George thinks you tried to kill Ashley. If we don’t prove him wrong, and soon, he’s going to issue a warrant.”

  Tom hissed through his teeth. “I didn’t do it, you’ve got to…”

  “I believe you, Tom. That’s why I’m calling you. If I thought you had anything to do with this, I would have arrested you myself.”

  “Okay, then who do you think did it?”

  “Let me send you a picture of the letters that were found with the poisoned candies. I have copies stored on my phone. Look at them and then call me back.”

  “Okay.”

  Katie hung up and sent Tom the photographs. A few moments passed before her phone started buzzing.

  “Did you write those?”

  Tom sighed heavily. “Yes...”

  Shit, Katie thought. Maybe he was the guilty party.

  “Except I didn’t write them to Ashley.”

  That was news.

  29

  Ashley

  42 days before trial

  Ashley was at her computer reading through a recent Iowa Supreme Court decision when the email notification came through. She dropped what she’d been doing and clicked on Outlook. The clerk of court sent notifications of filings by email. The ruling for Rachel’s motion to suppress was due any second now. Ashley had been on pins and needles ever since the hearing.

  The subject line for the notification read Courtesy NEF: FECR015987 State of Iowa v. Rachel Smithson. It had to be the ruling. Ashley’s heartbeat quickened. A bead of sweat formed along her brow as she logged into the electronic filing system and pulled up Rachel’s case file. There it was. Ruling on Defendant’s Motion to Suppress.

  Ashley clicked on the document. Her hands shook with anticipation. This was it. The moment of truth. The entire case hung on this ruling.

  The document populated the screen. Ashley didn’t read the court’s analysis including all the reasons for the decision. She didn’t need to know all that information just yet. What she cared about was found at the end. She skipped forward, scrolling down through pages and pages of facts and cited case law. Then she began to read.

  It is for the above stated reasons, Judge Ahrenson wrote, that the Court FINDS that the Defendant’s Motion to Suppress should be granted.

  “Yes!” Ashley jumped out of her chair and pumped her fist in the air. “Take that, Charles Hanson!”

  With the suppression of this evidence, the State would not be able to prove that the baby was born alive. Without a live baby, there could be no child endangerment or murder. The State’s case was dead. They could still proceed to trial, but Charles Hanson would look like a fool on a national stage. He couldn’t present evidence to all elements of the offense, and Judge Ahrenson would direct it out before a jury could consider the evidence.

  Charles Hanson, as an elected official, would never humiliate himself by losing so horribly and so publicly. It was bad for reelection. He would instead choose to dismiss the case. Rachel was as good as free. Not that it would happen immediately. Charles would wait to the last moment to file the motion to dismiss, ensuring that Rachel waited in jail right up until the trial date. That sucked, but Rachel would have an end date. Forty-two days until freedom.

  Ashley skipped out of her office and to the front, where Elena sat, typing on her computer while humming a tune. She looked up as Ashley drew nearer.

  “It’s nice to see you smiling,” Elena said.

  It was true. Ashley couldn’t remember the last time her lips had tipped up to form something other than a tight, forced grin. There had been a lot going on over the past few months, and very little of it positive. But that was all changing now. She could feel it in her bones.

  “Look at this,” Ashley said, handing a printed copy of the court’s ruling to Elena.

  Ashley would print another later and frame it. She’d put it on her wall of achievements, the section of her office dedicated solely to wins against the State.

  Elena focused on the first page, reading slowly, carefully.

  “Just flip to the end,” Ashley said, taking the document and turning to the last page. She handed it back to Elena and pointed to the final paragraph. “There. Read that.”

  Elena did, then she looked up, her face blooming with happiness. “That’s awesome, Ashley! When are you going to tell Rachel?”

  “I’m on my way to the jail now.”

  “Oh, wow. I can’t wait to hear how she reacts. This is good for her, right?”

  Ashley nodded and headed to the coat rack. “Really, really good,” she said, pulling on her coat.

  It only took a few minutes for Ashley to walk to the jail. When she arrived, Kylie was out front waiting for her.

  “I heard about the ruling.” Kylie’s smile spread all the way to her eyes. “The great Ashley Montgomery strikes again.”

  “Thank you. I’m pretty excited to tell Rachel.”

  “About that.” Kylie paused, sucking in a deep breath. “Be cautious. She might not handle the news the way you think she will.”

  “What?” Ashley was shocked. “Why not?” Nobody wanted to go to prison for life. Rachel was going to be one of the few people to beat prison entirely. She was getting out in a little over a month. That wasn’t a small thing. Plenty of inmates would kill for a ruling like this one.

  “I don’t know anything for certain,” Kylie said with a shrug. “I just know that the girl has been enjoying herself here in jail. I mean that. She’s completely changed. Rachel came in here as a wispy shell of a person. Now, she’s a regular c
hatterbox. Smiles more often than she doesn’t. Reads every free moment she gets. This may seem shocking, but I don’t think she wants out.”

  “Oh, that’s ridiculous,” Ashley said. “Everyone wants out of jail. That’s the whole point of it. Punishment.”

  Kylie grunted noncommittally and led Ashley into the attorney-client room. “I’ll go get Rachel.”

  The room only had two plastic chairs and an old, worn desk that separated them. Ashley sat in one of the chairs, crossed her legs, then uncrossed them and stood up again. She was all energy. Filled to the brim with excitement. Telling a defendant they had won was one of her favorite parts of her job. It didn’t come that often—rarely, in truth—but when it did, it almost made up for the devastation that came with all the other losses.

  The lock on the door clicked and Ashley looked up in time to see Kylie ushering Rachel inside. Ashley took a moment to study her client. Rachel had undergone a transformation. She’d added fifteen to twenty pounds, transforming her face from sunken-in and haggard to a true beauty. It wouldn’t matter what Ashley did with Rachel’s hair now. The girl was stunning. Almost hypnotizingly so.

  “Hi, Ashley,” Rachel said. She gave a genuine smile that showed a small gap between her two front teeth, a flaw that only added to Rachel’s beauty.

  “I’ve got great news.”

  “Oh?” Rachel said, furrowing her brow. “Better than your full recovery? I can’t imagine what could be better.” Coming from anyone else, Ashley would have thought the phrase was meant to be sarcastic. But Rachel’s voice was so small, so sweet, it couldn’t be anything but sincere.

  “Judge Ahrenson granted our motion to suppress.” Ashley produced a copy of the court’s ruling and set it on the desk.