Vindication

by H. Terrell Griffin

  “I’ll email you a copy of the order later this afternoon,” Meredith said. “Let me know if it’s okay, and I’ll get it to the judge for a signature.”

  I drove out to the detention center to meet with Esther. She was in good spirits, as always. “Why’re you looking so glum?” she asked.

  “We didn’t get bail.”

  “Neither one of us thought we would.”

  “We’re going to get another bite of the apple,” I said, and told her about the judge’s ruling. “I think we’ll actually have a pretty good chance next week. Maybe we can get you out of here.”

  “That’d be great, but I won’t hold my breath.”

  I told her about my conversation with Peggy Keefe and what I had learned from the autopsy report, which wasn’t much. “J.D. moved in with Judy Ferguson yesterday,” I said. “Went to work in the bookstore today.”

  “Are you going to see her?”

  “I’m not sure. I’ll call her when we’re finished and check on how she’s settling in. I don’t want to blow her cover. If anybody sees us together, they might make the connection. I don’t want that to happen.”

  “Are you going to move into my house?”

  “Not yet. But soon. Maybe later this week.”

  “I’ve been thinking about the van that the bartender at the World of Beer told you she saw. With the information you have on the rental car, you may be able to use the security cameras at the gates to track both of them. You need to talk to Hole-in-One Patty.”

  “Interesting name. Who’s she?”

  “A neighbor of mine. Patty Geoghegan. She and her husband, Bob, live behind me on Kelvington Road.”

  “How in the world did she get that name?”

  “Right after she and Bob moved down here from Maryland, Patty decided to go with some of her friends to one of the golf courses. She’d never played before but didn’t think it looked too difficult, so she asked to borrow a driver. She hit one off the first tee and it went right into the hole on the first green. She got a lot of press on that one, and hence the new nickname.”

  “I’ll be damned. How can she help me with the security system?”

  “Her nephew works for the security group run by The Villages developer. I know the boy’s job has something to do with computers. He’s majoring in computer science at the university in Gainesville. He’s a little weird.”

  “What’s his name?”

  “Willingham Hall. He goes by Will.”

  “Does he live in Gainesville?”

  “No. He was in the freshman dorm up there, but didn’t like the name of the building. Said it was bad karma, or something. So he moved in with Patty and Bob for the semester and commutes. Like I said, he’s weird, but he may be able to help find that van.”

  “I’ll check it out. I’m not sure if I’ll get back up here in the next couple of days, but if you need me, the jailers will let you use a phone. Just keep in mind that those phone calls are recorded. You don’t want to say anything other than that you need me to come. I’ll be on my way.”

  We chatted for a few more minutes and I left. Even the better jails are not conducive to idle conversation.

  I sat in my car parked in front of the detention center and called J.D.’s cell phone. When she answered, I could hear the low hum of voices in the background. “You at work?”

  “Yep.”

  “Wanna take some time off and fool around?”

  “Can’t do it. I’m a workingwoman. Get off at six.”

  “I’ll be at Tiny’s by then.”

  “Ugh. I don’t know why I put up with you. I haven’t had lunch yet. We could get something to eat, but that’s all. I think my boss might frown upon my disheveled look if I fooled around and came back to work.”

  I looked at my watch. Almost noon. “I’m not sure I want to waste my time on lunch if there’s no fooling around involved.”

  “Suit yourself. I’ve already been asked to dinner by a healthy looking elderly man. He even offered to paint my name on his golf cart, right in front of the passenger seat. I can always fool around after dinner if I’m in need.”

  “Perish the thought. Can you meet me at the Olive Garden up on Wedgewood?”

  “You think that’ll be okay? What if we see somebody we know? That might blow my cover.”

  “We’ll be okay. The restaurant is pretty far from Brownwood, and we can get a booth in the back.”

  “How do I find it?”

  “GPS,” I said.

  “You’re a big help. See you there in half an hour.”

  “How’s the undercover operation going?” I asked over our linguini.

  “I met two of the book club ladies this morning in the store,” J.D. said.

  “Was either one Ruth Bergstrom?”

  “Afraid not. She’s your best suspect, isn’t she?”

  “So far, my only suspect. When’s the next book club meeting scheduled?”

  “There’s one tonight. Do you have any other leads yet?”

  “We might have gotten lucky with the van,” I said, and told her about Will Hall. “I’ll get in touch with him later in the week and see if he’s willing to help us.”

  “I wouldn’t think he could do that legally.”

  “You’re right. And the evidence wouldn’t be admissible if he did give it to us.”

  “Then how do you get what you need?”

  “I’ll ask Will if the security technicians have a program that can isolate the kind of information I want. If so, I’ll serve a deposition subpoena on whoever runs that section. I’ll describe the van in detail and require him to bring all recordings and pictures relating to it that were taken of the van and driver by the gate cameras. I can do the same with Lathom’s rental car. Maybe we can put both vehicles in the same village at the same time.”

  “Do you think knowing the vehicles were both there at the same time would be useful? There’re a lot of houses in each one of those villages.”

  “Yeah, too many to be of much use to us, but maybe we can at least tie the van to the rental.”

  “Your subpoena will telegraph your interest in the van and the car to the prosecution.”

  “Can’t be helped,” I said.

  “Wouldn’t it be easier to ask the prosecutor to get a warrant for the information and share it with you?”

  “Yes, but then I wouldn’t be in control of the process. I think Meredith Evans is a very ethical prosecutor and will follow the rules and disclose all information she gathers. But I could be wrong, and who knows what kind of pressure she might get from above. This way I’ll know I have the information I need.”

  “You’re a cynic.”

  “All trial lawyers are cynics. We live by the creed that if anything can go wrong, it will. If I leave it to the prosecutor to get it for me, I might not get everything I need. Or I might end up with hours of recordings from every gate in The Villages. It’d take me a year to go through all that. This way, I can specify only recordings of the van and its driver, and the security people can use their filters to isolate just the footage or pictures I want.”

  “Then you’ll have to depend on them instead of the prosecutor.”

  “I’ll get the information from the security people under oath.”

  “You think they wouldn’t lie if it was in their best interest?”

  “It’s been my experience that if you tell the witness up front about perjury and the penalties, including jail, for lying under oath, they’re more likely to tell you the truth.”

  “And that works?”

  “It does if I put on my mean face when I’m telling them about the consequences if they don’t tell the truth.”

  “I didn’t know you had a mean face.”

  “You’ve never seen it, sugar, and you won’t, unless I see your name painted on some old guy’s golf cart.”

  She laughed, the little tinkly one that makes me shiver with the delight that comes from just being in her presence.

  “Okay. I
’ll be good,” she said.

  “Can you do something else for me?”

  “I’ll try.”

  “Check with the Barnes & Noble store and see if you can get a look at their surveillance tape from Lathom’s book signing. I’d like to get a still of the man she was talking to just before the signing started.”

  “They might not give it up that easily. Can I tell them I’m an investigator working for the defense counsel?”

  “I don’t see why not. It’s the truth.”

  “What if I have to flash my badge?”

  “I’d be a little more careful about that. It could get you in trouble and might bite me in the ass at the trial if it comes out.”

  “You’ve got a point. Two points, actually. I’ll see what I can do. Are you going home this afternoon?”

  “Yes. The island’s kind of lonely without you.”

  “You’ve got Jock.”

  “There’s that.”

  “And I heard that Tom Jones will be in town and there’s Logan, Sammy, Les, Cracker, leftover snowbirds . . .”

  I interrupted. “I get it.”

  “While you’re at Tiny’s with our friends, I’ll be spending the evening watching TV with Judy.”

  “Okay, okay.”

  “I’ll miss you, too. Unless there’s something good on the tube.”

  “You need something to keep you busy. And I’m not talking about some dandy old dude in a souped-up golf cart.”

  “Why don’t I talk to Will Hall. If he knows I’m Esther’s niece, he might be more amenable to cooperating with me than he would with you.”

  “That’s not a bad idea,” I said. “Do you think it’s okay to tell him who you really are?”

  “I don’t see why not. Will doesn’t socialize much, and we probably won’t casually run into each other. I know his aunt Patty, and she knows who I am. I don’t think we need an elaborate story for her. She doesn’t belong to the book club, and I try to stay away from the south end of The Villages when I’m out and about. If anybody hears that J. D. Duncan came to visit Patty’s nephew to talk about her aunt, they won’t think anything of it.”

  “Can you do that tomorrow?”

  “I sure can.”

  I watched her drive out of the restaurant’s parking lot with a sense of loss. I’d see her in a couple of days, but the very thought of being separated stirred up feelings of loneliness, something I hadn’t felt since I first met her.

  It was time to head home. Twenty minutes later, I was on I-75, sucking on a mammoth cup of Diet Coke, my Explorer headed south to paradise.

  I was thinking about Jock. I had suggested that J.D. ask him to stir up his agency computers and see what they could find out about Olivia Lathom and Ruth Bergstrom. I didn’t really want to bother him with the security computers in The Villages, although I suspected it would be a piece of cake for his agency to breach their firewalls.

  The agency would have plenty of background on Bergstrom and Lathom, just as they did on almost everybody. While Jock could get anything he wanted, I felt that a request to breach the security of a legitimate business network would be much more onerous than asking the agency to divulge information that would already be in their possession. Not much of a moral distinction, but certainly a practical one.

  If Will Hall could get the information, I’d have a start on tracking the van. If it was stolen, the information he could glean from the security section’s computers would be worthless. Still, it was worth a try.

  CHAPTER 17

  J.D. LEFT THE Olive Garden and drove back to the bookstore, taking Buena Vista Boulevard. She had not spent much time in The Villages before this trip and she had been surprised at the flowers that bloomed in the middle and the edges of the large roundabouts that controlled traffic on the major thoroughfares. She identified salvias, begonias, zinnias, marigolds, and petunias, but there were a number of others she didn’t recognize. Judy had told her that the flowerbeds were replanted at the beginning of each season so that there would be blooms all year round.

  The road was flanked at regular intervals by well-manicured golf courses, providing a view across the fairways and watercourses to homes that backed up to the courses. Golf cart lanes paralleled the road, occasionally crossing to the other side via tunnels.

  She already missed Matt, but she’d left him in good hands. He was surrounded by friends who would make sure that he didn’t get too lonely. She knew she had a lot to do in a short time. She was a bit hamstrung in that she couldn’t use the police resources that were usually available to her. She’d have to rely on old-fashioned digging, but she did have an ace in the hole for uncovering information that was not readily available. Jock.

  She smiled at the thought of her friend. She and Matt were his sister and brother, his only family. It had taken J.D. some time to come to terms with what Jock did for a living and how he went about it. His job was in direct contravention to the life she led as a law enforcement officer. She lived by rules and laws and regulations that Jock flaunted with impunity.

  She had, over time, come to understand the necessity of what he had to do for his country and how much the job took out of him. Every mission Jock undertook diminished him, snatched a little bit of his humanity and dumped it into a bottomless pit, never to be retrieved. Matt was afraid that one day Jock would just disappear, his conscience at a breaking point. When things got so bad that Jock stood on the edge of the abyss, the healing times, the days of drunkenness and self-pity and the slow recovery pulled him back, but never completely. He always left a piece of himself on the rim of the precipice, the part of him that stared into oblivion and saw the pit as his escape. Jock had recently come dangerously close to making that leap, and J.D. and Matt had pulled him back. Barely. She worried about him, but all she could do was love him like a brother and be there when he stumbled.

  The bookstore was busy, men and women milling about, checking out the shelves of new books, some sitting on the couches and chairs reading the first few chapters of the newest releases. J.D. stood behind the cash register, taking care of those who had made their decisions and were on the way home. Some of the customers introduced themselves and seemed interested in the new employee. J.D. told each of them that her name was Jade Conway, that she was Judy Ferguson’s niece, and that she would be visiting for a while.

  Two more women who were members of the book club introduced themselves and encouraged J.D. to come to their meetings at the Eisenhower Center. She assured them that she would do so.

  By midafternoon, the crowd had thinned out. J.D. noticed an attractive sixty-something woman dressed in slacks and blouse standing by one of the tables looking through some of the books that were on sale. As the last of the customers standing in line in front of the register paid for their purchases and left, the woman walked over to J.D. “I understand you’re Judy’s niece,” she said.

  “I am,” J.D. said. “I’m Jade Conway.”

  The woman stuck out her hand. “I’m Ruth Bergstrom,” she said. “I’m a member of our book club. I hope we can count on you to join us. We need some younger perspective.”

  The name sent a small jolt of electricity down J.D.’s spine. This woman was her target. J.D. shook the proffered hand and said, “I’m looking forward to it. My aunt said you do mostly mystery novels. Do you ever do other genres?”

  “We pretty much limit it to mysteries. You interested?”

  “Sure.”

  “We’re meeting tonight at the Eisenhower Center. Why don’t you get Judy to bring you?”

  “I’ll do that. Sounds like fun.”

  “Hi, Ruth.” Judy Ferguson had walked up. “How’re you holding up?”

  “As well as can be expected,” Ruth said. “It’s hard losing a friend.”

  “I see you’ve met my niece, Jade.”

  “I have. I was just inviting her to our book club meeting tonight.”

  “I’m sorry for your loss,” J.D. said. “Were you close?”

  “Ver
y. We’d been friends for many years. We used to work together in Atlanta.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that. It must be a great loss. May I ask what kind of work you did?”

  “We worked in a library. Liv grew up in Buckhead where all the rich people live and had inherited a lot of money. She didn’t need to work, but she did it to keep busy, I think. We became very close. She became a best-selling writer, you know.”

  “Wow,” J.D. said. “That’s great. Maybe I’ve read one of her books. What’s her name?”

  “Olivia Lathom. She was murdered last week. Right here in The Villages. Killed by one of our book club members.”

  “Accused,” Judy said.

  “She did it,” Ruth said.

  “We’ll see,” Judy said. “I don’t think Esther did it.”

  “Any way you look at it,” J.D. said, “it’s tragic.”

  “Yes,” Ruth said. “We’ll be talking about Liv’s book tonight. It’s going to be hard.”

  “What’s the name of the book?” J.D. asked.

  “Beholden,” Ruth said.

  “You know, Ruth,” Judy said, “we don’t have to do that book tonight. We can do it later when your loss isn’t so raw.”

  “I don’t think Liv would want us to change our plans. And, it might make me feel better to talk about her.”

  Ruth turned back to J.D. “It’s been nice meeting you, Jade. Where are you from?”

  “Miami. How about you?”

  “I lived just outside Atlanta most of my life. My husband and I moved down here when he retired. I’m afraid I’ve become a golf widow. Are you married?”

  “Yes,” J.D. said, “but I’m in the process of getting divorced.”

  “I hope it’s not too unpleasant.”

  “I wish it weren’t.”

  “Bad, huh?”

  “Pretty bad.”

  “Do you have any children, Jade?”

  “No. I guess that’s a good thing, given the circumstances. Do you have children?”

  “Yes. Three. They’re spread all over the country. We see them on holidays sometimes and that’s about it. Gotta go. Get Judy to bring you to the meeting tonight.”