Chain Reaction

by Diane Fanning

  Exploring the top of David’s desk, Lucinda found only one thing that raised any questions: a folded-up note. With gloved hands, she pressed it open on the surface. It began with a salutation. ‘Hi Davey!’ There was a heart over the ‘i’. Had to have been from a girl. ‘You need to speak to Kev,’ it continued. ‘It has to stop! Please!’ It was signed with a smiley face followed by a loopy ‘E’. She’d have to ask David’s parents if they knew who wrote the note. In fact, she needed to get a whole list of the boy’s friends. Someone had to know something.

  Lucinda got down on her hands and knees to peer under the bed. Dust bunnies, empty freezer pop packages, energy drink cans and dirty socks. She stood up and pulled down the bed linens: nothing stuck in the sheets but one discarded pair of tighty-whities. Nothing under the pillows, either. She flipped up the mattress. Two often-handled issues of Playboy but nothing more. She wondered if she should just leave them there and then thought of Sarah finding them and slid the magazines into a paper bag.

  She remade the bed, taking care to make it look as it did before she entered the room, down to sprawling the same T-shirt across the lower part of the quilt. Next, she tackled the dresser, looking under everything, inside of rolls of socks and into every pocket. A few notes, a bottle of breath spray – but no drugs, no cigarettes, no booze.

  Lucinda turned to the closet, carefully inspecting all the clothes on hangers. Then she kneeled down and went through the pile of fallen clothing and one by one through all seven pairs of shoes, turning each shoe upside down and shaking it. Her whole haul from the inspection there yielded one quarter, two pennies and a pile of candy wrappers.

  Finally, she hoisted his heavy backpack on to the bed. She pulled out textbooks and notebooks and shook each one upside down. School assignment papers, a permission slip, a couple of bookmarks and another folded note fell on the surface. She set the latter aside as she explored the remaining contents of the bag. Pencils, pens, a ruler, another pile of wadded-up candy wrappers, an iPod and an unopened energy drink. When she was certain it was empty, she set it aside and spread open the note. It read: ‘Saturday night at 10 by the dumpsters behind the Walking Dog.’ It was unsigned – not even an initial.

  Unless something was hidden inside the recesses of the laptop or there was sinister intent behind the two written messages she’d found, the room contained absolutely nothing that pointed to David as the bomber – not even one clue to why he was at the high school on a Sunday morning. She had hoped for a solid clue leading to the people she needed to question. All she had were two notes of unknown provenance. She could only hope that talking to David’s friends would lead to some usable information but there was no guarantee of that.

  A dead teenager, two grieving parents and soon a school full of shocked friends and acquaintances. What could she tell them? How could she comfort them when she had no answers and no idea of where to find them?

  ‘David,’ she said to the empty room. ‘Please, David, point me in the right direction. I need some help here. Who is “E”? And why did she turn to you for help? What was her problem? Who was Kev? What was your involvement? Why are you dead, David? What went wrong?’

  Caught up in the moment, Lucinda had not heard the doorbell ring and was unaware of Ted’s presence until he spoke. ‘Glad I got here as quickly as I did. You must be desperate if you’re talking to yourself.’

  Lucinda laughed and said, ‘Good to see you, Ted.’ They hugged briefly – and platonically, Lucinda hoped. She then explained all that had ensued up to that point.

  Ted collected the laptop, its cord, a few flash drives and a stack of CDs and DVDs. Then they headed downstairs.

  ‘Yes, he did have a cell phone,’ Sarah said, an exasperated look on her face.

  ‘You didn’t want him to have one?’ Lucinda asked.

  ‘I knew it was best that he did,’ Sarah said with a sigh. ‘But it was a constant source of conflict. Every night at dinner, we had to tell him to put it on the table and turn it off.’

  ‘And if we wanted to talk to him,’ Chuck added, ‘we had to take possession of the phone first or he’d never stop texting.’

  ‘He texted a lot?’ Lucinda asked.

  ‘He texted more than he talked,’ Chuck said. ‘Are you saying that his cell wasn’t with him?’

  Lucinda winced. ‘If it was, it didn’t survive the explosion. It would help a lot to have a copy of his bill to see whom he called and texted. I can apply for a search warrant to get his records from the phone company but that will take time. Would you, by any chance, have a copy of his bills?’

  ‘His bills? His bills?’ Sarah asked.

  Chuck interjected, ‘We have a family plan. His records are on our bill.’

  ‘Did you just toss them after you paid them or would you keep it on file?’ Lucinda asked.

  ‘We hold on to everything for at least a year, right, Sarah?’ Chuck said.

  ‘Oh, yes, of course,’ Sarah said. ‘I can get those for you.’

  ‘That would be a big help, Mrs Baynes. Thank you. When did your last billing cycle end?’

  ‘Oh, my, I don’t know. I …’

  ‘Well, when do you usually pay the bill each month?’

  Sarah shook her head and tears formed in her eyes. ‘I can’t remember. I know I should. I’m sorry.’

  ‘No apologies are necessary. I can figure that out from the bills and file a search warrant for the most recent records.’

  ‘Wait a minute. Sarah, didn’t you tell me you could get those records online now?’ Chuck said.

  ‘Oh yes, yes. What was I thinking? I can print that out.’ Sarah wiped away tears with the back of her hand. ‘I’ll go do that right away.’

  After Sarah left the room, Chuck stood and walked over to an antique oak washstand, pulled open a deep drawer and removed a photo album. He sat back down with the closed album resting on his knees and stared into space.

  Lucinda gave him some time and then asked, ‘Is there something you wanted to show me in that album, Mr Baynes?’

  Chuck sighed and, without looking at Lucinda, said, ‘I thought I did. I wanted to show you his pictures growing up. But now – but now – I just don’t know if I can bear to look at them.’ Chuck’s head jerked upward. ‘Sarah! Sarah, what’s wrong?’

  Lucinda spun around and saw Sarah standing with a hand over her mouth and a look of horror in her eyes. Then Chuck was standing beside her, an arm around her shoulders.

  ‘What is it, Sarah?’

  Tears coursed down the woman’s cheeks. Through her sobs, she choked out, ‘I went into the office for a reason. But I couldn’t remember why I was there.’

  Chuck pulled his wife tight against his chest and held her close, whispering comfort into her ear. After a couple of minutes, he eased back from her, planted a kiss on her forehead and said, ‘I do that all the time, Sarah. We all do. It was David’s phone records. You were going to get them for the lieutenant. Come on, let’s do it together.’

  Lucinda watched them walk out of the room, arms around each other. Sarah leaned hard on Chuck’s side, causing them to swerve while her husband re-established their equilibrium. Lucinda wanted to say something soothing but she was incapable of speech. A lump in her throat threatened to erupt in sobs. She swallowed several times to regain her composure.

  By the time the Bayneses returned with a manila folder in hand, Lucinda felt in control of her emotions but she knew it wouldn’t take much for them to flare up again. She struggled to remain calm and steady as she pulled out the plastic sleeve with the note from ‘E’.

  Neither parent knew the identity of the mysterious author with any certainty. Sarah suspected Emily Jarvis; Chuck thought Elizabeth Harding. When Lucinda asked about Kev, Sarah said, ‘Kevin Blackwood, probably. They were close in middle school but I didn’t think they were in touch much lately – so maybe it’s not him.’

  Lucinda asked if they knew who wanted to meet with David the night before he died. ‘He did spend a lot of time
at the Walking Dog,’ Chuck volunteered. ‘A lot of the kids do. Inexpensive food and a company tolerance for kids just hanging out. It doesn’t really point to anyone specific.’

  Lucinda asked the couple about David’s friends and watched the painful process as they brainstormed the names of anyone they could ever remember visiting David at the house, along with all those he’d mentioned on a regular basis. They couldn’t recall the last names of all the kids. Lucinda could only hope that Ted would be able to dig that information out of the computer.

  Sarah and Chuck looked haggard by the time they finished. Lucinda looked at her notes and hoped that one of those kids would know something – anything that would lead to the person responsible for David’s death, even if it turned out that it was David himself.

  Lucinda felt as if all the oxygen in the home had been consumed by their bottomless grief. She left the Bayneses holding on to one another on the sofa and let herself out of the house. On the porch, she inhaled a deep breath.

  THIRTEEN

  Lucinda felt devoid of energy when she slid into the passenger seat of Ted’s car. ‘It is never, never any easier. No matter how many times I do it.’

  ‘I know,’ Ted said. ‘It’s one thing I certainly don’t miss about my job on the force. Computer forensics doesn’t have as many adrenaline-churning moments but it also takes me out of the death notification business. Anything I need to prioritize for you in my analysis?’

  ‘Yes,’ Lucinda said, pulling out the legal pad with David’s list of friends and extracting a blank sheet. ‘The Bayneses did not know some of the last names for David’s friends. I am going to write down some first names. If you can pull out any indications of their identity in his email or Facebook, that would be very helpful. Also, I am trying to identify a girl with the initial of “E” who needed David’s help with some problem or other regarding someone she referred to as “Kev”, who might or might not be Kevin Blackwood, and I am interested in any references to the Walking Dog.’

  ‘Walking dog?’ Ted asked.

  Lucinda chuckled. ‘That’s right. The Walking Dog is a fairly recent addition to town. It wasn’t here when you moved up to Charlottesville. It’s just a fast-food teenage hang-out specializing in hot dogs. Mind if we talk about something else? I am drained right now.’

  ‘Course not. You want a family update?’

  ‘I’d love one. How’s your dad … Ellen, the kids?’

  ‘The kids are great. Good grades, lots of friends; they really like it up there. Dad? Well, I feel like we lose another piece of him every day but the good news is that he remains pleasant and still remembers all our names most days. When he temporarily forgets one of the kids’ names, he calls them “Buddy” and they don’t have a clue.’

  ‘And Ellen? Your marriage?’

  ‘That’s best of all.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘We’ve both been doing a lot of healing. We’ve been able to talk about the loss of the baby without getting angry or pointing fingers. We still walk on eggshells a bit with each other but that’s getting better. And we’re sharing a bed once again.’

  ‘That’s terrific, Ted.’

  Ted blushed a bit and said, ‘Yeah. I finally got to the point where I accepted the fact that the high school romance you and I had was just that – a thing of the past. That helped a lot and it made me realize that I was as much a part of the problem in our marriage as Ellen was. I had been placing all the blame on her.’

  Lucinda didn’t express the total relief she was feeling, afraid that it would sound too much like rejection. She just patted his arm and said, ‘Good, Ted. That is what you needed to do.’

  ‘And you? Look at you. You look fabulous. Only traces of the scarring remain. I bet those will fade even more with time.’

  ‘Thanks, Ted. I no longer cringe when I look in the mirror but they still stand out like flashing lights to me.’ For the rest of the ride, they shared the latest news about mutual acquaintances. Before getting out of the car at the Justice Center, Lucinda leaned across the seat and placed a kiss on Ted’s cheek. ‘Thanks for everything, Ted.’

  ‘The least I could do,’ he said.

  Lucinda walked into her office with a list of fifty-seven names. including one girl named Emily, two named Elizabeth and one Electra – what were her parents thinking? She looked up addresses and phone numbers. She called those five girls first – although she found all but one of them at home, the parents were at work. She’d gotten times when she could interview them with a parent present. She went back to the list gathering information about the remaining students identified by last names.

  She was halfway through it when Captain Holland barked, ‘My office, Pierce.’

  She reluctantly rose from her desk and followed him down the hall. What are the odds, she wondered, that this summons was related to Connelly? He’s probably been whining about me since he left the Bayneses’ house. Then again, maybe the captain just wants an update on the progress at the high school.

  ‘Sit,’ Holland barked as Lucinda walked through the door.

  The look on his face told Lucinda that she was not going to like what he had to say.

  ‘You’re off the case,’ he said and stared at her with an expressionless face.

  She was certain what he meant but didn’t want to believe it. ‘What case, sir?’

  Holland lowered his head and glared at her. ‘You know what case. The case at the high school. The explosion. You are no longer involved.’

  Lucinda sighed. ‘Jeez, Captain, are you really going to cave in to a little whining from an obnoxious federal agent?’

  The captain bolted to his feet and slammed both hands down on the surface of his desk. ‘A little whining? A little whining? Oh, give me patience. You threatened a federal officer with a firearm and you describe his reaction as a little whining? You are lucky that you still have a job, Lieutenant – even luckier that you still are, at least for now, a lieutenant. What were you thinking?’

  ‘Sir, I did not threaten him with a firearm.’

  ‘Really? What do you call it?’

  ‘Sir, I rested my hand on my gun. It was in the holster. The holster was still snapped shut.’

  By now, Holland’s face was blood-red and veins throbbed in his throat and at his temples. ‘If you don’t call it a threat, what do you call it, Pierce?’

  ‘I just wanted him to know I was serious.’

  ‘Oh, he got that. He said he was in fear of his life.’

  Lucinda rolled her eyes. ‘BS,’ she said.

  ‘Do you want me to charge you with insubordination, Pierce?’

  ‘No sir, I—’

  ‘Then clean up your attitude.’

  ‘I’m sorry, sir. I know my reaction was extreme but Connelly was badgering two parents who had just learned about the death of their son. He was leaping to unwarranted conclusions and he was undermining my investigation.’

  ‘Well, it’s not your investigation any longer. Connelly’s the lead now. Lovett is assisting him. And you are out of the picture. Go to your office right now, forward any digital evidence you have to me and pack up anything and everything else in your office connected to the case and bring it in here.’

  ‘Is this really necessary, sir?’

  ‘The decision has been made, Pierce. They didn’t even tell me until it was a done deal. The police chief called me after he hashed it out with Lovett’s FBI supervisor and ATF Deputy Federal Security Director Wesley. And just for the record, Pierce, I am really pissed off at you this time and haven’t decided what I am going to do about it. And, no, it’s not the political embarrassment of being ultimately responsible for you that has my dander up; it’s the fact that an explosion at one of our high schools – the one closest to this office – has been taken out of our hands; one of our kids is dead and we cannot be involved in solving the case – that is all because of you. It’s all on you, Pierce, and that pisses me off. Now, get out of here and go get those files together.’


  As she was walking through the doorway, the captain said, ‘One more thing, Pierce.’

  She turned around and said, ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Lovett has been ordered not to discuss the case with you. Don’t pressure him or he might end up out of a job. And while we’re at it, you all ought to stop seeing each other socially until this case is wrapped up.’

  Socially? He doesn’t know we’re living together? We haven’t gone out of our way to publicize that fact but we also haven’t tried to hide it. I had assumed everyone knew. Maybe I should call Jake and make sure he doesn’t volunteer the information unless he’s directly asked.

  When she reached her office, she continued to think about the wisdom of making that call or waiting to talk to him that evening. She first emailed every case-related file on her computer to Holland. Then she got an empty business envelope box and stacked documents in it. She picked up one of the two notes she found in David Baynes’s room but her hand hovered over the pile. She set the piece of paper off to the side. She did the same with the other message as well as her handwritten list of David’s friends. When everything else was in the box, she sat down to think.

  It was important evidence but they needed the cooperation of David’s friends. If Connelly goes in there with his hostile, suspicious attitude, the kids will balk at cooperating and the parents might hire attorneys. That would cut off all communication and stop any possible answers in their tracks. No defense attorney on the planet would want a teenager talking to law enforcement when Homeland Security was raising the threat of terrorism charges.

  Lucinda picked up the notes and her lists with notations about addresses, phone numbers and times of parental arrivals, slid them into a manila folder and walked down the hall to the copier, grateful that she could get there without going past Holland’s office. She made copies of all the documents and returned to her office where she slipped both the copies and the originals into her satchel.