Chain Reaction (7 page)

Lucinda swallowed hard to keep her own empathetic emotions from slipping out of control. ‘If one of you could show me to his room, I’ll get started.’

Chuck led her upstairs and into David’s room. ‘Well, I’ll go downstairs with Sarah. Feel free to do what you need to do. I just ask that you try not to mess things up too much. Sarah would feel the need to put everything back in its proper place and I don’t think she’s up to that yet.’

Once Lucinda heard Chuck’s descending footsteps and knew she was alone on the second floor, she called Jake. ‘They’ve given me permission to search their son’s room and to confiscate the computer. I’m going to call the Regional Computer Forensic Center and see if Ted Branson can get down here to take direct possession of David’s laptop. Please get Connelly out of here before he causes any further complications. I’ll get a ride from Ted or whoever he sends down from Charlottesville.’

‘Are you sure? I could help you in there.’

‘I know you could but my greater need is to get Connelly out of here before he causes any additional turmoil.’

‘You think he could cause them to revoke the permission.’

‘They said as much, Jake. In order to get them to sign the release, I had to add that as an automatic response if he walks through their door again. So get that insensitive jerk off of their property before that happens.’

‘Oh jeez …’

‘What?’

‘The blinds on one of the windows: someone has pulled up a slat and is looking our way.’

‘Get that man out of here now, Jake. They were very emphatic about that.’

‘That’s not going to be an easy job.’

‘Cuff him or do whatever is necessary. Just get him out of here now.’

‘I will not draw a gun on him.’

‘I did not draw my weapon,’ Lucinda objected. ‘I simply rested my hand on the butt of my gun.’

‘Technicality, Lucy. I think you really stepped in it.’

‘Won’t be the first time, Jake.’

L
ucinda was pleased with the results of her call to Ted. He promised to be there in two hours to take the computer to his lab for forensic analysis. Even more pleasing was Ted’s eagerness to take time when he got there to update her on how his kids and wife were doing. It sounded as if his marital situation was now on a firmer footing. She hoped that was true because it would mean he wouldn’t be attempting to make her feel guilty for pushing him away from the possibility of renewing their high school romance.

She opened up the lid of David’s laptop and was surprised to see that it was not password-protected. Wouldn’t a kid with something to hide make sure that no one else could get access? She pulled up his internet search history and saw no mention of anything that was even remotely connected to bombs or explosive devices. She also found nothing that suggested an interest in violence, except for a few action movies. There was no indication he ever visited any website with racist sentiments or of militia organizations or conspiracy theorists of any stripe. Not at all what she expected. But, then, if he was involved with any of that, wouldn’t he know to erase his tracks?

She went next to his Facebook page but that asked for a password. She opened his email inbox and found it was populated with a slew of YouTube links that led to music or humorous videos, communications from the school or teachers at the school and lots of spam. She checked his deleted messages folder but it was empty. Was that a sign of good email maintenance? She doubted it. If that were the case, he wouldn’t have had all that junk mail in his inbox. Whatever had been deleted would have to be ferreted out up at the computer forensics lab.

Lucinda looked around for a cell phone but didn’t find one. Perhaps it was destroyed in the explosion that took David’s life. Maybe he didn’t have one. She’d have to talk to his parents. If he did, she would need to get a search warrant to get a copy of his billing records. Or maybe Mr or Mrs Baynes would do that for her and save her the hassle.

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.

L
ucinda 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.’