Payback, page 21
“Because we knew it was the only year Mark Worthy attended the school,” Gin said, even though they had walked into that school office playing a hunch. “What we didn’t know was anything about the memorial page we saw in the book, or what happened to any of those boys, not just Scott. Which you supplied a very interesting story about.”
“It wasn’t a story. It was a fact,” Michelle spit out. This time when Matt reached over and laid a hand on his wife’s shoulder, there wasn’t anything subtle about the way she shook him off. “Fate stepped in and gave that lowlife Mark the ending he deserved.”
Matt looked resigned as he met Gin’s gaze. “The whole town felt the Rollers had something to do with that fire, Agent Reilly, so there might be some truth in what my wife believes about justice coming full circle. But I’m not sure about the other man who died in that fire. The news reports said there were two victims.”
“Actually, Mr. Hillyer, there were four people who died in that fire, including Mark Worthy,” Gin said.
Matt slowly nodded. “Ah, yes. Now I remember. But I don’t recall the news mentioning anyone else’s name beside Mark’s.”
“We’ve identified three of the victims. We’re still working on the fourth.” Gin smoothly slid in the lie before taking a quick step back and rebuttoning her jacket, effectively covering her badge. “Thank you for your help, Mrs. Hillyer. If we have any more questions, we’ll be in touch.”
JT had already left the cubicle and was waiting outside the showroom. Gin quickly followed her out, then retraced their steps to the car. Justin was already occupying the back seat, working on his phone.
He looked up when the car door opened. “Any luck?”
“The woman has a screw loose, and she doesn’t like her husband at all,” JT announced as she snapped her seatbelt into place. “Where did you dig her up?”
“Cheryl Young, the principal’s wife, told me about her, and her obsession with the Rollers.” Gin took out her own phone and checked for messages from Trey, smiling when his was the first that popped up. “Trey is waiting back at the hotel. He’s suggesting a group room service and a swap of information.” Deciding to deal with the rest of the messages and the mountain of email later, she tucked her phone away. “I think that’s a good idea.”
“Great, I’m starving,” JT declared. “Now who are the Rollers, with the fancy truck that had gasoline cans in the back?”
“The very helpful Cheryl filled me in on that, and I’m happy to share, but Trey needs to hear this story, too. So it can wait until we’re back at the hotel.” She glanced over the back of the seat. “Do you have any information to report?”
Justin leaned forward and gave the back of the driver’s seat a slight push. “Probably a duplicate of what JT found since we were both researching the same thing, and most of the references I uncovered that had to do with that memorial page were in the back issues of the local newspaper. The library has a collection of them going back twenty years.”
“Good enough.” Gin flipped through her mental to-do list. “JT, you’ll need to make that call to the Norfolk office and have them bring us a second car. Let them know that a timeline of first thing in the morning would be appreciated. And Justin? I have a copy of the yearbook for the graduating class our victims were in. I want you to compile a list of all the names of everyone who was on that football team, and the cheerleading squad. You and JT can start tracking them down and making contact. Those are tight-knit groups. Let’s see if we can find someone who was hovering around the area of that old house and saw the Rollers out on the road the night of the fire.” She frowned. “Or more importantly, heard someone else say they spotted a Roller on the road that night. That should let us track down whoever started that rumor.”
“Why do we care, if you don’t mind me asking?” Justin shifted so he could see Gin between the break in the front seats.
“Because that just might be the triggering event for this whole mess.” When Justin quirked an eyebrow at her, Gin shrugged. “I’ll explain when I’ve had a chance to review one of my interviews and the whole team is together.”
Chapter Eighteen
An hour later, everyone was crowded into Gin’s hotel room. Trey had commandeered the small desk to set up his laptop, while everyone else had claimed a spot on the king-sized bed. They were all busily tapping away or scrolling through screens when a knock on the door announced that dinner had arrived.
JT immediately tossed her phone on the bed and scrambled for the door. “I’m starving.”
With her ear buds firmly in place, Gin ignored her, concentrating on Michelle Hillyer’s interview. Until she heard JT’s loud “Holy shit.” She glanced toward the room’s door just in time to see two trolleys, loaded with food, being wheeled down the short hallway. The busboy, who was pushing one and pulling the other, looked around, his gaze settling on Trey, who had moved to stand next to the table in the corner.
“Is that where you want this?” The waiter eyed the small table. “I don’t think it will all fit. I can leave one of the carts, if you want.”
“It’s either leave the cart or you start stacking food on the floor, so go ahead and leave it.” Gin took out her earbuds and laid them on the bedside table. As the waiter unloaded the mountain of food, she stood and planted her hands on her hips. “Who the hell ordered all this?” She didn’t wait for an answer before glaring at her partner. “Let me guess. You did.” When he only grinned and shrugged, she pointed to the bill lying on top of the lids covering the food on the second cart. “So you can sign for it and explain this on your expense report.” The smell of French fries rising from a large bowl set off a loud growl from her stomach, reminding her that breakfast had been a granola bar, and lunch non-existent. Reaching over, she snagged a small handful of fries and munched on them while Trey oversaw the rest of the food delivery.
Once the waiter had departed, a happy smile on his face from Trey’s generous tip, they all descended on the food, each carrying a loaded plate to the first place available to sit down. Except for a satisfied grunt here and there, the next fifteen minutes passed in silence as they filled up on burgers, fries, mac ′n cheese, and a variety of deli salads, none of which had the color green in them.
Since both Justin and Trey had claimed the only chairs in the room, JT sat on the floor next to Gin. They’d both decided it was a more stable place to balance everything than trying to do that on the bed.
“Besides the fact that chivalry is definitely dead, I take it flyboy isn’t big on vegetables,” JT commented loud enough to be heard in every corner of the room.
“Chivalry doesn’t extend into our working environment. Every team member is treated the same, including calling dibs on seating arrangements,” Gin stated, laughing as she leaned back against the wall. “And as far as vegetables go? Trey’s allergic. He only eats them if he’s on the brink of starvation and there’s absolutely nothing else to eat.”
“Not true,” Trey countered by jerking his thumb toward the overloaded table. “There are red bell peppers in that pasta salad.”
“Still true, flyboy,” JT shot back. “Technically, peppers are a fruit. Anything with a seed in it is a fruit.”
Trey made a scoffing noise as he looked at Justin. “Is she kidding?”
Justin picked up his bottle of water and waved it toward JT. “She’s from New York, so it’s hard to tell.”
With her empty plate balanced in one hand, JT stood up and walked over to the trolley the waiter had left behind. Bending over, she slid the plate onto the bottom shelf, then straightened up to her full height and wiggled her eyebrows at Trey. “The undercover spy-guy speaks the truth. New Yorkers play it close to the vest. So where are you from?”
Trey stared at her. “I’ve also heard New Yorkers aren’t big on boundaries.” He leaned back in his chair and considered the personal question for a moment, then shrugged. “California. The North Coast, up above San Francisco.”
“You’re from California and you don’t eat vegetables?” JT made a sad face as she shook her head. “I heard you eat pretty healthy out there. I also heard you haven’t been with the Bureau very long, so you’re still a boot.”
“I transferred out of the active service and into investigative work several years ago, which makes me not a new recruit, so not a boot.” Trey walked over to the table and helped himself to more fries.
JT turned and appealed to Gin. “Is that true? Has he been in the field with the Bureau for more than a year? Because that’s not what I heard.”
Gin lifted her empty plate up and passed it to JT to stow away on the trolley. “In the field? Yeah, he’s been out chasing crime for more than a year. But doing it with the Bureau that whole time?” Gin pushed herself to her feet and shook her head. “Nope. He spent time with NCIS before he came to the FBI, so he still has a few months before he passes that year mark with us.” At JT’s gleeful grin, Gin wagged a finger at her. “But if you treat him like a boot on this case, I’ll send your butt home. He’s good at dotting the t’s and crossing the i’s, and right now we need that.” Her gaze swept across the room. “And speaking of the case, feeding time is over. Let’s get to it.” She pointed at Trey, who was grinning like a Cheshire cat. “You first. Did you uncover anything about the case that’s worth hearing?”
The grin disappeared as Trey motioned for Justin to get up from the desk chair, then took his place. Pulling his laptop closer, he opened it and went to work on the keyboard. “As far as the police reports from that time period, nothing jumped out at me. The worst report from then was the fire that killed those four boys, so I scanned that one and can forward it to everyone’s email.”
“Later,” Gin said. “For now, just give us the highlights.”
“For something that tragic, the official report was pretty thin.” Trey leaned back and crossed his arms over his chest, his eyes on the document on his screen. “At 0230 hours, an anonymous call was made to 911 reporting a fire at the old Bannon house. It’s on a remote road, about twenty minutes south of town, so not a lot of services close by. It took the fire truck fifteen minutes to get out there, and they almost beat the cops. Everyone was hauling ass because the caller said he saw a truck parked outside with a bumper sticker from the local high school, and he thought some kids were on the second floor. But by the time help arrived, the place was already completely in flames. It burned to the ground before the fire department could get it under control. I’ve got pictures from the report.” As the other three crowded around, Trey brought up a series of photos.
“Whoa,” JT exclaimed. “Not much left if that was once a house.” She frowned as she studied the devastating images on the screen. “And they found remains of all four victims?”
“That’s what the forensic pathologist who signed off on the investigative results said in his report.” Trey pulled up another document and pointed at the screen. “Remains for all four victims were verified.” He sat back again to give the others a better view of his screen. “The exact cause of death was attributed to the fire, since no blunt force injuries were detected. But whether those boys died from smoke inhalation or from fatal burns couldn’t be determined.”
“If they were on the second floor, then it was probably from the smoke. They might have even died in their sleep.” When everyone turned their heads to look at Justin, he kept his gaze on the screen. “Three of the victims were athletes, so in good shape. If the fire had woken them up and they had no way to walk out of the house, they would have jumped. To a seventeen, maybe eighteen-year-old guy in good shape, a jump from a second-story window wouldn’t be too big of a deal. Especially if the ground below them was dirt and not asphalt or cement.”
Trey nodded his agreement. “I would have jumped.”
“Me too,” Gin concurred. “Despite the handicap of not being a teenage male. But there’s this one thing. How did that caller know those boys were on the second floor? The fact someone might be in the house I get, because he said there was a truck parked outside. But that doesn’t put them on the second floor. And how did the caller know those were kids in the house? The owner of that truck could have been a parent of a teenager, or someone who graduated ten years before and had never bothered to take the school sticker off his car. Or just about anyone, really.” She gently bumped her arm against Trey’s shoulder. “Is there a transcript of that anonymous call, by any chance?”
By way of an answer, Trey quickly scrolled through several documents, then backtracked more slowly, finally stopping at a page that looked like it belonged in a script. As four pairs of eyes scanned the page, it was JT who let out the first soft whistle.
“Well, look at that,” she said. “That anonymous person says right there that there were kids on the second floor. And when the dispatcher asked if he could see anyone, or hear anyone calling for help, this dude said ‘no’. But he saw the truck with the high school sticker on it. And like you said, anyone can buy one of those. So how the hell did he know who owned that truck, and where those kids were in the house?”
“Exactly,” Gin said. “Did the police have anything about that in their report?”
“Not directly.” Trey switched his attention over to his phone and pulled up the notes app. “But the chief put me in contact with Officer Jenkins. He’s been with the force for over twenty years and was one of the deputies who responded to that call. He also helped with the investigative work afterwards.” He looked up and met Gin’s steady gaze. “According to Jenkins, practically the entire department responded that night, so he was a great resource to fill in the gaps. He said that the department had the same questions you just asked, so they made a big point of tracing that phone call. It was placed from a pay phone at a gas station. Unfortunately, all the cameras there were pointed at the pumps, so they didn’t get anything from them. And the pumps were working on automatic all night, so there wasn’t anyone on site either. Since it’s only locals that go through there after dark, if there’s any problem with the pumps or anything else, they just leave a note and the morning person takes care of it.”
“Which tells us it was a local who made that call.” Gin’s mouth pursed into a thin line. “And a local who had to have known those boys were out there, and might be the one who told Michelle Hillyer that the truck owned by Worthy was seen on that back road that night.”
“Except for one thing,” Trey interjected. “Jenkins said they heard the rumors going around town about the Rollers, so all of those boys were questioned. Every one of them had a rock-solid alibi, and not from each other.”
“Then all those rumors were just that. Rumors,” Gin said. At least that was something to think about. “Was there anything else in the police report we should know?”
“In the police report?” Trey went back to the original document he’d brought up. “Just that three of the victims were in high school, and on the football team together. One of them, Scott Randolph, was babysitting his eleven-year-old brother, Chase Randolph, while their parents were out of town for the night.” Trey sighed. “I’m assuming this stay-out-at-the-haunted-house thing was already set up with the other boys, so Scott just brought his little brother along too.”
As the room grew quiet, Gin blew out a long breath. Some parts of her job were hard to swallow. Like a deep dive into the deaths of four kids who would never get out of high school, or even middle school in the case of the younger brother.
“It’s just senseless,” JT said, breaking the silence.
“Maybe.” When Gin felt rather than saw JT’s startled look, she sighed again. “Unfair? Absolutely. But senseless? I’m not so sure. Unless it was an accident and those kids inadvertently started that fire themselves, then burning that house down, with those kids in it, made sense to someone.”
Trey made a sound of agreement deep in his throat as he opened another file. “This is from the fire investigator. And it takes some explaining. According to Officer Jenkins, the investigation was started by a guy named Weston. He’d been with the department for a couple of decades.”
Gin leaned in closer and looked at the heading on the report. “That name isn’t Weston. It says the investigation was completed by Fire Investigator Berber.”
“Yeah,” Trey said. “Jenkins told me that Weston was wrapping up the investigation when he had a serious heart attack. He retired without coming back to the department but left all his notes for Berber, who finished the investigation and declared it an accident. Jenkins swears that was not where Weston was going with it, and everyone he talked to at the time knew it.”
“So why the change of heart?” Gin asked. “Did Jenkins know anything about that?”
“Yeah. He told me that Berber went down the same route you just mentioned — that the kids started the fire themselves by leaving a faulty lantern on upstairs, or maybe not completely putting out a cigarette. But the mayor at the time wanted closure for the families and the town, so Berber went with ‘accident’, and made everyone happy. Except Weston. He even went to the final hearing and said that from the burn patterns on the deepest layer of debris, and the smoke patterns on the remains of the second floor that collapsed and ended up on top of the heap, it was clear that the fire started on the first floor. Not upstairs, but on the floor beneath where those boys were supposedly camping out. If the anonymous caller is to be believed about that. Which he should be, according to a brief one-liner in the final report,” Trey continued. “The remains were found mingled with the fallout from the collapsed second floor, not underneath it, which is what would have been expected if they were on the first floor.”
Gin lifted an eyebrow. “And Berber’s response to all that?”
“Jenkins said that Berber claimed the boys could have made something to eat over a fire they started or forgot to turn off the faulty lantern and left it downstairs. Since Weston had retired and Berber was the new Fire Inspector, his word carried the most weight and the case was closed.”
