Fractured, page 15
part #2 of Will Trent Series
Will asked Bernard, “Would you characterize Emma as slow or . . .” He seemed hesitant to use the word. “Retarded?”
Bernard appeared as shocked as Faith felt. “Of course not,” the man replied. “As a matter of fact, Emma has an exceptionally high IQ. A lot of dyslexics are incredibly gifted.”
“Gifted in what ways?”
He rambled off some examples. “Keen observational skills, highly organized, exceptional memory for details, athletically talented, mechanically inclined. I don’t doubt Emma will make a fine architect one day. She has an amazing aptitude with building structures. I’ve taught here at Westfield for twelve years and never seen anyone quite like her.”
Will sounded a little skeptical. “But she still had problems.”
“I wouldn’t call them problems. Challenges, maybe, but all kids have challenges.”
“It’s still a disease, though.”
“A disorder,” he corrected.
Will took a breath, and Faith realized that he was getting irritated with the runaround. Still, he pressed, “So, what are some of the problems associated with the disorder?”
The teacher ticked them off. “Deficiencies in math, reading, spelling and comprehension, immaturity, spatial problems, stuttering, poor motor skills, an inability to grasp rhyming meter . . . It’s a mixed bag, really, and every child is different. You might have a math whiz, or you might have someone who can’t perform simple addition; hyper-athletic or a total klutz. Emma was lucky enough to be diagnosed early. Dyslexics are very adept at hiding the disorder. Unfortunately, computers make it much easier for them to fool people. Reading is such a fundamental skill, and they tend to be ashamed when they can’t grasp the basics. Most dyslexics don’t test well unless it’s orally, so they tend to do very poorly at school. I don’t think I’m alone in saying that some teachers misconstrue this as laziness or behavioral related.” Bernard let his words hang in the air, as if they were directed at a specific teacher in the room. “Adding to the problem is that Emma is extremely shy. She doesn’t like attention. She’s willing to put up with a lot of bullshit in order to fly under the radar. She’s certainly had her moments of immaturity, but mostly, she’s just a naturally introverted kid who has to try extra hard to fit in.”
Will was leaning so far forward he was practically off his chair. “How did her parents react to this information?”
“I’ve never met the father, but the mother’s very proactive.”
“Is there a cure for it?”
“As I said before, dyslexia is not a disease, Mr. Trent. It’s a wiring problem in the brain. You would just as soon expect a diabetic to spontaneously produce insulin as you would a dyslexic to wake up and suddenly be able to tell you the difference between left and right and over and under.”
Finally, Faith thought she understood where Will was going with his questions. She asked, “So, if someone like Emma was being chased, would she be likely to take the wrong route—go up the stairs instead of down, where she could get away?”
“It doesn’t work like that. She would probably be more likely than you or I to intuitively know the best route, but if you asked her, ‘How did you get out of there?’ she wouldn’t be able to tell you, ‘I hid under the coffee table, then I took a left down the stairway.’ She would simply say, ‘I ran away.’ The most fascinating thing about this disorder is the mind seems to recognize the deficit and create new thinking pathways that result in coping mechanisms that the typical child would not otherwise consider.”
Will cleared his throat. “You said that she would be more observant than a normal person.”
“We don’t really use the word ‘normal’ around here,” Bernard told him. “But, yes. In Emma’s case, I would think that she would have better observational skills.” He took it a step farther. “You know, in my experience, dyslexics are far more keyed in than most people. We see this with abused children sometimes, where, as a form of self-defense, they’ve learned to read mood and nuance better than the typical child. They absorb an incredible amount of blame to keep the peace. They are the ultimate survivors.”
Faith took some comfort in his words. A glance around the room told her that she wasn’t alone in this feeling.
Will stood up. “I’m sorry,” he told the group. “I’ve got another meeting. Detective Mitchell has a few more questions for you.” He reached into his pocket, she assumed to turn off the recorder. “Faith, call me when you get to city hall.” He meant the morgue. “I want to sit in with you.”
“Okay.”
He made his excuses and quickly left. Faith glanced at her watch, wondering where he was going. He didn’t have to be at the Campanos for another hour.
Faith looked around the room, all the eyes that were on her. She decided to get it over with. “I’m wondering if there was something specific that happened with Kayla Alexander. There doesn’t seem to be a lot of sympathy for her considering what happened.”
There were some shrugs. Most of them looked at their hands or the floor. Even Daniella Park didn’t have a response.
The principal took over. “As I said, Detective Mitchell, Kayla was a challenge.”
Bernard let out a heavy sigh, as if he resented having to be the one to clarify. “Kayla liked to cause trouble.”
“In what way?”
“The way girls do,” he said, though that was hardly an explanation.
“She picked fights?” Faith guessed.
“She spread rumors,” Bernard provided. “She got the other girls into a tizzy. I’m sure you remember what it was like to be that age.”
Faith had tried her damndest to forget. Being the only pregnant fourteen-year-old in your school was not exactly a walk in the park.
Bernard’s tone turned dismissive. “It wasn’t that bad.”
Matthew Levy agreed. “These spats are always cyclical. They tear into each other one week, then the next week they’re best friends and they hate someone else. You see it all the time.”
All the women in the room seemed to think otherwise. Park spoke for them. “It was bad,” she said. “I’d say that within a month of enrolling, Kayla Alexander had crossed just about everybody here. She split the school in two.”
“Was she popular with the boys?”
“And how,” Park said. “She used them like toilet paper.”
“Was there anyone in particular?”
There was a series of shrugs and head shaking.
“The list is probably endless,” Bernard supplied. “But the boys didn’t rile up. They knew what they were getting.”
Faith addressed Daniella Park. “Earlier, you made it sound like Emma was her only friend.”
Park answered, “Kayla was Emma’s friend. Emma was all Kayla had left.”
The distinction was an important one. “Why did Emma stick by her?”
“Only Emma knows the answer to that, but I would guess that she understood what it meant to be an outsider. The more things turned against Kayla, the closer they seemed to get.”
“You said the school was divided in two. What exactly happened?”
Silence filled the room. No one seemed to want to volunteer the information. Faith was about to ask the question again when Paolo Wolf, an economics teacher who had been quiet until this point, said, “Mary Clark would know more about that.”
The silence became more pronounced until Evan Bernard mumbled something under his breath.
Faith asked, “I’m sorry, Mr. Bernard, I didn’t catch what you said.”
His eyes darted around the room, as if to dare anyone to challenge him. “Mary Clark barely knows the time of day.”
“Is Mary a student here?”
McFaden, the principal, explained, “Mrs. Clark is one of our English teachers. She had Kayla in her class last year.”
Faith didn’t bother to ask why the woman wasn’t here. She would find out for herself in person. “Can I speak with her?”
McFaden opened her mouth to respond, but the bell rang. The principal waited until the ringing had stopped. “That’s the assembly bell,” she told Faith. “We should head over to the auditorium.”
“I really need to talk to Mary Clark.”
There was just a second of equivocation before McFaden gave a bright smile that would rival the world record for fakeness. “I’d be happy to point her out to you.”
FAITH WALKED ACROSS the courtyard behind the main school building, following Olivia McFaden and the other teachers to the auditorium. Oddly, they were all in a single line, as were all the students following their respective teachers to the assembly. The building was the most modern looking of all the structures on the Westfield campus, probably built on the backs of hapless parents shilling candy bars, magazine subscriptions and wrapping paper to unsuspecting neighbors and grandparents.
One line of students in particular was getting a bit too rowdy. McFaden’s head swiveled around as if it was on a turret, her gaze pinpointing the loudest culprits. The noise quickly drained like water down a sink.
Faith should not have been surprised by the auditorium, which was really more like what you would find housing a small community theater in a wealthy suburb. Rows of plush velvet red seats led to a large stage with state-of-the-art lighting hanging overhead. The barrel-vaulted ceiling was painted in a very convincing homage to the Sistine Chapel. Intricate bas-relief around the stage depicted the gods in various states of excitement. The carpet underfoot was thick enough to make Faith glance down every few steps for fear of falling.
McFaden gave the tour as she walked, students hushing in her wake. “We built the auditorium in 1995 with an eye toward hosting overflow events during the Olympics.”
So, the parents had hustled their candy, then the school had charged the state to rent the auditorium.
“Daphne, no gum,” McFaden told one of the girls as she passed. She directed her words back to Faith. “Our art director, Mrs. Meyers, suggested the ceiling motif.”
Faith glanced up, mumbling, “Nice.”
There was more about the building, but Faith tuned out McFaden’s voice as she walked down the steps toward the stage. There was a certain frisson that overtook the auditorium as it began filling with students. Some were crying, some were simply staring at the stage, a look of expectancy in their eyes. A handful were with their parents, which somehow made the situation even more tense. Faith saw more than one child with a mother’s arm around his or her shoulders. She could not help but think about Abigail Campano when she saw them, remember the way the mother had so fiercely fought the man she assumed had killed her daughter. The hair on the back of her neck rose, an ancient genetic response to the sense of collective fear that permeated the room.
Doing a quick count with some multiplication, Faith figured that, including the empty balcony, there were around a thousand seats in the auditorium. The bottom level was almost completely full. Most of the Westfield students were young girls. The majority of them were very thin, very well-heeled and very pretty. They ate organic produce and wore organic cotton and drove their BMWs and Minis to Pilates after school. Their parents weren’t stopping at McDonald’s on the way home to pick up dinner before they went to do their second job on the night shift. These girls probably lived a life very similar to Emma Campano’s: shiny iPhones, new cars, beach vacations and big-screen televisions.
Faith caught herself, knowing that the small part of her who had lost so many things when Jeremy came along was acting up. It wasn’t these girls’ fault that they had been born into wealthy families. They certainly didn’t force their parents to buy them things. They were very lucky, and from the looks of them, very frightened. One of their schoolmates had been brutally murdered—more brutally than perhaps any of them would ever know. Another classmate was missing, probably being sadistically used by a monster. Between CSI and Thomas Harris, these kids could probably guess what was happening to Emma Campano.
The closer Faith got to the stage, the more she could hear crying. There was nothing more emotional than a teenage girl. Whereas ten minutes ago, she had felt something akin to disdain for them, now Faith could only feel pity.
McFaden took Faith by the arm. “That’s Mrs. Clark,” she said, pointing to a woman leaning against the far wall. Most of the teachers were standing in the aisle, diligently reprimanding students, keeping the peace in the large crowd, but Mary Clark seemed to be in her own little world. She was young, probably not long out of college, and bordering on beautiful. Her strawberry blond hair hung to her shoulders and freckles dotted her nose. Incongruously, she was dressed in a conservative black jacket, pressed white shirt and matching skirt that hit just below the knee—an outfit much more suitable for a matronly older woman.
McFaden said, “If you could just say a few words to the students?”
Faith felt a surge of panic. She told herself that she was only speaking to a room full of kids, that it didn’t matter if she made an ass of herself, but her hands were still shaking by the time they reached the front of the auditorium. The room was efficiently chilled by the air-conditioning, but Faith found herself sweating.
McFaden climbed the steps to the stage. Faith followed her, feeling the same age as the kids she was supposed to be assuring. While McFaden went straight to the podium, Faith stayed in the wings, desperate for any excuse not to have to do this. The lights were bright, so much so that Faith could only see the students sitting in the front row. Their uniforms were probably custom tailored—schoolgirl skirts and matching starched white tops. The boys had fared better with dark pants and white shirts with blue striped ties. It must have been an uphill battle every day to make them tuck in their shirts and keep their ties straightened.
There were six chairs behind the podium. Four of the chairs were filled with teachers, the last with a large hairy man wearing spandex shorts and clutching a wrinkled piece of paper in his obviously sweaty hand. His gut rolled over the waist of his shorts and sitting made it hard for him to breathe; his mouth was open, his lips moving like a fish. Faith studied him, trying to figure out what he was doing, and realized that he was going over the lines from a script in his beefy hand. Faith guessed by the whistle around his neck that he was head coach for the physical education department.
Beside him was Evan Bernard, sitting in the last chair on the left. Daniella Park was in the last chair on the opposite end. Faith noted the distance between the two teachers and guessed from the way they were studiously avoiding each other’s gaze that there was some tension between them. She glanced out at Mary Clark, who was still standing in the aisle, and guessed that might be the reason.
McFaden was checking the mic. Hushes went around the room, then the usual feedback through the sound system and the predictable murmur through the crowd. The principal waited for the noise to die down. “We are all aware of the tragedy that struck two of our students and one of their friends yesterday. This is a trying time for all of us, but as a whole, we can—we will—overcome this tragedy and make something good of it. Our shared sense of community, our love for our fellow students, our respect for life and the common good, will help all of us at Westfield persevere.” There was a scattering of applause, mostly from the parents. She turned to Faith. “A detective from the Atlanta Police Department is here to take some of your questions. I would remind students to please be respectful to our guest.”
McFaden sat down, and Faith felt every eye in the room scrutinize her as she walked across the stage. The podium seemed to get farther away with each step, and by the time she reached it, her hands were sweaty enough to leave marks on the polished wood.
“Thank you,” Faith said, her voice sounding thin and girlish as it echoed through the speakers. “I’m Detective Faith Mitchell. I want to assure you that the police are doing everything they can to find Emma, to find out who committed these crimes.” She threw in “And the Georgia Bureau of Investigation” too late, realizing that her sentence did not make much sense. She tried again. “As I said, I’m a detective with the Atlanta Police Department. Your principal has my direct phone number. If any of you saw anything, heard anything or have any information that might help the case, then please contact me.” Faith realized her lungs were out of air. She tried to take a breath without making it obvious. Briefly, she wondered if this was what it felt like to have a heart attack.
“Ma’am?” someone called.
Faith shielded her eyes against the bright stage lights. She saw that several hands were up. She pointed to the closest girl, concentrating all of her attention on the one person instead of the crowd of onlookers. “Yes?”
The student stood, and then Faith noticed her long blond hair and creamy white skin. The question came to Faith’s mind before the girl got it out. “Do you think we should cut our hair?”
Faith swallowed, trying to think of the best way to answer. There were all kinds of urban legends about women with long hair being more likely to be targeted by rapists, but as far as Faith’s practical experience had shown, the men who committed these crimes only cared about one thing on a woman’s body, and it was not whether or not she had short or long hair. On the other hand, Kayla and Emma looked so much alike that it could certainly point to a trend.
Faith skirted the question. “You don’t need to cut your hair, you don’t need to change your appearance.”
“How about—” someone began, then stopped, remembering protocol and raising her hand.
“Yes?” Faith asked.
The girl stood. She was tall and pretty, her dark hair hanging around her shoulders. There was a slight tremble to her voice when she asked, “Emma and Kayla were both blond. I mean, doesn’t that mean that the guy has an MO?”
Faith felt caught out by the question. She thought about Jeremy and the way that he could always tell when she was not being honest with him. “I’m not going to lie to you,” she told the girl, then looked up at the group as a whole, her stage fright dissipating, her voice feeling stronger. “Yes, both Emma and Kayla had long blond hair. If it makes you feel more comfortable to wear your hair up for a while, then do it. Don’t let yourself believe, though, that this means you are perfectly safe. You still need to take precautions when you’re out. You need to make sure your parents know where you are at all times.” There were whispers of protest. Faith held up her hands, feeling like a preacher. “I know that sounds trite, but you guys aren’t living in the suburbs. You know the basic rules of safety. Don’t talk to strangers. Don’t go to unfamiliar places alone. Don’t go off on your own without letting someone—anyone—know where you are going and when you will be back.”
