Betrayal of Trust

Chapter 21

We spent the next hour talking with Zoe Longmire, asking her for information about the kids from Olympia Prep who were connected to Janie’s House. I started the interview thinking that Zoe might have been responsible for the destructive texting campaign against Josh. In the end, I came away doubting Zoe had been an active participant, but still I couldn’t shake the suspicion that she knew more than she was saying about Josh’s situation.

All during the interview, we let her believe that we were there primarily because we were looking into the causes behind Josh’s suicide. For the time being we left Rachel Camber’s murder off the table, our strategy being that Zoe would be more forthcoming without the red flag of a related murder investigation. We had mentioned Rachel’s death to Meribeth Duncan and Greg Alexander, so word about what had happened was probably spreading through the Janie’s House community, but so far nothing had hit the media.

Generally speaking, stories about murdered runaways from small towns in western Washington aren’t thought to have “legs.” As a consequence they don’t get much media coverage. However, once some enterprising reporter made the connection between Josh’s suicide (which was being covered in a very respectful fashion) and Rachel’s death, it would take very little effort for Janie’s House to be embroiled in the ensuing scandal.

It was also possible that the whole Janie’s House enterprise might come to an end as a result. Their funding would dry up. Well-heeled contributors don’t like having their names linked to places with problems. And once it started looking like having local students volunteering to help needy kids wasn’t such a good idea, the schools around Olympia would withdraw their support as well.

As we conducted the interview with Zoe Longmire, it was clear that she was missing several other crucial pieces of the puzzle. Apparently Marsha Longmire and Gerry Willis hadn’t breathed a word to anyone, and most especially to their daughters, about the existence of that ugly video clip. We didn’t show it to her either. What we mostly did was give Zoe a chance to talk, to unburden herself to someone other than her grieving parents. Talking about her participation in Janie’s House gave her something to discuss that wasn’t Josh’s suicide. As she spoke, I remembered Greg Alexander’s remark about her blending in with the other kids and not lording it over anyone because she was the governor’s daughter.

“We should probably interview your sister, too,” Mel said when Zoe finally started to run out of things to say. “She’s not here now, is she?”

There was the slightest moment of hesitation before Zoe shook her head.

“Do you know when she’ll be home?”

“She’s staying at Dad’s place right now,” Zoe said. “Gerry’s sister is flying in from Michigan tonight, and she’ll be staying in Gizzy’s room. There are extra rooms on the third floor, but no one wants to stay there.”

We didn’t have to ask where Zoe’s father’s house might be because Ross Connors had already supplied us with a physical address for the governor’s former husband and his new wife.

Mel and I were preparing to leave when Marsha and Gerry showed up.

“We just came from the mortuary,” Marsha said. “The funeral will be Friday, the day after tomorrow.”

I was a little surprised to hear that the body had already been released to a funeral home. Usually in a case like this there are several days between the death and the time of release. I guess with the governor’s family involved, some effort had been made to streamline the process. Nevertheless, the strain of visiting the mortuary and making final arrangements had taken its toll on Josh’s grandfather. Gerry Willis looked like he needed to lie down in the worst way. Marsha asked Zoe to help him to his room. When they had left the room, Marsha turned on us.

“What are you doing here?” she demanded angrily. “They’ve done the autopsy. Josh’s death has been ruled a suicide. What more do you need to know?”

What a difference a day makes. Whatever welcome mat Marsha Longmire had put out for us a day earlier had evidently been rescinded.

My mother used to talk about the importance of telling the “unvarnished truth.” As a little kid that was something I wondered about. If you were going to paint the truth, how would you do it and what kind of brushes would you use? Now I know the best way to varnish truth is to cover whatever’s in question with a bright and shiny coat of pure BS.

“It has come to our attention that Josh was the target of numerous ugly text messages-harassing text messages. It’s possible those had something to do with Josh’s suicide, and we thought Zoe might have heard something about them.”

“Did she?” Marsha asked.

“No,” I answered. “Zoe had no idea about that.”

A part of me wondered if that was completely true. I had a feeling in my gut that Zoe knew more than she was saying, but right then we didn’t dare bring on the kind of tough questioning that would have given us a straight answer. That was the truth, but it wasn’t the whole truth, and it was most definitely varnished. It was smooth enough to explain our presence and our need to talk to Zoe. It was even smooth enough to get us out of the house.

As we were leaving, Zoe came back into the room. We thanked her for her help, with Marsha hanging on our every word.

“Whew,” Mel said, once we were back in the Mercedes. “There’s been a change in the weather as far as Marsha is concerned.”

“I noticed,” I said. “So what say we go have a nice little chat with Gizzy before her mother has a chance to shut us down?”

“We were right not to mention the interview possibility to Marsha,” Mel said. “Better to beg forgiveness later than to be told no in advance.”

I got out my wallet and handed Mel the address Ross Connors had given me for Sid Longmire, the governor’s ex. While I started the engine and fastened my seat belt, Mel fed the address information into the GPS. Eventually the GPS told us that our route was being calculated.

“What kind of a name is Gizzy?” I asked.

“It’s probably what her little sister called her, or a babysitter. On the face of it, Giselle isn’t such a bad name, and neither is Melissa. But the whole time I was growing up, kids called me Melly instead of Mel or Melissa. That’s what the girls called me. The boys generally called me Smelly Melly.”

“Jerks,” I said.

“Yes,” she agreed. “Most of them were. I’d be willing to bet that Giselle hates the name Gizzy as much as I hated Melly.”

The address was off Hawk’s Prairie Road, north of Olympia. We drifted into a GPS-punctuated silence.

“I think Zoe knew more than she was willing to say about the texting,” Mel said thoughtfully.

“I agree. The comments show too much knowledge about Josh’s history for a passing acquaintance. The kid was a loner. There’s no way he’d go around school talking up the fact that his mother died of an overdose or that he ended up in foster care. And who else besides Zoe or Gizzy would have a vested interest in telling him to go back where he came from?”

“My money’s on Gizzy, with Zoe knowing exactly what was going on,” Mel said grimly. “What a nice bunch of kids!”

“Did you find out anything about security cameras at Janie’s House?” I asked.

“Yes, I did,” Mel said. “According to Meribeth Duncan, there aren’t any. On purpose-so they wouldn’t ‘infringe’ on client privacy. That computer log system was evidently installed under the radar and without official sanction from the board of directors.”

“Now that they know some of those kids might be engaging in criminal behavior, maybe they’ll wise up,” I suggested.

Mel shook her head in exasperation. “How do you spell ‘Hear no evil; see no evil’? But Meribeth told me she’ll try to reconstruct a list of the people who had keys-houseparents, tutors, and so forth-who could come and go as they pleased.”

“Without any records that might be hard to do.”

“Not as hard as you think,” Mel said. “Don’t forget Todd copied all those hard drives yesterday. I think he’ll be able to dredge a whole lot of useful information out of those.”

There had been a multiple-vehicle rush-hour accident in the northbound lanes of I-5, and traffic was at a standstill just north of Olympia. Originally the GPS said we would arrive in twenty-two minutes. It ended up taking twice that.

“Did Todd manage to turn up any close friends on Josh’s computer?” I asked.

Mel shook her head. “Not so far. He evidently played Internet chess with several people, but that’s about it. I asked Katie Dunn to check last year’s yearbook. ‘Chess Club’ was Josh’s only listed activity. He’s old enough to have a learner’s permit, but there’s no record that he ever applied for one. Most kids race to the nearest licensing office the moment they’re eligible.”

“Josh Deeson was a long way from being a ‘most kids’ kind of teenager,” I said. “Maybe not bothering to get a driver’s license was one way to thumb his nose at all the other kids by ignoring their usual rites of passage. He didn’t care about them, and he didn’t care who knew it. He was odd man out and he intended to stay that way.”

“But why would Giselle be involved in this texting thing?” Mel asked. “What’s her motivation?”

“Marsha Gray Longmire and I went to high school together,” I said.

“Yes,” Mel agreed with a laugh. “I gathered as much.”

“Of all the girls in our class she was probably the coolest-she wore the best clothes; she drove the best car; she got the best grades. Did I mention she was valedictorian?”

“No,” Mel said, “but it figures.”

“She was cool; I was not cool.”

“Maybe you weren’t cool then and you aren’t cool now,” Mel said with a smile. “At least Marsha must have thought you were cool the day before yesterday. Why else did she ask for you?”

“Maybe because she thought she could call on old times’ sake to help control the narrative.”

“Which is?”

“As I said, Marsha was cool to the nth degree. Maybe Gizzy is just like her mother. DNA is like that. If she’s one of the cool kids, the last thing she wants is to be irrevocably linked to someone who is not cool-someone who is the antithesis of coolness.”

“Josh Deeson,” Mel supplied. “But I still don’t understand the point.”

“Whoever sent the texts probably did so in the hope they’d succeed in sending Josh packing. That’s what bullies do. They think that if they make things uncomfortable enough, the target will just fold and disappear. When Josh didn’t bail, they upped the ante with the film clip. But Josh fooled them again. Instead of disappearing without a whimper, he committed suicide. Now cops are involved in what should have been a relatively harmless teenage prank. There’s a real investigation. By now the kids involved have probably figured out that someone is going to come around asking uncomfortable questions. Maybe that meant the film star needed to disappear, too.”

“Speaking of which, I wonder if the King County M.E. has done Rachel’s autopsy yet?”

“Call ’em up and find out,” I told her.

Mel pulled out her cell phone. After jumping through a few voice mail prompts, I heard her ask for Dr. Mellon.

I was relieved to hear that we had lucked out and drawn Rosemary Mellon. She’s a new addition to the King County M.E.’s office. She hasn’t been around long enough to develop as many jurisdictional prejudices as some of the old guard. She’s easy to work with-thorough but not terribly concerned with going through channels and across desks. I had an idea Ross Connors had handpicked her for the job.

Mel listened for several minutes, jotting down notes. When she got off the phone, she gave me a briefing.

“According to Rosemary, Rachel had been dead about eight to ten hours before being dumped in the water. There are clear signs of strangulation. She found some defensive wounds as well as tissue under her nails. She expects to be able to get a DNA profile, but there’s no sign of sexual assault.”

“I wonder if our enterprising filmmakers were looking for an encore performance-a real one this time.”

Mel sighed. “Maybe,” she said.

Sid Longmire’s home was in what’s called a “gated community,” but on this summer evening no one was minding the gate. The guard shack was unoccupied, and we drove right up to the house.

I had given Mel a hard time about her objections to the age difference between Greg Alexander and his girlfriend, but that’s what happens when you look askance at other people’s foibles without taking your own into consideration. I had automatically expected Sid Longmire’s wife to be of the trophy, arm-candy variety and hardly older than his daughters. When Monica Longmire answered the door, I knew at once that assumption was wrong. What the second Mrs. Longmire had going for her wasn’t necessarily her looks or her age. Maybe Sid had tired of Marsha’s power politics and excessive coolosity and had gone looking for stability instead. In contrast to Marsha’s well-tailored good looks, Monica’s face was plain and more than a little round. She had the ruddy complexion of someone who spends too much time in the sun, more likely gardening than golfing. And the smile lines on her face were exactly that-smile lines.

“Yes,” Monica Longmire said, peering out past the security chain. “May I help you?”

Mel produced her badge. “We’re looking for Giselle,” she said. “We were told she’d be here with you and your husband. We need to ask her a few questions about Josh Deeson’s circle of friends.”

“I’m sorry. Gizzy isn’t here right now,” Monica said, opening the door. “She’s out with her boyfriend. They were planning on seeing a movie and then she’s going back home. That seemed like a bad idea to me-not the movie, going back home.”

Monica motioned us inside the house and directed us to seating in the family room.

“Frankly, I thought she and Zoe would be better off being here for the next few nights so they could escape some of the drama,” Monica continued. “It’s hard for kids to hang around home when everyone is so upset. I’m pretty much an outsider when it comes to what goes on with Marsha and Gerry, but I know they’re both really hurting. As for Josh? That poor kid never had a chance. And poor Zoe, too,” she added. “Finding Josh’s body like that must have been a horrible shock.”

Monica’s apparently genuine concern for her stepdaughters didn’t sound like part of the usual evil-stepmother tradition. But neither Mel nor I let on that as far as Governor Longmire knew, Giselle was still scheduled to stay with her father. Telling both sets of parents one thing and then doing something else is standard teenage behavior, even without a death in the family.

“We’d appreciate any insight you could give us,” Mel said. “Did the two girls talk about Josh much?” she asked.

“When Josh first went to live with them, Zoe especially was all excited about it. Gizzy was less so. Zoe was under the impression that since they were so close in age they’d end up being great pals. I think it hurt her feelings when that didn’t happen, but what do you expect when you start blending families? There are always a few bumps in the road. My boys are three and five years older than Giselle. The only thing they have in common with the girls is that they ostensibly belong to the same family. They share the occasional meal, usually on holidays, but they are not good friends, and they’re never going to be. That’s just the way it is. Sid and I are in love. The kids aren’t in love. Deal with it.”

“So Zoe was disappointed that she and Josh didn’t bond,” I said. “What was Giselle’s reaction?”

“To having Josh parachuted into their lives?” Monica paused to consider for a moment before she answered. “Let’s just say she wasn’t thrilled. Gizzy isn’t someone with the milk of human kindness running through her veins. We talked about the situation with Josh a few times. I tried to explain to her that there was nothing else Gerry and Marsha could do. Josh didn’t have anywhere else to go or anyone to look after him. I think Gerry and Marsha both deserve credit for trying to do the right thing.”

I had to admit to myself that Monica didn’t come across as a conniving “other” woman who had broken up Marsha’s longtime marriage. Like Mel with Kenny Broward, I had come here expecting to find a marital “bad guy.” So far there didn’t appear to be any.

“What do you know about Janie’s House?” Mel asked. “Did the girls ever talk about it?”

“Well, sure. The girls’ school encourages involvement, even though I don’t really approve,” Monica said. “That whole noblesse oblige, us-and-them thing bothers me. Yes, I know the official Olympia Prep position is that student involvement with less fortunate kids is supposed to be great for everybody, but who are they kidding? I mean, poor kids already know they’re poor without having the rich kids hanging around rubbing their noses in it.”

“So you’re not enamored of Janie’s House?” I asked.

“Not at all, but that’s just me,” Monica said. “Both Zoe and Giselle were really caught up in helping out there last year. Zoe’s the kind of kid who would break her neck trying to put a fallen bird back in its nest. As for Gizzy? I think her involvement with Janie’s House was more of an ego thing than it was anything else. She’s been back there again this summer, but only because Ron is still there.”

“Ron?” I asked.

“Ron Miller is Giselle’s boyfriend. He’s a year younger than she is and graduated from OP two weeks ago. I thought. . no, make that I hoped that being apart for a year would be the end of their romance, but I was wrong. They’re still as head over heels as ever. Next year could be a little tougher. He’ll be going to Stanford, and she’ll still be going to school in Tacoma. That will put a whole lot more distance between them. As my mother used to say, ‘Distance is to love as wind is to fire. Blows out the little ones and fans the big ones.’ ”

“Sounds like you’re hoping for the first option.”

Monica nodded. “And, at Sid’s insistence, keeping my mouth shut about it, too,” she said with a tight smile. “It’s the voice of experience speaking when I tell you that first-boyfriend types don’t always make the best husband material. Ron is certainly smart enough, but he has a mean streak. Sid takes the position that saying one bad word about him would just mean pushing Giselle in Ron’s direction that much more. Sad to say, that’s probably true.”

“In other words, you don’t like Ron much?” Mel suggested.

“Yes,” Monica answered, “but I try not to show it.”

“What does Ron do at Janie’s House?”

“He’s some kind of special assistant in the computer lab. He’s into computers in a big way. I think he’s planning on studying computer science in college. But didn’t you say you wanted to talk to Gizzy about Josh’s suicide? What does any of this have to do with that?”

I could have given her chapter and verse. Let’s see. Some poor little rich kid with a mean streak who was romantically linked to Giselle and who was intimately involved with the Janie’s House computer system sounded like exactly the kind of person we needed to find, not so much because of Josh’s suicide but because of Rachel’s murder. We didn’t have to tell Monica Longmire that, and we didn’t. It was time to back off from angling for more information about Ron Miller right then for fear of tipping our hand.

“We’re just looking for background material,” Mel said reassuringly. “Trying to understand what sent Josh over the edge.”

“ ‘Edge’ is the right word,” Monica said. “That must be how Josh felt-like he was walking on the edge of a cliff. From what the girls said, I’m sure there was a chasm between his old life and his new one. It doesn’t surprise me that he couldn’t bridge it. It’s a tragedy, of course, but somewhat predictable.”

“You have a nice place here,” Mel said, abruptly changing the subject.

It was important to keep the interview on a cordial basis. Mel’s comment was designed to maintain the smooth flow going with the added benefit that it was also true.

The house was stylish but more comfortable than your basic House Beautiful photo spread. We were in a great room that was part kitchen and part family room. The kitchen was all granite countertops and stainless steel appliances, and a huge flat-screen TV was situated over a gas-log fireplace in the family room area. Out through a set of sliding doors were a patio with a swimming pool and hot tub gleaming in the nearly setting sun. Beyond that I could see a golf-course fairway. Even in Washington’s down real estate market I estimated the place was worth more than a million bucks, give or take.

Monica looked around and laughed. “Yes,” she said. “Not nearly as grand as the governor’s mansion, but a little more modern.”

“If I had a choice, this is the one I’d pick any day of the week,” Mel said. “But how do the girls get back and forth?”

“Zoe’s still too young to drive, so either Sid picks her up and brings her out or I do. Of course, now that Giselle is home for the summer, she can do some of the driving. Marsha and Sid share custody. When school was in session, it used to be the girls stayed with their mother during the week and then we had them every other weekend, with the situation reversed during the summer. Now that they’re older and especially with Giselle off at school, we’re all a lot more flexible. They come and go at their own discretion. I think it’s really important for everyone that we keep things as civilized as possible.”

“Commendable,” Mel said. “What kind of car does Giselle drive?”

“It’s an Acura,” Monica said. “A silver Acura. Sid bought it for her when she graduated from high school.”

A car pulled into the driveway and I heard the sound of a garage door opening.

“That’ll be Sid,” Monica told us. “He’s been out of town for several days.”

It seemed likely that Sid Longmire’s view of our visit would be far less cordial than Monica’s, especially if the governor had managed to alert him as to what was going on. We decided it was time to beat a hasty retreat.

“We’ll be going then,” I said.

“You don’t want to talk to him, too?”

“No, thanks,” I assured her. “We appreciate your help.”

We made a quick exit out the front door and were gone before Sid Longmire was able to unload his luggage from the car and come inside.

Sometimes the best way to win a confrontation is to avoid it in the first place.