Rebels and Roses (Winslow Heights #2)

Chapter 16

16

C ooper, along with Jane, had decided to stop by the sheriff’s station to let Finn know that they were planning a trip to Chicago to talk to Tom’s other girlfriend. While the case might be officially closed, he wanted to keep Finn in the loop of their activities.

The receptionist sent them straight back to Finn’s office, where they found the sheriff looking far less happy than usual.

“The world is going to hell in a handbasket,” Finn declared before they had a chance to say anything. He’d closed the door to this office so they wouldn’t be overheard. “Are you here because you heard the news?”

“The news? What news?” Jane asked. “We were at Tate’s eating lunch.”

“Maybe the gossip hasn’t made it there yet,” Finn growled, scraping his fingers through his hair so that it stood on end. He picked up a piece of paper from his desk and handed it to Cooper. “Let me tell you about it. As next of kin, Fiona filled out the paperwork so that we could release Tom’s body to her and her parents. It should have been straightforward, but not anymore.”

Cooper quickly perused the contents, but then went back to the top to read it more carefully.

“What does it say?” Jane asked, reading over his shoulder.

“I think it says that Finn can’t release the body yet. To anyone.”

“That’s right,” the sheriff replied. “It’s a court order. Erica went to a judge this morning and got an injunction. She’s pregnant, and she’s claiming that the baby is the real closest next of kin. Not Fiona or the parents. Frankly, this is a mess. Your ex-wife isn’t backing down either. She’s livid. She’s getting a lawyer to fight this and is demanding a paternity test. Erica is digging her heels in, saying the baby is definitely Tom’s and that she’ll take the test anytime and anywhere. She knows who the father is.”

Jane’s eyes were wide with shock, and Cooper wasn’t much better. This was the last thing he’d expected to hear today.

“It explains why Tom would try and get clean,” Jane said. “He wanted to get off drugs for the baby.”

“That’s a reasonable assumption,” Cooper replied. “Although Erica said that Tom had been clean for six months. How far along can she be? She’s not showing.”

“Not all women show in the same way,” Finn said with a shrug.

Jane tapped the paper in Cooper’s hand.

“If Tom quit drugs before Erica got pregnant, it sounds like they might have planned it.”

From what Cooper could see, Tom didn’t plan much of anything in his life. It was chaos all around.

“Why on earth would they plan a pregnancy when Tom was just getting clean, and he had all these outstanding debts? It doesn’t make any sense,” Cooper pointed out. “That would be the last thing I would do in their place.”

“Some people think babies will fix things,” Finn said. “I had a cousin, and her boyfriend was a serial cheater, chronically unemployed, and an alcoholic. And those were his good qualities. She decided that having a baby would somehow magically make him a productive member of society. She believed it so much that she had three kids with him in hopes that he’d eventually grow the hell up.”

“I’m afraid to ask how that turned out,” Jane said.

“About as you’d expect,” Cooper laughed. “She and the three kids moved back in with her parents. He’s living with one of the women he was cheating with. He never sees his kids, and he’s never paid a dime of child support. But it’s just an example that when emotions are involved, people often don’t make the most rational of decisions. Either way, Erica says she’s pregnant with Tom’s baby. Now a court has to sort this out.”

In a way it was a relief that Erica had an injunction, keeping Tom here until there was a court ruling. As long as he was here, there was a good chance she would remain as well. Cooper didn’t suspect her of any wrongdoing, but he had questions. It would be easier to ask them if she was close by.

“Did you talk to Erica about checking into the hotel the night before?” Cooper asked. “That’s still an open question in my mind.”

“I did,” Finn confirmed. “She told me that I was mistaken. She came in that morning, not the night before.”

“Did you tell her that the hotel clerk feels differently?”

“I did, and she maintained that he was wrong. Didn’t get upset or anything. She was calm and cool, but she was firm on the timing. She didn’t come in the night before. I have a call into the hotel manager to get this straightened out.”

If Erica hadn’t come in the night before, it changed the entire situation. Sure, it was weird that Tom had passed away literally days after saying that someone was following him. But it wasn’t wildly weird until he’d found out that Erica had arrived earlier than she’d said.

It didn’t make that gut feeling go away, however. It was just as strong as before.

He still had a few unanswered questions about Tom’s life.

“It wouldn’t make any sense for Erica to have hurt Tom,” Jane argued as they pulled into a parking space in front of a student apartment building. They were going to talk to the girl that Tom had been with the night he’d died. “She was pregnant with his child. Unless she’d insured him for a million bucks, she’d want him around.”

Cooper had barely said a word the whole drive here. Jane could almost hear the wheels turning in his head as he thought about all they had learned about the recently deceased Tom Kemp. Clearly, he was struggling with something.

“That’s a good point,” he said after a long silence. “I want to just let this go. Believe me, I do.”

“But you can’t.”

“I can’t,” he sighed. “I feel like Tom is looking over my shoulder, prodding me to keep going. I’m sure his death was an accident. He had an addiction problem, and he got unlucky with cocaine cut with fentanyl. It happens. I see it in the news all the time. I don’t know why I can’t just accept it. Is it just my suspicious writer brain that sees dead bodies all the time?”

“Do you see dead bodies all the time? You should see someone about that,” Jane teased, trying to lighten the atmosphere. “If all your instincts are telling you to keep digging, then I’d go with it. Tom did appear to have a few secrets. With everything he told you about being followed and watched, you’d think he would have mentioned that his kind of fiancée was pregnant. Was he scared that whoever was following him might be a threat to Erica and the baby? I know I would be worried about it.”

“Exactly,” Cooper said, slapping the steering wheel in frustration. “That’s a lot of where this is coming from. Tom was hiding a whole bunch of shit from me. He asked for my help, but he didn’t give me all of the details. Maybe I’m just pissed off at him.”

“Things have been done for worse reasons. It also might be because…”

“Because?” he prompted. “Are you trying not to say that it might be because of Fiona?”

Yes.

“No, that wasn’t what I was going to say.”

“What were you going to say then?”

“I don’t remember.”

I am such a liar.

“Of all the things I thought might happen today, I didn’t think you would stop telling me the truth. I thought we were closer than that.”

Well…shit. When he said it that way, she felt like crap.

“Okay, fine. Maybe it’s because of Fiona.”

“You think I want to impress my ex-wife.”

“No, I do not,” Jane stated firmly. “Knowing you the way that I do, I think that you feel a sense of responsibility to Fiona, even though you’re not married anymore. You want to find out the truth about her brother to ultimately help her.”

“You could be right, but I’m not sure she wants my help,” Cooper said with a shake of his head. “She hasn’t asked for it, and she’s not shy when she wants something.”

“Then do this for you,” Jane said. “If you have questions, we’ll try and get answers. But that does lead to another topic. Does Fiona know that you’re going to talk to Tom’s other girlfriend Cassie?”

“I didn’t say anything. I figured she had enough on her plate without me adding more. Especially, as I don’t know if I’m doing all of this for nothing. I don’t want to upset her. That’s never pleasant.”

“From what Finn said, she’s already upset,” Jane said. “He said that she wants a paternity test for the baby. Is that standard procedure for the rich?”

“Baby, I have no idea. I’ve never been in a position where I’ve knocked someone up. I don’t really know why Fiona would be upset, but then I haven’t been around her in years. I would think the family would be happy that Tom had a baby that survived him. The very first question out of Fiona’s grandparents’ mouth was when we were planning to have a baby. They practically demanded a great-grandchild within a year of our wedding. They were focused on it, almost strangely so. Eventually, my father-in-law told them to lay off, and we’d have a baby when the time was right. Thankfully, that time never came.”

“You don’t like kids?”

“I love kids, and I wouldn’t mind having one or two. But a baby with Fiona would have been a huge mistake. She and I weren’t even remotely ready to focus on anyone but ourselves.”

They both exited the car, walking into the apartment building and down the hall. Amanda Barber lived in 1C, the second door on the right. Jane could hear music from the other side of the door, and a few people laughing.

“Sounds like someone’s home.”

“I called before we came,” Cooper replied. “She said she’d be around this afternoon, studying for finals.”

“Smart girl.”

The door flew open after a quick knock by Cooper. Amanda was a pretty girl, although to Jane she seemed awfully young.

Maybe it’s because I’m just too old.

“Come in,” Amanda said, stepping back so they could enter. “Sorry, I didn’t have a chance to pick up before you came. It’s kind of a mess.”

“I remember my college apartment. This is fine,” Cooper replied.

It wasn’t as bad as it could have been. It was far from a pigsty, but there were clothes, books, and a stray pizza box strewn around the room. But the living room smelled fresh, and there weren’t any signs of actual dirt. It was just clutter. Jane had seen far worse - apartments that should have been condemned and have holy water sprinkled over them.

Amanda pushed an armful of books on the couch to the floor where they fell with a thud.

“Go ahead and sit down.”

Cooper and Jane did as Amanda perched on the floor on the other side of the coffee table. There was another young woman sort of hovering in the kitchen, but she walked down the hallway to what Jane assumed was her bedroom.

“I’m not sure why you want to talk to me. Tom is dead. He’s not coming back, is he?”

The words sounded rather callous, but Amanda hadn’t really even known Tom. A few days out of her young life at most.

“We just have a few questions,” Cooper replied. “We’re hoping that you can answer them. That night you left the bar with Tom. What did you do?”

“We came here. We had a few drinks. We talked and danced. Some of my friends were here, too. We all had fun, and Tom was in a really good mood. He left around midnight or twelve-thirty. Somewhere around that time. I don’t remember it exactly as we’d been partying, and I wasn’t paying attention.”

“Is that all you did? Dance and drink?”

“We didn’t…do that, if you know what I mean,” Amanda replied, her cheeks pink from the question. “Sure, we kissed a bit, but I always knew it that was it. Tom was a nice guy, but he was also a little strange. You know what I mean.”

That last statement was directed to Jane, not Cooper.

“I probably do,” Jane said. “Was he a little handsy? Wouldn’t take no for an answer?”

Amanda rolled her eyes and shook her head.

“Actually, no. I could have easily handled that. He wouldn’t be the first guy to get ideas. But it was the things that he was saying that made him seem a bit out there. He wanted us to have some time alone, so we went and sat outside on the stairs. I thought he was going to make a move, but he wanted to talk.”

“What did he want to talk about?” Cooper asked.

“Himself, mostly. He said that he was in a bad relationship, but he was working to get out of it. He said that he could see himself with someone like me. He said he wanted to find the right person, settle down, get married, and have a family. I mean…that’s weird, right? I’m twenty-one, and I’d just met him. I wasn’t going to quit school, run away, and marry him or anything. Besides, he was leaving town in a few days so what was the point of all this?”

“Did he say anything else?”

“No, he got a call, and he left a few minutes later. I didn’t argue. If anything, I was relieved. Like I said, I got strange vibes from him. Even my friends said he was a little off. We were all drinking, though, so we could be wrong. He wasn’t mean or loud or anything like that. I am sorry that he died. I didn’t know him well, but I don’t wish death that young on anyone.”

“Did he say who the call was from?” Jane queried. “Was he happy, upset, angry when he left?”

“I don’t know,” Amanda said with a shrug. “He just answered his phone, talked for a few minutes, and then said he had to go. He left on foot, didn’t even call an Uber or anything. He wasn’t upset. He was just the same as before the call.”

Amanda didn’t know anything else, so Cooper and Jane thanked the young woman for her time.

“We need to know who called him,” Cooper said when they returned to the car. “It’s more evidence that he might not have died alone. Someone might have been there.”

“But he wasn’t spooked,” Jane pointed out. “To me, that indicates someone he knows. Or at least someone that he expected a call from. Like a drug dealer.”

“I can’t argue that,” Cooper conceded. “If Tom was looking to get drugs, it wouldn’t be difficult. This is a college town. Any one of the people he met that night, or the night before could have hooked him up.”

“He was meeting people in the bookstore as well. He had plenty of opportunity.”

“Task number one is to find out the caller,” Cooper repeated. “If we know that, we can ask more questions. They might be the last person to see Tom alive.”

“Okay, but I’m a little confused here,” Jane said. “Did they call his phone or Fiona’s? Fiona had his phone, right? So, he had to have had hers. That’s how you found him. Who knew that he had that phone?”

“It could be anyone,” Cooper replied. “He’s had the phone for at least a week from what he said to me. He could have given that number to quite a few people. But first things first, we might be able to pull the phone records.”

He made it sound like that was easy to do, like picking up popcorn on the way into the theater. Piece of cake.

“How are we going to do that? We’re not cops. Are you going to ask Finn to get a warrant? Because he thinks this case is closed.”

“I might know a guy.”

“Know a guy,” Jane echoed. “That doesn’t sound straight out of one of your books at all.”

Her tone was sarcastic, but come on… He sounded like some sort of renegade vigilante.

“Okay, I’ll just say it. When I was doing research for one of my books, I met a computer hacker. He might be able to help us.”

“Let me fix your sentence. You met an illegal computer hacker. And was it your fourth book? The one where the neighbor turns out to be the killer?”

“No, it was a different one. And you make it sound so terrible. I’m not after government secrets here. I’m just trying to find out one single, solitary phone call. If something needs to be done, we’re going to have to find a way to do it ourselves. Finn’s hands are tied. He can’t help up here, although I’m going to ask him to anyway. But I understand if you don’t want to be a part of this. It was selfish of me to drag you into this in the first place. I just wanted you here with me.”

What was this man doing to her heart? A few simple words could make it ache painfully with emotion.

“I want to be here with you. I just don’t want to visit you in federal prison, and I don’t want to be in prison. Orange is not my color, and it’s not yours either.”

“I look good in blue, but that’s beside the point. I know what you’re saying, but you have to admit that you’re curious. Someone called Tom that night, and they knew that he had Fiona’s phone. This call is proof that we don’t know everything about what happened that night. There are still unknowns.”

Cooper didn’t like unknowns. Mysteries and puzzles must be solved. Anything less was unacceptable.

She’d figured that out early in their relationship. There was something about his writer’s mind that made him want to know every single detail even if it wasn’t important. To her, anyway. But he was driven to dig and dig, wanting to figure it all out.

“We’re assuming Amanda is telling the truth,” Jane said. “I know, we don’t know her. She could be the most truthful person on the planet. Or not, and that’s my point. We don’t know. Maybe she and Tom were both doing cocaine that night. Maybe he wasn’t doing well, and she let him walk away and didn’t care about his safety. I’m just playing devil’s advocate. I don’t have a reason to doubt her veracity, but I’m being cautious.”

“If we get the phone records, we’ll know,” Cooper replied.

“I hate that you’re right.”

“I know. I’m not a huge fan of calling in a hacker, but I’m not ready to walk away from this yet. If anything, talking to Amanda has put even more questions in my head. I will ask Finn to look into the call, too. I’d rather go the lawful way, to be honest.”

There were loose threads in the story of Tom’s last night on this earth. Why had he been doing coke in the first place? What made him fall off the wagon? Where did he get the drugs? And the most important one - was he alone when he died?

Cooper wasn’t going to give up, and neither would she. Next stop?

Tom’s other girlfriend in Chicago. Jane couldn’t wait to hear what the woman would have to say.