Wrongful Death (37 page)

As he played, Anna got out her notepad and started writing down her details and mobile number for Father O’Reilly and added that she’d like to speak with him about Mandy Anderson.

Jack suddenly stopped, got up and stood beside her, towering above her as he looked over her shoulder to see what she was writing. It didn’t feel to Anna that he was being rude but more something that was just part of his physical makeup and natural inquisitive behaviour.

‘Don’t worry, it’s just a note for Father O’Reilly,’ Anna said.

‘Why do you need to know about Mandy?’ Jack asked, causing her to stop and glance up. She noticed that there was a look of concern on his face.

‘Did you know Mandy Anderson?’

He nodded. ‘She was always nice to me and helped me with the piano and my singing,’ he said quietly.

‘Well, I’m helping to try and find her.’

‘I helped as well, everyone around here did but they never found her,’ he said with a sad expression. Anna moved closer.

‘You must miss her.’

‘We were at the same school and played piano duets in church sometimes, and we were both in the choir. She was a better singer than me, the best voice in the choir – it will never be the same again without her.’ He turned away abruptly, and sat back at the piano.

Anna nodded, although she could think of a lot more to be heartbroken about than losing the best singer in the choir. She asked him if he used to hang around with Mandy and her friends and he said that he didn’t as they never invited him and he didn’t think they liked him. He ran his big hands along the piano keys and then blinked.

‘Well everyone apart from Mandy, that is.’ Anna felt quite sorry for Jack, realizing he was probably one of those kids who was teased or bullied by others because of the way he looked and acted.

‘Would you do something special for me?’ Anna asked.

Jack instantly stopped playing the piano and looked at her inquisitively. ‘What?’

‘I need to be sure that Father O’Reilly gets this note. It’s important and could help find Mandy.’

Jack took it from her and placed it in his pocket. ‘You can count on me,’ he said with a beaming smile.

As Jack took the note, Anna noticed that the back of his hands looked red raw and scratched.

‘That looks painful.’

‘It is. My dad told me off, said I should have known better,’ he said ruefully.

‘Known better about what?’ Anna enquired.

‘I was clearing some bushes at the back of the church by the woods and forgot about the Jimson weed. The sap caused a bad rash,’ he said, pulling up his shirt sleeves and showing Anna the front and back of his hands and lower arms, which were covered in bumps and blisters. She commented that it did look very sore, and Jack told her it wasn’t that bad. Anna felt there was a sweet innocence about the young man as she reminded him to make sure the priest got her note. He gave her a thumbs-up.

As she walked down the path away from the church hall, Anna heard Jack start to play a tune that sounded familiar but she couldn’t quite place it. She wanted to stop and listen some more but knew there wasn’t the time as she had to get back. As she continued her journey towards the shopping mall it seemed increasingly unlikely that Mandy could have been openly abducted off the street from either route she might have taken that day. If she had got in a car willingly then it had to be with someone she knew and trusted.

There were no cars in the driveway of 58 Lincoln Avenue, Julie Collins’ house, but Anna could hear pop music coming from an open window. She guessed, owing to the volume, that Julie might well be in on her own. Ringing the doorbell a couple of times, she got no answer, so she waited until there was a gap in the music and held her finger down on the buzzer. The music stopped and a few seconds later the door was opened by a young girl in bare feet, with heavy makeup and short brown hair, dressed in a loose T-shirt, no bra and cut-off jeans.

‘My mom and dad are out and I don’t want to buy anything or become a Jehovah’s Witness. Thanks anyway,’ she said abruptly, and started to close the door.

Anna introduced herself, showed her FBI card, and said that she wanted to speak with Julie Collins about Mandy Anderson.

‘I’m Julie. Have they found Mandy?’ the girl asked excitedly.

‘I’m sorry, she hasn’t been found. I’m helping on the case and was told that you were her best friend.’

Julie invited Anna into the house, which was very similar to the Andersons’, though slightly bigger and with minimal religious artefacts. She took Anna through to the kitchen, got herself a can of Diet Coke and sat down with Anna at the kitchen table. Anna asked her to go over the day she last saw Mandy and in particular if there was anything strange or different about Mandy’s behaviour. Julie said that Mandy was her normal self and that they had gone to the mall at about ten, and were just hanging out looking in the shops, and talking to other friends they ran into while there. It was about two p.m. when Mandy left, claiming she had choir practice.

‘You said that you went into the shops – did Mandy buy anything that day?’ Anna asked.

Julie frowned, looking up at the ceiling, deep in thought, trying to remember an incident that was by now two years old. Anna waited, but Julie said nothing and tapped her fingers on the Coke can.

‘It doesn’t matter how inconsequential it might seem, anything you remember might just be useful.’

‘There was something she was looking at, but it was just a cheap little camera gadget, a sort of secret agent spy thing.’

‘Tell me what you remember about it?’ Anna asked.

‘Okay, she said she wanted to go to Prezzies to have a look round. It’s a kind of gift and gadget shop, and she picked up a key ring that had this tiny little camera that took real pictures.’

‘Did she buy it?’ Anna asked.

‘I remember she showed it to me. For fun I grabbed it and took a photograph of her.’

Anna couldn’t recall having read about the camera in the case file. Julie finished her Coke, crushed the can in her hand and threw it into the kitchen bin.

‘Slam dunk,’ she said.

Anna was trying to be patient, but knew that the purchase of the camera could be vital new evidence.

‘Julie, I really need to know: did Mandy buy the camera?’

Julie sighed and shrugged. ‘I don’t know, but she bought a birthday card in another shop.’

‘Did she say who for?’

‘No, and I didn’t ask.’

‘Could she have had a boyfriend you didn’t know about?’

‘You kidding? Around here you can’t fart without someone noticing. We tried to set her up with a boy once at the church disco, but it was a disaster.’

‘It wasn’t Jack Brennan, by any chance?’ Anna asked.

Julie burst into laughter. ‘You gotta be kidding, even Mandy wasn’t that desperate.’

‘I got the impression they were friends, she helped him with the piano and singing.’

‘Yeah, but only ’cause she felt sorry for him. He’s kind of weird, comes and stands next to you and listens in on conversations, then starts talking about something completely different.’

Anna wondered if Julie simply resented Jack because she saw him as ‘different’.

‘He seemed pleasant enough to me when I met him earlier,’ Anna remarked in the boy’s defence.

‘Oh, he’s harmless but he’s got no friends as such. Apparently, he’s got some form of ADHD.’

Anna’s earlier suspicions about Jack were right. She knew that the reality was that many kids would never give the likes of Jack Brennan a chance, or make an effort to be friends with him.

‘Did you tell the police or FBI about Mandy and the key ring?’ she asked.

‘No, ’cause I never knew if she did buy it or not and they never asked me about what we did before she decided to go off.’

Anna realized that poor investigation skills had meant the camera key ring had been overlooked, and that if Mandy had bought the gadget for someone else then that could be the person who abducted and possibly killed her. She doubted that the killer would still have possession of it and suspected it was long since disposed of, or lay with Mandy’s body, wherever it might be.

Driving out of the mall, Anna felt more at ease with Dewar’s powerful Mustang as she looked for the directions back to the I-95, thinking about her meeting with the Andersons and how cruel life had been to them. She glanced down at her map to find that the I-95 was signposted as a right turn and then looking up suddenly saw the red traffic light in front of her. There was no cross traffic, and Anna could, under the local traffic laws, legally make the right turn through the red light, but she panicked and slammed on the brakes.

The driver behind had not slowed because the way was clear and was expecting the Mustang to turn right. Anna felt something slam into the rear of the car, causing her neck to snap back and then jolt forward and banging her forehead on the steering wheel. For a terrifying moment, she thought she was about to pass out.

The driver behind was a middle-aged woman who was thankfully understanding about Anna’s naïve knowledge of the traffic laws, and mercifully the only damage appeared to be to the bumpers of both cars. Anna suspected she had mild whiplash and concussion, but was more worried about Dewar’s Mustang and how she was going to explain what had happened. Langton, she thought, would go ape-shit. A member of the public had already called the local police and an ambulance on witnessing the incident. Noticing that she was unsteady on her feet from the knock to her head, the driver of the other car sat Anna down on the roadside.

By then, Anna was in floods of tears, completely distraught and confused about what to do and panic-stricken about the damage to Dewar’s precious car. And so she phoned the only person she could think of helping her: Don Blane.

Chapter Twenty-Seven

When Blane arrived at the scene of the accident it seemed to Anna that her knight in shining armour had come. She had managed to calm herself down while the attending ambulance crew tried to persuade her that she should go to the local hospital for a check-over but she insisted that apart from a stiff neck and headache she would be okay. The local police were very understanding and knew Blane well, and after he’d had a quiet word with them they agreed not to investigate the incident any further. He also called a garage repairman that he knew who agreed to fix the bumpers on both cars, and to tow away the Mustang to repair the damage as soon as possible. The man said he’d have it done by the end of next week, though a new chrome bumper would be noticeably shiny.

The lady who had gone into the back of Anna was quite distressed but Don calmed her down, gave her the address for his friend’s garage and said he would pay for the damage.

Blane told Anna he would take her back to the Academy and whether she liked it or not she was to get some stuff together and stay in his guest room so he could keep an eye on her and make sure she didn’t have a relapse or dizzy turn.

‘I’m fine, Don, and I don’t want to put you out,’ Anna protested, rubbing her neck. ‘I’m sure you’ve better things to do with your weekend than look after me. I also need to do my profile CV and work on the Mandy Anderson case file.’

He looked at her and shook his head disapprovingly. ‘No you don’t, they can wait. Some rest is what you need right now, so don’t argue with me.’

Left with little choice but actually not displeased, back at the Academy, Anna went to her room and packed the FBI-issue holdall with some overnight stuff and her wash bag. She tried ringing Langton again but as before it cut straight to voicemail. At first she was concerned for his wellbeing and worried that something might have happened to him, but then considered it more likely that the silly bugger had forgotten to take his phone charger with him. Anna looked at the Anderson case file on her desk, briefly thought about leaving it behind, then put it into the holdall along with her laptop. Any attempt to pick up the now-full holdall caused her to wince at the sharp pain, so she had little option but to drag it along the floor to the lift. Waiting there, she was approached by Beth Jackson, the Los Angeles detective from the room next to her.

‘Hi, there’s a group of us going out tonight, we’re meeting in the reception area at seven, if you’d like to join us.’

‘I’m really sorry, Beth, I had a bit of an accident earlier and I don’t feel—’

Beth cut her off: ‘Yeah, whatever. Have a nice evening, wherever it may be.’

The detective clearly didn’t believe her as she had the holdall beside her, with her pyjamas poking through the half-closed zip. Anna tried to explain but Beth ignored her and just walked off towards her room.

Blane was waiting on the ground floor. As he picked up the holdall he caught sight of the case file, looked at Anna and smiled.

‘You need to rest, not work.’

‘I’m sorry, I just thought if I couldn’t sleep then I should do something productive.’

‘Okay, here’s the deal. You have a bath then relax while I cook dinner. The Anderson case can be discussed while we eat, then after dinner it’s rest time.’

‘Agreed,’ Anna replied, and held up her hand to shake on it.

‘Sally and Peter thought you were wonderful and very understanding. Thanks for being open and honest with them,’ Blane said.

‘They were lovely people and I can see exactly why they care deeply for you,’ Anna said, deliberately making her feelings of gratitude clear. He said nothing, and Anna hoped that it was just because he was shy.

After half an hour’s driving along the main road, Blane turned off onto a dirt track just outside of Woodbridge. The track narrowed and eventually cut through woodland comprising tall fir, cedar and pine trees, the fragrant scent wafted into the car filling it with a relaxing atmosphere. Rays of sunlight cut through the branches and the woodland became denser as they drove on. Soon Anna could see a clearing leading to a shoreline, with a small boathouse and jetty. As they drove into the clearing there appeared a beautiful raised two-storey red cedar log cabin that overlooked the bay.

‘You live here?’ Anna asked, amazed at the peaceful surroundings and stunning views across Belmont Bay and the Potomac River.