Chapter Four
I sat at my desk in shock, hardly able to process what Garrett had just told me. Jessica Casey was dead, and only days after she’d told me she felt her life was under threat.
And I had dismissed her.
No, not dismissed outright. I’d considered whether she’d been the victim of a series of unfortunate events and if there was enough evidence to support villainy.
But even worse than that, I didn’t follow up in a more timely manner.
I could have spent the past few days checking into the case.
Instead, I’d been catching up on paperwork.
I felt like I’d committed a cardinal sin from which there would be no recovery.
“Lexi? Still there?” asked Garrett.
I took a deep, centering breath. “Yes. Yes, I’m here,” I said. “Where are you?”
“I’m two miles south of Ashgrove Farms. That’s the horse farm Mrs. Casey owns with her husband. Have you been there?”
“No, but she mentioned it.”
“Hold on,” said Garrett. Muffled voices sounded down the line and then the whir of an emergency siren. “Lexi?” he asked a minute later.
“I’m here. What happened to Jessica?”
“Her car veered off the road and crashed into a tree. It looks like she died on impact.”
“From the car crash?” I asked, the incidents she’d reported spinning through my head. Food she was allergic to, the icy path, the brakes…
Garrett paused. “Is there any reason to suggest otherwise?”
“I don’t know. Maybe,” I said. “She said a few strange things had happened to her and she was worried.”
“Listen, I have to go,” Garrett cut in. “The body is being moved shortly and I want to take another look at the vehicle and the scene. I’d like to know more about what you and Jessica discussed. Can you come down to the station this afternoon?”
“Why don’t I save you time and come down to the scene now?”
“That works for me,” said Garrett, surprising me by not insisting I didn’t come within five miles of the scene. “I’ll send you the location.”
He disconnected and I immediately set to pulling on my denim jacket. By the time my hand had popped out of the first sleeve, my phone pinged with a map location. I grabbed my purse and hurried out of the office, almost colliding with Delgado.
“Where are you going in such a big hurry?” he asked, stepping out of the way as I barreled past.
“I might need to right a terrible wrong,” I called over my shoulder.
“I told you that you should have bought the black pumps not the cream you’re wearing,” he replied. “Maybe even some practical, flat boots.”
“Perish the thought! The cream pumps are amazing,” I called as my foot hit the first step. “I’ll never regret them!”
Delgado snorted but whatever he responded with was lost to me as I hurried down the stairs towards the underground parking lot.
I barely obeyed the speed limit as I headed out of town to the highway that led towards the spot Garrett indicated.
Once again, the idea that Garrett hadn’t tried to stop me coming to the scene intrigued me.
Perhaps he wasn’t entirely convinced the car crash was an accident…
and neither was I. Jessica’s words echoed in my mind throughout the drive and the closer I got to the terrible scene, the worse I felt.
I couldn’t remember a time I’d let a person down more.
I turned the car off the highway onto the country road, trying not to beat myself up about it.
I told myself all the things I’d tell my best friend if she were faced with circumstances like this.
I couldn’t have known. It wasn’t my fault.
I’d made a mistake in not pursuing Jessica with more fervor, but not out of malice.
Yet even though I would fully believe each consolation if I’d spouted them to Lily, they rang hollow when I told myself the same things.
Tightly packed houses gave way to thickets of trees and larger properties on sprawling lots, then, when those thinned out, the road started to wind, and rolling pasture began to appear. Traffic became equally sparse and then there were no more houses, just the occasional barn as I zipped past.
An ambulance perched on the side of the road ahead, lights still flashing, the paramedics sitting up front in the cab, then roadblocks appeared before a bend in the road and a police officer stepped forward as I slowed.
“You’ll have to turn back, ma’am,” he said, ducking to peer through my car after I rolled down the window. “We have a situation ahead and the road will be blocked a while yet.”
“I’m meeting Lieutenant Graves,” I said.
“Can I see some ID?”
“It’s in my purse.”
“Go ahead, ma’am.”
I reached for my purse, unzipped it, and pulled out my driver and PI licenses, passing them both to the uniformed officer.
He perused them, then nodded. “I’ll let you through.
Lieutenant Graves’ car is the blue sedan.
There’s space for you to park behind but please wait on the road until he comes to get you. The crash site has been taped off.”
“Thank you.”
“I gotta warn you, it’s not pleasant,” he said, the edges of his mouth tipping down.
“I appreciate the warning.”
The officer walked over to the roadblock, signaling to his partner to assist him in lifting the barrier out of the way before waving me through.
Garrett’s vehicle was a quarter mile down the road, just beyond the bend.
I was careful to drive at a slow speed past the medical examiner’s van so I didn’t startle any of the assembling emergency workers, until I could pull in behind the blue sedan.
A tow truck rolled in from the opposite direction and pulled onto the grass strip.
We both got out of our vehicles at the same time, converging on the grass bank where most of the people were standing.
“Ouch,” said the tow truck driver, wincing as he gazed down the slope from the road.
I followed his gaze down the steep bank to the start of the tree line.
A white SUV rested against a thick oak tree.
The hood was crumpled, the steam long gone but the faint scent of gasoline hung in the air.
The trunk was partially open as was the driver’s side door.
The area that had been cordoned off showed thick tracks scoring the bank, wet from last night’s rain.
Obscuring the driver’s side door was Garrett and another man, a detective from his squad who looked familiar.
Both of them wore jeans and T-shirts with padded MPD vests.
They were looking inside the vehicle while two more men in overalls, carrying a tent and a stretcher, made their way down the slippery bank.
A woman in overalls stood to one side, checking something on her camera.
Garrett looked up, caught my eye and raised his hand. After saying something to his partner, he made his way up the bank, his jeans tucked into rubber boots.
“Let’s go over there for a few minutes,” he said, pointing to our cars. “They’re done taking photos and now they’re extracting the body. They’ll put up a tent. We don’t need to see that.”
“You’re sure it’s Jessica Casey?”
“There was a driver’s license in her purse and a business card with the same name.
I searched online and the photos attached to Ashgrove Farms match the deceased.
The vehicle’s registered to an Yvette Lyndsey.
I’m reasonably sure the driver is Jessica Casey but we’ll need a family member to make a formal identification. ”
“Do you want me to do it? I was only with her for half an hour but I guess no one else here met her.”
“I’m reasonably sure enough to say thanks, but no. Probably best we get a member of the family down once she’s been transported to the morgue and cleaned up.” Garrett patted my arm. “Not the nicest of topics, I know.”
“But part of the job,” I said.
“Let’s head over to my car. We can talk more there.” He glanced down. “Don’t you keep rubber boots in your car?”
I followed his gaze to my cream pumps sinking in the muddy grass and sighed.
Delgado was right. Not only had I come to regret my choice of footwear but it came sooner than I thought.
I took large, cautious steps back onto the road and cursed myself for even caring one bit about my shoes.
How could I think about such frivolous things when Jessica was dead?
“Here,” said Garrett, opening his trunk and rifling his bag for wipes. “Take the worst of the mud off with these. Doubt they’ll do much for your pants.”
“Thanks.” I perched on the rim of his trunk and wiped the dirt from my shoes.
A faint brown stain remained. A smidge of wet dirt had slipped inside, coating my sole.
Even as I thought it, that horrible, guilty feeling washed over me again.
Ballet pumps and wet feet were not important when Jessica Casey’s body was being extracted for transportation to the morgue.
Then something occurred to me.
Something I hadn’t seen from my vantage point higher up on the road but which became obvious when I stood on the edge of the bank.
“Why wasn’t Jessica’s airbag deployed?” I asked.
Garrett raised his eyebrows. “You clocked that, huh? It actually did but failed to inflate fully. It could be a manufacturing error or a part wasn’t pushed out of the way completely. From the contusion on the victim’s head and the blood on the wheel, it looks like she hit her head with full force.”
I winced. “Is that what killed her?”
“An hour ago I would have said yes but after you called her phone… I don’t know what to think. I’ll need the ME’s report.”
“Could someone have tampered with her airbag?”
“I’ve asked the crime scene techs to thoroughly investigate the vehicle.”
“How did she come off the road? I know it could be wet from last night’s downpour but I don’t recall it raining at all this morning.”