The Murder That Never Was (Forensic Instincts 5)

Lisa blinked, processing his question.

“You just said she was gripping a bag,” he reminded her in a quiet tone that pressed her just enough to get answers without flipping her out. “It must have fallen out of her arms. Did anything spill out? Did you do a quick check to see if there was anything in it you should have? Did you take it? Leave it?”

Prodded into remembering, Lisa shook her head from side to side. “It wasn’t there.” She paused. “The guy who shot her took it.”

“So you have no idea what was in it?”

“No.”

“Which is probably why you’re still alive,” Marc said. “They figured that nobody else knew anything.”

“I didn’t—not then.”

“Okay,” Ryan interrupted. “So Julie must have, unfortunately, walked into a situation involving a dangerous PED distribution ring—the one that that young gymnast, Shannon Barker, was PMing you about.”

As Ryan spoke, he was already thinking about the next steps he had to take. “Yoda,” he said. “Do a cursory search on Shannon Barker and Jim Robbins…”

“Yoda doesn’t need to waste his time,” Milo interrupted. “I’ve done an in-depth search on both Shannon and Robbins, as well as on the Apex Olympic Gymnastic Center, where Shannon trained, and on Yuri Varennikov, who was Shannon’s manager.” Milo pulled out his laptop, flipped it open, and turned it on. While it booted up, he glanced quickly at Ryan’s business card to verify his email address. “I’ll send you everything I have right now.” A corner of his mouth lifted. “Should I cc Yoda?”

“Was that humor, Ryan?” Yoda inquired. “Or is a response in order?”

“It was humor, Yoda,” Ryan replied. “Not to worry. I’ve got this.” He frowned thoughtfully as Milo began to email material to him. “You hit a brick wall so far on who Robbins could have been working for?”

Milo nodded. “But, like you and Marc said, whoever it is, Julie must have found out more than she should have.”

“Agreed.” Ryan was still frowning. “But how did Julie get involved in the first place? For Shannon?”

“Her actions were a part of who she was.” Claire had that faraway look in her eyes. “Julie Forman was a nurturer. She took Lisa in and got her a job, and Lisa is a grown woman. Shannon, on the other hand, is a teenager and one of Julie’s charges. Julie felt committed to finding out the full scope of who was responsible for harming Shannon—and to doing something to stop them.”

“All of which spells trouble,” Marc said, rolling his coffee mug between his palms. “Julie must have found some paper trail—physical evidence that was in that bag she was carrying. The big guns had to get that bag and shut Julie up before she had a chance to share what she’d found with anyone else.”

“Where do the Montclair police fit in?” Lisa asked, her palms upturned in question. “Why did they show up at my door? Do they really think I’m a murderer? And who tipped them off to me? I can’t imagine it was Shannon—that doesn’t fit.”

Ryan shook his head. “Shannon’s all about being under Julie’s protective wing. She’s her only ally. The last thing she’d want is to turn her over to the cops. No, the police were just doing their job.

I hacked into the Chicago Police Department records, specifically to read the Lisa Barnes homicide file. It was being kept open pending finding Julie Forman and eliminating her as a suspect or a witness. My guess is that they found out where Julie was and asked the Montclair police to pay her a visit. Their energy on this seems pretty low, so I’m guessing they’re not really investigating hard-core.”

“We’ll coach you on what to say if they show up again,” Marc added. “But I agree with Ryan. I think they’ll give Chicago their report, and they’ll all call it a day.”

“Of course,” Emma muttered. “Why bother with a thorough investigation of a piece of trash like Lisa Barnes?”

“Hey, kid, don’t knock it,” Ryan said. “I know how passionate about this you are, but the best thing for Lisa is if the cops go away. There’s enough of a tangled web here for us to sort out, and enough enemies we have to find and expose.”

Casey rose and poured herself another cup of coffee. “Let’s get to your next hurdle,” she said to Lisa and Milo. “Shannon Barker. She’s showing up on your doorstep tomorrow. She’s going to see that you’re not Julie. She’s going to have a million questions and be completely freaked out. We need to coach you on how to handle her so that you keep her contained and on your side. It’s more than doable; you just need the right method to do it. That’s where I come in.”

Milo nodded. “I guess I was wrong. I do need a behavioral specialist, maybe not to read my body language but to teach me how to read somebody else’s.”

“This isn’t just about body language,” Casey corrected. “You’re going to have to guide her in her thinking, as well as her actions.”

“I wish we knew more about Julie’s thought process when she was killed—what she found, what she planned on doing with it—things like that. It would help a lot in handling Shannon’s insecurities. As it is, we’re kind of shooting blind,” Milo said.

“That’s where I come in,” Claire responded. “Hopefully, I can give you some of those answers so you know more about what you’re dealing with. How many of Julie Forman’s personal items do you have? And I don’t mean her ID, cell phone, and computer. That’s the tech stuff, Ryan’s department. I mean truly personal items—clothing, family photos, jewelry, even her perfume. Those are the tools I need.”

Lisa stared at her, fascinated. “Milo says you’re a psychic.”

“I actually said she was a claircognizant,” Milo corrected. “It’s a more precise definition, one that doesn’t conjure up images of crystal balls and séances.”

Claire’s smile reached her eyes. “Thank you for that. Very few people make that distinction. Claircognizance—clear knowing—is a metaphysical sense in which I simply know something to be true, even though I can’t back any of it up with fact or provide an explanation as to how I know it. It’s not that the term psychic is wrong, it’s just that it’s so overused and in all the wrong ways.”