“I’m saying I love you in my own special way.”
“I know you are, Beautiful Bree,” I said and blew her a kiss.
“Better than Bonehead Bree,” she said with a laugh and blew it right back.
It felt good to laugh and kid each other like that again. We’d been through a rough patch in the spring and it had taken time for us to see the humor in anything.
I shaved and showered, feeling cheery that first morning in Starksville, like life was taking a turn for the better for the Cross family. Isn’t it funny how just changing your location changes your perspective? The last couple of months in DC had been claustrophobic, but being back on Loupe Street, I felt like I was on the edge of wide-open country, familiar but unexplored.
Then I thought of Stefan Tate, my cousin, and the charges against him. And the way forward suddenly looked dark again.
Chapter
10
An hour later, I left Bree and Nana Mama putting together our lives in the bungalow and went with Naomi to the jail where Stefan Tate was being held. As we drove, I reviewed the highlights of the eighteen-page grand jury indictment against my cousin.
About a year and a half prior to his arrest, Stefan Tate joined the Starksville School District as a gym teacher at both the middle and high schools. He had a history of drug and alcohol abuse that he did not reveal on his applications. He met a middle-schooler named Rashawn Turnbull and eventually became the boy’s mentor. My cousin led a secret life selling drugs, including the heroin that was believed to be responsible for two overdoses before Christmas last year.
Stefan’s personal drug use spiraled out of control. He raped one of his older female students and threatened to kill her if she told anyone. Then he made advances toward Rashawn Turnbull and was rejected. In response, my cousin raped, tortured, and killed the boy.
At least, according to the indictment. It took everything in my power to remember that an indictment was not a conviction. It was just the state’s version of events, only one side of the story.
Still, when I finished reading it, I looked up at Naomi and said, “They have hard evidence here.”
“I know,” my niece said.
“Did Stefan do it?”
“He swears he didn’t. And I believe him. He’s being framed.”
“By who?”
“I’m open to suggestions at this point,” she said, turning into a public parking lot near the city hall, the county courthouse, and the jail, all of which were brick-faced and in desperate need of repointing.
Across the street, the police and fire stations looked much newer, and I remarked on it as I climbed out.
“They built them with state and federal grants a few years ago,” Naomi said. “The Caine family donated the land.”
“Caine, as in the fertilizer company?”
“And the maiden name of the boy’s mother, Cece Caine Turnbull.”
We started toward the jail. “She credible? The mom?”
“She’s a piece of work, that one,” my niece replied. “Got a sheet going back ten years. Real wild child and definitely the black sheep of the Caines. But on this, she comes across as more than credible. The murder has ravaged her. There’s no denying that.”
“The dad?”
“In and out of the picture, recently mostly out,” Naomi said. “And he’s got about as strong an alibi as you can have.”
“He was in prison?”
“Jail down in Biloxi. Doing eight weeks for assault.”
“So he wasn’t a good role model in the boy’s life.”
“Nope. That was supposed to be Stefan’s job.”