Lorna stood in the lobby for a long minute, then followed him outside. She got into her car and fished around in the bottom of her bag for her keys, then remembered they were in her jeans pocket. When she started the ignition, the radio came on. She snapped it off, wanting silence, and drove home mechanically, without thinking where she was going, and got caught in the traffic jam Brad had warned her about.
Lorna sat behind a dark red pickup while the injured were loaded onto gurneys, her mind still trying to process everything Billie Eagan had told her.
That Billie and her mother had, over the years, become friends.
That Mary Beth had taken Billie in and given her a place to live. That she’d made sure Billie had food to eat and medical care, and the support she’d needed to overcome her addictions.
That Mary Beth had believed in Billie’s innocence.
Had she? Or was Billie just trying to find a sympathetic ear?
She was still debating that point when Brad waved her through the intersection.
5
When Lorna was in line to pay for her coffee at the mini-mart the next morning, a hand reached past her from behind and plunked down two quarters.
“ County Herald.” The man attached to the hand held up the newspaper for the clerk to see and turned to go on his way, but not before Lorna caught the headline.
“One large coffee?” the clerk asked.
“And one Herald,” Lorna said.
She picked up the paper on the way out of the store and folded it, carrying it under one arm till she reached the car. Once behind the wheel, she opened the paper and scanned the front page.
Callen Cops Catch Killer! screamed the caption over the picture that sat right on the fold. In it, Billie Eagan was being led from her house in handcuffs, looking confused and tired. The story reiterated the disappearances of both of her children and the “facts” that led to her arrest.
This isn’t right, Lorna told herself as she pulled out of the parking lot. It just doesn’t feel right.
She read through the item again when she got home. She’d thought about Billie for much of last night, and had come to the conclusion that if her mother had been convinced of Billie’s innocence, there must be something there. But how to convince Chief Walker of that, without any evidence to the contrary?
And how to begin going about looking for something that could help Billie? Lorna wasn’t a lawyer, as Brad Walker had pointed out, and all she knew about investigating crime she’d learned from watching CSI and Law & Order, and her newest favorite, Medium. There were no psychics in Callen, that she was aware of, and she knew no sleuths to call upon for advice.
Not quite true, she reminded herself as she sipped her coffee. There is Regan Landry…
Regan, who had shared a flat in London with Lorna and six other girls one summer long ago, and who, following in the footsteps of her famous father, was making a name for herself as a major writer of true crime fiction.
While it had been years since the two women had seen each other, they had stayed in touch. Most recently, Lorna had written a letter of condolence when Regan’s father had been murdered last September. Regan had responded with a note and had sent her business card with her phone numbers… Where had Lorna put that?
Lorna went through the business cards in her wallet, then through the electronic phone book on her computer. She finally found Regan’s card stuck in the back of her Day-Timer. She debated with herself whether to call.
Maybe first talk to the public defender, she thought. See what he’s thinking. Maybe there are motions he can file, something he can do to get Billie out on bail, if nothing else. At nine a.m. she called information for the county courthouse, and when she got through to the switchboard at the number given, she asked to be connected to the PD’s office. After a series of transfers, Joel Morgan answered his extension.
“This is Lorna Stiles,” she told him. “I’m a… a friend of Billie Eagan’s. I was there at the police station yesterday, when you went to speak with her.”
“What can I do for you, Ms. Stiles?” His voice was curt and crisp.
“Well, I was wondering what’s going to happen next, for one thing. Is Mrs. Eagan going to be transferred to the county prison, is she-”
“She’s already there. They moved her last night.”
“Oh.” Lorna was taken aback by the news, though she didn’t know why she would be. She knew there weren’t facilities at the Callen police station to hold a prisoner overnight.
“Was there something else?”
“Is she going to stay in prison? I mean, don’t you usually arrange for bail, or file something to protest the charges?”
“I can’t get her bail, because she has no guarantor for the funds. As far as ‘protesting the charges,’ I’m not sure what that means, frankly.”
“I mean she’s innocent. What are you doing to prove that?”
There was silence, then a chuckle.
“Everyone is innocent, until proven guilty.” The sarcasm was blatant.
She decided to ignore it.
“My point exactly. What are you doing to prove her innocence?”
“I spoke with Mrs. Eagan at length last night. She has no alibi for the night her son disappeared, the night the police assume he was killed. She has admitted to me and to the police that she and her son argued that night, that the argument turned violent. She stopped short of an out-and-out confession, but that might come, who knows?”
“Are you serious? She didn’t kill Jason.”
“And you know this how?”
“She told me.”
“She told me as well. But I don’t know that there isn’t more she’s not saying, frankly.”
“You’re her lawyer. Aren’t you supposed to believe in her?”
There was silence on the line for a long moment, then he said, “I’ll be getting copies of the original police documents-the reports that were filed following the disappearance of her daughter, and those that were made after the son disappeared as well. I’ll look over the statements that were taken at the time, and then I’ll decide where to go from there. Now, unless you have some information that might be relevant to her defense…”
“How much is her bail?”
“What?”
“Her bail. What was it set at?”
“One hundred thousand dollars.”
“Isn’t that a lot of money?”