Midori, who’d stopped crying, looked over at Jenna. She was clearly puzzled.
“Long story,” she said, not wanting to go into it, but seeing that Midori could use a diversion. “OK. Basically, my mom and I were captured by a serial killer. He’s dead now.”
Inside her cruiser, the detective turned the ignition. “Not just any serial killer. Dylan Walker.”
“Yeah, him,” Jenna said, fastening her belt and wishing that she’d sat in the backseat instead of Midori.
“I’ve read about him,” Midori said.
The statement surprised Jenna. She hadn’t thought Midori read anything.
“I’ll tell you about it sometime,” Jenna said, knowing that she never would. She didn’t like to revisit those days any more than her mother did. They never talked about it. They were glad that the media ignored the five-year anniversary of the handsome serial killer’s death in that bunker on the Washington coast. They celebrated the fact that true-crime TV movies and books had fallen on hard times, and that none had been written or produced about the man and his crimes—and their role in his death.
“Yes, that was quite a story,” the detective said, clearly angling for more information.
But Jenna wasn’t going to bite. She’d said all she had to say. She turned away from Midori and faced the passenger window as the BZ house and the makeshift memorial faded from view. She played some images of those days of terror from five years ago in her mind, but she didn’t let any of those images seize her. How could she? It seemed like so much nothing compared with the murder of her sorority sister, Sheraton Wilkes.
The offices of the Dixon Police Department were about on par with Cherrystone’s, where Jenna had spent most of her teenage years popping in to drop something off, get some money, or just say hello. She recognized the conference room where the officers gathered at the beginning of their shift to catch up on what was happening. The weekend cops—some reserves, she guessed—had left a greasy box of apple fritters.
Those wouldn’t have lasted back home, she thought.
She saw the bulletin board that was affixed with at least two hundred police and sheriffs’ patches from across the south. Back home, Sheriff Kiplinger had started one of those, too. She remembered how happy he was when she brought in a patch from an Oregon county that he hadn’t ever seen. She’d won it on eBay for three dollars plus shipping, and she’d never seen a happier man.
Detective Jasper sat Jenna and Midori on folding metal chairs in a room that overlooked the parking lot of a Cracker Barrel Old Country Store and Restaurant. She set out a pad and a pen. She offered them coffee or sodas, but neither Jenna nor Midori felt like drinking anything.
Midori just wanted to cry.
“All right,” the detective said, “I want to talk to you two, for a couple of reasons.” She fixed her gaze on Midori and pushed a box of tissues toward her. “Midori, you are her best friend. We need to know everything you can tell us about Sheraton. Who were her friends? She have any enemies? Any run-ins with anyone? That kind of thing. OK?”
Midori dried her eyes. “OK.”
“And you,” she said, now looking at Jenna, “you were with Midori and Sheraton last night at dinner.”
“Right. But I barely knew the girl. I’ll be as helpful as I can be, though.”
“Understood. Midori, tell me about Sheraton.”
“What do you want to know?”
“Boyfriend troubles?”
“She was dating Matt Harper, but it was going all right.”
“We know about Matt, and another detective is talking to him now. Any others? She was pretty. She probably broke a few hearts on campus.”
Midori pulled the zipper on her hot pink Juicy tracksuit top. “She was a big flirt, but it was all in fun. Everyone liked her. If anyone’s told you otherwise, they’re lying.”
“Everyone liked her but the killer.”
Of course, the detective was right about that.
They discussed dinner the night before, how Sheraton had wanted to go out and party at one of the fraternity houses when they got back. Jenna stayed behind in the BZ house and Midori said she was out only until about twelve-thirty.
“I just wasn’t into it. Sheraton was. She told me to go home and she’d be right behind me.”
“What was she doing?”
“We were at the Tri Gamma house. She was on a couch talking to some guys and some other girls. There was nothing special about it. She was just talking, having a good time.”
They talked for a little while longer. The detective took copious notes, though Jenna couldn’t see what she was writing down.
There really wasn’t that much to say. No one saw anything. This had to be some kind of random happening. There was no stalker. There was no person bent on revenge for some silly transgression. Whoever had slashed the life out of Sheraton Wilkes had done so out of a sickness for which she had only one word: Evil.
“So, Jenna,” the detective asked, as the two young women stood to leave, “is there any reason anyone would want to kill you? You were supposed to be sleeping in that room, correct?”
Jenna slung her purse over her shoulder and gathered her coat.
“No,” she said.
Midori’s eyes widened and she stared at Jenna, then the detective.
Detective Jasper followed the pair as they started to leave. “No one harassing you? Bothering you? Threatening you?”
“No. No one at all. And thanks, Detective, I really needed you to say that. Nice.”
Chapter Thirty-eight
Tustin, California
The dog’s name was Maggie. Michael Barton called her Maggot.
She was a ten-year-old liver-and-white Springer spaniel mix that, by most observers’ accounts, had to be the love of Mrs. Hansen’s life. There was even proof of it. The wall next to the TV had been outfitted with shelves that gave clear and incontrovertible testament to the dog’s place in the family—there were a dozen pictures of Maggie in silver and gold frames. There were none of any of the children who lived there with “Mama and Papa,” as they were instructed to call the Hansens. Not a single one, not even a Polaroid. But there was Maggie on the beach in the surf, barking lazily at the sky. A shot of Maggie sprawled out on the sofa. Maggie with a Frisbee in her mouth, looking brightly at the camera.
How Michael grew to hate that canine. Certainly jealousy was a factor, and later in life, he’d figure that out. The dog was more important than any of the kids in the house.
One time when he didn’t eat the rancid lentil soup that Mrs. Hansen had made and left on the stove for four days, she ladled some of it over the dog’s kibble and made him eat it there, on all fours like he was nothing more than an animal. When he cried and screamed and finally succumbed to her demands, she laughed and turned to her dog.
“Don’t worry, baby, I’ll wash the bowl after he’s finished so you won’t have to get any of his germs.”
The dog seemed to smile.
But there was another reason to hate Maggie. The dog was a cheerful witness to Michael’s repeated humiliations at the hands of Mr. Hansen.
Sometimes when Mr. Hansen had his pants unzipped and his pelvis pressed into Michael’s face, Maggie would sit in the corner, panting like she was enjoying what the smelly man was doing.
Maybe the dog was happy that she didn’t have to lick her master there?
Michael tried to talk to Maggie by sending messages from his brain, to hers.
Bite him! Make him stop! Bark! Do something! Stupid dog!