“We know Jennifer Goodall graduated with the class of 1999,” Paul said. “So, type in ‘Donovan.’”
My fingers flew over the keys, I hit Return, and in less than a second there he was, Lieutenant Chris Donovan, Class of 1999, near the bottom of a list of thirty-seven Donovans who had attended the Naval Academy since Robert Donovan graduated in 1877.
I fell back in my chair. “Holy moly! Jennifer Goodall and Chris Donovan were classmates!”
“Now that, I’d say, takes it completely out of the realm of coincidence,” Paul said. “We must call Murray.” He reached for the telephone.
“Do you have any connections at the Pentagon these days?” I forged on. “Someone I could talk to?”
“Hannah, as I told you this weekend, I think it’s risky for you to go poking around.” He started punching numbers. “Please, let’s just make sure to pass on to Murray any information you turn up and let him and his highly trained staff handle it.” He covered the mouthpiece of the receiver with his hand. “He’s getting paid for this, remember.”
As if I could forget. Our vacations for the next ten years were bankrolling Murray and his highly trained staff. Goodbye fifteenth century villas in the gently rolling hills of Tuscany. Hello to tours of Maryland’s scenic Eastern Shore at the wheel of our Volvo.
“Good grief, Paul,” I chided. “Nobody could be more involved than me. It’s my life that’s on the line. If Chris Donovan is a spurned boyfriend who murdered Jennifer, asking him questions will only put him on his guard. Or, consider this,” I said as a new thought occurred to me. “What if Chris Donovan is gay, and Jennifer was running true to form and threatened to ‘out’ him?”
Paul shook his head. “Donovan’s a civilian, remember? He must have served the five years he owed the Navy, then got out. The Pentagon doesn’t discriminate against gays, as long as they have the good sense to remain civilians.”
“I’d still like to poke around and find out a little more about Donovan. I can ask Dorothy Hart about him, for one thing. If Chris Donovan worked for her husband, she might know something.”
“I can see that I’m not going to change your mind.” Paul reached out and squeezed my hand. “Talk to Dorothy, but for the love of God, Hannah, please, be careful.”
I kissed the tip of his nose. “Of course I will.”
While Paul left a message on Murray’s home answering machine, I clicked the Print button and watched the printer spew out several pages of information about the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network and USNA Out.
After Paul hung up, I said, “But you didn’t answer my question. Do you have any connections at the Pentagon?”
Paul leaned back in the chair with his hands behind his head. “Jack Turley might still be there.”
“That gawky redhead who used to play basketball for Navy?”
Paul grinned. “‘That gawky redhead,’ as you so eloquently put it, is now a captain in the United States Navy working for one of the Under Secretaries of the Navy for Something or Other. The last time I saw him was at Homecoming for his twentieth class reunion.”
I groaned. “That makes me feel positively ancient.”
Paul stood up and patted my head affectionately. “We are ancient, my dear.” He bent down and kissed my cheek. “Jack gave me his business card at the game. I have it at the office somewhere. I’ll try to reach him in the morning. Coming to bed?”
“In a minute. Your decrepit old wife needs to shut down her computer.”
“No last minute games of solitaire?”
“No solitaire. Promise.” I grinned up at him. “It’s no fun playing with myself.”
Paul’s fingers trailed lightly down the length of my arm, lingering briefly on my fingertips. “That’s just what I was hoping you’d say.”
CHAPTER 17
The next day was Friday. While I waited for Paul to locate Captain Turley’s business card and engineer an invitation from his former student for me to visit the Pentagon, I made it a point to track Dorothy down. I found her at the Academy, curled up in a chair in the Hart Room-no relation!-drinking coffee from a paper cup and reading a book.
I hadn’t seen Dorothy since my arrest-hadn’t seen much of anybody, really-so I was relieved when she shot out of her chair and embraced me like a long lost twin, separated at birth. “Hannah,” she gushed. “I’m so, so sorry!”
“So am I!” I stepped back from her embrace and studied her face for any sign of suspicion or mistrust. “I didn’t do it, you know.”
Her cheeks flushed. “Of course you didn’t, silly! Everyone knows that.”
“Not the FBI, apparently.”
She waved a hand dismissively. “They’ll figure that out. Ted says that the evidence against you is circumstantial at best.” She seized my hand and dragged me toward a chair. “Sit. Tell me about it.”
I settled into the upholstered chair next to the one she had been sitting in and tucked my feet comfortably under me. The last thing I wanted was to relive the horror and embarrassment of the worst week, bar none, of my life to date, so I said, “I’ll spare you the gory details. Suffice it to say that I’m out on bail and that my lawyer is, as we speak, working his tail off on my behalf.”
“He’s good?”
“Very good.”
Dorothy sipped her coffee, her amber eyes serious over the plastic lid that covered her cup. “I just can’t imagine what evidence they can have against you, Hannah.”
“I only know what I read in the papers, Dorothy. The Sun said that Jennifer was killed with the hammer I’d been using to build the sets for Sweeney Todd. It did occur to the reporter, at least, that perhaps that would explain why my fingerprints were all over it.”
“If that’s all there is, it’s pretty lame,” Dorothy remarked.
I nodded. I considered telling my friend about the bloody sweatshirt and the witness who had supposedly seen me behind Mahan Hall on the day of the murder, but I could hear Murray Simon’s voice rasping in my ear, cautioning me to trust no one, and for once I erred on the side of caution and listened. “My lawyer’s talking to the U.S. Attorney in charge of my case,” I explained. “Sooner or later they’ll have to share whatever evidence they have against me, but I must say, they seem to be dragging their feet.”
“Frankly,” Dorothy said, “I didn’t expect to see you here today.”
“What else am I going to do? Stay at home and pull the covers over my head?” I paused and pressed my fingertips against my eyelids, suddenly overwhelmed by a strong wave of déjà vu.
“Hannah? Are you all right?” Dorothy’s voice seemed to be spiraling down a long tunnel.
I opened my eyes. “I’ve never been arrested before, Dorothy, but I was just thinking that it doesn’t feel that much different from being diagnosed with cancer.”
Dorothy sucked in her lower lip and nodded. Clearly I was speaking a language that she could understand.
“What I mean is, in either case, there’s the very real possibility that I’ll lose my freedom at the end of it, by incarceration on the one hand, or death on the other.”
Dorothy’s eyes grew wide. “Cut it out, Hannah, you’re scaring me.”
“Sometimes I scare myself.” I patted her knee reassuringly. “What I’m trying to say is that in both cases I feel such a lack of control, that I’m compelled…” I paused to reflect for a moment. “… no, I’m driven to do something, anything, because standing still is, at least for me, simply too frightening and painful.” I forced a smile. “Usually I try to keep myself so busy solving other people’s problems that I don’t have time to worry about my own.”