Justice for Katie Page 5

  "She said she wanted to speak with me privately." Again, the attorney did not elaborate.

  "And did she? Speak with you privately, I mean."

  "I walked her to her car and we spoke briefly in the parking lot." Once more, the attorney stopped.

  "Amanda, I'm investigating a murder. It would be so much easier if you just told me about your conversation with Carolyn from start to finish instead of me having to pull it out of you a sentence at a time."

  Knoll sat back in her chair and smiled. "I'm sorry, Matt. Force of habit. Years of legal conditioning."

  "Well, pretend you're not a lawyer and just tell me what the woman said."

  "She didn't say much," said Knoll, serious again. "She was a lawyer too, you know. A damned good one. She didn't want to be overheard."

  "Did she tell you why she wanted to talk to you?"

  There was a beat, then Amanda said, "No. She didn't want to talk to me in public. I asked her to come back to my office but she said she had to be in court. By the time she was due out of court, I was due in and after that, she had a deposition."

  "Do you have any idea what might have been bothering her?"

  Another pause. "No."

  "Did you arrange to meet her in her office after work?"

  "She offered. Since my husband and kids are out of town right now, normally I would have gone. I'm directing a play for the community theater, though and I had rehearsal last night. I asked her to meet me at the theater and we'd talk before the actors showed up."

  "She didn't come?"

  "No. I called her office and her cell but both went to voice mail so I thought she got held up or changed her mind. I was going to call her this morning when I saw this." She gestured again at the newspaper, then looked sharply at Matt. "Whatever she wanted to talk to me about, you think someone killed her over it?"

  "I don't know," said Matt, "but I sure wish she'd told you what it was."

  ***

  Emma was also pouring over the morning paper. Jake had left early to meet with a client and her parents before accompanying them into court. Emma always kept one day a week free to give her a chance to catch up on paperwork but since Grace had come, she'd been spending most of her free time at home.

  Emma got up to refill her coffee cup and stood staring out at Casper Mountain as she waited for the cup to fill. Jake had not been happy when Emma told him she'd persuaded Grace to extend her visit another few weeks.

  "She calls me Jacob. In my whole life nobody has called me Jacob except my Great-Aunt Ruth. I hated it then and I hate it now."

  "Just ask her to call you Jake."

  "I did. I've asked her three times and do you know what she finally told me? Nicknames are for little boys, Jacob."

  "I know it bothers you and I promise I'll talk to her about it. She calls Matt by his full name and he doesn't seem to mind it. It's just that her generation is more formal than ours."

  Jake had stalked off to the barn and Emma was been relieved that when he returned a half hour later, the storm seemed to have passed. She'd tried to bring it up to Grace but she hadn't quite been able to find the words. Last night, when Grace had called him Jacob, Jake had looked pointedly at Emma. She was going to have to find a way to broach the subject.

  Grace settled into the chair across from hers at the dining room table and reached for the cereal. Emma brought her a cup of coffee and sat down. Before she could mention Jake, Grace sighed. "I can't stop thinking about Carolyn Maxwell. What kind of person was she?"

  Diverted, Emma considered for a moment. "Upright. Unbending. That's what comes to mind. If there was a right way to do something, Carolyn knew it and did it that way."

  "That's quite a compliment. Did you like her?"

  "Well enough, I suppose, though I didn't know her outside of Rotary and Bar Association dinners."

  "Did other people seem to like her?"

  "She could rub people the wrong way. I can't say that I've heard of anyone being more than annoyed or exasperated with her though."

  "Emma, you are the most painfully tactful person I know. Never be afraid to call a spade a spade," laughed Grace.

  Emma saw an opening to speak to Grace on Jake's behalf but Grace closed it. "If my theory is true about the murderer being someone inside the office, then the killer would know Carolyn was not the type to just let it go if she thought there was something wrong."

  "You're thinking it must have been something criminal in nature or she wouldn't have sought out the US Attorney."

  "Yes. it seems logical that either she thought Mr. Blakely was involved or that he would just sweep it under the rug. Does this Blakely fellow have higher political ambitions?"

  "Jake says Blakely has his eye on the Senate once one of our Senators retires."

  "Senate seats rarely come open so I can't imagine he'd want to risk what might be a once in a lifetime opportunity by having his office embroiled in scandal."

  Emma frowned. "He'd be taking a bigger risk by killing Carolyn, especially in his own office suite."

  "I'm not suggesting he killed her. I'm just thinking that she wouldn't go to him because she couldn't be certain he'd do anything about it. Or maybe she already talked to Blakely and he told her to keep quiet about it."

  "I could see a man like Blakely going to the person Carolyn suspected and telling him to knock it off. He'd consider it handled, but depending on what it was, Carolyn might not be satisfied."

  "And if Carolyn was going to bring the Feds into it, either Blakely or the person Carolyn was concerned about might act quickly prevent that."

  "But that would mean that Blakely is either a murderer or he's covering up for one." Emma frowned.

  "Unless he tells Matthew about it. Do we know if he's spoken to Blakely yet?"

  Emma shook her head. "What I'd give to be a fly on the wall at the County Attorney's office today."

  "I think we might be able to be the next best thing." Emma stared at Grace, who was wearing a sly smile.

  "What do you mean?"

  "Carolyn gave me her card and told me to call her so we could have lunch." She retrieved her purse and dug out the slightly crumpled business card.

  "So?" asked Emma.

  "So Carolyn has a secretary, I assume?"

  "I would think so."

  Grace picked up her cell phone. Dialing the number on the card, she was soon put through to Nancy Keene. Nancy was pleased when Grace asked if she and Emma could take her to lunch to sympathize with her over her loss.

  After arranging the time and location, Grace hung up her phone and looked triumphantly at Emma. "If we can't be the fly on the wall, we can at least hear what the fly has to say."

  Emma chuckled and shook her head. "Remind me to never get on your bad side."

  7

  Nancy Keene was waiting for them when Grace and Emma arrived at Sammy Jo's, a hole-in-the-wall diner popular with downtown office workers. The decor was dated and a little threadbare but the owner was friendly, the service fast, and the food second to none.

  Nancy was dressed conservatively in a mid-calf beige skirt with matching jacket, which she'd removed and folded neatly on the bench beside her when they sat down. Her blouse was soft, white and ruffled at the neck and wrists. A string of black pearls completed the outfit. She looked exactly what she was - steady, reliable and efficient.

  "I'm going to skip lunch and go straight to dessert," said Emma, glancing up at a chalkboard with the specials of the day. "I want one of those cherry shakes."

  "Good choice!" said Deanna, their waitress. "I had one of those before the lunch rush started."

  "I'll have a turkey club," said Nancy, not bothering to look at the menu or specials.

  "Just like you like it. That's one of my favorites too," said Deanna. She turned to Grace. "What would you like, dear?"

  "I hear you have the most amazing soup," said Grace. She looked at the chalkboard. "Split pea sounds perfect."

  "It's really good today," agreed the person
able Deanna. "I didn't have it, but several of my customers did and they're all still smiling."

  Deanna gathered up the menus and ambled to her next table, greeting the diners as though they were old friends. They probably were. Deanna had been a fixture at Sammy Jo's for more years than she would care to admit.

  "I have to tell you how very sorry I am for your loss," said Grace. "I had only just met Carolyn and I'm sorry I wasn't able to get to know her."

  "She must have liked you. When she came back from Rotary, she told me you'd be calling and asked me to cancel something if I had to so she would be available to have lunch with you. Could have knocked me over with a feather."

  "Was that not like her?" asked Grace.

  "Carolyn never cancelled business appointments for social engagements. Work always came first with her. Come to think of it, I can't think of her ever having a purely social lunch engagement. Her lunches were usually business of some type."

  "It must have been a great challenge for you to keep up with her schedule," said Emma.

  "It was at first. Carolyn wanted things the way she wanted them. She had a system and that was the way she wanted her office run. Stick to the system and you never had a problem with her. Go outside of that, and you'd better watch out."

  "Had you worked with her for very long?" asked Grace.

  "Twenty-seven years. Her first assistant, Doris Wilde, stayed sixteen years, from the time Carolyn joined the office until Doris retired. Doris hand-picked me and taught me the system."

  "You must have been sad to hear that Carolyn was planning to retire," noted Grace.

  "Oh no. When she told me she was leaving, I decided to go too."

  "You seem too young to retire!" said Emma.

  "I'm fifty-six. My husband retired last year and he's been chomping at the bit to hit the road. When I submitted my notice, we put our house on the market, had a big yard sale and bought an RV."

  "You're going to see the world!" said Grace wistfully. "What a lovely idea."

  Emma shot a look at her friend. She wondered whether there were things Grace regretted not doing before the cancer struck. If she could get Grace to call him Jake, maybe she could talk him into letting her stay until early October. Then she could take Grace to see the changing colors in Yellowstone.

  Deanna returned bearing food. She set Emma's shake in front of her. It was served in tall glass and came with a metal mixer cup still containing shake that had not fit into the glass. Emma's eyes widened. "I'm going to need a to-go cup," she said.

  Deanna laughed. "Everyone says that, but you'd be surprised how few people end up needing one. You give it a go and if you have any left when your friends are done eating, I'll bring you one."

  Deanna left the table, stopping here and there on her way back to the kitchen, laughter travelling from table to table in her wake. Sammy Jo's might never make Zagat, but it would always be packed in Casper.

  There was little room for small talk while they ate. "It's a horrible thing, what happened to Carolyn," said Grace after a time.

  "It was terrible. Nobody deserves that."

  "I didn't know Carolyn very well. What was she like to work with."

  Nancy put her sandwich down and frowned. "I don't want to speak ill of the dead but she was challenging to work for. She was never mean or condescending, mind you, but she was very hard to satisfy."

  "But you worked for her for twenty-seven years! Why stay if you were unhappy there?"

  "I never expected a job to make me happy, the way young people seem to these days. For me, a job is just a job, and the pay and benefits were better than I would have had anywhere else. She was my boss. I didn't expect her to be my friend. I respected her and she respected me."

  Nancy put her arms on the table and with a deep sigh she continued, "It was a terrible shock when the police told me Carolyn had been murdered - and right there in her office."

  "When was the last time you saw Carolyn?" asked Grace.

  "I took her dinner in to her before I left the office yesterday. I told the police I must have been the last one to see her. Except for the killer, of course. Everyone else had already gone home but the delivery boy was running late. I stayed because he wouldn't have been able to get into the building after 5:30."

  "Why was Carolyn working late? Wasn't she retiring soon?"

  "Carolyn was always working. I was forever telling her to go home, make herself a hot meal, read a good book - you know, just get out of the office. It's so sad. She'd been so happy about all the things she was going to do once she retired." Nancy's eyes glistened.

  "Was anything bothering Carolyn?" asked Grace after Nancy composed herself.

  "Why do you ask?"

  "She seemed distracted at Rotary, as though something were upsetting her."

  "She was bothered about something that day. I went into Carolyn's office first thing to go over her calendar, as we always did. She was sitting at her conference table instead of at her desk and when I started to close the door she stopped me."

  She took a long drink of iced tea. "She kept glancing into the hallway, then she got this surprised look on her face. I turned around to see who she was looking at."

  "Who was it?" asked Emma.

  Nancy looked around the diner to make sure no one was listening, then leaned in toward them. "Amanda Knoll."

  8

  Emma and Grace didn't speak until they were safely in Emma's car. What was Amanda Knoll doing at the County Attorney's office? Nancy said she had no idea. Carolyn had worked on occasionally with Amanda or her predecessor but she wasn't on Carolyn's calendar that morning. Clint Taylor was in court first thing, Barney Nelson had called in sick and there were no other offices in that hallway.

  Grace had asked Nancy if she'd mentioned Amanda's visit to the police, but she told them she'd forgotten. Since Amanda hadn't been there to see Carolyn, Nancy couldn't imagine why it would matter. She promised she would call Matt Joyner when she returned to her office.

  "Have you ever been to the County Attorney's office, Emma?"

  "No, but Jake goes there to meet with Clint Taylor sometimes. Why do you ask?"

  "I'm wondering about the layout of the offices. Nancy said she turned around to see what Carolyn was looking at and saw Amanda Knoll in the hallway. Carolyn's reaction suggested she had expected to see someone, just not Amanda."

  "Maybe Amanda stopped by on her way to work, not knowing Barney was out, and was headed back down the hall on her way out."

  "That wouldn't explain Carolyn's surprise at seeing her."

  "No, I guess not."

  "Carolyn positioned herself specifically to give herself a view of the hallway. I'm curious what she might have seen that Nancy did not."

  "What could she see that would have surprised Carolyn about Amanda simply being there? If she was surprised, why didn't she just call out to Amanda and ask her about it? Why wait until she saw her at Rotary?"

  Emma started the car and headed to the police station. "I think we'd better stop playing detective and go talk to Matt."

  "Excellent idea," agreed Grace.

  ***

  Matt was not happy to hear Emma and Grace's story. He ushered them into an interview room and listened with increasing agitation as they described their lunch date with Nancy Keene. When they came to Nancy's revelation about Amanda's being at the County Attorney's office on the morning Carolyn was killed, he got up and started to pace.

  "First of all," he began, when he could trust himself to speak. "What do you two think you're doing interfering in a murder investigation?"

  "We wanted to help," said Emma. "Grace thought that Carolyn's secretary might be more willing to talk to us than to the police."

  "I already interviewed Mrs. Keene."

  "And did she tell you what she told us?" asked Grace.

  Matt stopped pacing and faced the two women. He sighed and rested his hands on the back of the chair. "Not exactly."

  "She told us she didn't tell the polic
e because she didn't think it was relevant, which it may not be. She promised us she would call you when she got back to her office."

  "You know what just occurred to me?" asked Emma, suddenly straightening in her seat. "Nancy says Carolyn was watching the hallway and was surprised to see Amanda. Well, if Amanda was on her way in, Carolyn wouldn't have been surprised to see her there because she would assume Amanda was there to meet with Barney Madison on a case. Maybe Amanda was on her way out."

  "But if Carolyn was surprised because she hadn't seen Amanda come in, wouldn't she assumed she just missed her?" asked Grace. "As you pointed out in the car, why wouldn't she just ask Amanda about it there and then? Why did she wait? Matthew, do you know what Carolyn could see from where she was sitting? Could she see the door to either of the other offices? Maybe Amanda was coming out of one of those offices and Carolyn knew both men were gone."

  "But how would Amanda get in without Carolyn seeing her? Nancy said Carolyn was always in her office before the building opened at quarter to 8. If Amanda got there earlier, she wouldn't have been able to get into the building." Emma sat back, discouraged.

  Matt sighed. Turning his chair around, he straddled it and looked pointedly at each woman as he spoke. "You did the right thing coming to me. I appreciate your theories and I promise you, I'll speak with Nancy Keene and Amanda Knoll but you two need to stay out of this investigation."

  "Is there an alarm system in the building?" asked Grace, ignoring him. "Would someone have to enter a code to disable the alarm if they came in when the building is closed? Have you checked that, Matthew?"

  Matt spoke slowly, emphasizing each word. "Are you even listening to me? Never, I repeat, never do anything like this again. This isn't a game, there's a murderer out there and he or she could strike again at any time."

  Matt paused, letting his words sink in. "Grace, you said yourself the killer took a terrible risk, striking where he did and when. The body wasn't even cold when the cleaning crew found it. What if they had come early that evening? Then I'd be looking at three bodies right now."