What Janie Saw

CHAPTER TWO

NOW RAFE UNDERSTOOD why Janie and her sister had scurried to his office—bypassing the officer on duty. With the art book missing, Janie and her boss were the only people who had read an alleged murder confession. If Derek Chaney had changed his mind about wanting to confess, then he’d be sweating bullets about now, and Janie might be where he’d aim those bullets.

Rafe couldn’t cancel his court date, but now, returning the phone calls and the visit to the correctional facility would no longer be his top priority.

Today, Rafe would be spending time with Janie, lots of time.

“Did the campus cop who put the art book in the safe discover it missing, or was it a different campus cop?” Rafe asked.

“Same cop.”

“Did he happen to admit to looking at the art book?”

“He glanced at the first couple of pages, but not the whole thing. It was late and there’d been a report of someone trying to break into parked cars on campus. He wanted to keep his eye on the monitors. Still, he filled out the report, so he knew what was in it.”

“Why didn’t they contact the police last night?”

Across from him, Janie—ever the teacher—raised her hand. Rafe bit back a wry smile.

“The confession is in Derek’s personal art book,” Janie burst out. “His art book! It’s supposed to contain thumbnail sketches and ideas for the project he was working on. I thought—hoped—he’d decided to write some sort of graphic novel. We had some doubt as to whether it was fact or fiction. Patricia Reynolds, the chair of my department, was going to notify the dean this morning and see what he wanted to do.”

“Hear that?” Rafe said into the phone.

“The dean called us just after eight this morning,” Nathan affirmed. “Our guy arrived at twenty after. He was there when they opened the safe.”

Rafe looked across the desk at Janie. “How did you find out the art book had gone missing?”

“The dean called me.”

Turning his attention back to the phone, Rafe asked, “What does Patricia Reynolds think of all this?”

Nate answered, “She’s coming to the station this afternoon to make a statement and try to recreate what she read. She admits, though, that she only scanned the first page then flipped to the last. Once she saw Brittney’s name, both she and Miss Vincent headed straight to campus police. Apparently there was quite a bit more to the art book, though, at least six pages.”

Rafe could only frown and stare across his desk at Janie. “How much did you see?”

“About six or seven pages. Only four pages had to do with Brittney.”

Was there anything after that? Anything you didn’t read?”

“Not sure, but I don’t think so.”

“What’s your gut feeling?” he asked. “Does the art book show fact or fiction?”

Her sister squeezed Janie’s hand. Janie, for her part, seemed more interested in fiddling with the edge of her shirt, tugging at some unimportant thread.

Janie might not have answered, but on the phone, Nathan didn’t hesitate. “I told you this whole thing’s become a mess. Kid might have been capable of murder, but not anymore. He died over the weekend in a meth explosion.”

Rafe almost dropped the phone. “Accidental?”

“We didn’t have reason to believe otherwise until we got the call about the art book this morning. Now there’s reason to look at the case again.”

“Does Janie know?”

“No.”

“Send me what you’ve got so far concerning Derek Chaney. I’d like a copy of last’s night police report, too. I’ll be by with Janie this afternoon,” Rafe said, ending the conversation and ignoring the raised eyebrow Janie shot him. No doubt she didn’t like him making promises for her.

Well, as a potential witness to murder, Janie was about to find out that certain obligations were not negotiable.

He studied Janie’s expression: fear battling compassion with a dash of shock at being in such a situation.

He understood that fear and shock, and was glad Janie had her big sister with her. The whole town knew Katie had pretty much raised Janie.

Small towns weren’t big on secrets.

“What don’t I know?” Janie asked.

He’d hoped she’d let that part of his conversation with Nathan slip by. But, as an artist, details were her life, whether she created them or observed them.

“Well?” she nudged.

As much as he wanted to protect her, he had to prepare her. “You don’t know how ugly this case might turn out to be.”

Janie and Katie looked at each other. He noted that Katie’s expression was starting to resemble Janie’s: it was one of fear.

He booted up the computer and retrieved the file on Derek Chaney that Nathan had already sent. Silently, he skimmed the words before turning to Janie, sliding over some blank sheets of white paper taken from the bin of his printer and giving the direction, “Recreate everything from the art book that you remember.”

“Everything? Can’t I just describe it to you?”

“I want it written and drawn. We can’t afford to miss something. And you should re-create it while it’s still fresh in your mind.”

“Can I do it at home?”

Not a chance. He wasn’t about to let her leave. She pretty much lived at a zoo. He couldn’t imagine a place with more distractions. Plus, she was constantly rushing back and forth between her own classes at the University of Arizona and her lab assistant duties at Adobe Hills Community College.

“No, I need you here. I want you to copy Chaney’s art book as closely as you can—presentation, margin, everything. If he wrote in pencil, I’ll get you one. If you need special artist supplies, give me a list.”

She looked a bit shell-shocked. “This might take a while.”

“Rafe,” Katie said, “I can see to it—”

“No, she has to be here.”

“But—”

“I’ll do it.”

Rafe wasn’t sure what had put a fire under Janie, but suddenly it was as if she had to get whatever she’d seen out of her.

He watched as she frantically arranged herself so his desk became a drawing table. She brushed aside bits of something he couldn’t see and, without asking, moved some of his belongings aside. She then placed two pieces of paper, one on top of the other, in front of her. She held the pencil as if she were afraid it would explode. The point merely broke and he handed her another one.

She made an attempt to draw something on the page. But it only took her a moment to wrinkle the paper and toss it in the trash. Two more pages quickly followed. Her hand was shaking badly—no wonder she couldn’t draw.

Katie watched, her lips pressed together. “What kind of danger is Janie in, Sheriff? Are you going to arrest the kid who wrote the art book?”

Of course that would be Katie’s first concern. She knew all about predators, though mostly the animal kind. Being a zookeeper did that. And she and Janie both understood what Rafe knew.

The human predator wasn’t all that different.

“Right now,” Rafe said, “we just have to focus on finding out what was in the art book so we can take the next steps. Derek’s not a threat to Janie.”

Janie’s fingers tightened around the pencil, but she didn’t look at the paper. Instead she stared at Rafe. “What do you mean he’s not a threat? How can he not be a threat if what I read is true?”

A case that already set his cop teeth on edge was going to get even uglier. She needed the truth. “Chaney’s dead. He died this weekend in a meth-lab explosion.”

* * *

GUILT PRICKLED UP the back of Janie’s neck even as she felt the floor tilt. She started to stand, wanting to run but unsure of where to go. Derek’s death wasn’t something she could escape from. Nor could she escape her guilt that she’d been relieved by Derek’s absence this past week.

She hadn’t realized it would be permanent.

She should have tried harder to reach the kid, to find out what made him so unhappy, so dark.

Katie opened her mouth to say something, but Janie settled back into her seat and stopped her. “I’m fine. Really fine. I know what I need to do.”

But crowded with three people, the walls of the office started to close in on her. The room was devoid of color.

It made her remember living with her aunt. They’d rented a barren apartment, with no real colors anywhere to brighten the mood of the place. Until she picked up her paintbrushes and created.

Rafe must have picked up on her assessment of his office. “We can do this somewhere else if you’d like? We have a nice conference room.”

No, the brown, black and beiges of his office were fitting colors for what she was about to do. If they walked through the police station again, she’d have to see the men in uniform. She’d have to think about how they shone their flashlights while they searched for people on the run. Rafe was dressed like one of those cops, even though he was the sheriff. His badge was bigger, too.

“Here’s fine,” she managed to say.

Katie excused herself and went to find the ladies’ restroom. Janie relaxed a little bit. She should have come by herself, should never have dragged a pregnant Katie along.

“I’m sorry you have to go through this,” Rafe said.

She’d heard that line before, from cops even.

Rafe didn’t look like any of the cops she’d met, though. His black hair was somewhat short, straight, and only mussed where he’d run his fingers through it in frustration. His piercing eyes were as black as his hair. He gazed at her as if he could see past the facade she presented the public. He was a big guy, solid. He was the kind of guy who would catch you when you fell and not grunt because you weighed more than one-thirty.

She got the feeling he really was sorry.

But many of the cops she’d dealt with had been sorry for what they’d put her through. Rafe was no different. She didn’t need his sympathy. After all, he would only be sorry until he didn’t need her anymore. Then he’d forget her as the next day, the next crime, dawned.

Typical cop, or sheriff, or person in authority, or whatever.

Janie’d learned at a young age to only trust herself and her sister, Katie. That was why Janie drew animals. They gave no false pretenses, had no ulterior motives.

“Yeah, I get it.” Janie’s goal right now was the same as it always was when it came to the local authorities. If she couldn’t avoid them, do what they wanted so they’d leave her alone.

This time, however, she needed the cops. She just wished she believed, like her sister did, that the men in uniform were the good guys, defenders of the innocent and destroyers of evil.

Because evil had definitely rocked her world.

“It was just a typical evening, a typical class,” she muttered, amazed by how quickly normalcy had changed into nightmare.

“I’m sure—” he started.

“And then it wasn’t.”

How could she explain to him that after reading a few pages of a kid’s art book, her world had turned upside down, and she was still clinging to the hope it would right itself, that what she’d read would prove to be just a graphic novel—fiction, and nothing more.

“So nothing happened in class?”

“Nothing. It was after class, in the student union, that everything happened.”

“Give me every detail. Brittney’s been missing too long.”

“You talk as if you knew her.”

“Her dad’s my insurance agent. Her family attends the same church I do. I’ve known her since she was born.”

Janie couldn’t imagine that kind of stability. Rafe had lived in Scorpion Ridge his whole life. She’d bounced from her father’s place to apartment after apartment, neighborhood after neighborhood with an alcoholic aunt. In some ways she was still bouncing. Maybe she always would be, as her goal was to paint exotic animals in their natural habitat, and this meant lots of travel. Right now, she was saving every dime and putting together her portfolio and résumé, hoping she would be chosen as a visiting artist in Johannesburg, South Africa.

She could hardly wait.

Rafe, on the other hand, was a third-generation law officer with roots so deeply grounded in Scorpion Ridge that even during his few vacations, he’d rather have been home.

Janie’s idea of home didn’t match his.

She’d figured that out during their one date.

He’d been all about Scorpion Ridge, its people, the way of life. She loved it here, too, but there were people to meet and places to go.

And pictures to paint of so many different things far away.

* * *

RAFE OPENED HIS top desk drawer and withdrew two flyers. These were just the newest. From the day his father entered the Scorpion Hills Police Station to serve and protect, missing persons had received special consideration.

But his father had never solved the one missing-persons case that was the most important to him—his own son, Rafe’s brother. Ramon could have been dead all these years...or he could be alive, waiting to be found.

Not knowing he had a family that loved him and that had never stopped searching for him.

Rafe stared at both flyers for a moment before casually placing one in front of Janie.

Three words could describe the photo: young, pretty, happy.

In comparison, Ramon’s missing-persons photo had been of a baby not even forty-eight hours old.

Compassion warred with fatigue across Janie’s face.

Brittney’s white-blond hair streamed past her shoulders. A gray, sleeveless blouse hugged curves that hadn’t had time to mature. In her right arm, she clutched a brown-and-white spotted dog, maybe just a puppy, that stared happily at the camera.

Janie leaned forward and began re-creating.

While she worked, Rafe logged onto CopLink and learned more about the late Derek Chaney.

The kid’s rap sheet was long enough to make Rafe grind his teeth. However, nothing but petty crimes were listed. And yet, judging by the names of those alongside Derek during his criminal activities, the boy was capable of finding himself in the middle of a murder.

Rafe would love to give Brittney’s parents some good news. But Derek’s involvement only pointed to bad news. For everyone.

He’d just noted the absence of sound, the lack of pencil scratching against paper, when Janie asked, “Do you think Derek died because of the art book?”

“Anything I say would be speculation, and this early in the case, I’d rather not speculate.”

She gave him an indignant glare that spoke louder than words. “But if—”

“If is a pretty powerful word,” Rafe returned.

She gripped the pencil tightly, scratching out words on the paper as if she had to get them out, away from her. Finally, she finished, but not before whispering, “I’m afraid.”

“I understand,” Rafe said. “I’ve not slept a full night since Brittney disappeared. Neither have her parents.”

She let out a deep breath and turned the last paper so he could see it. “I’ve re-created everything I remember.” She finished by tapping on the last paper. “When I got to her name and then the blood in the dirt, I stopped and headed for my division chair.”

Blood in the dirt...

He’d have to, in some form or another, repeat this information to Brittney’s parents, so they didn’t hear it on the news. Reporters were like cockroaches, they showed up where they didn’t belong and were hard to get rid of.

No matter how much Rafe wanted to handle Brittney’s case without sensationalism, the media would get involved, would push the envelope, wouldn’t care whose emotions got trampled as long as their ratings soared.

“And you’re sure you’re done?” He nodded toward the paper on his desk.

She glanced again at Brittney’s photograph on the flyer and then picked up the pages she’d created. Four in all. Slowly, carefully, she examined each one. After about fifteen minutes, only erasing a few things or adding a detail here and there, Janie scooted the paper across the desk and settled back in her chair. “I’m done.”

It took him just two minutes to scan the haunting sketches.

“This is it, all you remember?”

“There wasn’t that much more, but after I got to this, I stopped and went to see Patricia.”

It had been the right move. The moment she realized what she had in her hand, she should have turned it over to the authorities—too bad it hadn’t been the local police. Rafe could only imagine the grief Nathan was giving the campus cops over the art book’s disappearance.

Still, he wished she’d read the whole thing, memorized every picture.

“What I’m most sorry about,” Janie admitted, “was not paying attention to the numbers on the license plate. He’d included them, but I did no more than glance at the numbers because they were so tiny.”

“Could you distinguish the sex of the occupants?”

“They were tiny stick figures but with details.”

Still, they could label the occupants—Derek and Brittney were in the back, Chad was driving and Chris was the front-seat passenger.

“I know you’ve said that nothing happened in class, but I still want to hear about the last week. All the events leading up to you reading the art book. Don’t leave anything out.”

Her sister returned.

Janie glanced at Brittney’s photo again, then showed it to Katie. To Rafe, she said, “I’m assisting with two classes this semester. Both art. In the late afternoons, if I get an appointment, I work in the Writing Tutoring center. I’m pretty good with English, and it’s extra money.”

“And she’s taking classes at the University of Arizona as well as being employed at Bridget’s,” Katie threw in.

“My Monday/Wednesday class starts at six. I didn’t have a student appointment yesterday,” Janie continued. “So last night, I got there right on time.”

Rafe noticed a sudden blink of her eyes, a quickening, slightly out of sync. She’d either just told a lie or she’d left something out.

Janie regained her composure, smoothed back her unruly strawberry-blond hair, and went on, “I’d earlier set up the stations and put handouts on the back table. So, when I got there, the students were signing in and already starting to work on their major projects.”

“What was Derek working on?”

“It’s a medieval battle scene. Very detailed. He’s done two others so far. All pretty much the same focus. Lots of blood, battle, destruction.”

“You say you got there right on time. Is being on time important?”

She hesitated before answering, “Yes, for both me and the students. I take points from students who are late. If they’re more than twenty minutes late, I count them absent.”

Rafe nodded. So, Miss Janie Vincent was a free spirit who also liked rules. “Seems to me that someone as concerned about punctuality as you are would arrive to class early, just in case a student needed to talk to you, or something.”

Her lips pursed together before she said, “I used to get there early, but then...”

“Then?”

She looked him right in the eye. “Then Derek Chaney started arriving early, too. At first, it wasn’t so bad. He asked questions because he claimed he also wanted to paint murals. I gave him some books to read. He kept them a while, then returned them.”

“And this behavior caused you to stop arriving to class early?” Rafe had to give her credit. She was a master lip purser, but she didn’t squirm at all.

“Look,” Janie said, giving him a haughty glare that reminded him of his own college days and how a professor could reduce him to age twelve without blinking. Few, however, had made him want to achieve more than a pass in the class. And none had been as pretty as Janie Vincent. “I don’t want anything I say here to slant the investigation. I—”

“Slant the investigation?” Rafe sat up. “What do you mean?”

“I mean if I tell you this guy creeped me out, had anger issues, you might believe I’d already condemned him. I can answer impartially, and—”

“Janie,” Rafe said carefully, “right now, we can only label Derek as a person of interest, that’s all. His art book and drawings are probably just the work of a young adult crying for attention.”

She gave a slight shake of her head. She hadn’t given her opinion on fact versus fiction earlier, but she clearly had an opinion now.

Not fiction.

He agreed but couldn’t let on to that.

“Innocent until proven guilty,” was a double-edged sword. In Rafe’s profession, his job was to decode, visualize, analyze and interpret. Years ago, a cop’s perspective—his intuition—had counted for something. Today, because of politics, Rafe didn’t dare share what he thought. It could later be used against him in a court of law.

Plus, Jane Q. Public—especially in the case of a missing or wayward child—wanted optimism.

“Do you want to know how many people have come forward with information about the disappearance of Brittney Travis? Hundreds. And all of them turned out to be dead ends.”

“How many of the hundreds attended the same college?” Katie jumped in.

“More than you’d believe.” Rafe leaned forward. “We investigate all leads, and certainly, we hope this one will take us closer to the truth, but chances are it won’t. Chances are you have the misfortune of reading some misguided young man’s work of fantasy.”

“I know fantasy when I read it,” Janie muttered. “Derek draws fantasy and his writing was nothing like his usual drawings.”

She had him there. And, he figured, by the end of the interview she’d get him a few more times if he wasn’t careful.

“Did you tell Professor Reynolds that he creeped you out?”

“Yes.” Janie filled him in on some of the suggestions Patricia had made for dealing with a difficult student—like one who invaded personal space, who believed in staring as a way to intimidate, and who got argumentative when given constructive criticisms. She explained how ineffective those suggestions had been and finished with, “Derek left during the break Wednesday, a week ago, and didn’t return.”

“Any idea why he left?” Rafael prodded.

She grimaced. “No idea. Patricia had me clean and put away his supplies.”

“How about the people he sat by? Did any of them leave, too?”

“The students all have their own stations. Pretty much their own worlds. The station to his left is empty. The station to his right is a reentry adult. She ignores him. I’ve heard her mutter a few times about teenagers with attitudes.”

“So you weren’t the only person he creeped out?”

“Attitude came off of him in waves.”

“Since you were scared to be in the room alone with him before class started, what did you do after class?”

She hesitated but didn’t purse her lips. Too bad, he somewhat enjoyed watching her expressions of angst. And she had perfect lips. “Derek was the first one out the door. I don’t think the other students even thought twice about what he did after class ended.”

“So, no complaints or other students who lingered?”

“Not that I noticed.”