J.A. Jance - Dead Wrong

“Since Bradley Evans confessed to the crime and also went to prison for it, it’s possible that the investigation into your daughter’s death was something less than thorough,” Joanna explained. “We’re exploring the possibility that someone else may have been involved.”

“You’re saying Bradley had an accomplice?”

That wasn’t at all what Joanna meant, but since that idea seemed to satisfy some of Anna Marie’s objections, she let it slide. Joanna knew from reading the casebook that the Lisa Evans homicide had been closed so quickly and so definitively that few of the victim’s friends and associates had ever been interviewed.

“Possibly,” Joanna said.

“Was it a woman?” Anna Marie asked. “I always wondered about that-if he had a girlfriend or someone on the side-and that’s why he got rid of Lisa.”

“Did your daughter say something that led you to think that might be the case?”

“No. According to what she told me, everything was hunky-dory, except for Bradley’s drinking, that is. She was worried about it. That was the only thing she ever complained about.”

“It may be the one thing she mentioned to you, but she might have said something more to someone else,” Joanna said. “You see, Mrs. Crystal, although I love my mother very much, there are issues in my marriage that I would never discuss with her. Is it possible that Lisa had friends other than you, people her age, that she might have told her troubles to?”

Anna Marie considered for a moment before she answered. “Lisa’s best friend would have been the Tanner girl-Barbara Tanner. Lisa might have said something to her.”

“Who was Barbara Tanner?”

“Her parents owned the dry cleaner’s where Lisa worked. In fact, Barbara was the one who got Lisa the job in the first place. She worked part-time there while she was still in high school and then full-time after she got out. Barbara worked there, too, some of the time, but after she went off to college, she only worked on winter breaks and during the summers to help her parents.”

“What about Lisa?” Joanna asked. “Why didn’t she go to college?”

Anna Marie shrugged. “She wasn’t interested, mostly. Kenny would have found a way to pay for it if she had really wanted to go, but her grades weren’t all that good, and she never really liked school.”

“Do the Tanners still live around here?” Joanna asked.

Anna Marie shook her head. “They sold out a long time ago, and they’re both gone now. Barbara was a change-of-life baby, so her parents were a lot older than Kenny and me.”

“What about Barbara?”

“I have no idea,” Anna Marie said. “The last time I saw her was at Lisa’s funeral. She was there with her fiance. I know she introduced me to him, but I don’t remember his name or anything about him. I don’t think he was from around here.”

“Did Lisa have any other friends?”

“Not really. She wasn’t a very outgoing person; she was pretty but shy. I thought working in the dry cleaner’s would help bring her out of herself. Instead, she ended up meeting Bradley. He asked her out and that was it. He was the only person she ever dated, and for some reason she didn’t think she deserved anyone better.”

Joanna thought about what Leslie Markham had said-that Rory was the only person she had ever dated. It sounded as though Lisa Marie Crystal’s history had repeated itself in Leslie. Both of them had settled for someone who probably wasn’t the very best specimen of manhood. And what about Lisa’s father, Anna Marie’s beloved Kenny? Maybe he wasn’t any better than the men his daughter and granddaughter had chosen. Was the propensity for choosing men badly also to be found on mitochondrial DNA?

Joanna closed her notebook and rose to her feet. “We’ll see what we can do to track down Barbara Tanner.”

Anna Marie rose, too, and followed Frank and Joanna to the door. “You will tell me, won’t you?”

“Tell you what?” Joanna asked.

“Tell me if you find out someone else was involved,” Anna Marie said. “It wouldn’t change anything, but at least then I’d know why Lisa died-that there was an actual reason for it. That’s what I really wanted Bradley to tell me-why he did it. If he’d given me at least that much, maybe I could have forgiven him, but without knowing…” Anna Marie shook her head and didn’t finish.

“If we find out,” Joanna said, “I promise we’ll let you know. But tell me one more thing, Mrs. Crystal. Do you happen to remember when your daughter’s baby was due?”

“Oh, yes,” Anna Marie said. “I remember that perfectly. Her due date was November the fifteenth. That’s my birthday, too, so of course I remember. When Lisa told me she was pregnant, I remember telling Kenny, ”Oh, boy! By Thanksgiving we’ll be grandparents.“ But that wasn’t to be,” she added sadly.

“The families never do get over it, do they,” Frank observed, once they were back in his Crown Victoria. “But I admit, the family resemblance from Anna Marie to Lisa and from Lisa to Leslie is downright spooky. Where to now?”

But Joanna already had her phone out and was dialing Markham Realty. “Since Leslie and her husband own the place, let’s hope she doesn’t go home at the stroke of five.”

“Ms. Markham is in with a client writing up an offer,” Fran, the receptionist, told her. “It may be some time before she’s available, and I’m not allowed to interrupt.”

“That’s all right,” Joanna said. “We’ll stop by the office and wait for her to finish.”

“What’s the plan?” Frank asked.

“Leslie presumably knows the least about what went on in 1978, but she still may be able to tell us things that will help. She may be aware that she’s adopted. Then again…”

“You’re going to tell her?”

“I’m not sure,” Joanna said. “Maybe. If not, our fallback position will be DNA.”

“Which could take weeks or months to give us an answer.” Frank sighed. “I suppose it would be asking too much to hope that Leslie Markham smokes, too.”

“No,” Joanna said, “I’m sure she doesn’t. We’re going to stop by the Starbucks on our way and pick up a latte for her. When it’s time for us to leave, I’m going to count on you to bus the table- and to keep the cups straight.”

“I should be able to manage that much. By the way, Leslie is number four.”

“Number four what?”

“Mrs. Rory Markham the fourth,” Frank returned. “He married Leslie two weeks to the day after his divorce from number three was final.”

“No wonder I didn’t like the guy,” Joanna said. “He gave me the heebie-jeebies.”

“More of your good ol‘ woman’s intuition?” Frank asked.

“More like woman’s radar,” Joanna replied.

They waited in the lobby of Markham Realty until a quarter past six. When Leslie finally emerged from the conference room and escorted her client to the front door, she frowned at Frank and Joanna as she walked past. Only when the client was safely out of earshot did she whirl on them.

“What are you doing here?” she demanded. “I already told you everything I know. I’ve never met the man who took those pictures, and Rory’s still mad at me about it. He thinks I had some kind of relationship-”

“Actually,” Joanna said, “I’m quite certain you never had a romantic relationship of any kind with the man in question. In fact, our investigation will be able to lay your husband’s concerns to rest on that score. But could we please go somewhere a little more private to discuss this? And we brought you a drink. It’s probably cool by now, but…”

She was relieved when Leslie accepted the proffered cup without a murmur and then led them into the conference room.