Daniel Palmer - Helpless

Marvin continued, “With the help of the FBI, the state has been able to ID ten of the forty girls whose images they found on your laptop. In their opinion, thanks to the Leterg program, the part of the encryption they couldn’t crack, you were able to conceal the identities of the people to whom you sent the images.”

“But I wouldn’t even know how to install a Leterg program, let alone use one,” Tom said.

“It would appear that isn’t the case,” said Marvin. “But that’s not all.”

“What do you mean?”

“Money, Tom. According to the indictment, you were being paid for these images. And it’s been going on for quite some time. Three years or so. The timing links you to all the girls from Shilo. The D.A. is going to ask for your help in identifying the girls they can’t.”

“I’m assuming one of those girls is the one who sent me her picture,” Tom said.

“That’s right. They were able to pull the deleted image from your cell phone provider’s network. It hadn’t been purged yet. Her image was there. They didn’t find any others.”

“This is insane, Marvin. Please tell me you believe that I’m innocent of all this.”

“Remember what I said about professing your innocence to me?”

Tom nodded dully.

“The state looked into your finances, Tom. They’ve attached the records here. Did you know you have a bank account with over a hundred twenty thousand dollars in it?”

Tom’s mouth fell open. “I what?”

“It’ll take some time to untangle where the money came in from. But it looks like a lot of offshore accounts and shell businesses. It would appear you were very good at hiding the money trail.”

“A hundred twenty thousand dollars?” Tom buried his head in his hands. “Oh, Marvin. This sounds bad.”

“Well, like I said, that’s the evidence detailed in these discovery documents,” Marvin said, holding up the packet. “I mean, you don’t usually see this many pages for a capital murder case.”

“Do they have any sworn testimony?” Tom asked. “Has anybody questioned Lindsey yet?”

Marvin scanned through the pages, but his expression suggested that he already knew the answer. “They have,” he said, “ and she’s denied, in sworn testimony, ever having any sort of sexual relationship with you, or having made wanted or unwanted sexual advances toward you, and she denies claims that you made wanted or unwanted sexual advances toward her.”

“Well, so that’s good. We’ve got a case. If Lindsey denies it all under oath, it could throw the rest of the charges against me into a tailspin. That Leterg thing, those images, this money that I didn’t even know I had.”

Marvin frowned. He set down the indictment, picked up his pencil, and twirled it even faster. “I’m not sure a jury is going to care about a fifteen-year-old girl’s testimony,” Marvin said. “They’re going to see computer logs and other forensic archives that the D.A. will insist prove your guilt. I don’t know a single superior court judge who won’t give you the maximum sentence allowed if you’re convicted. Prison for sex offenders is an ugly place. Uglier still for child pornographers. That’s why I’m suggesting we plead. Maybe do a couple years, tops.”

“And live my life as a convicted sex offender? No thank you,” Tom said. “I can’t believe what you’re even suggesting. You’re my lawyer, Marvin. I’m innocent of all these charges!” Tom slammed his hand against Marvin’s conference table for emphasis.

Marvin didn’t flinch. “What is it you want me to do, Tom?” he asked.

Tom gave a pitiable laugh and threw his hands up in the air in a show of defeat. “You’re my lawyer, Marvin. What is it I want you to do? I want you to prove that I’m innocent, that’s what.”

“And if we lose? Are you ready to face that possibility?”

“We’re not going to lose,” Tom said. “Because you’re going to fight for me and we’re going to win. If it’s not Lange setting me up, then we need to figure out who else it could be. When I was a SEAL, I never went on a mission believing I was going to fail. I went knowing with every fiber in my being I was going to succeed. This is a battle I can’t lose, Marvin. I need to know that you’re going to fight for me. I need to know that you’ll take this all the way.”

Tom’s eyes narrowed on Marvin. The pencil spinning about Marvin’s fingers fell to the floor. Marvin held Tom’s hard-edged stare with his own unblinking eyes. Then he smiled.

“I was hoping you’d say that,” Marvin said.

Tom let go of the breath he’d been holding. “So what’s our next move?”

“Well, police brought the FBI into this case,” Marvin said.

“So?”

“So, I suggest that we do the same.”

The Shilo Wildcats won the Thursday night football game against Cumberland by a score of 37 to 17. Rainy Miles hadn’t come to watch football, though. She’d come to talk with Tanner Farnsworth.

After the game, she spotted Tanner in the parking lot, hanging out by a red Mustang.

Nice car, she thought.

Tanner was out of shoulder pads and into his street clothes. He was also surrounded by a group of a dozen or so other teenagers. As a collective, the group seemed to be competing with each other for top prize in the Most Uninterested Teen contest.

Dressed in dark jeans and a suede jacket, Tanner radiated the sort of magnetism that drew the girls’ glances and kept the boys hovering nearby. He was tall, well built, and handsome, coolly detached in a way that suggested he was the leader of this pack. Through her investigative work, Rainy had seen her fair share of boys like Tanner Farnsworth. One of them had passed around a naked picture of Melanie Smyth.

Rainy stepped out from the shadows and approached the group. Their expressions all said, “You’re not thinking of talking to us, lady.” But as she neared, that hostility dimmed as one by one they stopped paying attention to her. It was as if by tuning out this stranger, they had somehow become invisible to her. Of course they hadn’t. They just wanted to be.

“Are you Tanner Farnsworth?” Rainy asked. She tried to sound friendly, but years spent arresting people tainted most everything she said with a hint of menace. The other boys took a few cautious steps in retreat, leaving an island of space around her and Tanner. He was tall, and Rainy had to crane her neck to make eye contact.

“Who are you?” Tanner asked.

“Agent Loraine Miles. I’m with the FBI.”

Rainy flashed her badge and studied Tanner’s expression for any sign of a tell. Rapid blinking. Head turning. Eyes averting her gaze. A hand to the face, throat, or mouth, some reflexive gesture to scratch away the invisible itch of guilt. Tanner did none of those things. Even so, Rainy’s internal radar blinked out the word creep like a neon sign.

“Weren’t you at our school?” Tanner said.

Tanner produced a cocky smile that Rainy disliked intensely. It suggested that he recognized her as an adversary, and that awareness brought him a degree of pleasure.

“Yes, I was,” Rainy said. “I’d like to talk with you about Lindsey Wells.”

Tanner’s cocky armor began to crack. “What about her?” he asked.

Rainy had already sent a preservation request to Tanner’s cell phone provider. Any evidence against him would remain on the servers.

“Are you two dating?”

“We were,” Tanner said. “She dumped me. I guess she prefers older men.”

“When did she dump you?” Rainy asked.

“A couple days ago. Are you here to investigate why we broke up?” He smiled a wry, unpleasant grin. The boy’s arrogance was as repulsive to her as what she now believed he’d done with Lindsey’s pictures.