The Competition (12 page)

Wednesday morning, October 9

Morning, as usual,
came too early for me. I had to fly through my shower and jump into the first thing I saw in my closet. Not Graden. Graden woke up at the crack of dawn as a matter of habit as well as choice. Probably his only obnoxious trait. When I went out to the living room, I found him reading the paper and drinking coffee.

He looked up and smiled. “Morning, sunshine. I don’t think you have time to order breakfast.”

“No.” I sighed, poured myself a large mug of coffee, and tried to slug down as much of it as possible.

He looked me over, noticing my outfit. “I take it you won’t need to be in court today.”

I was wearing black jeans and an ivory turtleneck sweater. “Nope. We’ll be out doing interviews, and I don’t want to freeze.”

Graden smirked. “Yeah, it could get down to sixty degrees. Better wear your snow boots.”

I threw my napkin at him, then walked over to the hall closet and pulled out my down puffer coat. Graden walked over and put his hands on my shoulders. “Listen, I need you to be very careful. Those kids are crazy—”

“No, not crazy. Personality disordered—”

“Whatever. Which makes them unpredictable. No one knows where or when they’ll surface. And remember, they still have guns.”

I opened my purse and pulled out my .38 Smith and Wesson. “But I’m a better shot, and I’m a little crazy myself.”

“A little.” Graden smiled and kissed me.

When I got downstairs, Bailey was parked at the front entrance and chatting with Angel. “Mind if we stop and get some coffee?” I said. I hadn’t had my two-cup daily dose.

Bailey pointed to a bag in the front passenger seat. “Got ya covered. Even brought bagels.”

I grabbed my coffee from the cup holder and took a sip, then rummaged through the bag. Coffee, bagels…even cream cheese? This kind of service I never got. Not from Bailey. “Okay, where’s the catch? What do you want?”

“Nothing. Friends buy friends breakfast, don’t they?”

“No.”

“But now that you mention it, we really should check in with Dorian. Let her know we didn’t preserve Otis’s laptop for her.”

See? “So let me get this straight. I’m supposed to incur the wrath of Dorian for a measly coffee and bagel?”

“And cream cheese. And there’s some jam in there too.”

I put in the call and got lucky: Dorian’s voice mail. I pumped a fist and gave Bailey a triumphant smile. Then I checked my own voice mail. There were fifty-seven messages. I listened to the first one. The producer of channel nine news was asking for comment on the search at the Jarvis residence. The next four were the same. I didn’t bother to listen to the rest, or wonder how the press got my cell phone number. They’d gotten it during the Antonovich case too. I made a mental note to change my number. Again. Northbound traffic wasn’t bad. By ten to eight, Bailey was pulling into the faculty parking lot at Robert S. Taft High School. Located on Ventura Boulevard—the busiest thoroughfare in the Valley—Taft wasn’t as big or as fancy as Fairmont High. It had that ’60s square-box, plain-wrap look. Also unlike Fairmont, it wasn’t an enclosed building. It was your typical Southern California school, with classrooms accessible from outdoor hallways.

A secretary directed us to the classroom that had been set aside for our interviews. The door had been propped open, and the room was downright frosty. Even Bailey rubbed her hands together and zipped up her jacket. The other problem was that the only furniture in the room was a few desks. The kind that are attached to chairs. If we sat at those desks, it would put a physical barrier between us and the students. We needed the kids to relax and open up.

“I guess we could sit on the floor, hippie-style,” I said.

Bailey shook her head. “A little too casual. We need to maintain some authority.” She pulled a couple of desk-chairs to the front of the room and sat on the desk. I followed suit.

Seconds later, a teenage boy with shoulder-length blonde hair poked his head in through the open doorway. “Are you the cop—I mean, officers we’re supposed to talk to?”

Bailey put on her warm interview smile and gestured for him to come in. “Make yourself comfortable,” she said.

He slid into the chair facing us and stretched out his legs. They stuck out past the edge of the desk by about a foot. His name was Kenny Epstein, and he’d known Logan since junior high. I asked if they were good friends.

Kenny shrugged. “We weren’t super close or anything, but we were friendly. We’d shoot the shit—uh, sorry.”

I waved him off. Yo, me and Bailey, we were the cool cops.

Kenny gave a nervous smile and continued. “Logan was always the smartest guy in the room. A real brainiac. But not a nerd or anything. Pretty much everyone liked him—”

“Would you say he was popular?” I asked.

Kenny tossed his head, flicked back his overgrown bangs. “He didn’t party a lot or anything. He wasn’t Joe Social. He was kind of the quiet type, you know? But he was a good guy.”

“Did you ever hear of him getting bullied or pushed around by the jocks?” Bailey asked.

“Logan? Nah.”

“Do you know Otis Barney?” I continued.

“Pasty little dude?”

Pasty. I pictured the face I’d seen in photographs in the Barney house. I guess he was sort of pale. “Yeah. A little bit shorter than you, medium build. Curly brown hair.”

“Yeah. Not real well, but I remember seeing him around.” Kenny paused and frowned. “You asked about bullying. I think that guy got knocked around by some punk on the football team. And I heard someone once threw his books in the toilet.” Kenny shook his head disapprovingly. “I don’t get shit like that. He never bothered anybody, so why mess with him?”

“When was the last time you saw him?” I asked.

“No clue. Like I said, I didn’t really know Otis. Just saw him around school.”

“What about Logan? When was the last time you saw him?”

“I don’t know, maybe a week ago?” Kenny dropped his gaze to the floor.

“Not since the shooting?” I asked.

Kenny shook his head. “But there’s lots of kids I haven’t seen since…” His eyes slid away, and a long moment passed as Bailey and I gave him a chance to recover. Then he looked at me with worried eyes. “I heard you guys are saying Logan’s one of the shooters. Is Otis the other one?”

Bailey gave him her poker face. “We’re just looking into everyone who hasn’t been accounted for.”

Kenny sat up in his chair and folded his arms. “I don’t know about that Barney guy, but Logan couldn’t have done it.”

“Why’s that?”

“Because…Logan never got mad…at anybody. Never talked shit about anybody or anything. It just makes no sense.”

I asked him the standard shrink questions: did he know anyone who did “talk shit” about wanting to kill people or feeling persecuted? Kenny didn’t. Just the usual “my ‘fill in the blank’ sucks.”

“Did you know Logan’s brother, Luke?”

Kenny’s eyebrows went up. “I didn’t even know he had a brother.”

“Do you know who hung out with Logan?”

“Darnell, Leo, I think Caleb.” Kenny shrugged. “That’s all I can think of.”

“So not Otis?”

“Not that I ever saw.”

I got the last names and descriptions of the friends he’d mentioned and then had him tell me what he remembered of the shooting.

“I, like, dived under my seat.” He described the gunfire, the remark one of the shooters had made about jocks, the horror of it all, but he had nothing new.

The next few interviews got us more of the same: Logan was a great guy, never got bullied that anyone knew of, and had never had a problem with jocks—or anyone else. A couple of others confirmed the tattoo and that it was a recent acquisition—within the past month or two.

They also confirmed that Otis was a strange guy who did get bounced around by at least one of the football jocks—Bryan Scofield—but Otis had never seemed like the violent type. I probed to find some connection between Otis and Logan, but no one had any recollection of seeing them together. At least not until we got to Caleb.

If anyone still wore a pocket protector, Caleb would be that guy. He was on the short side, but even so, his pants were floods. He had wavy hair that refused to stay in its side part and constantly fell into his eyes, and black-framed glasses. He’d known Logan since third grade and they’d bonded over their mutual love of math. This I could not relate to. Math was the reason I chose law school—lots of reading, no numbers. In spite of that, Caleb was a nice kid. Shy, quiet, but not abnormally so. Predictably, he was a Logan fan. But he’d also seen some dark spots on the halo of St. Logan.

“Back in junior high we studied together and stuff. But by around our sophomore year at Fairmont he got kind of…moody. Sometimes he’d just pop off at me for no reason.”

“Did he ever get violent? Hit you?” I asked.

“No, no. Nothing like that. He’d just be…upset.”

“About?” I asked.

“Nothing in particular. At least not that I could tell. He’d just get withdrawn and…down.”

It sounded like depression. But it also sounded like typical teen hormones and angst. “Do you know Otis Barney?” I asked.

Caleb wrinkled his nose and pushed his bangs back. “Yeah.”

“And?” I asked. “What do you know about him?”

“Nothing really. Just that he’s kind of weird.” Caleb made a face. “And kind of pathetic. I just saw him a couple of weeks ago. Logan and I were talking in the parking lot. He walked up and just interrupted us. Started telling Logan they had to get going. He acted like I wasn’t even there.”

“Did Logan say anything to him?” I asked. “Get mad?”

“No. Just told him to wait a sec.”

“But you never knew them to be friendly before?” I asked.

“Well, like I said, I didn’t see all that much of Logan recently, so they could’ve gotten to be buds without me knowing about it.”

“Was that your only contact with Otis?” I asked.

“Pretty much. Other than seeing him around school.”

We kept at it for another ten minutes or so, but didn’t get anything more. Still, we’d found another link between Otis and Logan. Progress.

Bailey glanced at her watch, then looked outside. “We’ve got three more kids out there. We can either tell them to come back and get lunch or power through.”

“I vote we power through.” After our mini-breakthrough with Caleb, I hoped we were on a roll.

Logan didn’t have
a big crew, but he was a social butterfly compared to Otis. Interestingly, whereas Logan’s fans had all been male, the only two kids who claimed to know Otis were girls.

Chloe had a head full of curls and a round, rosy face. Given that look, I expected a high-pitched Kewpie doll of a voice, but I was surprised to find it was rich and mellow. I bet she could sing. We made our introductions, and Chloe sat down in the chair and put her fringed purse on the floor. The desk didn’t leave much room, but she somehow managed to cross her jean-covered legs and tuck her hands between her knees.

“I’ve known Otis since our freshman year. He was so sweet.”

“Was?” I asked. “He changed?”

Chloe nodded, making her curls bounce. “When we started at Fairmont, we were all a little scared. You know, big school, we were freshmen, and we’d all heard the stories about what they did to freshmen…” Chloe had a wistful smile. “Otis was in my homeroom, and on our first day, he admitted he was scared. We sort of bonded over that, you know? So we got to be friends. Not, you know, hangout friends or anything, just school friends. But he could make me laugh about almost anything.” The wistful smile grew bigger with the memory. “The teachers, the other kids. He got me through my freshman year.”

“Did he make you laugh about the jocks?” I asked.

“All the time.” Chole’s smile suddenly faded. It made the room seem darker. “I guess they must’ve found out somehow, because one of them, this asshole—” Her eyes grew wide, and she clapped her hand over her mouth.

I waved her off. “I believe in calling an asshole an asshole. What’s his other name?”

A glimmer of a smile from Chloe, and then she sobered again. “Bryan…something. He threw Otis’s books in the toilet. And I heard he knocked Otis down a couple of times too.”

“But you never saw it?” I asked. Chloe shook her head. “Did Otis tell you about it?”

“Never. I think he was ashamed to. When I heard what had happened, I tried to get him to report it, but he wouldn’t even talk about it. He’d just change the subject.” Chloe’s sad eyes got to me.

“Did you and Otis stay friends after your freshman year?” I asked.

“Not as much, but somewhat. Yeah.”

“Did he talk to you about the jocks this year?” I asked.

“No. So maybe they weren’t hassling him anymore.”

“Do you know Logan Jarvis?” I asked.

“No.” Chloe frowned. “I mean, I’ve seen him around, but I don’t actually, like, know him.”

“Did you ever see Otis with Logan?”

“No.” She looked from me to Bailey. “But I heard you think Logan might be one of…them.” I nodded. “Are you thinking Otis is the other one?” I didn’t answer right away. “Because I can tell you he isn’t. Otis couldn’t hurt anybody. Ever.”

“Did you see him the day of the shooting?”

Chloe turned her head to the side and stared at the wall for a few moments. “I think I did. I think I saw him coming up the front steps that morning because we said hey.” She paused, then continued. “Yeah, I’m almost sure of it.”

“Was that the last time you saw him?” I asked.

Chloe’s eyes dropped down to her lap. She nodded.

“Chloe, did Otis ever talk about getting revenge against anyone?” I asked.

“No!” Chloe leaned forward, her expression earnest. “Otis was the most nonviolent person I’ve ever met. I know people told you he’s kinda weird, and he is. But if anyone’s telling you he could’ve done something like this, they’re full of it! Believe me, I knew him for real. There’s no way!”

And the next girl—Suzanne Eckman—echoed virtually all the same sentiments about Otis.

We went through our list of shrink questions with both of them. They had no recollection of anyone who fit the profile.

Our last interview was with another of the friends mentioned by Logan’s mother.

Evan Cutter had a military-style buzz cut and the kind of lean frame and ropy muscling you usually see on wrestlers. But he had none of the swagger that usually goes with the type. He shuffled in with slumped shoulders and barely met our eyes. I introduced myself and put out my hand. He held it loosely for the barest of seconds, dipped his head, and plunked down in the chair.

We asked the usual preliminary questions about how long he’d known Logan and how they’d met: one year, in gym class. It was a perfect segue.

“Did the jocks ever give Logan a hard time?” I asked.

“Not that I ever saw.”

“If they had, do you think he would’ve told you?” I asked.

Evan shrugged. “I’d hope so.”

“You wrestle?” I asked.

“I used to. But I got bored after a while. Plus, I needed the time to study. I’m not a brainiac like…Logan.” At the mention of his friend’s name, his face tightened, and I thought he was about to cry. But he swallowed hard and cleared his throat. Crisis averted.

“Do you know Otis Barney?”

Evan’s lips twisted. “Yeah, he’s a loser. He tried to buddy up to Logan this year. Kept hanging around, trying to get Logan to do stuff with him.”

“Did it work?” I asked.

“Kinda, yeah. Logan said they hung out a couple of times. Probably my fault. I don’t have as much free time as I used to. I got a job over the summer. Pizza delivery for New York’s Finest.”

So he blamed Otis for pushing Logan down the wrong path. And himself for not having time for Logan anymore. “Then you and Logan were pretty tight—at least at one time?”

“Yeah. I mean, I wouldn’t say ‘best’ friends, but we hung out.”

“Did you ever know Logan to be violent?” I asked. “Or have a temper?”

“He didn’t used to. But more and more he seemed kind of…I don’t know, edgy? Everything seemed to bug him.” He paused, his expression troubled. “And, yeah, he lost his temper a couple of times.”

“What would set him off?” I asked.

Evan shook his head. “That’s what was so weird. Nothing big. An A minus in calculus, a stain on his shirt. Stupid stuff.”

“Did you ever hear him threaten anyone?” Bailey asked.

“Not specifically. He’d just hate on everything. Probably why I didn’t take it seriously. I mean, he wasn’t going to try and take out the whole world, right?” I said nothing. Evan huffed. “Come on. Seriously? He was just venting. Look, I heard the press conference, so I know what you think, but there’s no way he did this.”

“Did he ever talk about guns?” I asked.

“Not that I ever knew.”

“What about Otis Barney?” I asked. “Did he ever mention wanting to get guns, or being able to get them?”

“Specifically, did he say he was going to buy a gun? No. But that kid, I’d put money on it. Isn’t he the typical kind of loser jerk who needs to have a gun to feel tough?”

“You tell me,” I said. “Is he?”

“Yeah. I wouldn’t be surprised if that kid had a whole arsenal stashed somewhere.”

I was getting the distinct impression Evan was not an Otis fan.

“Where were you when the shooting happened?” Bailey asked.

“In the gym.”

We asked what he’d seen and heard, but like many others, he’d ducked under a bench when the first shots were fired. He couldn’t tell us anything we hadn’t heard at least fifty times before.

“Did you see Otis or Logan the day of the shooting?” I asked.

“No. I wish I had.”

“Because you would’ve stopped it?”

“I would’ve tried.” Evan’s knee began to bounce. “And I’m not saying I believe Logan’s involved. I don’t. I’m just saying…I…whatever.” He stared at the floor.

“Let me go back to something you mentioned before,” I said. “You said Logan had more free time than you. That maybe that was why he got friendly with Otis.” Evan nodded. “According to Logan’s mother, he had a job too,” I said. “And he was working lots of hours.”

“But not all the time, at least not from what I remember.”

“What about in the past few weeks?”

Evan shrugged. “I don’t know. I’ve been pretty busy myself.”

Logan’s job at the mall was on the to-do list we’d given the unis. It’d be easy enough to check out.

We wrapped up with the usual shrink questions. And got the usual answers. We let Evan go. He shuffled out looking fairly miserable.

I was feeling the same way. “How come the only guy anyone remembers talking shit like the shrinkers described is the guy who’s hooked up to an IV in the hospital?” I asked.

“To be fair, they warned us these shooter types come in all shapes and sizes.”

“True.”

“Our next interview’s waiting for us in the main office.” She pulled out her notepad. “Otis’s English teacher. Arthur Windemere.”