The Promise (38 page)

Chapter Sixty-
nine--Samantha

             
Thanks to Elie’s quick work on finding Samantha’s home address, Detective Michael Gallagher and Officer Simpson stood on the front porch of the Shields residence.

As the detective rang the doorbell he confided to his partner, “This girl should be totally surprised to see us. I instructed the people over at County to not allow Raven any phone calls.”

Simpson nodded as they heard the door opening and were greeted by a strikingly pretty teenage girl. “Yes?” She greeted them.

              “I’m Detective Gallagher of the Athens Police Department. This is Officer Simpson. We are looking for Samantha Shields.”

              The girl smiled slightly, “I’m Samantha.” She nervously added, “You’re from the police department?”

              Gallagher quickly reassured the girl, “We’re just here to follow up something on the Allison Taylor case and we just want to ask you a couple of questions, that’s all. No big deal.”

              “Okay,” she looked at them tentatively, “Um, do you want to come in?”

              “Sure, that would be fine. This should only take a few minutes, Samantha,” he responded as they entered her home.

              “Is it okay if my mom listens in, sir?”

              The detective smiled, “Absolutely.”

              As they got inside and were seated, Samantha went to find her mother and brought her back into the room with her. The mother was as tense as her daughter, “Has Samantha done anything wrong, officers?”

Gallagher shook his head, “Not at all, Mrs. Shields. We just have a few questions for her regarding the disappearance of Allison Taylor. We had some information that she might be able to aid our investigation.”

He turned to the young girl, “Samantha, do you remember where you were the day Allison Taylor disappeared at the University of Georgia?”

              The girl answered quickly, “Sure, I was up at the lake with my family.” Gallagher looked at her mother who nodded in assent with her daughter.

              “Okay, Samantha. How do you remember that you were at the lake that particular day?”

              She looked right at the detective as she answered, “Because we heard the news that night as soon as we got home. Plus, I got a phone,”

She suddenly stopped in mid-sentence as if she had said too much.

              But it was too late, Gallagher was alerted to her faux pas. “You got a phone call, from one of your friends?”

              The girl looked nervously at her mother as she stalled to answer. Finally, Mrs. Shields rescued her, “She got a phone call from Raven that the Taylor girl had been abducted.”

              This was interesting news to Gallagher since no one outside of the Taylor family and the police had heard of Allison’s vanishing until several days later.”
How did Raven know and who else knew?”

He proceeded to tie down the wording of that phone call from Raven, “Samantha, do you remember the wording Raven used when she told you the news? Did she say the word, ‘abducted’ or did she use another word?”

              No, Raven doesn’t talk that way. She said, ‘The bitch is gone. Long live the wicked bitch!’” She looked over meekly at her mom who winced at the language Samantha used in quoting Raven.

              “So, Raven seemed happy that something bad had happened to Allison Taylor?”

              Now, Samantha was on the spot.

She didn’t want to betray her friend, but she had already said too much so she couldn’t exactly extricate Raven or herself from the verbal dissing of Allison’s disappearance.

She tried diplomacy. “Mr. Gallagher, you have to understand, Raven and Allison didn’t like each other. So,”

              Gallagher nodded. “Yes, Samantha, we were aware of their feud. I guess it stems back to Allison and her,”

              Samantha interjected, “Yes, to Allison stealing Raven’s professor boyfriend over in England.”

              The detective’s eyes got wide on that revelation. He tried to remain nonchalant. “That’s correct, we have him on file, too.

That seems to have stirred things between them, huh. You know about all that, too?”

He was hoping the girl would take the bait.

She did.

              “Well, you would hate someone too, if she killed the guy you loved, right?”

As soon as she made the statement, she backtracked furiously off it, “I don’t mean, ‘killed’, that’s such a strong word, um, accidentally killed…”

              Now, Gallagher was listening carefully to every word the Shields girl was saying. He posed the question, “So, Raven thinks that Allison Taylor had something to do with the death of the professor?”

              Samantha’s face turned beet red.

She was now in the outer limits of revelation and was desperately trying to find a way back to anonymity.

There was no verbal exit, however. She had painted herself into a corner and Gallagher was making sure she was staying there until he got the rest of the answers from her.

Samantha bailed out as best she could, “You need to talk to Raven about it, sir. All I know is that she told me that Allison was supposed to give that guy his medicine and she didn’t and he died. I honestly don’t know anything else.

I don’t want to say anymore, okay?”

              As Gallagher saw the pleading look in the girl’s eyes he realized this interview needed to conclude pronto puppy.

He did his best to make the girl feel better, “Samantha, you are a very courageous girl and a true friend. Thank you for helping us out. You did your duty to your community and the police department appreciates it.”

He looked over at her mom, “Thank you, Mrs. Shields, for opening up your home to us. I hope we haven’t imposed too much on you today.”

              In a gracious voice, Shelley Shields arose, went over to her daughter and put her arm around her, “Anything we can do to help you, please let us know, Detective. It’s so sad about the Taylor girl. We hope you find her.”

              Gallagher turned and walked out the door with Simpson not far behind. As they got to the car, Samantha came running out to join them, “Raven won’t get in more trouble because of what I told you, will she?”

              The detective smiled as he reassured her, “If Raven tells the truth, she won’t get into any trouble. You can help her by encouraging in doing the right thing, Samantha.”

              “Mr. Gallagher, I just feel bad that Raven’s involved in this at all. It’s not her fault. It was her boyfriend who got her into this mess to begin with!”

              “Well, the professor, is dead now so, he’s no longer making things tough for Raven…”

              Samantha looked surprised, “Not that boyfriend, sir. The one who got her mixed up with Allison Taylor in the first place.”

              Now, it was Gallagher’s turn to be surprised, “Which boyfriend would that be Samantha?”
 

             
“The guy who Raven thinks cheated on her with Allison Taylor, Mr. Gallagher, that sleazy headmaster, Mr. Oden and he’s…!”

              “Samantha, you do realize that Malcolm Oden is dead, don’t you?”

              Samantha’s facial expression quickly turned to one of sheer terror.

Finally, she spoke, “Uh yes, of course. I have to go back inside now!”

              As the detective stood there absorbing this new piece of information, his mind suddenly wondered if two people that most people assumed were dead, Allison Taylor and Malcolm Oden, were in reality living happily ever after?

              As Gallagher started to get into his car, he noticed a MSNBC van sitting just around the corner. He quickly drove over to it and addressed the occupant, ”What in the hell are you doing? He demanded.

              The correspondent, a good-looking young man in his late 20’s smiled at him, “Just trying to help you solve the case, Gallagher. Who’s the young girl?”

              “She’s none of your damn business. Leave her alone!”

              “I’m just doing my job detective, have a nice day.” He smiled back.

              As he drove away, Gallagher had anything but a smile on his mind.

Chapter Seventy-the Mortician

             
As Gallagher entered the funeral home where Malcolm Oden’s body had been embalmed, he met the funeral director, Mr. John Lackey. He asked to speak to the mortician who had prepared the assistant headmaster’s cadaver for cremation.

“Hello. I’m Detective Gallagher of the Athens Police Department, homicide division. I need to speak to one of your employees, Mr. Sanders, concerning the…”

              “Al Sanders?” interrupted the director.

              “I assume so,” responded Gallagher, “He’s your embalmer, right?”

              “He was. Until we had to embalm him…”

              Gallagher looked at the man as shock waves went through his brain. “He’s dead?”

              “He is as dead as a man could be, yes. He was one of my best employees. He worked here for thirty-two years. He really knew his stuff, and how to stuff ‘em!”

He laughed at his own play on words.

              The detective wasn’t sure what to say next, “Yeah, it’s a shame. Was his death, uh, expected?”

              The funeral director shook his head, “Not exactly. It was kinda sudden. He drowned fishing accident.”

              Gallagher was incredulous. “He drowned?”

              Lackey misunderstood him, “Well, he was under water too long. You know the lungs can’t,”

              The detective was getting impatient, “I know how a person drowns. I’m asking you about the circumstances surrounding the accident. Did he just fall off a boat? Did he know how to swim?”

              “Sanders evidently lacked the skills of a swimmer. He was fishing on the lake and he was found the next morning, in the lake.”

              “How come I never heard about this?” asked Gallagher.

              “The accident happened in South Carolina, near his hometown. He was visiting his kids and he snuck out one day to get some blue gill and that was that.”