Shadow of Doubt (A Kali O'Brien legal mystery) by Jonnie Jacobs Read Free Book Online

“Yeah, I guess I did.”
    I backtracked and began questioning her in more detail about the shopping trip. An airtight alibi is always a good defense. Unfortunately, we weren’t even close. “I’ll check it through, just in case,” I told her. “Maybe I can find someone who remembers seeing you that afternoon.”
    She nodded mutely, as though her mind were a hundred miles away. I wondered which was worse, losing a husband or being accused of his murder.
    “Did Eddie seem worried about anything the last couple weeks? Distracted, upset, anything at all unusual?” She thought a moment “Not really. Eddie’s always going a couple of different directions at once. It’s just his way.”
    “Friday night at the party he mentioned something to me about needing a lawyer. Do you have any idea what it was about?”
    Jannine thought some more, twisting her wedding band with her right hand. “Not unless it was about The Mine Shaft. Eddie and his sister inherited an interest in the place when their father died. Their uncle wanted to buy them out; Eddie didn’t want to sell. It got real ugly there for awhile, but I think everything was pretty much settled. You’d have to ask Susie about the details though. Eddie didn’t talk business with me.”
    I’d about run out of questions, and I sensed Jannine had about run out of energy. There were a couple more things I needed though. “Does Eddie have a desk or someplace where he keeps phone numbers, business records, that sort of thing?”
    “Just this sort of table and file cabinet off the bedroom. You want to see it?”
    I nodded.
    The table was old — scratched and nicked and a little wobbly, but everything on it was neatly arranged in canisters and plastic bins. The file cabinet was the same. There were folders for tax records, insurance, car maintenance, and such — every one of them carefully labeled.
    “I’m the messy one,” Jannine said. “My drawers look like the aftermath of a hurricane; Eddie’s are neat as a pin. You should see the way he folds his socks.” A shadow crossed her face. “Folded them, I mean.”
    “I know it’s going to be hard, but I’d like you to go through Eddie’s papers — checks, receipts, phone records, that kind of thing. There might be something there that would help us. I’ll come back later and work with you, if you’d like.”
    “That’s okay. I think I can do it.” Her voice was flat and quiet. “I’m going to have to go through everything sooner or later anyway.”
    The phone rang just then, and while Jannine went to answer it, I made a few quick notes to myself.
    “That was Jack Peterson,” she said when she returned. “Remember him? Only it was Mr. Peterson in those days. He’s principal now and kind of like Eddie’s mentor. I tried to make it quick, but he’s been so good to us I couldn’t very well hang up on him.”
    Mr. Peterson had been hired in the middle of our sophomore year when Miss Locke, the typing teacher, ran off with the father of one of her students. I’d never had him as a teacher myself, having been labeled somewhere in the early grades as one of those students better suited to Latin and chemistry than business courses, but I had a vague recollection of a thin, pale young man who sported bow ties in a town where most of the teachers wore jeans.
    “He’s moved around quite a bit,” Jannine continued, “only came back here about three years ago. He’s in line to run for state assembly in the next election.”
    “He’s done quite well by himself, hasn’t he?”
    She nodded. “Of course, he did it the easy way. His wife has money and a long history of political connections. She was one of those dutiful daughters who never left home until her parents died. That was only a couple of years ago. Jack Peterson’s star has risen rapidly since the marriage.”
    “Does he still wear those silly bow ties?”
    She smiled. “And stiffly starched shirts. He and Marlene would have been at the