What Janie Saw. Pamela Tracy

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СКАЧАТЬ he’s almost nineteen, legal age. Outside of kicking him out, what could we do?” Mrs. Chaney sounded more like she was talking to herself than to them.

      “Jimmy, our oldest boy,” Mr. Chaney said, taking over, “was worried too. He came home from his job in California at least once a month so we could do something as a family over the weekend. We’d hoped things were changing. Last year, for a while, it was like we had the old Derek back. Then, at the beginning of fall semester, it all went wrong again. He started staying out all night, missing school, taking money without permission.”

      The Chaneys were doing what most parents did in this type of situation—not so much trying to convince Rafe that they were caring parents, but trying to assure themselves.

      “Derek had so much potential,” Janie said. “His art was riveting, daring. I could see the artist he could be. If there’d only been more time.”

      Mrs. Chaney nodded, her eyes filling with tears.

      “Would Jimmy possibly know who Derek was hanging around with?” Rafe pressed.

      “We asked him. He gave us two or three names, but they were kids Derek had hung around with before leaving high school.” Mrs. Chaney shot her husband a guarded look. Rafe waited.

      “Jimmy and Derek didn’t spend much time together,” Mrs. Chaney admitted, “unless we were doing family things.”

      “Why is that?” Rafe asked.

      “There’s a ten-year difference in their ages,” Mr. Chaney said. “And we adopted Derek. He’s my brother’s son. By the time the boys got comfortable with each other, Jimmy was heading off to college.”

      “Jimmy’s going to be a doctor,” Judy added. “He has little tolerance for anyone he suspects of dabbling in drugs.”

      Rafe wanted to jump on that comment, but the kid had just died in a meth explosion. He could read about Derek and drugs in Nathan’s report without putting the Chaneys through more grief.

      “What were the circumstances of the adoption?”

      “Derek’s mom is in prison. She’s not in the picture and she won’t be getting out anytime soon. My brother passed away when Derek was six.”

      Rafe noticed Janie walking over to the picture, staring at Derek, and looking incredibly sad. She’d been taken in by relatives, too, Rafe remembered.

      It hadn’t gone well, either.

      “So none of Derek’s issues can be directly related to his birth parents?” Rafe asked. “Maybe something to do with his mother?”

      “No, we’ve had him since he was eight. For the two years after his dad’s death, he was pretty much neglected by his mother. Besides, if any of his mother’s friends came looking for him, they wouldn’t know to search for him under our last name. Once we got his anger issues under control, he fit right in. We were thrilled. We’d wanted five of our own.”

      The Chaneys were good people. They were doing what innocent people did, sharing everything, trying to be helpful, wanting to understand how things could go so wrong.

      “He didn’t realize how good he had it,” Janie whispered.

      Rafe thought the same about many of the juvenile delinquent cases he handled.

      Getting back on task, though, he said, “There’s a chance that Derek had information about another case we’re working on. On the phone, you said you’d let us go through Derek’s room?”

      “Of course,” Mrs. Chaney said. “We will do all we can to help the police so some other kid doesn’t become a victim like Derek.”

      Mr. Chaney ushered them up the stairs and opened the door into a room almost the size of the living room. “My wife can’t bear to see all this,” he said. “It’s exactly the way Derek left it.”

      A mess, typical teenager. The bed was unmade, the floor littered with clothes and books and video games. A flat-screen television was against one wall. Shelves of books were on two others. A whole row was designated for textbooks. Rafe noticed math, sociology and lots of English. Well, that made sense. According to Janie, Derek also had a gift for writing. Posters, of bands Rafe didn’t recognize, graced the wall.

      “He used to be a reader,” Mr. Chaney said. “Up until about eighth grade.”

      “What happened?” Janie asked softly.

      “First sports, then girls,” Mr. Chaney said. “They wouldn’t leave him alone. Once he got to high school, it was a strange herd of friends.”

      There were no photographs in the room, but lots and lots of drawings. Derek seemed to be enthralled by dark castles, fire-breathing dragons and fierce warriors.

      “I’d better go check on my wife,” Mr. Chaney said.

      Janie walked into the room, not a bit put off by the mess. She rubbed her shoulders as if cold, but it wasn’t a chill in the air that made her uncomfortable. It was more likely a chill in her heart. He felt it, too.

      “I should have tried harder with that boy,” she murmured.

      “You did make an effort,” Rafe reminded her.

      “Not enough of one. Sometimes a teacher is the only one who can make a difference, see beneath the grime.”

      Rafe wondered if a teacher had been there for her, back in her muddled childhood. She’d made it clear that cops hadn’t been. Somehow knowing that made him want to change her mind. Not only about cops in general, but about him specifically.

      But they were losing precious time, so he asked, “Do you see the art book?”

      “Not yet.” Janie walked to the middle of the room, sidestepping a pair of jeans and a skateboard. She turned in a circle, first with her eyes open and then with them closed. After a moment, she headed for a desk.

      “The desk is too neat,” she explained. “Nothing else in this room is neat.” She briefly touched the computer’s mouse and lifted the pad. Then, she opened the only drawer.

      Nothing.

      Watching her, Rafe was again struck by her attention to detail. She was doing what he usually did, had been trained to do, and she was doing it by instinct.

      Janie next checked under the bed. He’d already done that and found nothing unusual.

      But she pulled out one tennis shoe. “This isn’t his.”

      Rafe looked at it: dull brown and somewhat new. “How can you be sure?”

      “Derek would never wear this color.”

      “What color is it, exactly?”

      Janie gaped at him in disbelief. “It’s green.”

      Rafe wasn’t one for sharing what he didn’t consider a disability. But, in this case, it might make a difference in what she could see and what he couldn’t.

      “I’m СКАЧАТЬ