homicide, and it’s still unsolved.”
“So was she drowned?”
“Looks like. Knocked on the head first, right on top of the noggin, too. Not an injury she could have easily given herself.”
“Did your brother know her well enough to talk to us?”
“I’m sure he did. It’s not a huge school, you know. Want me to give him a ring? He’s a deputy now, too, and he’s on shift.”
“Please. That would be great.”
He picked up the phone, asked for Shay Simmons to call in. Within a few minutes, the phone rang.
“Shay, it’s Steve. Can you swing in my office for a minute? Got a coupla detectives from Nashville want to talk to you about LaTara Bender. Okay, thanks.” He hung up.
“He’ll be here in five.”
“Fabulous. Thank you. So, while we’re waiting, what kind of stuff had LaTara been getting into?”
“You know how it is in these small towns, Detective. Some of them want to break free, some are mired in worlds of their own making. LaTara was one of the latter. If you want my opinion, that girl never had a chance. I wasn’t surprised to find her dead. For a while we thought it was just a sad accident, like I said. When we found out she’d been murdered, well…it’s hard for these girls. They get themselves into drugs and spiral out of control.”
“And there was classical music playing at the scene when you arrived?”
Simmons looked at her, a frown creasing his forehead. “Yes, there was. We didn’t think much of it at the time. It was another bone of contention with the family-LaTara’s mother said they didn’t have any classical music, wasn’t her kind of thing. There was a CD playing on the stereo in LaTara’s bedroom.”
“Do you know what it was?”
“It’s in the files, I’m sure. Can’t say I recall off the top of my head.”
A soft knock made them all turn and look at the door. A younger version of Simmons filled the doorway. Taylor laughed to herself. These corn-fed farm boys were huge.
“Shay, come on in,” Simmons said. The younger man entered the office and gave his brother a handshake. Taylor could tell they were close.
“Shay, this is Detective Taylor Jackson and Detective Renn McKenzie. They’re investigating a series of murders in Nashville, want to hear about LaTara. Can you tell them what you remember?”
The younger Simmons’ face colored. “Poor LaTara. That girl…such a sad case. She got into drugs, started staying out all night. Stopped going to church, stopped coming to school. By the time we graduated, she was turning tricks. She had a hard life-her uncle raped her when she was seven or eight, and she had to testify against him. It was all done by video, but still, it was a horrible situation. She used to talk about it, how scared she was sitting in the judge’s office. She never really got over it.”
“It sounds like you knew her well.”
“Not that so much as I tried to help her. She was a scared mouse in school, you know the kind. Jumping at shadows. But she got into drugs, and once that happened, there was nothing I could do for her. Mostly prescription stuff in school, some pot and meth, too, though I’m sure she moved on to the harder drugs once she dropped out.”
The sheriff spoke. “We found a prescription for methadone at the scene. Seems she was trying to turn over a new leaf. She hadn’t entirely cleaned herself up, her tox screen showed opiates. It was consistent with what we knew about her lifestyle. It was just such a damn shame, seeing a sweet girl go down that road.”
“Deputy Simmons, is there anything else you know about her? Who she was hanging around with? A boyfriend? Did she have a pimp, a dealer that you remember? Was she close to anyone? Have any enemies?”
He thought for a minute. “There wasn’t anything like that. I can’t recall her having a boyfriend. There was one guy who hung around her, this skinny kid. Oh, what was his name? I can’t remember, I’ll have to go look through the yearbook. Otherwise, it was just on the sly. Her momma was strict, I do know that. But it broke her when LaTara died.”
“Is her mother still around?”
“Sure. Lives in the same house where LaTara passed. Bless her heart.” He looked at his brother. “Listen, I’ve got to go, I need to get back out on the road. Bubba’s covering for me, he’s ready for lunch.”
The sheriff got to his feet, signaled to his brother. “Get on out of here. I’ll see you at dinner. Judy’s making pot roast. Thanks for coming in.” They slapped each other on the back briefly.
The sheriff gestured to the files on his desk, caught Taylor’s eye. “Besides, we’re waxing poetic here. Y’all need to go through the files. We’re going to step out, let you get up to speed, then I’ll answer any more questions you might have. Got a good old boy in the drunk tank that needs springing. Just shout down to Debbie if you need me.”
“I appreciate it, Sheriff. Deputy Simmons.” They all shook hands again, then the two men sauntered off down the hall, one of them whistling.
Taylor settled into the chair, pulled the top file toward her, pushed the second in the stack at McKenzie. “Let’s get started.”
It only took half an hour to get through the meager files. According to the reports, LaTara was discovered by her mother, Marie Bender, who allegedly dragged her daughter’s body out of the tub, then called 911. The scene had been disturbed, no doubt about it. A CD of Vivaldi’s Four Seasons was in the stereo, the repeat button pressed so “Winter” played over and over. No one knew what the significance was, so they’d printed it, gotten nothing off it, and placed it into evidence. Taylor wasn’t entirely sure what the significance was either, but the simple fact that it was there, so out of place in the Bender household, stood out starkly. That, and it matched the tentative M.O. they had from the Love Circle crime scene.
McKenzie traded files with her silently.
After a few moments, Taylor said, “There’s only one big thing that’s leaping out at me.”
“What’s that? The head injury?”
“No, that’s not it. LaTara had been bludgeoned, causing the skull fracture, then drowned in the bathtub. There were signs that she’d had sex recently, but no trace of semen had been found. Granted, she was lying in a tub of bathwater. I can’t imagine they did a rape kit and looked for DNA. Why would they? It didn’t look like a sexual assault, plus the victim was known to be engaged in illegal activities. This was a small town’s investigation-autopsy done in Nashville, evidence passed along to the TBI for analysis-for the most part, obvious answers fit the crime. Standard forensic work had been done. The case was handled just fine, only without a final resolution.”
“So what’s jumping out at you?”
“According to the crime-scene reports, there was a large area of damp carpet outside the bathroom door.”
She gave McKenzie a moment to process. She saw the lightbulb go off a few moments later. She bit back a smile.
“You think he killed her, then took her out of the tub and had sex with her.”
“It’s a possibility. Assuming we’re dealing with the same killer, it fits. I don’t know if that’s the case. We need to find out if the mother dragged the girl’s body into the bedroom, or if that event was confined to the bath. If it was, we’ve got something to go on.”
She made a note to ask the sheriff about it. All kinds of ideas were running through her head. Was it the mother, or an EMT, who splashed water on the carpet? Or was it something more nefarious? Because knowing the M.O. of her killer, the postmortem sex scenario made perfect sense.
Simmons popped his head back into his office. “Need anything?” he asked.
Taylor grabbed the sheet she’d been reading from. “Actually, yes. Perfect timing. Do you remember the wet carpet outside the bathroom door?”
“Let me see.” She handed him the report. He looked it over, then got a faraway look in his eye and rubbed his meaty chin, like it would help him remember.
“You know, I do. Seems her mama pulled her from the tub. That bathroom’s not so big, I’d assume it was splash from the tub’s water. At least, we did at the time. It was about two feet from the bathroom door, just to the right of LaTara’s bed. Why do you ask? It mean something to you?”
“I hate to even be thinking it, but if this is the same killer, we need to look at all the possibilities. You never tested LaTara for semen, correct?”
