“Your room is all right?” he asked.
“The room’s fine,” Mel assured him.
A waitress showed up, order pad at the ready. “They’ll have coffee,” Ross said, without bothering to ask our opinion. “Bring us one of those big pots. When we’re ready to order lunch, I’ll let you know.”
Nodding, the waitress went away. She was back a minute or so later with an insulated carafe of coffee.
“Cream and sugar?” she asked, pouring into the cups in front of us.
“Black,” Mel and I answered together.
“Okay,” she said, and went away, leaving us alone.
The moment she was gone, Ross reached into his pocket. He pulled out an iPhone, tinkered with it for a moment, and then set it in front of Mel. “I need you to watch this video
Mel watched. The sound was turned off. There was no way to tell what was happening on the tiny screen, but from watching the subtle shifts in Mel’s features-the tightening of the muscles on her jawbone, the sudden iciness in her eyes, the paleness of her cheeks-I knew whatever it was wasn’t good.
When the video ended, she turned on Ross. “Is this real?” she demanded.
He nodded. “I think so.”
Without another word, Mel punched what must have been the replay button and pushed the phone over to me. There was a girl on the screen. She looked to be fourteen or fifteen, maybe, straight teeth, dark wavy hair, a blue scarf tied around her neck. She smiled for the camera-a nice smile; a shy smile-as though she was a little nervous about being there. Then two disembodied hands appeared on the screen. Each hand grasped one end of the scarf, and they began to pull. For a moment the girl was docile, as though this was something she expected and might even have welcomed. I had heard of the choking game before. I realized this wasn’t a game about the same time the girl did. She began to claw at the scarf and try to loosen its hold on her neck. She surged to her feet, struggling. The camera’s focus moved with her, staying on her face, keeping the bodies and faces that belonged to the hands pulling on the scarf safely out of the camera’s view.
I watched it all the way to the end. When it was over, I knew the girl was dead. I also understood why Ross hadn’t ordered any food. I felt as sick to my stomach as Mel Soames looked.
“Snuff film,” I said unnecessarily. “Who is she?”
Ross shook his head. “No idea who she is or where she’s from.”
“But there are three people involved in the homicide,” Mel said. “Two guys pulling the scarf and one guy running the camera.”
“Right,” Ross said. “Three.”
“So if you don’t know who she is or where she’s from, how come this is our case?” I asked.
Ross looked uncomfortable as he collected the iPhone and stuffed it back into his pocket.
“Governor Longmire brought it over to my office and dropped it off earlier this morning,” he said. “It’s the governor’s husband’s grandson’s phone. He’s fifteen.”
“Do you think he’s involved?” Mel asked.
Ross shook his head. “No way of knowing. His name is Josh Deeson. The kid could be one of the hands pulling the ends of the scarf or he could be the guy with the camera. It’s also possible that he’s entirely innocent. His mother, the governor’s stepdaughter, is deceased. From what I can tell, she was pretty much of a loser who overdosed on meth two years ago. The father was declared unfit, and the courts awarded custody to the boy’s maternal grandfather, Gerard Willis, who happens to be married to Governor Longmire and who also happens to have undergone quadruple bypass surgery just last week.”
“I remember reading something about the governor’s husband going in for surgery, but I don’t recall anything about his daughter’s death being drug-related.”
“There are still a few things that aren’t fit to print-if you have enough pull, that is,” Ross said. “The version of the daughter’s death that went out to the media was that she died of an accidental overdose. The custody hearing was conducted behind closed doors, and those documents are sealed. From what I’ve been able to learn so far, Josh has been living in the governor’s mansion since before the custody arrangement was finalized. Sounds like he’s got ‘issues.’
“Governor Longmire and her husband are giving the kid a roof over his head-a very nice roof, by the way; food to eat; clothing to wear; a cell phone; a computer. In return, he’s been giving them fits by ditching school, getting into fights, and sneaking out at night. That’s how the phone ended up in Governor Longmire’s possession this morning. The governor’s security detail saw him letting himself out, using the old rope-ladder trick to climb down from the upper stories. He managed to give them the slip, but they called in a report. Governor Longmire confiscated the rope ladder and was waiting for Josh when he came back to the house early this morning. As punishment, she confiscated his iPhone. Once she turned it on and saw the film, she called me.”
With noon approaching, several groups of people had come into the restaurant. For a time the hostess managed to keep our booth separated from other diners. As the place filled, however, that was no longer possible. Two people in the latest group of four nodded in Ross’s direction. He was an official with a statewide office and a reputation to go with it. Naturally people recognized him.
He removed the phone from his pocket and handed it to Mel. “You might want to put that in your purse,” he told her. Then, to both of us, he said, “No more names, by the way-aliases only when in public. Little Jack Horner is at school today, with one of Old Mother Hubbard’s bodyguards along as an enforcer.”
“Why school?” Mel asked. “Isn’t it summer vacation?”
“Summer school,” Ross said. “Supposedly making up classes he flunked. She’d like to see you about two o’clock.”
“In her office?”
“At home,” Ross said. “You know how to find it?”
“My GPS knows how to find it,” Mel said confidently.
“What about the kid’s computer?” I asked. “That might have a lot more information than his phone.”
Ross nodded. “So I understand,” he said. “I told Old Mother that you’d pick it up when you stop by this afternoon. For starters, I’d like you to take it to Todd and let him make a copy of whatever’s there.”
Todd was Todd Hatcher. He is an electronics wunderkind who also has a Ph.D. in economics. He had come to Ross Connors’s attention when he did a study on the high cost of geriatric prison care. Todd’s interest in the subject had grown out of his own experience. His father, a convicted bank robber in Arizona, had been sentenced to life in prison. When the father began exhibiting symptoms of Alzheimer’s, he was paroled to the care of his wife, a waitress, who exhausted her life savings and her life trying to care for her ailing husband. Todd’s doctoral committee at the University of Washington had dismissed Todd’s study out of hand. When Ross Connors heard about it, not only had he stepped in to rescue Todd’s Ph.D. aspirations, he had also taken Todd on as an occasional consultant whose computer hacking skills went beyond his publicly recognized skills as a forensic economist.
But there was also a subtle warning here for Mel and me. There are some pretty savvy computer experts working for the Washington State Patrol Crime Lab. I couldn’t help but wonder why Connors was using a private consultant to examine Josh Deeson’s computer. Probably the same reason Mel and I were on the job.
“Search warrants?” Mel asked.
“Got ’em,” Ross said. He patted the pocket of his jacket and pulled out a packet of documents, which he handed over to Mel. “That covers Jack Horner’s computer, his iPhone, and his room. It’s Old Mother Hubbard’s house. She bought the computer with her credit card and she’s the one who pays for Little Jack Horner’s Internet connection. Legally, since she’s the one providing his room, she could voluntarily give us access to that and to his computer as well, but just in case the kid is actually involved in a homicide here, we’re better off with properly drawn warrants.”
“Works for me,” I said. “Warrants are always better than no warrants.”
“Does Grandfather Time know about any of this?” Mel asked, inventing a suitable alias for Gerard Willis on the spot.
“Not so far,” Ross replied. “There’s some concern that being given upsetting news right now might interfere with his recovery.”
Ross’s answer to that question went a long way to explain all the secrecy.
“And why us?” Mel asked. “Why Beau and me?”
“That’s easy. Old Mother Hubbard asked for Beau in particular,” Ross said, nodding in my direction. “She says
