What Janie Saw(13)
“Slant the investigation?” Rafe sat up. “What do you mean?”
“I mean if I tell you this guy creeped me out, had anger issues, you might believe I’d already condemned him. I can answer impartially, and—”
“Janie,” Rafe said carefully, “right now, we can only label Derek as a person of interest, that’s all. His art book and drawings are probably just the work of a young adult crying for attention.”
She gave a slight shake of her head. She hadn’t given her opinion on fact versus fiction earlier, but she clearly had an opinion now.
Not fiction.
He agreed but couldn’t let on to that.
“Innocent until proven guilty,” was a double-edged sword. In Rafe’s profession, his job was to decode, visualize, analyze and interpret. Years ago, a cop’s perspective—his intuition—had counted for something. Today, because of politics, Rafe didn’t dare share what he thought. It could later be used against him in a court of law.
Plus, Jane Q. Public—especially in the case of a missing or wayward child—wanted optimism.
“Do you want to know how many people have come forward with information about the disappearance of Brittney Travis? Hundreds. And all of them turned out to be dead ends.”
“How many of the hundreds attended the same college?” Katie jumped in.
“More than you’d believe.” Rafe leaned forward. “We investigate all leads, and certainly, we hope this one will take us closer to the truth, but chances are it won’t. Chances are you have the misfortune of reading some misguided young man’s work of fantasy.”
“I know fantasy when I read it,” Janie muttered. “Derek draws fantasy and his writing was nothing like his usual drawings.”
She had him there. And, he figured, by the end of the interview she’d get him a few more times if he wasn’t careful.
“Did you tell Professor Reynolds that he creeped you out?”
“Yes.” Janie filled him in on some of the suggestions Patricia had made for dealing with a difficult student—like one who invaded personal space, who believed in staring as a way to intimidate, and who got argumentative when given constructive criticisms. She explained how ineffective those suggestions had been and finished with, “Derek left during the break Wednesday, a week ago, and didn’t return.”
“Any idea why he left?” Rafael prodded.
She grimaced. “No idea. Patricia had me clean and put away his supplies.”
“How about the people he sat by? Did any of them leave, too?”
“The students all have their own stations. Pretty much their own worlds. The station to his left is empty. The station to his right is a reentry adult. She ignores him. I’ve heard her mutter a few times about teenagers with attitudes.”
“So you weren’t the only person he creeped out?”
“Attitude came off of him in waves.”
“Since you were scared to be in the room alone with him before class started, what did you do after class?”
She hesitated but didn’t purse her lips. Too bad, he somewhat enjoyed watching her expressions of angst. And she had perfect lips. “Derek was the first one out the door. I don’t think the other students even thought twice about what he did after class ended.”