The Professor (McMurtrie and Drake Legal Thrillers #1)(29)
Professor, I’m so sorry about your retirement. Please know that all the students are very upset about it, especially me. I was really looking forward to being your student assistant. Anyway, I finished your first assignment and I wanted you to have the benefit of my work. Though you didn’t ask, I went ahead and prepared an excerpt, summarizing the cases I found so that you would have it for your new edition. Please call me if you have any questions. Home (205) 451-0777. Cell (205) 555-2330.
Dawn
Tom couldn’t believe it. In his rush to get out of Tuscaloosa, he had forgotten all about Dawn Murphy. Reading the note again, he was relieved that it appeared that Dawn had no idea that she was implicated in his being forced to leave the school. At least Jameson kept his promise about that.
As Tom looked again at the notebook, he felt a lump in his stomach. The assignment had just been to find the cases, but Dawn had gone above and beyond. This is exactly what I would have wanted, he thought. She had anticipated correctly and finished in record time. She’s good, Tom thought. Very good.
Glancing from Dawn’s work to Drake’s complaint, an idea popped into Tom’s head. Dawn Murphy had wanted to be Tom’s student assistant because she needed money to provide for her daughter.
Now she’s out of a job...
Tom picked up Dawn’s note and looked at the phone numbers printed at the end. You told Rick that you would stay away. That you wouldn’t interfere.
He stood, walked into the den and grabbed the phone. Looking at the note, he started to dial Dawn Murphy’s cell number. He hesitated before pressing the last number. This is crazy, he thought. Just hang up the phone and stay out of it. Tom started to lower the phone, and then his instincts took over. Fuck it, he thought, pressing the final digit and holding the phone to his ear.
21
Wilma Newton, bride of the late Harold Newton, now lived in Boone’s Hill, Tennessee. According to Doris Bolton, Wilma’s next-door neighbor in Northport, she had moved sometime around the first of November. Ms Bolton had been nice when Rick had dropped by. Invited him in for tea and talked about a host of different subjects. The weather. Her late husband Earl. Alabama football. After he had been there almost thirty minutes, Rick had asked about Harold Newton. “Poor Wilma,” she had said. “A widow at thirty-one. Damn shame.” Ms Bolton didn’t have the address or number, but said that Wilma and her girls had moved to Boone’s Hill, Tennessee – “you know, over there by Fayetteville” – a few months back. Rick didn’t know, but nodded as if he did. Fifteen minutes later, he was gone, having to promise Ms Bolton that he would come by for tea again sometime. “Roll Tide,” Ms Bolton had yelled from her front door, as Rick opened his car. “Roll Tide,” Rick had yelled back.
When Rick had returned to the office, he called information and learned that there were five Newtons in the Fayetteville, Tennessee area. He started calling them and got a hit on the third, when a girl who sounded about eight answered the phone, saying, “She’s not here right now,” when Rick asked for Wilma. Instead of leaving a message, he told the girl that he’d call back later and asked if her mother would be home that night. “She’s working late at the Sands, so I don’t know,” the girl had said.
Rick then obtained the number and address for the Sands Restaurant online. He called the number and asked for Wilma. When whoever answered the phone said, “She’s taking an order right now, can she call you back?” Rick had politely declined, saying he’d call back later.
But he wasn’t going to call back.
“Sure you want to just drop in on her?” Frankie asked, handing Rick his briefcase.
“I’m sure,” Rick said, annoyed at being questioned. “She’ll be more willing to talk if she knows I’ve come a long way. On the phone, she could just tell me to go to hell and hang up on me.”
Frankie was sucking on a green lollypop she’d gotten at the bank, and she made a loud smacking sound with the candy. “She could tell you to go to hell in person, and slam the door in your face. Be a lot quicker to call. We called ahead with Carmichael, and you are meeting with him tomorrow night at 5.”
“That’s different,” Rick said, biting his lip. “We called ahead with Carmichael, because we got to him through Ultron. If I just showed up at the Ultron plant in Montgomery and asked to talk with the loaders of Harold Newton’s rig on the day of the accident, the plant manager would have me thrown off the premises.”
“The restaurant manager could do the same thing tonight,” Frankie said, sucking on the lollypop. “Could throw your skinny butt right out of there.”
Rick started to snap something back, but stopped himself. Sighing, he shook his head at her. “Thanks for the support.”
“Just telling you like it is,” Frankie said, biting off a piece of the lollypop and turning around. As her teeth began to grind the candy up, she added. “If you come back empty-handed, don’t blame me.”
Rick gritted his own teeth and, with Frankie’s back turned to him, he made a choking gesture with his hands towards her. Then he opened the door, and began thinking about how he would prove his secretary wrong.
He was so lost in his own thoughts, he almost ran over the young woman standing at the foot of the stairs.