the computer in Jasmine’s office,” Will told the detectives to fill the silence.
“Visual and audio?” Baskin asked.
Will nodded.
A few seconds later, the officer returned holding a pair of large earmuffs. “I keep these in my unit for when I go to the range,” he explained. “They’ll block all sound. They’re going to be a bit big though.”
“Katie,” Will said, “I’m going to keep you with me, but I want you to wear these, okay?”
Rather than reply, she lifted her head long enough for the officer to get the earmuffs positioned on her head.
“Would you call my dad, Frank Campbell?” Will asked the officer.
“Sure. What’s his number?”
Will gave it to him. After thanking the officer, he went with the detectives to Jasmine’s office. He deliberately avoided looking down at the blood as they passed it, afraid it would send him right over the edge.
He guided the detectives through logging into the security feed, explaining how the program worked so they could access the camera and microphone recordings they needed to review.
“I think it might be best if you wait in the lobby, Mr. Campbell,” Jeffries said.
Will suspected if he hadn’t been one of the city’s most popular professional athletes, she wouldn’t have worded it that way. He wasn’t at all above using his status to his advantage right then.
“I’m staying right here.”
The detectives exchanged glances. Neither of them argued with him.
Will watched along with them as they started with the footage from that morning. They watched it at an advanced speed until there was anything worth viewing.
A woman arrived out front around noon. She walked from somewhere out of the parking lot’s camera range rather than parking a car. When the feed switched from the outdoor overhead view to the camera over the front door, Will frowned.
“I’ve seen her before,” he said. “She’s one of the parents or grandparents who wanted their kid to have lessons here.”
“Her identity is one of the reasons we want to view this footage,” Baskin said. “There are differing stories on that.”
“You mean…that woman…she’s the one who…”
“We’re verifying that right now,” Jeffries said, not unkindly.
Will withheld his other questions through the rest of the viewing. He watched with the detectives as the woman circled the building, examining the windows and the doors as though trying to find a way in. After thirty minutes, she left.
Jasmine, Alima, and Katie arrived at half-past three. Seeing them all talking and laughing as they walked up to the front door so soon after that woman skulked around the building gave Will chills. Even if he hadn’t already known something bad had happened, he would have experienced the same grim sense of foreboding.
The detectives stuck to live footage from there. At first, the only feeds with any footage worth viewing alternated between Alima in the front office and Jasmine with Katie in the dressing room. Will watched with a painful knot in his chest as Jasmine styled Katie’s hair. He listened to them talk about Katie’s day.
He heard Jasmine tell Katie she loved her. Saw that love in the expression on her face.
It was the first time since he’d met with Carol Ann that he acknowledged how deep a cut she had made with the words she spoke about Jasmine. He had tried his best to convince himself not to believe anything she said, knowing she was manipulating him. But try as he might, he couldn’t deny that she had described his relationship with Jasmine almost to the letter.
Doubt had taken root. He’d spent the past week and a half questioning whether he had made a serious mistake.
And he had, he realized now.
He hadn’t trusted Jasmine.
The camera continued to alternate between Alima’s phone calls and Katie’s dance lesson for another fifteen minutes. Then there was movement on a third camera…the one over the front door.
The woman who had scoped out the studio earlier once again approached from somewhere off-camera. She paused by Jasmine’s car and looked inside. Will puzzled over why she went from the driver’s side window to the rear window. Whatever she saw in the back made her smile.
What did she see? Will wondered. The only thing he could think of would be…
“Katie’s booster,” he said out loud.
The detectives looked at him.
“Sorry,” he said. “I think she was smiling because she saw Katie’s booster seat in Jasmine’s car.”
Baskin nodded and jotted something in the small notebook he carried.
They watched as the woman walked up to the front door and knocked determinedly on it with the side of her fist.