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“Now wait just a minute, you bitch,” Chucky started.
“Calm down, Mr. Wetherill. There is no call for that kind of language.” Duke stood up for his girl and in this case, Garrett appreciated it.
Jessica pushed out a long breath. “I’ve been civil about being dragged down here away from my job to open my private safe deposit box in front of a bunch of strangers, telling me the carved wooden box I put inside isn’t my own property. Well it is mine, and I can prove it without having to open the box.”
The prosecutor smiled indulgently. “Okay. I’m listening.”
“On the bottom of the box along what constitutes the back edge is a special message carved into the wood. Take a look.”
Duke turned the box over, glanced where she’d directed, smiled widely, and read out loud. “A wooden box carved especially for Jessica Hoyt by Hunter Franklin.”
Jessica said, “It’s my wooden container, and I’d like to put it back in my private safe deposit box again, if you don’t mind.”
“Wait a minute. How do we all know you didn’t carve that message into the box after you stole it from me?” Chucky asked, sounding entirely too reasonable. “Answer that, why don’t you?”
Jessica smiled tolerantly. “That’s why I brought Hunter Franklin, the woodcarver at Old West Town with me today. He made the box for me. He’s here to testify that he made the box from scratch.”
“That doesn’t prove anything.” Chucky insisted. “You could have bribed him or something. Who knows what you’d do?”
Duke and Warrick turned to look at her again as if dumbass had a point.
Jessica sighed as if unconcerned. She pulled a flash drive out of her pocket. “On this flash drive is a step-by-step video of Hunter creating the box for me, including the final step, where he carved the message on the bottom. Also there is video of me paying for it. I used cash. I hope that’s okay. I didn’t want my credit card number filmed.” The hint of sarcasm wasn’t lost on Garrett.
Meanwhile, Chucky eyed the flash drive in her fingers like it was lethal poison gas about to be unleashed in the tiny crowded room.
“Where did you get that flash drive, Jessica?” Chucky turned a new color, gray.
“Oh, I don’t know. I picked it up somewhere.” Jessica didn’t smile exactly, but she seemed incredibly satisfied. Garrett recognized that expression, as he’d made her look like that before.
She handed the flash drive to the prosecutor. “Hopefully, once you watch the video you’ll be satisfied this is in fact my carved wooden box. Made for me especially by the very talented woodcarver at Old West Town.”
Chucky turned to her with malice in his expression. “You fucking bitch. I know what you did. I know what you fucking did.”
“I don’t think that language is called for,” Duke said.
The prosecutor asked, “Is it password protected?”
Jessica smiled. “Not anymore. I had a friend fix it so you can just plug it in and watch any video on the drive without any password needed at all.”
Garrett pointed to a computer in the corner of the room. “You can plug it in over there and look if you want to, Warrick.”
The prosecutor smiled. “Thanks. I will. Then I believe this whole business can be concluded.”
“Don’t you fucking look at that flash drive!” Chucky yelled. He turned to run out, but Garrett had locked them all inside when they entered. Clay had suggested it when he passed him coming into the bank. Although, it was the bank’s standard procedure.
Chucky started screaming, “Let me out of here!” through the bars of the door Garrett had secured before retrieving Jessica’s safe deposit box.
Warrick, Duke, and Jack walked over to the computer, plugged in the flash drive, and brought up the first of quite a few videos listed on the directory.
The first one was a short of Chucky getting a blackmail video ready for someone named Nadine Marstic, telling her he wanted money or he’d send what constituted a sex tape to her boss at a prestigious university where she was not quite a tenured professor.
Apparently, he’d filmed her without her knowledge during a particularly sophisticated sexual experience involving some sex toys and the use of a safe word.
