‘Anything you can tell me.’
‘I never worked with them myself,’ Katy said. ‘They were probably in their last few years of fostering when I was starting out. But there’s nothing on the file to suggest that they weren’t decent people. Do you know something different?’
‘This isn’t about them. It’s more about the kids they fostered.’
‘Someone in trouble?’ Katy’s eyes were serious. She cared deeply about the kids in the system. She saw the shitty time they had, the impossible odds stacked against them, and she saw the results of those obstacles every day.
‘Steven Gifford had handguns. He was a member of a local gun club. Had them for years. Two guns were stolen from his safe six months ago. Whoever stole them used a key that he’d kept in a locked drawer in his study. They knew exactly where to go, and they only took the guns. Nothing else.’
‘So you think it was one of the kids.’
Judith shrugged. ‘Maybe. Maybe not. There could be some other family member or friend close enough to them who knew about the key. But I figured I’d start with people who’d actually lived in the house.’
‘Okay. I get it. Well, I went through the file. The Giffords fostered thirty-six kids altogether.’
‘They told me that. Seems like a hell of a lot of kids.’
‘I knew a couple who took in eighty over the years. Most of those placements would be short-term emergency arrangements. You take a couple of kids for a weekend or a couple of weeks if something blows up. Or maybe you have a long-term arrangement to provide occasional respite care, if a family is coping with a chronic illness, or something like that.’
‘Is that what happened with the Giffords?’
Katy looked at her notes. ‘They had nine long-term fosters, and twenty-seven short-term over the years. Everyone’s aged out of the system now, of course, but according to the file, six of the long-term fosters were in uni by the time they aged out, and three of them were doing some kind of apprenticeship or trade. All of them were doing well. Four of the short termers are dead. Two from drug overdoses in their teens—they weren’t with the Giffords when they overdosed—one murder and one suicide.’
‘Seems like a lot. Four dead out of thirty-six.’
Katy made a face. ‘It’s horrible, but you know these kids and their circumstances. You know what they’re coming from. We can’t save them all, or even most of them, it feels like.’
The mood darkened.
‘What else have you got?’ Judith asked.
‘Well, I can give you the names. For the kids who are still alive, at least. You can check, I suppose, for criminal records for all of them, but you’re going to find a fair amount, I’d expect. From our files I can see that at least eight of the short termers had at least one encounter with the police. Petty stuff, mostly. Drug possession or public disturbance. Though one boy was charged with auto theft.’
‘What was his name?’
‘Uh... Benjamin Bradly. Ben Bradly.’
‘Okay.’ The name meant nothing to Judith. Katy was probably right. These kids would have histories. She’d have to wade through a mountain of irrelevant detail.
The barman arrived with their food. He left it on the table and departed.
‘Jude, you’re not going to mess with these kids, right? I mean, you’re going to go easy.’
‘You know I will.’
‘Because they’ve had it tough. Most of them are probably just trying to get on with their lives. They don’t need to have police knocking on their doors, or coming to their jobs.’
‘You know I won’t do that, Katy. I just want to see if any of them have an active criminal record or connections. I need to trace the gun used to kill Robert Walker. If one of them took it, they probably sold it. Rocky has a suspect. A guy called Jack Miller. Maybe Rocky has it right, maybe this Jack guy bought the gun from one of the foster kids, or from someone else who knew where Gifford kept his guns.’ Though the foster kids weren’t kids anymore, Judith thought. She had to be careful. Not to let Katy’s empathy—and her own—lead her into making that kind of mistake. A vulnerable fourteen-year-old could grow up to be a dangerous twenty-four-year-old. ‘But if he’s not right, if Jansen’s got the wrong guy, I want to know who took the gun, and where that gun ended up.’
‘I’m trusting you with this.’ Katy said.
‘You know you can.’
Katy AirDropped her notes to Judith’s phone. A list of names and dates of birth. Katy grimaced as Judith opened the note and flicked through it.
‘What?’ Judith asked.
‘Nothing.’
