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The first was to the tech unit back at Central Station to have them check the GPS data on Keith Penn’s phone. If they could verify that he was traveling from Running Springs to Van Nuys, with an extended pit stop at a roadside bar, it would form the basis of a credible alibi.
Next she called Ryan, hoping he might be on a break from the trial. But her call went straight to voicemail. She briefly updated him on recent details, including Michaela’s cremation, her dad’s DUI, arrest, and possible alibi, and Sergeant Costabile’s overtly suspicious behavior.
When she hung up, she saw that she’d missed a call from an unfamiliar number while she was leaving the message. She immediately played it.
“Hi, Ms. Hunt, this is Detective Wiley Strode of Valley Bureau, Van Nuys Station. I’m assigned to the Michaela Penn case. I understand that Detective Hernandez with HSS has filed to work concurrently on the case and that you both were at the crime scene last night before I arrived. I’ve been trying to reach him all day without success so I thought I’d reach out to you to coordinate our resources. Unfortunately, there doesn’t seem to be much to coordinate. It’s increasingly looking like this case may end up in our unsolved file. Regardless, please give me a call when you get a chance to compare notes.”
Detective Strode’s tone was professional and courteous and, at least on the surface, it seemed like he wanted to cooperate. But underneath the pleasant demeanor, it was clear that his bottom line wasn’t much different than Sergeant Costabile’s.
As far as he was concerned, the investigation was closer to the end than the beginning, a strange attitude to have when it came to the brutal stabbing murder of a teenage girl. No one at Valley Bureau seemed to care much about solving this case. In fact, they all seemed actively invested in not solving it.
The last concern gave her an idea and led her to immediately make another call. Again, she got voicemail, this time for Garland Moses. She tried to keep her message brief.
“Garland, you’re pretty old,” she began, hoping to soften her request with some disarming humor. “I’m hoping that since you’ve been around the department for so long, you might be able to give me some insight into some Valley Bureau personnel, specifically at Van Nuys Station. One is Detective Wiley Strode. But I’m especially interested in an officer named Sergeant Hank Costabile. He’s inserted himself into a case I’m pursuing in some really intrusive, borderline threatening ways. Have you heard of him? If so, what can you tell me? If not, can you work your ‘on the sly’ magic and get me some intel? I know the guy is bad news but I’m flying blind about just how bad. Thanks in advance.”
She hung up, uncertain if she was abusing the veteran profiler’s generosity with the request. But she knew there was no way she was going to smash through the blue wall of silence through conventional means. Even Ryan, who’d been a cop for a nearly a decade, seemed only to have a general sense of Costabile. She needed help from someone who’d been around the department much longer than that.
Her last call before pulling up at Marchand’s house was to Detective Gaylene Parker in Vice. She told Parker about Filthy Films using an underage actress and asked who she needed to contact to get something done about it. Parker, who sounded personally offended, said that she would call the right people and guaranteed that all Filthy productions would be shut down by the end of the day.
With that off her plate, Jessie focused on the task at hand. She got out of her car and walked up Marchand’s circular driveway to the front door. While his house was large and had a hilltop view of the currently hazy valley, it was dated, with seventies-style ranch house architecture and a few dangling shingles. It looked like a fixer-upper that had never been fixed up.
I guess porn directing isn’t the cash cow I assumed it was.
She rang the bell and waited, curious to meet the creative mind behind some of the works she’d surreptitiously watched on her laptop earlier. When Giles Marchand opened the door, she had to stifle a gasp.
