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“Oh, it is, especially since Wheedan has a history of anger mismanagement and a penchant for revenge. He’s still incarcerated, but he’s got a couple of brothers on the outside who also have a similar approach to problem-solving. I made a round of calls but didn’t leave messages for the same reason you didn’t.”
Arnett made a note. “Adding them to the list.”
“My second is Cooper Ossokov, but I’m not sure how likely he is. He was just exonerated with the help of an Innocence Project. Originally convicted of murdering and raping Zara Richards, but a confession and an analysis of touch DNA identified the actual killer as Dale Kranst, who had also raped and murdered several other women since.”
Arnett nodded, expression blank. “Right. I’ve been keeping up with that. I was one of the detectives on his investigation.”
Jo did a double take. “How is that possible? We were partnered during that time.”
“Remember when you broke your leg and were on desk duty for a few months?”
“I completely forgot about that.” Jo had been invited on a ski trip by a romantic interest, and had learned the hard way that a few trips down the bunny slope as a child did not a ski expert make. “Or maybe I repressed it. What was that, fifteen years ago?”
“About that.”
Jo sagged back against her chair. “Safe to say fifteen years in prison for a crime you didn’t commit could make you bitter.”
“He claims he’s not.” Arnett shook his head “Supposedly found Jesus in prison or some such?” Arnett said.
“Buddha,” Jo said. “And, sobriety.”
“Whatever it takes.”
Jo tapped her notepad. “The point is, he’s out now. But why would you risk going right back?”
“Depends whether he’s really okay with it.”
Jo sat back up and swung around to her monitor. “Either way, due diligence. So that makes three new people we need to check out in addition to Hauptmann. I’m hoping something in Bernard’s background will point us to the identity of our mystery texter and save us some time.”
“While you do that, I’ll see if I can dig up any sort of aggressive history for Bruce Ashville.”
Jo started with the basics. Lacey Bernard had no criminal record, and had grown up in a small town on the west end of Oakhurst County. Once she graduated high school, she moved to New York where she attended SUNY Buffalo for her degree in journalism; she got married shortly after she graduated and her name changed to Grandin. The only employment listed was for a small paper in Buffalo, where she worked until 2018. At that time, she divorced her husband, changed her name back to Bernard, and settled in Springfield. She didn’t show any employment again until she was hired by theSpringfield Gazetteat the beginning of 2021.
Jo paused to consider. Thousands of people left their hometowns to go to college, stayed in the new location because they fell in love, then returned home when the relationship fell apart. But to leave the job without having another one lined up? Whatever happened must have been dramatic.
Hoping for something more personal, Jo turned to social media. Bernard’s Facebook page was set to private, and her Instagram was carefully polished and curated to create a ‘brand’ rather than give insight into Bernard’s personality. Jo continued scrolling, and as the months passed in reverse, the feel of the feed shifted—fewer professional shots and more candid, personal ones. By the time she made it back to the beginning of the account, opened in 2018, she found a few pictures of Bernard’s sister, who’d recently been diagnosed with breast cancer. There were also several graphics for causes near to her heart—breast cancer and sexual assault awareness were recurring themes.
Twitter turned out to be a goldmine. Bernard posted her own stories and retweeted others several times a day. For nearly the past year, regular links to articles in theSpringfield Gazetteappeared, all police-blotter oriented: Murders, robberies, break-ins, car-jackings, drug arrests, some with follow-ups, most without. Then Jo stumbled on a familiar name.
“Well, well, well,” Jo said.
“What?” Arnett asked.
“Bernard wrote a series of articles about Cooper Ossokov.”
CHAPTERSEVENTEEN
“Coincidence?” Jo asked.
He rolled his chair over to her desk and followed her finger to one of the tweets. “Hard to say. His release was big news. I’m sure everyone on these sorts of beats went nuts over it.”
“Right. But read, say, this story”—she pulled up an article—“then compare it with this one about Ossokov.”
After skimming the openings, his brows rose. “The other is perfunctory. In this one she has an agenda. You think there’s a personal connection?” he asked.
She tapped her nails on the desk. “Maybe. But she doesn’t just argue that Ossokov was harmed. She makes the case that Dale Kranst wouldn’t have been able to kill the other women if he’d been caught at the time, and that Zara Richards’ family were harmed because her actual murderer had been allowed to live a free life for all of those years. She argues all of them should sue.”
Arnett’s jaw clenched. “So, what, every time we don’t catch a killer, the commonwealth should be liable for it?”
