Page 44 of Pretty Broken Dolls
“They seemed to have an issue with a boyfriend.”
“Hmm…Looks like her friend Mandy was upset after she caught Jeanine with her boyfriend, Brady Randall.”
“That’s not good. Where was the boyfriend?”
“He has a solid alibi. He was at a conference in Indiana at the time. Verified by the hotel, conference people, and he was seen on security cams.”
“That doesn’t mean he couldn’t have had someone else kill her. Who were the other possible suspects?”
“I guess there was some issue at Community Health Alliance where she worked as an assisting nurse for those who are on assistance or social security.”
Gulping more than half her coffee, she said, “What kind of issue?”
“It was a lot of back-and-forth talk, but from what I could gather, it sounded like a hostile work environment,” he said and flipped through more pages. “There’s background on the staff, but it reads like a boring book. Nothing that stands out.”
“So our victim stole her best friend’s boyfriend and her work place was antagonistic.” Katie leaned back. “That could open up a whole host of other suspects—for all kinds of reasons—hate, revenge, jealousy. So what about neighbors?”
“Most are retired, except for next door. A Mrs. Sadie Caldwell who is also retired, but she’s…”
“What’s wrong with her?”
“She’s on record for calling the police on two occasions because of a loud party.”
“Not a big suspect list.” Katie was disappointed that after all the manpower and time that had gone into the investigation, this was all they had come up with. “So what did the profiler have to say?”
“How did you know there’s a profiler?”
“That’s just how these types of investigations go. Andpleasedon’t tell me ‘a white male between the ages of thirty-five and forty-five, single, blue-collar worker, no arrests except for something like trespassing or fighting in a bar, etc.’”
McGaven smiled. “Pretty close.”
Katie let out a loud sigh. “Agent Campbell is correct. They are all trained to investigate the same way, to not to see outside the box—for lack of a better phrase.” She frowned, thinking about killers’ motives.
McGaven handed her the pages he had highlighted.
“Let me see,” she said and skimmed through the information. “It is like they kept repeating the same things…like they didn’t have anything better to do. Making the report look bigger.”
“You can see how they’ve hit a dead end.”
“Let’s start at the beginning,” she said. “We have already spent time with military K9 training, but while we have to wait for information on our victim at the fairgrounds let’s dig deeper into Jeanine Trenton. When we went to her house, all of her personal belongings were gone. I’m still waiting to hear back from the attorney.”
“We might learn something new.”
“Until we get an ID on the vic from the fairgrounds, let’s dig in here.”
“I’ll contact Mandy Davis then,” he said, searching for her phone number. “It’s good to talk to the best friend and she’s had some time to think about everything too.”
“I’d like to know if she knew anything about the sergeant at the K9 training facility.”
“Sounds good.”
Katie reread the reports as McGaven spoke to Ms. Davis, and made several inquiries about Jeanine Trenton’s belongings. She wanted to know what John in forensics had to say about the crime scene. She made arrangements through Agent Campbell for John to receive everything that was collected and also the photographs of Jeanine Trenton.
“We can speak to Mandy Davis at eleven thirty,” McGaven said.
“Great.” Katie slowly shuffled the paperwork around on her desk.
“What’s bothering you?”
