Read Online Judgment Calls by Alafair Burke - Free Book Online Page A

with a McMeal for your witness. The last time I checked, Kincaid, you and I were still friends. Would it kill you to at least say hi to me before we head in for work?”
    I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. “No, it wouldn’t. You’re right. Hi. Hi, Chuck. It’s nice to see you. Now can we go do my interview?”
    “Yes. And it’s nice to see you too.”
    I rang the doorbell. I could hear obnoxious music, the kind that started to sound like noise when I turned thirty, blaring from inside. I rang the doorbell again and then banged on the door. I felt him standing behind me while we waited on the porch in silence. When I heard the music get lower and footsteps approach the door, I looked at him over my shoulder. “That was nice of you. To bring her some dinner, I mean.”
    “Thanks.”
    I couldn’t tell what Kendra Martin looked like when she answered the door, because her face was obscured by a big pink gum bubble. It popped to reveal a thin pale girl with doe eyes and full lips. Her wavy, dark hair stopped right below her shoulders. She wore an Eminem sweatshirt and a pair of jeans that looked like they’d fit my father. So far, she seemed like a typical thirteen-year-old.
    She looked past me at Chuck. “What’re you doing here?”
    “I came by to see whether you listened to anything I told you on Sunday. What did I tell you about looking out the window to see who’s here before you open the door to anyone?”
    She shifted her weight all the way to one leg and swung her hip one direction and tilted her head in the other. “I guess I forgot this time. Anyway, it was you, so it’s OK, right?” She twisted a lock of hair with her fingers. Obviously Chuck Forbes’s magnetism was not lost on this new generation of teenage girls.
    “OK, we’ll treat that as a test run. But I mean it: From now on, you have to look before you open that door. If it’s someone you don’t know, you don’t answer. Got it?”
    “Yeah, I got it. Whaddaya doin’ here?”
    “I brought someone over who I want you to meet. This is Samantha Kincaid.”
    Kendra looked at me without saying a word. Then she smiled at Chuck and popped her gum. “She your girlfriend?”
    Chuck looked at me and raised his eyebrows. “No, she’s not my girlfriend. But she is a really good friend of mine, and she’s a DA. She’s going to be handling your case.”
    I held out my hand to her. She shook it but looked down at the floor while she did it.
    “It’s nice to meet you, Kendra. I’ve heard a lot about you. Detectives Walker and Johnson tell me you did a real good job helping them at the hospital last weekend.”
    “That’s funny. They told Chuck and Mike I acted like demon spawn.”
    “They might’ve mentioned something like that to me too. But they also said you were very helpful. Do you mind if we come in?”
    She looked at the box in Chuck’s hand. He said, “I thought you might be hungry. The fries are still hot.”
    “Come on in.” She took the box from Chuck. “Thank you.”
    “Don’t mention it. It was Sam’s idea, anyway.”
    “Thank you,” she said to me.
    I looked at Chuck. “It wasn’t a problem. Really.”
    The Martin house wasn’t what I expected. I had braced myself for the worst. Unfortunately, I’d gotten used to the fact that an entire segment of the population raises its children in filthy homes that don’t look like they could possibly exist in the United States. Last year, police went to an apartment on a noise complaint and found nine children alone in a one-bedroom apartment. They all slept on the same bare, stained mattress on the bedroom floor. The carpets were soaked with cat urine and feces. The kids had been alone for a week and were living off of dry cat food and some candy bars that the oldest child, an eight-year-old boy, had been given to sell for the school choir.
    Their mothers, two sisters in their early twenties, had left on a meth hinge. As they later told police, they lost track of time