Read Online Trial by Fury (9780061754715) by Judith A. Jance - Free Book Online Page B

to tears.
    â€œWhat is it?” I asked.
    â€œHe just walked off. I couldn’t believe it. He never said anything to us. Not good game. Not nice try. Nothing. Not even a word about the bad call. It was like he couldn’t wait for the game to be over so he could be rid of us.”
    Payson was quiet again. There was more to his silence than just grief over the death of someone close to him. It wasn’t an end of innocence, because I’m not so sure innocence exists anymore. But it was the end of something else—of youthful hero-worship, maybe—and the beginning of a realization of betrayal. It’s hell growing up.
    â€œHe didn’t even leave us the damn cookies,” Payson managed.
    â€œCookies?” I almost choked on the word. “Did you say cookies?”
    Payson grinned sheepishly and swiped at his eyes. “Girl Scout cookies. Pretty stupid, huh? But it was a tradition. Every member of the team got his own personal box of cookiesafter the first game in the tournament—win or lose, it didn’t matter.”
    I hadn’t expected an answer to the Girl Scout cookie question this early in the investigation. “Why Girl Scout cookies?” I asked.
    â€œCoach Altman, our first coach. His wife was a Girl Scout leader, and he always brought cookies. Coach Ridley said he was going to do the same thing. And he did, last year. I guess this time he just forgot.”
    â€œHe didn’t forget,” I said.
    Bob Payson’s eyes lit up. “He didn’t?”
    â€œThe trunk of his car was full of Girl Scout cookies. Something kept him from giving them to you, but he didn’t forget.” It was small enough comfort, but Payson seemed to appreciate it.
    Embarrassed, he mopped a tear from his face. “Knowing that makes me feel better and worse, both. How come?”
    I shook my head. “Beats me,” I said. “Can you think of anything else, Bob?”
    â€œNo. Can I go now?”
    â€œSure,” I said, “you’ve been a big help. Thanks.”
    As Payson got up, I glanced across the room to where Peters was talking to one of the cheerleaders. She had broken down completely. She had buried her face in her arms and was sobbing uncontrollably. CandaceWynn patted her shoulder and gently straightened the girl’s hair.
    All other eyes in the room turned warily toward the weeping girl. Raw emotion can be pretty tough to take, especially when everyone is feeling much the same thing, but only one or two have nerve enough to express those feelings.
    The counselor leaned down and spoke into the girl’s ear. She quieted some, and I went on to the next boy on the team. Peters finished with the cheerleading squad long before I had worked my way through the team. In the course of the interviews it became apparent to me why Bob Payson was captain. None of the other boys was either as observant or as articulate as Bob had been. They told me more or less the same things he had, but without some of the telling details.
    By three o’clock, parents began arriving to take their kids home. I could see Ned Browning’s handiwork in that as well. One way or another, he was going to make sure the likes of Maxwell Cole didn’t lay hands on any of his “young people” as long as they were in the school’s care and keeping.
    Unfortunately, I knew the news media a little more intimately than Ned Browning did. I guessed, and rightly so, that reporters would make arrangements to snag the students at home if they couldn’t reach them at school.Had Ned and I discussed the matter, I could have told him so.
    By the time the last of the students had left, Peters and I were wiped slick. As usual, we had worked straight through lunch and then some. Candace Wynn looked like she’d been pulled through a wringer, too. We invited her to join us for coffee at Denny’s, a suggestion she accepted readily. It wasn’t totally gentlemanly