She skimmed through all the mundane questions Justice Line clerks asked of prospective clients—time of day, weather, exact location, including address and nearest intersection, and details of what the injured party was doing at the location of the incident—until she got to the meat of the form, known as the narrative.

“My daughter, Jazmin Mayes, worked at the hotel as a housekeeper,” Yvonne Howington had written. She’d skipped many of the questions on the form, typing in question marks, or “don’t know.”

Finally, she got down to brass tacks.

IN YOUR OWN WORDS, PLEASE DESCRIBE WHAT HAPPENED.

Yvonne’s response was succinct, bone-chilling and heartbreaking.

Jazmin gets off work at 11 o’clock on Sunday nights, but that night she didn’t come home, like she told me she was going to. The police say she was killed sometime after midnight. Another housekeeper called hotel security after she went to the laundry and found Jazmin’s body wrapped up in sheets in a laundry cart. The guard was the one that called the police. The police told me she’d been strangled. The police came to my door at eight o’clock that morning. There were two of them, a man and a lady, who said they were detectives. That’s when they told me my daughter was dead. They didn’t say nothing about how it happened, not at first. They just asked me a whole lot of questions about Jazmin, and who her friends were at work, and how long she’d been working at the hotel, and whether or not anybody had been bothering her.

Yvonne Howington slapped the crossword book shut. “Look here. Did that assistant say when Mr. Campbell will be back?”

It was nearly two o’clock. Brice’s office hours could best be described as erratic. Although she hadn’t seen it yet, Drue knew he had an office at home. If he was working on a big case and didn’t want the distractions of the office, he often decided to work alone, at home.

“Mr. Campbell’s assistant told me he probably won’t be back in the office today,” Drue said. “I really think it would be better if you made an appointment to see him. I can have his assistant call you to set up a time.”

“That assistant is just stalling me. I been trying to get to see Brice Campbell ever since she called to tell me about the check I was going to be getting. He promised me four, maybe five million dollars. And I get nothing? That ain’t right. He knows it and I know it, and you’d know it too, if you knew what I know.”

Drue swallowed hard. The desktop phone buzzed. She picked up her headset.

“Tell me she’s gone.” It was Wendy.

“Afraid not.”

“I’m coming out there and we’ll get this taken care of right now.” Wendy disconnected.