“God’s honest truth, it was pure coincidence.” Jennifer laughed a caught-out guffaw. She must have been waiting for this question. “I never met her before that, well not face to face. My round-about connection to her was because of Melinda Holbright. My mother worked for the Holbrights, as you know, and Melinda and I used to play together when we were very young.”

“Not when you got older?” Warren’s eyebrows shot up, questioning.

Jennifer smirked. “She comes from money and I was the maid’s daughter. The time came when we didn’t hang around together anymore.”

“Was that a problem for you?” Warren pressed.

Jennifer relaxed in her seat. “The last time I did anything with Melinda Holbright, detective, I was around seven or eight years old. So no, the loss of her friendship did not scar me for life.” The sarcasm in Jennifer’s voice was evident. “Anyway, I was happy to not be around her anymore.”

“Why was that?”

“She was a mean little girl. She did horrible things.”

“Like what?” Gavin asked.

“Where do you want me to start?” Jennifer scoffed. “Since you want to know, I’ll give you the typical Melinda. Back when we were children the American Girl doll was huge. Every little girl wanted one. Of course Melinda had a number of them. It’s all I wanted, but they were so expensive, something my mother couldn’t afford. One day my mother surprised me with one. I couldn’t wait to show Melinda. When I did, she was happy for me. Said the doll was beautiful. A little while later Melinda suggested we paint our nails with some new purple glittery polish she had. My doll was sitting next to me. While the nail polish bottle was open, Melinda knocked it over and it spilled all over my doll—the hair, the face. It was ruined. Melinda apologized, but I know she did it on purpose. Probably doesn’t mean anything to you two but to a little girl, this was the end of the world.” Jennifer crossed her arms. “That was a mild thing she did. It wasn’t long after that she started tripping me or bumping into me hard. One time it was on the landing of the staircase and I went down a flight of stairs. Luckily I didn’t break anything. I didn’t play with her after that.”

Jesus, Gavin thought.

“Did you ever live in the Holbright house?” Warren asked.

“No. Never. Not in any of them. My mother wasn’t live-in help. She went to work in the morning and came home in the evening. The two of us had our own place. It wasn’t much, a second-floor flat on the West Side, but it was okay.”

“Just you and your mother?” Warren again.