“No,” Walt said. “First, Victoria was never formally convicted, so there’s nothing to overturn. And second, sadly, without a conviction no one really cares about it.”

“I care.”

“I know you do.”

“And Emma Kind cares.”

“I know that, too. And she’s lucky to have you digging through the case. I just wanted to give you the full picture as to why the files I showed you yesterday didn’t tell the whole story. This box”—Walt pointed at the table—“had been in the DA’s possession until the US Attorney’s Office subpoenaed all of Greenwald’s files. They took a hard look at each of them, but passed on digging into the case against Victoria Ford. The Southern District of New York shipped this box back to the BCI, where it has sat for years. And now, as I root back through the details, I can’t help thinking that for such a high-profile homicide, I was tapped early on to run the investigation. Maggie Greenwald requested me. At the time, I was honored. I thought I’d made such an impression that she picked me for my talent. But a little time and perspective tells me that maybe she picked me because I was young and green, and because she could manipulate me in ways another, more experienced detective would not have allowed.”

“You didn’t do anything wrong, Walt. You followed the evidence, and no one can fault you for that. You didn’t plant evidence. And you certainly didn’t suppress it. The crime scene you found led to Victoria Ford. Not by hunch, not by speculation, but by forensically backed evidence. You didn’t make any mistakes. You didn’t manipulate the evidence.”

“No. But I’m wondering if I was manipulated. This case went up in smoke after 9/11, and when the dust settled, everyone had moved on. Soon after, I was recruited into the FBI and I never really put much thought into it after that. But now, twenty years later, with the things you and I have uncovered, I’m starting to wonder if a dead woman was branded a killer when, in fact, she was innocent.”

The narrative that twenty years earlier an aggressive district attorney had focused on the wrong woman in the death of Cameron Young was starting to play out in Avery’s mind. She had no way to prove who had killed Cameron Young, only that there was a very realistic possibility it was not Victoria Ford. Avery knew her viewing audience would salivate over every detail. And things were about to get even juicier.

Walt gathered the files and the photos and returned them to the box.

“There’s one more thing I came across in this box of lost evidence,” Walt said, holding up a plastic evidence bag. It held a thumb drive.

“What is it?”

“The sex video of Cameron Young and Victoria Ford.”

CHAPTER 47 - Manhattan, NY Sunday, July 4, 2021

CHAPTER 47