Strong Alibi by K.C. Turner (story reading txt) 📗

day of her death. There is a text message just like Brandon said. He received a text from Pam at 8:32 pm saying she was going to her sister’s house.”

Elizabeth studied the page in her hand. “That’s the last text sent from her phone. There’s a bunch of missed calls after that. Looks like that was the last time she talked to anyone. However, before she sent the text to his phone, she received a text at 7:48 from his number asking her to meet him at their favorite place. But, I’m just curious why it reads differently than the rest of them.”

“Really? Let me see that.”

She got up, moved around the corner of the table, and stood next to him placing the paper in front of him. “Look,” she said pointing her finger where she wanted him to read. “That’s his number, right?”

Martinez glanced back and forth between the two phone records. “That’s his number all right. Son of a bitch. He met her, they have a fight; he kills her and then sends the text to himself from her phone. The timing works. They meet at say eight o’clock, half an hour is plenty of time for him to take care of her, dump her body in the lake, and send a text. Then he tosses her phone in behind her. That’s why we never found it.”

“Not quite. Look at the number in brackets right below his.”

The excitement in his voice dissipated. “Well what the hell does that mean?” He shoved the paper out of frustration.

Sitting back down in her chair, she replied, “I’m not sure really.” She lifted her right foot and rested it on the seat before she began looking over the phone records again. “That’s the first time that number pops up anywhere.”

“For crying out loud. This case has been nothing but a dead end from the get go.” He sat back and grabbed a take-out box plunging the chopsticks into the food, contemplating whether he could stomach another bite.

“Maybe not.” She jumped up from her seat and went to the living room to fish for her laptop. Grabbing it from the end table she excitedly sat back down at the dining room table and opened the screen. She turned on the airport, opened Chrome, and began typing in the search box. “I once read an article on a third party app someone created that allowed you to text or call any one, from any phone number, and you could choose which number showed up on the recipients phone.”

Curious, he asked, “What the hell are you talking about, Liz?”

Finding the article she became excited. “No, seriously...” She flipped the laptop around and set it in front of him. “Check it out.”

Upon skimming through the article he said, “Well I’ll be a son of a bitch.”

“Exactly.” She sat in her chair, proud of herself. “Find the owner of that number, and you find whoever lured Pam to the docks that night.”

“And this is exactly why Peggy Cabot can go screw herself.” He stood from his seated position and grabbed the arms of her chair, leaning over her possessively. “What do you say we take this in the other room?”

Chapter 13

The drive into the bureau Wednesday morning was sticky and Martinez couldn’t wait to sit in the air-conditioning. After the previous day had been quite uneventful and full of paperwork, he was anxious for things to begin churning again. With Shawn out of the office for the day, he was hoping to quietly get some work done. He sat down at his computer and opened his email. The cell phone company returned his email regarding his request for the owner of the phone number found on Pam’s phone record.

“Hot damn!” Quickly opening it in hopes of having a name, his excitement diminished when he read the number belonged to Marshal Media Corporation. Although they did confirm it was sent via a third party application that allows a person to send a text to any number with the allusion of coming from a specific contact. “For God’s sake,” he said as he shook his head from side to side. He looked at the phone number again. I could just call the damn number. Nah, that would be a waste of time. No one would give me any information. Then again… Screw it.

He picked up the receiver to his office phone and dialed the number. It rang a few times before going to voicemail with a generic recording. After hanging up the phone he moved on to his computer and went straight to Google to search when his office phone rang. “Detective Martinez.”

“Hello, this is Damian Burk. You’ve been trying to contact me?”

“Mr. Burk! Yes, yes I have.” Martinez fumbled around his desk for a pen and pad of paper. “Thank you for returning my call. I was hoping you could come down to the station to answer some questions regarding Pam DeFranco.” Glancing over at the caller ID he wrote down the phone number Damian called from.

“I don’t think so. You can ask me some questions, but now’s your chance. Take it or leave it.”

“Okay, let me start by asking how you knew Mrs. DeFranco?”

“We worked together at Creative Industries.”

“Was your relationship strictly professional?’

“If your asking me that question, I assume you already know the answer.”

“Look, Mr. Burk, I’m just trying to find out what happened to Pam. If you cared about her, I would think you would want to help in whatever way you could. Unless, of course, you have a guilty conscious.”

There was a long pause and Damian sighed. “Pam and I worked together for about three years. We started seeing each other about a year ago.”

“Did Mr. DeFranco know about the two of you?”

“She recently told him. I know he was pissed. She also found out she was pregnant not long ago.”

“Did she tell her husband about the pregnancy?”

“I know she was planning on it. Whether or not she got around to