Page 79 of Sunset Beach
She glanced down at the police report half hidden on her desktop. “Uh, Ray Hernandez, please.”
“One moment.”
The extension number rang twice and a woman answered. “This is Rae Hernandez.”
Drue was startled to be speaking to a female detective. “Oh hi. My name is Drue Campbell. I work for the law firm that Yvonne Howington hired to represent her after her daughter was killed two years ago at the Gulf Vista Hotel and Resort.”
There was a long silence on the other end of the line.
“Oh yeah. Campbell, Coxe and Kramner,” Detective Hernandez drawled. “Brice Campbell, the billboard barrister.”
Cute, Drue thought.
“You know, Yvonne Howington’s not too crazy about the way you people handled her case,” Hernandez said.
“That’s why I’m calling,” Drue said. “I’ve obtained some new information about Jazmin’s murder, and I’d like to meet up and discuss things with you.”
“I’ll tell you what I told Yvonne. This is still an open investigation. I’m not at liberty to discuss it with you or your law firm.”
“If we could just meet,” Drue blurted out. “I think we could help each other help Yvonne get some answers. And some justice.”
“I doubt that,” Hernandez said.
“Thirty minutes of your time. That’s all I ask. I can meet you any place you say, any time you say. I could come in to your office if that’s convenient.”
“I’m about to clock out. I worked all weekend and I’m off tomorrow, because my son has a baseball tournament down in Sarasota.”
“What about tonight?”
“He’s got a game tonight.”
“I could meet you at the game,” Drue said, not caring that she sounded desperate.
“I actually like to watch my son play when I attend one of his games,” Hernandez said. “But, tell you what. I’m taking him early, for batting practice, at six. We can talk there. Lake Vista Park. You know where that is? Sixty-second Avenue South? Not far from Lakewood High School.”
“I know just where that is,” Drue said.
“See you there,” Rae Hernandez said. “I’ll be the stubby mom with the thick calves, wearing a white ball cap, a Red Wings jersey and a pissed-off expression.”
33
Lake Vista Park was teeming with kids and parents. It was still broiling hot under the late-afternoon Florida sun, and the stands of pine trees around the park offered little shade as she walked toward the playing fields from the parking lot. Drue wished she’d asked Rae Hernandez which baseball diamond her son would be playing on, but in the end, she gravitated toward a field where a dozen kids in red jerseys and mud-stained baseball pants were lined up.
She stood at the bottom of the bleachers, gazing up, hoping the detective would spot her, but none of the women fit the description she’d been given. The stands were mostly empty, with only a dozen or so people, mostly moms, with a sprinkling of dads, chatting, idly watching their kids taking batting practice.
There was a concession stand, so she decided to get a cold drink before resuming her search. The woman selling hot dogs and soft drinks was wearing a Red Wings T-shirt. “Do you happen to know Rae Hernandez?” Drue asked.
“Sure,” the woman said. “Her son Stephen is on my son’s team.”
“I’m supposed to meet her here, but I don’t actually know what she looks like. Could you maybe point her out to me? Do you know if she’s sitting in the bleachers?”
The woman looked amused. She leaned out the window of the stand and pointed toward the outfield, where a lone woman was sitting on a red folding stadium chair.
“That’s Rae out there.”
The detective had her eyes glued to the field. She had a scorebook open on her lap, and as promised, she was wearing a Red Wings jersey and a white baseball cap with her dark hair in a ponytail sticking out of the back.
“Detective Hernandez?” Drue said, as she walked up.
