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“Okay,” Muriel said a few moments later. “I’ve pulled up the names and addresses for the last couple of foster placements for Jeff Ross. Let me know when you’re ready with a pen.”
Eden jotted those down, then thanked Muriel again. “Binky’s next groom is on me.”
After she ended the call, she showed the list to Chandler. “What do we do now?”
“We start calling them and find out if they’ll talk to us,” he said, taking the first two names and walking over to the sofa with this phone.
Eden stayed at the table and called the last two families on the list. Chandler struck out on both of his. Neither of his families would talk with them. The first name on Eden’s list hung up on her too after she asked about Jeff Ross.
Finally, she got the mother from the last family on the list. It also happened to be the last foster home Jeff Ross had been placed in before he aged out of the system. Eden was starting to feel desperate. She needed this woman to talk to them or else all her work was a bust. She decided to go for broke and lay all her cards out on the table.
“Ms. Forrester, my name is Eden Dawson. And back in February, I witnessed Jeff Ross commit murder.” There was a gasp on the other end of the line, but the woman didn’t say anything. And she didn’t hang up.
Eden continued. “In a week and a half, I’m going to be testifying against him in court—and I think there’s someone out there who wants to make sure that doesn’t happen. Someone ran my car off the road. Someone broke into my house and put cyanide in my coffee. Someone locked me inside the building where I work and set it on fire. And since you know Jeff so well, I was hoping you could tell me about him—and help me figure out who it is who wants me dead.”
When she was met with nothing but silence, Eden feared she might have gone too far. Then the woman said, “It’s just such a shame what happened to him. We did our best. I swear we did.”
“I’m sure you did whatever you could for Jeff.” Eden met Chandler’s gaze again and he nodded. “We’d really appreciate if you’d tell us anything you can about him.”
Ms. Forrester sighed. “Well, I suppose it couldn’t hurt anything now.”
“Great.” She got permission to put the call on speaker phone so Chandler could hear as well, waiting until he settled in the chair beside hers before continuing. “Okay. Go ahead.”
“You asked about who might be behind the attacks. I think it must be Terry—Jeff’s brother.”
“Were they close when you knew them?” Eden asked.
“Inseparable. I never saw a more devoted brother than Terry. Even though they weren’t placed together, he did everything he could to be there for Jeff. The social worker told me when Jeff was placed with us that we should expect Terry to basically come along for the ride, even though he was officially placed elsewhere. He was always writing, calling, visiting, as much as he was able. Not long after Jeff came to live with us, Terry aged out and started living on his own. He got a job and a place to live close by specifically so he could be there for Jeff.”
Eden and Chandler exchanged a look. Yep. The more she heard, the more certain Eden was that Terry was involved in all this.
Ms. Forrester snorted. “Used to be if I couldn’t find Jeff, I’d call Terry. Nine times out of ten, he was there with his brother. When Jeff finally aged out of the system, too, I offered to stay in touch with him. I do that with all my kids, to give them support when I can. But he said he didn’t need anything from me because his brother would look after him.” She sighed once more. “Maybe I should have done more to keep them apart. They were both mixed up in crime—it started young for them and was the reason why they weren’t placed together. Maybe they weren’t good for each other. But I just couldn’t bring myself to try to cut out from Jeff’s life the only person who’d loved him from the start.”
“It wasn’t your fault, Ms. Forrester,” Chandler said. “People make their own choices in life. Sounds like you did all you could for him.”
“Thank you for saying that,” the woman said. “Do you need anything else from me?”
Eden explained how much it would help if Mrs. Forrester would call the police and let them know about the connection between Jeff and Terry. Once the woman agreed, they ended the call.
After hanging up, Eden stared at Chandler. “So.”
“So.” He sat back and clasped his hands atop his flat stomach. “We still don’t have any proof that Terry is behind your accident or anything else that happened to you.”
“No. But he seems to be the closest connection Jeff has outside of prison,” Eden said. “And from what the foster mom said, he seems to care deeply about his little brother. Maybe enough to try to keep him from spending the rest of his life behind bars for murder.”
“Maybe.”
Eden took a deep breath. “Well, if she talks to the police, we know they’ll at least start looking into Terry, if they haven’t already. I feel like we accomplished something anyway, even if my crazy assailant is still on the loose.”
