Page 32 of Shadow of Justice
“Just that Shante finally told Jamie what we’d all been thinking. That he was coming on too strong and it wasn’t cool of him to try to go through our friend group trying to hook up. None of us liked him like that. We just wanted him to chill out.”
“Did he?” I asked.
“Kind of. He certainly stopped bothering me. And he stopped coming to our study sessions. I assumed he’d finally taken the hint. But that was all at least a year before Ellie went missing. That’s why I never thought much about Jamie during all of that. His behavior wasn’t a problem. He was just this dorky guy in our classes. We were friendly. But he was on the periphery.”
“So Ellie never told you she was having issues with him?” Gus asked.
“Not specifically, no. She stayed friendly the longest with him out of anyone. I remember asking her about it. It was right before Christmas break, a couple of months before Ellie disappeared. She mentioned she was going to meet him for coffee. I think I asked her why she was still giving that creep the time of day. I don’t remember what she said. But I got the sense she felt sorry for him. Like he had no other friends. Then when we got back … now this Idoremember pretty well. I was sitting next to her and she got a call from him on her cell. She didn’t say anything but she clicked it off. Didn’t answer. The vibe I got was that she was annoyed with him. I wished I’d have asked her about that. I just didn’t. I didn’t like talking about him. Giving oxygen to it. We talked about classes. We talked about our plans. Ellie was working for a home health care agency. She liked it. She was just on her path, you know? Ellie was not someone I ever worried about. She didn’t do drugs. Didn’t drink. Didn’t date losers. Didn’t date at all as far as I knew. Not seriously. There was just not an ounce of drama where she was concerned and that’s why I liked her so much.”
“Okay,” Gus said. “What about when she disappeared? I asked you then if you knew anyone who might want to hurt her.”
Bree shook her head. “And my answer today is still no.”
“What about Jamie Simmons after the fact?” Gus said. “Did you have any communication with him after Ellie went missing?”
“Yes,” Bree said quickly. “And this is the part that’s haunting me the most now.”
Gus and I exchanged a look.
“What do you mean?” I asked. All Bree knew was that Jamie had been arrested. The media knew that his daughter had turned in evidence implicating him. But so far, we’d been lucky that the substance of that evidence had not been leaked.
“Jamie was just really upset. And it’s not that that in itself raised any suspicions on my part. We were all completely freaked out. Ellie was the last person I would ever have predicted that happening to. She was careful. Responsible. I told you all that. Anyway, Jamie was just at the forefront of everything. Calling us all. Telling us when and where different search parties were being organized.”
Gus wrote something in his notepad.
“He brought those missing person flyers to school,” Bree said. “Handed them out and got everyone to tack them up everywhere. Went to every vigil. I mean, we all did. Definitely in the beginning. As the weeks went on, we all knew there was no hope. Ellie was never coming back. Jamie took the whole thing really hard.”
“And that seemed out of character?” I asked.
“No. That’s just it. It seemed veryincharacter. That’s why I didn’t think a whole lot about it. I just rolled my eyes. I knew Ellie didn’t like Jamie. I knew he annoyed her as much as the rest of us. She was nicer than the rest of us about telling him to buzz off. If you ask me, she was too nice. I’ve never been the kind of person who’s had issues setting boundaries. Ellie was always more worried about hurting people’s feelings. She put up with Jamie more than the rest of us did. So when she went missing, it made a certain amount of sense to me that Jamie would take it so hard. But he was just … I don’t know. Really intense about it. Once when Paul and Sarah said they couldn’t be at the search party one weekend … Sarah’s grandma died or something. They had to go to Fort Wayne for a funeral. Jamie was livid. Snapped at them in the courtyard. Said they didn’t care about Ellie as much as the rest of us. Paul put him in his place. We chalked it up to stress. Moved on.”
Gus wrote a few notes, then closed his book.
“I’m sorry,” Bree said. “I just didn’t think to mention any of this back then. Jamie was intense. It wasn’t out of character in my mind. Now … if he really did have something to do with hurting Ellie, it makes a different kind of sense. I could see it as the behavior of someone guilty. Now … I think maybe Jamie hadn’t moved on from Ellie. I think maybe he was still in her shit, you know? Still trying to get with her like he did everyone else in the group before that. And if she did something to finally set that boundary … maybe he …”
“You can’t do that,” I said. “You can’t second guess yourself.”
“You answered the questions I asked of you,” Gus said, his tone bitter.
“Did he ever seem violent?” I asked. “Do you know if any of the other girls in your friend group were afraid of him?”
Bree shook her head. “I just know that we were getting creeped out enough to freeze him out. And we did. Jamie did have a temper. That day in the courtyard with Paul and Sarah, he made a scene. Yelling at the top of his lungs. Calling them names. It was scary. But like I said, I just wrote it off as stress. Ellie was Jamie’s friend, too. At least as far as he was concerned.”
“I really appreciate this,” Gus said.
“I haven’t done anything. Maybe if I’d have told you all this twenty years ago, it could have made a difference.”
“None of this would have raised reasonable suspicion against Jamie Simmons,” I said, as much for Gus as Bree. “It’s like you said. You were all grieving. You were all traumatized by losing your friend.”
“Then when she was found all those months later,” Bree said. “I don’t know. It never occurred to me it could have been someone in our group. I’m sorry.”
“Did you know Jamie ended up marrying Ellie’s sister?” I asked.
“No,” Bree said quickly. “I mean, I know it’s a small town. But I didn’t stay in touch with the people from college. I moved to Ann Arbor. Started my own life. Our paths didn’t cross. Jamie didn’t pursue nursing as far as I know. But when I found out last week, I was horrified. Just horrified. I remember Ellie’s sister Erin from the funeral later that year. She looks just like her. My God. If I’d known Jamie married her … I don’t know. It might have got my wheels turning.”
“It’s okay,” Gus said. “You can’t beat yourself up. This has been helpful. I may have more questions later. For now, just try to put it behind you.”
“I loved her,” Bree said. “Ellie was special. And this is all such a waste.”
