“What about the spare rooms? What was in those?”
“One was a kind of catchall. He had a spin bike and a treadmill in it. Some boxes he’d never unpacked from when he moved in. Mrs. Loomis added to those.”
“Were those boxes sealed?”
“They were. Yes. I’d offered a few times to help unpack them. They never took me up on it.”
“What about the third bedroom?”
“That was his office. There was a desk with a computer. A couple of file cabinets.”
“Did you ever have occasion to go into those drawers? Either the desk or the file cabinets?”
“Sometimes, yes. Once or twice he called while I was there. This was before Mrs. Loomis was in the picture. He was at work and forgot some notes he needed. So he asked me to go in and find them. They were in a desk drawer.”
This was gold. My hope that Jenna would grow comfortable on the stand paid off. She continued with her candor, explaining how she helped Tom unpack and organize his basement as well.
“All right,” I said. “So in the four years that you worked for Tom Loomis and gained intimate familiarity with where he kept his things, you never once saw this XYZ buck knife?”
“No,” she said.
In his closing, Quick would discount this. Just because Jenna had never seen it didn’t mean it wasn’t Tom’s or Katy’s knife. But I’d scored some points he couldn’t volley. I felt hope rising in my chest. Even Katy sensed a shift. She sat a little straighter in her seat. I should have stopped there. I let my confidence get the best of me. About two minutes later, it would cost me.
“Okay,” I said. “Let’s get back to your arrival at the house and your normal routine. You said you had the garage door code. But never a spare key?”
“No. He never gave me a key.”
“Are you sure about that?” I asked. But I had already jumped the tracks. A small voice in my head screamed as if I were at the controls in a cockpit: pull up, pull up, pull up!
“I’m sure. I just had the garage door code.”
Stop. Don’t. Do not.
“How were you supposed to get in if the garage door wasn’t working? Say, if the power went out?”
“If the power were out, I wouldn’t have been able to work that day. I can’t clean in the dark or with no electricity. Besides, Mr. Loomis installed one of those whole house generators. His power was never out. I only went in through the garage.”
Crash. It wasn’t earth-shattering. Not even a major mistake. I should have stopped with the knife.
“So you entered the house at 5:52 a.m. At 5:57 a.m. Mr. Kinney, the neighbor, placed a call to 911. So just under five minutes. That’s the amount of time you were in the Loomis house?”
“That sounds about right. Yes.”
“You didn’t immediately walk back to the bedroom upon entering the house, did you?”
“I don’t know what you mean.”
“Well,” I said. “You said you walked in with your own supplies. A tote. Were you carrying the tote when you walked back into the bedroom?”
“What? No, I put it down.”
“Where?”
“In the kitchen.”
“You were wearing a coat in the surveillance video. Did you take it off?”
“Yes,” she said.
