My apologies for the short chapter I posted last time...Sometimes there's only one logical place to cut the story off. But this chapter is longer.

My thanks also go to the wonderful readers who chose to leave great reviews! I really appreciate you taking the time!

So, on with the story! Enjoy...

See part 1 for disclaimer...

Part 7

They managed to make more progress on the Thursday. They spoke to many of Cassandra's classmates, who all described how they had been shocked to hear of her death. Most of them were still pretty upset, so Harm and Mac had to take it easy with them. But they managed to put together a timeline of Cassandra's usual movements.

In the morning, Cassandra usually left her home at 05.30. This was routine on a Monday morning, because the gymnastics team got in a training session, before classes started at 0800. The team congregated in the school gymnasium at 0610 and trained until 0740, leaving the students just enough time to get showered and changed before classes started. But Cassandra hadn't turned up that morning. Somehow, she had passed the school, continued towards the base and ended up on the other side of the fence, on the firing range. Why would she run towards the military base, instead of the school?

It proved to be a hard puzzle to solve, until they got to interview one young boy who fit Timothy's description of the boy hanging around Cassandra a lot.

Jeremy Baker, a final year student and a member of the gymnastics team, like Cassandra, approached Harm and Mac once his classes were over. He had a pair of studded sports boots around his neck, like Timothy the carer/housekeeper had described.

"Ma'am, Sir?" he knocked on the open door just as Harm and Mac were packing their papers up to leave, "I heard you were interviewing people about Cassie's…murder."

The young man looked distinctly uneasy saying the last word aloud.

"Yes, that's right…who are you, son?" Harm asked.

"Jeremy, Sir…Jeremy Baker. I knew Cassie from gym team. I was wondering if there's anything I can do to help you catch the person who did this?"

Harm and Mac invited him in.

"We're glad that you came to find us," Mac told him, "Is it okay if we interview you? We were about to pack up for the day. But if we can get this done, now, even better."

Jeremy nodded in the affirmative.

"How old are you, Jeremy?" Harm asked him.

"Sixteen, Sir," the boy told him, "Well, nearly…next month."

Once they had determined that the boy had no reservations about them interviewing him,

Jeremy told them something, which built upon what they knew, so far.

"Cassie was going to meet me," he told them, "Even though she has to go out of her way to come and meet me, she usually did, unless she was running late and there wasn't time. She was planning to when I spoke to her on Sunday. Only, when I got to the place where we usually meet, she wasn't there."

"What time was that?" Mac asked.

"Around 5 minutes before 6 0'clock. Practice starts at 10 minutes past 6, so I thought she was just running late and that she'd just gone straight to there. Only, when I got there, she hadn't turned up."

"Why does Cassie come and meet you, if it takes her out of her way?" Harm asked.

The boy just shrugged, "I don't know…I kind of…like…Cassie and I think she could tell. We got talking at one meet and she walked home with me that day, as far as the base. She said she was going in there anyway, to pick up some stuff from her Dad's office. The next week, before practice, I was just walking to school along the same route and she was there…I guess I never really questioned it. She just seemed to like meeting up with me."

I light bulb went on inside Mac's head.

"Jeremy, your walk to school takes you past the military base?"

"Yeah, my house isn't far from it, why?" he replied.

"And if Cassie was coming to meet you that morning, she'd have to walk away from the school and towards the base?"

"Uh-huh…But she wasn't there when I got to the base. We always meet along the fence behind the shooting range. She didn't turn up. I had to leave by a couple of minutes after 6, otherwise I'd be late for practice."

"How tall are you, Jeremy?" Mac asked.

"Six-two."

"And your favourite apparatus is?"

"The rings, Ma'am."

"Have you ever been onto the military base, Jeremy?"

"Just once, Ma'am. A while back, over a year ago. Cassie managed to get a bunch of tickets to watch the military band performing. She was standing in as mascot and I got passed a ticket through a friend of a friend….that was the first time I noticed Cassie. I was just new to the school and the gymnastics team and didn't know a lot of people. But my friend passed me this ticket and I went to watch out of interest."

A sad smile came across his face.

"Cassie looked real good that day…even with that bulky costume on! She nailed all of her tumbles."

Harm and Mac shared a knowing look.

Once Jeremy Baker had been thanked and excused, Mac came to one conclusion; Jeremy Baker could not have killed Cassandra Drake.

"There is no way that a boy that size could get through that hole in the fence," she summarised to Harm.

"Why not?" he asked her.

"It would be hard enough to get the length of him through the hole in the fence, let alone his upper body."

Being an athlete, Jeremy had a bulky upper body, which was probably why he favoured the rings in gymnastics. A man had to have immense upper-body strength if they were to perform on such an apparatus.

"But gymnasts are skilled," Harm pointed out, "He might have been able to."

"I really don't think so," Mac shook her head, "and he couldn't have gotten over the razor wire across the top."

They both agreed to disagree.

"I think we should go and see the Admiral," Mac told Harm, "His daughter Gemma wasn't at school today and as a friend of Cassandra's I think anything she might have to tell us would be valuable."

Harm just nodded and they were off back to the base.

OOOO

The Admiral granted them their interview, but requested that they be gentle with his daughter, as she was still in an extremely fragile state over the death of her best friend.

That was why she had been absent from school.

"Gemma?" Mac asked her, softly, "Would it be alright if we had a word with you?"

The girl was curled up at home, on her bed. The tv was playing and Harm and Mac could see that it was a recording of a cheerleading meet, probably filmed within the last year. Teary eyed, Gemma Basingstoke slowly nodded her head.

"We're so sorry about what happened to your friend," Harm told her, "but we want to catch the person who has done this, so they can't hurt anyone else. If we could understand more about what had been going on in Cassie's life, we might come across this person. Do you know of anyone who would have cause to hurt Cassie?"

The girl shook her head.

"No," she told them, croakily, "everybody loves Cassie. She's never had an argument with anyone…I can't believe she's gone…"

The Admiral, who was sitting in on the interview moved to take her hand.

"Has anyone been showing any particular interest in Cassie, lately? Officers from the base, boys from school?"

Gemma looked up.

"Um, Cassie was pretty into a boy from school. He liked her too, I think, but he seems a really nice guy…I don't think he'd ever do something like this. I don't know how anyone could..."

"What is this boy's name?" Mac already had a good idea who it was.

"Jeremy," the girl replied, "I think his surname is Baker."

"Do you know of anyone else?"

"No…but Cassie had been experiencing some…tension on the gym team. It never used to be so competitive, but since Lisa Baron joined, Cassie's been on edge sometimes. Even though Cassie was under a bit of pressure, she really was never in it just to win. She always preferred the team events."

"Was this girl actually giving Cassie any trouble?" Mac asked.

"Not exactly," Gemma told them, "But Cassie said she seemed to be trying to compete with her, even in training sessions. She was trying to land more difficult moves, make them higher, faster and better timed. Cassie never took the bait, though, she couldn't have cared less about it."

"Was Lisa Baron ever hostile towards Cassie in front of you?"

"No, it was more cold indifference that I saw from her. She has a…reputation amongst the people in our year."

"She's not very popular?" Harm questioned.

"Not really, Sir," Gemma hesitated, but after a nod from her Father, she continued to tell them what she knew, "She has a nick-name; um…fugly…fugly skank."

Harm shot Mac a questioning look. He'd never heard that one from Mattie, but seeing as it was probably very derogatory, he figured he should probably be glad that he hadn't.

Mac shot him a look that told him she'd explain it later.

"Did Cassie ever call her that?"

"No! Never…She said that it was a really mean thing to say."

"Gemma," Mac continued, "when was the last time you heard from Cassie, before she died?"

Gemma dropped her gaze and looked quite stricken.

"I last talked to Cassie on Sunday, at cheerleading practice…" she choked out, "But she called me on Monday morning…I was still asleep, I didn't realise…"

"Did she tell you about any problems she was having?" Harm quickly steered the conversation away from the emotional topic of Cassie's call on the morning of her death.

"No, she seemed to be as happy as ever…even with her Dad so sick, she always managed to be so upbeat."

"Gemma, we need to ask you about the times that you and Cassie went onto the military base…" Mac spoke up.

"Yeah," Gemma nodded, "Okay."

"Did you two ever get in any other way than through the gate?"

Gemma didn't at first understand.

"How do you mean?" she asked.

"Did the two of you ever get in through gaps in the fence?"

"No, never!" Gemma vehemently shook her head, "If we'd have been caught, it would have gotten our Dads into so much trouble. We always went through the gates. We knew most of the people who stood guard. They were pretty nice to us."

"Had Cassie been going on-base a lot, lately?"

"Not really," the girl shook her head, "She used to, to collect work for her Dad to do at home. But he's been so bad, lately, he's just not able to work anymore…Is Cassie's Dad okay?"

"Not really," Harm told her, "But we're confident he's not too aware about what has happened."

"Thank goodness," Gemma spoke, more to herself than to the other people in her room, "It's all so hard to understand..."

After that, they left and went back to their lodgings for the day, to look over what they'd collected so far, that day.

OOOO

AN: I'm afraid I may be caught up in pesky RL tomorrow (job interviews and friends visiting.) I'll post another chapter shortly, just to tide you over until I get the chance to post again!