Erased by Jordan Marshall

anything wrong with Berkeley,” she said. “I met with them. They were nice.”
    “So what was the problem?”
    Brandy shrugged. “They said they didn’t have enough applicants from certain ethnic groups. I’m a black female. They had a quota to fill, so they wanted me.”
    “This scholarship was almost a free ride,” the Director said. “You spent your own money to get a degree from a less respected institution because you didn’t want to be part of a quota system?”
    Brandy’s heart sank. She couldn’t read Ashcroft. His eyes were hard and unblinking, his body language rigid. She could only judge his thoughts based on his questions. She got the feeling that he didn’t approve of her. “I didn’t want to be a statistic,” Brandy said. “If it was all handed to me, I couldn’t be proud of that. I never would have known if I earned it or not.”
    Ashcroft’s eyes went back to the screen. “Says here you turned down the CIA. Was that a quota too?”
    “There was a quota,” Brandy admitted, “but there was more to it. I did my time overseas. If I joined the CIA, I would have been right back there. I wanted to be home.”
    “Yesterday you assisted Agent Smith with the murder-suicide on the Bay Bridge. Tell me about that investigation.”
    Brandy shifted uncomfortably at the sudden leap in topics. She wasn’t quite sure where to start. “There were two bodies,” she said. “A cab driver named Bob Clarke –the killer- and the victim, a man named Michael Turner. Bob was an immigrant who moved back and forth between the U.S. and Jamaica for most of his life. His father was a drug smuggler who served twenty years for his involvement in a killing in Florida and then disappeared. Bob’s mother went to Jamaica and never returned.
    “He’d been back in the states for three years as of last month. He spent the last nine months working as a driver for the Black & Yellow Cab Company. He lived a solitary life, had very few friends. His employer said his behavior had become increasingly antisocial, but that he was a hard worker and hadn’t had any customer complaints.”
    “You’ve got a mind for details,” Ashcroft said. “I see why the CIA wanted you. What about the victim?”
    “Turner was a liberal activist. He was an active member of Greenpeace, Human Rights Watch and most of the other big ones. He worked in politics occasionally, mostly with the Green Party and the Libertarians. He was also a documentary filmmaker, but hadn’t produced anything in a few years.
    “We interviewed some of his associates and family members. None of them knew what he was doing in China, or why someone would have killed him. The briefcase raises other questions as well.”
    Ashcroft raised an eyebrow. “What briefcase?”
    “Turner left SFO with two bags: a carry-on suitcase and a leather briefcase. Witnesses at the crime scene recounted seeing a man on a motorcycle drive by and steal the briefcase after the suicide. Turner’s suitcase was still in the cab.”
    “That might not mean anything,” Ashcroft said. “Random crimes of opportunity happen all day long in this city.”
    “I would have thought that too,” Brandy said, “except for one fact: The witnesses saw Michael leave the cab with the briefcase, before he was killed. Bob Clarke chased him down and killed him, and then brought the briefcase back to the car.”
    “Interesting,” said Ashcroft. “What do you suppose was in it?”
    “No idea, sir. We still don’t know what he was doing in China in the first place. One possible theory is that Turner was involved in some sort of smuggling operation. It makes sense because he was just returning from a foreign country. There’s no telling if he spent his entire trip in China or if he used the country as an entry point. Obviously, there is still the issue of the cab driver’s suicide. If Bob Clarke had been part of the smuggling operation, he might have had motive to kill Michael Turner. The suicide just