The Silenced Women

by Frederick Weisel

  The room fell silent. Rivas, Coyle, and Eden watched Mahler slowly move across the room to Holland. “No victim’s been found in the park, but that doesn’t mean one isn’t there.”

  “Come on, Eddie, the evidence’s different for this one.” Holland pointed to the photo enlargements taped to the wall. “That’s not Partridge carrying the body. He’s not our guy.”

  Mahler smiled. “You sound awfully sure for someone who just came on the case.”

  “I’m looking at the evidence.”

  “Partridge’s not our guy for this one. But until I see something different, I say he’s the one who did the girls two years ago, and I don’t think he’s finished.”

  Eden stood and walked to the whiteboard. “I agree. Last night when you were in the park, I did some more work on the victim in Fresno, Sandra Avelos.” She pointed to a new photo. “This is her. Strangled in a public park in April 2017, two days after Easter. Killer used the same type of cord and strangulation pattern as the earlier Santa Rosa and Vallejo victims. Same signature cut at the base of the spine. Partridge’s girlfriend says he went with her to Fresno for the major holidays.”

  She faced the others. “But there’s something else. The medical examiner found blood on the tail of the victim’s blouse.”

  “So what?” Coyle said. “The killer cut her, right?”

  “Only it wasn’t Avelos’s blood. The doer must have accidentally cut himself.”

  “Wait. What? Is it a match to Partridge’s blood type?”

  “It’s his type. But it’s O positive, same as forty percent of the general population. By itself, it’s not conclusive. If we had Partridge’s DNA, we could run a test that would tell us one way or the other.”

  Mahler peeled the Avelos photo off the whiteboard and examined it. “I hear the Fresno PD sent you something.”

  Eden nodded. “Yeah. It’s a transcript of a phone call on their homicide tip line the day after the killing. Caller says on the night of the Avelos homicide her boyfriend came home and beat her. Then he forced her facedown on their bed and used a knife to cut her lower back. The call was anonymous, and the Fresno investigators weren’t able to track it. Probably a prepaid phone. I’m still looking for something in the transcript to make an ID.”

  “How about Elise Durand?” Mahler asked. “What’re we missing?”

  Rivas pointed to the timeline. “We’ve still got a huge hole in the sequence. Security camera at the victim’s office shows her leaving the building, without her car, at 5:40 p.m.”

  “Then comes the huge hole,” said Coyle.

  “Yeah. What we know is, eleven hours later, at 4:02 a.m., the surveillance video at the Violetti Gate shows a hooded figure dismantling the lock on the gate. Then, according to the timestamps on Tyndale’s photos, the three men carry the victim’s body to the bench from 4:09 to 4:18 a.m. The video shows the car driving out of the gate at 4:23 a.m.”

  Coyle raised his hand like a kid at school. “We do know a few other things. In the missing eleven hours, according to the autopsy, the victim eats an expensive meal and swallows a shitload of OxyContin and quetiapine. She fires a gun, someone strangles her, she cuts open the back of her head, and she’s wrapped in a red blanket. All in a location we haven’t identified. In the company of a person or people we haven’t identified.”

  Mahler stood in the center of the room. “Eden and I are going to talk to Benjamin Thackrey this morning. We should know more after that.”

  Holland pointed to the whiteboard. “It looks like we also know our victim ends up in the trunk of a vintage Mercedes, which may or may not be owned by someone named Victor Banerjee, who may or may not live in San Francisco.”

  “Speaking of Victor Banerjee,” Coyle said, “I did some searching online and found pretty much nothing. Which is strange, right? With social media and online everything, it’s not easy to disappear. If I run a search on any of you on Facebook or a few other sites, I’ll find something.”

  Holland laughed. “Some of us more than others.”

  “So what’s it mean?” Rivas asked. “This guy’s not online?”

  “I think,” Coyle said, “it means Mr. Banerjee wants to be invisible and has the technical expertise to do it. The only thing I found was a three-year-old newsletter for a Muay Thai dojo in Oakland, which lists V. Banerjee as a competitor.”

  “What the fuck’s Muay Thai?” Holland asked.

  “Chinese martial art. Close combat. Short, quick punches. Leg-kicks below the waist. Think Bruce Lee.”

  “Did the newsletter have an address or photo of the competitors?” Mahler asked.

  Coyle shook his head. “By the way, when you talk to Thackrey, don’t mention Banerjee. I’m using the keystroke logger to make them think we’re following other leads. In fact, ask him if he was in Fresno in April 2017.”

  Holland motioned for Rivas. “We should get on the road. We might learn something about Banerjee from this tech startup place.”

  As he passed Mahler, Holland turned. “I talked to Frames. The hospital’s releasing him. He’s still in pain, but he’s able to get around. I promised to keep him up to date. He said he wants to talk to the boys who put the dogs in his car.”

  Mahler nodded.

  “Sorry about that thing earlier. I have to say what I think.”

  Mahler waited a beat. “Everyone who comes through VCI thinks he’s right the first day. Gets harder the second day.”

  (ii)

  (FRIDAY, 9:35 A.M.)

  Mahler and Eden found Thackrey’s address in Dry Creek Valley. A narrow, paved drive zigzagged up a grassy slope to a sprawling, one-story house. The building sat on a hillside, on the western side of the valley. In front of the house, a windbreak of Italian cypress bordered a green lawn.

  A tall, dark-haired man opened the door. Mid-thirties, he wore a black shirt untucked, faded jeans, and leather clogs. He smiled at his visitors. From inside the place came the sound of Sinatra and the Sands Hotel, Vegas, 1965.

  Mahler held up his badge and introduced Eden and himself. “We’re looking for Benjamin Thackrey.”

  “Ben Thackrey. What’s this about?”

  “We have a few questions about Elise Durand. May we come in?”

  Thackrey frowned. “Ah, Elise. Poor girl. Sure, come on through.”

  They followed Thackrey down a marble-tiled corridor into a large living room filled with morning sunshine. A floor-to-ceiling glass wall and French doors looked out on a lawn. Beyond that stood a meadow and then a vineyard, where straight, trellised rows stretched the width of the valley.

  Thackrey waved his guests to a white leather sofa. He pointed a remote to turn off the sound system. “I was just having a coffee.” He held up his mug. “Can I make you a fresh one? Sumatran, low acid?”

  Mahler and Eden declined.

  Thackrey drank slowly from his mug and looked at Mahler. “I read an online account of Elise’s murder. Terrible thing. I understand this might be related to earlier killings in the park? Serial killer, is it?”

  Mahler shook his head. “We’re still looking at the evidence. Tell me, Mr. Thackrey, what was your relationship with the victim?”

  “Elise? Interesting. I hadn’t thought of her as a victim until now. I guess you’d say that, for a time, she and I were involved romantically.”

  “For a time?”

  “Yes, but for all intents and purposes, it ended.”

  “How did it end?”

  “How does it ever end?” Thackrey smiled at Eden. He sat with his legs crossed. His right foot held a clog by the toes and rocked quickly up and down. “We grew apart. Elise was very attractive, obviously. But she was less mature than the women I usually see. And she had a…drug dependency.”

  “A drug dependency?” Mahler asked.

  “Downers mostly—OxyContin. But really anything she coul
d get her hands on. It’s sad to witness an addiction taking over someone’s life. I don’t mean to be critical, given what’s happened, but she needed more of my time than I was able to spare.”

  “Was the decision to end the relationship mutual?” Mahler asked. “Did you and Ms. Durand argue?”

  “Nothing of consequence. We just stopped getting together.”

  “When did you last see Ms. Durand?”

  “A while ago. Two, three weeks.”

  Behind Thackrey, a large abstract oil painting hung on the wall. A bright red slash stabbed across a white canvas. Eden pictured Elise coming toward her from the kitchen, sitting beside Thackrey. Had she been killed in this room? Had her body lain on the floor?

  “We have a witness who saw you with Ms. Durand last Saturday night,” Eden said.

  Thackrey sipped his coffee. “Really? Well, that’s awkward, isn’t it? And what does this witness say Elise and I were doing?”

  “Buying five ounces of meth.”

  “You’re kidding, right? Methamphetamine? Do I look like the sort of person who would buy meth?”

  “Please answer the question.”

  “I was not with Elise on Saturday night, and of course, I was not buying meth.”

  Mahler, who had spent years in rooms with liars, found himself admiring the smoothness of Thackrey’s lies. “Where were you?”

  “I don’t remember. In the city, I think. I had dinner.”

  “Where?”

  “Perbacco’s on California Street.”

  Eden wrote in her notebook. “Can someone corroborate that?”

  “I was alone. I had the stracci.”

  “So you’d have a receipt, or an online record of the transaction?”

  “I’m not comfortable giving you access to my accounts without a subpoena.”

  “What about Monday evening, say, after five thirty?” Mahler asked. “Where were you?”

  “Here, by myself.”

  “Did you make any phone calls that would back up your statement?”

  “I don’t remember. Why would I have to back it up?”

  “Do you own dogs?”

  “Dogs? That’s an odd question. But, no, I’m not really a fan of animals. I have a number of fragile antiquities I’m rather protective of.” Thackrey pointed at a cabinet across the room. “That marble sculpture of Artemis the Hunter is from the second century. Worth two million.”

  Mahler watched Thackrey’s shaking leg again and then looked at the man’s eyes. What kind of shit was this guy on? “Nervous, Mr. Thackrey?”

  “Of course I’m nervous. I’m being interrogated by police officers about a murder. What about you? You keep blinking. What’s that about?”

  Mahler wondered if Thackrey’s shaking leg was tuned to a beat inside his head, keeping time to music only he heard. “How about last evening around seven? Where were you?”

  “Last night? You know, I’m getting pretty tired of this. I was here. I’m always here. And I was alone, with no one to ‘back me up,’ as you say.”

  Mahler imagined asking, Were you inside my house last night?

  “Besides, what difference does it make where I was?” Thackrey said. “Wasn’t Elise already deceased by that time?”

  “It was a…related incident.”

  “A related incident? That makes it all clear.”

  “Were you in Fresno in April 2017?”

  “Good God. Fresno? 2017? You people have the strangest way of questioning someone. No, I was not in Fresno in April 2017.” Thackrey laughed. “And anyone who says I was is a liar.”

  “Do you own a firearm?” Mahler asked.

  “A gun? Do you have any idea how insane this is? I’m a Stanford grad. I built startups that are on the Nasdaq. I live in wine country. Why would I have a gun?”

  “Do you own a firearm?”

  “No, I do not.”

  Eden, who had been quiet for the last few minutes, spoke up. “I understand you were questioned two years ago in the disappearance of Reggie Semple?”

  Thackrey lowered his coffee mug and peered at Eden with new interest. “That’s correct. I was questioned.”

  “And Ms. Semple was never found. Is that right?”

  “I believe so. I haven’t followed the news.”

  “You were dating Ms. Semple at the time of her disappearance?”

  “Dating? Wow. I haven’t heard that word in a long time. Yes, I was in a relationship with Reggie for a while. I believe she was seeing other men as well.” Thackrey put his coffee mug on the table in front of him. He frowned. “I’m not sure what my relationship with Reggie has to do with events here in Sonoma County.”

  “Did Elise know Ms. Semple?” Eden asked.

  The question brought silence to the room. Mahler, who had risen from the sofa in expectation of leaving, stood still.

  Thackrey’s right foot stopped rocking. He looked back at Eden. “Know her? Of course not. How do you even imagine that happening? I haven’t seen Reggie in years, and when I did, it was down in the city. I met Elise up here in Santa Rosa. Different worlds.”

  “With you in common.”

  “With me? Yes, I suppose—although I don’t know what you’re implying by that.”

  Thackrey faced Eden as she stood. He smiled. “I must say, Detective Somers, you don’t have the usual personality of a police officer.”

  “What personality is that?”

  Thackrey glanced at Mahler. “Smugly moralistic.”

  “I don’t find those sorts of generalizations hold true.”

  “Is that right? I only meant you seem a bright young woman. I never associated intelligence with law enforcement.”

  “Maybe we’ll surprise you.”

  “Maybe you will. I’m not an expert on the matter, of course. I’m just an engineer who happens to be good at writing code. It’s a binary occupation, one thing or the other.”

  “But that’s not all you do, is it?”

  “Isn’t it? Perhaps we can chat again. In the meantime, I hope you’ll take care. Intelligence is a…rare gift. But in your line of work, I would think it’s equally important to know when you’re close to danger.”

  Eden looked back and met his eyes. “What makes you think I don’t know?”

  Chapter Thirty-One

  (i)

  (FRIDAY, 10:03 A.M.)

  “What kind of place is too good for a Starbucks?” Rivas came out of the coffee shop on the corner of Howard and Third in San Francisco’s South of Market district. He maneuvered around a crowd of pedestrians waiting for the light and turned his back against the chill, damp wind blowing down Third.

  “Six bucks for a small.” Handing one of the coffees to Holland, Rivas yelled above the roar of a jackhammer across the street. “Something called Ethiopia Sidamo.”

  Holland smiled, opening his coffee. “This is what the world looks like when high-tech money takes over, Rivvie. Different scene back in the eighties when my dad was on the job here. Then it was bathhouses, leather bars, junkies shooting up in the doorways. Now it’s the Digital Renaissance. Hipsters and posers. Skinny jeans and designer glasses in every sidewalk cafe.”

  Rivas took the top off his coffee and watched a cyclist change lanes in front of a Muni bus. “Man, I feel like a fish out of water. Where the fuck are we going?”

  Holland looked at his phone. “End of the next block. By the way, I texted Frames on the drive down. Told him we’re close to the boys who put the dogs in his car. Thought he’d want to know.”

  The offices of DivingBell were the ground floor of a renovated, century-old stone building. The entrance was etched with the company’s logo—a windowed canister, with a chain rising upward—which the detectives had seen on Elise Durand’s computer. Entering, Rivas and Holland stepped into an empty lobby. Their attent
ion was immediately drawn to a glass door on the left side, with a view of a cavernous space where tables of computer workstations spread across the floor and an army of Holland’s hipsters stared at screens.

  A large, blank television hung on the lobby wall in front of the detectives. Cheery musical notes sounded, and an earnest-looking woman with a mass of curly hair appeared on the screen. She seemed to be sitting behind a desk in a bare room. “Good morning, gentlemen,” she said. “May I help you?”

  Holland held up his badge. “Police. Here to speak with the owner.”

  “The owner?” The woman frowned. She repeated the word as if it were in a new language. “I’m not sure who that would be.”

  “Okay, darling. Your top cheese. Whatever his or her title is.”

  “Yes, sir. Do you have an appointment?”

  Holland grinned. “No, sweetheart. We don’t make appointments. It’s about a murder.”

  The woman on the screen blinked and shifted in her seat. “I’m sorry, sir. Did you say murder?”

  “That’s right. Homicide investigation. We have a few questions. Quick chat, and we’re out of your hair.” Holland turned toward the glass door. “Through here?”

  The woman jumped up. “Sir, sir. You can’t go inside without an escort. Please wait for Monica.” She looked down and tapped at a computer tablet. “You’ll be meeting in…Nebraska.”

  Holland looked back at the screen. “Sorry. What?”

  “Nebraska. Third room on your right. Monica will show you.”

  Thirty seconds later, a woman in jeans and oxford shirt arrived on the other side of the glass and lifted a plastic card from a lanyard around her neck. The door emitted a metallic buzz and swung open.

  “All right if we bring these?” Holland held up his coffee. “Won’t contaminate anything?”

  Monica giggled and led Holland and Rivas through the company’s workspace. The room was filled with conversation and ringing phones. The interior walls were painted in bright primary colors. Redbrick pillars rose to a fifteen-foot ceiling featuring exposed ventilation ducts and electrical conduits. Farther inside, they came to a row of glass-walled conference rooms, labeled Illinois, Michigan, and Nebraska. Monica gestured toward the open door of the last room. “Enjoy,” she said and walked briskly away.