by Blake Pierce
“So what are you going to do?” he asked. “Head back home?”
She honestly wasn’t quite sure yet. Part of her wanted to stay in DC just for the hell of it. Maybe she’d get some shopping done or go out to her favorite spot at the National Mall and just sit to reflect. It was certainly a gorgeous day for it.
But then again, she wanted to be back home, too. While she had struck out in terms of Brian Neilbolt, the fact remained that someone had killed Julie Meade. And it seemed that the police were at a loss so far.
“I’m not sure,” she said. “I may hang around town for a bit but I’ll likely head back home before nightfall.”
“If you change your mind, give me a call. It was really nice seeing you, Kate.”
They paid their checks and left the table after a brief embrace. Even before Kate left, her mind seemed to have snagged on one particular thought, one that had come out of nowhere, it seemed.
Julie was killed in her home, while her husband was out of town. If there was a break-in of any kind, no one mentioned it to me. Not the police while I was being lectured, and not Debbie or Jim. If there had been a break-in, you’d think that would have been mentioned.
It made her wonder…did the killer enter the house because he was invited? Or did they perhaps, at the very least, know where a spare key was hidden?
Those questions settled it. Once she’d given her glass of wine enough time to run its course, she was going to drive back to Richmond. She’d promised Assistant Director Duran that she would not beat anyone else up.
But she’d said nothing about not investigating.
Of course, the funeral was first. She’d pay her respects and do her very best to be there for Deb tomorrow. And after that, she’d step back into her role—perhaps with a bit more excitement than she cared to admit.
CHAPTER EIGHT
The next afternoon, Kate was standing in the back row of mourners as the Meade family and their closest friends assembled at the cemetery. She stood with her little breakfast crew—Clarissa and Jane dressed in black and looking genuinely heartbroken—who had managed to love on Debbie earlier in the morning. Debbie seemed to be doing much better than she had on the day she had asked Kate to look into the murder. She wept openly and let out a single anguished moan of sorrow, but she was still present. Jim, on the other hand, looked like a very broken man. A man who would go home and think long and hard about how sometimes, life just wasn’t very fucking fair at all.
Kate couldn’t help but think of her own daughter. She knew she’d have to call Melissa when the funeral was over. She hadn’t known Julie Meade very well but based on conversations she’d had with Debbie, Kate assumed she had been around the same age as Melissa, give or take a few years.
She listened as the preacher went through the familiar Biblical passages. While her thoughts were very much with Debbie, they were also still slightly obsessing over how this could have happened. She had not come out and asked directly if there had been a break-in since she had gotten back from DC but she had kept her ears open. She had noticed that neither Jane nor Clarissa had ever mentioned a break-in, either. And that was odd because Clarissa somehow had a knack for knowing everything thanks to her nose for gossip.
She looked up at Debbie and Jim, noticing that there was a tall man standing by Jim. He was relatively young and dashing in a clean-cut sort of way. She lightly nudged Jane beside her and asked: “The tall guy next to Jim. Is that Julie’s husband?”
“Yeah. Tyler is his name. They hadn’t been married long. Less than a year, I think.”
It occurred to Kate that maybe her little breakfast clique really didn’t know one another very well after all. Sure, they knew all about their former jobs, favorite caffeinated beverages, and wishes and dreams for retirement. But they had never really gone much deeper. It had been sort of a mutual silent understanding. They had rarely talked about their families, keeping conversation surface level, fun, and entertaining.
There was nothing wrong with that, of course, but it left Kate knowing very little about the Meade family. All she knew was that Julie had been their only child…in the same way that Melissa was her only child. And while she and Melissa were not as intimately close as they had once been, it still hurt to even think about losing her.
Once the service was over and the crowd started to disperse in a tangle of hugs and awkward handshakes, Kate and her little coffee group follow suit. Kate, however, hung back where a few people had kind of hidden themselves away for a cigarette. While Kate was not smoking (she thought it a disgusting habit), she wanted to stay out of sight for a while. She scanned the crowd and found the tall figure of Tyler Hicks. He was speaking to an elderly couple, both of whom were openly weeping. Tyler, however, seemed to be doing his best to remain calm.
When the elderly couple left, Kate made her way toward him. Tyler was heading in the direction of a middle-aged woman and her two children, but Kate made a point to reach him first.
“Excuse me,” she said, angling herself in front of him. “You’re Tyler, right?”
“I am,” he said. When he turned to face her, she could see the grief all over his face. He was drained, tired, and looked to be empty of just about everything. “Do I know you?”
“No, honestly,” she said. “I’m a friend of Julie’s mother, though. My name is Kate Wise.”
A flicker of recognition sparkled in his eyes for a moment. It made his face look almost alive for a split second. “Yeah, I heard Debbie mention you. You’re an FBI agent or something, right?”
“Well, recently retired. But yes, that’s the gist of it.”
“Sorry she sent you looking into what happened to Julie. I can imagine that made for an awkward situation.”
“No need to apologize,” Kate said. “I can’t even imagine what she’s been going through. But look…I’ll make this quick. I won’t want to take up too much of your time. I know that Debbie wanted me to look into the ex-boyfriend and while I haven’t been able to speak with her about it yet, he is clean.”
“Mrs. Wise, you don’t have to do this for her.”
“I know,” she said. “But I was wondering if you could maybe answer a few really quick questions for me.”
He looked insulted at first but then resigned himself. A curious and sad look crossed his face as he asked: “Do you think there are questions worth asking?”
“Perhaps.”
“Then yes, I’ll answer a few. Quickly, please.”
“Of course. I was wondering if you had seen anything around the house once you returned home that might have seemed strange or out of place. Maybe something that didn’t seem like that big of a deal considering what has just happened to Julie. Maybe something you thought you’d look into later, when things had calmed down a bit.”
He shook his head slowly, looking back to the place where his wife would be lowered into the ground within the hour. “Not that I can think of.”
“Not even any signs of a break-in?”
His attention went back to her and now he looked a little spooked. “You know, I’ve started to wonder about that myself,” he said. “All of the doors were locked when I got home that next day. I rang the doorbell because my keys were in one of my bags and I didn’t want to dig for them. But Julie never answered. I didn’t even bother to think about that until yesterday, when I was trying to get to sleep. Someone came in easily, without breaking in. And then they locked the door behind them. So they knew how to get in. But that doesn’t make sense.”
“And why not?”
“Because there’s a code for the security system that only Julie, myself, and our cleaning lady knows. We change it every two months.”
“Any suspicion about the cleaning lady or her family?”
“Well, she’s pushing sixty and we don’t know her family. The police were looking into it but found nothing.”
“Well, how about you?” Kate asked. “Is there anyone you can think of that would have even considered doing this?�
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He shook his head without giving it much thought. “I’ve spent every waking moment since I came home and found her body trying to think of someone who would have any reason to kill her—to even be angry with her. And I keep coming up blank.” He paused here and then looked at her skeptically. “You said you’re retired. So why are you so interested in this case?”
She gave the only answer that would be acceptable. “I just wanted to do everything I could to ease Debbie’s mind.”
She knew that there was a deeper truth, though. And it was a selfish one.
Because being just a little involved in this case is the most purposeful I’ve felt since I retired a year ago.
“Well, I appreciate your help,” Tyler said. “And if you need anything else from me, please let me know.”
“I will,” she said as she gave him a lame sympathetic clap on the back and left him to his sorrow. The truth was, though, that she doubted she’d ever speak to him again. She’d been an agent long enough to know an innocent and truly heartbroken man when she saw one. She’d bet everything she owned on the fact that Tyler Hicks had not killed his wife. She already felt terrible for hijacking him after his wife’s funeral. She’d stay away from Tyler from this point on; if he could be of any further help, let the cops handle it.
She went to her car and pulled out into the slumbering line of traffic that was leaving the graveyard. She drove back toward her house in silence, her thoughts continually drifting to Melissa and her forthcoming granddaughter.
Her phone rang, obliterating the train of thought. There was a number, not a name, on the display screen. She answered it suspiciously, still shaken over the funeral and how the experience was making her think long and hard about her own daughter.
“Kate Wise?” a man on the other end asked.
“Yes, this is Kate,” she said.
“This is Randall Budd. How are you?”
“Somber,” she answered honestly, a little pissed that she was having to speak to Chief Budd in that particular moment.
“You go to the funeral today?” he asked.
She was rather surprised that he even knew Julie had been buried today. Maybe she should cut the guy some slack after all. “Yeah,” she answered. “Just left about fifteen minutes ago.”
“Well, look. I wanted to call to let you know that at about eight o’clock this morning, we got an anonymous tip. An arrest was made in the death of Julie Hicks. We’ve still got the guy here in interrogation. Some guy that came out to fix their Internet a few weeks back. He’s got some intimate knowledge of the family and he has a previous arrest record for—get this—sexual misconduct. We’re looking into his story and accounts and it all looks solid.”
“Who is it?”
Budd sighed, a sound that was like static electricity through the phone. “Ms. Wise, you know I can’t tell you that.”
“Of course you can. I’ll do nothing with the information other than try to help you.”
“Yes, but with all due respect, I have not asked for your help.”
“Can you at least tell me if the suspect knew the victim personally?”
The other end of the line was quiet for about three seconds, finally broken by a thick sigh and Budd’s voice saying: “No.”
She almost pushed harder but left it at that. If she really wanted to know, all she’d have to do was place a call to Logan. It would be a cheap thing to do but at least the option was there.
“And it’s looking like he’s the guy?”
“It’s certainly a possibility,” Budd said. “Once we have enough to book him for it, we’re going to notify Debbie and Jim Meade. So please keep it to yourself for now. I just thought I’d do you the courtesy of knowing…in the hopes that you don’t go all vigilante on us again.”
“Thanks for that,” she said. “Have a good day, Chief.”
She hung up with a sense of relief. Case closed. That was a good thing. Now Debbie and Jim could maybe begin to start looking at what grieving was like with closure involved.
But then she thought about what Tyler Hicks had said about the security code. And even the things he had not said. About how someone would have to know how to get in unseen. How someone would have to know the family well enough to get inside the house after dark, past the security measures and locked doors.
By the time she got back to her house in Carytown, that relief was gone. If anything, it had morphed into an entirely new kind of certainty.
A certainty that told her that whoever killed Julie Hicks was still at large.
CHAPTER NINE
If there had been one aspect of being an agent that Kate had hated, it was the few times she’d had to appear in court to give her testimony or to testify against a prisoner’s parole. However, doing it now, a year removed from her job with the prospect of returning in a minor role in the future, she found it exciting.
She was set to testify against a man named Patrick Ellis. She knew the history like the back of her hand but still hung on every word as the judge recounted the case for those in attendance.
“It has been proven beyond reasonable doubt that Mr. Ellis killed a married couple while they were hiking on the Blue Ridge Mountain trails in 1993. The married couple, the Muellers, had been discovered three days following their fateful hike. Both of their heads had been smashed in, the wife had been raped and sodomized, they’d been stripped naked, and disemboweled. During the initial case, the defense pushed hard for a ruling of insanity, given the gratuitous nature of Ellis’s crimes.
“In the end, Ellis had been found to be of sound mind, having given far too much thought into the killings not to have planned it beforehand. Further evidence had shown that the Muellers had not been random; they lived just three streets away from him. He’d even mowed their grass for them one time when the Muellers were vacationing in Florida.”
He paused and looked out to the courtroom, making sure it sank in. As he went over the minutes and notes from previous dates, Kate relived the case in her head. It had been twenty-five years ago but the case, like most of the ones that had taken her into a courtroom, seemed just as fresh as one that had occurred last week. Even Patrick Ellis looked pretty much the same with the exception of a ratty beard and a few gray hairs. He recognized her even before she was called up to testify. He gave her a smile that was just as sharp as a knife.
A knife I’m sure he’d be happy to plunge directly into my throat, she thought as she stepped up onto the stand.
“Before we begin,” the judge said once he was done with catching everyone up, “I should make it clear to those in attendance that Ms. Kate Wise retired from the bureau a little over a year ago. Still, I have it on good authority that everyone she worked with, including her superiors, gives her their full trust and confidence. That being said…Ms. Wise, I assume you know all of the reasons that are being given for the parole of Mr. Patrick Ellis, correct?”
“I do.”
“Can you state those reasons for the court?”
“Of course, Your Honor. I know that during his first year in prison, Ellis was involved in three fights, one of which nearly killed him. I also know that during his third year, he began to attempt to get permission to reach out to friends and family members of the Muellers under the reasoning that he wanted to apologize. When he could not get that permission, he attempted to commit suicide by hanging himself. Lastly, I know he has regularly been attending chapel and Bible studies, and that he has apparently given his life to Christ. For the past four years, he’s apparently been a model inmate and, in the words of several guards, is the very definition of a changed man.”
“That’s exactly right,” the judge said. “Based on those details, what is your opinion of the possibility of parole?”
“Well, Ellis was originally sentenced to life in prison. And while the option of parole was tacked on to that sentence, I vehemently fought it at the time. And I will continue to fight it now. I can’t say if Ellis is a changed man now or not. But
I can tell you that the things I saw at the crime scene when the bodies were discovered was the work of a man that enjoyed what he had done. I can also tell you some of the deranged things he said to my partner and I when he was under interrogation. I know there are members of the Muellers’ family in attendance today, so I’d rather not go over the things Ellis said in private. But I will if I have to in order to make sure that he never sees another day of freedom.”
She snuck a glance toward Ellis and saw that his grin was gone. He now looked like a man who was being haunted by some nameless ghost.
“Do you not consider his good behavior and changed ways a sign of turning himself around?”
“I don’t think it matters,” Kate said. “Parole would make him a free man. Yes, he’d have tests and restrictions galore, but he’d still be free. He’d have some semblance of a life back. The married couple I found disemboweled in the side of a mountain twenty-five years ago don’t get that option. So no…I don’t find Mr. Ellis’s change of personality any reason to grant parole.”
She saw the grim expression on the judge and the shocked silence that fell through the audience like a series of boulders from the sky. Yes, in the past she had hated this part of the job. But it had come back quite naturally and as much as she hated to admit it, she felt incredible even under the evil glare of Patrick Ellis.
***
She was on her way out of the courthouse twenty minutes later, directly after it had been decided not to grant parole to Patrick Ellis. The discussions in the courtroom had brought back very vivid images of the murders. It was hard to understand that those kinds of scenes had made up her life at one point. Granted, the Muellers had been among the worst mutilated and abused bodies she’d seen in her career, but the number of bodies had kept piling up and somehow defining what she did.
It had taken her until retirement to understand that. For each case she broke or folded, there had usually been at least one dead body. She didn’t dare ponder just how many she had seen or been around in her career. It was those kinds of details and numbers that, she thought, could dive a retired agent to the brink of insanity.
