by Chelsea Cain
“I didn’t mean it like that,” Archie said. He had put Susan through enough; he didn’t want to argue with her about this.
“What did you do after we watched that tape?” Susan asked evenly. “You called Henry. He dropped everything and came right over. You showed him the footage. And you two have been wringing your hands ever since.”
“So?” Archie said.
“There’s a task force out there hunting Gretchen,” Susan asked. “Why didn’t you call them?”
Archie fumbled for an answer. “I wanted Henry’s take on this first.”
“It’s been forty minutes since we saw proof that she was on that island last night,” Susan said. “That’s forty minutes that the cops trying to catch her won’t have. Maybe she’s long gone by now, I don’t know. But I do know that when you see a deranged escaped criminal, you call the police. So they can start looking. So they can set up roadblocks. So they can warn the public. You don’t call your friend. You don’t sit there like an idiot.” Susan peered at him intently. “You do want her caught, right, Archie?”
Archie looked to Henry for support. Henry’s eyes went from Susan to Archie. He smoothed his mustache and raised his eyebrows at Archie.
Archie sank back in the sofa. “The video is sort of compromising,” he said.
“The serial killer humping your face?” Susan said. “Yeah, I’d say so. But you’re already compromised, if you hadn’t noticed. Now you need to decide what you’re going to do about it.”
“Do you want to make the call, or should I?” Henry asked Archie.
The truth was Archie didn’t think they had a chance of catching Gretchen. She was smarter than all of them. But he wasn’t going to admit it.
“I’ll do it,” Archie said with a sigh, and he pulled his phone out of his pocket and dialed.
CHAPTER
32
The crime scene investigator was named Gary. He was in his thirties, Archie guessed, with a slight build and thick dark hair that would have fallen just above his shoulders if it hadn’t been pulled back in a ponytail. A feathering of dark hair on his chin appeared to mark the early stages of a goatee.
Archie shifted his weight and the plastic sheeting under his bare feet crinkled.
“Will this take much longer?” Archie asked, clearing his throat.
“If you keep squirming,” Gary said.
On the other side of the bedroom door, Archie could hear the others having a hushed, heated discussion, but Gary seemed impervious. Archie couldn’t make out many words, but he recognized Sanchez’s voice as one of the loudest.
At first it had been a relief when Gary had shown up. At least Archie got to leave the room.
Gary ran a latex-clad finger over the back of Archie’s bare thigh and Archie felt his gluteal muscle reflexively tense.
He had been picked clean by CSU before. Just two months ago, after a bomb strapped to a man had gone off, splattering Archie with a pink soup of flesh and bone, Archie had spent an hour being culled for evidence.
But this was different.
He was naked, standing on a plastic sheet, while a fully clothed man knelt in front of him. It was, to put it mildly, a bit more invasive.
Gary touched a mole on Archie’s thigh and then peered at it through a magnifying glass like it might be a clue.
“That’s me,” Archie said with a sigh. “I’ve had that my whole life.”
Gary nodded. His prominent nose was offset with deep-set large dark eyes and eyelashes like Elizabeth Taylor’s. If he managed to grow the goatee, it would look good.
Archie stole a glance at his bedside clock. It was after nine. He shifted his weight again.
“I took a shower this morning,” Archie said.
“You already said that,” Gary said. “And then I said it was still worth harvesting evidence, and then you objected to my use of the word harvesting.”
Archie remembered that now.
“Are you uncomfortable?” Gary asked.
“I’m naked,” Archie said. He was finding himself in this situation a little too regularly for comfort.
“It won’t be much longer,” Gary said. He got to his feet and focused his attention on Archie’s neck. The stray fine hairs at Gary’s hairline fluttered every time Archie exhaled. Archie tried to remain perfectly still. It was hard to be still. Every one of Archie’s knuckles suddenly needed cracking. His nose itched. He wanted to stretch. He was cold. Gary produced a pair of tweezers and plucked something off Archie’s skin and deposited it in a plastic bag. Gary had done that four times so far, and each time the item he’d pulled off Archie had been so minuscule that Archie couldn’t see it at all.
“What’s that?” Archie asked.
Gary shrugged. “Probably nothing,” he said. He tucked the bag into his crime scene kit and returned with a small black plastic comb and then settled onto his heels in front of Archie. “I’m going to comb your pubic hair,” he said.
Archie wasn’t sure how to respond to that, so he tried to remain stoic as Gary drew the comb through Archie’s pubic hair in short swift strokes, stopping after each stroke to examine the comb for any errant hairs. When Gary saw hairs on the comb he eased them into an evidence bag. After thirty or so strokes, he sealed the bag, wrote something on it, and stowed it in his crime scene kit.
When Gary turned back to Archie he was holding what looked like a six-inch-long Q-tip.
Archie had a bad feeling about this. He took a small step back.
“We use this to perform two tests,” Gary said, wiggling the Q-tip. “We use it to swab the shaft and glans of the penis to search for traces of vaginal mucus, and we also insert it into the urethra to collect a sample for STD testing.”
“Excuse me?” Archie said. His mouth felt very dry.
“It’s protocol,” Gary said. “For a full examination.”
“It’s unnecessary,” Archie said emphatically. “Because I did not have sex with her.”
Gary pursed his lips. “It’s my understanding you don’t remember much of last night, yes?” he said. “So you can’t be sure, can you?”
Archie drew his hands through his hair. He hadn’t considered the possibility that he’d had sex with Gretchen last night or that there had been anything more to the evening than what the tape showed. But he had lost five hours, and the tape only accounted for two minutes of that. He was barely conscious in the boathouse footage, but who’s to say what state he’d been in before that? He wanted to believe he hadn’t had sex with her. But at the same time he couldn’t put it past himself, not with their history. He knew himself well enough to know that.
Archie eyed the Q-tip pinched between Gary’s latex-clad fingers. “We have to do both tests?” he asked.
Gary considered the Q-tip. “It’s possible we could get away with just the one,” he said.
“Which one?” Archie asked quickly.
“Do you have a preference?” Gary asked.
Archie raised an eyebrow. Wasn’t it obvious?
“Are you concerned about STDs?” Gary asked.
“Right now?” Archie said. He had never been less concerned about STDs. “Not at all.”
Gary smiled. “Then I’ll just swab your penis, then,” he said pleasantly.
“Fine,” Archie said, relieved. He lifted his hands to his hips and looked over Gary’s shoulder at the wall.
Gary put the penlight back in his mouth and lowered out of Archie’s sight. Archie kept his eyes focused dead ahead, cringing as the dry fuzzy end of the Q-tip tickled lightly along the shaft and then around the tip of his penis. It was over quickly. Gary did it expertly, like he swabbed penises thirty times a day. Archie exhaled the breath he had been holding and Gary dropped the Q-tip into a plastic vial.
“Does it ever not work?” Archie asked.
“What?” Gary asked, looking up.
“You threatened to jam the stick up my dick so I’d agree to the swab,” Archie said.
Gary lowered his head, but Archie c
ould see he was smiling. “You could have refused.”
“But I didn’t,” Archie said.
“But you didn’t,” Gary said, still smiling. He picked up his pen and started writing something on the label of the plastic vial. “You can put on your pants now,” he said, not looking up.
Archie stepped off the plastic sheeting, picked up his underwear off the bed and pulled them on, and did the same with his pants. He was starting to put on his shirt when Gary stopped him.
“Not so fast,” Gary said. “I still need a blood draw.”
Archie tossed the button-down aside and sat on the edge of the bed, his bare feet on the floor.
Gary took a seat next to him and crossed Archie’s forearm over his knees. He tied a urine-yellow rubber tourniquet around Archie’s upper arm, letting it snap tightly into place, and then wiped the inside of Archie’s elbow with iodine. “You have nice veins,” Gary said.
“I’ve been told that before,” Archie said.
Gary tossed the used cotton ball in a small orange biohazard bag and then produced a hypodermic syringe from his kit. He took the cap off the needle.
“What will they test for?” Archie asked.
“I expect they’ll run a general tox screen as well as some tests for more specific drugs along the line of what she’s used in the past,” Gary said.
Gary slid the needle into Archie’s vein. Archie watched as his blood filled the hypodermic’s barrel. Opiates would show up on any basic tox screen, and Archie knew he’d started last night with plenty of pills. “I took some Vicodin last night,” Archie told Gary. Then there were the two he’d chewed when he’d come to on the riverbank. “And this morning,” Archie added
“Okay,” Gary said.
“I just thought I should mention it,” Archie said.
Gary withdrew the needle and pressed a cotton ball in the crook of Archie’s elbow and bent the arm closed around it. “You better spend some time thinking about what you’re going to tell them when they ask about it,” he said. He gave Archie a meaningful look and then glanced toward the closed door. “We’re done,” he called.
* * *
Archie was still buttoning his shirt when he walked into the living room. Everyone stopped what they were doing and looked at him. Raul Sanchez sat on Archie’s sofa with Bob Eaton, the chief of police. Martin Ngyun had Susan’s laptop on his knees on a stool at the kitchen bar, and Claire was standing close to Henry by the window. Susan had the refrigerator door open. She was the only one who didn’t look up. She was pulling bread and peanut butter out of the fridge, clearly intent on making a sandwich.
Archie forced himself to look around the room, to meet all of their eyes, until, one by one, the heads turned back to what they had been doing.
There had been more, at first. Archie had counted seventeen cops in his small apartment when Gary had escorted him into the bedroom. Then Henry had explained the sensitive nature of the video, and all nonessential personnel had been asked to leave. Archie imagined them all home posting status updates on Facebook, publicly wondering what new humiliation Archie Sheridan had suffered now.
“How are you doing?” Eaton asked from the couch. Archie couldn’t remember the last time he’d seen the chief out of uniform, but tonight he was in street clothes—a blue Columbia Sportswear jacket, jeans that looked ironed, and a button-down shirt that was open at the collar. One of his hiking boots had come unlaced.
“I’ve just had my penis swabbed, Bob, how are you doing?” Archie said.
Eaton coughed uncomfortably. His hair was entirely white, but the light reflecting off his jacket tinted it with blue. “This is…” Eaton flailed helplessly. “This is…” He looked around the room, but nobody came to his aid. What was there to say? Archie could think of a few things: This is … humiliating, demeaning, degrading, denigrating, mortifying. But Eaton wasn’t really a word man. He squinted at Archie and Archie almost felt sorry for him. “Do you need to talk to someone about this?” Eaton asked.
They were all looking at Archie again, except for Susan, who was spreading peanut butter on a piece of wheat bread. Archie could smell the peanut butter from across the room.
“Am I supposed to be traumatized?” Archie asked. This was exactly what he’d wanted to avoid, all of those eyes brimming with concern, as if he’d survived some ordeal. “You know what’s traumatizing?” Archie lifted his shirt, exposing the thick scar that ran up his midsection. “Having your spleen forcibly removed without anesthesia. That’s traumatizing.” He directed his chin toward his laptop, which still sat open on the kitchen bar. “That, right there, is cuddling.”
He had already decided that he was going to tell them. Now he swallowed hard and made himself go through with it. “Look,” he said. “Some of you know this.” He glanced across the room at Susan, who peeked up from her sandwich. “The rest of you have at least heard rumors, so I’ll just be clear.” He shut his eyes. It was the only way he could say it. “I had an affair with her.”
“Archie,” Henry said sharply, “stop.”
Archie could feel the weight of everyone’s attention; it made his neck burn. An affair? Was that even the right word? Archie opened his eyes. “Gretchen Lowell and I had a sexual relationship during the period she infiltrated the investigation,” he said. The words tumbled out now. He lifted his hand, the one without the ring. “You’ll notice that I’m no longer married.” The apartment was completely silent. Claire threaded her hand through Henry’s, but Archie could tell from her expression that his confession hadn’t been news to her. He wondered what, if anything, Henry had told her and what she’d figured out on her own. “That’s what she’s doing on the tape,” he said. “Reliving old times.”
He’d done it.
He stole a glance at Susan. She was on the other side of the kitchen bar, facing him, eyebrows raised, frozen, with a piece of bread in one hand and a butter knife in the other.
Ngyun was facing Susan’s laptop screen, his features bathed in its blue light. But his hands weren’t moving over the keys, and his mouth was open.
Sanchez cleared his throat. He had his palms together, his fingertips touching his lip. “Well, shit,” he said quietly.
But Eaton was the only one who looked truly, utterly surprised. He was looking at Archie with abject astonishment. Apparently not everyone had heard the rumors after all.
“You slept with her?” Eaton sputtered. “With Gretchen Lowell?”
Archie met his eye. There was no going back now. “We had sex, yes,” he said. “Many times.”
“When did it end?” Eaton asked.
“She locked me in a basement and tortured me,” Archie said, deflecting the question. “What do you think?”
Eaton turned to Henry, who was shaking his head at the floor. “You knew about this?” Eaton asked him.
“Not at the time,” Archie said quickly before Henry could answer.
“She seduced him, Bob,” Henry said, crossing the living room to take the chair nearest Eaton. “He was under a lot of pressure, remember?” Henry scratched the back of his head. The chair creaked. “Overworked. Exhausted. He was vulnerable. She knew that.” He touched his mustache. “She did it to fuck with all of us,” he said.
“It hasn’t been easy for Archie,” Claire said. She walked over and stood behind Henry. “It was a mistake,” she said, giving Archie a supportive smile. “He’s been punished enough for it.”
Archie didn’t deserve their support, but he was grateful for it.
Eaton hunched forward and studied his hands. Sanchez zipped up his FBI windbreaker and then unzipped it, and then zipped it up again. The room was so quiet Archie could hear the fridge humming. Susan perched cross-legged with her shoes on his counter, holding her sandwich with both hands, her eyes doing her own survey of the room and studiously avoiding his.
“Is that why she let you live?” Eaton asked.
“I honestly have no idea why she let me live,” Archie said.
Sanchez l
eaned back against the couch and stuffed his hands in his jacket pockets. “Why make this confession now?”
Archie shrugged. “I don’t care who knows anymore.”
“Like any one of you wouldn’t have fucked her given half the chance,” Claire said with a snort. Henry shot her a look. “What?” she said with a shrug. “It’s true.”
“They want to keep a lid on it,” Susan said from the kitchen, a biteful of sandwich in her cheek. “That’s what they’ve been talking about while you were in there. They think warning people she’s back will cause a panic.”
The lightness in Archie’s arms vanished. He looked around the room, stunned, waiting for someone to contradict her. Keep a lid on the fact that the Beauty Killer was back? They had to warn people—if not for the public’s protection, then to help apprehend Gretchen. Someone might spot her.
“Good to see you’re feeling better,” Sanchez said to Susan, narrowing his eyes.
“Thanks,” she said, coloring slightly. “The Midol really helped.”
“You can’t keep a lid on this,” Archie said to Eaton. Gretchen had designed this scenario after all, of that Archie was certain. And if Gretchen expected them to stay tight-lipped, the only proper response was to shout her presence from the rooftops. “You’re going to issue a statement, right, Bob?”
“Do you know what tomorrow is?” Eaton asked. The lines in his face seemed to deepen. “It’s Halloween.”
Halloween. Archie shook his head and smiled. She couldn’t have planned it better. “Of course it is,” Archie said. He moved around to the chair across from Henry and sat down.
Sanchez looked like he was waiting for him to say something.
“What’s so funny?” Sanchez asked.
“You think this is a coincidence?” Archie asked him. “Her coming back now?”
“You have to warn people,” Susan said from the kitchen. “You have to make an announcement.”
“She’s right,” Archie said.
