by Elle Gray
“The one thing we can do right now is solve this mystery girl’s murder. And maybe some of these others while we’re at it,” I tell him. “Maybe if we can close enough cases and show the city and county there’s a real problem here, we can get them to pull their heads out of the sand and worry more about the people, than about putting in a new fountain in town. It sure would give you some political capital.”
“I hate politics.”
I quirk a grin. “So do I. But sometimes you have to play the game to get ahead.”
I’m definitely the last person to be talking about playing the game. I abhor politics to the point that I don’t even know the rules of the game. It’s a game I refuse to play. But for somebody in Morris’ position, it’s vital that he learns the rules and plays the game. But on his own terms, not theirs.
“I gotta admit, having a little capital would be nice. Real nice,” he says.
“Things change quickly, Sheriff. Most normal people, civilians I’m talking about, don’t pay attention to things like murder rates. A city council should. And if we show the people the failures of the city council, maybe they’ll take it out on them at the ballot box. And maybe, if we’re lucky, they’ll be replaced by people who care about this town like you do, who will do the right thing.”
“Your mouth to God’s ear, Agent Wilder,” he says. “Your mouth to God’s ear.”
Fourteen
Hikqu State Park; Outskirts of Briar Glen
The night air is cool. Crisp. And the stars overhead sparkle like cold chips of ice in the darkness overhead. My legs and lungs are burning, but I shut out the pain and push on. Running has always brought me clarity of thought, and I need that more than anything right now. After plowing through and organizing another couple years’ worth of case files, there’s a jumble of information in my head. It’s all disparate pieces right now with no common thread that I can see just yet.
Stabbings. Shootings. Bludgeoning’s. Strangulation. The victims cut across racial, religious, gender, age, and economic lines. Looking at it from the outside, it simply looks like a whole bunch of random murders. But then there’s the woman on the beach. How does she fit into all of this? Does she fit in at all?
The signature, the fingernail, tells me there’s somebody out there hunting women. But the idea that she was sexually assaulted by multiple people prior to her death puts a wrinkle in that theory for me. In my experience, that’s not how typical serials operate. Her murder, as well as the pile of bodies in this town over the last fifteen years－murders that have never been solved－is confounding me.
My breath comes out in thick plumes of steam, and the steady drum of my footsteps on the soft, packed dirt of the forest trail is in time with the rhythm of the music pumping into my ears. The hard driving guitar and Meg Myers’ throaty harmony drives me on as I emerge from the woods that surround my bungalow and into a neighborhood.
It’s an upper middle-class neighborhood that like downtown Briar Glen, is a mish-mash of different styles and designs. Victorians are mixed in with Mediterranean, which sit beside both an American and a Spanish Colonial. Further down the street is a Ranch style home, and beyond that, a Craftsman. The one thing they all have in common is that they’re well-kept and in good repair.
Some might consider the lack of any coherency in architecture to be off-putting. Some people would look down their noses at the chaotic jumble of competing architectural styles. Personally, I find it charming. It’s far better than cookie cutter tract homes, where everything looks absolutely the same, and one house is identical to the next one. And the one after that. And the one after that. To me, all of these different styles in one neighborhood adds depth. Character. And I like that.
It makes me think about my life, with some small part of me wondering if I’m ever going to settle down, or if I’m going to be living in hotel rooms in one city or another for the rest of my life, living out of suitcases full of my own sheets and blankets until I’m too old to settle down.
That, of course, brings to mind my reasons for having such a nomadic lifestyle, and as I scroll down the list of reasons and justifications I’ve given myself over the years, I arrive at the same realization I came to a couple of years ago. Oh, I’ve tried to deny it, but I’m not very good at lying to myself. It makes me somewhat envy those people not cursed with a sense of self-awareness.
I prefer living life on the road, as a nomad with no permanent roots, simply because the idea of being bound to one spot terrifies me. It took me a long time to get comfortable living with Annie and Maisey. And although I got good at pretending otherwise, I can say that I never fully settled down in their home. Not because of them. It has nothing to do with them. They were, and are, nothing but supportive and lovely. They welcomed me into their home and treated me not as a strange, distant relation, or an object to be pitied and treated like a glass doll, but as one of their own. It’s something I will always appreciate and will never be able to repay them for.
But the fact of the matter is that I’ve seen firsthand how quickly your home, your sense of safety can be stripped out from under you. I’ve seen how quickly your entire world can be turned upside down, and how your home can be turned into a house of horrors. It took years of therapy and my own critical self-analysis to realize that deep down, it’s like I feel if I keep myself on the move, I can keep myself away from tragedy. If I don’t put down permanent roots, my sense of safety can never be shattered, and my world can’t be turned on its head. On the move, I’m the one in control and nobody can take that from me.
As the thoughts roll through my mind, they bring with them images of my parents. They bring memories of them lying face down in congealed crimson pools. Gritting my teeth, I push myself harder, run faster, as if I’m trying to outrun my past. Trying to outrun my memories.
A dark-haired woman jogs by, her ponytail bouncing in time with her stride, and gives me a nod as I stop on the corner of a street and put my hands on my hips. I suck in deep lungful’s of breath, giving myself a break for a moment. My mind is still whirling with all the facts of the various cases I’ve absorbed over the last couple of days. There’s something I’m missing. Something I’m not seeing. And I think it’s something that will bring everything into a sharp focus. If I can just find that one key, I can make it all make sense.
Unless I’m wrong about it all, of course. That’s a thought that’s been hanging around in the back of my mind. For all of my number crunching and analysis, I’m human, and as a human, I’m prone to mistakes. Prone to seeing things that aren’t really there. It’s still entirely possible that this massive spike of unsolved murders in Briar Glen over the last fifteen years are the result of a lot of violent people, and perhaps, helped out by shoddy police work.
Not having trained investigators would, of course, hamper any efforts to bring justice to the victims by closing their cases. That’s not the fault of Sheriff Morris and his men, of course. Personally, I’d put the blame on the city politicians who aren’t providing adequate support for their police force. But it’s entirely possible that the lack of police trained to investigate crimes, and a city council who’s apparently blasé about it all, has allowed killers to run free.
The one thing that bothers me about that theory, though, is that from what I’ve seen, Briar Glen isn’t a town that appears to be riddled with crime. It’s a relatively affluent place, and there doesn’t seem to be a part of this city that could be considered the ‘wrong side of the tracks.’ There are parts of this city that have been left abandoned after the industry that once sustained it vanished, the buildings left standing empty. But there isn’t really a rough side of the town, where crime and violent criminals would normally fester. From what I’ve seen, Briar Glen is one of those rare, idyllic towns. An upper middle-class utopia.
I hit the button on my ear buds to stop the music as I bend at the waist and put my hands on my knees. I’m still breathing heavily everything processes through my mind. Clearly, I don’t get
out and run enough. It’s something I need to do more often, and I silently vow to myself that I will. Turning around, I start back the way I came, walking briskly, but not running. I’m not quite ready for that just yet.
The scream echoes through the dark, shrill and filled with terror. I know instantly that it’s the dark-haired woman who passed me before. A shot of adrenaline floods my veins, and my heart accelerates once more. Another scream tears through the night, and I take off in the direction it came from, running for all I’m worth.
My pulse pounding in my ears, I push myself harder. I don’t know where I’m going exactly, I’m simply heading in the direction the screaming seemed to have come from. The sound of a scream that’s cut off, followed by a car door slamming draws my attention.
I turn down a small path that cuts between two large houses. I emerge onto the next street over just in time to see the back end of a dark van tearing around the corner, its tires squealing on the pavement.
I give chase, but it’s too late. The van disappears around another corner further ahead and is gone. The dark-haired woman along with it. I pull my phone out of my small pack and call Sheriff Morris, already knowing there’s not going to be anything he can do.
Fifteen
Briar Glen Sheriff’s Station; Downtown Briar Glen
“No, I was too far away to get a license plate,” I say miserably. “Your deputies didn’t see anything?”
“Afraid not.”
We’re both sitting in my temporary office the following morning. After calling Morris and laying out the situation for him, he said he’d have his guys look into it and keep an eye out for the van. After that, he insisted that I go back to my hotel, telling me there was nothing we could do about it and that he’d see me first thing this morning. That we’d go over it together.
I didn’t get much sleep. How could I sleep when a woman had been snatched off the street a block away from me, and I could do nothing to stop it? Instead, I pored through the case files I had again, looking at them closer, searching for that one thing I’d missed that would pull it all together for me. I think I dozed off at about four or so, but was back up again at six, ready to get back to work. And to Morris’ credit, he got to the station before I did, ready to get to work.
Not that there was much for us to do. We combed through the missing persons reports on file and had no matches to either the woman on the beach, or the woman I saw last night. And nothing new had come in overnight. Whoever the jogger was, nobody was missing her yet, and I wonder how long it’s going to be before somebody does. She was a young, attractive woman, surely she’s got people in her life who are going to notice that she didn’t come home. Hopefully before it’s too late.
“Well, it’s not like I gave them much to go on,” I mutter.
“Don’t beat yourself up, Agent Wilder,” he says soothingly. “Not much you could have done. Besides, we don’t even know for sure it was an abduction. It could have been－”
“No Sheriff. I know the sound of somebody in distress. The scream I heard last night was one of somebody being taken,” I interrupt him. “The fear was too raw. Too real. Somebody was kidnapped last night. Right off the street.”
“Unfortunately, there’s not much we can do until somebody reports her missin’.”
“I know,” I grumble. “And it’s frustrating as hell.”
“What in the hell were you doin’ out so late, anyway?” he asks. “The world’s a dangerous place, Agent Wilder.”
“I appreciate your concern, Sheriff… kind of sexist though it may be,” I say. “But I like to run at night when I’m working through a case. And I’m a black belt in two different martial arts disciplines. I assure you, I’m quite capable of taking care of myself.”
“Two?”
I nod. “Two.”
“Huh. That’s impressive,” he says.
I shrug. “Also practical because, as you say, the world is a dangerous place.”
He laughs and sits back in his seat. “That it is, Agent Wilder. That it is.”
Thinking of the dark-haired jogger I saw last night conjures images of the woman from the beach, and I can’t shake them. I’m half afraid, but half certain we’re going to find her in the same condition. Deep down in my gut, I know that her fate was sealed the moment that van took off. Now it’s just a matter of waiting for the body to drop.
Feeling agitated, I get to my feet and rifle through the bag I’d brought in with me. I stopped by the store on my way home from the station last night and picked up some essentials. I take out a gallon jug of distilled water and fill the coffee pot and set the dark roast I’d picked up to brew.
“Brought your own coffee?” he asks, arching an eyebrow at me.
“I’m finicky about my morning caffeine,” I reply with a small smile. “And no offense, but cop shops always have the cheap blends that taste like they were roasted in a dirty gym sock.”
He laughs. “Can’t argue with that.”
“Grab your mug. Trust me, you’ll like this,” I tell him.
He nods and goes back to his office to fetch his mug. As I sit behind the desk waiting for him to return, and the coffee to finish brewing, I see the morning shift rolling in. The deputies cast dark glances into the office as they pass by. And I’d have to be deafer than Beethoven to not hear them whispering amongst themselves about me. Though none of them say a word directly to me, it’s pretty clear that the deputies are less than thrilled with my presence.
“Your deputies don’t seem to like me very much,” I mention to Morris when he steps back into the office.
“Nah. It ain’t you. They just don’t like Feds in general.”
I laugh softly. “You didn’t either.”
“Still don’t,” he acknowledges. “But you’re not a normal Fed, so you’re all right.”
“You are a smooth talker, aren’t you?”
He shrugs. “I try. If any of the boys and girls out there give you any grief, you just mention it to me. I’ll take care of it.”
The coffee pot chirps at me, letting me know it’s ready, so I take Morris’ mug from him, fill it, and hand it back to him, then pour one for myself.
“Cream? Sugar?” I ask.
“Black, thanks.”
I dose my mug liberally with cream and sugar, then sit back down behind my desk and take a sip, smiling as I feel the contentment spread through my soul. Morris just chuckles to himself then takes a sip.
“What?” I ask.
“Just bringin’ your own coffee and fixin’s into the office,” he says. “Kinda seems like bringin’ your own beddin’ into a hotel.”
I stare at him blankly for a long moment and he seems to pick up on it because he looks down into his mug, a smirk tugging at the corner of his mouth. “Oh,” is all he says before taking a sip of his coffee. After another moment of strained silence, Morris looks up at me.
“On the plus side, you’re right. The coffee is damn good,” he says.
A smile flickers across my lips as I take another drink. But my expression turns sour and my mood darkens quickly as the sound of the woman screaming last night echoes through my mind. I try to shut it out, but the shrill, piercing tone keeps reverberating in my head.
“I hate this,” I growl.
“Trust me. So do I.”
I’m not good at sitting here, waiting. I need to find something to do. There’s a knock on the office door and one of Morris’ deputies－Summers is his name－pokes his head in. He’s a tall man, with thin dark hair, a square jaw, and dark eyes. He’s built, with wide, sloping shoulders, and biceps as big around as my thigh. He obviously spends an inordinate amount of time in the gym.
“Sheriff, we just got a call,” he says, his voice deep and gruff. “Man says his fiancé never came home last night.”
Morris and I exchange a look and get to our feet, and I feel a rush of anticipation flowing through me. The deputy hands Morris a slip of paper and the Sheriff looks at it for a moment.
&
nbsp; “Thank you, Deputy. Good work,” he says, then turns to me. “Let’s roll.”
Sixteen
Murray Residence; Briar Glen, WA
“I had to work an overnight at the hospital last night,” he says. “And when I got home this morning, Tracy wasn’t here.”
“Tracy Webster, is it?” Morris asks.
He nods. “Yeah. That’s right.”
“Jordan, is it possible Tracy is out with friends? Could she have had a few too many last night and－”
“She doesn’t drink,” he answers.
“Okay, but could she have possibly spent the night at a friend’s house?” Morris presses.
Jordan shakes his head. “I’ve already called around. But she wouldn’t have crashed somewhere else without telling me.”
“You’re sure about that?”
“I’m positive, Sheriff.”
I watch as Jordan Murray stands up from the loveseat he’d been sitting on and starts to pace the living room, first folding his arms over his chest, then dropping them down to his sides. He slips his hands into his pockets and pulls them out again. He’s upset. From where I’m sitting, it looks genuine.
The couple lives in a small Craftsman style home. It’s one of the smaller homes on the block, and is neat, tidy, and tastefully appointed. This place definitely has young, hip, socially, if not financially affluent couple, written all over it. All of the furnishings, while nice, aren’t top of the line or expensive. They’re not a wealthy couple, but they do try to make it seem like they are.
I’m sitting on a plush recliner and Morris is perched on the edge of the larger sofa. Both of us are tracking Murray as he walks back and forth, back and forth, fidgeting and unable to sit still. His face is etched with worry and his eyes are red, as if he’d been crying. Murray is doing a decent job of keeping his emotions reined in, but it’s a fragile thing, I can tell.
