by Elle Gray
Once we’re back through the doors, my mouth falls open in a gape. The first thing I noticed the moment she opened the door was that her formerly rust-colored hair is now a bright shade of pastel pink. Honestly, I’m surprised she got away with it at work. Beks has always been on the edgy side, and back in the day when we were roommates in college, pushed me to lighten up and live a little. Those were some of the best days of my life.
“Hey, how are you, Blake?”
“I’m good, thanks,” I say and point to her hair. “That’s a….new thing.”
“Thanks,” she winks. “Just got it done a couple days ago. I like to think it brightens up the place.”
“I’m glad I can always count on you to do just that,” I tell her. “I’m kind of shocked they let you come to work like that, though.”
“Well, I love it,” offers Astra. “If I could pull it off at the Bureau, I totally would go maybe, like, teal.”
“Oh, that’d look awesome on you!” Beks encourages her. “Come on, let’s go back.”
Rebekah leads us into her office and closes the door behind us. She drops into the seat behind her desk and offers us the chairs across from her. I lean forward and set the cup of coffee and bag of doughnuts from Fred’s—her favorite doughnut joint—down on the desk in front of her.
“Bribery,” Rebekah observes with a wry grin. “So you mean to say you’re not just here to have a chat about hair color?”
“As always, Beks, you are right on the money.”
I give Rebekah a minute to take a bite of her chocolate-sprinkled doughnut and wash it down with a swig of coffee. She groans indecently as she chews her doughnut and slumps back in her seat, a wide smile on her face.
“I’ll admit, I do love the bribes,” she says.
“It helps to know your audience.”
She takes another bite and nods. “So, what is it I can do for you?” she asks around a mouthful of doughnut. “Must be something good for you to be plying me with Fred’s. Lay it on me.”
“Stacy Burkett,” I say. “What can you tell me?”
She takes another bite, then turns to her computer and taps on the keyboard, reading off the information that pops up. Rebekah takes a moment, then turns back to us.
“Stacy Burkett, age twenty-five,” she says. “Originally brought in as a Jane Doe, but she was subsequently fingerprinted and revealed to be Stacy Burkett. Her mother made the official identification yesterday.”
“Cause of death?” I ask.
“Official listed cause of death is internal bleeding caused by blunt force trauma. But it’s hard to know exactly which injury caused the bleed,” Rebekah says, her chipper expression falling to one more serious. “If I had to guess, though, I’m thinking somebody….beat her with a baseball bat.”
Astra and I share a grimace. “Jesus,” I mutter.
“This girl was beaten up badly. I’m looking at the photos and it’s grim. Broken ribs, fractured arm, fractured leg, she had more abrasions and bruises than could be counted. Frankly, she looks as if she went through a meat grinder. The shapes of some of the injuries I’ve seen are consistent with a long, blunt object—like a bat,” she explains. “But here’s the weird thing—she was normal weight and in good health otherwise. In the message you sent me earlier, you said you thought she was a victim of a trafficking ring. I don’t see any of the usual signs of that. She wasn’t malnourished, her tox screen was perfectly clean—other than being beaten savagely, she was the picture of health.”
Rebekah turns the monitor so we can see as she scrolls through the photos, each one of them seemingly worse than the last. Somebody worked her over hard, which doesn’t jibe with the picture of the girl’s good health Rebekah just painted for us. It’s a detail that doesn’t make the least bit of sense.
“Where was she found?” Astra asks.
“According to the reports, she was found just off old Highway 12. Drivers said she just appeared out of nowhere,” Rebekah says. “They clipped her but that wasn’t what killed her. Her injuries were already pretty severe when she was out on the road.”
“And nobody knows where she came from?” Astra asks.
Rebekah shakes her head. “Negative. Not according to anything I’m reading right now,” she says. “But my question is, since she’s from Seattle, how in the hell did she get all the way down to Highway 12, to begin with? What was she doing down there? And was she down there the entire time she was missing?”
“Those are all excellent questions,” I note. “And we will be sure to ask her mother all of them.”
“Is there anything else you can tell us?” Astra asks.
“Yeah,” Rebekah says, her face growing pale and drawn. “She gave birth recently.”
“Not aborted?”
She shook her head. “No, she definitely gave live birth.”
“How recently?” I ask.
“Hard to say for sure,” she replies. “But it was recent. Probably within the last month.”
Astra and I exchange a glance. This whole thing just took on an even darker shade. If there’s an infant out there, that just puts a whole new sense of urgency into this investigation.
“Okay, anything else we need to know?” I ask.
She shakes her head. “Nothing I can’t text you later.”
“Great,” I say as I get to my feet. “If you come across anything you think we need to know, please do. Thanks, Beks.”
Astra and I get to the door, but Rebekah stops me, and I turn around.
“I’ve heard some of the cops who come through here talking. There’s apparently a pool going around the SPD right now,” she says.
“Yeah? What are they betting on?”
“How long it’s going to take Deputy Chief Torres to indict you for Gina Aoki’s murder,” she says. “As it stands, the over/under is thirty days.”
“Thirty days? Is that right?” I raise an eyebrow.
“It is,” she replies with a laugh. “Which should I bet? The over or the under?”
I give her a devious grin. “Oh, the over,” I tell her. “Definitely bet the over.”
“That’s my girl,” she smiles.
Twenty-Five
Residence of Mia Burkett, Crown Hill District, Seattle, WA
“So, are we really not going to talk about Torres and this betting pool?” Astra asks.
I pull the car to a stop at the curb and cut the engine. Before we get out, though, I turn and look at her.
“There’s nothing to talk about,” I shrug. “You know there’s no case there. No matter how hard he tries to imply there is.”
“I know that, but if the rank-and-file cops are talking openly like that, it means Torres is gearing up for war,” she points out. “He’s coming after you.”
“Then let him come. All he’s got is a bad attitude and a grudge. There’s no way he can connect me to a murder I didn’t commit,” I say.
“That doesn’t mean he’s not going to try.”
“And the worst thing I can do is give it oxygen,” I counter. “If I acknowledge it, I give it validity. I give it life it doesn’t deserve.”
“But if you ignore it, you let Torres shape the narrative. You let him get his story out there and let his minions continue to amplify it.”
“So what? Let them talk,” I shrug. “I don’t care.”
“You should care. He’s going to wage a PR campaign against you,” Astra presses. “These days, you don’t need actual proof to tar somebody’s reputation. And make no mistake, Blake—he’s not doing this with the hope of a criminal conviction. He’s trying to smear you badly enough to damage your career. Maybe even tank it entirely.”
“Please. The brass isn’t going to listen to him,” I say.
“You need to be very careful, Blake. This is all politics and theater. It’s trial by innuendo,” she says. “And Torres is not only very well connected, but he plays the game a lot better than you do.”
“It’s not going to come to that,”
I insist.
On some level, I’m more concerned about it than I’m letting on. I know Torres is coming for me. I know he’s going to try to hang Gina Aoki’s murder on me. He’s been trying from the moment her body was found. I know his dislike of me stems from my friendship with Paxton Arrington as much as it does from the fact that the cases my team has broken have made him look bad in the court of public opinion.
But there’s not much I can do about it. Torres is going to do what he’s going to do. All I can do is fight the battles he brings my way. And that’s exactly what I’ll do. I will fight tooth and nail. To the bitter end. And when the smoke clears, I know that I’m going to be the one left standing. All Torres has are lies and innuendo. He has no case. I’ll let my record speak for itself.
“All I’m saying is that you better start digging your trenches now.”
“I will,” I tell her. “I’m not going to let somebody like him take me down or tarnish the work we’re doing.”
“And you know I’ve got your back. No matter what happens, you know I’m in your corner,” she smiles.
“I do. And thank you.”
“Anytime.”
We get out of the car, and I look around the solidly middle-class neighborhood. Trees line both sides of the street, and the houses are older but are mostly well-tended. The people here seem to take pride in their homes and try to keep them clean and nice. The Burkett home is a one-story ranch-style home that’s painted a light shade of blue with white shutters. Both could probably stand a new coat. The lawn is well kept, and a large sycamore tree stands in the middle of the yard.
We walk up the driveway and to the front door. I knock and step back. A couple of moments later, the door opens to reveal a woman who’s probably in her mid-forties but looks ten years older. She’s got a wild tangle of dark hair that’s shot through with gray and looks as if it hasn’t been brushed in days. She’s wearing a ratty, threadbare housecoat, with rumpled pajamas underneath it.
Mia Burkett is about five-five, pale as a sheet; her eyes are bloodshot, with dark bags beneath them. It’s obvious she’s been crying and likely hasn’t slept for days. She’s holding a coffee cup that has more booze than coffee in it—I can smell it from where I’m standing. Given her loss, I can’t say I blame her for doing a little self-medicating.
“Yeah?” she asks.
We badge her. “Special Agent Russo, SSA Wilder,” Astra starts gently. “We are very sorry for your loss, Ms. Burkett. But we’d like to ask you some questions, if that would be all right?”
“I talked to the cops yesterday,” she says.
“I understand, but we’re also looking into your daughter’s case, and we’d like to follow up with just a few more questions,” Astra says. “I promise that we won’t take up much of your time.”
She takes a long swallow from her coffee mug, then shrugs and turns away, walking back into the house. She leaves the door open, though, so I’m going to take that as an invitation. We follow her in, and Astra shuts the door behind her. We find ourselves in a living room. Ms. Burkett is sitting in an armchair, staring through the sliders without really seeing what’s beyond the glass.
Astra and I perch lightly on the edge of the sofa, giving her a couple of moments to gather herself. I’m sure that after living in uncertainty for the last year, only to have her worst nightmare come true, has been a pain that rocked Mia to her very core.
“Ms. Burkett, I know this must be a horribly difficult time for you,” I start. “All we need is to ask a few questions, and we’ll be on our way.”
“Fine. Ask your questions,” she mutters, her voice hoarse and raspy. “But hurry up about it. I have to plan my daughter’s funeral.”
I frown and look down at my hands, feeling a sharp lance of guilt piercing me. Questioning somebody on the worst day of her life is never easy.
“I know it’s been a long time, but do you remember where Stacy was the night she disappeared?” I ask.
She shakes her head miserably. “I don’t. She and I were both busy—me with work and my boyfriend at the time, and Stacy with school and her friends. We didn’t talk a whole lot. We were like ships passin’ in the night most of the time,” she says, the sound of guilt thick in her voice.
“Did she have a boyfriend at the time?” Astra asks.
Mia shrugs. “Maybe she did. We didn’t talk a whole lot. She was always a pretty and popular girl,” she says. “But she never mentioned anything about a boyfriend to me.”
“Do you recall her ever mentioning having trouble with anybody?” I ask. “Anybody watching her or maybe following her, or anything like that?”
Mia shakes her head again. “Not that I remember, no.”
Her voice cracks, and I see the tears rolling down her face. She quickly wipes them away and clears her throat, trying to regain her composure.
“I wish—I wish I could do it all over again, you know?” she says. “I wish I would’ve taken more time for Stacy. I wish we’d been closer.”
The regret in her voice is as thick as the guilt. My heart goes out to her. I can’t imagine what she must be feeling right now. Knowing she’ll never get the chance to see her daughter again, to grow closer to her and to celebrate all of life’s milestones, has to be one of the most painful things a person can go through.
I have a small understanding of that feeling. Having had my kid sister ripped away from me and knowing I’ll never see her again or get the chance to celebrate life’s milestones with her is a gut punch. But I didn’t give birth to Kit, so I imagine it’s a thousand times worse for Mia.
“I always held out hope Stacy would come back to me, you know? I always made myself believe that she went off somewhere to live a little bit of life. I pretended she was traveling the world, seeing all the countries she talked about when she was a kid—France, Spain, even Japan,” Mia says, almost as if she’s speaking to herself. “And I always believed that one day she’d walk through that front door again and tell me all about her adventures. Kept her room just like it was the day she left. She always used to get on me about tryin’ to pick up her room a little. I just couldn’t bring myself to do nothin’ else with it.”
She falls silent and looks down at the coffee mug in her hand. I get the feeling she’d like nothing more than to crawl inside of it and drink until she blacks out, hoping she’ll wake up to find this has all been a horribly vivid nightmare. But I can tell she knows the truth of it: there is no amount of alcohol that will make this any less real. Or any easier. She’s a strong woman, but I can see the cracks forming in her. I just hope she’s able to keep herself pieced together long enough to begin healing.
“For months and months, I held onto a thread of hope. Over time, that thread got a little frayed, but it held. I think in some ways, havin’ that thread cut is probably a good thing. Maybe a little bit of a relief, if it don’t sound too bad sayin’ that,” she goes on. “I mean, I guess on some level I always knew that phone call would come, but to finally get it and have that hope taken away—it hurts, yeah. But havin’ to let go of that false hope I was clutchin’….it’s a little bit of a relief. Does that make me a monster?”
Astra shakes her head. “No. Not at all, Ms. Burkett. It makes you human,” she says. “And that relief you feel is you giving yourself permission to let go of the past and move forward. I’m sure Stacy would want you to do that. To live your life.”
A low chuckle passes her lips. “Not sure I know how to do that anymore.”
“It’ll come back to you. In time,” I say, thinking of the process it took for me to find my way back to life after my parents were killed. “It’s like a muscle inside of you. It’s a little weak and atrophied right now, but the more you use and exercise it, the stronger it will get.”
She gives us both a tight smile. “I’m sorry to go on and on like this. You had some questions to ask me?”
At this point—and after all this time—I’m not sure Ms. Burkett’s going to be able to answer our q
uestions. Especially given the fact that she and Stacy weren’t all that close. But there is one thing I think she might be able to tell us.
“Ms. Burkett, in the days and maybe weeks before her disappearance, was Stacy acting any differently? Did she have any sort of a personality change?” I ask.
She looks at me with a frown on her face and the light of surprise in her eyes. She nods slowly, looking at me as if I’m clairvoyant or something.
“Actually, yeah. She was different in those last few weeks before she went missin’. I remember her goin’ on and on’ about how wasteful we are. She was addicted to her own phone and computer but said she wished we could just go back to simpler times when we didn’t have all this technology that was keepin’ people apart and all,” she tells us. “Said the world would be a better place if we got rid of all the phones and computers and stuff. I thought she joined some environmentalist group at school or somethin’, to be honest. I never paid it much mind. She went through phases sometimes. Didn’t think it meant anything.”
I exchange a subtle glance with Astra, who seems to be on the same page as I am. Something is beginning to take shape. I can’t exactly see what it is. It’s a silhouette through frosted glass, our view obscured and opaque. But I feel the shape of it, and judging by the look in her eye, Astra feels it, too.
I turn back to Ms. Burkett with one more question for her. “Ms. Burkett, what happened to Stacy’s father?”
“Oh, him,” she snorts. “Stacy’s sperm donor ran off after I got pregnant. Never heard from that dirtbag again.”
It’s another possible link in the chain. Stacy and Selene had a few things in common, but at this point, it could just be a coincidence. However, three would be a pattern. And if I were a betting woman, I’d say that the other twenty women who went missing all came from fatherless homes and had undergone something of a personality switch in the weeks before their disappearances.
