by Blake Pierce
“Okay…”
Danielle rolled her eyes. Chloe could tell that she was thinking very hard about the next words to come out of her mouth. “I got something like that about forty minutes ago,” she said. “Not nearly as strong as that TV show made it sound, but it was there. It was strong enough. And it was…well, it was weird.”
“No one broke in,” Chloe said. “I haven’t been shot.”
“I can see that. But…I don’t know. I had the weird twin-feeling. I felt like I had to be over here. Sorry if it sounds dumb. But…well, is there anything I might have prevented by showing up?”
Chloe shook her head no. But she thought: Just stopping me from plotting out the murder of our father. She gave a soft little laugh and sipped from her beer.
“You’re not well,” Danielle said. She nodded to the beer bottle. “How many of those will I find in the trash, empty?”
“Two. And I’m sorry…but who are you to be concerned about someone’s drinking habits? I have a kettle to go with that pot.”
“Oh, I don’t care about the drinking. You self-medicate however you see fit. But I do know that self-medicating isn’t you. It never has been. You’re the logical one…the smart one. It’s because you’ve delved into my old strategies for coping that I’m here. That’s what has me worried.”
“I’m fine, Danielle.”
Danielle folded her arms and reclined back on the couch. If there had been any good-natured ribbing to the conversation, Chloe sensed it disappear in that simple gesture. Danielle’s gaze had an icy feel to it.
“So you mean to tell me that the last year or so, with you proclaiming Dad’s greatness to me…I just let that ride? You and I coming to a head several times for him, and you always going to bat for him. The way I see it, I deserve some honesty, Chloe. I’m not stupid. This bombshell with Dad has messed you up.”
“Of course it has.”
“So tell me what you’re thinking. Tell me what we do now. If I’m being totally honest, I don’t see why you haven’t turned him in yet. Isn’t the journal enough to convict him?”
“You don’t think I’ve thought of that?” Chloe asked, starting to get slightly angry. “And no…the journal isn’t enough. It could be enough to maybe reopen the case, but that’s about it. There’s no hard evidence…and the fact that there was already a trial and our father was put in prison and then let go makes it even harder. Throw Ruthanne Carwile’s recent conviction in there, and it becomes one huge mess.”
“So you’re saying he’s likely going to end up getting away with it?”
Chloe didn’t give an answer. She downed the rest of her beer and walked into the kitchen. She opened the refrigerator door to retrieve another but then stopped. Slowly, she closed it again and leaned against the small kitchen counter.
“I’m aware that this is mostly my fault,” Chloe said. It was hard to admit. The words tasted like acid in her mouth as they came out.
“I’m not here to blame you, Chloe.”
“I know. But it’s what you’re thinking. And I don’t blame you. Now that I’ve seen what’s in that journal and sort of…I don’t know…sort of have a feel for him…I’m thinking it, too. If I had listened to you before all of this started it would be different. Before Ruthanne, before landing my job at the bureau…”
“Don’t do that. Just…let’s look forward. Let’s figure out what we can do.”
“There’s nothing!”
Chloe surprised herself when she screamed the two words at her sister. But once they were out, she found it hard to reel them back in.
“Chloe, I—”
“I messed up. I failed you and Mom and myself. This is me now. I have to live with this and just…”
“But we can figure it out together, right? Look…I dig this role reversal and all, but I can’t stand to see you beating yourself up like this.”
“Not now. I can’t deal with it right now. I have to figure some things out.”
“Let me help, then.”
Chloe felt suffocated. She also felt another outburst coming on, but she clenched her fists and was able to stamp it down. “Danielle,” she said as slowly and as patiently as she could, “I appreciate the sentiment and I love you for being so concerned. But I need to handle this on my own for right now. The longer you pester and press in, the harder it’s going to be. So please…for right now…can you just leave?”
Chloe watched as something in Danielle’s expression shifted. It looked like disappointment. Or maybe it was something closer to sadness. Chloe couldn’t tell and, quite frankly, she didn’t care in that moment.
Danielle set her beer down on the coffee table—not yet even a quarter of the way empty—and got to her feet. “I want you to call me when you’re done being distant.”
“I’m not being distant.”
“I don’t know what you’re being,” Danielle said as she opened the door to leave. “But distant sounded better than a bitch.”
Before Chloe could say anything in response, Danielle made her exit, closing the door behind her.
Chloe wished Danielle would have slammed the door. At least then there would have been some sort of feeling left, some sign that Danielle was just as mad as Chloe was. But there was only the soft click of the door closing and nothing more.
Chloe sat in the silence that followed for the rest of the afternoon and all she had to show for it the next day were more empty beer bottles in the trash can.
CHAPTER TWO
On Sunday, Chloe found herself sitting in a visitor parking space outside of the DC Central Detention Facility. She looked at the building for a moment before getting out of the car, trying to figure out exactly why she was there.
She knew the answer, but it was a hard one to swallow. She was there because she missed Moulton. It was a truth she would never speak out loud, a sore spot that she was having trouble processing. But the plain and simple truth was that she needed someone to comfort her and ever since she’d moved to DC, she’d seen Moulton as that figure. Oddly enough, it was something she had not come to realize until after he had been sent to prison for his role in a financial fraud scheme.
At first, she’d thought she only missed him because of the physical intimacy—the need to be held by a man when she was feeling discouraged and lost. But when Danielle had left yesterday and Chloe had found herself desperate to talk to someone about what she was dealing with, she thought only of Moulton.
With one final push of motivation, Chloe got out of her car and walked through the front doors. She used her federal ID to get inside, signed in, and then sat in a small holding area as a guard was sent back to get Agent Moulton. The holding area was basically empty; apparently Sunday was not the most popular day to visit troubled loved ones in prison.
Less than five minutes later, Moulton appeared through the door in the back of the room. The room itself was set up like a small lounge of sorts. Chloe was sitting on a couch, which Moulton slowly approached. He looked at her with a skeptical smile, as if trying to size her up.
“You okay if I sit here?” he asked, uncertain.
“Yeah,” she said, scooting over to allow him room on the couch.
“It’s nice to see you,” he said right away. “But I have to admit that it’s also very unexpected.”
“How are you being treated here?”
He rolled his eyes and sighed. “It’s mostly guys like me. White collar crime stuff. I’m not ever really worried about getting jumped in the showers or beaten up in the exercise yard, if that’s what you mean. But I don’t even want to talk about that. How’s work? Working on anything of interest?”
“No. They partnered me back up with Rhodes. She and I have been working this profiling project. A little boring at times, but it keeps us busy.”
“You two getting along?”
“Better than the first time around, that’s for sure.”
He leaned in closer and once again gave her a skeptical look. “What brings you to these p
arts, Fine?”
“I wanted to see you.”
He smiled. “That makes me feel much better than it should. But I don’t buy it. Not completely anyway. What’s up?”
She looked away from him, starting to feel embarrassed. Before turning back to him, she was finally able to squeak out something of an answer: “My father.”
“Your father? The one who just popped back up in your life a few months ago? The one that spent most of the last twenty years or so in prison?”
“Yeah, that’s the one.”
“I thought you were happy about that, for the most part.”
“I was. But then something else popped up. And then something else. There’s just been this huge pile of crap that keeps getting added onto. And this last thing I discovered…I don’t know. I think I just need someone not attached to him to give me an opinion.”
“Maybe someone who worked closely with you before getting thrown in prison?”
“Maybe,” she said, giving him a smile that felt a bit too flirty.
“Well, hearing the story would be the most interesting thing I’ve taken part in over the past two weeks or so. So let me hear it.”
It took a few seconds for Chloe to find the courage to talk about such a personal issue but she knew it needed to be done. And as she started telling Moulton about Danielle’s constant warnings about their father as well as the revelations discovered in the journal, she understood why she had refused to discuss it with Danielle; it was opening her up to vulnerability. And that was not a state that Danielle had ever seen her in.
Even as she told Moulton everything, she kept some of the more private details to herself—particularly when it came to memories pertaining to her mother’s death. But getting out the bits she did was extremely helpful. She knew that at the core of it all, this was nothing more than a venting session. Be that as it may, it still felt like a weight had been lifted from her shoulders.
It helped that Moulton never questioned her or even made faces to indicate his true feelings on the matter. He knew what she needed; she just needed someone to listen—someone to maybe even offer some advice.
“I assume you’ve considered taking this to Johnson?” he asked when she was done.
“I have. I’ve thought about it a lot. But you know as well as I do that nothing would be done just because of a few journal entries written two decades ago. If anything, it would probably just clue him in. The moment police or FBI start questioning him, he’d know something was up.”
“You think he’d run?” Moulton asked.
“I don’t know. You have to remember…I don’t know him all that well. He spent most of my life in prison.”
“And what about you and your sister? Do you feel safe? You think he’d come after you?”
“Doubtful. He still sees me as his confidant. Although I’m sure he might figure something is up since I haven’t returned his calls or texts. And I’m not answering the door when he comes by.”
Moulton nodded, understanding. He was looking at her in a way that was slightly uncomfortable. It was the same thing she had seen in his eyes a month or so ago when they had nearly slept together. And God help her, she wanted to kiss him quite badly in that moment.
“You know what you have to do,” he said. “I don’t know if you came here hoping I’d back you up on it or what.”
“I know.”
“Then say it. Speak it out loud and make it real.”
“I need to find out for myself. Not an official investigation, but just… keep tabs on him, I guess.”
“You think that involves reaching back out to him?” Moulton asked. “Maybe just carrying on like normal, as if everything is the same as it was before you read those journal entries?”
“I just don’t know.”
A brief silence fell between them, which Moulton eventually ended with a sigh. “There are a lot of things I’m going to miss out on because of what I did,” he said. “Too much stuff to really even think about, honestly. But one of the things I’m starting to truly regret is that I think you and I could have been pretty great.”
“I’m trying not to think about that.”
He nodded, looked into her eyes, and slowly leaned in. She felt herself being drawn toward him like a magnet, could even feel her lips starting to part to accept his kiss. But she turned her head at the last minute.
“Sorry. I can’t. All this nonsense with my dad…the last thing I need is some weird strained relationship with a criminal.”
He chuckled at this and rested his head playfully on her shoulder. “You’re right,” he said, pulling his head up and looking at her. “But hey…I call rights on being able to hit you up when I get out of here.”
“And how long will that be?” Chloe asked.
“Officially a few years. But good behavior and some bureau loopholes…no one is sure just yet. Could be as little as eight months.”
“Yeah…I’ll give you first rights,” she said.
“Something to look forward to…that’s good. Because this place sucks. The food, though…better than I expected.”
She was reminded of why she enjoyed his company. He had seamlessly transitioned the awkward talk of her father into something else. And he had done it without making her feel like a burden.
They sat on the couch for another fifteen minutes as Moulton described what life had been like for him over the past few weeks. He was taking it all with a grain of salt and had no qualms about fully admitting his guilt and remorse. It was good for Chloe to hear it—not just because she believed he truly was a good man deep down, but because it showed that people were capable of being honest.
And given the nightmare she could feel brewing between her, Danielle, and her father, being in the presence of any kind of honesty was hugely refreshing.
She took her leave forty minutes after she had gotten out of her car in the parking lot. Moulton had not tried to kiss her again, though she secretly wished he would. She left feeling oddly satisfied, feeling that she was finally moving forward after three weeks of feeling stagnant and stymied.
As she made the walk back across the parking lot, her phone rang. She grabbed it right away. It was probably Danielle or her father. If it was her father, she thought she might actually answer it this time and make up some excuse as to why she had been dodging his calls. She figured he’d accept just about any reason, given the fact that he had just suddenly reappeared in her life after almost twenty years.
But the number she saw on the display was neither her father’s nor Danielle’s. It was a line from the bureau. She cringed a bit as she answered it. A call on a Sunday was sure to set up a stressful Monday.
“This is Agent Fine,” she answered.
“Fine, it’s Johnson. Where are you right now?”
She actually had to bite back a small laugh before answering. “In town,” she answered as vaguely as possible.
“I need you to visit a crime scene in Falls Church. Seems to be right in the area of your expertise. Wealthy neighborhood, murdered socialite-type.”
“Today?”
“Yes, today. The body was discovered Friday morning. The police have done their part and are coming up blank.”
“Just one body?”
“Yes. But we need an agent on it to ensure that it isn’t linked to a similar case in that area last year.”
“Sir…do you think Rhodes can handle it alone? I’m sort of dealing with some personal things.”
There was a brief moment of silence on the other end. “Is someone dead? A loved one pass away?”
“No sir.”
She knew that Johnson knew the scantest details about her father’s history. She wondered if he was silently considering all of that on the other end.
“Sorry, Fine. You’ve spent three weeks in an office, putting a profile together. I want you out in the field. I want you and Rhodes both down in Falls Church within three hours. Two if you can manage it.”
She opened her mouth to
protest but stopped herself. She had no desire to be knee-deep in a murder investigation given everything she was dealing with. But at the same time, she knew that getting involved in a case might be exactly what she needed. It would not only distract her from the drama with her dad, but it might put her in the right frame of mind to figure out a way to bring down her father.
“Yes sir,” she said. “I’ll call Rhodes right away.”
And just like that, she had her first active case in three weeks. The timing wasn’t the best but who was she to argue? At the end of the day, she’d joined the bureau to help people in need—to help bring a sense of justice to a criminal system she had never fully trusted.
In light of all that had happened concerning her father in recent weeks—including her own misconceptions about him—it seemed almost fitting that it was this mindset that followed her as she got into her car and called up Agent Rhodes.
CHAPTER THREE
If Rhodes suspected that Chloe was dealing with personal issues, she made no mention of it as they rode out into Falls Church. In fact, she had not said anything about a change in Chloe’s personality for the three weeks they had been working together on the profile project—trying to come up with a profile on a man believed to be leading the charge on a series of armed bank robberies in New York. Then again, Rhodes was something of a hard ass and kept to herself. Even when their partnership had hit a new level after Chloe had saved her life following a near-fatal gunshot wound, Rhodes showed no signs of wanting to know Chloe on a deeply personal level.
And that was perfectly fine with Chloe.
In fact, most of the drive from DC to Falls Church, Virginia, was covered in silence. Johnson had not given them much to go on; the details on the murder were practically nothing. All he’d told them was that the local deputy would be on the scene to debrief them when they arrived.
