by Jette Harris
“Intel. I didn’t expect to see you here. To what do I owe the pleasure?”
Steyer sighed and took the boys’ place on the bottom step. “It’s a long story.”
“I don’t think there’s anything but long stories between us. How did you end up in the FBI anyway?
Steyer furrowed his brow and shook his head. “It was political: When I was announced KIA, Johnny threatened to out me unless they investigated further. I showed up alive. My father agreed to get me a good, non-military job if I kept my head down, to avoid scandal.”
Nodding, Tech looked down at the pieces spread across the towel. He dabbed some oil on a rag and began to lubricate the buffer assembly. “I heard that… Justice Steyer developed a—uh—soft policy on gay rights toward the end.”
“I heard that too.” Steyer leaned down to pull a splinter from the stairs. He looked up to find Tech staring into the distance with an odd expression on his face.
“Did you ever forgive him?”
Steyer shook his head. “There was nothing to forgive; I’m happy. I don’t think having them in my life would have improved that. In hindsight, I think it was better that way. Less complicated.”
Running a hand over his mouth, Tech nodded. “So, your fella… your beau…”
“My husband.”
Tech chuckled and shook his head. “Is he that Japanese fella from the photo in your pack?”
Steyer blinked rapidly. “I had almost forgotten about that. Yes, that’s my Johnny.”
Looking back down at the parts spread across the towel, Tech shook his head again. “I couldn’t even commit to being a father for thirty years, much less commit to someone I couldn’t marry.” He picked up the spring.
“I hear you did pretty well on the paternal front. At least, I’ve heard wonderful things about your daughter and granddaughter.”
Tech’s hand quaked. He placed the pieces back down. “Yeah, I guess… eventually. But now I feel like I hadn’t done enough.”
“How so?”
“Did you… Did you read the incident report for Thi’s accident?”
“I did.”
“She coulda… She coulda gotten out. She chose to go back. Chose to stay. And Heather… Even with this Phoenix fella’s track record… I expected to see her by now.”
“We did too. Time’s not up yet.”
“Two more days,” Tech scoffed. He turned to study the house next door. “Aneta and Lauri, they talk about… feelings of despair. Clinging to hope.” He shrugged. “I don’t feel that way. I still have to convince myself I might never see her again. But hope… I don’t have to cling to it; I have to keep it in check.”
Steyer raised his eyebrows and patted Tech’s knee. “That, my old friend, is what they call a blessing. Cling to that.”
82
Byron attempted to call Thrace three times, but they went straight to voicemail. He texted him instead:
Could u check CCSD case history 4 mentions of Michael/Michelle Menter?
After half an hour of jerking his knee, Byron decided to go about things in the proper fashion: He got up from his desk, walked to the far side of the room, and sat on one of the deputy’s desk.
“You busy?”
Sergeant Kline of the Cobb County Sheriff’s Department made short work of Byron’s request. He crossed the room and dumped a handful of files on Byron’s desk. He held up the top three. “These identify Michael Menter by name—all trespassing cases. The rest identify a man going by the name Michelle.”
“Thanks, man.”
Kline clapped a hand on the rookie’s shoulder and left him to his wild goose chase. Kicking his feet up on his desk, Byron opened the top file.
****
Thwack!
Byron fell out of his chair and raucous laughter filled the office.
“Got it!”
He looked up to find Kondorf grinning broadly. The rolled-up manila folder in his hand had black specks on the side. Byron narrowed his eyes and wiped his forehead. His lip curled as dead fly came away on his hand. Kondorf had the decency to offer him a napkin and some hand sanitizer.
The smell of coffee filled the office, crowded with officers about to change shifts. The night shift, tired and rumpled, packed up to leave, and the day shift, looking just as tired yet fresh, settled in. Agents Steyer and Remington were already in their office. Byron’s face flushed as he realized they had passed him as he was asleep at his desk.
“Wanna put in a few more hours?” Kondorf asked. “We’re about to start knocking on doors.”
“Sure, sure.” Byron picked up a notepad with some notes scribbled on it. “I have a few addresses, places Michelle was caught squatting. A couple of places already on the map, and the Hospitality House.”
“Huh.” Kondorf peered inside a few of the files.
Kline, drinking one last cup of coffee, scratched his chin. He turned to the three deputies preparing for the morning shift. “Yo, Duley!”
“Yo, Sarge!” Duley replied.
“Didn’t you have a case involving the Hospitality House last month?”
“Naw!” Duley crossed the room. “Kid said he was there, but I didn’t believe him.”
“Why not?” Steyer’s low, steady voice intruded on their loudness.
Duley pulled his shoulders back and stood square to the agent. “Story didn’t line up. Kid said he was at the Hospitality House when he showed up with a knife wound to his shoulder.”
“The Hospitality House is also somewhere Michelle Menter was known to frequent,” Byron said. Duley fixed him with a cold gaze.
“County or City?” Steyer asked.
“County,” the deputies answered as the officers said, “City.”
Steyer’s eyes flicked between them, unamused by this dissonance.
“It’s a historical landmark, right on the city line,” Kondorf explained. “So it’s ownership is constantly in debate.”
“The Hospitality House,” Kline began, “is the oldest house in Cobb—”
“It’s where they used to take folks for lynching,” Byron muttered.
“—dates back to the days of Big Shanty—”
“That name is a sick joke.”
“—built by General—”
“Is it vacant?” Remington interrupted, coming up behind Steyer.
“Most of the time, yeah,” Kondorf replied.
“Then why are we still standing around?”
Steyer turned to Byron, hand extended. “Report.”
Byron’s face burned under Duley’s accusing glare as he handed the fed a manila folder. Steyer flipped it open and skimmed the report.
“We need to find this young man and speak with him. Stay away from the Hospitality House until we have a team together.”
Remington pointed to Byron. “No stupid heroics to save your friends, understand?”
Byron flushed again and nodded. He leaned on his desk next to Kondorf. They watched silently until the feds were out the door. Duley shook his head and followed.
“There’s a—uh—a Krispy Kreme out that way, right?” Kondorf asked.
“Yep,” Byron replied.
“I could use a doughnut,” Kline muttered.
They gathered their things. Within minutes, the previously-bustling office was empty.
83
Agent Steyer called in their location, double-checked the notes from Duley’s case, and stepped out of the car. He wished they had dressed down for this, as the young men on the basketball court glanced at him suspiciously. They relaxed only slightly when the younger, darker-featured agent climbed out. They returned to their game. The agents stood at the gate, watching them.
“Was there a photo with the file?” Steyer asked, voice raised slightly.
“Only of the injury,” Remington replied, drawing his finger across his shoulder.
One of the young men noticed the gesture and twisted to stare at them, but stumbled. He had a prominent scar across the cap of his shoulder. Remington
waved him over with a wide sweep of his arm.
“Am I in trouble?” the young man asked as he jogged over.
“You Darnell?”
“Maybe.”
“No, you’re not in trouble,” Remington replied. “We need your help. We need to know what happened at the Hospitality House last month.”
Darnell looked back at his peers, then nodded to a corner of the court. Steyer and Remington gave him plenty of room, not wanting to intimidate him.
“Nobody believed me,” Darnell said. “My gramma thought it was one of these guys fuckin’ around with a gun or somethin’.”
“What was it?” Steyer studied the wound. It was a broad, whitish-pink scar, still lined with little pocks from the stitches.
“A knife, about that long.” He held his hands about eight inches apart. “And really thin.”
“He stabbed you?” Remington asked.
“Motherfucker threw it at me. It stuck in the door like somethin’ from a movie.”
Steyer and Remington exchanged a concerned glance. “When was this?” Steyer asked.
“Mid-April. I cut through the woods. There’re all kinda paths back there. I climbed over the fence and came across the side yard to the kitchen door.”
“Did you see any cars or vehicles?”
“Nah, but I wasn’t lookin’ either. No one’s ever there unless they got nowhere else to go.”
“How often had you gone there before?”
Darnell glanced at the other young men. They had returned half-heartedly to the game. “You sure I’m not in trouble?” He buried his hands deep in his pockets.
Steyer looked him in the eye. “We’re trying to catch a serial killer, sport, not slap you on the wrist for being in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
Darnell’s eyes widened. He straightened up. “I used to go there a lot, when I was runnin’ with a bad crowd, but they got cleared out about a year ago. After that, I only went every once in a while, when things got too loud at home.”
“I can understand that,” Steyer said.
“I go in through the kitchen door, because it’s easy to jimmy the lock. It’s always a mess in there, but this time it was different. It was clean, like it had been flipped or something. Then I smelled coffee. I look, and there was this guy leanin’ there against the counter…” He went to the corner of the court and leaned against the fence with a hand in front of his chest, pantomiming. “…drinking a coffee. He stared at me like it was nothin’, no big deal. It’s not like someone just broke into his house.”
“What did he look like?”
“Uh… He was cut. Not big, but cut. Brown hair, brown eyes. Darker’n yours.” He nodded at Remington. “Around the same height, though. He wasn’t wearing nothin’ but jeans. They were good jeans, though, the expensive kind.”
“And he jumped up and threw a knife at you?” Remington asked.
“No, he didn’t jump. That’s the thing. He didn’t even put his coffee down.” Darnell continued to reenact the incident. “He looked around, pulled the knife out, and threw it. I ran, heard it stick in the door. I didn’t even realize he had hit me until I was over the fence.”
The muscle in Remington’s jaw bulged as he ground his teeth. “Did he chase you?”
“Nah. I looked back, and the door was still open, knife stickin’ out of it, but I didn’t see him at all. When I got home, my shoulder wouldn’t stop bleedin’, so Gramma took me to the hospital. They called the cops. Deputy Duley, he don’t like me. He knew me back from when I was runnin’ with the wrong crowd… I don’t blame him, but he shoulda believed me.”
“Sergeant Duley says once you were stitched up, he brought you back there. Is that true?”
“Yeah.”
“According to the report, nothing looked out of the ordinary.”
“That was the thing, though!” Darnell’s eyes got wide. He shifted his weight from one foot to the other. “He told me to walk him across the yard, and I did. There wasn’t no blood on the grass, or the fence, like he had cleaned up. I know I got blood on the fence—I saw it with my own eyes! Then we got to the door, and there wasn’t a hole in the goddamn door! I saw the knife stickin’ out of it! He had me jimmy the lock, and it wouldn’t give. I looked real close; It wasn’t even the same door. Motherfucker had changed the fuckin’ door!”
Remington snorted. He lowered his head into his hand.
“You gotta believe me!”
Steyer pursed his lips. “He’s not laughing at you, son. He’s laughing because we do believe you.”
“You do?” Darnell looked between the agents, torn between relief and suspicion.
“Motherfucker changed the door!” Remington’s voice was high and tight. He turned toward the fence, covering his eyes. He pulled his lips back from his teeth, torn between a grin and a grimace, exposing his straight white teeth.
“Agent Remington…” Steyer scolded.
“No, no, I’m good.”
“What’s wrong with him?” Darnell asked.
Steyer raised his eyebrows, then patted the young man on his unscathed shoulder. “You may have just saved a lot of lives.”
“Damn right,” Remington muttered. He threw his head back, placed his hands on his hips, and took a deep breath. He turned from Darnell to Steyer with a smile. “Let’s go before he burns down the oldest house in Cobb County.”
84
2002
Washington, DC
Sweat ran down Remington’s neck in torrents. His heart pounded as he threw one punch after another. He could feel eyes on his back. His pace slowed. Hiding a glance by twisting his torso, he caught an old man in a suit watching him from the other side of the glass wall. He had a folder in his hand.
Fuck. I must be in trouble.
Remington resumed pounding the bag. When he was winded, he cooled down on the rowing machine. Only when his workout was over did he retreat to the locker room.
Although there had been a few men in the room when Remington emerged from the showers, they dispersed soon after he sat down. The silence gnawed at him as he took his pulse. Looking up, he found Special Agent Steyer from Violent Crimes leaning on the wall next to the door. The man who had been watching him.
Remington’s heart beat faster. He had heard of Richard Steyer; This could either become an incredibly awkward scene or a much-desired opportunity. Steyer was often called in to consult when the lines between Organized Crimes and Violent Crimes blurred. Remington recalled a soul-crushing case involving the growing market for newborns; The traffickers did not wait for the mothers to deliver before abducting the babies.
The senior agent stepped forward. “Agent Remington.”
“It’s Steyer, right?”
“It is.”
“How can I help you?” He spread his hands to indicate the unusual meeting place.
Steyer dropped the file on the bench next to him. “What do you see?”
Remington flipped the file open. It contained information on four missing persons in San Francisco. He glanced over the photographs: Two women, two men. Their ages ranged from early twenties to late thirties, different races, different careers. He leaned over the file with increasing interest. Steyer observed silently as Remington sought out the place in each report where witnesses reported interaction between the missing person and another man, tall, dark-haired, dark-eyed, and snorted as his finger traced under the words feminist book reading and Dungeons & Dragons.
“There’s no doubt they’re related?”
“There’s plenty of doubt they’re related.”
Remington shook his head dismissively. He began to grind his teeth. There was something there, in the back of his mind…
“Detroit.” He smacked the file with the back of his hand. “This… this is the Phoenix Serial Killer.” He looked up at Steyer. His excitement faded as he placed the reports with the faces and names: Phoenix. Detroit. Steyer. Feingold.
Steyer nodded.
“But why are you sh
owing me this? This is VC.” Remington held the file back out to the senior agent. His heart pounded; The implications of this exchange were too good to be true.
“You’re being transferred.” Steyer turned away without taking the file. “Pack a bag; We’re going to California.”
85
May, 2006
Atlanta
Sergeant Duley ignored Agent Steyer’s advice. He was not about to admit to a fed and a Yankee he had neglected a case. He had met Darnell before, and didn’t believe any yarn about a knife-throwing naked man. As for the mystery renovations, neither Cobb County nor Cheatham Hill—both listed as landowners—could give him a straight answer on the matter.
Driving by was the original idea. He didn’t expect to find fresh tire tracks in the marble gravel driveway. Duley became anxious as he grabbed his bolt-cutters. There was an inkling in the back of his mind, making him regret not taking Agent Steyer’s advice. He ignored it as he cut through the chain securing the gate.
Pulling in front of the house, Duley called in the tracks and reported he would be checking for occupants as if this were a routine call. He would report back in within ten minutes. He was relieved when Agent Steyer did not bark back. He planned to run out any trespassing kids or meth addicts and get off the property as quickly as possible.
The looming trees made him feel like he was being watched.
Duley mounted the porch and banged on the door in classic police-fashion. After two minutes, he banged again. He began to wonder if he had cause to force entry when he heard a shout from within, sounding like, “Yeah—hold on!”
A fuzzy shadow appeared on the other side of the cracked lead glass. The door was opened by a tall, middle-aged man who looked vaguely familiar. He was wearing a fluffy blue robe and striped pajama pants. His unshaved face and mussed hair made it look like he had rolled out of bed when Duley knocked. He looked surprised to see a deputy at the door.
“Oh, good morning!” He leaned against the doorframe. “Sorry, it’s a big house and I was—” He paused to yawn, then shrugged. It was obvious what he had been doing.
