by Sal Bianchi
Bette glared at her before shoving the paper back at me.
“Not bad.” She shrugged before slipping a pair of shooting earmuffs over her ears and unholstering her own gun. She turned away from us then and began to focus on her own target.
“Do you want to try?” I asked Chloe, who was still glowering at Bette.
“Huh?” she asked blankly. “Oh, uh, not really. I mean, it looks fun, but I’m not that great of a shot.”
Chloe wasn’t a field agent, so she didn’t have as much experience using a firearm as Bette and I did. She would have had to pass some basic tests in order to become a federal agent, but otherwise, it wasn’t really a requirement for agents who only worked in the office.
“That’s okay.” I smiled encouragingly. “Even if you miss, it’s still fun. It’s a great way to relieve stress.”
I could tell by the glint in her eyes as she looked down at the gun in my hands that she wanted to.
“Okay.” She nodded as a smile broke out across her face. “I’ll try it.”
I reloaded the gun and showed her how to put on the protective earmuffs before standing back and letting her get to it. Her stance was good, and she seemed confident. The second she pulled the trigger, though, I cringed. She missed the target entirely. Not just the outline printed onto the sheet of paper, but the entire paper itself.
“Oh no.” She frowned sullenly.
“It’s okay.” I hurried to reassure her. “It’s been a while since you shot a gun, right? It’s normal to be a little rusty. Just try it again.”
“Okay.” She grinned at my encouragement.
She fired again, and even though she still missed the figure, she at least hit the paper this time.
“I got it!” She announced gleefully, and I bit my lip to suppress a chuckle at her enthusiasm.
“What are you cheering for?” Bette huffed from the next booth. “That was horrible. Are you even aiming?”
I frowned at her. Chloe was just having some fun. Why did Bette have to be so mean?
“I swear,” Chloe sighed, “you act like a teenage girl sometimes, Bette.”
She’d snapped at Bette, but she’d put the gun down anyway, so I could tell that Bette’s comment had upset her. Bette just rolled her eyes and resumed shooting her own target.
“Come on.” I prompted Chloe as I put my gun back into my holster. “I know somewhere else we can practice shooting.”
“Are you sure we should leave?” Chloe asked as I guided her out of the range and back up to the main floor of the building. “It’s still technically the middle of the workday.”
“Well, I won’t tell if you won’t.” I smirked. “Besides, my partner’s MIA right now anyway, and I can’t do much until he gets back. It’ll be fine.”
“All right,” Chloe replied nervously. She cast one last look back at the building as we stepped into the parking lot.
Honestly, it wasn’t really like me to ditch work either, but Chloe had looked so sad after Bette’s mean remark that I felt compelled to do something about it. Worst-case scenario, I could call this a team-building exercise. I was just trying to boost my fellow agent’s morale, that’s all.
Forty minutes later, we were strapping on vests and helmets and getting ready to go into a large field filled with an assortment of small and large objects we could use as cover.
“Are you sure about this?” Chloe asked nervously for about the hundredth time.
“It’ll be fine.” I grinned. “Paintball is fun. You’ll be able to practice your aim and getting hit with paintball doesn’t hurt nearly as much as getting hit with a bullet.”
“Wait,” she yelped as she snapped her head around to look at me through the thick goggles of her helmet. “So it does hurt?”
“Only a little,” I replied after a moment of hesitation. “I’ll go easy for the first round, okay? The farther away you are, the less it hurts, so just keep moving.”
“Fine,” she grumbled as she fidgeted with her paintball gun.
I did go easy on her for the first round, since she was still figuring out how to play. By the second round, she felt confident enough that I didn’t feel bad about beating her. As soon as the third round started, it was like a switch got flipped.
All of a sudden, it seemed as though she didn’t care how many times she got hit. Her only focus appeared to be hitting me with as many paintballs as possible, as closely as possible.
“What are you doing?” I shouted as she cornered me against the edge of a massive tractor wheel and repeatedly fired at me at close range.
“I’m the queen of paintball!” She cackled as she finally ceased her onslaught.
“You’re a bully,” I grumbled as I pulled my helmet off. My hair was covered in dried paint, and it pulled and cracked as I slipped the helmet off.
“Oh, don’t be a baby,” she laughed as she sat down beside me and pulled her own helmet off. “That was really fun. I’m glad we came.”
“It’s more fun with more people,” I remarked. “With just the two of us, it’s basically just tag with paint.”
“It was still fun.” She grinned. “And it was nice to be able to blow off some steam after that fiasco with Ryan.”
“Yeah.” I frowned as I remembered the entire reason I’d escaped to the shooting range in the first place. “I don’t know what we’re going to do now. He was our best lead. Now he’s dead, which just adds more questions.”
“It’s strange how human nature can be,” Chloe remarked wistfully. “Our most base instinct is survival, and the propagation of our offspring, but we’re also one of the only living creatures on earth that kill its fellow species for reasons other than survival. It’s such a bizarre, yet fascinating dichotomy in that--”
“Wait,” I suddenly exclaimed. “Offspring. The kid!”
“Huh?” Chloe asked blankly.
“Sorry,” I muttered. “I didn’t mean to interrupt you. What you said about humans taking care of their offspring, though, reminded me of something Ryan said at the restaurant. It totally slipped my mind because we had to rush in right after, and then there was that whole panic, but Ryan said something about his son witnessing the murder.”
“The police said the son hadn’t said a word,” Chloe replied. “He wouldn’t have known that he’d witnessed the murder unless he was there, or the murderer told him.”
“We need to speak to the kid,” I declared as I ripped off my gloves and dug through my pocket for my phone. I was just about to call Flint when it went off.
“It’s Stein,” I noted out loud as I answered the call. “Hello?”
“Agent Park,” he answered. “This is Stein. Is Nick there with you?”
“No,” I replied before putting the phone on speaker. “Chloe is though, why?
“Oh, hi Agent Summers,” Stein replied. “Anyway, I guess we can just fill in Nick later. I’ve got some new information on the case. I was looking through Ryan Rothschild’s records, and it looks like he took out a life insurance policy on his wife a few months ago. A pretty hefty one, too. Apparently, he purchased it just a few weeks before news of their impending divorce went public.”
“He must have seen the writing on the wall,” I frowned. “He knew she was about to leave him and took out the life insurance policy while they were still together.”
“He’d been planning to kill her since then?” Chloe exclaimed, her eyes wide with shock. “Just because she was going to leave him?”
“Too bad he won’t be able to collect,” I scoffed, pleased that his plot to take her life just for money had ended in his own death.
“Actually,” Stein corrected me, “Ryan wasn’t the beneficiary. The two kids were. So they might get the payout.”
“The insurance company’s going to pay out on what was clearly a hit?” I asked skeptically.
“Well, it was a no-wait policy,” Stein replied. “I’m sure they’ll fight it, but unless they can prove in the near future that Ryan deliberately took out the
life insurance policy intending to kill her, it might be too late.”
“I hope they get it then,” I muttered sadly. It couldn’t replace their parents, but it might at least help them to live now that they were on their own in the world.
“I do too,” Stein said with a sigh.
“Oh, that reminds me. I was actually just about to call the director about the kids. Ryan mentioned something earlier about how his son had apparently witnessed the murder. We wanted to know if we could talk to him about it.”
“I’ll talk to Markus and let you know what he says,” Stein replied.
“Thanks,” I said before ending the call.
“I hope he agrees,” Chloe remarked. “Although I can see why child services might be reluctant to let that happen. Depending on the age and psychological state of the kids, it might not be prudent.”
“It sucks when kids are involved in cases,” I muttered.
“Yeah.” Chloe nodded. “But hey, don’t get all down about it. We had a nice afternoon, right? I really appreciate you bringing me out here. Honestly, it really hurt my feelings when Bette made that comment.”
“Don’t mention it.” I smiled at her. “And you’re right, it was fun.”
We spent so much of our time dealing with such awful people that sometimes it could become overwhelming. It was important to take some time to chill and have fun, too, if only to keep from going crazy.
My phone went off, breaking me out of my thoughts.
“Hello?” I answered immediately, surprised by how fast Stein had called me back.
“The director said he’s working out the details now, but it will be okay by the time you get there,” Stein replied. “I’ll send you the address now. See if you can’t get in touch with Nick so you can both head over there before it gets too dark.”
“Got it,” I replied. “I’ll call him now.”
I said goodbye and ended the call.
“Awesome.” Chloe grinned. “We’re actually getting somewhere now.”
“You gave me the idea.” I smiled back at her as I called Nick.
“Oh, hey,” he answered right away. “I was just about to call you. I might have some new information about the case.”
“What a coincidence,” I replied. “So do I. Flint wants us to go talk to Ryan’s kids. Remember what he told the woman in the restaurant? The kid might have seen what happened.”
“That’s right,” Nick muttered. “All right, do you have the address already? I’ll meet you there.”
“I’ll send it to you now,” I replied before ending the call to send him the information.
I felt a renewed sense of vigor now that we were finally starting to get somewhere with this case.
13
Nick
The drive over to the small house the kids were staying at took about twenty minutes, and the sun had almost completely set by the time we got there. According to the information Stein had sent us, the kids were originally only supposed to stay at the emergency safehouse until it was determined that it was safe for them to go with their father, who was, at the time, under suspicion of having murdered their mother.
Now that both parents were dead, however, CPS was attempting to find the next closest relative willing to take them in. It was a sad situation that hit too close to home for me, but I swallowed my own anxiety and focused on the task at hand.
I could see as I pulled into the driveway that Jase was already here.
“You ready?” Jase asked me as I got out of the car.
“Yep,” I smiled confidently as I closed the car door behind me. “Why’s your hair all wet?”
“Oh,” Jase replied sheepishly. “I was playing paintball with Chloe. I didn’t have time to shower, so I just did my best to get cleaned up in the office bathroom.
“With Chloe?” I asked. She’d always struck me as the bookish, indoor type, so it was surprising to hear that she was into paintball, of all things. “Cool. Invite me next time, though.”
The house itself was a small bungalow with a little front yard. Bikes and toys of several sizes and in multiple stages of wear were scattered around the porch. They were most likely a mix of donations and hand-me-downs left here by other children throughout the years.
As we climbed the porch steps, Jase took the lead and knocked on the door. There was a shuffling sound inside before the porch light clicked on and the door opened just a few inches.
“Hello?” the woman who answered peered out at us. She had steely blue eyes, and her brown hair was pulled back into a messy ponytail.
“Hi,” Jase greeted her with a smile. “I’m Agent Park with the SDCT, and this is Costa PI. We wanted to speak to Josh Rothschild about what happened last night.”
The woman had a shrewd look in her eyes, as though she was trying to decide whether she could trust us. Her gaze drifted over to me, and for just a split second, something flashed across her expression. It was gone so fast that I couldn’t gauge what it was, but something about it had left me unnerved.
“All right.” She nodded as she pulled the door open further and stepped aside to let us in. “You can call me Linda. I got a call from Markus that you’d come.”
“Then why was she so suspicious of us?” Jase whispered so only I would hear him. I looked back at her as she locked the door securely behind us. I wasn’t upset that she’d analyzed us like that before letting us in. She was in charge of caring for children who might be in danger, after all. It was nice to see that she took her job seriously.
“Have a seat,” she commanded as she nodded toward the couch in the living room. “I’ll go get him.”
Her tone left no room for argument, so Jase and I both did as she asked. As I sat down, it occurred to me that she had referred to the director by his first name. That meant that they probably already knew each other before this case, and well enough to be on a first-name basis.
She returned a few moments later. There was a small boy trailing behind her, carrying a baby that was almost half his own size. He looked up at us with wide, frightened eyes as he walked into the living room.
“This is Josh,” Linda said softly as she looked at the boy. Her tone and facial expression were completely different from when she’d been speaking to just us earlier. “And his baby sister, Olivia. Josh is being a good older brother and taking care of her, aren’t you, Josh?”
He nodded before turning to shoot Jase and me what was probably meant to be a glare. Coming from a five-year-old, though, it looked more cute than threatening.
“These two nice men would like to have a talk with you,” Linda explained gently. “Would you be okay with me holding Olivia while the three of you talk?”
“No!” Josh exclaimed as he clutched the baby tighter. “I’m her big brother. It’s my job to take care of her.”
Linda smiled sadly at him before looking up at us.
“He’s barely let go of her since they got here,” she informed us. “He even insisted on changing her diaper himself.”
I looked back down at Josh, who was still shooting me a glare. The baby in his arms looked like she was over a year old, and I could see his arms shaking as he held her. She was certainly heavy enough that it must be a strain on his arms to hold her, but he still maintained his grip.
“Hey, Josh,” I smiled softly at him. I slipped off the couch and onto the floor in front of him. He tensed visibly and scowled at me. It was cute how protective he was of his baby sister, but it was sad to think of why he had to be that way in the first place.
I looked around for something I could use to break his guard down, and my eyes landed on a spiral notebook sitting on the coffee table next to us. I reached over to pluck the notebook from the table and swiftly tore a blank page out of it. Josh flinched at the sudden movement and noise, and I made a mental note not to move as quickly from now on.
“Have you ever seen a paper plane, Josh?” I asked as I began to fold the sheet of paper.
The look of apprehension melt
ed off his face as he shook his head no. Instead, it was replaced by a wide-eyed wonder as the sheet of plain paper magically transformed into an airplane before his eyes.
Once I finished it, I sent it soaring across the living room with a flick of my wrist. I almost laughed at the look of unhindered joy that flashed across his features. It was nice to see how something so simple could bring so much happiness to a kid.
“I can teach you how to make one,” I offered. “Then you can show your sister how to make them, too.”
I could practically hear the gears turning in his head as he considered what he should do. After a few moments of thoughtful hesitation, he relented with a nod and turned around to hand his sister to Linda. She smiled warmly as she took the baby from him.
He checked to make sure that Linda had a good grip on her before coming to sit in front of me.
“How do you fold it?” he asked eagerly.
“Well, first, you fold it in half like a hot dog,” I explained as I took two more sheets of paper and went through the motions slowly so that he’d be able to follow along. I waited until he seemed more at ease before I started asking him about the attack. “Josh, do you think you could tell me about what happened last night?”
His hands froze for just a moment at my question before he continued with his airplane.
“I was playing on my tablet,” he replied guiltily, as though he thought he might get in trouble for it. “Nana told me to go to sleep, but I waited until she was gone and started using it again.”
“Nana?” I asked. “Is that what you call the woman who takes care of you?”
“Yeah.” Josh nodded as he fidgeted with the paper in his hands. Flint had said that the senator’s body was found the next morning by the kid’s nanny, and that Josh had been sitting by her when she was found.
“When did you go downstairs?” I asked. I figured it would be best to let him go at his pace in explaining instead of asking him directly what he’d seen.
“I could hear the TV,” he explained. “I was listening so I would know when mommy was coming upstairs so I could close my eyes and pretend to be asleep.”