The Coworker: The First Nate Castle

by Vernon Rush

  The fourth victim was a transplant from a DC firm, Hogan & Lowell. She had just leased a house in Frederick. Nate and Daria could now learn a thing or two studying these now four murders. People didn't leave law firms if their career was on track. They would suffer the worst people in the world if they were handling their job well enough. This meant number Four could have left her previous firm because she wasn't a particularly good lawyer. Unless the move was predicated for other personal reasons. A career for a lawyer was personal, so the personal thing had to be dearer than the career. But since those lawyers were few and far between, they immediately deduced that the fourth victim, Stacy Gottsponer, was not cutting the mustard at Hogan & Lowell.

  "She's not cutting mustard anywhere," Daria retorted, raising a glass of iced mineral water Nate poured her. He slid an empty bottle her way and pushed the whole lemon and olive oil closer. "She's pushing up daisies."

  "You make the salad dressing, funny lady." He tossed the salad with wooden tongs. He sliced the bread, and softened the butter in the microwave. Dinner was done. "Do we head to my place or shall we eat here? It appears to be just the two of us?"

  "That's because any one of your housemates is out prowling for their next kill." Daria raised her brows.

  "Okay, let us assume that I meant kitchen space to ourselves and not the entire house. Les murs ont oreilles. Okay? The walls have ears. And they probably heard that," he chastised.

  Without missing a beat, Daria replied, in a strained whisper, as loud as if she spoke. "That's because they have supersonic killer hearing."

  He drew up next to her and portioned salad out on plates. "Executive decision. The doctor is now in. What is going on with you?"

  Daria pinched the bridge of her nose. "It really gets to me that someone picks off people, women mostly. I don't have a man in my life," she said, to which he raised his brows. "You're my friend Nathaniel and very significant, but you know what I mean. I freelance; I hang out with you. Is this what my society, as you put it, thinks of me? I get that it's on the news every two minutes. I know people are adding their two cents about it at the Creamery, but eventually people will be buying batteries for this or that or having seconds on some exhibition of gluttony. What does it all mean? What do I mean? These murder victims, all of them, have rich lives. They have the house, the car, the job, and the looks. They have the commercial. People like them don't get plucked."

  He laughed softly because that was their phrase. Murdered people were totally plucked. "Get plucked."

  "It's not funny, Nathaniel."

  "Hey, I’m never amused when someone invokes my full name." He topped his mineral water. "We know when these things happen that we personalize them. They are remote occurrences that seem like they are intricately woven into our own lives and that we are at risk. That's why people are talking about it all over town and that's why you're freaking right now. Because, to normal people, people do matter. You matter. I matter. Serial killers aren't that broad. They are narrow. You nailed it. People don't matter to them but specific criteria do. Let's review. What do I have in common with these murders? I study them. That's it. Am I next on a list because I am proximal? Okay, so I am at some risk. What about you? You're a woman; these victims were women. You’re a freelance support person and these were young lawyers not even on partner track. Came from square families. Working class. You? I mean you know and I know, this guy is hunting. You aren't in a position to be hunted."

  "Except for at my creepy house," she said.

  "You do have a creepy house," he chided her. She hit him in the arm. "Ouch. Why do they call them the Coworker Murders and not the ridiculously small house murders? Daria, it is perfectly reasonable to hit a freak bubble. It is hard to assimilate the cavalier way in which someone can steal something so valuable. Stay next to me. You will not be killed." He speared salad and delivered it to her mouth.

  She chewed and replied, "Or else we will both get killed because you're proximal."

  He sighed because she just wasn't getting it. "Daria."

  "Do you ever wonder what we would be like if we had parents like they did?" Daria asked randomly. He made a face at her so she explained. "I mean sent us to school and made life easy for us?"

  "Well, my mother and grandmother did the best they could. I think they did a great job. I went all the way to graduate school. Is that your take on these victims? That they had it made? I think they were working class like you and me."

  "I think that is the general view of people with multiple degrees pulling in six figures. It was a momentary lapse, given we talked about my awful dwelling. I guess I did okay on my one degree. But what I am talking about is like: What if my father had been around? How would I be different that would then make my life different? I would wager that all the people had good dads. That's all I am saying."

  He bristled. His father had left him when Nate was 11. His father had suffered from the same affliction that he had: alcoholism. His mother had taken on two jobs to support his grandmother and him. He attributed all the time he spent with his grandmother for his path. Philosophy, history, and psychology were interests his grandmother fostered with the stories about family and people and discussions of reason. She would take him through twists and turns of thinking that would get his mind off of missing his dad. She and his mother were the smartest people he knew. And they managed to give him a grounded, loving home despite everything. Daria hadn't been quite as fortunate. Her father had died and left her mother holding the bag, a responsibility she wasn't always smooth about. Nate had never met Daria's mother, but by all accounts she was a shrew.

  "You do fine," he told her. "What do they say? If there is some place in life you want to be, go there? I mean, the grass is always greener, right? Single people see families and think, ‘if I only had that,’ and vice versa. You and I are in our thirties. It’s hard to say whether I am missing anything, being so newly sober. Right now, I am so bent on focusing on the next moment."

  "So you don’t want the cool house and the vacations?" Daria asked.

  "Oh, is that what you think they had? You’re in the legal professional. You know young attorneys in firms work like slaves. They don’t go on a lot of vacations. It is all in the way you look at it. In fact, you have a lot more personal freedom than any of them had, I would venture."

  Daria brushed her thick honey-colored hair from her face. "Do you think it will stick? The not drinking? Or are you still doing it for the time being?"

  He had to think on that one. His stints of sobriety were not usually that long and he knew going into them that he was going to drink eventually. But this time he had no idea. Something in him had changed and he knew it right away. He just didn’t have the nerve to say so out loud. "Not sure on that one, Daria. Not sure."

  ***

  He could hope to run into Det. Jack Wilcox at a meeting, but Nate had a sense of urgency that would not allow him to be so passive. And he couldn't wait around for Daria to follow through on her contacts. He thumbed his notes to see if she had had given him one for the placement agent who sent admin candidates to the various professional firms throughout Frederick. As she had wisely pointed out, he had no first degree rapport with this contact of Daria’s. It shouldn't be too hard to figure out; he would just run down the short list of agencies in Frederick. The trick then became how to make an approach the agency without coming off as a salacious weirdo but then something occurred to him. Nate thought perhaps the college used the same placement agency? He started from there.

  CHAPTER 7

  The Black and the Bigot

  He was beginning to clean up pretty good now that he was just this shy of picking up his first benchmark chip in the rooms. He had been just over three weeks without a drink, though to the outsider he probably looked like there was some sort of diagnosis. He had to be mindful of that when he interacted with strangers, for his gaunt appearance undermined his authority and credibility greatly. Certainly, he didn’t want to scare off Daria’s c
ontact either.

  Emily Fabian was the go-to person in all of Frederick at Professional Placements. At first, Daria wanted to maintain the agent's anonymity, but after the second murder went unsolved, when Nate and Daria thought Cobbsmith was it but he wasn't, Emily said she was okay with whomever Daria needed to disclose her identity to, as long as the firm didn't know she was talking and as long as the press didn't learn her name. Or so Nate understood.

  Emily Fabian was the agent the college used as well and when his own HR person told him that, he recalled her name and confirmed it with his notes. It was a personal 'ah ha!' moment because it marked a further clearing of his alcoholic fog. He was getting sober. He was recovering.

  He dialed Emily directly and lefts a voice message, followed up with email, which he gathered from the placement agency's website. He got an instant reply. She phoned.

  "I am not comfortable with you calling me, Mr. Castle," she said.

  "Doctor," he corrected.

  "What?" she asked agitatedly.

  "It's Dr. Castle. But you can call me Nate. Ms. Fabian, I am only asking that you share with me. Of course, it is entirely up to you. I am entirely discrete. I don't share my information. Your safety and livelihood is paramount to me."

  "How are you involved?"

  "I have worked as a consultant with the Frederick Police on the first two murders and I've made solving them something of my life's work."

  "You're not with the police now?" she asked.

  "No, I never was. I merely consulted. I am a professor here at the community college. I am a licensed private investigator. My graduate work in Forensic Psychology had an emphasis on serial crime and so the police have found my input useful. I am calling you today in hopes that you would give me some insight as to the victim firm’s atmosphere. If you're privy to any of the gossip, that kind of thing."

  "I would really not like to have this conversation over the phone. I am not sure I want to have this conversation at all. I am very, very stressed out," she said.

  "Ms. Fabian, I understand," he replied.

  "You're a professor at the community college?" she asked.

  "That's right," he said.

  "You're black, right?" she asked.

  That stunned him. His race was pointed out to him enough times, though in well-spaced intervals, as to qualify as regularity. This time it came out of left field and shut him up for the time being. "I am indeed," he answered, a little leery of what was to come next. He could hear it in her voice. She was back-pedaling.

  "I only ask because I think I've seen you. At the school," she said.

  "I see. So you think I am the black teacher you saw while you were at school." Nate wanted to throw up but the good thing about this interview was that she was bigoted and critical, which made him suspect she was a gossip hound. If she talked to him, she would be a useful tool. "I feel I should tell you I am an associate of Daria McCarroll's."

  "Who?" Emily asked abruptly.

  ""Daria? She is a freelance paralegal. Is a one-woman show for the sole practitioners throughout town. Blond hair. Attractive?"

  "I am not sure it is appropriate that I know who you think is attractive, Mr. Castle."

  "It's Dr. Castle and I apologize for the wrong choice of words. I was describing a person who—"

  Emily cut him off. "I remember faces and profiles, not so much names."

  That would figure, he thought. Still, despite his having a sterling academic pedigree, he was certain that she would know him ever as the black guy.

  "It will come to me. I am a little thrown by all of this right now."

  He was thrown by Emily's response. Clearly, he'd had a misunderstanding about the nature of Daria's relationship with her. He didn't want to delve further into it; Fabian confirmed she knew Daria so it was all good for his purposes. "Well, if you are able and willing to meet, I would be grateful. If you can't, I completely understand. I sent you an email so you can contact me quietly, privately and no one ever need know."

  "Meet me at the library. They have some private rooms where you can listen to music or whatever. Let's go there. We can talk," she said.

  For someone in the personnel placement business, Nate thought that the meeting place was a pretty good on-the-spot idea for someone shouldn't have call to have such an idea. Who else had she been speaking to in private that she was so practiced? he wondered. "Does four o'clock work?" He could meet her for an hour, eat something, shower (which he was still having to do sometimes twice a day because of the physical detox), and make an evening meeting. His life was getting full.

  It was easier to walk to the library than drive and so that was what he did. The librarians greeted him with their usual congeniality. "Good afternoon, Dr. Castle," they practically chorused.

  He responded to each personally, by first name. He was punctual and there were only so many private cubicles where Emily Fabian could be awaiting him, if she was as prompt as he was. He didn't tip his hand to anyone what he might be doing there. He let them assume.

  One of the things Nate did when he met people after he spoke to them was try to imagine what they looked like. Emily, in his mind, was a moderately overweight, undersexed white woman. He had to check each cubicle twice since they were empty save one, filled by a smoking hot, brunette. He lightly rapped his knuckles against the glass.

  She peeked around the door. "Dr. Castle?" she asked.

  "Nate," he confirmed. How many black men were coming to see her? he mused to himself. The cubicle had a privacy shade, which he drew.

  "Have a seat, please," she said. "Do you mind if I see some credentials?" she asked.

  He obliged. It was a completely reasonable request but something about it made him cop a resentment. He was about to blast her for lingering over his photo ID, when she said, "Wow you're really handsome," she gushed. "I can't believe I said that out loud. It's just that you picture people in your mind once you've heard them on the phone. I was wrong."

  Consciously guilty of having done the same thing, Nate shrugged. "Thank you, I think. And thank you for meeting me."

  They each folded their hands and regarded one another.

  "So, what can you tell me about Weston & Hale?" he asked.

  "Well, what you know is it is an old established firm. Fairly conservative but not a grind. Despite being a big firm in a small town, it has a national reputation. So while the ambitious lawyer would like to place in a big city firm, especially being fairly close to DC, this firm is respected well enough that a position here would be considered a feather in one's cap."

  "So the news says Stacey Gottsponer was a transplant from DC to Frederick. The change was a promotion of sorts?"

  "Not sure, exactly. My impression is that she was not a smart cookie, just a connected one. Jumping a ship like Hogan & Lowell begs the question, but landing on Weston & Hale sort of answers that question. If she hung a shingle out as a sole practitioner suddenly at her age, that would be a different story," Emily said.

  "So this is number two at Weston & Hale. Tell me something of the people. Who stands out? Across the board."

  "Well, there is the one crotchety paralegal. Old guy. Never married. Lived with his mother, then she died. All the attorneys relied on him so that saved him but had the social graces of the Uni-bomber. It is the current running joke that he's the killer."

  "I see. So I guess that means that, what, have you reached out to the firm to extend your condolences or anyone from the firm reached out to you? Something like that?"

  "Kind of. There are a few admins who regularly check in with me, always looking for that better job. A couple of the people at Weston & Hale were at the other firm and left that place because they were so bothered by it. Here it is, happening all over again."

  He sat up straight in his chair, lit up by the very thought. "Really?" he asked. "So let me get this straight. When the murders happened to people at the other firm, people left that firm and came to Weston & Hale and now the murders are happening
again?"

  Emily froze at the notion.

  He could see the lights going on. Emily and he may have inadvertently stumbled on a common thread and it had her shaken. "Easy," he said, holding her eye so as to keep her grounded. "I see you're thinking what I'm thinking and you're scared. I don't blame you. I have a detective I want you to talk to. It would all be very quiet. We could keep it anonymous. You would be protected." His voice raised as he could see his suggestion exasperated her.

  "No police!" she shouted, backing into a corner like a trapped animal.

  "You may have no choice in this situation. Eventually, you will have to come forward. For now, though, I could go to him first, keep you out of this then," Nate suggested. "I will not mention you at all. You have my word. I gave you my word to keep you out of the equation and so it shall be."

  "I should have never agreed to this," she said, as though she were scolding herself.

  "Ms. Fabian. Emily. I will assure your every safety. The best thing you can do is to make a concerted effort to remain calm. Take it real slow. Is there some place I can drop you off? We can come back and get your car if you drove."

  Emily shook her head, but Nate didn't like to see her degenerate. He could see the panic taking hold. But then she looked at him which brown eyes the size of saucers. It had been a long time since Nate was attracted to a woman. Daria was attractive but she didn't do it for him, and they were good friends besides. Nate's alcoholism put the kibosh on his sex drive. On drives for everything except for drinking. Looking at Emily now, he was caught off guard.

  "I am really overwhelmed right now," she said. "I think I am going to hit the first bar I see and get trashed. I know you are itching to go to the cops with this and I know it's the right thing. You have my permission to tell them whatever it is you think, but please make sure I am safe."

  "I appreciate your cooperation. We will do this on the agreement that your name is kept quiet."