by K. M. Hodge
Jason, who had been quiet up until then, spoke up. “So, Ben, where were you last night?” He swirled his glass of scotch—his third of the night—and leaned against the buffet.
Ben frowned. “I was here at home, visiting with my family. Why do you ask?”
Ellie shot Jason a look of warning. He had better not fucking go there!
Jason smiled drunkenly back at both of them as he teetered on the edge of the buffet. He lifted his index finger up to his lips in mock thoughtfulness. “Hmmm.... Well, you see, I’m trying to solve the mystery of who Doc fucked last night after the funeral. She didn’t come home until 3:00 AM.”
Ellie’s face burned hot with pure rage and she lunged at him.
Jason overcorrected his dodge and landed hard on the floor. “Ow,” he cried out. “Don’t worry about me. I’m okay.”
Ellie caught herself before falling forward, and glared down at Jason. Somehow she resisted the urge to kick him while he was down.
Ben—kindhearted and forgiving—sighed as he bent over to pick Jason up. “I’m going to go put him down for the night in the guest bedroom, so he can sleep off this stupidity.”
Ellie slumped down on one of the chairs, her tearful face buried behind her hands. With Katherine gone, everything was falling to shit.
A few minutes later, Ben came back into the room and placed a comforting hand on her shoulder. She covered his hand with hers and squeezed it before releasing it. “How long has he been like this?”
Ben sighed and rubbed his eyes, which were red-rimmed and sunken in. “A year maybe. It got really bad after Katherine told him she was... she was going to die.”
The wound was fresh and raw, Ben’s grief hidden behind his lopsided grin—the one Katherine had loved so much.
Ellie reached for his free hand again and squeezed it. “How are you holding up?”
He gave her a tired smile. “I’m okay. I know it will be hard when everyone leaves and I have to go back to work.”
She listened quietly, creating space in the moment for his grief.
He looked up and away as his eyes brimmed with unshed tears. “I really miss her. The house is too quiet with her gone.” He slumped into the chair beside her.
Ellie’s phone buzzed with an incoming message from Chris. She pulled it up and smiled in anticipation.
Chris: Are you still coming?
“The mystery man, I presume,” Ben teased.
“Yeah.” She sighed and hid her smile behind her hand.
“Go. I’ll clean up here and take care of Jason, and bring him and the boxes by first thing tomorrow.”
She scrunched her brows together. “I can’t—”
He held up a hand to interrupt her. “You can and you will. If Katherine were here she would be pushing you out the door.” He gave her arm a little shove. “Go on. Don’t keep him waiting. Get going then!”
Ellie jumped up from her chair and kissed him on the cheek. “Thanks, Ben.”
She looked back at him one last time before shooting out the door.
He gave her a goofy smile and the thumbs up sign. His red eyes and the tears spilling down his cheek made the moment bittersweet.
***
Pipeline Rapids Walkway
Richmond, Virginia
June 16, 2025
9:00 PM
~~~
Sally followed closely behind the two men for over two miles—hiding in brush and behind trees along the way. This part of the pipeline didn’t see much foot traffic that time of night, so the men went unnoticed by anyone other than her.
They didn’t detect her trailing them—too stupid and arrogant to ever think they could be followed. They took precautions against electronic surveillance, but no one thought to protect themselves against good old-fashioned surveillance—on foot.
“Jean, we have to do something soon. Things are getting out of hand,” Alejandro said. “The police are starting to poke around now.”
“You gonna be the one to talk to him?” Jean huffed and puffed as he carried his half of the dead weight.
“Fuck no!” Alejandro turned at the pass and walked backwards down the worn path.
“Well then keep your head down and shut the fuck up unless you want to be on the list. Let him deal with the cop. Don’t think for a minute that he doesn’t know what’s going on.” Alejandro stopped at the bridge and indicated with his head to toss their burden over into the river.
Sally watched from behind a leafy Paw-Paw tree as the men—men she grew up with— heaved a body into the water. A mixture of sadness and relief washed over her as she watched her old man’s body floating away down the St. James. Even though she didn’t love him, she did the sign of the cross, kissed the cool medal of her St. Rita medallion, and said a short prayer as he disappeared into his watery grave.
“Father, Son and Holy Ghost,” she murmured to herself.
She would light a candle for him at St. Sebastian’s. It would be expected.
After that, she could really be free. The plan had been set in motion—no going back now. If it all worked out, she could leave Ocean City and The Syndicate behind her forever.
***
Church Hill Neighborhood
Richmond, Virginia
June 17, 2025
6:00 AM
~~~
Ellie quietly crept into the dimly lit house on her bare feet, not wanting to disturb Jason and his girlfriend, whose car was parked in the driveway. She was surprised to see Marianna laying a passed-out Jason on the couch in the living room. She sighed.
Marianna startled and swung on her heels with her gun drawn.
“Geeze-oh-peas!” Ellie walked out of the shadows with her hands up. “Don’t shoot, it’s just me.”
Marianna sighed and holstered her weapon. “What happened last night? Where were you when he was binge drinking himself into a stupor all night?”
Her bold, baseless accusations taxed Ellie’s nervous system. “Excuse me?”
“You all should be ashamed of yourselves.” Marianna got Jason onto his side and placed the Aztec throw over him.
Ellie stared blankly back at her. “Are you kidding me? Where were you? Ben said he’s been like this for months. What are you doing to help him?”
Marianna’s eyebrows lowered to form one long line of barely controlled rage. “I don’t have time for this shit. Some of us have to go to work.” She stormed out of the house and slammed the door behind her.
“What the fuck just happened here?” Ellie rubbed her eyes and stared out the window at a blue jay, sitting on the ledge watching her.
“She verbally bitch-slapped you.” Jason groaned as he grabbed a pillow and hugged it to himself.
With nowhere else to funnel her rage, Ellie popped Jason hard on the back of the head, making him yelp and squint.
“Wha’ the fuck, Ellie!” His hand cupped his cheek and he shot her a hateful look.
“Don’t you ‘what the fuck’ me! What the hell got into you last night?”
He groaned. “I don’t know. What’d I do? I don’t ‘member anything.”
She squatted down beside him. “You need to get some help, Jason.”
He opened his eyes one at a time and startled a little at her closeness. “I know... I know.”
She stood and went to the bathroom, and turned on the shower. Then she returned and dragged him into it fully clothed.
Jason shuddered awake, coughing and choking on the water that beat down on him. “What the hell!”
Ellie walked out without even acknowledging him. The dipstick for her patience with him was nearly bone dry. She went into the kitchen to cool off and make them breakfast and coffee.
Twenty minutes later, Jason came into the kitchen wearing some clean boxers and a t-shirt, and sat down at the table.
She poured him some hot coffee and spooned some scrambled eggs onto his plate. She knew he was in no condition to argue; that would come later.
“Eat, drink your coffee, and the
n we’re going to talk about getting you well.”
He sat silently eating his food.
She knew him well enough to know that his silence in no way meant he was going to be on board with her planned intervention.
***
Richmond Police Department, First Precinct
Richmond, Virginia
June 17, 2025
10:30 AM
~~~
Marianna’s departmental Dropbox notification dinged. She set aside her research and pulled up the preliminary CSI report on the Mitchel murder.
The report stated the weapon found on scene was a Glock 42 handgun with a six-round magazine and an Osprey silencer. Five .380 bullets remained in the magazine. The gun had been discharged once, but due to the polygonal rifling, the lab was unable to measure the width of land and groove impressions. It was listed as 0.000. So even if the coroner came back with a .380 bullet, they had no way of proving it came from the gun on the scene.
Dammit!
To add insult to injury, the Richmond DMV records had found no match on the partial. She was going to have to contact the FBI to get permission to submit her partial thumbprint for a match in the Next Generation Identification (NGI) database. Even if they got a match, they still couldn’t tie the weapon to the dead body.
Marianna needed more information. She pulled up the access portal to Jason’s personal cloud and put in his password--one she saw him key in dozens of times.
He won’t mind.
It didn’t take long for her to find a point person at the FBI she could talk to about her theory of The Syndicate. Alex’s old paperwork and notes listed his superior and fellow arresting officer as Section Chief Emmanuel Richards.
She finger-swiped his name into the Richmond PD cloud system, pulled up his contact information, and noticed a recently closed file on him. The police had responded to an accident on the I-95—a four-car pileup. One of the cars had caught fire after slamming into a tree. A passerby stopped and pulled the driver out, but the woman, Cassandra Richards, was pronounced dead on the scene. The car was registered to her husband, former FBI agent Emmanuel Richards.
Marianna jumped up from her seat, snatched her keys and tablet, and bolted to the garage.
She tossed her things into her vehicle and was getting ready to pull out when her phone alerted her to a new text.
Jason: I’m sorry.
Biting her lip, she debated about whether to return his text. She decided to let him stew. She had more important things to deal with now.
***
Bruckman Assisted Living
Alexandria, Virginia
June 17, 2025
12:00 PM
~~~
Betty Williams was a good-natured person who tried to find the good in every person. All of this changed the day her husband passed away. They were responsible, and she was sure they were watching her.
The shifty orderly with the cold black eyes, Leyman, brought her a tray with lunch. “I thought you might like to eat in here today, Ms. Williams.”
Betty trembled under the weight of his chilling gaze. His actions seemed so innocuous that she often questioned if her thoughts about him were all nonsense.
She straightened up in her bed as he brought the bed table up to her. It was truly hideous food, but she ate it anyway while reading a new eBook she had picked out that morning.
In her distracted state, the prick she felt at the base of her foot took her by surprise. She cried out and dropped her reader, then looked up to see Leyman placing a bottle and syringe in his pocket.
He turned her TV up loud and closed the door behind him.
She screamed, but no one came as her chest tightened and her heart began to race. The last thought she had as the darkness closed in was an ironic, smug satisfaction—she hadn’t been crazy about Leyman, after all.
***
Manny Richards’s Brownstone
Alexandria, Virginia
June 17, 2025
1:00 PM
~~~
Manny had sat all night on the stoop.
His daughters, straight from the airport in an automated Alphabet car, freaked out when they found him passed out on the stone steps. Once they realized he wasn’t dead, they lit into him about scaring them half-to-death. It didn’t take them long to jump right into making the arrangements.
Last month, he and his wife Cassie had met with a lawyer and finalized their wills—finally crossing it off their to-do list. When the will had been finalized, he joked with her about how they were going to die any day now. He thought back on the joke now—not so funny anymore.
He watched as the girls whirled around him in a tornado of controlled chaos, bouncing from one thing to the next.
Is everything moving at a faster pace or am I losing it?
The doorbell rang its too cheery song—his wife’s idea. Both girls bounded off to answer the door, a pair of energetic, grieving bunnies.
“Dad, there’s a detective who wants to talk to you.” His eldest, Julia, stood in the doorframe.
Manny strained to rise from the couch and walked through the foyer to the open door, where a beautiful young detective, the one he’d seen on TV, stood.
“Hello, sir, my name is Detective Espinosa.” She held up the badge that hung around her neck. “I’m so sorry to bother you in your home, sir, and please accept my condolences for the recent death of your wife. I just need a moment of your time. I have a few questions involving your wife’s death and how it may be connected to an old case you might remember.”
Manny’s youngest daughter, Morgan, chimed in. “I think you might be mistaken. My mother died in a car accident. I don’t see how it could possibly have anything to do with some case my father might have worked on.”
The detective met his gaze and held it.
The Syndicate... It has to be about The Syndicate.
“May I speak with you for a moment, sir? Privately?”
Manny nodded, then turned to face his girls. “I’ll just be a minute, girls. Go on back inside.”
They turned in almost unison to go back inside, but not before giving Marianna the stink eye.
When the door closed behind him, Manny motioned for her to sit down on the stoop beside him.
The neighborhood children were out riding their bikes and playing catch.
Some things don’t change. Thank God.
The scene playing out before them could have been cut and pasted from his own childhood.
Manny cleared his throat and gave the detective a sideways glance. “The Syndicate... You’re here because of the Syndicate, aren’t you?”
For the first time in sixteen years, he found himself craving a cigarette. Instead, he twisted his hands and swallowed hard.
Not going to cry... I’m not going to cry.
“You think The Syndicate had something to do with her death?”
“Yes, sir, I do, but that’s just the beginning.”
Chapter 4
Church Hill Neighborhood
Richmond, Virginia
June 17, 2025
1:00 PM
~~~
Jason escaped upstairs after tolerating a lecture from Ellie about his drinking. Sure, he had a problem, but he didn’t know if he was really ready to deal with it. The booze helped hold him together, but it also tore him apart at the same time, like a broken zipper that got off the track.
He settled down to comb through the box of stuff from Ben’s house, which sat in the middle of his bedroom floor. It contained mostly old pictures, but also a box of journals tied together with a bit of twine. The twine held a slip of folded paper with his name neatly scrawled across it; she had set them aside for him as research for his new book. He put them on his nightstand to look at later.
Another small wooden box, about the size of his palm, sat at the bottom of the larger box—like the boxes kids used to keep their joints in back in the day. Considering Katherine’s past exploits, it had been most likely used to hold
her drugs back when she was using. He cracked open the lid and found all of her AA chips.
Damn, Ben....
Then he saw Katherine’s familiar scrawl on a torn scrap of paper:
Just think about it.
Jason reached inside and took out the silver 24-hour chip, and put it in his pocket. He remembered picking her up after the first meeting, and how she had proudly showed it off to him. Now he found himself on a similar path. He wasn’t sure how he had gone from casual drinking at night to varying levels of drunk all day long.
He lay down on his bed and began to read one of the earlier journals from her heavy drinking days. In a weird way it made him feel like she was still with him.
***
Unknown Location
June 17, 2025
1:00 PM
~~~
For him, being the boss and having all the power and the prestige made it all worthwhile. Now his patience had paid off and the most powerful crime ring in the United States was at his disposal. The two-part plan for revenge had been set in place. He wished he could do it himself—with his own bare hands—but since he was the boss that simply wasn’t possible. Instead, he sat on his throne and sent out the others, who followed him like lemmings, to do all of the dirty work.
“Boss.” Henry walked into the sparse room. “We took care of Billy, but we have a problem with Tidy.”
This was the last thing the boss wanted to hear right now. He took a deep breath and shifted the papers in front of him. Henry and some of the other senior men had warned him that Tidy would be a liability, but like most entrepreneurs, he knew he sometimes had to make calculated risks to move forward.
“What’s wrong, Henry? What’s Tidy done now?”
Henry stepped farther into the room, and the security team closed the door behind him. “Well, sir, after he killed the wrong person... well, he was very agitated. Two of our men are in the hospital. The doctor got him subdued with apparently enough tranquilizers to take out a bear—”
“So you’re telling me that the problem is under control?”