by Carsen Taite
Sarah nodded and pulled out her cell phone. “We left a guard at Cedar Acres earlier, but I’ll have a couple of agents from the local office check on Ellen.” She turned to George. “Okay by you if we help out?”
George grinned. “Look at the fed playing nice. Better stop it or I’ll have to take back all the mean things I’ve said about you guys behind your backs.”
“Guys, can you focus?” Danny didn’t try to hide the growl behind her command as images of horrible things happening to Ellen flooded her mind. The note with the flowers was etched in her memory. Last night was such a rush. Thanks for the view. If Angela was the killer, it would’ve been easy for her to find where Ellen lived. Was she after Ellen or Vivian? Whoever delivered the flowers, whoever wrote that note had watched them. On the deck, through the windows, on the bed. Danny shivered, horrified at the realization that the intimacy they’d shared had been a show for a killer. The emotion that coursed through her was a strong signal she had no business working this case any longer. Once Ellen’s life had been placed in danger, she’d become too personally involved.
Hell, who was she kidding? Once she’d made love to Ellen, she’d crossed any line of professionalism she might have maintained. She might be able to fool the others into thinking all she cared about was Ellen’s immediate safety, but the truth was she cared about way more than that. She wanted a future. A future Ellen clearly didn’t want based on how easily she’d dismissed her that afternoon.
All the more reason to focus on the case. She may not be able to see it through, but at least for now, it could occupy her mind and crowd out all the wishing for things she couldn’t have.
Chapter Twenty-two
“Am I under arrest?” Ellen squared off with the suited agents standing in front of her hotel room door. Tired of being cooped up inside, she’d decided to make a trip to the office. She’d had a nagging feeling all day that the answer to finding the killer was somewhere in the sorority’s records. It had to be and no one was better equipped to find the answers than she was, but when she opened her door she found that the uniformed guard down the hall had been supplemented by a pair of FBI agents who were insistent that she stay put.
“No, ma’am. We just recommend for your own safety that you stay here while certain developments are investigated.”
Developments? Something big was happening. Ellen considered ducking back in the room and texting Danny to see if she could find out what was going on. But she’d told Danny to go. The last thing she needed to do was send mixed messages, especially when Danny had already made a choice to focus on her work instead of anything that might develop between them.
She stared at the agents’ stoic faces and crossed arms. These guys weren’t going to tell her anything. She’d have to leave the room if she wanted to have a chance of learning what was going on. Leaving the door propped open, she stepped back to grab her purse and keys. “You guys may be concerned about my safety, but I’m concerned about my sanity. I won’t be gone long. Hope you don’t get too bored waiting for me.” Without another word, she shut the door, pushed past them and hurried to the elevator, hoping the car would arrive before she lost her nerve.
She drove straight to the office, but she parked on the street instead of in the depths of the underground parking garage. She didn’t seriously think she was in any danger, but too many movie scenes of trapped victims dying lonely deaths in parking garages flooded her mind. Wouldn’t hurt to be a little bit cautious. As she fished for coins for the meter, her phone buzzed with an incoming text.
Call me. 911. Agent Flores.
Nine one one indeed. The agents at the hotel must have ratted her out and now Sarah was going to try to coax her back to the hotel. She started to drop her phone back into her purse, but hesitated. Sarah was probably with Danny. And even if she wasn’t, she might tell her what was going on. She punched in the numbers and waited impatiently for Sarah to answer.
“Flores.”
“It’s Ellen. Are you going to threaten to lock me up?”
“No one wants to lock you up, but we are concerned about you.”
“If you want me to barricade myself somewhere, I’m going to need a good reason. Something better than a vague reference to developments in the case.”
“Are you at your office?”
“I’m on the street in front of the building, but I haven’t gone in yet.”
“We have reason to believe your intern, Angela Perkins, is a suspect in the killings.”
Ellen’s response was immediate. “That’s crazy.”
“It’s definitely crazy, but it’s not without foundation. It appears her deceased mother may have been Pledge Thirteen.”
“Deceased? Was she killed?”
“She committed suicide when Angela was fifteen. Guess who discovered her dead body?”
Ellen visualized a young girl finding her mother’s corpse and gasped. “Oh my God. That poor girl.”
“Maybe. I guess even Bundy had a bad childhood. Still not a great reason to go around killing people.”
“She’s supposed to be working this afternoon.”
“I know. We have a couple of guys at your building and they are picking her up for questioning. Promise me you won’t go up there. We don’t want her to see you right now.”
Ellen stared up at her building. Was Danny in there right now, about to help interrogate Angela? The image of Angela’s smug smile as she handed Danny a white rose at the mixer flashed in her mind. Had Angela stood outside her house, delivered the flowers? Had she watched them making love? The very idea caused her to double over.
“Ellen?”
She leaned against the car. She had to pull herself together. “I’m here.”
“Promise me you won’t go up there?”
“Tell me one thing. Is Danny there?”
“What? No, she’s at the station. You could call her, you know.”
Sarah made it sound so easy, but it wasn’t. She chose to ignore the advice. “I’m going for a drive. Will you keep me posted about what you find out about Angela?”
“You bet.”
Ellen got back in her car and left downtown on I-35. She hadn’t started out with a plan other than to get as far away from her office, house, and the stifling feeling of having her every move being watched. She drove an hour and a half to Hillsboro before pulling over and parking at the local outlet mall. As she stared out her window at the shoppers strolling around the complex, she wondered if they were all as carefree as they appeared, or if they were like her. Weighted down by a past full of secrets.
*
Danny sat next to Molly and they both watched on the closed-circuit monitor as George and Sarah took turns questioning Angela. They started with easy, background questions designed to make her think they were talking to everyone connected with the sorority, especially those who were at the mixer the week before. They even mentioned the guy they had followed from the mixer and been watching ever since to gauge her reaction.
She was eerily cool, offering a mix of concern and naiveté about the tragedy that had befallen some of the older members of the sorority. After about an hour of careful and kind questioning, Sarah took on the role of bad cop, questioning Angela about her whereabouts on the days of the murders, starting with the most recent delivery of flowers to Ellen’s house.
Danny was constantly amazed how many people stuck around this long for questioning without asking for an attorney. Usually they at least asked something like “Am I in trouble?” or “Should I hire a lawyer?” to which the rote response was “If you didn’t do anything wrong, you have nothing to hide” or “Sure, you can get a lawyer, if that’s what you really want, but if you didn’t do anything wrong…” But Angela didn’t ask any such questions nor did she show any signs of cracking even when Sarah started asking about phone records and who she might have been talking to, disparaging the older members of the sorority, the night of the mixer. All of her responses were easy and calm.
&nbs
p; Danny was so intent on watching the slow and careful grilling, that she barely noticed the tap on her shoulder.
“Ma’am?” A young uniformed cop stood behind her holding a folder.
She stood and motioned for him to follow her a few steps away so Molly could continue to watch the interview undisturbed. “Yes?”
He held up the folder and spoke in an earnest tone. “Detective Ramirez asked me to get this important information and bring it to him. Any idea if he plans to be out of there soon?”
Molly lifted her head at the mention of “important information” and walked over to stand beside her. Danny wondered if the folder contained Angela’s mother’s autopsy. They’d managed to find the reported cause of death from an archived newspaper obituary, but she hoped the autopsy would give them something more to work with. She was itching to open it, and if Molly weren’t standing right there, she would have ripped into it. She could still do it. She was Molly’s boss, after all. Time to decide which was more important, being the prosecutor or the lover. Ellen may have asked her to go, but it wasn’t in her nature to give up so easily. If she wanted to fight for a chance with her, she needed to draw some lines and one of them was right in front of her.
She motioned for the officer to hand the file to Molly and walked back over to the monitor. She would see this part of the case through, but she’d start positioning Molly to take over the ultimate role once they were sure they had the killer. Lover. That was her choice. She only hoped Ellen would give her the chance.
“Danny, you’re going to want to take a look at this.” Molly held the folder in one hand and made urgent motions with the other. When Danny reached her side, Molly shoved the folder into her hands and started rattling off details at a brisk pace. “And check out these photos.”
Danny flipped through the photographs, one by one. Half a dozen angles all showed the same thing. The same kind of hangman’s noose that had been found at each of the murder scenes. If they hadn’t been sure before that young Angela was involved in the murders, now they had motive. She’d come home one day after school to find her troubled mother swinging from a beam in their home. A scene like that could devastate anyone and, for someone who had been raised by a troubled woman, she had apparently broken, although she managed to maintain a psychopathic guise of normal.
She handed the photos back to Molly. “Knock on the door. George and Sarah need to see these.”
“There’s something else.” Molly pulled a sheet of paper out of the folder. Danny watched as she traced the lines with her finger. It was a birth certificate. For a Collin Perkins. Mother, Angela Perkins. Father, unknown. She pulled the paper from Molly’s hand and scoured the page for the date of birth. When she found it, she knew she held the most important piece of evidence they’d found to date. Collin Perkins had been born almost nine months from the date Pledge Thirteen had been paid to leave Alpha Nu. If Angela Perkins senior had been raped like she claimed, Collin Perkins, the child of that rape, definitely had the strongest motive to avenge her death. She knew she was jumping to conclusions, but Sarah and George weren’t getting anywhere with the other child of Pledge Thirteen, and she was certain this piece of evidence was key.
“Do we know where this guy lives?”
Molly looked through the file. “Same address as Angela. Looks like the house is still in their mother’s name. He probably inherited it and lives there with his little sister.”
“No way we have enough for a warrant, but I think we’re on to something. Get Sarah and George and let’s meet in the war room.” Danny turned to walk away with the folder still in her hand, but stopped short. Prosecutor or Lover? Could she be both? She handed the folder back to Molly. “You’re the new lead on this. I’ll clear it with Alvarez. I’m in the room, but you call the shots. Okay?”
Molly nodded and only barely hid a smile of excitement. They were about to have a big break. Danny could feel the pulsing energy and didn’t blame Molly for wanting to be a part of it. Within a few minutes, they were all settled in the conference room. Danny let Molly explain what they’d found.
Sarah responded first. “I think George and I should go pay Collin a little visit. Maybe he’ll invite us in and we can get a free look around. We see anything of interest, we can let you know and you can get a warrant to do a full search.”
George nodded. “I told Angela we were getting her dinner. She has a thing for Yale, the cop who brought her in. I’ll let him hang out with her while she eats, get her to stick around for a while. Danny, where will you be if we need you?”
She started to answer, that she’d be right there, waiting on their call to draft a warrant, but that was Molly’s job now. Besides, there was somewhere else she’d rather be. Someone else she wanted to see. She told George to call Molly about the warrant and Molly to call her if she needed any help with the process. Satisfied she had made the right decision, she left the station and headed to her car.
Chapter Twenty-three
It was after dark when Ellen pulled up to the familiar complex and waited for the valet to approach. She had no idea how she’d wound up here. She’d spent the time parked in Hillsboro wondering how her life had gotten so messed up in the course of a few weeks. Then she realized she’d been living a lie for years. A lie where her mother was a philanthropic socialite and her father a respected intellectual, ostensibly the perfect pair. What a crock. Vivian was a mean-spirited bitch and Bill was a coward. To top it off, they’d never loved each other and she now seriously doubted whether they’d ever really loved her. Suddenly her propensity to steer clear of anything more meaningful than a fling seemed normal. How could anyone expect her to be any different with these two as an example?
She wished she were different. If she were, she would have told Danny that she would wait for her to finish with the case. She would have told Danny that she wanted to try. She would have asked her to be patient. If she were different, there were so many things she would have done.
But she was the child of her parents, and that was likely why she’d unconsciously driven here, hoping that her mother was mentally present and that she could get some answers about why she’d done the things she’d done.
She handed her keys to the valet and walked through the doors of Cedar Acres. Probably best to check in with Mrs. Patterson before she talked to her mother. She had no idea if there’d been any fallout after the garden scene. Normally, she would’ve checked in sooner, but after the recent revelations, apathy was the strongest emotion she could summon when it came to her mother’s well-being.
Mrs. Patterson wasn’t in sight and the receptionist was on the phone, so she waited on a couch near the front counter and watched the residents shuffle around the facility. Based on the crowd, it looked like they were all flooding out of the dining hall. She tried to remember the last time she’d eaten and was surprised to recall it had been cereal from room service that morning. She’d lost her appetite after Danny had left her hotel room, and right now she felt as though she’d never be hungry again.
Several minutes passed and she was about to interrupt the talkative receptionist when Mrs. Patterson appeared at her side.
“Ellen, how nice to see you. I was headed out, but I saw you sitting here. I hope nothing’s wrong.”
“Nothing specific. How is my mother?”
“Well, it’s been interesting. Since the visit from your friends, she’s been more aware than normal. I know we were worried about setting her back, but it appears as if you may have jogged her consciousness in a good way.”
Ellen considered the possibility that she might be able to have a prolonged conversation with her mother about her past, about what she had set in motion with her actions, about what she’d made of her life in the aftermath. Now that the possibility was real, she was uncertain. Did she really want to hear the truth?
“She’s in her room if you’d like to see her. I’m sure she’d love the chance to talk to you.”
Ellen wasn’t sure about that,
but she knew she needed to close out this chapter of her life before she could start anything new. And she desperately wanted something new. “I’ll go see her now.”
Vivian sat in a wingback chair reading by the light of a Tiffany lamp on the table beside her. Ellen noted the novel in her hand was the same one she had insisted someone had swiped from her room. The soft light from the lamp didn’t hide the deep age lines that etched her once spa-pampered face and the black patches under her eyes. If she didn’t know her, Ellen would’ve thought she looked like any other lonely old woman.
Ellen observed her in the quiet for a few moments before Vivian looked up. “Why hello, dear. I didn’t hear you come in.”
“Do you know who I am?” Best to start this process with a clear understanding of where things stood.
“Of course I do. Why don’t you come in and sit down?”
Ellen edged into the room, but remained standing. “The last couple of times I was here you thought I was Marty Lawson.”
“Poor Marty. She died, you know.”
Her words were sad, but something was off, like she didn’t realize the horrific way Marty had met her end. “I know. Do you remember how she died?”
“Are you here to quiz me? Because you really should sit down for that.” She scrunched her brow. “I don’t seem to recall exactly how she died, but I do recall it was recently and untimely. She was always very healthy and fit.”
Ellen felt the buzzing of her phone. She pulled it out and looked at the new text, seeing the “where are you?” before she noticed the sender. Danny. She itched to type a reply telling her where she was and arranging a time to meet, but she needed to air things out with her mother first. She quickly typed, “call you later” and turned off her phone to prevent any other interruptions. For all she knew, Danny’s text was merely Sarah’s attempt to find out where she’d gone to elude the agents who’d been keeping her prisoner. No way was she going to risk losing the opportunity to take advantage of her mother’s lucid moments. Her haste kept her from sugarcoating her next words.