by Vakey, Jenn
“It’s Evans,” she said when she heard Wooldridge’s voice on the other end of the line. “You’re going to need to catch the first available flight to Denver, then make your way to Brooks Hollow. Sheriff Eric Stigent will be waiting for you at the station.”
“Don’t tell me Mifflin’s still there?” She could hear a note of excitement in his voice.
“Oh, it’s so much more complicated than that,” she said as she took a deep breath. The thought of having to run through the entire story made her only more exhausted. “Long story short, you already have Mifflin. He’s the body lying in your morgue. Christopher and Melissa Roberts faked their deaths with the assistance of his sister. Christopher is really dead now, and Sarah and Melissa are waiting for you at the station.”
Her statement was met by deafening silence.
“Oh, and if you were planning on attending the convention this week in Denver to hear Ben Davis speak, you might want to cancel. He’s been shot, and won’t be able to make it.” Her tone was dry and almost cold as, once again, she was overcome with anger.
“I,” he paused, seemingly trying to process all of the information that had just been thrown at him. “I’ll be there tomorrow.”
Rilynne hung up without saying another word and slid down in her seat, letting her head drop down onto the back. When it did, she was met with a sharp pain. She had completely forgotten about her head. Returning the ice pack to the now throbbing spot, she leaned back and closed her eyes.
It took her a few moments to realize where she was. Ben had only brought her to the spot once before, though it was quite unforgettable.
She walked out to the edge of the ledge and looked down on the city lights below. She could see why Ben always took a trip up there whenever something was wrong in his life. It was one of the most relaxing places she had ever been. After taking one last look, she turned around and climbed on top of the large boulder in the middle of the clearing.
“You know,” Mifflin said as he sat down next to her. “He told me what you could do. Christopher told me all about your abilities. I told him he was crazy, but he insisted it was true. He said that’s how you’re able to solve all of those cases when everyone else gets stumped. I guess it didn’t help you here, though.”
“I know,” she said without turning toward him. “I should have known something was wrong. I should have caught him before he involved you. I’m so sorry.”
“What’s done is done,” he said, though she could hear the resentment in his voice. “I thought for sure after he told me that, you wouldn’t be too far behind, no matter how many precautions were taken,” he continued. “How does someone hide from someone like you? Apparently it’s easier than I thought.”
She didn’t know how she could have missed it. She had been so caught up in what she thought she knew, she completely missed what had been right in front of her.
“You tried to tell me,” she said woefully. “Even Christopher tried to tell me. I was so consumed with anger that I wasn’t listening to what was actually being said.”
As she said it, she could feel her confidence slipping away.
“Stop that,” another voice came through the darkness. She spun around so fast that she nearly fell off the boulder. She strained her eyes to see where the voice was coming from. Her heart gave a quick jump when she saw Ben stepping out of the tree line.
“Are you okay?” she asked as she jumped to the ground. “They took you back for surgery and I haven’t heard anything.” She rushed toward him, but stopped just a few feet short and let out a quick gasp at his appearance.
Blood was still oozing from his gunshot wound, leaving his clothes stained red. A wave of dread passed over her and she felt like she was going to collapse.
“None of this was your fault,” he said firmly. “You can’t blame yourself for the choices other people make. You can’t see everything.”
She pulled her eyes away from his blood soaked clothes and found an almost sympathetic look on his face. “This is my fault. He only did this because he was afraid of me. Mifflin is dead because Christopher didn’t feel that he could just leave me. He knew what I… he knew that I could find out what happened. And you…”
“Detective Evans.”
Her eyes shot open, bringing the room back into focus. She looked around for a few moments before she remembered where she was and jumped from her seat. As she did, the ice pack on her lap fell to her feet.
“I’m sorry for startling you,” the thick Irish accent came from her right. She turned to find a tall man in blue scrubs standing next to her. “I’m Dr. Terrance Cahill. I believe you’ve already met my partner.” He motioned to the woman walking toward them. It wasn’t until she pulled the surgical mask off of her face that Rilynne recognized her as Dr. Raab. She felt an immense panic wash over her as she braced herself for the news.
“Mr. Davis’ surgery went well, and we’ve moved him into our recovery room,” he explained. “He was very lucky. The bullet missed all of his vital arteries, and just nicked the appendix before exiting through his back. We could have repaired the appendix, but as it’s not a vital organ, we went ahead and just removed it. He should be ready to be released Thursday morning.”
Her knees nearly buckled as she let out a sigh of relief. He continued talking, but she was so elated over his news that she didn’t hear anything else he said.
“As for you,” Dr. Raab stepped in and shook her back to reality, “we would like to do a CT scan, just to be safe. The paramedic informed me that this was your second head wound this week that resulted in loss of consciousness. I know that you’ve declined treatment, but now that Mr. Davis is stable, I would really like to have a look.”
“Okay,” she said as she followed them back to the examination room.
*
“I don’t see any fractures on the skull, but you do have a concussion. I’m going to have a room made up and keep you overnight for observation. Now, you said that you’ve had a concussion before, correct?” Dr. Cahill asked.
“Yes, I was hit by an assailant last August, which resulted in a concussion.”
“Okay, so you know the drill,” he replied. “You need to rest, and you can apply an ice pack to the knot as needed. Don’t scrub or soak the stitches for the next forty-eight hours. Also, avoid aspirin and alcohol for at least two days. After that, you can use a small amount of shampoo, but you still need to take care of the area. Follow up with your physician in seven to ten days.”
She nodded briefly, stopping when her head began to throb. “Is there any way I could be put in a room next to Ben?”
“That shouldn’t be a problem,” he said. “I’ll have the nurse get it ready for you. Mr. Davis is still unconscious, but he should be coming out of it before too much longer.”
Rilynne followed the nurse into the room directly across the hall from the one Ben was in. After allowing her vitals to be checked and taking the pills handed to her, she walked out of the room and into Ben’s, taking the seat next to his bed. She had just reapplied the ice pack to the back of her head when she heard him starting to stir.
“You’re making a habit of sitting next to my hospital beds,” he said hoarsely, though his eyes hadn’t yet opened.
“You’re making a habit of ending up in one,” she teased. “Though technically this isn’t really a hospital. How did you know I was here?”
“Please,” he tried to laugh, but his throat seemed to be irritated, she assumed from his intubation. “Like you’d be any place else. And as for my habit of ending up in hospital beds, you’re always in one yourself at the time. I just don’t want you to be lonely, that’s all.”
“You’re right,” she said. “Getting yourself shot is the best way to make sure a girl doesn’t get lonely.”
He nodded, his eyes finally opening as he looked over to her. “Damn straight. Sure, I could have gone with a simple concussion like you, but I thought this would be much more manly. Besides, I always wondered what
it actually felt like to be shot.”
“Well, I hope you have that out of your system now,” she replied.
He bobbed his head up and down. “From now on, when you feel like taking a trip to the hospital, you’re on you own. I’ll visit you, but no more overnight stays for me. Do you know how the surgery went?”
She was almost surprised it took him so long to ask. “They had to remove your appendix, but you can go home in a couple days. You were very lucky.” As she said it, guilt passed over her causing her to look away.
“Stop that,” he said bluntly.
She jerked her gaze back to him, both shocked and confused by his statement. Her face must have shown it, because he didn’t wait for her to respond before continuing.
“Stop feeling guilty,” he said. “You’re not the one who shot me, so stop feeling like this is your fault.”
“I should have listened to you,” she replied. “I should have waited. If I had, none of this would have happened.”
He opened his mouth to say something, but quickly closed it without a word. Instead, he pulled his hand up and ran his knuckles across his chin.
“You saved my life,” she said, knowing where his mind had gone. “Christopher would have killed me if you hadn’t intervened, there’s no doubt in my mind about that. Add to that the fact that he had a gun pointed at your head. If you hadn’t fired when you did, we would both surely be dead right now.”
“He was your husband,” he stated. “I…”
“I wasn’t wrong with my profile,” she interrupted. “He was a sociopath. He murdered my partner and stabbed me in the back. Literally. He did it all while leaving my bedroom covered in blood, knowing I would be the one to find it. You don’t do that to someone you love. He’s the only one to blame.”
She wished she could convince herself that what she was saying was true. As hard as she tried, she couldn’t help but feel that she should have known. That behavior wasn’t something that could have just come about, and she didn’t understand how she could have missed it. She also didn’t know why she was never able to see what had happened, or any glimpses of Christopher afterwards.
Judging by the look on his face, Ben seemed to know what she was thinking, at least in a way, though he didn’t mention it. Instead, he reached out and grabbed her hand, holding it firmly as he laid his head back down and closed his eyes.
*
“They’re releasing me, so I’m going to head over to the sheriff’s station for a bit. Despite still being furious, Byman said they’ll let me do an unofficial interview with both Melissa and Sarah,” she said. “I’ll be back a little later to check on you. Maybe I can sneak you in something good to eat. Any requests?”
“Is there a magic food out there that can get me released?” he asked as he pushed himself up in the bed.
“You do know that you were shot, right?” she asked, unable to keep the grin off of her face.
“That was yesterday,” he replied. “I’m ready to get out of here.”
“You never were one to sit back and just allow yourself to heal. I wonder how much time they’re going to make you take off this time.”
His eyes widened as he pulled himself the rest of the way up. “You didn’t tell them, did you?”
“You mean tell them that you were shot?” She didn’t even try to hide the amusement in her voice. “Even if I hadn’t, I’m sure Summers had it around the entire station within five minutes of me hanging up. You should have heard Wilcome when I called him, though.” She sat down on the edge of his bed, pulling her feet up underneath her. “He didn’t seem to know what to think about it. After the initial shock over how I could have let you get shot, he was actually quite impressed with how you handled yourself. You should probably call him,” she added. “I told him I’d keep him informed on your progress. I’ll be honest, I’m failing miserably.”
“I might as well,” he said. “It’ll give me something to do to help pass the time.”
“It won’t kill you to relax for one day,” she said, patting his feet under the sheets. “Dr. Cahill said you should be ready to be released tomorrow morning. Wooldridge will be here today to take Melissa and Sarah back, so we can actually head home after you’re released.”
“Sounds good to me,” he replied as he laid back and reached for the television remote. “As far as I know, no one there wants to shoot me.”
Chapter Sixteen
Anticipation built as she made her way back to the station.
“I put Melissa Roberts in room one,” Byman said when she walked through the doors. “Sarah Bennett is in room two. Who would you like to speak with first?”
After a few moments of consideration, she answered, “Melissa.”
Melissa’s bloodshot eyes turn to the door when it opened. Other than the hair-which was much shorter and darker than the pictures-she looked just like the images Rilynne had seen. Her expression was that of pure panic as she bounced nervously in her seat.
“Do you know who I am?” Rilynne asked as she dropped down into the chair across from her.
Even before she nodded, Rilynne could tell by the guilt on her face that she did.
“So I’m guessing you know what I do?”
Again, she just nodded.
“Chief Wooldridge will be coming in to do an official interview with you, but I wanted to get some answers myself, if you don’t mind,” she said as she pulled out a file. “What can you tell me about this man?”
Melissa picked up the picture of Mifflin that she slid across the table and looked at if carefully for a few moments before handing it back.
“I don’t know who that is,” she said softly.
Rilynne studied her frightened expression carefully as she leaned back in her chair. “This is Detective Lamar Mifflin,” she went on. “He was my partner until he was killed and framed for the deaths of you and Christopher. His safe and accounts were then cleaned out, and that money was used to set up your new life in Brooks Hollow.”
The look on Melissa’s face was somewhere between confusion and panic.
“No,” she said firmly. “We didn’t have anything to do with this. I won’t deny that we set it up to look like we had both been killed, but that was it. We didn’t kill anyone in the process,” she insisted. “We just wanted to start over.”
As much as she wanted to tie Mifflin’s death to Melissa, Rilynne couldn’t help but feel as though she was telling the truth.
“I’ll tell you exactly what we did,” she continued, “but you have to believe that we’re not responsible for that man’s death. I know that it was crazy, but if my husband didn’t think that I was dead, he would have come after me and killed me himself. After Christopher asked for a divorce and you attacked him, he didn’t see any other way out. So…”
“I’m sorry,” Rilynne interrupted her. “What are you talking about? Christopher never let on that he was at all unhappy with our marriage, let alone ask for a divorce.”
“He told you four weeks before we set up the scene in my house, and you left him with a busted lip,” Melissa said as she tensed up with anger. “He said that with your temper it would only get worse once he actually filed the papers.”
Rilynne stared at Melissa in utter disbelief, not knowing whether to be angry, or feel sorry for her.
“Christopher busted his lip playing in the department football game,” she said gently. “He was hit from the side by Detective Ramos and lost his helmet as he was going down. By the time the other guys realized it, there were already three men on top of him. He was actually lucky he only came out of it with a busted lip. And I assure you that Christopher never approached me about a divorce. If he had, I would have been hurt, but that would have been the end of it.”
Melissa seemed to be fighting an internal battle as she processed all of the information she had just been given.
She considered letting Melissa have more time to absorb everything, but the urge to continue was too strong. “Christopher a
dmitted to me that he ran into Detective Mifflin the day after he faked his death and stabbed me in the back,” she started.
“He what?” Melissa asked, as her eyes grew wider.
“Yes, that’s right,” Rilynne said coldly as she turned around and lifted her shirt, showing Melissa the knife scars. “I walked in on him before he was finished covering our bedroom in blood, so he stabbed me seven times in the back, actually leaving the knife stuck in,” she said as she sat back down. “The following day, he ran into Detective Mifflin and lured him to his car. Now, he didn’t elaborate on the events leading up to actually killing him, but I can speculate from the evidence left behind. He murdered Detective Mifflin, dressed him in his blood soaked clothes, put on his wedding band, and buried him outside of Madison. He did all of that after pulling every tooth from Mifflin’s head, so they couldn’t be used to identify him. Around the same time, he somehow transferred the recording from Mifflin’s cell phone to the one he had been using to communicate with you, and emptied out his accounts and safe. Mifflin instantly became the number one suspect for your ‘murders.’”
When she finished, Melissa looked as if she was going to be sick.
“Why don’t you tell me how you went about faking your deaths,” Rilynne said.
Melissa took a moment to gather her composure before answering. After taking a deep breath, her confusion seemed to have been replaced by anger. “It was his idea,” she said, stressing on ‘his’. “For four weeks we drew blood and stored it. When we had enough, he covered my kitchen in it. I hid out at Sarah’s house for a week before he brought me here. A week after that, he went back to finish it. He was gone for two days and when he came back, we started looking around for a house. We didn’t have a television for the first several months, so I didn’t see any news coverage about our deaths. I guess by the time we had one set up, the story had died down.” She took a breath and looked Rilynne in the eye. “I swear I didn’t know that you were attacked, or that anyone had been killed. I would have never gone along with it if I had. I need to talk to my husband,” she stated. “I need to hear it from him.”