by Karen Rose
Predictably, angry murmurs filled the room.
Well, that’s special, Steven thought. No hi, how y’doin, a funny thing happened on the way to the precinct. Nope, just launch right into it. He bet this guy was great at parties.
Toni stepped up to the podium. “Enough,” she snapped. Every voice went silent. “We have evidence to charge Rob Winters with”—she pointed a finger in the air—“spousal assault”—she added a second finger—“and conspiracy to commit murder in the first degree.” She closed her hand into a fist and carefully lowered it to the podium. “When we find him, we will arrest him and he will be provided the same due process to which every citizen of this country is entitled.”
Again the angry murmurs. Again the equally angry snap from Toni Ross. “Enough!” Again the silence. “You think we do this lightly? You’re wrong. He is a police officer. He has taken an oath to serve and protect the people of this city. He has taken an oath to uphold the law himself.” She paused and looked around. “As have we all. This is an official proceeding. We will begin an organized search at oh-nine hundred hours today. He is, of course, armed. We found an assortment of disguises in his house. He has the capability to dramatically alter his features.” She picked up a file folder. “We’ll post copies of these pictures showing what he might look like disguised. Don’t look for his face. Look for his build, his mannerisms.” She paused and looked out over the crowd. “You are all good people, good cops. None of us ever wants to believe one of our own can go so bad. But it does happen. The evidence against Rob Winters is very strong. But he will be treated fairly. When we catch him”—she looked around the room once again—“and we will catch him, we will read him his rights and bring him in just as if he were any other criminal. He will be cuffed. Are there any questions?”
Not one hand went up.
She nodded curtly. “You are dismissed. Report for duty.”
Steven dragged a chair up front and placed it beside her. Toni waited until every officer had cleared the room before sinking into it.
“Nice job, Toni,” Steven murmured. “But not one you’d choose to do again.”
“Not in my lifetime.” Ross looked around and sighed. “Did the LUDS come in?”
“Not yet.” Steven had requested Winters’s cell phone records the night before. Given the mobility allowed by wireless phones, records and traces always took longer to get. “I asked for them to be faxed to your office. Call me when they do, okay? I have an appointment with one of the Legal Aid attorney’s old clients this morning. I’m hoping she remembers something that will help me find him.”
Charleston, South Carolina
Wednesday, March 14
6:00 P.M.
“Have a seat, Mr. Thatcher.” John Smith ushered Steven to an empty chair across from his desk. His walls were sparsely decorated with dime-store watercolors, a poster portraying a series of Charleston’s historical landmarks, fingerpaintings done by children, presumably his, and importantly the North Carolina State University Law School diploma. “How can I help you this evening?”
“Mr. Smith, I’m Special Agent Thatcher of the North Carolina State Bureau of Investigation.” He held out his shield for Smith’s inspection. A dull red flush began spreading across the man’s face. “I hope you can help me in one of my ongoing investigations.”
“I see,” Smith said slowly, bringing out an embroidered hankie to dab at the beads of sweat forming on his brow. Steven hoped for Smith’s clients’ sake that the attorney showed considerably more finesse in court. “Please, by all means, go on.”
Steven watched Smith mop his brow, hoping his disgust wasn’t too apparent. “Nine years ago you filed a restraining order for a woman named Mary Grace Winters. Do you remember her?”
Smith fumbled with the hankie, barely stuffing it in his pocket before pulling it out again to dab his forehead some more. “I can hardly be expected to remember all my clients from that long ago, Agent Thatcher.”
Steven leaned back in his chair. “Could you check your files?”
“I, uh, I don’t have my files from Buncombe County in this office. They’re in my home office.”
Steven stretched his legs out, crossing them at his ankles. “Well, perhaps I can refresh your memory, Mr. Smith. Mary Grace Winters came to you about nine years ago to file a restraining order against her husband, an officer with the Asheville PD. You served it to the judge who wanted a little more information before granting a restraining order on local law enforcement. That night, Mary Grace ‘fell’ down a flight of stairs and ended up being hospitalized with partial paralysis. A few weeks later, you moved away from Asheville.”
Smith swallowed and swabbed his neck with the now-damp hankie. “I vaguely remember her.”
“Why did you move from Asheville, Mr. Smith?” Steven asked, not kindly.
“I, uh, my wife’s family lives here in Charleston. We decided to move here.” His eyes narrowed. “How did you find me here, Agent Thatcher?”
“I looked up your old cases in the court record. One of your clients, Mrs. Clyde Andrews, sued her neighbor for damage done to her prize roses by the neighbor’s cocker spaniel. She remembered seeing your North Carolina State diploma on the wall.” He lifted one corner of his mouth. “She’s a Duke fan, so she remembered your diploma with considerable disdain. At any rate, once I knew your alma mater, tracking you down through the alumni files wasn’t that difficult.”
“Very creative, Agent Thatcher.” Smith visibly swallowed. “However, I’m quite afraid you’ve wasted your time. I really don’t remember anything that would be of value to you.”
Steven shook his head and straightened his tie. “I think you, Mr. Smith, are missing a critical element required for success in your chosen field.”
“And that would be?” Smith raised his brows, trying for cool and collected and failing miserably.
“The lying gene. You, sir, lie very badly. We could do this via subpoena, but that would be an unfortunate use of both my time and yours. You’ll either tell the truth on the stand or perjure yourself as badly as you’re lying to me now. Or you could tell me the truth now.”
“I could invoke attorney–client privilege.”
“You could, if your client was still alive,” Steven snapped. If he hadn’t been so pissed and disgusted, Steven might have felt pity for the shock on Smith’s face. But he was pissed and he was disgusted. “Hadn’t heard about that?” he asked in as non-emotional a voice as he could muster. “Mary Grace Winters and her seven-year-old son disappeared seven years ago. There was some question of foul play, but there was never any evidence to support it. No body and her car was never found—until a few weeks ago when her car was dragged out of Douglas Lake.”
“And her b-b-body?” Smith stammered.
“Still none found,” Steven answered. “But I believe her husband had a hand in her disappearance. I want an iron-clad case of spousal abuse and I think you can help.” When Smith said nothing, Steven added softly, “How did Winters scare you out of Asheville, Mr. Smith?”
Still the man said nothing, simply sat looking tortured and sweaty.
“You have children?” Steven picked up a family picture from Smith’s desk, watching his face all the while. “I’d walk through hell ’n back for my boys.” He caught Smith’s eye. “Don’t make me subpoena you, Mr. Smith, because I will.” Steven turned the photograph over in his hands.
Smith expelled his pent-up breath in a loud whoosh. “Damn you. Damn you for finding me and damn you for making me feel like pond scum.” He grabbed the photo from Steven’s hand. “See my wife? She was six months pregnant with our daughter when Mrs. Winters came to me for the first time. It took me a month to convince Mrs. Winters the law was her best hope before she filed that damn restraining order.” He shook his head, his expression bitter. “I congratulated her on her bravery. The day after she filed I got a call from her husband. She was terrified of him. Me, I was green, fresh out of law school and bent on saving the whole damn world. He told
me to tear up the restraining order, that his wife was of dubious mental faculties and unable to speak for herself. I told him it was now up to the judge and he just laughed.”
Smith dropped his eyes to the photo of his wife and son. “He laughed and said his wife had taken an unexpected fall the night before. She wouldn’t be coming back to finish the work we started. Then he said, ‘Your lovely wife is pregnant, isn’t she? Pregnant women can be so awkward and prone to … unexpected falls.’ He said ‘unexpected falls,’ just like that. Scared the ever-livin’ shit out of me. He knew where my wife worked, and that her obstetrician was on the second floor of the medical center. He knew where she went to Jazzercise for God’s sake.” Smith lifted haggard eyes to Steven. “I tossed and turned for a week. Then my wife came home one day with a twisted ankle. Said she got jostled from behind on a crowded escalator and tumbled. Luckily someone at the bottom helped break her fall. And no, she didn’t see who did it. It could have been coincidence, but I wasn’t willing to take the chance. I never told her about Mrs. Winters or her husband. I just drew in my shingle and came here. End of story, case closed.”
“Except that Mrs. Winters turned up missing,” Steven remarked blandly.
“I didn’t know about that. I swear it.”
Steven leaned forward, pinning Smith with his eyes. “If you had, would you have come forward?”
Smith looked down at his hands. “I don’t know.”
Steven blinked, content to roll his eyes in spirit only. “Did you keep her files, Mr. Smith?”
“Yes. I documented everything at the time.” He rose and walked to an upright filing cabinet, more government surplus. “I kept copies in my safe deposit box, just in case anything ever happened to my wife and kids.” He pulled out a file folder and thrust it at Steven. “Take it. They are my originals. Send me copies if you want. I’d rather never see them again.”
Asheville
Thursday, March 15
9 A.M.
Steven met Toni Ross in her office for the morning briefing.
“LUDS came in last night,” Toni declared wearily.
“Did you find anything in them?” he asked.
Toni slouched down in her chair, her expression more drawn than the day before. She was aging before his eyes. Steven decided she wouldn’t want to know that.
“Yeah,” she answered, her voice husky from lack of sleep. “Not so much who Winters called, but who called him.”
Steven pulled up a chair, straddling it. “I give,” Steven said warily. “Who called our pal?”
“Ben Jolley.”
“No big shock,” Steven shrugged. “According to Lambert, Jolley and Winters have been buddies a long time.”
“Yeah, but the calls to Winters’s cell phone didn’t start until after he was considered missing.”
Steven grabbed the LUDS and scanned them again, matching them with the key dates and times he held in his head. “Jolley called Winters about an hour after I got back from Sevier County.” He glanced up at Toni and she nodded. “And again an hour after you told me you were revoking his paid leave. Jolley’s been keeping Winters pretty damn well informed.” He looked down again. “But Winters was in … Chicago when he received the call.” He looked up again, puzzled. “He’s in Chicago?”
Toni nodded. “Far as I can tell. Why he’s there I have no idea.”
“You’ve notified the Chicago PD?”
“This morning at about two A.M.”
“Why didn’t you call me?” Steven demanded.
“Because I knew you’d be dead tired from your trip. I thought I’d let you sleep.”
Steven frowned. “Where’s Jolley now?”
Toni rubbed her hands over her eyes. “In Interrogation 1. Steven, there’s more. You aren’t going to like it. Look at his calls for last Saturday.”
He did … and the cold fist of fear clamped his heart. Every drop of blood in his body seemed to turn to ice. “Oh, God,” he breathed, then looked up to find Toni’s gaze focused on him. “He was in Raleigh. He was near my kids.” Abruptly he stood and shoved his fingers through his hair. His heart was racing. “I’ve got to call my Aunt Helen.”
“I did already,” Ross assured him quietly. “And I called Lennie Farrell. He put twenty-four-hour surveillance on your house and on all of your kids, to, from and during school. He said you were relieved of the assignment if you wanted to get home.”
Steven dropped back in his chair and pressed his fingertips against his eye sockets. “Twenty-four-hour?”
“Yes.”
“I’ll call my aunt and ask her what she wants me to do. For now I’ll get working on how Winters got all the way up to Chicago. Can you ask Lambert to help me check the airlines? Just in case our boy likes to travel in style.”
“What did your aunt say?”
Steven looked up from his laptop where he’d been checking his E-mail in the relative quiet of the sweltering little conference room. Toni stood in the doorway, her expression concerned. “She said what I thought she’d say,” he answered. “That she and the boys were fine and I could do more good here trying to find the bastard than hovering over them at home for God knew how long.”
Toni smiled. “She called him a bastard?”
Steven raised a brow. “Actually I called him a bastard. Aunt Helen called him something slightly less repeatable. Listen, I’m glad you’re here. I wanted to show you something. Did you know there was a website devoted to patron saints?”
Toni shook her head. “No, but it doesn’t surprise me.”
He double-clicked his mouse, eyes locked on the screen, then tilted it in Toni’s direction.
“Saint Rita of Cascia,” she read. “Patron saint of impossible causes. Just like you thought.”
“Read her bio.”
Toni read, than looked up with a frown. “So it all fits together. Susan Crenshaw gives Mary Grace a statue of the patron saint of impossible causes that also was an abused wife. Rita’s husband beats her, dies; Rita takes her vows and enters a convent. Susan knew.”
“Toni? Thatcher?”
Steven turned to find Detective Lambert standing in the doorway, holding a manila folder, the light from the window turning his head into a shining halo. Steven still had to fight to keep from thinking of Jonathan Lambert as a pretty boy. But he’d do it. Toni Ross considered Lambert her right-hand man and Steven had come to respect her as a class act.
“What do you have, Jonathan?” she asked. “Please tell me it’s good news. I need a little of that today.”
Lambert entered the little conference room, his line-backer’s body making it that much smaller.
“I’ve examined Rob’s hard drive and Internet cache.” He waved the folder with a satisfied smile. “Interesting stuff.”
“And?” Steven asked. “Have a seat, Lambert. Make yourself right at home in my little sauna.”
Lambert pulled out a chair with a sympathetic grin, sat in it, then handed him a summary of Winters’s computer journeys. “Up until Monday the fifth, he visited basically the same sites. A lot of porn sites, a lot of white power sites.”
“Surprise, surprise,” Toni murmured.
“Then on the fifth, he started visiting people finder databases.”
Steven frowned. “What? Why would he do that?”
“He was putting in names like Mary, Grace, Mary Grace, Mary Anne, Mary Beth. Last names varied from Smith, Jones, Summers, Fall, Spring, to name a few.”
Steven looked at Toni, brows nearly fused together. “He’s looking for his wife.”
“Why would he look for her? Why would he search for a woman who’s been dead for seven years?” Cognition lit Toni’s eyes. “Unless maybe he thinks she’s not dead?”
Steven rubbed his temple. “I can’t believe this.”
“Why would he suddenly believe she’s not dead?” Toni mused.
“This whole thing started after he’d seen the car in Sevier County.” Steven stood up and paced the length of the tiny
room. “It has something to do with that statue.”
Toni was quiet for a long moment. “Nurse Burns told you that Mary Grace said it was the first gift she’d ever received, right? It would be important to her.”
Steven stopped pacing and stared out the window. “It’s a symbol.”
“Freedom. Independence.”
Steven thought of the hopelessness in Sue Ann Broughton’s eyes. “Hope.”
“Pretty powerful emotions.”
Steven nodded, thinking, creating the scene in his mind. “Yeah. And for Mary Grace those emotions were more powerful than fear. That car was launched into the lake, not pushed. Picture this. Mary Grace makes some friends in the hospital. Susan Crenshaw is one of them. Susan gives her a statue and Mary Grace treasures it. She gets home from the hospital and what will hubby dearest do?”
“Break it,” Lambert answered.
Steven met his eyes with a brief nod. “To break her. It was cracked and glued together. She glued it back together. Maybe hid it so he wouldn’t break it again. Vandalia said Winters was … agitated.”
Toni sucked in her cheeks. “She’s outsmarted him.”
“Rob wouldn’t like that,” Lambert commented dryly.
Toni’s grin was wry. “No, he wouldn’t, would he?”
“He’s infuriated,” Steven continued, barely aware of their comments. “But she endures, somehow. Makes some friends. Connections. Somebody helps her escape.” He turned to stare out the window, not really seeing anything but the scene unfolding in his imagination. “They take the car to the lake. Can you see it? She has that statue, her own symbol of freedom. She uses it to launch her car in the lake, leaving behind everything that was Mary Grace Winters. She’s reborn.” He stopped, wheeling around to catch Toni’s eye. “She’s someone else now.”
“That would explain why she left her purse behind,” Toni agreed.
“And why Winters is checking databases for variations on her name,” Lambert added.
Toni frowned. “But why did she leave her walker behind?”
“I don’t know,” Steven answered, “but I bet we’ll find out when we find Mary Grace Winters.”