“Yeah, well I’m glad I’m just a small town cop and I don’t have to deal with that bullshit.”
“Sometimes I wish I was as well,” Maguire laughed. “Then I wouldn’t have to deal with assholes like that.”
“Better you than me,” Hutch replied. “I couldn’t imagine having lunch with someone like that.”
“Oh, Coleman will be long gone before we ever have to share a table.”
“How do you know that?”
“There’s a general consensus in Washington, which is itself rather rare, that Coleman was illegitimately put in the spot by the President over more qualified people. Coleman’s selection rankled a number of people, on both sides of the aisle, so with the elections right around the corner the next President will move to replace him rather quickly. They’ll only get a token push back and then it will go from front page news to buried rather quickly.”
“I really hate politics.”
“So do I.”
“So why do you do it?” Hutch asked, before finishing off his coffee. “I may be wrong, but to me, outside of Washington, D.C., New York City is the next big political machine.”
Maguire leaned back in the chair, as he contemplated the question.
“It is,” Maguire replied, “and I will admit that sometimes I really don’t know, Hutch. I guess there is still a part of me that really does want to help people.”
“But do they even want our help?”
Maguire frowned. “No one loves the warrior, until the enemy is at the gate.”
The conversation was interrupted suddenly by a flurry of commotion coming from just beyond the closed door.
“What the….” Hutch exclaimed, as the door next to him swung open.
“We got a hit,” Blackshear shouted, as he rushed inside the office.
“What?” Maguire asked, getting up from the chair. “Where?”
“Annabelle Birch was just involved in a motor vehicle accident on Route 26,” Blackshear replied. “About twenty minutes from here.”
“I can get us there in ten,” Hutch said, as he grabbed his jacket.
“Okay, slow down,” Maguire replied. “What’s the current situation at the scene?”
“A trooper was dispatched to an accident and when he got there he recognized the name on the license and confirmed the BOLO on the plate.”
“Has he spoken to her?” Maguire asked.
“No, not yet,” Blackshear replied. “She’s being treated for some minor injuries she sustained, but the EMT’s are getting antsy. They want to remove her to the hospital.”
“Okay, tell him not to talk to her at all,” Maguire replied. “Tell him to play it nonchalant. Give the EMT’s some BS story that the computer system is down and it should only be a few minutes and he can give her back the paperwork and then they can leave.”
“Shouldn’t we just collar her?” Hutch asked.
“No,” Maguire said. “I gotta believe she’s a smart girl and they’ve planned for the eventuality of something like this. You slap cuffs on her now and she is going to shut up and demand a lawyer. That’s something we don’t have any time for right now.”
“I assume you have another option?” Blackshear asked.
“Yeah,” Maguire said coldly. “Fear.”
CHAPTER FORTY-SIX
“How much longer is this going to take?” Susan asked the EMT sitting next to her. “I’m starting to feel nauseous.”
“I really don’t know,” he replied, as he reached over to take her pulse.
“I’m starting to feel really bad,” Susan said, ushering up a contrived look of pain on her face.
“This is just bullshit,” he remarked angrily. “He’s intentionally dragging his ass. If I had to guess I’d say he’s probably waiting for the sheriff to come so he doesn’t have to do the report.”
“I’m starting to have this tingling feeling in my legs.”
“Hold on for a minute,” he said, getting up and moving toward the driver’s cab.
Susan quickly surveyed the interior of ambulance. She spied a pair of trauma shears, which the man had left on the seat next to him. She glanced over her shoulder, making sure the man’s back was too her, and then grabbed them. She slipped her hand back under the blanket and secreted the shears inside the waistband of her jeans.
She didn’t know what was going on, but Tatiana had drilled it into her head that she always needed to have a plan ‘B’ in place; just in case things took a sudden turn for the worse.
“Do you know who this state cop is, Brenda?” the man asked his partner, who was impatiently sitting in the driver’s seat of the ambulance.
“No, but he’s about on my last goddamn nerve,” she replied angrily.
“Can you go and check how much longer it is going to be,” the man replied. “If he tries to give you any shit, just tell him I’m going to call the E.R. and have them file a complaint.”
“Fine,” the woman replied with a heavy sigh.
She exited the ambulance and made her way back to where the police car was parked.
She could see the trooper sitting behind the wheel and her anger only grew as she realized he wasn’t doing anything. She watched as the window slowly rolled down.
“Yes?” Mendes asked.
“Listen, I’m not trying to be a bitch here, but we’re leaving.”
“No you’re not.”
The comment didn’t come from the trooper, so she turned sharply to look back in the direction of the men who were approaching the car.
“Excuse me?” she asked with a shocked expression.
“I said you’re not leaving.”
“And who the hell are you?”
“That’s on a need to know basis and you don’t,” Maguire replied.
The man looked vaguely familiar to her, but the suddenness of the encounter left her unable to properly process what was happening. She turned her attention from him to the other two men, one of whom she did recognize.
“Hutch, what’s going on here?”
“I need you to come with me for a minute, Brenda,” Hutch said. “I’ll explain what’s happening.”
The men watched as Hutch escorted the woman back toward his patrol car and then turned their attention to the trooper.
“Anything change?” Blackshear asked.
“Nope, she’s still waiting in the back of the ambulance, sir.”
“Thank you for your help, Trooper,” Blackshear said. “Just hang back here for a few.”
“Yes, sir,” Mendes replied.
Maguire and Blackshear made their way toward the back of the Ambulance.
“You sure this is how you want to play it?” Blackshear asked.
“You have a better idea, Tom?”
“No,” the man admitted.
“Then we have to go with the only option that we have available to us.”
“I can’t even begin to count all the ways that this can go wrong.”
“Just remember what General Patton said,” Maguire replied, as they reached the back of the ambulance, “A good plan executed now is better than a perfect plan executed next week.”
“I hope that sounds as uplifting and motivational in court,” Blackshear said with a frown, as he opened the back door of the ambulance.
“Who the hell are you?” the EMT asked.
“State police,” Blackshear replied. “I need you to step out for a minute.”
“Are you for real?” the man asked angrily. “We have a patient that needs to go to the hospital, now!”
“Sir, step out of the ambulance,” Blackshear replied.
The man was getting ready to argue, but something in the look of the two men standing there gave him pause.
“Fine,” he conceded, getting up and stepping out of the vehicle, “but just so you know I plan on filing a formal complaint about this.”
Maguire climbed into the back of the ambulance, sitting down across from the young woman lying on the stretcher, and stared at her. He
could see the uncertainty in her eyes. Watching intently as she struggled internally to figure out what was going on. Then he saw the muscles in her jaw ripple, as her teeth clenched tightly. He knew that she’d put enough of it together to know that she was caught.
“Well I guess we can dispose of the Annabelle Birch charade now,” he said.
“What do you want?” she asked coolly.
“To give you choices,” he replied.
“Choices?” she scoffed. “I know who you are. I know all about you.”
“Then I suggest that you listen closely, because I’m only going to say this one time.”
“You don’t scare me.”
“Oh, I’m not trying to scare you, Susan.”
“Then what do you want?”
“Just answers,” Maguire replied.
“What if I don’t want to talk to you?” she asked smugly. “Maybe I just tell you to go fuck yourself and advise you that I want to talk to my lawyer.”
“That’s one choice,” he replied, “but I would caution you strongly against using that.”
“Oh please, spare me the melodrama,” Susan said.
She watched as Maguire reached inside his jack and removed some papers.
“What’s that?”
“This? Oh, this is a list of your greatest hits, Susan.” Maguire replied. “Your mother and father, Hannah Kurtz, Lou Jenkins, Paige Wilson….”
Maguire’s voice trailed off, as he continued to look through the papers.
“Oooh, I’m busted, Mr. Policeman,” she said with a laugh, as she raised her arms up and held her wrists together, waiting to be handcuffed.
“I’m not sure how cheerful I would be if I was looking at that much time,” Maguire replied.
“We both know there is a huge difference between being charged with a crime and being convicted of one. I can spout off over a dozen other names, but that doesn’t mean you can tie me to any of them.”
“How about Alex Taylor?”
Maguire watched as the smirk disappeared from Susan’s face.
“Sorry, not doing anything for me.”
“Really?” Maguire asked.
“Guess I’m not big on names,” Susan replied.
“I would have thought it would ring a bell,” he replied, as he handed her one of the papers.
She took it and stared at the black and white photocopy of her car that the security camera had captured.
“Yeah, that’s my car, so what?” Susan replied arrogantly.
“It’s your car coming from the same direction that Alex Taylor went missing from,” Maguire replied. “It was also at the same time that we captured a cellphone signal.”
Susan fought hard to maintain her calm appearance, even as the anger inside her threatened to bubble up to the top.
“You don’t say,” she replied. “Sounds like coincidence to me.”
“Oh, I’m sure it does,” Maguire replied, “but I highly doubt that theory is going to survive the light of day after the forensic techs get done tearing apart your car.”
“Sorry, I’ve had a lot of folks in my car,” she said ominously. “I enjoy giving people a one-way ride.”
“Well, where you’re going, you’ll have plenty of time to contemplate all the ones you’ve left behind.”
“You honestly think I’m afraid of going to Goffstown?” Susan asked, referring to the New Hampshire State Prison for Women.
“No, I don’t,” Maguire replied softly, “but who said anything about Goffstown?”
“Isn’t that where female prisoners go to in New Hampshire?” Susan asked quizzically.
“Yes, state prisoners go there, Susan, but you’re not going to be a state prisoner.”
“Wait, what do you mean?”
“Did you honestly think your exploits were going unnoticed outside of New Hampshire?”
“I don’t understand,” Susan replied, as she felt a wave of panic begin to well up inside her.
“What’s not to understand, Susan?” Maguire said matter-of-factly. “You’re a serial killer,”
For some reason, hearing those words made her inwardly cringe.
“You’ve made quite a name for yourself, Susan,” Maguire continued, “and now we have a paper trail. The Penobscot Police Department has made an official request to have the F.B.I.’s Behavioral Analysis Unit join the investigation. Your abduction of Chief Taylor, along with your crisscrossing of state lines, has taken this investigation to a whole new level, a federal one.”
“So what does that mean?”
“It means that when they get done with you, Goffstown is going to sound like a five star luxury resort compared to where you’re going to end up.”
Susan stared at Maguire stoically, but her gaze was met with an equally impassive look. Something in the man’s cold, blue eyes told her that he wasn’t bluffing and she wasn’t going to win this battle.
“You said I had choices,” Susan said.
“Tell me what you did with Alex,” Maguire replied.
“This wasn’t my idea,” she replied. “I wasn’t the one that wanted to kidnap her.”
“You only have one opportunity to tell me what happened, Susan.”
“She’ll kill me,” Susan replied angrily.
It was an unexpected reply, but Maguire had interrogated enough people over the years to know better than to be caught off guard. He took the nugget of information and pushed it to the side for a moment. The young woman’s cold façade had cracked and her false bravado was gone. He couldn’t let the moment get away from him.
“Let me make this absolutely crystal clear for you, Susan. The window for you telling me what I want to know is closing rapidly. You might have just gone along for the ride, but if anything happens to her I promise you that I will make it my life’s mission to ensure that the Attorney General takes this case through federal court and that you end up with the death penalty.”
“That doesn’t sound like much of a choice.”
“Well, that all depends on your outlook,” he replied. “If anything happens to her you can be rest assured that you will spend the rest of your days in solitary confinement, in a windowless cell at the Carswell federal penitentiary, without any other human contact. There you will live with each and every one of the ghosts that you have made; ghosts who will haunt you until you make that final trip to the Terra Haute where they’ll stick a needle in your arm and send you off to meet your maker. Most folks can do it for a day or two, maybe even a week, but then the walls begin to close in and the noise in your head will become unbearable. You’ll become paranoid, maybe even psychotic, as you try and determine what is real and what is imaginary. Some inmates say that they begin to see their victims, so I imagine that little cell of yours will get crowded awfully fast. If you were a lot older you could find some comfort in knowing that you might die soon, but being young you’ll have decades of fun to look forward to.”
Susan swallowed hard.
“Or maybe you’ll take the coward’s way out,” Maguire continued. I hear that a lot of folks opt for suicide as a way to break their earthly bonds. That becomes a tad bit harder when you are in solitary, but it’s not impossible. I heard of one inmate that reached the end of his rope and killed himself by literally gnawing at his own wrist.”
Maguire shook his head in revulsion at the image.
“But just remember to make sure you get it right the first time, because ending up in a psychiatric seclusion cell is even worse. Or, you can avoid all of that. Just tell me what I want to know and you can stay here in New Hampshire. At least in Goffstown you will be able to feel the sun on your face every day.”
“You talk like I’ve already been found guilty,” Susan replied, as she fought hard to keep her voice from cracking.
Maguire reached back into his pocket and removed another piece of paper. It was a photocopy of the letter she had left behind in her father’s apartment.
“I’m not a lawyer, but this unsolicited confession look
s like pretty good grounds for premeditation,” he replied. “Couple that with the kidnapping and murder of a cop and I’d say that you’re pretty much royally screwed. The folks over at the FBI are pretty good at what they do. I bet they can tack on a few interstate murders without too much effort. That being said, if you help us out, with any luck you might get a good appeals lawyer who makes a ‘she was not in her right mind’ argument and gets you a reduced sentence.”
Maguire could almost see the gears in her head spinning, as she tried to figure her next play. It was a scene he’d watch play out hundreds of times. The smiling, laughing faces of perps on the street that inevitably turned to crying and pleading when the cuffs went on. It was easy to be brave when you were surrounded by your peers, but the impudence was short lived when they came face to face with reality.
“I want protection,” Susan said softly.
“I can give you that,” Maguire replied.
“And no death penalty,” she added.
“That I can’t promise you, but I will guarantee that your cooperation will be made known to any prosecutors or judges assigned to your case. Likewise, if you hold anything back from me, I will make that clear as well. It’s the best I can do.”
Susan weighed her dwindling options and reached the only viable conclusion.
“Give me a pen.”
CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN
The whiskey had finally done its job.
Tatiana stared down vacantly at the tumbler she cradled in her hands. The hurt and pain she had first felt with Susan’s departure was gone now, replaced by a slow, simmering anger that held her ever-darkening thoughts in a vise-like grip. Any feelings of personal responsibility that she might have felt had been steadily transferred to the woman in the other room. If anything, Tatiana’s only fault was not doing something sooner to insulate Susan from the evil machinations of that deceitful little whore.
Susan was young, impressionable, and Tatiana was quite sure that Alex had known exactly what she was doing when the two of them talked. She could envision her filling Susan’s head with all manner of lies. Alex may have thought she was being smart, as she drove the wedge of jealousy deep into Susan’s mind, but with the young woman out of the picture now all that remained was Alex.
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