by Ruth Kyser
Chapter 4
Sarah had lived in Herbert her whole life and had never been to the police station before yesterday’s visit. Now she was headed back there for the second time in less than twenty four hours.
The station was located in a turn of the century two-story brick building at the edge of town. They pulled up in front of the station and she sighed in despair. Here she was again. She glanced up at the brick building as she exited the vehicle. When she turned back around she found Agent Morgan at her side, his warm hand firmly on her elbow as he walked with her toward the glass double doors of the station. Sarah couldn’t figure out yet if she should be afraid of him of not, but she was afraid of the power he represented. It was a sobering thought to realize he had the authority to put her in jail.
There was a small amount of comfort for Sarah in the presence of Police Chief Stan Warner who appeared in his office doorway as they walked into the building. He greeted her with a nod of his head and a partial smile, and Agent Morgan paused long enough to reach out and shake Chief Warner’s outstretched hand.
“I appreciate the use of your facilities, Chief.”
“No problem, Agent Morgan. Let us know if you need anything.”
Then Chief Warner turned and went back in his office and Sarah was left with the impression he was no longer involved in the case. She couldn’t help but feel that bit of news didn’t bode well for her.
Regardless of what Agent Morgan had told her, they were treating her as if somewhere along the way, she had become a suspect.
Well, they were crazy. She hadn’t done anything wrong and she wasn’t going to be afraid of any of them. She stiffened her back and shoulders as Agent Morgan once again took her gently by the elbow and led her through the station to a small room near the back of the building. Sarah had to assume it was the small town’s version of an interrogation room. She had never been in one before and had only what she had seen on TV shows as a reference. A video camera and laptop computer sat on a table at one end, with another small rectangular table and a few chairs placed in the center of the room. As her eyes took it all in, some of her bravado left her and she quickly walked over and sat in one of the chairs, feeling like her legs were made of rubber.
There was no sense trying to deny it. Sarah was scared. She didn’t know what they wanted from her and she was terrified of what they were going to ask her. Yesterday had been difficult enough. And one thought kept racing through her mind and it worried her.
Did they really think she had anything to do with this?
God, why did you let something like this happen? And what is going to happen to me now?
Sarah hadn’t talked to God in years, but she knew she needed some help. She just didn’t understand what was going on. Her friends were dead and she had been taken to the police station. With no one to call for help, what was she going to do?
Agent Morgan took the chair across from her and Agent Thorne sat in a chair next to the table with the video equipment. Sarah watched the female agent push some buttons and then nod at Agent Morgan. He turned his attention back to Sarah.
“Do you need anything before we start, Miss Masters– a drink of water, coffee - anything?”
Sarah shook her head and tried to calm her racing heart. “No. Thank you, Agent Morgan. I’m fine.”
He gazed at her a moment before he continued. “Okay then. First, tell me the names of all the employees that were in the office building yesterday. Then start with what you did when you got to work yesterday morning and go through the rest of the day. I need to get a feel for what your normal day in the office was like.”
Sarah closed her eyes in pain. ‘A normal day,’ he had called it. Yesterday had been anything but a normal day.
She opened her eyes and quietly gave him the names of all her friends she’d lost. “Adam Brown, the senior partner. Jim – James Walters and Ben Curtis the other two partners. There are...were three paralegals; Tyler Stewart, Heather Winchell and Cody Spencer. Then there are three other secretaries in addition to myself – Alice Mason, Julia Smith and Margie Williams.” She swallowed back her tears. It was so hard to believe she was never going to see any of them again. These people weren’t just names to her. Most of them were friends she had worked with for the past six years.
“Was there any indication that any of your co-workers weren’t getting along – a grudge against one of the partners, perhaps?”
The question caught Sarah by surprise. She would never think of any of her co-workers doing anything to hurt anyone. “No way. We all got along great. It was a like a big family, Agent Morgan. We did things together, even went out for dinner several times a year.” She wiped a tear from her face. “I can’t believe any of my friends would have done something like this. There has to be some mistake. Besides, they were all there…but me.” She stopped talking for a moment as the implication of what she had just said hit her. She wasn’t helping her situation any. “I should have been there too,” she whispered.
Agent Morgan looked at her steadily for a moment. “Has there been any employee fired recently who might have a grudge against the firm?
Sarah blinked a couple of times and then shook her head. “No, I don’t think so.”
He stared at her a moment and Sarah got the feeling that he was going to push her for more information, but then he said, “Go on. You were going to tell me about your day.”
Sarah looked down at her hands clasped on top of the table and then glanced over at him and nodded. “I stopped at the post office and picked up the mail like I do every morning. Then I went to the office and to my desk. Margie was already there with her morning coffee and a donut.” Sarah swallowed hard. “Margie Williams is the other secretary in the front part of the office. She was going to be married in three months.” Blinking her eyes, she tried to stop the tears she could feel accumulating. “I was supposed to be her maid of honor.”
Sarah tried to gain control of her emotions before continuing. “Sorry.” She swallowed back her tears again and continued. This was so difficult. Didn’t he realize how hard this was for her? Sarah gritted her teeth. She didn’t know Agent Morgan and didn’t want to, but right now she sure didn’t like him very much for putting her through this again.
“I checked my email and sorted the regular mail like I do every morning. Those items that are addressed to the partners are given directly to them. The rest, I open myself and distribute to the proper people, depending on the item.”
Agent Morgan interrupted her. “Was there anything special in the mail yesterday morning that you can remember? Any packages or large envelopes?”
Sarah shook her head. “No. Actually there wasn’t much mail at all, so it didn’t take me long to sort it.” She paused again to focus and get back her train of thought. “The first appointment of the day came in at 9:30 – Mr. and Mrs. Burdick – they were there to see Ben Curtis. He’s been working on their will and setting up the paperwork for their trust. They were there about an hour and then left.”
Agent Morgan nodded at her. It was so hard to go back and recall every moment of what ended up being her last day with these people; they had all been so close. As a matter of fact, she and Margie had been best friends. They’d gone shopping, to the movies, and had frequently gone out to eat together. Margie had always teased Sarah about constantly being on a diet and had told her countless times that she didn’t need to lose weight, but Sarah knew better. She was what some would describe as ‘chunky’. No matter what anyone called it, in her own eyes she was fat.
It was so hard to believe Margie wasn’t going to be around to tease her anymore. She kept thinking someone was going to walk in the door of the interrogation room and tell them it was all a mistake – everyone had gotten out of the building before the explosion and they were all safe. But nobody was telling her that.
“Go on. What happened next?” Agent Morgan’s words
brought her back to the present.
Sarah blinked a couple of times. She needed to focus. “I answered some more emails and took phone calls from several people – setting up appointments for them. I had a few letters to type up and mail for Adam, so I worked on those. At 10:30 Mr. Charleston came in to see Jim Walters for his appointment. He was there to talk about settling his mom’s estate. She passed away three weeks ago. He was with Jim about a half an hour and then left. ”
Sarah looked over at the video equipment and wondered who would see this video. Hopefully families of the victims would never see this and have to hear about the events of their loved ones’ last day.
She looked back at Agent Morgan and continued. “Margie took an early lunch and was gone longer than normal because she had a dentist appointment. She got back about twenty after twelve. Everyone else took their normal lunch hour at noon. Usually the partners and the paralegals go to lunch together. I think they did yesterday too. The other two secretaries also went to lunch at noon.
“Because of Margie’s appointment, I took my lunch later than normal. One of us always stays over the lunch hour so we don’t have to close the office. I was originally planning to leave about twelve thirty when Margie got back, but the security alarm repair man was there to do his annual checkup of the system, so I waited until he finished. He left about 12:40. Then I was on the phone for a while with a prospective client answering some questions.”
She paused and Agent Morgan looked up from his note taking. “The repairman from the alarm company – anything out of the ordinary there?”
“No, it was Jerry, the regular serviceman. He’s been doing the service on our security alarm for years.”
Agent Morgan nodded and turned his attention back to his notepad. “Go ahead.”
Sarah sighed again. Chief Warner hadn’t been nearly as specific in questioning her the previous day. “Like I said, I was on the phone for quite a while with this prospective client. While I was on the phone, the guy from the gas company came in. I just waved him through to the basement and didn’t really talk with him much.”
Morgan sat up straighter. “Tell me about him.”
Sarah blinked a couple of times as she remembered. She hadn’t really thought much about the guy from the gas company. As a matter of fact, she couldn’t even remember if she had mentioned him to Chief Warner the day before. She thought she had, but she wasn’t sure.
“I don’t know what to tell you. I was on the phone. He came in and stood in front of my desk. I was on hold with a client, so was able to talk to him for just a few seconds. He told me he was there to check the meter because they thought there was a problem with it”
Agent Morgan’s head came up from his note-taking as Sarah gasped and looked across the table at him.
“Oh, my gosh! The meter! He said he was there to check the meter.” The words came rushing out of her mouth as the significance of it started to hit her. “The gas company used to have a meter reader come in the office every few months to read the meter and check it because it was in the basement of the building. They moved it outside four months ago so they wouldn’t have to come in and bother us anymore…” She heard her voice go up in octaves as she kept talking.
The realization of what she had just said hit her. “Oh no. Do you think he’s the one that did this?” She felt her body start to shake again and Agent Morgan looked over at Agent Thorne.
“Get her some water, Jess,” Sarah heard him say quietly.
As Agent Thorne left the room, Sarah tried to control her panic. Why hadn’t she thought of it sooner? There was no reason for anyone from the gas company to come into the building. The meter was no longer in the basement and anyone from the gas company should have known that. Why hadn’t she realized it yesterday and stopped the man? Could she have prevented this whole thing from happening?
Agent Thorne returned with a glass of water and handed it to Sarah, who slowly took a sip. As she held the glass in her hand, Sarah was disturbed to see her hand was shaking again like it had most of yesterday afternoon. When Agent Morgan started to speak to her again, she turned to look back across the table at him.
“Miss Masters…Sarah -- May I call you Sarah? As soon as you feel up to it, I need you to tell me as much as you can about this guy from the gas company,” he said quietly.
Agent Morgan’s eyes were looking at her steadily and for the first time since he had started questioning her, she finally felt like he believed in her innocence.
Sarah spoke slowly as she remembered. “I was on the phone, like I said, so I didn’t really have a lengthy conversation with him or anything. But I think I can remember some things about him. He was wearing dark blue jeans, with a long-sleeved light blue cotton shirt with a patch that looked like the one the gas company uses. The shirt wasn’t tucked in and he looked kinda sloppy. I think the shirt also had a name on it…” She thought for a moment, but shook her head. “I’m sorry. I can’t remember.”
“That’s okay,” Agent Morgan said. “Take your time and tell me everything you can remember. You don’t have to hurry.”
Sarah nodded. “Like I said, he stood in front of my desk for just a few seconds. He was wearing a hat, like a baseball cap – it was light blue too, like his shirt. He had long dark hair, black I think, pulled back in a ponytail at the base of his neck. I remember thinking it looked rather stringy like it needed to be washed. I think he had a badge thingy clipped on his belt too, but I didn’t get a good look at it.”
“How tall would you say he was?”
“About five foot eight, maybe five foot nine. He was standing and I was sitting so it’s hard to be sure, but I don’t think he was very tall. He looked like a Latino or Hispanic – kind of dark and swarthy, if you know what I mean.” Sarah watched Agent Morgan nod as his pencil raced across his notepad.
“I remember the top buttons on his shirt were unbuttoned and I could see he had some kind of tattoo on his upper chest.” She grimaced. “I don’t really like guys with tattoos. They give me the creeps.”
She noticed Agent Morgan lift his lips a little at her remark, then he looked back down, all the time his pencil scratching away. When she stopped talking, he looked back up and gave her a nod to continue.
“You’re doing great, Sarah. How much would you say he weighed?”
She sighed. Guessing weights had never been one of her talents. “Maybe 170 pounds, I think. That’s just a guess, you realize. I think he had a goatee – you know small mustache and a little beard just around the mouth area…” She ran her right index finger around her own lips and chin area. “…although he looked like he hadn’t shaved in a few days. I remember thinking at the time, he didn’t look very professional.”
“How about his eyes. What color were they?”
Sarah thought for a moment. She could remember he had been wearing sunglasses when he first came in the office building and had folded and stuck them in his shirt pocket while he had stood in front of her desk. He had looked right at her when she was on the phone.
“They must be brown. I remember they were dark colored so they must be brown, and he had bushy black eyebrows.”
“Was he carrying anything?”
Sarah replayed the moment in her mind when she had first looked up to see him standing in front of her desk. “I think he was carrying something like a meter reading thingy in one hand and a small toolbox in the other. The toolbox was silver-colored. I remember thinking it looked kind of nice, like it was fairly new.”
“Did he speak to you?”
She nodded. “Yes. I was on the phone – on hold, like I said. But he said he was there to check the meter and asked how to get to the basement. I pointed out the door to him down the hallway and he headed in that direction. That’s the last time I saw him.” She shook her head over and over. “I never should have allowed him into the basement. I should have remembered there was
no gas meter down there and called the police. This is all my fault.”
Agent Morgan slowly shook his head. “Don’t go there, Sarah. You are not to blame, and right now I need you to focus on telling me everything about this man. Do you remember anything special about his voice?”
Sarah thought for a moment. “He had a deep voice with an accent like Spanish was his native tongue.” She turned the corner of her lips up a little at the surprised look on Agent Morgan’s face. “I took two years of Spanish from a Mexican/American when I was in College. No matter how hard my professor tried, she couldn’t get rid of that accent.”
He nodded his understanding and she continued. “So, he went to the basement and I finished my phone call. I looked at the clock and realized it was one o’clock and time for me to leave, so I grabbed my purse and went home for lunch. Everyone else in the office had already come back from lunch when I left.”
“Where were you parked?”
“The office parking lot at the west side of the building. Everyone parked there. Oh.” She stopped and looked over at him. “There was this white paneled van. I assumed it was the one the gas repair guy drove. It was kind of old and had some rust on the rear tire wells.”
“Any markings on it? Do you know the year, make or model?”
She shook her head. “No, I’m sorry. I’m not very good with recognizing types of cars. It looked like it might have had some orange paint on the doors though, kind of like the gas company’s logo, but it was almost all worn off. That’s why I assumed it was his truck. It had a ladder rack on the top, I think, but no ladders.”
“Did you happen to see the license number?”
She shook her head. “No, I didn’t look. If I had known how important it was going to be…”
“That’s okay, Sarah. You’re doing great. But you never saw the guy from the gas company leave, correct?”
“No. He arrived just a few minutes before I left and was still in the basement when I went to lunch.” She swallowed hard. “And then when I got back, it was all gone.”
Sarah watched Agent Morgan write something more in his notebook, and then he looked back up at her. “Sarah, do you think you can remember the name on his shirt?”
Sarah closed her eyes. You can do it - she could remember her Dad telling her when she was little. He used to have her play a memory game with him to train her to remember things. He would put twelve or more different items in the middle of the dining room table, and then call her into the room to look at the table. She’d have thirty seconds to memorize the items. Then he’d have her leave the room while he removed one or more items from the table. He would call her back and she would have to try and tell him what items were missing. Her dad had been so much fun, and had cheered her on whenever she got them all correct.
You can do it! Just try and remember.
“Paul. It was Paul.”
Agent Morgan rewarded her with a small smile. “You’re sure?”
Sarah nodded and explained. “My Dad used to have me play a memory game with him when I was little.” She quickly told him the gist of the game. “I have appreciated his teaching me to remember details many times over the years. Back then it was just a game, you know, but now…”
He nodded his understanding. “You’ve done a great job, Sarah. I can’t believe how much you’ve remembered after all you’ve been through. More than likely, Paul’s not his real name anyway, but it’s still helpful information.”
He paused for a moment and flipped the pages of his notebook. “I have just a few more questions for you. Did Adam Brown ever mention to you or anyone else in your hearing that he’d received a death threat from a Mexican drug cartel?”
She stared at the Federal Agent in front of her. There was that question again. Why did everyone keep asking her that?
“Absolutely not! Why in the world would a Mexican drug cartel threaten him? He’s just a small town civil attorney. My goodness, he never had any dealings with drug pushers or anything! Brown and Associates specialized in contracts, mortgages, wills and leases, and tort and patent law. It’s crazy to think he would be involved with something like that!”
“You don’t know of any communications or heard of anything dealing with the cartel or any questionable business dealings?”
Sarah shook her head again. “Absolutely not,” she repeated. Why did everyone keep asking her about this? She had handled most of the paperwork for the law practice over the years and there had never been anything that even resembled what Agent Morgan was implying. The firm handled civil cases and estates for local people, not dealings with drug traffickers. Were they all crazy?
He looked down and flipped through his notepad again, then looked back up at her. “Do you remember an attorney named Matt Calvin who used to work for the practice?”
Sarah flinched on hearing the name she had thought she would never hear again. “Yes, I remember Matt.”
She saw Agent Morgan lock his eyes on her. “What about him?”
Sarah felt uncomfortable under his studying eyes, but continued making eye contact with him. She didn’t want it to appear like she was hiding anything, but she also wasn’t ready to talk about her past relationship with Matt. It was none of the FBI’s business, after all.
“Matt Calvin was one of the firm’s partners. He left the law practice about nine months ago. It wasn’t on very good terms.”
“What happened?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know all the specifics other than one afternoon Matt and Adam Brown, the senior partner, got into a shouting match in Adam’s office. Matt yelled something about quitting and stormed out of the office.”
What Sarah was leaving out was, that same night Matt had broken off their engagement and left her life forever. She was also omitting how devastated she had been. Before Matt left town, the wedding plans had already been set in motion. The announcements had been ordered and her dress was in the process of being altered. He had left her behind to clean up the mess his running out on her had created. It had taken her months to finally come to the conclusion he had done her a favor by leaving. Months -and a whole lot of tears. He had hurt her deeply and she had never been able to forgive him.
“I think he moved to Miami to take a job in a law practice there,” she added.
She saw Agent Morgan nod. “He was working for a firm there that has had questionable dealings in possible money laundering, and heavily involved with defending members of a local drug ring. We’ve been trying to bust them for years.”
Sarah caught the word ‘was’. “Where is he now?”
Agent Morgan hesitated and she caught the quick blink of his eyes. He finally answered and his words were spoken slowly like he was choosing them carefully. “He was found dead in his car after his brakes went out on a hilly road. There was never any proof found – at least not enough to convict – but it was thought he was killed by the drug Cartel he’d been working for.”
Sarah gasped. What in the world had Matt become involved in?
“So you think that this death threat against Adam has something to do with Matt’s involvement down in Florida?”
Agent Morgan nodded. “We believe Calvin was already involved with the cartel while he was still working here for Brown and Associates. After he moved to Florida, he must have decided somewhere along the way that he wanted out of the dealings with the Cartel, but he was already in too deep. You don’t just walk away from an involvement with these people.
“I need you to try and remember, Sarah - did you overhear enough of that last conversation between Mr. Brown and Calvin to know if it had anything to do with his activities with the Cartel? Anything at all? Or do you remember any overheard conversations of Calvin’s which, looking back now, sound suspicious?”
She shook her head. “They were shouting at each other that day. I didn’t hear any of the actual conversation though.
“I can’t believe any of this is happening, Agent Morgan. This is just a small town. Things like this don’t happen around here.”
“Think about it for a minute, Sarah. Did Matt ever mention anything to you that might lead you to believe he was using Brown and Associates in his dealings with the cartel?”
She shook her head, feeling far too stunned to even think anymore. Matt had never fit in with the rest of the attorneys. Sarah could recall overhearing Adam Brown talking with one of the other partners about Matt. He’d said Matt spent too much time looking for the easy way to make a dollar rather than doing the honest thing. It would seem Adam had understood more than she what type of man Matt Calvin was.
Then Agent Morgan spoke again.
“I have just one more question for you, Sarah.”
She quickly looked over at him, feeling tendrils of fear again when she heard the serious tone of his voice.
“Did you have a nameplate on your desk?”
Well, that wasn’t the question she had expected.
She nodded. “Of course. Everyone but the partners had nameplates on their desks…” She stopped talking and blinked a couple of times as she felt the blood draining from her head. When her ears started to ring, she was sure she was going to faint.
“He would have seen it. He knows my name,” she almost whispered.
Agent Morgan quickly stood and came around to lean against the table next to where she was seated. He reached out and lightly touched her shoulder. “If you feel faint, Sarah, put your head down between your knees.”
Sarah took another sip of the water. She couldn’t help but notice her hand was shaking again as she set the water glass back down on the table in front of her. She stared at the rings of water on the table her glass of water had caused and concentrated on taking one breath, then another.
I will not faint. I refuse to pass out.
Agent Morgan glanced over at Agent Thorne who reached down and stopped the video camera, and then he straightened up to stand next to Sarah’s chair. Sarah looked up at him and could read the look of concern on his face.
“We aren’t going to let anything happen to you, Sarah. I promise,” he spoke firmly.
He reached out and touched her shoulder again and she was surprised by how much it comforted her to have contact, however brief, from another human being. What she really needed was a hug.
He looked down at her. “Will you be okay here for a bit? I’ll be back, but I have something I need to do.”
She nodded and saw him motion for the woman to follow him as they both left the room.