Naomi and Brian nodded as they finished gathering their things. Once they'd headed out, Vivi realized the place was empty—with the exception of her and Ian. She watched as he made a last pass around the room. His shoulders sagged a bit under his uniform and, as her eyes traveled down his body and over his clothes, wrinkled and muddied from the activities of the day, a wave of fatigue washed over her. She yawned.
“Tired?” he asked, walking toward her.
“I think it's sympathy fatigue. You look like you could use a good night's sleep.”
Ian stopped in front of her. After tucking a strand of hair behind her ear with his good hand, he rested his palm against her neck, his thumb tracing her jaw.
“I don't think I've ever told you how beautiful you are.”
His comment threw her for a moment. It was out of the blue and spoken so matter-of-factly that the raw honesty of what he felt when he looked at her was made clear. Not one to handle compliments well, had it been less sincere she would have turned away in embarrassment. But as it was, she offered him a smile and touched her lips to his.
“Thank you,” she said. And taking a moment, she leaned against him as his cheek came to rest on her head.
“We have a long road ahead of us, Vivienne,” he said, his voice quiet. “It feels like the momentum is picking up, like we have more leads now, but we still have a long way to go before whoever is doing this is locked up for good.”
She nodded against him. It was true, even if he made an arrest tomorrow, it could be months before a trial. Evidence had to be sorted, compiled, reviewed, and evaluated. It was a long process, much longer than the television shows portrayed. And she was glad he didn't expect a magic bullet. But even so, living just one day thinking someone was obsessed enough with her to kill other women and target those close to her had taken a toll on both of them. For her, for Ian, and for all the women who had died, Vivi hoped tomorrow would bring some progress, some real progress, and they might find themselves a real, viable suspect.
“Guv?” Nick popped his head in. “I'd say I hate to interrupt, but I don't, so I won't. I want to be caught up on what you lot found today.”
Vivi stepped away. Catching her eye, Ian cocked his head in question. She shrugged in response.
“Did you find anything today?” Ian asked.
“If I did, does that mean you'll invite me home for dinner and a debrief?” Nick asked.
“Maybe.” Ian crossed his arms.
“Maybe,” Nick answered. Ian glared at him. Nick sighed.
“Yes, I did. All jocular antagonism aside, we do have some things to talk about.”
Vivi watched as Ian held Nick's gaze as some form of silent, male communication occurred. After a moment, Ian turned his gaze back to her; then he let out a long breath.
“You think there's enough food in the freezer or should we stop and pick something up?”
* * *
Ian watched Vivienne as she walked out of the bedroom, phone to her ear, Rooster at her heels. They'd stopped at his parents’ to pick up the dog, then headed home for a quick shower and change of clothes before Nick joined them. Vivienne was now on the phone with Sam, getting an update on where he was with the evidence.
“You two seem awfully cozy,” Nick said, taking a sip of his beer.
Ian didn't bother to answer.
“I never lived with her, you know. Close, but as you Americans like to say, no cigar.”
Nice, just what he needed tonight, a reminder that the man having a friendly dinner with them had once been one of Vivienne's lovers. He didn't feel threatened by Nick, but he was feeling extremely possessive and protective of Vivienne. The protective part didn't surprise him so much, the possessive part did. He was pretty sure it was an altogether new feeling for him.
“Yeah, you fucked that one up,” Ian said, hoping to close the door on where this was heading—it was not a conversation he wanted to be having.
“She told you, didn't she?” Apparently, he wasn't going to be that lucky.
Ian slid a pan of lasagna onto a pot holder on the kitchen table. “How you dismissed her and then used her theories to work a case, taking credit for them? Yeah, she told me. She may trust you as an investigator, but don't believe for a second that she trusts you as a friend.”
After pouring himself a glass of milk, Ian caught Vivienne's attention and gestured with his good hand to her empty glass, silently asking what she preferred. She pointed to the wine from across the room, even as she continued her conversation, and he set a glass on the table for her. He would love a glass himself, or a beer, but not now, not while there was someone still out there after Vivienne.
“She reduced me to a school boy, you know,” Nick said.
Ian looked up from dishing out a helping onto Vivienne's plate.
“I half-hated her because she's so damned smart, smarter than me by a long shot. And I was half in love with her. Like some kind of punk teenager, I couldn't handle the conflict so I solved the problem by making it go away. If she hated me, problem solved,” Nick explained, taking the serving spatula from Ian.
Ian raised an eyebrow. “I hadn't realized we'd reached this level of sharing.” He was pretty sure Nick was exorcising his own guilt, but as far as Ian was concerned, he was doing it with the wrong person. He didn't give a rat's ass what had been going through Nick's head when he and Vivienne had their falling out. He thought it was a dick move, but Nick's loss was his gain.
“Sharing what?” Vivienne asked, joining them at the table. Rooster followed her in and flopped his body on the floor beside her seat, looking ever hopeful for a scrap. Ian shot a look at Nick, letting him know this one was all him.
“What a fuck up I was all those years ago,” Nick answered, sliding a huge portion of lasagna onto his plate.
Vivienne looked startled for a moment then turned to look at Ian—to check on him was more like it, to make sure he wasn't upset. He shrugged.
“You're here with me and not him,” Ian commented.
“That's very straightforward, MacAllister,” Nick drawled.
“Life's not all that complicated, Larrimore. Not unless we make it that way. Or someone else does,” he added, in reference to their current situation. “Any news from Albany?” he asked, changing the subject as they dug into the meal.
“They've got DNA running on all the swabs collected from the hospital,” Vivienne started. “So far about half have come back as only Meghan's. They'll be running them through the night, or rather Daniel will be running them through the night, so we should know by tomorrow if there is any blood other than hers in the mix. They focused on biological evidence today, since it takes the most time. Tomorrow, they'll start on the other evidence, like her car and clothes. They'll see if they can find anything similar to what we found on Rebecca, and of course, the car will be dusted for prints and vacuumed for particles.”
“How is Daniel?” Ian asked.
“Holding up. Sam said he's a machine, but a meticulous one, which is a good thing. I think, given Daniel's past, he's probably the last person to do anything that might compromise evidence, but it was good to hear Sam's confidence in him, especially on this case.” At Nick's questioning look, Vivienne filled him in on the kidnapping and death of Daniel's twin sister.
By unspoken agreement, they finished their meal in silence, and once the dishes were clean, all three made their way to the living room and sat down. The files of the men—of the potential suspects—lay on the coffee table. As Rooster dragged his soft toy and blanket into the room, Ian picked up the top folder and handed the first picture over to Vivienne.
“We'll go through all the faces Naomi and Brian found and then go from there. Your Uncle Mike was in all three videos, as were Brian and Travis.” He handed her the three pictures.
“We already knew they were in all three locations, so this isn't new. Who else do you have?” She dismissed them, and though Ian had already cleared Brian, the other two were still in the running as
far as he was concerned. A look at Nick told him they would talk later, and so, choosing his battles, Ian moved on.
“Mike Ross is forty years old and lives in Boston,” he started as he handed her another picture. “He comes from a wealthy family and doesn't seem to do much these days but float around the fundraising circuit and hold a figure-head position at his family's business.”
“Which is?” she asked.
“Wiring, but special wiring used by defense contractors. Not very glamorous, but very profitable,” Ian answered.
“I think I know that name, now. I'm pretty sure Collette, Naomi and Brian's mother, has a friend with the last name of Ross. What do you know of his family?” Vivienne asked.
“Father's name is Christopher, mother's name is Leanne. He has two sisters, Susan and Jenna,” Ian provided. “Do any of those names sound familiar?”
“Yes, I think Leanne Ross does sound familiar, but you could ask Brian and Naomi. Did they say anything about him today in the station?”
Ian shook his head. “No. They saw the photo but they were working mostly on the local potential suspects we have. If he was the same Ross you think he might be, would they have said something?”
Vivienne nodded. “Most definitely. If they recognized him.”
He paused then asked another question. “The Ross family seems to run in different circles than families from the North End, how would the twins’ mom know them?”
Vivienne gave a little snort. “Because their mother is about as Boston Brahmin as you can get. Her family was and is loaded. She was an only child so she inherited everything when her parents died. She's married to Tony, one of my dad's brothers.”
“There's got to be an interesting story there,” Ian said with a smile.
“My dad, Uncle Mike, and Uncle Tony are all cops, and one night Uncle Tony was walking the beat and saw some guy getting a little too aggressive with a young woman. He stepped in, and he and Collette fell in love that night and have been in love ever since. Believe me, Uncle Tony is the butt of many a family joke, especially since they moved into her family's Beacon Hill mansion after they got married. The twins were raised there. You're right it is a different world than the North End, but there you have it.”
That was a new twist, something unexpected. Not that he thought it would solve the case, but it was possible Vivienne would have encountered Mike Ross at some point in her younger years. But he wasn't sure what to think about the twins not recognizing him if he was a family friend.
“Anything else about him?” she asked.
“Yeah, he applied to the police academy when he finished college. He started but never made it through. We don't have the records yet on why he didn't make it,” Ian supplied.
“If he was there for any length of time, he would at least have a familiarity with weapons,” Nick pointed out.
“Chances are he also hunts. A lot of families like his do,” Vivienne added. “Do we know where he is now?”
“No, I'll see what Naomi and Brian can find tomorrow and we'll go from there. This,” Ian said, handing her the second picture, “is Kirk Hancock. He showed up in our records because he has a military background. He's a former Marine, Special Forces. His record was minimized, but reading between the lines, Nick and I figure he probably does a lot of the same kinds of things I used to do.”
“The kinds of things my brother used to do,” Vivienne added.
“He's not from Boston but since he's been out, he's been consulting with defense companies, two of which are located near Boston. Back at the station you said he looked familiar to you, any more thoughts on that?” Ian asked.
Again, Vivienne studied the photo, frowning. A stray lock of hair fell forward against her cheek. He brushed it back behind her ear, earning him a small smile that shot straight to his chest. He never had any doubts about Vivienne, although he knew they both had questions—about themselves, each other, and them as a couple. But in that moment, all his questions were answered and he knew what it felt like to be certain of someone. The rest they would figure out along the way.
“I feel like I've seen his face before, but not like this,” she said, holding up the picture. In it, Kirk Hancock was wearing a suit, his clean-shaven face smiling at someone with whom he was talking.
“In what way?” Nick asked.
She shook her head. “I don't know. It's the smile I recognize more than anything else.”
“Any chance he was a friend of your brother's?” Nick asked. Vivienne cocked her head and studied the picture again.
“My brother did send me pictures every now and then. If you scruff him up, he'd look the sort Jeff would have worked with. Ian?” she said, raising her gaze to his. He knew what she wanted to say but wouldn't in front of Nick. Lucas would have a better idea if her brother knew Hancock. Acknowledging her suggestion, he took the picture back and said he'd handle it. Before Nick could ask what “it” was, Ian handed her the last picture.
“Lee Grant. Thirty-eight years old. He's a search and rescue professional based out of North Carolina. He has no weapons experience we can find, but he's from the rural south so chances are he knows his way around a rifle.”
“He definitely doesn't look familiar,” Vivienne said with certainty.
“You said that at the station, but I don't want to rule him out quite yet,” Ian said.
“Why?” she asked.
“Because,” Nick interjected, looking at the file of information on him. “He's been to a lot of the same disaster sites you have. Has worked with some of the same agencies. Going by this,” he said, holding up the paper, “he's had ample opportunity to get to know you. Whether you know it or not.”
Vivienne's eyes went from Nick to Ian, then back to Nick again before she spoke. “Fair enough,” she said, handing the picture back to Ian. “You're right, I don't know him, but that doesn't mean he doesn't know me. Or think he does anyway. What else do you know, Ian?”
“He travels a lot. There is a SAR training facility in Maine where he teaches, so he's been in the Boston area. All the other areas where the women are missing or dead have all experienced a disaster of some sort or another that would require SAR assistance. We'll work on seeing if we can get anything to line up tomorrow.”
Done with the men in the videos, Ian moved on to the local men, Joe and Schuyler Adams, Timothy Howell, and Simon Willard.
“I think we can rule Timothy Howell out. He's a bit of a creep, but if he taught the workshops on his website, there are more than a dozen of the women on our board he couldn't have had contact with, including the missing and murdered women in Boston,” Ian said.
“How do we know this?” she asked.
“Naomi and Brian pulled up all the cached information from the past several years from his website. He does teach and work all over, but most of the dates didn't line up with anything on our timeline,” he responded.
Vivienne seemed to mull this over before putting the file down and picking up the next. “Schuyler and Joe Adams?”
“Now there's a pair,” Ian said. “Joe's story pretty much aligns with what he told us today. He was in the military, though, right out of high school. Didn't handle it very well and started drinking and doing drugs. He was in and out of rehab for a few years before finally getting clean for good. Since then, he's gone to landscaping school and now runs a small but successful company. He does most of the work himself.”
“Healthy body, healthy mind,” Vivienne commented.
“Avoiding idle hands is probably more like it,” Nick interjected.
“Either way, there is nothing on record about him for the last several years,” Ian continued. “Naomi and Brian dug up some Facebook pages with pictures of him. He doesn't have a page, but he has friends that do. The pictures are all benign—ones of him running the Boston Marathon, fishing with some friends, that kind of thing. No pictures of him drinking or doing anything dumb.”
“Any pictures of him with women?” she asked.
“One, she was petite and blonde. The name tagged was Stephanie Moyer, she's a kindergarten teacher in Brooklyn,” Ian answered.
“So, are you ruling him out?” Nick asked.
Ian shook his head. “Not yet. He has weapons training and access and familiarity with this area. He also travels a lot for his job and, as far as Naomi and Brian could dig, some of his trips aligned with our timelines of missing and murdered women.”
“That's not looking good,” Nick commented.
Ian inclined his head in agreement. Still “not looking good” was a far cry from being a viable suspect.
“His dad is even more interesting. Also military background, but he was Naval Academy and then JAG corps. When he got out, he practiced in Boston and made a ton of money as a criminal defense attorney,” Ian said, handing her another file.
“Joe said his dad's current wife is his stepmother. What about his first wife?” Nick asked.
“She died in a suspicious car accident when Joe was ten. She came from a small town in Mississippi and wasn't exactly the kind of wife an up-and-coming attorney wanted as he climbed the social ranks.”
“What were the circumstances?” Vivienne asked, closing the file.
“By all accounts, she never drank,” Ian started. “Not even socially. According to the report Lucas emailed us, that was actually one of the issues between them. It was hard for him to schmooze at cocktail parties when his wife was a teetotaler. But when she died she had blood alcohol level of .12, way more than the legal limit.”
“Where had she been before that?” Vivienne asked.
“At a house she and Schuyler had rented for the summer on the Cape. All three of them had been down there. Schuyler drove back early with Joe, claiming he needed to work. She followed several hours later but never made it.”
“Any indication she lost it? Maybe got tired of being married to a jerk and stopped by a bar on her way home?” Nick suggested.
Ian shook his head. “A neighbor saw her leaving, waved to her as she drove away. There wasn't time for her to stop anywhere before the accident.”
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