Victor doesn’t leave, though. Instead, he takes off his jacket and walks to the nearby closet to hang it up. “Does my sister know this is how you feel?”
I shake my head. “I’ve tried to tell her but she always comes back with How can you feel alone when I’m right here? Or I’m sorry I’m not enough for you.” I wrap my arms around my middle. “Oh, and I’m supposed to not care who my father is, either. He’s just genetic material, she says. Any questions about who killed my mother? Whoa. That topic is way off-limits.”
Victor rolls up his sleeves and slides back into his chair. He rests his elbows on the table, rubbing his hands over his face.
“How about this?” he says. “I’ll tell you a dark secret of mine—something that no one else knows.”
Uhhh. I didn’t see that coming. I peer at him through a safety curtain of hair. “That’s kind of random.”
“It’s not random. It’s an exchange. This way you’ll have the same power over me that you’re afraid I will have over you if you talk to me about this box and your stuff up in the attic. How’s that sound?”
I shrug because I don’t know how it sounds. I can’t imagine what he could tell me that would give me any power over him.
“I think I’m about to get fired.”
“What?”
He nods. “Yeah, no one knows that. But I’m pretty sure it’s coming.”
“Why?”
He pulls his phone off of his belt and checks it, then turns it upside down on the table. “I helped to put an innocent man in jail.”
“On purpose?”
“Not on purpose. But in this case, intent isn’t the issue.”
“Why not?”
“Because the man was killed three days after he was incarcerated. It was a setup. Somebody tampered with my lab in order to make sure he went to jail, where they could get to him. I can’t prove it, not yet, and since he’s dead, I can’t fix it, either.”
“But if it wasn’t your fault…”
“That’s the whole point of what I do. It’s all about what you can prove. And everything that happens in my lab is my responsibility.”
I sit back. I don’t know if Victor’s overshare makes me trust him more. But I do feel for him. “So, what are you going to do?”
“I haven’t decided yet.” His phone vibrates and he ignores it.
“Is this why you came home?”
Victor shrugs. “I came because Rachel asked me to come. Something she’s never done before. She’s worried about you. But, now that I’m here, I can see that it’s not a bad thing to know you have some family who’s got your back.”
He presses the fingers of both hands together as if trying to squeeze out the words. “I’ll admit, I don’t quite know how to address the way my sister handles your situation. I’m not a therapist … or a parent.”
I gnaw on the corner of my lip.
“But I do believe that a lifetime spent blocking feelings can lead to sociopathic behavior.” He stops and looks at me. His expression is not the normal angry adult look, but more like he thinks I’m an interesting puzzle. “You don’t strike me as the serial-killer type.”
I didn’t expect that, so of course I laugh. “Whew. That’s a relief.”
“If what you need is the free space to talk about your mother, I’m here. I can be your uncle and your friend. I can also just sit and listen. Or, you can tell me to go to hell.”
I raise my eyebrows.
“But if the unsavory things that have been going on lately have anything to do with what’s in this box, well, then you really do need me.” He smiles, and it’s not a creepy I’m-trying-to-be-your-friend smile, but a real I’m-here-for-you smile. “I’m thinking that first you’d like to know more about your mother, right?”
“Well, there’s almost no way I could know less.” The snort that follows is automatic. I can’t help it. “Sometimes at night I play this game where I lie in bed and try to think of everything I can remember in my whole life. I work my way back year by year. I start by trying to remember all the things that happened when I was twelve … then nine … then six. I keep working back to the very earliest thing I can remember. Then I lie quietly, eyes closed, and I let my mind float, like a feather in a breeze, hoping to latch on to something. Maybe I’ll remember how she smelled, or the tone of her voice.… I go back really far in the remembering game. I can remember a lot of things: a special dress, a favorite bunny toy. But she’s like an itch I can’t scratch—a memory of her is there, but I can never quite latch on to it.”
Victor pinches his lips together. The skin at the corners of his eyes folds up. “That’s sad, because she was such a beautiful person.”
“When I saw the box, I had to take it. Just so I’d have something that was close to her.” I lean forward. “Rachel never even showed me that all my mother’s things were in the attic. I found them by accident.”
“And you don’t remember anything about the murder?”
I give him a grim smile. “Only the smell of blood.”
He nods. “No one forgets that.”
I pose my index fingers in the shape of an X. “And there’s something about seeing the shadow of a cross on the floor, like when the sun shines through a French door at an angle.”
“That’s all?”
I nod.
I lay my hands flat on the table and press down. My knuckles are white as bleached bone. “So, yeah, you could say I have some questions.”
Victor shifts positions in his chair. “Then let’s start at the beginning.”
“Well, I didn’t just lose my mother, I lost the identity of my father, too.”
“It was my understanding she was planning to raise you alone,” Victor says.
“Maybe. But if she were here I could at least ask her questions. Think about it. I share DNA with a stranger. She might have loved him, or maybe he was just some random dude, but I came out of that and I have no idea who he is. Sometimes I walk down the street and just look at face after face after face and wonder, Am I related to you … or you?”
Victor smiles at the way I wave my hands around.
“I believe I have a right to know who my father is. I also think I have a right to know who killed my mother and why.”
“I agree on both counts,” he says.
“There’s one more thing I want to know … well, it’s more than a want, it’s a need. I need to know my father isn’t the one who killed her. That he wasn’t the one who took away our dream of being a family.”
Victor stays silent for a long minute. Then he ticks each item off on his fingers. “So, if I heard you correctly, you want to solve a murder, establish paternity, and rule out a suspect?”
I nod. “That pretty much covers it.”
“That’s what we call the DNA trifecta.” He nods at my mother’s box, still sitting in the middle of the table. “And, while it’s all doable, it’s going to take more juice than you’ve got up in your attic playroom.”
“I know. That’s why Miss Peters was helping me.”
Victor sits forward. “The biology teacher who was murdered? She knew about all of this?”
“Yeah. Well, I’d say most adults in town know about me and what happened to my mom. But Miss P was the first to actually show me how I could get some answers on my own.”
Concern forms in the creases of Victor’s forehead. “That sounds highly inappropriate for a teacher. What did she show you … exactly?”
“She knew I was playing around with forensic stuff and she showed me—like you just said—how DNA could answer all of my questions. She helped me. Maybe you’ll help me now.”
Victor runs his thumb over a spot on his wrist, finally meeting my gaze with a look that’s just as intense as mine. “I’ll take a cursory look into the case. But first, I’m curious to know how you started ‘playing around with forensic stuff.’”
“Your books kind of started it.” I grin and he rolls his eyes in response.
“The attr
action was always about finding the answers to my questions.” I adjust my position in the chair by curling one leg up under me. “But first I had to get the techniques down. And that takes a lot of practice.”
Victor rests his elbow on the table and props his head on his hand. “Some would say it requires more than practice, but go on.”
“Well, a friend of mine at school was afraid her boyfriend was cheating on her, and I thought maybe we could use forensics to prove it. I started by looking at hair samples. Then taught myself to lift fingerprints and do chromatography tests on lipstick and stuff.”
Victor looks surprised. “Wait a minute, you taught yourself to lift prints and do chromatography?”
“They teach it in high school now, so how hard can it really be?”
“I’ll be sure to tell my boss that,” he mutters. “Keep talking.”
“We helped a lot of our friends at school with problems, which prompted Miss Peters to try to get a forensics class or club on campus.”
“Wow, you’ve gone to a great deal of effort. Old Carl must be impressed with you,” Victor says.
“Yeah. Not really. I mean, Principal Roberts gets it, to a point. He says science fair projects are okay, but forensic experiments are forbidden on campus.”
“You’re kidding, right?” Victor asks.
“I wish. Mr. Roberts claims my forensic experiments could have unpleasant consequences. So, if I get caught doing any investigations on campus, it’s an automatic three-day suspension.”
Victor rolls his eyes. “He’s not wrong about the consequences, but if I told you some of the pranks we pulled when we were in school…” He gets up from the table. “Hey, I’m starving and I make some serious scrambled eggs à la Victor. What do you say?”
I nod an enthusiastic yes.
Victor heads for the refrigerator and starts unloading ingredients. “Your mother loved eating breakfast for dinner. In fact, last time I saw her we had eggs à la Victor.” He gets a distant look on his face.
“When was that?” I ask.
“I think it was June 1998, something like that. You weren’t born yet and I was home for my mother’s funeral. How’s that for the circle of life?” He musters a sad smile. “Not the happiest of moments. Your mom handled everything for Rachel, though. She was a rock.”
I don’t know what to say. I let the quiet in the room swallow us up. After a while it gets to be too much. “So you wouldn’t have a problem with my investigations?” I ask.
Victor whirls to face me; he’s got four eggs in one hand and a package of grated cheese in the other. He kicks the refrigerator door closed. “Oh, I didn’t say that. I am impressed with how smart and resourceful you are, but unsupervised investigations aren’t a good idea. And especially not with real evidence.” He nods toward my mother’s box.
“I wasn’t trying to investigate her murder … not yet, anyway.”
“What does that mean?” Victor turns his attention back to the stove. With a series of sizzles, I hear each egg hit the skillet. Next he opens the cheese and grabs a huge handful. I can’t see where it goes but I assume he’s dropping it on top of the eggs.
I clear my throat. “Not yet, because I’m thinking of making this my career.”
Victor waves the spatula over his shoulder. “You should. But take classes or go to CSI camp or something. I don’t like the idea of you doing these things unsupervised.”
I watch in quiet amazement as he moves in front of the stove, rolling the skillet from side to side while vigorously pummeling the eggs with the spatula.
“But you still think it would be good for me, right? Critical thinking and all that.” Rachel would never agree to CSI camp or anything having to do with forensics. She’s afraid exposure to that stuff will “set me off.” Whatever that means. But maybe if Victor thinks it would be good, he’ll plead my case with her.
“Yes. Your inquisitive nature drives you to research and learn, and that’s good. What you lack is the experience and maturity to understand that this kind of information is power, and there are people in power who won’t think twice about using it the wrong way.”
He scoops the eggs onto two plates and brings them to the table. “Like the person who keeps calling my phone. I don’t want to talk to him. But as you can see, he’s not giving up. He thinks he can badger me into picking up my phone, otherwise he’d stop trying.”
Victor’s words spark something. People in power who won’t think twice about using it the wrong way is a tremendous thought. I scoop up a bite of egg and nibble it off the tines of my fork as the odd pieces of my evidence suddenly start to come together in my head.
“What’s wrong?” Victor asks.
I’m distracted and thinking this through. But because I don’t answer him, he picks up his plate and inspects the eggs, as if there’s something wrong with them.
“I have a question,” I finally say. “What did Sydney mean when she said the chief prefers ‘old-school’ police work?”
Victor takes a couple of bites of egg, scraping the extra-gooey cheese off his fork with his teeth. “I think what she means is that Charles isn’t really up on the latest forensic science tech. She said ‘old-school,’ and by that I think she means ‘old-fashioned.’”
“But could there be a reason why he would be against forensic science, like maybe a reason he would get super upset over having a lab here in Iron Rain?” I scoop up more egg onto my fork. These eggs look simple, but Victor’s right, the taste is amazing.
He gives me a questioning look. “I can’t figure out where you’re going with this, so do me a favor and just tell me?”
I set my plate aside. “Okay. Total trust. I wasn’t investigating my mother’s murder, I was looking into who killed Miss P.”
Victor’s head snaps up.
“I felt responsible for what happened to her and, you know, for getting Journey involved, too.”
“From what I understand, Journey got himself involved.” Victor finishes his eggs and sets his plate aside. “He was there on his own accord. But when you say investigate, what do you mean exactly?”
“We’ve been gathering clues,” I say. “Miss P was going to run DNA tests for me and Journey and we think this is why she was killed. Here’s the thing—so far all of our evidence points to only one person.”
Victor ferries our plates to the sink and returns to the table. “Who would that be?”
“Don’t laugh or make me feel weird, but … I’m just going to say it. Chief Culson.”
I spread my hands out on the table. It sounds even more ridiculous when I say it out loud.
“I have evidence that links Chief Culson and Miss P.”
30
You won’t go wrong if you always follow the evidence.
—VICTOR FLEMMING
For the first time Victor gives me a look of total disbelief. “Linking Chuck and your teacher doesn’t mean anything. They’re two adults. I’m sure they knew each other. They might even have been dating.”
The thought of adorable Miss P dating droopy Chief Culson is not a pretty one. “What if I can prove he was at her house the night she was killed?”
Victor looks skeptical.
I pause to wipe off the table. “Alright, I know it sounds crazy, and I’ll admit when I was gathering the clues they seemed more like accidents. But when you said that about a person in authority using their power the wrong way … it triggered something for me. Think about it. The chief is a person in a position of power.”
Victor sneers. “I wouldn’t exactly call Iron Rain a power center.”
“But did you know that Miss P was working to create a forensic lab here, in Iron Rain?”
Victor frowns. “Actually, that wasn’t mentioned in regard to her murder.”
“Well, she was. She wanted the school and the police department to share it. I assumed the chief was psyched about it—I mean, who wouldn’t be? But thinking back to what Sydney said, maybe he wasn’t. And, he is a person in po
wer.”
Victor makes a calming gesture. “Don’t get hung up on the power thing. What I said was just something you say. I don’t see Chuck having any kind of motive—or the balls, for that matter—to murder anyone.”
“But in your books you always say ‘you’ve got to go…’”
“‘… where the evidence takes you.’” Victor slaps his hands on the table. “Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Let’s see what you’ve got.”
I grab my mom’s evidence box. “What should I do with this?”
Victor thinks for a moment. “Put it back in the attic … but just for now. Okay?”
“Okay.” I dash up to my room and carefully return the file box to the attic. Now that Victor knows about it, I don’t know how long I will get to keep it. I haven’t told him about the matching shirt tie that Journey found in his van. I have a feeling that if he knew this was connected to my mother’s murder, he’d start acting like Rachel. He’d take it all away and I wouldn’t get to see any of it.
I return to the kitchen with my laptop and a smaller shoe box containing the evidence I’ve been collecting on Miss Peters’s murder. Victor has cleared the table, and propped his huge brown leather briefcase on a chair beside him. The top of the briefcase gapes open and Victor is flipping through a notebook. I pause to reflect on just what a perfect moment this is. In all of his books, Victor stresses the importance of keeping detailed notes. And here he is … in my house … at my table … waiting to see mine.
I set the shoe box on the table and hand over my notebook. It’s not leather-bound like his, but it’s what’s inside my cardboard cover that counts. “I kept a detailed journal on everything, just like you describe in your books.”
He gives me an appreciative smile as he flips through the pages, stopping to jot something here and there in his own notebook. When he’s done, he sets it aside. “Okay, hit me with it.”
I open the box and begin to spread things out on the table. “Remember those fingerprint cards you spotted the other night? Well, one of those sets of prints belong to Chief Culson.”
To Catch a Killer Page 18