Fireflies: A Katie Bell Mystery (book 1)

by BG Archer

  "Get ID’s on these five guys will you, and did you get a chance to talk to any of the wait staff from the night?"

  Tapscott replied, "Yeah, I talked to both the night manager and one of the bartenders. The cocktail waitress Tori's dancing with?" Tapscott flipped open his notebook and glanced at his notes. "Lacy Person. She's coming in to talk at noon. You want in?"

  Arthur thought about it while he tapped his pen on the desk. “No, I’ll observe.”

  He looked out past his office and saw agent Sandra Fields walking to her desk, carrying a crate of files.

  “What’s Agent Fields up to?” the senior agent asked.

  Agent Tapscott glanced up. “Oh, she’s going over the back case files on Martin Snow. Can you believe it? The first two years of the investigation are actually not up on the database yet? She overnighted them from records.”

  Arthur watched Fields open the box and pull out a stack of folders, setting them down on her desk. She had a Starbucks’ Venti cup sitting on her desk, the top steaming.

  “And what about the files from GIRF?”

  “They are shipping over the video footage, as well as the written log of who checked in. Should be here by the end of the day.”

  “Good. Tell you what,” Arthur said, looking back up at Tapscott, “Why don’t you have Agent Fields take point on this one.”

  Agent Tapscott frowned. “Want to see how she does?”

  “I know you. I don’t know her yet.”

  Tapscott didn’t like not being in the limelight but understood where the senior agent was coming from.

  “Fair enough.”

  Agent Fields was already finished with the third page of the first folder on Martin Snow when Tapscott walked over and leaned over her shoulder.

  "Where are you on the witness list?"

  “It’s a work in progress,” she said, her eyes never leaving the page.

  As far as Agent Fields was concerned Tapscott smiled at her a little too freely, although she ignored it. Tapscott had been professional in all other ways, but Fields had a sneaking suspicion it wouldn’t stay that way for long if she let him in the door.

  Arthur Bell was an unusual man, and Sandra was perfectly willing to put up with the skirt chasing bullshit of Tapscott to spend more time around one of her personal heroes.

  Still, Arthur seemed so … haggard these days. It was as if sadness had stained him like a tattoo. Of course his daughter starting college and moving out of the house probably didn't help matters.

  Fields kept those observations to herself. Instead, she shifted her attention back to the files in front of her.

  "Okay. Let me know as soon as it's finished. Also, here're pictures of the five men who had contact with Tori that night."

  Agent Tapscott held up his BlackBerry and thumbed through the pictures for Sandra.

  "Email them to me?"

  “They’re in your inbox. Run them through facial recognition and see if we get any hits."

  "So basically you're telling me how to do my job?"

  She smiled at him but there was nothing warm about it.

  Agent Tapscott shrugged, his expression smug. “Just offering helpful pointers.”

  7

  2:38PM, Friday Sept 21st

  Arthur watched the surveillance footage again. Since Agent Tapscott had left his office he had gone over it two more times. He watched the whole thing at one-and-a-half-times speed, focusing on a different person on each viewing.

  Other agents would have always focused on Tori Watson, but he had only needed to do that on his first viewing. On his fourth time through he focused on the men around her. By the end of the day, he would watch it at least three more times, focusing once on each of the different men. It didn't matter if they actually did anything incriminating on the tape. That wasn’t the point of the exercise. What mattered was whether their stories of that night matched their actions, or at least were in drunken line with what the tape showed.

  On the fourth time through he was paying specific attention to the last man Tori Watson had danced with. He was in his early thirties, Caucasian, and wearing a grey suit and white shirt. He bought her the last two drinks, both mixed cocktails, and for the last half hour did a very effective job of grinding up against her which Tori seemed to not mind in the slightest. They headed out together right before last call at 1:53AM. Before they left the building Lacy, no longer serving but still hanging out, bumped into him spilling a beer all over his shirt. In the video he clearly became angry and snapped at her before heading to the bathroom to clean up, but Tori wandered outside without him, and headed down the street alone and disappeared from the street camera at 1:57AM. The huddle of people leaving had created a bit of a crowd around the front door and it was no different for the man in the suit trying to break through them at 1:58AM. Tori was gone, but he did head down the block the same direction she had wandered off before he too disappeared from the last camera.

  Arthur yawned and rubbed his eyes. It was after eleven, but he could use another cup of coffee. He was still tired, but didn’t mind the slight throbbing right behind his eyes. He had a good one, and that was enough motivation to have the slight hurt be worth it.

  It occurred to Arthur others would be a bit disturbed to hear him describe such a grizzly case as a "good one,” but the truth was that was how he saw it. Even after everything he had been through, after everything he had put his family through, there was nothing like the thrill of the chase for him. If someone had to do it… it might as well be someone who seemed to have a particular knack for it. He looked at the picture on his desk of Katie in her prom dress. Her hair was blonde in the picture to match her cream-colored dress and she looked stunning, like a real life princess.

  He picked up his phone to call her and then thought better of it and put the phone back down. It was only day two. He didn't want to smother her.

  The cocktail waitress Lacy would be in soon, and Arthur was curious how she would behave in the questioning. He doubted she was have any useful information, but perhaps she would remember a name of one of them in the bar before facial recognition did it’s job.

  Personally, Arthur suspected that the reason she had come down to the building was uniform eyes. There were more than a few women that had fallen in love with TV procedurals and on those rare chances they got to actually feel like they were a part of one, maybe even secretly (and obviously hoping ) to give that crucial key to help break the case.

  Arthur’s guess would be Agent Kenneth Tapscott’s good looks and cowboy swagger had had an effect on Miss Lacy Persons. He was aware that stereotyping was bad, but in the current climate he didn’t mind using whatever tools he had at his disposal. Either way, it would probably be the most entertaining part of his day, and he was curious how Agent Fields would do running point.

  Who knows, maybe because she was running it they might have a break due to nothing other than beginner’s luck.

  They weren’t lucky.

  Lacy was a nervous women who was probably insecure that she was getting closer to thirty than to twenty by wearing far too much makeup (though it was at least well applied) and had not yet realized that men did not really care, (especially any she would meet at the club where she worked.) She had a thin frame and large breasts, and Arthur suspected they were an enhancement, as well as it looked like some work done to her lips and maybe even her face, though the last part was unclear.

  Arthur’s hunch about Lacy wanting to chase a badge was right-on-the-money, much to his amusement, and Agent Fields annoyance. Lacy attempted to be very helpful and batted her eyes a great deal at Tapscott, while being downright cold to Fields, who asked the majority of the questions and who Lacy never answered directly, instead keeping her attention on the very manly and fit agent. For his part, Tapscott tried to play it cool, but it was obvious he was not above the flattery, puffing his chest up at more than one question in the twenty-minute interview, which made Arthur crack up from behind the glass one-way mirror.r />
  The gist of Lacy’s answers were simple: she had seen Tori at the club before the previous month and had danced with her before, and remembered all the guys though she had only had two drinks after she got off work.

  Tapscott thanked her and shook her hand before they let her go.

  Arthur was waiting in the hallway when Lacy and Agents Tapscott and Fields finally left interrogation room number two. Seeing her closer up, Arthur suddenly had the strangest feeling that he had seen Lacy before, someplace other than the video.

  "Agent," she said warmly as she passed him before heading out the door.

  Tapscott hesitated before following after her, his eyes darting quickly to his boss.

  "I'll just walk her out."

  "Uh-huh."

  Agent Fields watched her partner rush after the cocktail waitress and glanced at her boss, shaking her head.

  “You may have been only thinking it, but I swear you just said ‘men’ in a disgusted tone,” Arthur said.

  Agent Fields looked taken aback by her boss’s humor.

  “What, just because I’m a badass doesn’t means I can’t be funny.”

  “A badass?”

  Arthur shrugged. “I’ve had my moments.”

  Agent Fields turned and started to head back to her desk, but Arthur thought of something and called out to her.

  “Agent Fields.”

  She turned back.

  “I saw you were reading through old case files of Martin Snow. I appreciate the background work but know if you have any questions about them, feel free to ask me about them anytime.”

  The younger agent looked surprised. “Really. Even--” she blushed, embarrassed she had started to ask that question.

  “Yes. Even though. I also happen to have another advantage besides being more entertaining than a thousand pages of dull reports.”

  “What’s that?”

  Arthur looked off, his eyes distant for a moment. “I was there,” he said before turning away from her and heading in the opposite direction down the hallway.

  8

  9:06AM Saturday, Sept 22nd

  Katie woke to find Tiffany was gone, leaving Katie to consider her options for the morning.

  SCU was on the quarter system, which irked Katie, but she had decided being closer to her father was more important to her than worrying about participating in an academic system that was fundamentally flawed. Arthur had protested, especially considering she had also gotten into Brown, Berkeley, and Vassar. She had won out in the end, because when Katie’s mind was made up about something, that was it. There was no way to sway her no matter the power of the opposing force. Besides, SCU had given her a full ride on an academic scholarship.

  Even though she had just woken up, she was already feeling tense. Katie could feel her that her shoulders were tight, and the back of her neck. Her preferred method of stress relief was running, and Katie realized to her disgust she hadn’t gone for almost a week. It was time to rectify that.

  Katie had always been fast and had even made it to state her junior year. It wasn’t her life, though she did love it, and it was good to be able to just put on her shoes and go. Not having to think about whatever the hell was on her mind, no matter how shitty the world was around her, she could just take off, and not think. For Katie, running was an escape from … everything. Feet pounding on the ground, sweat on her brow, her heart pounding and sucking in fresh air as music hit her ears, there was nothing quite like it for Katie.

  So, Katie threw on some workout shorts and a grey tank-top and put on her pair of pink-and-blue Nike runners.

  Katie took it easy and ran a 5K on SCU’s outdoor track. She warmed up with a half-a-mile jog before she started to push herself. Due to the week off, her legs felt stiff when she started, but her breath was calm and regular, even if her muscles were not responding as quickly as Katie would have liked. After the first mile at her usual pace her body relaxed, muscle memory taking over and she felt like a weight was being lifted off her shoulders; Katie didn’t have to think about it, or anything else for that matter. She could simply float, letting her body take care of the rest.

  When Katie was done she was covered in a thin layer of sweat, and for the first time since she had arrived at SCU felt relaxed. Maybe relaxed was too strong of a word, but at least at ease enough that she decided it was time to better familiarize herself with the campus.

  It was a trait she had picked up from her father. Arthur Bell never went into a building without knowing where the exits were, as well as having at least three alternative routes out of the location. He hadn’t pushed his lessons on his daughter, but he had taught her, and she had listened.

  In high school Katie had known the floor plan to the campus so well that when the need had arisen (a few times) she had easily been able to sneak out or in of whatever building she had been in, without anyone else being the wiser.

  It wasn’t like Katie sought out trouble, but … morally tricky situations had been presented to her on more than one occasion, and she had dealt with them as best as she could.

  Before Katie had stepped foot on SCU she had looked at several maps of the campus, as well as a city map of Asheville and spent plenty of time on Google Maps looking at nearby cross streets. It wasn’t her town, not yet, but it was going to be.

  Katie felt like she had a good grasp of the actual locational layout, but it was the interior of the buildings themselves she was still fuzzy on.

  Katie decided her main goal for that Saturday morning would be familiarizing herself with building G. It was the central building that housed both the bookstore and the food court, as well as student government offices and administration offices, as well as classrooms. Katie only had one class there in the fall, General Research 101, but it was the main building, so it was the perfect place to start. Besides, the exploration would fill the requirement of going to the bookstore, which was on her list of things to do anyway.

  First though, she needed a shower and a change of clothes.

  The third floor dorm showers were just down the hall from her and Tiffany’s room and she was left undisturbed as she showered and shampooed. It was that time of the month again, and Katie groaned as she added a tampon and tossed back two sugar-coated Advil. The cramps hadn’t started yet, but she knew her body well enough to know they would come.

  Back in her room, Katie slipped into a pair of black jeggings with coordinated rips on both legs and a dark green T-shirt and examined herself in the mirror. She had put on a light amount of makeup in the bathroom, just a basic layer of blush and eyeliner, but in the mirror she added a muted red lipstick. Lastly, she slipped on her current favorite pairs of shoes, light grey Tom's with no socks.

  Katie pulled her messenger bag over her shoulder and did one last spin in the mirror to make sure she was satisfied (she was) and headed out.

  Katie glanced at her G-Shock as she left Everwood. It was 10:20AM. The bookstore didn’t open till 10:30AM and Katie’s stomach had started to grumble in the shower.

  She stopped off at the coffee shop first and it was a girl working this time, not “baby-faced.” Katie ordered a latte and a blueberry scone, her favorite.

  Unfortunately all baristas are not created equal and the latte wasn’t anything particularly special, certainly nowhere near as good as the Americano from the day before. Katie wondered why that was, and made a mental note to learn more about coffee someday, if she ever had the time and still cared. The scone was great though, freshly made and still nice and flaky. Katie ate it before checking the time again. 10:32AM.

  She sauntered down to the shop. As Katie walked, she started to see more students begin to emerge from their perspective dorms and wandering about, though they all had a look of sleepy haze that Katie had shed hours before. Katie preferred keeping a nocturnal routine but unfortunately for her that was not an option starting the following Monday with her schedule. Monday, Wednesday, and Friday Katie had a 9AM class that she silently cursed (and when Kati
e had first realized she had to take it, the curse had not been so silent).

  G Building was located at the northeast end of the campus and was five stories high. It was massive, about the size of a standard city block, and it was also ugly like gutter water. It was all brown and lifeless cement, with not nearly enough windows for Katie’s taste. Even though she arrived about five minutes after it had opened, the bookstore was already crowded by the time Katie entered.

  She found her books quickly and the other additional supplies she needed, a few pens and some extra notebooks and a stack of index cards. Katie also browsed the computer section of the store and glanced at all the laptops and technical additions, before selecting two things she needed. She didn't have a sleeve for her laptop and grabbed a charming one that was black but had a nice design of a Japanese maple on it, and a 16G thumb drive. Katie already had two thumb drives, but she was huge on backing up her information. It never hurt to have a spare with extra data on it. Once she purchased all her items, Katie made one last run through the store to see if there was anything she had forgotten, but came up empty handed. When Katie had paid for everything, she had used her student ID credit card and the total was $153.00 which boggled her mind. Apparently even average higher education prices were downright highway robbery.

  Back at the dorm room, Tiffany still wasn't there and Katie finished unpacking as well as putting away her new purchases. She looked out the window and considered what to do next. The idea of wandering outside and just running into people kept popping into her mind. The only problem with the idea was it didn’t actually appeal to Katie very much. Sure she was all about trying out new things, but there was no way that she was going to meet new people doing that. Something else was calling to her, something that was far more appealing, though it was nothing new. It didn't stop her though and she quickly dove into reading the two new textbooks she had just picked up. None of her classes looked particularly hard to her this first quarter, but Katie liked walking in the first day being more than fully prepared.