Making myself a cup of tea, I found myself thinking. Every success in my life, including my agility career, all the awards I got from my work as a law-enforcement officer, and the accolades for finding Joey Washburn, every one was overshadowed by my enormous failure. I’d failed to protect my partner. He died on my watch. Something I’d done—my failure to cuff our suspect properly or my failure to pull completely off the road—had ended Lee Park’s life. And now, his dead eyes haunted me.
There were a lot of other little failures, too, if I were honest. A lot.
I wondered, how did anyone ever balance the books? Was I doomed to live with the shame of my failures until I died? How could I carry that weight?
I’d always thought achievement was the key. After all, pride, or self-esteem was the coin of the realm in my generation and nothing feeds that like achievement.
It seemed to me now as I stirred honey into my tea that pride was a poor antidote to shame. Pride could not balance the books.
But what would?
I sat on the couch and thought about Nate, about the way he’d sat on the floor as I poured out my story. He was a good listener. And compassionate. I appreciated that.
I opened the drawer of the end table and took out the business card Nate had left me, the one for the psychologist. He said she had helped him a lot. Maybe that’s why he was so steady. He’d been through this, or so he said. Yet, he seemed so well-balanced.
I fingered the card. Then I put it back and closed the drawer.
The thought of spilling my guts to another counselor filled me with dread. I could handle this myself, I decided. I just needed to move on. Let the past be past. Buck up, Buttercup.
After all, remember all your successes!
After that pep talk, I picked up the remote and flipped on the TV, zoning out on Netflix until I thought I could sleep, then I went to bed. That night in my dreams, we were not searching victoriously for a little boy. We were chasing a bad guy or being chased by him. In the end, I laid on my back in a little clearing, my face melting into the earth.
Luke found me, just as he had found Faith. And when he licked me, I woke up, tears on my face, and I wrapped my arms around my big dog like a scared three-year-old.
The next day, I pulled out that business card again. This time, I made the call.
28
Five days later, on a sweltering hot July day, Scott Cooper held a meeting at BAU for everyone involved in what he now called the Caldwell investigation. Once word got out, he knew the press would come up with a catchier name.
The two analysts attended, along with the principal investigators in the Sandy Smith and Julie Mitchell cases, representatives from the appropriate local prosecutors’ offices, and a couple of FBI agents.
Looking around the room before the meeting began, an odd thought popped into his head. He wished he’d been able to invite Jessica Chamberlain. Her ideas had broken the Sandy Smith case. She was smart, and she had a good investigative brain. He still felt bad about the abrupt way he’d spoken to her. And yes, he’d apologized, but he didn’t think it had taken. He’d called her twice over the last couple of weeks, but she hadn’t returned his calls.
Pushing those thoughts aside, he introduced himself and the BAU analysts to the assembled group, then having each officer explain his or her connection to the group. After that, the BAU people gave some introductory remarks. When they were finished, he passed out the questionnaires BAU had helped him develop.
“I’ve emailed these to you as well,” he told the team, “but I wanted you to see what we’re looking for. We need to study the victims in detail, as well as the locations they were last seen. On the sheets I passed out, you’ll see lots of questions about the women—their habits, their personalities, their social contacts. Were they gregarious? The type of person who would automatically trust a stranger? Did they tend to be oblivious to their surroundings? And so on. We need to figure out how the UNSUB gained access to them.
“Please try to develop information through best friends or work associates—someone other than the parents. They often know less about their kids than anyone else.”
Several people chuckled at that, but Scott knew from personal experience it was all too true. Neither he nor his parents had known about the boy his sister snuck out to meet.
A woman in the back raised her hand. “What aspect will you be concentrating on?”
“I’ll handle the Caldwell investigation since she was found on federal property. I have agents out of Philly doing the interviews now. I’ll also coordinate the ME reports and whatever information you feed me to see if we can find any link at all between these three women.”
“Doesn’t that seem unlikely, considering the places these women lived and, well, their educational and economic disparities?”
Scott drummed his thumb against his leg. “Yes, you’re right. But we’re going to ask all the questions anyway, just in case there’s a link we’re not seeing.” He took a deep breath. “The second questionnaire focuses on location and time frame. We want to know how the subject picked his victims. Were these women targeted? Were drugs involved, or alcohol?
“So look at the location the victims were last seen and the locations where the bodies were found. Discover everything you can about those places. Did anyone see them get into a vehicle? Anyone see someone on the roads nearest the places the bodies were dumped? Who owns the properties? Are there any hunting cabins or logging areas nearby? Work the time frame from about a week before the victims disappeared to a week after they were found.”
“That’s a lot of digging,” an officer said.
“We need every bit of evidence we can find. That’s the only way this case will be solved. Get what you can. Update me as facts develop. Don’t talk to the press. And we’ll meet again in two weeks.”
After a couple more procedural questions, the meeting adjourned. As people shuffled out of the room, Scott could only hope someone came up with the key to this case before another young woman found herself staring into the eyes of this monster.
Scott’s ASAC, the assistant special-agent in charge of his office, had assigned two other agents to help him. He’d get more later, he’d been told, if circumstances warranted it.
One guy he knew pretty well from the gym, Robert Hudson. An African-American from the Bronx, Robert had a reputation for being thorough. The other was a first-office agent, a woman from Chicago named Dana Danvers. She looked at Scott when the room was empty and said, “What do we do?”
“Sit down,” Scott said, dropping into a chair. “Let’s go through my list.” The two agents found seats. “Here’s what I need. 1. Any GPS information we can get from the victims’ cars. Where they traveled, etc. 2. I want clear information on Sandy Smith’s case. You know her car was found off the road. So did she just run off the road? Or did someone run her off? Did she survive the crash only to be abducted by this guy? Or was she badly hurt, or did she die in the crash, spoiling his plans?”
“Regarding Faith Caldwell, I want someone to go hang out at the coffee shop and ask customers if they noticed her. Jog their memories.” He pulled pictures of Faith out of his briefcase and handed them to the agents. “Scope out the customers. I don’t know who we’re looking for, obviously, but I want to identify any guy who’s big enough to kill a small woman and carry her a significant distance.
“Okay, now, her car was left on the shoulder of a nearby road. Local police impounded it and have gone through it. Make sure we have those reports, including the pictures. Had her car broken down? What made her get in the car with the UNSUB? Was she forced? Tricked? Was it a blitz attack? What?”
Robert and Dana were taking notes like mad. Scott kept talking. “We believe both Julie and Faith were dead when they were dumped in the woods where they were found. Was anything recovered on the scene that didn’t belong to them? Was there evidence of premeditation, that is, precut bindings or gags, that sort of thing?” Scott looked up from his paper. “Basica
lly, I want to know every blasted thing we can about these cases. And I want pictures of everything.”
“Aerials?” Robert said.
“Good idea,” Scott responded. “I’ll ask aviation to fly over and shoot the sites.” He ran his hand through his hair. “I want everything sooner rather than later.”
Robert looked up, his brown eyes focused on Scott, his shaved head shiny under the lights. “I got the cars. Let me figure that out. Then I’ll move on to something else.”
Scott nodded. “Sure.”
“What should I do?” Dana asked.
What could she handle? Scott wondered. She had short, dark hair and was about five-eleven, he figured. He’d heard she was a martial arts expert and could kick the guts out of anybody who tried messing with her. But she was also fresh out of the Academy. “You take the coffee shop. Go hang out there. Talk to the employees. Check out the regular customers.”
“Got it.”
“Let’s go,” Scott said, rising to his feet.
“Wait,” Dana said, looking at her watch. “It’s two o’clock. Should I wait until tomorrow?”
“What time was Faith at the coffee shop?” Robert asked. “That’s your answer.”
Dana shuffled through some papers. “Let’s see…”
“Three-fifteen,” Scott said, answering the question for her. “So go now and see who comes in for an afternoon caffeine hit.”
Dana tossed her head. “Right.”
She started to leave.
“Check in,” Scott reminded her, “and clock your hours.”
“Will I get overtime?”
Scott’s eyes widened. He didn’t bother to respond.
29
The psychologist recommended by Nate was Sarah Pennington. A week later, I sat in her outer office filling out intake forms and wondering why in the world I had decided to put myself through this again.
Because I can’t handle the anxiety attacks anymore. I need help.
Her office was on the first floor of an enormous, old Victorian house in downtown Charlottesville in an area populated mostly by University of Virginia students. It was summer, and many of them were gone, so I had no trouble finding a place to park. That would become a problem come fall, but I had no intention of continuing counseling that long.
A wreath of twisted vines and silk flowers hung on the door of the turreted house. A sign indicated it contained the offices of three other professionals—a dietician, another counselor, and one massage therapist.
Brown leather, split in some places, covered the chairs in Sarah Pennington’s waiting room. They looked like she’d bought them at a thrift store. I tried not to be judgy, but really. A bubbling fish tank on a stand stood against one wall. On the other was a small, three-shelf bookcase that held a few self-help books, some magazines, and a bunch of brochures.
Apparently, a silent alarm or a video camera had alerted Ms. Pennington that I had arrived. A middle-aged woman with long blonde hair and a wide, open face popped her head out of the door to the inner office. “Jessica Chamberlain?”
I nodded.
“I’m Sarah Pennington.” She handed me a clipboard, and said she’d be right with me.
Now here I sat, answering questions about my health, my purpose in making this appointment, my goals, and oddly, my religious beliefs. My health was good, and my goals were simple: I wanted to get rid of my bad dreams and end my anxiety attacks. (That’s what Nate had called them, and I looked it up and figured he was probably right.) As for my religious beliefs, I sure hadn’t come for a sermon, so I made that perfectly clear.
As I waited for my appointment, I thought about that last question. I saw too much organization in the universe and too much beauty in nature to think it all happened by chance, regardless of what brainiacs like Stephen Hawking said.
But my family didn’t do church. I figured all religions were more or less the same. So if you were into that sort of thing, just choose one. The few times I had prayed, like when the Towers fell, nothing changed. So I’d decided I didn’t need religion. I was on my own in life. Nate was not going to convince me otherwise.
A voice interrupted my thoughts. “Miss Chamberlain?” I quickly scribbled “none” under the religion question and stood up. “Welcome. Come in.”
I wanted to do anything but walk into that office. Finally, I forced my feet to take those steps.
“Have a seat.” She gestured toward a light-brown couch accented by a couple of bright pillows as she took her place in a classy, black-leather chair—an Eames knockoff I guessed. Beside her a bookshelf was crammed with weighty tomes, her old textbooks maybe. The wall behind her held three framed posters, sayings of the sort you’d expect in a shrink’s office. I didn’t bother reading them. On her desk, which was to her left, my right, sat a six-inch wooden cross on a pedestal. It had a circle on it, right where the two pieces intersected. That was curious to me, but I was looking at the backside and couldn’t figure out what that design was all about.
As I settled back, I noticed that next to the couch, to my left, was a huge basketful of stuffed animals, including a brown-and-white dog with floppy ears. I assumed those were for the kids she saw. But who knew? Maybe some adults were needy enough to want to hold them.
“What brings you here?” Sarah asked, fixing her gaze on me.
That’s when I noticed her eyes. They were bright blue, like Nate’s, and full of life. She couldn’t be a relative, could she? I’d gotten the idea he’d seen her professionally. He wouldn’t see a relative, would he?
I shook off my thoughts. Investigating Nate’s social connections wasn’t why I was here. Instead, I began telling my story, anger edging my words like fine steel on a knife. I was sick of my life being out of control, sick of the dreams, and sick of my fear. I was tired of worrying I’d fall apart at any moment, and I wanted a plan to end this mess I was in.
“Give me four points, five, even ten, and I’ll do them,” I said, sitting forward on the couch. “I’m very disciplined. Exercises, drugs, whatever—I just want all this to stop. I want my life back!”
Sarah had quietly listened, taken notes, nodded at times (in agreement, I presumed). She asked me about my home life, about my childhood, about my goals and ambitions, my friends, my beliefs, my social life.
Forty-five minutes later, I stood up to leave, proud I’d kept my composure and convinced I had been very clear. Sarah Pennington knew what I wanted.
“So tell me,” I said, “what should I do? Give me a list; I’ll get started.”
Sarah looked at me, smiled, and said, “We’re just going to keep talking for now.”
I rolled my eyes. “I want to fix this quickly!”
“Our brains don’t work that way,” she said. “It takes time to work through things.”
“I’ve spent enough time dealing with this mess!”
“I understand,” she responded.
I jerked open the door.
“Jess,” she added.
I turned.
“Expect things to get worse before they get better.”
I drove home frustrated, wondering if I was wasting my time and money.
I had no idea that within three weeks, I would sit sobbing on that couch, clutching the brown-and-white stuffed dog as if it were real and could save me from the violent storm raging inside.
30
That appointment with Sarah three weeks after I’d started left me shaking and anxious, scared to go on and afraid not to. I called Nate. He got me into this mess, so he could talk me off the ledge.
He came over, fixed tea, and listened as Sarah had, calmly and compassionately. At one point he told me to breathe, reminding me of the pattern—in for four, hold for seven, out for eight. After a while, he asked me a question. “Of all the people you’re angry with, who is it hardest to forgive?”
“Myself,” I answered without hesitation.
“Why?”
“I screwed up!” I yelled. “I deprived a woman of her
husband, a son of his father. I let the bad guy win. And he’s still winning.”
Luke abandoned Sprite and climbed up on the couch with me. He draped his forefront across my lap, his head down, his eyes glancing around for whatever I thought was threatening me.
“What gives you the right to judge yourself so harshly? To condemn yourself?”
“If not me, who?” I exploded. Luke raised his head, then lowered it again. I knew the answer Nate wanted to hear. I just didn’t want to say it. I began stroking my dog, thankful for the feel of his coat, for the rich colors, for the warmth of his body, for the diversion he provided.
Nate let some silence grow between us. My anxiety increased.
“That dog,” he said, gesturing toward Luke, “he doesn’t feel the same way about you as you do.”
“He’s a dog.”
“You deprived him of his first owner.”
“And I’m making it up to him!”
“Is that why you have him?”
His question stopped me short. I had to think about that. “No,” I said, finally. “I love him.” I leaned over and kissed the top of Luke’s head. “That’s why I have him.”
“Ever make a mistake with him?”
“What does that have to do with anything?” I pushed back, trying to avoid the road Nate was leading me down.
“You’re the one who asked me to come over,” he said softly.
That was true. So I took a deep breath and said, “I lost my temper with him once, right after I got him. I had him off-leash in a park at dusk. I threw the ball toward the road, accidentally, and he went racing after it. I saw a car coming and screamed at him to come, but he didn’t—he was focused on the ball. The car blasted its horn, and Luke stopped. But it scared me, and I was mad.”
“And you … ”
I closed my eyes, momentarily, at the painful memory. “I jerked his collar, hard, when I got to him. I yelled at him. It was the completely wrong thing to do.” I felt my face grow hot.
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