Once Cold

by Blake Pierce

  It took Bill a moment to catch her meaning. Then his eyes widened and he shook his head.

  “Oh, no, Riley,” he said. “This one is long gone. Meredith isn’t going to be interested in opening it up again.”

  He could see that she also had doubts, but she was trying to hide them.

  “We’ve got to try,” she said. “We can solve this case. I know it. Times have changed, Bill. We’ve got new tools at our disposal. For instance, DNA testing was in its infancy back then. Now things are different. You’re not working another case right now, are you?”

  “No.”

  “Neither am I. Why not give it a shot?”

  Bill gazed at Riley with concern. In less than a year his partner had been reprimanded, suspended, and even fired. He knew that her career had sometimes hung by a thread. The only thing that had saved her was her uncanny ability to find her prey, sometimes in unorthodox ways. That skill and his occasional covering for her had kept her in the BAU.

  “Riley, you’re asking for trouble,” he said. “Don’t rock the boat.”

  He could see her bristle at that and immediately regretted his choice of words.

  “OK, if you don’t want to do it,” she said, getting up from her chair, turning, and heading for his office door.

  *

  Riley hated that phrase. “Don’t rock the boat.”

  After all, she was a boat-rocker to the core. And she knew perfectly well that it was one of the things that made her a good agent.

  She was on her way out of Bill’s office when he called, “Wait a minute. Where are you going?”

  “Where do you think I’m going?” she called back.

  “OK, OK! I’m coming!”

  She and Bill hurried down the hall toward the office of Team Chief Brent Meredith. Riley knocked on their boss’s door and heard a gruff voice call out, “Come in.”

  Riley and Bill stepped inside Meredith’s spacious office. As always, the team chief cut a daunting presence with his large physique and his black, angular features. He was hunched over his desk poring over reports.

  “Make it quick,” Meredith said without looking up from his work. “I’m busy.”

  Riley ignored Bill’s worried glance and boldly sat down beside Meredith’s desk.

  She said, “Chief, Agent Jeffreys and I want to reopen a cold case, and we wondered if—”

  Still focused on his papers, Meredith interrupted.

  “Nope.”

  “Huh?” Riley said.

  “Request denied. Now if you don’t mind, I’ve got work to do.”

  Riley stayed seated. She felt momentarily stymied.

  Then she said, “I just got off the phone with Jake Crivaro.”

  Meredith slowly lifted his head and looked at her. A smile formed on his lips.

  “How is old Jake?” he asked.

  Riley smiled too. She knew that Jake and Meredith had been close friends back during their early days at the BAU.

  “He’s grouchy,” Riley said.

  “He always was,” Meredith said. “You know, that old bastard could be downright intimidating.”

  Riley suppressed a chuckle. The very idea that Meredith would find anybody intimidating was rather funny. Riley herself had never been intimidated by Jake at all.

  She said, “Yesterday was the twenty-fifth anniversary of the Matchbook Killer’s last murder.”

  Meredith swiveled toward her in his chair, starting to look interested.

  “I remember that one,” he said. “Jake and I were both field agents back then. He never got over not being able to solve it. We talked about it over drinks a lot.”

  Meredith folded his hands together and looked at Riley intently.

  “So Jake gave you a call about it, eh? He wants to reopen the case, come out of retirement?”

  Riley felt a fleeting impulse to lie. Meredith would surely be more open to the idea if he thought it came from Jake. But she just couldn’t do it.

  “I called him, sir,” she said. “But it was already on his mind. It always is this time of year. And we talked through some possibilities.”

  Meredith leaned back in his chair.

  “Tell me what you’ve got,” he said.

  She quickly collected her thoughts.

  “Jake thinks the killer is still in the general area of the killings,” she said. “And I trust Jake’s hunches. We think he was consumed by guilt—probably still is. And I had this idea that he might regularly leave flowers on the grave of the last victim, Tilda Steen. So that’s something new to check out.”

  Riley could tell by Meredith’s face that he was getting interested.

  “That could be a really good lead,” he said. “What else have you got?”

  “Not much,” she said. “Except Jake mentioned a glass that had been picked up as evidence.”

  Meredith nodded.

  “I remember. His idiot rookie partner ruined the fingerprints.”

  Riley said, “It’s probably still in the evidence locker. Maybe we can get some DNA off of it. That wasn’t much of an option twenty-five years ago.”

  “Good,” Meredith said. “What else?”

  Riley thought for a moment.

  “We’ve got an old composite sketch of the killer,” she said. “It’s not all that good. But maybe our tech guys could age the picture, come up with some ideas about what he might look like now. I could turn it over to Sam Flores.”

  Meredith didn’t say anything right away.

  Then he looked at Bill, who was still standing near the doorway.

  “Have you got any cases going, Agent Jeffreys?”

  “No.”

  “Good. I want you to work this case with Paige.”

  Without another word, Meredith turned his attention back to his reports.

  Riley looked at Bill. Like her, he was gaping with surprise.

  “When do we start?” Bill asked Meredith

  “Five minutes ago,” Meredith said, waving them away. “What’s the matter with you two? Quite wasting time. Get to work.”

  Riley and Bill hurried out of the office, excitedly talking about how to get things underway.

  CHAPTER NINE

  A little while later, Riley was relaxing as Bill drove the FBI car to the town of Greybull, where Tilda Steen had been killed. Riley felt good to be working on a new case, especially one of her own choosing.

  It was a warm, sunny day. She felt as though her troubles and anxieties were fading behind her. Now that she had time to clear her head, Riley was beginning to feel quite differently about Ryan’s departure.

  Why would she want him to stay, anyway?

  She certainly didn’t want him sleeping over now that he was seeing somebody else.

  And it was wrong to let the girls keep living with an illusion that he was truly part of their family.

  Things could be worse, she thought.

  Ryan might have hung around for a much longer time, only to eventually crush the girls’ hopes and expectations even more hurtfully.

  Good riddance, she thought.

  Just then, Riley’s phone buzzed. She saw that the call was from Blaine. It took her a second to remember that she’d left a message with him just last night, belatedly accepting his dinner offer. So much had happened this morning, it felt like much more time had passed since she’d made that call.

  She answered the phone. Blaine sounded upbeat and cheerful.

  “Hi, Riley. I got your message. Yeah, the offer still stands.”

  “Thanks,” Riley said. “I’m glad.”

  “So when do you and your family want to come over to the restaurant? Tonight, maybe?”

  Riley hated to put the whole thing on hold. But what else could she do?

  “Blaine, I’m out of town right now, working on a case. I’ll be back later today, but I might have to keep working.”

  “How about tomorrow, then?” Blaine asked.

  Riley suppressed a sigh. Things had gotten awkward fast. The last thing she
wanted was for Blaine to think she was pushing him away again. But with a new case underway, she simply didn’t know when she would be able to accept his invitation.

  The awkwardness was compounded by Bill’s glances at her from behind the wheel. It was obvious from his mischievous grin that he’d heard who she was talking to.

  Riley felt herself blush.

  She said, “Blaine, I’m so sorry. I just don’t know right now when it’ll be possible.”

  Blaine didn’t reply. Riley knew that he must feel a bit puzzled. After all, she had sounded so eager in her message. She figured that honesty was the best approach.

  “I’m not being coy, Blaine. I’m really not. I promise, when this case gets settled, we’ll come to your restaurant the first chance we get. And we’ll return the invitation. Gabriela will cook up something wonderful for you and Crystal.”

  Now she could hear a smile in Blaine’s voice.

  “Great. I’ll let you get back to work, then.”

  They ended the call. Bill’s grin widened, and Riley’s blush deepened.

  “So who was that?” Bill asked.

  “Mind your own business,” Riley said with a slight giggle.

  Bill let out a peal of laughter.

  “No, I don’t think I will, Riley. I think I still qualify as your best friend. I’m supposed to be nosy. That was Blaine, wasn’t it? Your nice handsome neighbor.”

  Riley silently nodded.

  Bill said, “So are you going to tell me what’s going on, or what? The last I heard, Blaine had moved across town and you were trying to fix things up with Ryan.”

  Riley remembered how hotly Bill had protested when she told him that she and Ryan were getting back together.

  “Do I need to remind you of everything that guy did to hurt you?” Bill had said. “Because I can remember every detail.”

  “Whatever you do, don’t say ‘I told you so.’”

  “Why not?” Bill asked.

  Riley sighed aloud now.

  There’s no use fighting it, she thought.

  There was nothing she could do except swallow her pride.

  “Because you did. Tell me so. And you were right. Ryan’s the same old insufferable, unreliable Ryan.”

  “He bailed on you, huh? I’m sorry to hear that.” He sounded genuinely sympathetic. “It must be tough on the kids.”

  Riley couldn’t bring herself to tell him how true that was.

  “Anyway,” Bill said, “I’m glad you’re finally giving ‘Mr. Right’ a chance.”

  Riley groaned with exasperation. She wanted to throw something at him. Instead, she joined in his laughter.

  Her phone buzzed again. She saw that it was a message from Sam Flores.

  Riley was glad to have her attention snapped back to the job at hand. Before they’d left Quantico, she and Bill had talked to Sam Flores, the head of the lab team. They asked him to get right to work looking for DNA on the glass and aging the old composite sketch.

  Riley checked her tablet computer. Sure enough, Sam had sent her some new sketches of the suspect.

  “He sent the new pics,” Riley said.

  “How do they look?”

  “They’re not much to look at, but they’ll do,” Riley said.

  Riley compared the sketches Sam and his team had put together to the old sketch. The original hadn’t been very lifelike. The artist had been too careful. In Riley’s experience, a little imagination and creativity sometimes helped capture a suspect’s personality.

  Still, Riley could see that Sam and his tech people had done a good job with what they had to work with. They’d tried to cover a range of possibilities. In one of the sketches, the man looked much as he had in the old sketch, except with more lines and wrinkles and graying hair. In another, he had put on more weight, and his jowls drooped. A third showed him with a beard and mustache.

  Riley knew better than to show all three new sketches to potential witnesses at the same time. They’d only get confused. She had to choose just one of them.

  She had a hunch that the sketch that most closely resembled the original would be the best one to work with. She didn’t know exactly why. Something about the original’s expression suggested someone who might not deliberately change his appearance over the years. Also, the man seemed to have a distinctly thin body type. Riley guessed that he wouldn’t have put on much weight.

  Of course, she could be completely wrong. But she knew that it was best to trust her instincts.

  Just then they pulled into the sleepy little town of Greybull. Riley figured that it had a population of less than a thousand people.

  “Where’s our first stop?” Bill asked.

  “The cemetery,” Riley said.

  She gave Bill directions, and they arrived at the cemetery within minutes. Riley brought up a map of the cemetery on her tablet. She and Bill got out of the car and wended their way among the tombstones.

  Soon they found the grave that they were looking for. It was marked by a modest, average-sized stone with the inscription …

  TILDA ANN STEEN

  beloved friend and daughter

  1972–1992

  The dates startled Riley. Of course she already knew that Tilda had been twenty when she’d been killed. But Riley hadn’t really stopped to think that Tilda would be forty-five if she were still alive. What might her life have been like? Would she have stayed in this little town and raised a family, or would she have gone far away and pursued an altogether different kind of life? Riley had no idea. And the truth was, nobody would ever know.

  Riley suddenly felt more determined than ever.

  I’ve just got to solve this case.

  Riley saw that two sets of flowers decorated the grave. One was a little bucket of daffodils in cheerfully mixed shades of yellow, orange, and white.

  “Those are pretty,” Bill said, pointing to the daffodils. “Do you think they’re what we’re looking for?”

  Riley didn’t think so. The flowers didn’t look store bought.

  She leaned down and opened a little note that was tied to the bucket handle. The message was short, simple, and heartfelt.

  Dear Tilda,

  Honey, I still miss you. I’ll always miss you. I’ll always love you.

  Mother

  “They’re from Tilda’s mother,” Riley told Bill. “I’m sure the flowers are from Paula’s own garden.” She could imagine Paula carefully cultivating a bed of bulbs she’d planted in a sunny area for early blooms.

  “Does Paula live here in Greybull?” Bill asked.

  “No. Tilda’s parents moved away soon after the murder. Paula still lives in Virginia, though, over on the other side of Richmond. Her husband died last year.”

  Riley felt a pang of sympathy as she remembered Paula telling her on the telephone …

  “What would we become if I forgot Justin or you forgot your mother? I don’t ever want to become that hard.”

  Paula had always struck Riley as a brave person. But she knew that Paula was also intensely private.

  How lonely she must be! Riley thought.

  The other flowers were a more formal bouquet with gladiolas and carnations—an arrangement that might come from a florist. They were held in a plastic cone that had been stuck into the ground.

  Obviously thinking about fingerprints, Bill put on plastic gloves and picked up the cone of flowers, then emptied out the water. He put the arrangement in a plastic bag that he’d brought along for this very purpose.

  A voice called out. “What are you folks doing there?”

  Riley and Bill turned around and saw an anxious-looking man in a security guard uniform walking toward them. He looked as though he might be in his late fifties.

  Riley and Bill produced their badges and introduced themselves. The guard’s eyes widened with interest.

  “Has this got something to do with what happened to Tilda?” the guard asked. “That was a long time ago.”

  “We’re reopening the case,” Bil
l said.

  “Did you see whoever it was that brought these flowers?” Riley asked.

  The guard shook his head.

  “They were put here late last night. I don’t know who it was. The others are from Paula Steen—I’ve known her for ages. She comes around every year and we talk a bit. I always get rid of her flowers for her when they fade.”

  Pointing to the bouquet in Bill’s hand, Riley asked, “Does somebody else bring flowers every year?”

  “Yeah,” the guard said. “Always at night. I’ve seen him a few times.”

  Riley showed the guard the composite sketch.

  “Does he look anything like this?” Riley asked.

  The guard shrugged.

  “I couldn’t say. I never get a good look at him at night, and he always wears a broad-rimmed hat that shadows his face. He’s pretty tall, though. And thin.”

  Riley mentally seized on these details. They fitted her hunch that the killer would still be as thin as he’d always been.

  “What was he driving?” Bill asked.

  The guard thought for a moment. “Just a regular sedan. Light-colored, I think. But I’m not sure.”

  “Can you remember anything else at all about him?” Riley asked.

  The guard just slowly shook his head no.

  Bill asked, “Do you have any idea where he might have bought this arrangement?”

  “Probably Corley’s Flowers,” the guard said. “It’s the only florist in town.” He pointed beyond the cemetery and added, “It’s right over yonder, just a block along Bowers Street. You can’t miss it.”

  Riley and Bill thanked the guard and left the cemetery. There was no point in driving such a short distance, so they walked. Riley looked around at the town, which seemed eerily peaceful. She and Bill passed a few others out walking who politely waved and smiled at the strangers.

  Of course, the people had no idea who Bill and Riley were, or why they were here.

  Some of them probably hadn’t even been born when Tilda Steen had died.

  It made Riley feel strange, knowing that she and her partner were here to stir up ghosts that the townspeople would surely rather forget.

  She and Bill arrived at the corner flower shop, an old brick building with a slightly faded sign that looked weathered with age. Riley could see right away that Corley’s Flowers had been here for a long time—probably for decades before the murder.