Mistress

Chapter 33

The Hotchkiss family is home at just after ten in the morning. Home and intoxicated, at least the missus. But I’m sure as hell not going to blame them. As far as they know, they’ve lost both their children in the space of a week.

Before I knock on their door, I read and reread on my smartphone everything the media had on the death of Diana’s brother, Randy. The theme is familiar: Randy Hotchkiss, distraught over the death of his sister, committed suicide by jumping off the roof of Van Hise Hall on the University of Wisconsin campus. No sign of foul play. No pending criminal investigation. Case closed. Yeah, right.

The parents don’t really remember me from Diana’s visitation, and they aren’t thrilled about my being a reporter, but I assure them that I’m not here on the record. When they allow me in, it feels more like a function of their exhaustion than their willingness to speak with me.

Their home is an old Victorian with a dated living room lined with color photographs of their children and black-and-white shots of their ancestors. The whole room has a musty smell overlaid by the smell of burned coffee-not that either of the Hotchkisses appear to have been drinking it this morning.

Bonnie’s eyes are bloodshot and aimless, looking through the fog of grief and alcohol. George is more alert, but he’s clearly suffering as well. Each of them snaps to attention, though, when I tell them a story that every parent who has lost a child longs to hear: somehow, miraculously, their child didn’t really die.

“Is this…some kind of a cruel joke?” George asks.

“I didn’t come all this way to joke, Mr. Hotchkiss. I saw the photos. Diana had that tattoo above her ankle.”

“Then why aren’t the police here, asking us about that? You’re the only one who noticed the missing tattoo?”

“I don’t think the DC police had time to notice something like that,” I answer. “The feds swooped in right away and took over the investigation. Before the local cops could do much of anything, the whole case was snatched from them.”

Bonnie shakes her head. “What does all of this even mean?”

I open my hands. “I-I guess I’m not sure. Diana was involved in something. What it was I don’t know. Was she part of something, or did she discover something-I don’t know. All I know is that the person who fell from that balcony wasn’t her.”

George slowly turns to Bonnie. Each of them is incredulous-I can hardly blame them-but hope is a powerful fuel for suspension of disbelief.

“And you say-the people who found her-”

“The two women in the compact car, right. I think they were plants. They were supposed to be there. They made sure they were the first ones there. I think they covered her hair over her face. I mean, you could hardly see her face to begin with. It was nighttime, there was poor lighting, and anyway she’d fallen face-first, so-forgive me, I know that’s graphic, but it’s not like I could really identify her, anyway.”

“But they made sure,” says George.

“They made sure. Her hair was covering her face by the time I got there. It was Diana’s clothes, it was her shoes-the woman was made to look like her, no doubt. But whoever did this missed that detail about her tattoo.”

Bonnie shakes her head. Tears have formed but they haven’t fallen. This is, in the end, potential good news to them, however mind-blowing it may be.

“Did you know that Diana dyed her hair dark a month before this happened?”

“No,” Bonnie says.

I nod. “Thinking about it now, I bet she probably dyed her hair to match the hair of whoever it was who fell from that balcony.”

“You’re saying Diana helped murder some girl?” George asks. “Is that what-”

“No, sir. I doubt she knew about it. But the truth is, I don’t know. Listen, Mr. and Mrs. Hotchkiss. I know this is crazy. I do. But there’s an easy way to figure this out.”

They both look at me. It’s a fairly obvious conclusion, but their brains aren’t fully functioning at the moment.

“Demand that the federal government release her body,” I say.