Last Words

7

Mia watched the boats out in the harbor from the conference room window in the St. Dennis police department. It was a perfect July day, with the clearest of blue skies, low humidity, and temperatures in the mid-eighties. What an incredible view, she thought as a large sailboat entered the harbor, its sails at half-mast. How does anyone get any work done around here?

She rested her elbows on the windowsill and tried to keep her impatience in check. The conversation she’d had with John last night had been short and sweet and to the point.

“Female vic found encased in plastic, left in the backseat of the police chief’s car, second such victim found in three days. Chief of police has requested assistance. You’re the closest agent to the scene. First thing in the morning, you’re there. Good luck-it’s your baby now.”

Or would be, if the chief of police would have the courtesy to show up.

She drained the cup of coffee the dispatcher had brought her when she first arrived over a half hour ago. It was cold and not so bad, as cop coffee went, but her stomach was leaning toward slightly upset and she could have used a Coke.

She’d been told that the chief was in a meeting off-site, but was expected to arrive any minute. She hoped it would be soon. She pushed aside the coffee and stepped into the hall.

“Excuse me,” she called to the dispatcher.

He turned to her, the phone in his hand.

“Sorry,” she said. “I was just wondering if there was a soda machine…”

“What’s your pleasure?” He hung up the phone.

“I’d kill for a Coke.”

“Can okay?”

“Whatever form it comes in is more than okay.”

“Right through that third door you’ll find the kitchen. Help yourself to whatever you want.”

“Thank you. Sorry to have disturbed you.”

“Not at all. I’m sorry you’re having to wait so long.”

Mia found the kitchen and the promised cold can of soda. She popped the lid and took a long drink. Better than coffee for an upset stomach, she told herself as she returned to one of the uncomfortable chairs in the conference room. Yesterday’s local newspaper was there on the table; she scanned the headlines.

ALL WRAPPED UP! shouted the front page of the tabloid paper. Body wrapped in plastic left for anguished parents! Ballard woman suffocated!

No wonder everyone’s panicking, reading crap like this. What moron gave out all that information to the press?

She folded the paper and tossed it to the opposite end of the table in disgust.

“…waiting for you in the conference room,” Mia heard the dispatcher say.

“Great. Give him some coffee and tell him I’ll be in in just a second.”

“Ahhh, Chief-”

“Be right there, Garland. Gotta take this call, I’ll make it fast…”

Why did they always expect a guy? She shook her head. Women had been in the FBI for years, and yet people were still surprised when the agent they were expecting wore a skirt. Or in her case, well-cut black linen pants and a crisp white shirt.

His entrance into the room caught her off guard.

If he was surprised to find that Agent Shields was a woman, he hid it well.

“Agent Shields, I’m Gabriel Beck.” He approached her with an open hand and a weary smile. “I apologize for making you wait. I see someone’s brought you a drink. Can I get you a refill?”

“No thank you.” She took his hand and gave it the firm shake she reserved for those times when she felt she needed to assert herself. She fished her credentials from her bag and handed them over. “I’m sure you’ll want to look these over.”

He did. When he was finished, he handed them back and took the chair directly opposite hers.

“You’ve been brought up to date?” He asked.

“Only by the local paper.” She pointed to the end of the table.

“That was a pretty bad piece.” He shook his head. “You wonder what people are thinking when they write crap like that.”

“They’re thinking about how many papers they’re going to sell.” She folded her arms on the table.

“I’m sure they had a banner day, then.” He leaned back in his chair. “I had a long talk with your Agent Mancini yesterday afternoon, I assumed he passed on everything we talked about.”

“He told me about the two bodies that were found, how they were found, and where. Both victims were from towns nearby, is that correct?”

He nodded. “Right. The first was found on the front porch of her family home, the second was found here, in the backseat of my car.” He added wryly, “My personal car.”

“Nice touch on his part. How’d he get the car open?”

“Apparently I’d left it unlocked.”

“So he just walked onto your property in the middle of the night and dumped the body in your car and no one heard or saw anything?” she asked.

“Not a thing. It had to have been between the hours of one and five in the morning. I was downstairs reading until a little before one, and I was up again at five. I try to run four mornings each week. I left the house at ten after five and got back around five forty-five.”

“And you didn’t notice anything at all?”

“The car was parked behind the house, in front of the garage. I left and returned through the front door. It wasn’t until I was leaving for a meeting around seven thirty that I found the body.”

“The car’s been impounded?”

“The lab people are still working on the bare amount of trace our people were able to recover. The killer had apparently hosed down the plastic to remove anything that might have clung to the wrappings before he put her into the car.”

“Fingerprints?” she asked.

“Not a one.”

“Careful, wasn’t he?” She tapped her fingers on the table. “And thorough. Not taking any chances at all. But that’s a brassy move, leaving her for you to find. She was from St. Dennis?”

He shook his head. “No. She was from a nearby town, Cameron. At least, we’re thinking she was. A young woman named Mindy Kenneher went missing there a few weeks before the woman who’d been found on Sunday night. I’m expecting to hear back from the ME any time now. I was meeting with the chief of police from Cameron when you arrived. He was on his way to the morgue to take a look at the body.”

“He hadn’t seen her yet?”

“The ME spent hours with the remains yesterday and last night. The condition of the body apparently made it very slow going. As hot as it’s been this past week, decomposition accelerated inside the plastic. She-the ME, Dr. Reilly-is very thorough. She’s taking her time with this.”

“It’s my understanding there was a tape found with the first body,” she said. “Was there one with the second as well?”

“Yes, but because of the breakdown of bodily fluids inside the plastic, the tape was saturated and has been compromised. Agent Mancini said the FBI labs could work on that, see if they could improve the quality. Unfortunately, right now it’s inaudible.”

“I’m sure we can help with that. Any chance I can listen to the tape that was found with the first victim?”

“The chief in Ballard has that; I’ll have him make a copy. And I’ve already requested a copy of his file, and the file from Cameron. We’ll get you whatever you need.”

“Chief, why do you suppose he left the body for you to find?”

“Beck,” he told her. “Everyone calls me Beck. And I don’t know why he picked me, except for the fact that I attended the press conference Chief Daley held over in Ballard the other day. There were four of us, police chiefs from four communities. Five all together, including Daley.”

“Why were you all there?”

“Mostly to let our communities know we were going to work together to solve the case.” He made a face. “It seemed like a good idea at the time. In retrospect, not so much.”

“Because he-the killer-may have felt threatened? Maybe thought you were ganging up on him? Or then again, judging by his response, maybe he’s playing with you. Maybe he saw the whole thing as a challenge? ‘You guys think you’re so smart, well, I’ll show you. You don’t know who you’re dealing with.’”

“You got that part right.” Beck nodded. “We don’t know who we’re dealing with.”

“Why you?” she asked. “There were other local chiefs there. Why did he pick your car and not one of the others?”

“I have no idea. I’m trying not to read too much into it.”

He pushed the chair back from the table and stood.

“You feel like taking a walk?”

“Sure.”

“ Garland, I have my phone if it’s important,” Beck said as he passed the desk. “We’ll be back in a while.”

Garland was on the phone, but raised a hand to signal he’d heard.

Mia followed Beck through the lobby and out the front door. She dug in her bag for her sunglasses, then swung the bag over her shoulder.

“Pretty town,” she said as they walked toward the water.

“One of the prettiest towns around. I want to keep it that way.” He stopped at the end of the macadam drive. “St. Dennis sits right at the convergence of the New River, which you can see straight ahead there, and the Chesapeake Bay, out there to your left, where that big cruiser is headed. During the War of 1812, the town was shelled by the British. Several of the houses in town still have cannonballs embedded in their walls, but none fell. St. Dennis is very proud of that.”

“Ahhh, spoken like a proud native,” she said. “Born and bred here, I assume?”

“No.” He turned and started toward the brown, shingled building that stood at the end of the parking lot.

“Really? Could have fooled me.” She hustled to keep up. “Where are you from?”

“Here and there.”

O-kay…

“So where are we headed?” she asked.

“I want to give you the lay of the land around here. St. Dennis is split pretty much in two by Charles Street, which is the main road you came in on. Half of the town faces the water, the other half faces the farms on the opposite side of town. Along Charles, we have shops where you can find just about everything. Eateries that run the gamut from pretty damned posh to a storefront with tables on the sidewalk where you can sit barefoot and eat hot dogs. We have an art gallery and an antiques shop and a bookstore where you can find comic books and first editions as well as the latest best sellers. There’s a marina where you can dock your boat and a boatyard where you can buy one if you don’t already have one.” He paused. “We have a population of about fifteen hundred.”

She slowed down. She got it.

“That big a commercial district plus a low population equals a tourist town.”

“Mostly on the weekends, yeah. And we have several old inns, bed-and-breakfasts, that sort of thing, so we get a lot of people staying around in the summer months. We had our Harbor Festival last weekend. Close as we can figure, our population just about tripled.”

“That’s a lot of people coming and going, some staying,” she said. “So you have to wonder…”

“Yeah. Was he one of them?” Beck turned back toward the municipal building. “Let’s walk up to town.”

He was tempted to add If you’re up to it, in those shoes.

What was it with women and high heels? He’d seen Vanessa teettering on heels that had to be four inches. And Steffie, too, whenever they’d gone out to dinner. Agent Shields’s weren’t that bad, and she didn’t seem to have a problem keeping up with him, but still. It was one of those things men just didn’t get.

“Of course, he could just as easily be a local, living in any one of these small towns. Until we can learn a little more about him, we’re all just speculating. One of the reasons I wanted the FBI involved was to have access to your profilers. Maybe help us get a handle on what type of person we’re dealing with.”

“We can do that. Let’s try to get a handle on the whole picture first. We’ll start with the victims, see what they have to tell us.”

“But they’ll send someone, right?” They reached the end of the walk that led to Charles Street and stopped at the corner. “They’ll send us someone who can do all that?”

“They did.”

He stared at her for a long moment.

“You mean you-”

“I’m trained to do it all.” She tried to smile good-naturedly, but a weak grin was the best she could come up with.

“Sorry. I thought you were just here as an investigator.”

“That’s all part of it. However, if I feel we need someone with more experience, I won’t hesitate to call in one of the big guns.”

Someone in a passing Buick slowed down to yell a greeting at Beck.

“How’s your wife feeling, Tony?” He called back.

“Doin’ better, thanks!”

“Tell her I was asking for her.”

“Will do!” The driver of the car waved and continued on his way.

“Nice shops.” Mia glanced across the street to the row of storefronts.

“Like I said, a little something for everyone.” Beck gestured toward the place on the corner. “Let’s grab something cold, then I’ll give you a short tour.”

He held open the door to Sips, a narrow one-room affair that sold only drinks. After a chat with Sam, the owner, about the body in Beck’s Jeep while he poured them each a large drink, Beck cut the conversation short.

“Won’t take much to feed that fire,” Beck said after he and Mia stepped back outside. “It’s all anyone wants to talk about.”

“How many homicides do you have in the average year?” she asked.

“Average?” He pretended to think it over. “Maybe one. Most I recall was one year when a couple of runaways from Baltimore holed up in one of the abandoned shacks down near the river. One of them flipped out and beat the other one to death with a shovel while he was passed out. We also had a shooting that same year, so that was two. Hal might know of others. You can ask.”

“Hal?”

“He was the chief of police before me. He still works part-time when we need extra hands, which we always seem to, this time of the year.”

“He was the chief and now he’s a part-timer? That sits okay with him?”

“I haven’t heard any complaints. Actually, it was his idea.”

“Hey, you.”

Mia turned to see a pretty young woman step out from the doorway of the shop they just passed.

“You’re just going to walk by and not even poke your head in to say good morning?” The woman walked toward them, not bothering to mask the fact that she was appraising Mia from head to toe.

“Good morning,” Beck said. “ Ness, this is Special Agent Mia Shields, from the FBI. She’s here to help out with the investigation. Agent Shields, my sister, Vanessa.”

“Oh. Wow. FBI.” Vanessa looked impressed.

“Good to meet you.” Mia smiled and looked past Vanessa to something that caught her eye in the shop window. The sign over the door read Bling in stylized letters. “You work in this shop?”

“Actually, I own it,” Vanessa told her proudly. “My little piece of the world.”

Mia stepped closer to the window. “You have some lovely things. That’s an interesting bag there…”

“It’s a fabulous bag. Stop in sometime and take a look while you’re here.”

“ Ness, Agent Shields isn’t here to shop,” Beck stage-whispered.

“True, but that doesn’t mean she can’t come by when she has a spare minute.” Vanessa smiled broadly at Mia. “Just to look.”

“Maybe I’ll do that before I leave town,” Mia nodded. “Just to look.”

“Good.” Vanessa turned to Beck. “So where are you off to?”

“Just showing Agent Shields around. I want her to have a feel for the town.”

“Don’t forget to show her the houses down around the square. And the old church. Oh, and the Breakstone Inn.” Vanessa turned to Mia. “It’s just gorgeous. We have so many beautiful homes that are totally restored, it’s one of the-”

“I don’t think Agent Shields is interested in an architectural tour,” Beck said.

“Actually, I am,” Mia told him. “It helps get a feel for the town and the type of people who live here. I’d like to see-”

She was interrupted by the sound of Beck’s ringing phone.

“Excuse me,” he said to both women as he took the phone from his pocket and answered. “Beck.”

He listened for several minutes, then said, “Thanks. I’ll get back to you.”

“Problem?” Vanessa asked.

“I’d say so.” He turned to Mia. “The body that was found in my car, the one we believed to be the missing woman from Cameron?”

“Yes?”

“It isn’t.”

“Isn’t…” Mia looked confused.

“It isn’t Mindy Kenneher.”

“So who is it?”

“That’s a damned good question.” He started to cross the street, motioning for Mia to follow.

“I guess if you had a report of a missing local woman you’d have mentioned it by now.” Mia caught up with him on the sidewalk on the opposite side of the street.

“Good guess.”

“So it isn’t the woman you knew about, the one from the neighboring town.” She quickened her pace. “And you haven’t gotten word of anyone else missing?”

“None.”

“Which means he brought her here from somewhere else just to jab at you a little, or someone’s missing who hasn’t been reported.”

“Judging by the appearance of the corpse, this one’s been missing for a while. The flesh was pretty soupy.”

“What’s your guess, weeks?”

“Tough to tell. Even the ME wasn’t sure she’d be able to pinpoint how long the vic’s been dead. Given the heat and the temperature that would have built up inside that plastic wrapping, I don’t know that we’ll ever know for sure how long she’s been dead. Unless, of course, we’re able to identify her and figure out how long she’s been missing.”

“I’ll call someone back at the Bureau, see if he can shoot over a list of women who have been reported missing over the past, let’s say six months in a fifty mile radius. We’ll see if any of them match the vital stats of your vic.” They reached the municipal building and headed for the door.

“I’ll give the ME a call and see what she’s got that we can use. As I said, the body is in pretty bad shape.”

Beck held the door and allowed Mia to enter the building first. Garland was flagging him down with a fistfull of phone messages and Beck grabbed them as he walked by, mouthing a thanks to the dispatcher who was busy taking another call.

“There’s a phone in the conference room you can use,” Beck told Mia. “My office is the next door over. Come on in when you’re finished.”

“I brought my own.” She took her phone from her bag and held it up as she went into the conference room. He had calls to make as did she.

Five minutes later Mia tapped lightly on Beck’s open office door then entered without waiting for his invitation.

“Someone in my office is running through the latest NCIC missing-person entries,” she told him.

“Great. We’ll see if any of them match up with the ME’s best guess.” Beck leaned against the corner of his desk. “She’s thinking the vic is in her mid-twenties, blond hair. Hazel eyes. Five feet six inches tall, weight at the time of her death was probably around one twenty-five. Extensive cosmetic dental work-a lot of porcelain crowns. Expensive stuff. The flesh was in poor condition so she’s not sure of any distinguishing marks like birthmarks. There is an old healed fracture of the right forearm, most likely a childhood injury. And that’s all we’ve got to try to match her up with.”

“If she’s in the system, we’ll have her. If not-”

“If not, we go on the six o’clock news and let the world know what we’ve got. Someone has to be looking for this woman.”

“In the meantime-”

“In the meantime, we wait,” he snapped.

She stared at him for a long time, then said calmly, “I’ll be waiting in the conference room. I’d appreciate it if you’d get me a copy of the files on the two vics-the first one that was found, and the one who’s still missing. In particular, I’ll need to see all the interviews. Family, friends, coworkers.”

He looked at her quizzically.

“Know the victim, know the killer.” She turned and went into the conference room, closing the door quietly behind her.