As she and April teased each other lightheartedly about what to pack, Riley realized that she was having fun. That abyss that she and Mike had talked about a little while ago seemed far away. She still had a life outside of that abyss. It was a good life, and whatever she decided to do, she was determined to keep it.
While they were sorting things, Gabriela stepped into the room.
“Señora Riley, my cab will be here pronto, any minute,” she said, smiling. “I’m packed and ready. My things are at the door.”
Riley had almost forgotten that Gabriela was leaving. Since April was going to be away, Gabriela had asked for time off to visit relatives in Tennessee. Riley had cheerfully agreed.
Riley hugged Gabriela and said, “Buen viaje.”
Gabriela’s smile fading a little, she added, “Me preocupo.”
“You’re worried?” Riley asked in surprise. “What are you worried about, Gabriela?”
“You,” Gabriela said. “You will be all alone in this new house.”
Riley laughed a little. “Don’t worry, I can take care of myself.”
“But you have not been sola since so many bad things have happened,” Gabriela said. “I worry.”
Gabriela’s words gave Riley a slight turn. What she was saying was true. Ever since the ordeal with Peterson, at least April had always been around. Could a dark and frightening void open up in her new home? Was the abyss yawning even now?
“I’ll be fine,” Riley said. “Go have a good time with your family.”
Gabriela grinned and handed Riley an envelope. “This was in the mailbox,” she said.
Gabriela hugged April, then hugged Riley again, and went downstairs to wait for her cab.
“What is it, Mom?” April asked.
“I don’t know,” Riley said. “It wasn’t mailed.”
She tore the envelope open and found a plastic card inside. Decorative letters on the card proclaimed “Blaine’s Grill.” Below that she read aloud, “Dinner for two.”
“I guess it’s a gift card from our neighbor,” Riley said. “That’s nice of him. You and I can go there for dinner when we get back.”
“Mom!” April snorted. “He doesn’t mean you and me.”
“Why not?”
“He’s inviting you out to dinner.”
“Oh! Do you really think so? It doesn’t say that here.”
April shook her head. “Don’t be stupid. The man wants to date you. Crystal told me her dad likes you. And he’s really cute.”
Riley could feel her face flushing red. She couldn’t remember the last time someone had asked her on a date. She had been married to Ryan for so many years. Since their divorce she had been focused on getting settled in her new home and decisions to be made about her job.
“You’re blushing, Mom,” April said.
“Let’s get your stuff packed,” Riley grumbled. “I’ll have to think about all this later.”
They both went back to sorting through clothes. After a few minutes of silence, April said, “I’m kind of worried about you, Mom. Like Gabriela said …”
“I’ll be fine,” Riley said.
“Will you?”
Folding a blouse, Riley wasn’t sure what to answer. Surely she’d recently faced worse nightmares than an empty house – murderous psychopaths obsessed with chains, dolls, and blowtorches among them. But might a host of inner demons break loose when she was alone? Suddenly, a week began to feel like a long time. And the prospect of deciding whether or not to date the man who lived next door seemed scary in its own way.
I’ll handle it, Riley thought.
Besides, she still had another option. And it was about time to make a decision once and for all.
“I’ve been asked to work on a case,” Riley told April. “I’d have to go to Arizona right away.”
April stopped folding her clothes and looked at Riley.
“So you’re going to go, aren’t you?” she asked.
“I don’t know, April,” Riley said.
“What’s there to know? It’s your job, right?”
Riley looked into her daughter’s eyes. The hard times between them really did seem to be over. Ever since they’d both survived the horrors inflicted by Peterson, they’d been linked by a new bond.
“I’ve been thinking about not going back to field work,” Riley said.
April’s eyes widened with surprise.
“What? Mom, taking down bad guys is what you do best.”
“I’m good at teaching, too,” Riley said. “I’m very good at it. And I love it. I really do.”
April shrugged with incomprehension. “Well, go ahead and teach. Nobody’s stopping you. But don’t stop kicking ass. That’s just as important.”
Riley shook her head. “I don’t know, April. After all I put you through – ”
April looked and sounded incredulous. “After all you put me through? What are you talking about? You didn’t put me through anything. I got caught by a psychopath named Peterson. If he hadn’t taken me, he’d have taken someone else. Don’t you start blaming yourself.”
After a pause, April said, “Sit down, Mom. We’ve got to talk.”
Riley smiled and sat down on the bed. April was sounding just like a mother herself.
Maybe a little parental lecture is just what I need, Riley thought.
April sat down next to Riley.
“Did I ever tell you about my friend Angie Fletcher?” April said.
“I don’t think so.”
“Well, we used to be tight for a while but she changed schools. She was really smart, just one year ahead of me, fifteen years old. I heard that she started buying drugs from this guy everybody called Trip. She got really, really into heroin. And when she ran out of money, Trip put her to work as a hooker. Trained her personally, made her move in with him. Her mom’s so screwed up, she barely noticed Angie was gone. Trip even advertised her on his website, made her get a tattoo swearing she was his forever.”
Riley was shocked. “What happened to her?”
“Well, Trip eventually got busted, and Angie wound up in a drug rehab center. That was just this summer while we were in Upstate New York. I don’t know what happened to her after that. All I know is that she’s just sixteen now and her life is ruined.”
“I’m so sorry to hear that,” Riley said.
April groaned with impatience.
“You really don’t get it, do you, Mom? You’ve got nothing to be sorry for. You’ve spent your whole life stopping this kind of thing. And you’ve put away all kinds of guys like Trip – some of them forever. But if you stop doing what you do best, who’s going to take over for you? Somebody as good at it as you? I doubt it, Mom. I really doubt it.”
Riley fell silent for a moment. Then with a smile, she squeezed April’s hand tightly.
“I think I’ve got a phone call to make,” she said.
Chapter Seven
As the FBI jet lifted off from Quantico, Riley felt sure that she was on her way to face yet another monster. She was deeply uneasy at the thought. She had been hoping to stay away from killers for a while, but taking this job had finally seemed like the right thing to do. Meredith had been clearly relieved when she’d said she would go.
That morning, April had left on her field trip, and now Riley and Bill were on their way to Phoenix. Outside the airplane window the afternoon had turned dark, and rain streaked across the glass. Riley stayed strapped into her seat until the plane had made its way through rough-and-tumble gray clouds and into clearer air above. Then a cushiony surface spread out beneath them, hiding the earth where people were probably scurrying about to stay dry. And, Riley thought, going about their everyday pleasures or horrors or whatever lay in between.
As soon as the ride smoothed out, Riley turned to Bill and asked, “What have you got to show me?”
Bill flipped open his laptop on the table in front of them. He brought up a photo of a large black garbage bag barely submerged in shallow water. A dead white hand could be seen poking out of the bag’s opening.
Bill explained, “The body of Nancy Holbrook was found in an artificial lake in the reservoir system outside of Phoenix. She was a thirty-year-old escort with an expensive service. In other words, a pricey prostitute.”
“Did she drown?” Riley asked.
“No. Asphyxiation seems to have been the cause of death. Then she was stuffed into a heavy-duty garbage bag and dumped into the lake. The garbage bag was weighted with large rocks.”
Riley studied the photo closely. A lot of questions were already forming in her mind.
“Did the killer leave any physical evidence?” she asked. “Prints, fibers, DNA?”
“Not a thing.”
Riley shook her head. “I don’t get it. The disposal of the body, I mean. Why didn’t the killer go to just a little more trouble? A freshwater lake is perfect for getting rid of a body. Corpses sink and decompose fast in fresh water. Sure, they might resurface later on because of bloating and gases. But enough rocks in the bag would solve that problem. Why leave her in shallow water?”
“I guess it’s up to us to figure that out,” Bill said.
Bill brought up several other photos of the crime scene, but they didn’t tell Riley much.
“So what do you think?” she said. “Are we dealing with a serial or aren’t we?”
Bill’s knitted his brow in thought.
“I don’t know,” he said. “Really, we’re just looking at a single murdered prostitute. Sure, other prostitutes have disappeared in Phoenix. But that’s nothing new. That happens routinely in every major city in the country.”
The word “routinely” struck an uncomfortable chord with Riley. How could the ongoing disappearance of a certain class of women be considered “routine”? Still, she knew that what Bill was saying was true.
“When Meredith phoned, he made it sound urgent,” she said. “And now he’s even giving us the VIP treatment, flying us directly there on a BAU jet.” She thought back for a moment. “His exact words were that his friend wanted us to look into it as the work of a serial killer. But you sound like nobody’s sure it is a serial.”
Bill shrugged. “It might not be. But Meredith seems to be really close to Nancy Holbrook’s brother, Garrett Holbrook.”
“Yeah,” Riley said. “He told me they went to the academy together. But this whole thing is unusual.”
Bill didn’t argue. Riley leaned back in her seat and considered the situation. It seemed pretty obvious that Meredith was bending FBI rules as a favor to a friend. That wasn’t typical of Meredith at all.
But this didn’t make her think any less of her boss. Actually, she really admired his devotion to his friend. She wondered …
Is there anybody I’d bend the rules for? Bill, maybe?
He’d been more than a partner over the years, and more than even a friend. Even so, Riley wasn’t sure. And that made her wonder – just how close did she feel to any of her coworkers these days, including Bill?
But there didn’t seem much point in thinking about it now. Riley closed her eyes and went to sleep.
*
It was a bright sunny day when they landed in Phoenix.
As they got off the jet, Bill nudged her and said, “Wow, great weather. Maybe at least we’ll get a little vacation out of this trip.”
Somehow, Riley doubted that it was going to be a lot of fun. It had been a long time since she’d taken a real vacation. Her last attempt at an outing in New York with April had been cut short by the usual murder and mayhem that was such a big part of her life.
One of these days, I need to get some real rest, she thought.
A young local agent met them at the plane and drove them to the Phoenix FBI field office, a striking new modern building. As he pulled the car into the Bureau parking lot, he commented, “Cool design, isn’t it? Even won some kind of award. Can you guess what it’s supposed to look like?”
Riley looked over the facade. It was all straight, long rectangles and narrow vertical windows. Everything was carefully placed and the pattern seemed familiar. She stopped and stared at it for a moment.
“DNA sequencing?” she asked.
“Yep,” the agent said. “But I’ll bet you can’t guess what the rock maze over there looks like from above.”
But they walked into the building before Riley or Bill could hazard a guess. Inside, Riley saw the DNA motif repeated in the sharply patterned floor tiles. The agent led them among severe-looking horizontal walls and partitions until they reached the office of Special Agent in Charge Elgin Morley, then left them there.
Riley and Bill introduced themselves to Morley, a small, bookish man in his fifties with a thick black mustache and round glasses. Another man was awaiting them in the office. He was in his forties, tall, gaunt, and slightly hunched. Riley thought he looked tired and depressed.
Morley said, “Agents Paige and Jeffreys, I’d like you to meet Agent Garrett Holbrook. His sister was the victim who was found in Nimbo Lake.”
Hands were shaken all around, and the four agents sat down to talk.
“Thank you for coming,” Holbrook said. “This whole thing has been pretty overwhelming.”
“Tell us about your sister,” Riley said.
“I can’t tell you much,” Holbrook said. “I can’t say I knew her very well. She was my half-sister. My dad was a philandering jerk, left my mom and had children with three different women. Nancy was fifteen years younger than me. We barely had contact over the years.”
He stared blankly at the floor for a moment, his fingers picking absent-mindedly at the arm of his chair. Then without looking up he said, “The last I heard from her, she was doing office work and taking classes at a community college. That was a few years ago. I was shocked to find out what had become of her. I had no idea.”
Then he fell silent. Riley thought he looked like he was leaving something unsaid, but she told herself that maybe that was really all the man knew. After all, what could Riley say about her own older sister if anyone asked her? She and Wendy had been out of contact for so long that they might as well not be sisters at all.
Even so, she sensed something more than grief in Holbrook’s demeanor. It struck her as odd.
Morley suggested that Riley and Bill go with him to Forensic Pathology, where they could take a look at the body. Holbrook nodded and said that he’d be in his office.
As they followed the Agent in Charge down the hall, Bill asked, “Agent Morley, what reason is there for thinking we’re dealing with a serial killer?”
Morley shook his head. “I’m not sure we’ve got much of a reason,” he said. “But when Garrett found out about Nancy’s death, he refused to leave it alone. He’s one of our best agents, and I’ve tried to accommodate him. He tried to get his own investigation underway, but didn’t get anywhere. The truth is, he hasn’t been himself this whole while.”
Riley had certainly noticed that Garrett seemed to be terribly unsettled. Perhaps a little more so than a seasoned agent would usually be, even over a relative’s death. He’d made it clear that they weren’t close.
Morley led Riley and Bill into the building’s Forensic Pathology area, where he introduced them to its team chief, Dr. Rachel Fowler. The pathologist pulled open the refrigerated unit where Nancy Holbrook’s body was being kept.
Riley winced a little at the familiar odor of decomposition, even though the smell hadn’t gotten very strong yet. She saw that the woman had been short of stature and very thin.
“She hadn’t been in the water long,” Fowler said. “The skin was just beginning to wrinkle when she was found.”
Dr. Fowler pointed to her wrists.
“You can see rope burns. It looks like she was bound when she was killed.”
Riley noticed raised marks on the crook of the corpse’s arm.
“These look like track marks,” Riley said.
“Right. She was using heroin. My guess was that she was slipping into serious addiction.”
It looked to Riley like the woman had been anorexic, and that seemed consistent with Fowler’s addiction theory.
“That kind of addiction seems out of place for a high-class escort,” Bill said. “How do we know that’s what she was?”
Fowler produced a laminated business card in a plastic evidence bag. It had a provocative photo of the dead woman on it. The name on the card was simply “Nanette,” and the business was called “Ishtar Escorts.”
“This card was on her when she was found,” Fowler explained. “The police got in touch with Ishtar Escorts and found out her real name, and that soon led to identifying her as Agent Holbrook’s half-sister.”