Last Words (12 page)

“How’d I do?” Mia asked.

“From what I’ve heard about the case so far, I think your comments regarding his need for control are right on the money. And I agree, this man has very serious issues with women. He has a need to abuse them, degrade them, totally dominate them. I think when you find him, you’ll find that he has what appears to be a seemingly normal life, even a normal love life. He could be married, or has been. He’s very good at keeping this other side of himself hidden.”

“You think we’ll find him?” Beck asked.

“Absolutely. He’ll lead you right to him, if you give him enough time. The downside of that is, the longer it takes to find him, the more women will die.”

“As far as we know, this is his third victim,” Beck told her.

The profiler shook her head.

“He’s way too accomplished to be a novice. He’s got his act down pat. I’m sorry to say he’s had lots of practice. No one starts out at this level of expertise.”

Beck turned to Mia. “You were going to have someone at the FBI look into similar crimes…”

“And we’ll have his report as soon as he finishes it, yes. But there’s a strong possibility that there won’t be any matches.”

“Because maybe his victims haven’t been found?”

“Exactly.” Mia nodded. “These murders are unique. I think if there were others with similar characteristics in the system, we’d have heard by now. They’d pop right out.”

“Maybe what we need is a run of missing women from this area over the past ten years,” Beck said thoughtfully.

“Let’s start with five,” Mia suggested. “I think if he’d been at this for more than that, some of his victims would have surfaced by now. Let’s see how many cases of missing young women on the Eastern Shore remain unsolved.”

“Do we want to limit the area?” Beck asked.

“No. Let’s go farther. So far, none of the victims have been tourists, they’ve all been living within a ten-mile radius, but who knows if he’s roamed, or how far. Let’s do the Eastern Shore to the ocean,” Annie suggested.

“That’s easy enough to get.” Beck stood. “I’ll have Garland start on that right away.”

He excused himself from the room.

“So how are you feeling?” Annie asked.

“I’m fine. Why?”

“You sounded a bit tired last night,” Annie said gently. “I was worried that maybe you’ve been working too hard for too long without a break.”

“I’m okay. I don’t need a break.”

“Mia, we all need a break once in a while.”

“I’m okay, really. But thanks.”

“I’m going to have to stick around to read over the files Beck has had copied for me. It’s going to take me hours to get through it all. Any chance I could bunk in with you at Connor’s tonight?”

“Sure. I’d love to have you stay.”

“Thanks. I’ll call Evan and let him know where I’ll be.”

“Do you think he’ll mind? After all, you’ve only been married for what, six months now?”

“Six months and eighteen days, but who’s counting?” Annie smiled.

Beck came back and closed the door behind him.

“Garland is on it. He’ll let us know as soon as he has some results,” he told them.

“So what else do you need, Dr. McCall?” Beck asked. “You have copies of the files, the photos, the reports…”

“That should keep me busy for a while,” Annie said. “Perhaps we could meet in the morning and go over the case?”

“Whenever you’re ready,” Beck replied.

“Let’s say eleven tomorrow assuming you work on Sunday. That should give me enough time to get through all this. If I feel I need more time, I’ll give you a call.”

“Sunday’s are like any other day around here.” Beck nodded. “Thanks for making room in your schedule for this, Dr. McCall. I’m sure you’re busy.”

“It’s an intriguing case. I’m looking forward to examining the files.”

Beck turned to Mia. “Before you leave…”

“Right, Jessica Flynn. She’s the girl who was going to rent a condo in Ocean City for a long weekend with Colleen Preston.”

“We know that.”

“Yes, but what you don’t know is that according to Jessie, Colleen was supposed to be meeting with the owner of the condo on Wednesday—the day after she disappeared—to pay for the rental and get the keys. But what if she met up with him a day early?”

“Would it be too much to ask that Jessie knows the name of the owner?”

“It would be,” Mia told him. “It seems that Colleen was the only one who had any dealings with the owner. She made all the arrangements. Jessie didn’t even know where this place was located, except that it’s a high-rise right on the beach.”

“Of which there are dozens in Ocean City.”

“Anyone around here own one of them?” Mia asked.

“Only about a third of the population of St. Dennis,” Beck said.

“Why would you buy a place on the ocean if you live on the bay?” She wondered.

“There’s been a building boom in Ocean City over the past ten, twelve years. Like I said, there are dozens of those high-rise condos on the beach. Lots of people have bought them as investments and rent them out. Then there are people who like the ocean, and a condo is an affordable way of having that weekend place. At least it used to be affordable, I don’t know what those places are going for now. If it’s rented during the summer, it can pretty much pay for itself.” He sighed. “So, yeah, many people around here own condos in Ocean City.”

“Don’t people who rent mostly go through rental offices? Would you deal directly with the owner?” Mia asked.

“You might if you knew the owner personally,” Beck replied. “Then again, there’s always the possibility that there was no condo, that it was just a ruse to get her to meet him someplace. And maybe Jessie just assumed that the person who had the key was the owner instead of a rental agent.”

“Jessie told me that she’d given the money to Colleen and that Colleen was going to give this guy a check.”

“Then we’ll check with her bank and get a look at her recent transactions,” Beck said. “We’ll need a warrant, but that won’t be a problem.”

“Do you think there’ll be a check?” she asked.

“Nah. I think the whole condo thing was a means of getting to Colleen. But it’s a thread to pull on. So let’s see if anyone knows if Holly or Mindy had any dealings with anyone in real estate before they disappeared.”

Beck glanced at his watch, then stood. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a meeting with the mayor. Dr. McCall, unless I hear from you, I’ll see you at eleven. Agent Shields, you’ll be there?”

“I will.”

“Good.” He started toward the door, then stopped. “You’re not planning on that walk around my neighborhood in the middle of the night tonight, are you?”

“No.” Mia walked into the hall ahead of Annie. “Tonight I’ll be reviewing the file on Mindy Kenneher. And I promise, if I have any thoughts about interviewing anyone connected with the case, I’ll give you a heads-up.”

“I’d appreciate it.” Beck turned off the light at the wall switch. “The chief of police over in Cameron was pretty adamant about not bringing the FBI into his investigation.”

“We’ll bring him around,” Mia said over her shoulder as she and Annie headed for the lobby.

“No doubt you could,” Beck said under his breath as he watched her walk down the hall. “No doubt at all…”

13

“So, what’s it like, living out here all by yourself?” Annie sat at the kitchen table and watched Mia fill a pot with water and put it on the stove to boil.

“Quiet. If I didn’t work so much, I don’t know if I could stay,” Mia admitted. “You’re actually the first visitor I’ve had since I moved out here.”

She opened a box of pasta and tossed it into the pot, then added, “Unless of course, you count the wildlife. Deer. Fox. Raccoons.”

“You could always move back to Arlington,” Annie reminded her.

Mia made a face. “Too far. John’s been assigning me to a lot of the action on the Eastern Shore. Over the past few months, I’ve had several cases in Dela ware. I think once Connor comes home and wants his house back, I may consider moving to Wilmington. It would be more convenient, I think, and there are some nice areas around the waterfront.”

“You mean Wilmington, Delaware, not North Carolina.”

“Right.” Mia searched the cupboard for a jar of spaghetti sauce. She found it behind a box of cereal she’d brought with her when she moved in, but had never opened. She opened the jar, poured it into a pan, and set it on a burner.

She opened another cabinet and took down two wineglasses. She handed them to Annie and said, “Would you mind opening the bottle I picked up on the way home tonight? It’s still in the bag next to my purse there on the counter. The opener is in the drawer to your right.”

“Sure.” Annie did as requested. After she poured wine into both glasses, she handed one to Mia and said, “Speaking of Connor, any idea when he’ll be back?”

“Not a clue. I never know. About a month ago, he breezed in around 3:00
A.M.
, scared the shit out of me, stayed two days, then disappeared again.” Mia laughed. “He’s like a shadow, you know? He goes off and does whatever it is that he does, comes back, reports to whomever it was that sent him there in the first place, gets another assignment and poof! Gone again.”

“I’ve noticed he’s been doing much more of that over the past year or so.” Annie tossed it out there and waited for a reaction. When there was none, she added, “It’s almost as if he can’t stay in one place for too long.”

“Connor loves to travel.” Mia shrugged. “He always has. And he’s always been into that covert thing. Sometimes I almost think it’s a game to him.”

“That’s one game I wouldn’t want to play. The stakes are very high.”

Mia turned to Annie. “How do you know?”

“We talk sometimes,” she said simply.

“You mean between assignments?”

“Sometimes.”

“Does he tell you where he goes? What he does?”

“Not with a great deal of specifics, but sometimes he just needs to unload. And I guess me being a psychologist, he feels safe unloading to me.”

“The fact that you were going to marry his brother probably has nothing to do with it.”

“I’m sure it has a lot to do with it.” Annie studied Mia’s face.

“Does he ever talk about Dylan?”

“Of course. We both do.”

“Even though you’re married to Evan now?” Mia asked.

“The fact that I was lucky enough to find someone else to love, who loves me, doesn’t mean that I’ve had my memory erased. I did love Dylan; Evan knows that. He also knows that I would have been married to Dylan by now if he hadn’t died.”

“You mean if my brother hadn’t killed him.” Mia’s jaw was squarely set. “If my brother hadn’t murdered him—”

“We both know how Dylan died, Mia,” Annie said softly.

Mia picked up her glass and took several sips of wine.

“Sometimes I don’t understand how you can still be friends with all of us.”

“You’re kidding, right?”

Mia shook her head.

“I’ve worked with members of your family for as long as I’ve been with the Bureau, Mia. At one time or another, I’ve worked with every one of you. I have great respect for you and Connor and Grady and Andrew as professionals, and I care about all of you very much. And Aidan—hell, my sister is married to him, he’s soon to be the father of my first nephew. And yes, we’d have been family if Brendan hadn’t killed Dylan.” Annie took a deep breath. “I like to think you’re still family, and not just because your cousin married my sister.”

“Are you really that forgiving?”

“Mia, there’s nothing for me to forgive. No one was responsible for Brendan’s actions except Brendan. No one is to blame, except Brendan. Please tell me you don’t think that any one of you could have stopped him from doing what he did.”

Mia shrugged. “Andy and I have talked about this a million times, why we didn’t see what he was doing, why we didn’t know how evil he was….”

“Why would you have?” Annie’s eyes narrowed.

“He was our brother, we knew him better than anyone.” Mia laughed harshly. “We should have known.”

“You know of a person only that which they choose to show you. Brendan obviously had a great stake in not letting anyone see what he’d become. He was very careful to never slip out of character.” When Mia started to protest, Annie held up a hand. “I’m the specialist in behavior. If anyone should have noticed that something was off with him, it was me. But I never did, not for an instant.” She tried to smile. “Even when he set out to kill me, I never saw it. I was just lucky that his plan was interrupted.”

“By his partner. A child smuggler.”

“We take our saviors where we find them.” Annie leaned her elbows on the table. “And Luther Blue will spend the rest of his life in a federal prison for his crimes, not the least of which was shooting Brendan in cold blood. At least the operation was shut down.”

Mia drained her glass and reached for the bottle to refill it.

“Until someone else picks up where they left off.”

“That’s always a possibility, of course,” Annie said, “but I know that entire area is being watched pretty closely. I doubt you’ll see truckloads of children being smuggled out of Santa Estella again. Let’s be grateful for that much, okay?”

Mia opened a cabinet and took out a colander and set it in the sink.

“Look, there are a lot of bad things going on in this world, I don’t have to tell you that. You deal with it every day, just as I do. We do the best we can to be part of the solution, not part of the problem.”

From where she sat, Annie could see that Mia had tears on her face.

“It’s Brendan’s sin, Mia, not yours,” she said gently.

As if she hadn’t heard, Mia grabbed the pot from the stove and drained it in the sink. She put the spaghetti on plates and topped it with sauce, then placed one before Annie.

“You might want to move your file. Spaghetti sauce finds a million ways to splatter when you’re trying to read.”

“Right.” Annie sighed and moved the file aside. She watched Mia refill both wineglasses and move her own files out of the way so she could sit across the table from Annie.

“So,” Mia said. “How is Mara feeling? It must be so exciting for her and Aidan, with the birth of their first child so close….”

And just that quickly, Mia had changed the topic and hadn’t brought up Brendan’s name again for the rest of the evening, Annie recalled later. Once dinner was over—a dinner during which Mia had just about polished off the rest of the wine—Mia excused herself to go up to her room with her file, presumably to work.

Annie had settled into Connor’s room and studied the case files Beck had given her earlier that day, but her thoughts kept returning to the woman pacing the floor above. It didn’t take a doctorate in psychology to see that Mia was very troubled.

Finally, when the sound of footsteps overhead ceased, Annie got out her phone and dialed a number that very few people knew. She listened as the phone rang until voice mail picked up.

“Connor, Annie here. Hope you’re safe and well, wherever you are.” She paused. “Please give me a call when you’re able. There’s something I need to talk to you about.”