After pulling away from Clarissa’s house, Sam called Captain Malone.
“Hey,” he said. “What’s up?”
“So, Calvin Worthington…”
“What about him?”
“Cap…” Sam was seized by regret and anger and sadness all at the same time. “I think I might have an idea of what happened. It’s not solid yet, but Stahl… He totally dropped the ball and left these people twisting in the wind all this time. When that gets out…”
“I know,” he said with a sigh. “More bad press for the department.”
“Right. Which is the last thing we need with Feds up in our grill. I’ve spent a half day on it, and I think I know what went down. A half day. I’m so fucking furious right now that these lovely people were forced to wait this long for answers.”
“I’m right there with you. I’m ashamed to say I barely remember the case.”
“I remember it vividly. I was in Patrol and took the initial call. I’ve never forgotten Lenore or her terrible grief, and I’m pissed at myself that I didn’t circle back to this one the first second I was in command.”
“I get why you feel that way, but like I said before, the last two years have been insane for you professionally and personally.”
“I feel sick about this.” She took a winding path to Capitol Hill, dodging the worst of the midday traffic.
“We all do the best we can.”
“No, we don’t all do the best we can. Most of us do, but the few who don’t make us all look like shit. Stahl barely bothered with the most rudimentary investigation. I want to take another look at all his cases from the time he first became a detective. If there’re others like this one, I want to know.”
“That’d be a monumental task.”
“That absolutely has to be done. I don’t care what it takes or how long, but we’re going to look at every one of his case files. We probably ought to do Conklin’s too.”
“Jesus, Sam.”
“I’m so pissed with myself. I knew full well that Stahl didn’t do everything he could with the Worthington case. That was the first time I tangled with him, when I sought him out to see what was being done, because I couldn’t forget Lenore’s awful grief. He told me to stay in my lane and mind my own business. What was I supposed to do with that? I was a Patrol officer, and he was a detective on his way to sergeant.”
“You couldn’t do anything.”
“No, that’s actually not true. I could’ve gone to my dad and asked him to look into it.”
“And what kind of trouble would that have caused you?”
“All the trouble,” Sam said, sighing. She hadn’t gone to her dad because she’d known exactly what kind of shit storm that would’ve created for her—and her dad. “I’m really spun up about this, on multiple levels.”
“I can tell, and with good reason. Let’s sit down and figure out a plan after things calm down for you.”
“We’re doing this. I don’t care if I have to do it on my own time. We’re doing a full review of all their cases, and we’re going to own the results.”
“You’ll need to loop the chief in on this plan of yours.”
“I will.” Sam had no doubt her beloved uncle Joe would feel the same way she did. There was nothing good cops hated more than bad cops. “It probably goes far beyond the two of them.”
“Maybe so, but in the grand scheme of things, I think it’s a small percentage.”
“That’s cold comfort to someone like Lenore Worthington, who’s had to wait fifteen years to find out what happened to her son.”
“Yeah, you’re right.”
“We can’t move on from this like we don’t know it’s a huge problem, Cap. Please tell me you agree with me.”
“I do, but we have to find a way to do this without making things worse for the chief and the rest of us. We can’t go at it like bulls in a china shop.”
“I guess I’m the bull in this scenario.”
“You said that, not me.”
Sam laughed. “I hear you. And I appreciate what you’re saying. It’s just so upsetting to realize how many corners have been cut in places where they shouldn’t have been.”
“I wish we had a full team of cops who approached the job like you do, but the fact is we’re a massive department full of flawed human beings. Some more so than others. We’ll fix what we can and find a way to live with what we can’t do anything about.”
“I guess I can do that.”
“I’ll talk to the chief, and we’ll sit down about this after you get done moving into the White House.”
“You just had to say that, didn’t you?”
He sputtered with laughter. “Are you or are you not about to move into the White House?”
“Don’t remind me.”
“You know who’d totally love this so much?”
“I was thinking that earlier. He’d be busting his buttons.” She blinked furiously to contain the sudden rush of tears. “I’m so sad he won’t be able to visit us there.”
“He’ll be there. He’ll be right in the middle of it. You know that.”
“Yeah, I do. All right, I need to go talk to a former criminal who found Jesus in prison and is now a pastor at a Baptist church.”
“That’s a mouthful. Is he tied to Worthington?”
“His look-alike cousin, who was in all the trouble at the time Calvin was killed.”
“Are you thinking mistaken identity?”
“I was until Calvin’s girlfriend gave me another thread to pull. Javier Lopez, who’s in our custody with the Carter murder?”
“What about him?”
“He had fisticuffs with Calvin two weeks before he died, and it apparently escalated. Of course, none of this was in Stahl’s reports because he never bothered to talk to the girlfriend or the cousin.”
“I hate that son of a bitch for so many reasons, but if this turns out to be the tip of an iceberg with his cases…”
“I’d bet my badge on the iceberg.”
His deep sigh said it all. “I’ll talk to the chief. I’ll let you know.”
“Just a reminder that I’m leaving at four on Wednesday to do the viewing at the Capitol, and I’m out all day Thursday for the funeral and flight to South fucking Dakota. I guess I’m moving on Friday. I’m already in a pissed-off mood about this week, and it’s just getting started.”
“Are you flying on Air Force One?”
“I guess.”
“That’s so freaking cool.”
“You wanna go in my place?”
“I’d do it in a minute. I’ve always wanted to ride on Air Force One.”
“We’ll see what we can do to make that happen.”
“That’d be amazing. I guess I’ll see you when I see you, and when I see you, I’ll steer clear.”
“Good idea. Later.”
Sam’s stomach ached after the conversation about icebergs. It made her sick to think about cops cutting corners and victims of violent crime suffering as a result. She parked in the lot outside the church, approached the attached office and stepped inside to encounter one of her favorite things—a receptionist. This one was an older woman with a sweet, accommodating face. As she showed her badge, Sam hoped she was actually accommodating.
The woman’s face went flat with shock. “You… You’re… Oh my heavens!”
“Hi there, I’m Lieutenant Holland with the Metro PD, looking for D’Andre Worthington. Is he available?”
“He… I… You’re the first lady!”
For fuck’s sake. “I am. Is Pastor Worthington available?”
“He…” She stood so quickly she managed to upend her office chair, which crashed to the floor with a loud bang that brought the man Sam was looking for from an adjoining office to see what’d happened. D’Andre wore a dark suit with a white dress shirt and no tie. Even years later, Sam could see his startling resemblance to his late cousin.
“Are you all right?” He tended to his receptionist before he noticed Sam standing there. Then he did a double take when he too recognized her.
She introduced herself to him and asked for a minute of his time.
D’Andre hesitated, for only a second, but he hesitated, nonetheless. “Sure. Come on back.” He led her into his office, where the walls were lined with books and the desk stacked with papers. “Pardon the mess. Happens when I’m writing my sermons.”
“Not to worry. My office is always a disaster.”
“You’ll have to pardon me for being somewhat stunned to have the first lady drop by to see me.”
“I’m not here as the first lady. I’m here as the commander of the MPD’s Homicide division.”
“You’re here about Calvin.”
“That’s right.”
“Why now after all this time?”
“Because Lenore reminded me recently that we had unfinished business when it came to your cousin.”
“The MPD never took much interest in what happened to my cousin,” he said with an edge of bitterness to his tone that she could certainly understand.
“You’re absolutely right, and I apologize for that. I was the Patrol officer who responded the night Calvin was killed. I’ve never forgotten Lenore or him.”
“So what can I do for you, other than confirm that yes, I was in a lot of trouble around that time, but I certainly didn’t kill the cousin I loved like a brother.”
“Did people think you’d killed him?”
“There were rumors that I’d had something to do with it, or that it was related to me in some way, but I’ve never heard anything solid that would tie it back to me or my friends at the time. I loved him. I would’ve thrown myself in front of that bullet to save him.”
“Did you know Javier Lopez?”
D’Andre’s eyes went wide. “What about him?”
“I’m asking if you knew him.”
“I went to school with him. Cal and I both did. He was in the grade between Cal and me.”
“What was your impression of him?”
“He was an asshole bully, always picking on people who couldn’t defend themselves. You know the type. No one liked him, but everyone was afraid of him.” He chuckled softly. “Except Cal, of course. He got right up in Javier’s face and told him he was a douche for what he’d done to this girl—her name was Maisy—by acting like he was into her when he was just making fun of her.”
“So you knew about their fight?”
“Everyone knew about it. People thought Cal was a badass for confronting him.”
“What did Javier think?”
“I don’t really know. I stayed away from him. I was no choirboy and made a lot of mistakes that I genuinely regret, but that guy was seriously bad news. From the time he was a little kid, he was just a nasty son of a bitch, and I don’t say those words lightly in this house of God. It’s the truth.”
“Did you ever consider that he was behind Cal’s murder?”
“I think most people figured he had something to do with it.”
Sam couldn’t bear to hear that. Most people thought Javier was probably involved, but somehow the police had never even talked to him about the case. She handed D’Andre her card. “If there’s anything else you think might be relevant, please give me a call.”
“I really hope you can get some answers for Lenore and Ayana. They’ve waited long enough.”
“I couldn’t agree more. Thanks for your time.”
In the car, she used the Bluetooth to call Freddie.
“Hey,” he said. “Where are you?”
“On the way back to HQ. You?”
“I’m there after learning my baby has a blown head gasket, and there’s no point to getting her fixed.”
“I’m very sorry for your loss.”
“Yeah, yeah, I’m sure you are.”
“I’m truly sorry you’re sad about it.”
“Thank you.”
“I won’t, however, miss the backfiring that made me feel like I was under attack.”
“There it is,” he said, laughing.
“Do me a favor and ask one of the Millers to meet me at HQ in twenty minutes, if possible. Get Javier Lopez into an interview room and ask Green to get me a list of Lopez’s known associates from fifteen years ago. I just need two or three names.”
“Will do. What’s going on?”
“I think I’ve got the Worthington case put together.”
“Seriously? Already?”
“Yes, and it was revoltingly easy, actually. Our good friend Stahl didn’t do even the most rudimentary investigation. If he had, Lenore and her family wouldn’t have had to wait fifteen years for justice for Calvin.”
“That’s disgusting.”
“Truly. I told Malone I’m going back to look at every one Stahl’s open cases to find out what other corners he cut. But first, I want to wrap this up for Lenore.”
His deep sigh said it all. “We’ll be ready when you get here.”
She ended the call and pushed the accelerator, eager to get to HQ and get this case sewn up for Lenore and Calvin. Sam couldn’t change the past, but she could correct a terrible wrong by making an arrest in Calvin’s case. Now she just had to figure out how she was going to play it with Javier.
That’s why she needed to talk to one of the identical blonde triplets who served the District as Assistant U.S. Attorneys. Sam arrived at HQ a few minutes later to discover a much larger Secret Service presence had effectively moved the media mob out of the way. “Huh, well, look at them being useful.” She parked in her usual spot outside the morgue and went inside, stopping first to check in with Lindsey. “Have we got DNA back from the rape kit on Shanice Williams?”
“Just now.” Lindsey handed her a printout of the report. “All five suspects matched.”
“Vile.”
“Extremely.”
“That poor girl.” After so many years on the job, Sam had become almost immune to the horrors she experienced on a daily basis. But some were worse than others. “I’ve possibly tied one of them to a cold-case murder from fifteen years ago.”
“Wow.”
“I’m trying to figure out how I’m going to play it with him. Maybe let him think I’m going to deal on the murder and assault of Carter in exchange for info on Worthington.”
“Good luck with it. I hope you can get some answers for the Worthingtons.”
“Me too.”
“So, um, Terry invited me to go along on the trip to South Dakota on Air Force One.”
“If you squeal like a girl, I’m gonna stab you.”
Lindsey cracked up laughing. “It’s Air Force One, Sam.”
“Go to work, Lindsey.”
Sam left her laughing as she exited the morgue and headed for her pit. She’d always be more at home there than on Air Force One or at the White House. This was her world, and it was where she thrived. Maybe there was something missing in her that she didn’t feel the need to squeal like a girl over the trappings of the presidency. But then again, she’d never been a typical girl or gotten excited about things other women did. Sure, she loved shoes and clothes as much as the next gal, but she drew the line at squealing.
Freddie was waiting for her when she came in. “Faith will be here in ten, Lopez is in interview one, and Dr. Trulo is waiting for you in your office.”
“Great, thanks. Has the lab reported back about the prints on the knife that killed Carter?”
Freddie checked his computer. “I just got the report. There were two sets of prints—one belongs to Shanice Williams and the other to Fernando Toppa, one of our five suspects.”
“Excellent.” It worked out perfectly for her plan that Lopez wasn’t the one who actually stabbed Eduardo Carter. “Send Faith in when she gets here, and ask Captain Malone to sit in too.”
“Will do.”