She chuckled as he walked out with a multifinger wave. He really was something. She wasn’t exactly sure what she wanted to do about it, but what she’d said was right. No relationship should occur until after her investigation was done. She didn’t want to get him into any more trouble. Neither did she want to go down that path to find out she’d been very, very wrong. That would leave her with devastating consequences—both professionally and personally.
The waitress returned, collected the empty dishes, and asked if Alex wanted more coffee.
She nodded. “If you don’t mind. Does anybody else need this room, or can I stay here?”
“You have another thirty minutes without any pressure.”
“Excellent. Thank you. I’ll sit here and do some more paperwork then.”
After the waitress left, the table cleared now, Alex brought out all her documents and organized her notes. Everything was convoluted. She needed to update her timeline. What she really wanted was to know who had lived in which house when. The fact that Macklin had theorized the intruder may be female was very interesting.
And she was quite pissed at herself for not having thought of it herself.
It did give her a completely different angle to tug and another possible connection to these four women. Speaking of which, she had the boyfriend who’d fought off the intruder to call. She pulled up her notes, and quickly dialed the number. Luckily the boyfriend was there. She asked him several questions but he wasn’t helpful. His tone was cautious, as he said, “Yes, it’s possible but it could just as easily been a slight male. I didn’t sense anything feminine about him.”
She thanked him and hung up.
She entered her notes into her digital files. She wanted everything organized before her meeting later this morning. Her superiors were looking for results. Realizing she still had a few more minutes, she picked up her phone and called Bill. After introducing herself, she said, “You spoke with Macklin earlier.”
“Yes, I did.”
Bill’s voice was warm with intelligence shining through. She liked that. “What’s Macklin like?”
“He’s everybody’s best friend. He’s loyal. He’s not the type to stab you in the back. And I know for a fact, he’s the kind to give you a hand-up. In one of our endurance tests, I wasn’t going to make it. I was done. But Macklin wouldn’t let me go. He hassled me. He bugged me, and he swore at me—cursed me out—anything he could to make sure I made it through the test. I was so mad I didn’t realize it when I completed the test. That’s the kind of man Macklin is.”
“So you don’t think he could have anything to do with this case.”
“No. I don’t know Marsha myself, but, if she was anything like Macklin told me… I can see a hint of anger in any man if a woman did something like that to him. But to set it up, hit her over the head, and then slice her throat? No. One must wonder why it was done that way. The blow to her head would have rendered her unconscious. Why slice her throat too? To make sure she was dead? Maybe. But then why not hit her over the head again?”
“What’s your theory?”
“I think she was hit over the head so she’d be unconscious. But then, while she was unconscious, why didn’t anything else happen?”
“Something else did happen,” she said drily. “Somebody slit her throat.”
“Sure, but no strength was required for that. When Marsha was already subdued, no force was required to kill her.”
Getting an inclination of what he might be saying, she said, “Meaning, it could have been a woman who did this?”
“Absolutely. It could have been a woman. Marsha could have been sitting on a couch. The blow could have incapacitated her, and the woman could have dragged her from the couch, slit her throat, written Macklin’s name in blood, and left. Nobody would be any the wiser.”
As soon as Alex got off the phone with Bill, she updated her notes and considered the other residential properties and their previous owners. Through the housing files, she went through each of the addresses one by one, wrote down the names and the contact information.
Then she followed up with each person whose house had been broken into. Checking how long they’d lived there, if they knew either Marsha or Macklin or any of the other three women who had had their houses broken into. Each time she came up blank. Each time the homeowner had lived there long enough that Alex discounted previous residents as being an issue.
Shaking her head, frustrated at the complete lack of pertinent information, she got up, poured herself another cup of coffee.
After finishing up at the restaurant, she drove to her office. She had the autopsy back on Marsha, but then she’d already talked to the coroner. Nothing new there. The tox screen was also negative. She sent Macklin a quick text, saying she’d contacted Bill, and he had confirmed everything Macklin had said. She left it at that, short and sweet.
The response was almost instant. “So am I off the hook? Does that mean we can do lunch?”
She shook her head. But knowing she was grinning like a silly fool, she quickly replied, against her better judgment, but unable to ignore the need to see him. “Sure. But you’re not off the hook yet.”
“I’ll pick you up at noon.”
“No. I’ve got interviews. Pick someplace close to my office.” She didn’t know why she was being contrary, but she didn’t want to be gone too long, out of the loop, in case anything blew up here. Not that anything was likely to blow up anywhere. She had a meeting shortly with the rest of the team.
She walked in to see she was already late. She wasn’t running the meeting, so she grabbed a chair at the back and sat down. All the murder evidence on Marsha had been discussed, and Alex added the last bit of information she’d gleamed that morning.
Lance asked, “So we’re now thinking this could have been a woman?”
“It could have been a woman, but we’re not sure either way, and we can’t confirm that the same woman did the B&Es. The killing was extremely vicious. But it wasn’t a crime of passion. It was well laid out.”
“But that blow to the head opened up the field to it being a female killer?”
Alex nodded. “That’s exactly true. We have to keep all options open. What we don’t have is any idea why those photographs were underneath the drawer in Kathleen’s bedroom. Bill said he did leave a dresser behind. His buddy was supposed to drop it off for charity somewhere but forgot. Bill assumed the housing complex managers removed it.
“I’ll call her doctor today to do a follow-up on her medications. According to Macklin, she was on and off medications all the time he knew her.”
“I bet she was. The problem is, when they don’t voluntarily take them, all kinds of hell breaks loose.”
“Theories? Strings to pull? Anybody have any suggestions as to where to go from here?”
“We were hoping something would show up on the lab tests, but the tox screen was negative,” Lance said slowly. “She doesn’t appear to have had any friends. And yet, I think we need to dig further into the relationship between Marsha and these other women.”
“They didn’t know her,” Sandra said from the back.
“I came to the same conclusion, but people lie all the time. Let’s dig deeper into that, and see if we can pull any threads. It’s possible they met, but it wasn’t important enough to remember.”
The meeting concluded soon afterward. Alex grabbed her bag and keys, and headed for the hospital to talk to the doctor. She had tried to make an appointment, but that was almost impossible. So she planned to walk in and spend five minutes of his time, whether he liked it or not.
As she walked into his office, she found a full waiting room. The receptionist looked up at Alex, and her smile dropped. “He’s really busy.”
Alex nodded. “I understand that,” she said gently. “But we have a murder investigation.”
The receptionist looked nervously at the full waiting room. “Just a minute.” She walked into the doctor’s office. When she came back out, she said, “He’ll fit you in between a couple appointments. If you could come through here please.”
She led Alex down a hall in the opposite direction and into a small room that was more like a boardroom. Assuming it was for staff lunches, possibly for meetings, Alex sat down and waited. She pulled out her notepad and jotted down some questions she wanted to ask. A few minutes later, the doctor raced in, looking harried and in a hurry. “What’s this about?” he demanded.
She lifted her head. “Marsha McEwan.”
Confusion crossed the doctor’s face, and then it lit with understanding. “What’s wrong with her?”
“She’s dead.” She watched shock, then horror, and finally understanding change his expression.
He sat down, clicked on his phone, and asked the receptionist for the file. “I can’t say I’m surprised. Was it suicide?”
“No, she was murdered.”
His gaze widened, and he swallowed hard. “I’m sorry to hear that. She was extremely unstable. She was committed for a period of six months for testing. But, on the right medication, she did really well and was released.” He stopped talking when he heard a knock at the door. “Come in.”
The receptionist entered, handed over a file, and left quickly.
“When were those months she was committed?” She quickly wrote down the dates, realizing it matched one of the periods when nobody had very much information on her. “That explains what she was doing during that time. Was she released into someone’s care?”
“Yes. She had a cousin who signed for her. Marsha got a job and moved out within a few months. The cousin was off the hook, and everything returned to normal.” He looked up from his file, frowning. “I really thought she had turned the corner because we had the right medication for her.”
“How much do you know about her life?”
“As much as anybody,” he said. “I suppose.”
“Were you aware of her fixation and stalker tendencies toward a certain man?”
He groaned. “Marsha did speak of it a couple times. He was one of the problems we had tried to get her to deal with. To get her to understand this person was not her partner, not the love of her life. According to her, they were not only married but he cheated on her. She was pretty angry about it.”
That settled into Alex’s brain. “Do you remember the name of the person?”
He nodded. “It was an unusual name, but she’d showed me a picture of him. He’s a big guy. His name is Mack. Like the big Mack trucks.”
“He filed two restraining orders against her several years ago,” Alex said. “She became violent and extremely disruptive.”
The doctor sighed. “She was certainly focused. I have all kinds of clinical terms for that type of thing. But she wasn’t my patient other than for her medical needs. I checked in to make sure she was doing okay physically, but, other than that, you’ll have to see Dr. Sherman. He was her psychologist. He’s the one who helped get her committed, ran her through the testing, and then released her.”
“Do you have Dr. Sherman’s contact information?” She asked a few more questions, but nothing seemed to pop. “Any idea if she was ever pregnant?”
He flipped through the file and said, “Doesn’t look like it.” He lifted his head and looked at her. “Does it matter?”
She shook her head. “No. I’m just checking if she had other relationships and how involved they were.”
“The last time I saw her, she was alone, I believe, but I don’t know for sure,” the doctor admitted. He stood. “I really do have to get back to my patients.”
Alex nodded. She rose and said, “Thank you very much.” She packed up her notebook and walked out, thanking the receptionist with a smile as she walked outside. When she was on the street, she phoned Dr. Sherman’s office. He was in San Diego, and she could see him in the afternoon.
She checked her watch and realized she had just enough time to meet Macklin. If she was a little early, that was fine. She’d rather be a little early than a little late in this case. If she was honest, she’d rather he was a little early as well, so they could spend a little more time together. She really liked him; she just knew it was a hell of a bad deal to get involved now.
She knew better …
Macklin pulled in beside her as she parked and got out of her vehicle. She waited, uncharacteristically happy to see him. Even when she tried to stomp down the joy surging through her at his big smiling face, telling herself she was being silly, she knew it wouldn’t be that easy. He was right; there was an attraction between them. It was just shitty he was on her suspect list. But she had found no serious motive for him, so she couldn’t charge him.
As far as she was concerned, he was wiped off her list. However, he was the only one who had any real connection to Marsha. It just made no sense he would have waited all this time to do something about her.
She knew her mother would be horrified, telling her to get away from a killer. But Alex felt absolutely nothing but calm, control, and comfort when she was around Macklin. He slung an arm around her shoulders and gave her a quick hug.
She stepped back and frowned at him. “We don’t have that kind of a relationship,” she scolded.
He chuckled. “Yes, we do. You’re just hiding behind your files.”
“I am not,” she retorted. She let him nudge her ahead into the restaurant. They took a table at the far back corner. “How was your morning, Macklin?”
“Busy. Any news?”
“Nothing that makes a big difference,” she confessed. “Filling in the background on the various players in this game. But nothing major. It’s hard in Marsha’s case to find anyone who knew her.”
“The only things I knew about was that Marsha was a big yoga fan. She belonged to a yoga club for a long time.” He frowned. “And I know she went afterwards with a few of the women but that was years ago and I don’t think she went often.”
She stared at him. “Interesting.”
He shook his head. “It’s pretty common. I often go for a beer or coffee with the guys. It could have been the same idea.” He shrugged. “I honestly don’t know. And don’t forget that was a few years ago. I have no idea what she might have done in the last couple years.”
“I haven’t tracked down anything she was involved in yet.”
“Have you checked her credit cards? The way everybody is switching to subscription services these days, it’s possible her yoga classes involved a fee, and, if she belonged to a social club, possibly fees were charged there too.”
Alex stared down at her notepad, pissed at herself for not having checked it. “I checked her credit card for purchases in the last month, but found nothing. Her purchases appear to be normal.”
“That’s the problem with subscription services. They can be monthly, but it can also be bimonthly or quarterly. Some of them might even be annually.”
She added credit cards on her notepad and beneath that she wrote subscriptions. “That’s a good suggestion.” She dropped her pen and looked up at him. “Any talk of upcoming missions?”
“Lots of talk about the situation in the Middle East. I could be heading out soon on a training mission.” He leaned forward, stared her straight in the eye, and said, “Unless I’m not allowed to go.”
“As far as I’m concerned, you can go,” she said candidly. “I’ll know where to find you, if it’s a military mission.”
“That you can.” He stared around the restaurant. “It’s hard. Everybody knows. Everybody talks. Nobody has any answers.”
“You appear to be good friends with Corey.”
He glanced at her. “I’m good friends with men from several units. … We’re like brothers.”
“That’s the way to have it. My job usually pits me against everybody. It’s hard to have the same sort of camaraderie.”
“What about the guys you work with?”
“In my old office, yes. But, since I moved here, hell no.” She gave him a chilly smile. “That’s the problem with being the boss. Nobody wants to get too friendly with you.”
“Must be lonely.”
“Same for you. It’s not like you’ve had much in the way of relationships for the last few years.”
His grin flashed. “I was saving myself for you.”
Inside, her tummy fluttered, and her heart smiled. “But who said I was saving myself for you?” She laughed at the look on his face.
“You’re a cruel woman.”
But he said it in such a joking tone that she knew he didn’t mean it. She really enjoyed the banter between them.
Just then the waitress arrived, and they ordered lunch. Knowing her afternoon could be busy, she ordered a healthy salad with chicken, then watched as Macklin ordered a double burger and fries.
“You know all that cholesterol will kill you one day.”
“You know a bullet could kill me a whole lot earlier too.”
She thought about that. “I guess that’s something you have to think about when you head off to these dangerous missions.”
“Hell no. That will get you all twisted up in knots. The last thing I want to do is think of how short my life could be, and I might not come back from any of these missions. There’s enough to worry about besides the ifs. I enjoy life, and I try to live it on a day-to-day basis, not worrying about the things I can’t change. Enough is going on in the world right now.”
“So your health isn’t an issue?”
“It is, indeed. And normally I watch the food I eat. But occasionally it’s nice to have food you want, even if it isn’t good for you.”
After that there was a lull in the conversation. Yet it wasn’t awkward. It was peaceful and calm. She really liked that. “If you do go overseas, when do you come back?”
He shrugged. “It could be anywhere from four to forty days. It depends on what’s happening.”
“We both have jobs like that. Lots of times I can’t talk about cases too.”
He rolled his head toward her and grinned. “Now that we’ve got some of those boundaries established, I think you should let me take you out for dinner.”
“We haven’t even finished lunch yet,” she protested.
“Well, we could jump into bed instead.” The grin that flashed on his face was knowing and full of mischief.
She didn’t know if she should take him seriously but figured he was ready to go whichever way she responded. “Not a good idea.”
He said, “Actually it’s a hell of a good idea. But I can understand needing to take a little more time. Can’t say I’m all that smooth at this anymore.”
“Good. Enough smooth males are around. I’d rather have natural and real.”
At that, he chuckled.
The waitress arrived, and they dropped their conversation. Alex settled back as her food was placed in front of her. The interruption was well-timed because she was confused at her feelings inside. And, if she went with her heart, she’d have said, “Bed now.”
But, if she went with her mind, it told her to back off and to stay backed off. Because of the investigation. If nothing else, it would make her look bad to the rest of the company if she had a relationship with one of the murder suspects.
That thought alone made her uncomfortable as she realized they were already in a public place, and this time it wasn’t to ask questions. To counter that, she brought out her notepad and placed it beside her, then pulled out a pen. She considered the notes from the doctor this morning. “This afternoon I’m meeting Marsha’s psychologist.” She glanced up to see he was studying her carefully as he ate. “I remember you saying she disappeared for a while?”
He nodded.
She said, “She spent six months in a mental facility, going through a series of tests. When they finally stabilized her medication, she was released.”
He froze for a long moment and then nodded. “That fits. Like I said, she had troubles with her medication all the time.”
“Troubles in what way?”
“Troubles in that sometimes she forgot to take it. Sometimes she did not know how many to take—they confused her. Or maybe she just didn’t care enough to get it straight in her head.”
“Or maybe she couldn’t. I feel like I must give her the benefit of doubt that her mental problems made more than just one area of her life difficult.”
“That’s because you’re a softie,” he said quietly. “But you wear it well.”
Flushing, she turned her attention to her salad and then attacked it with a little more force than necessary. It was kind of easy for him to say so, and, at the same time, it was a little awkward. She couldn’t remember the last time she had anybody quite as interested in her. It was funny he had never asked about that.
As if reading her mind, he said, “How long since your last relationship?”
Startled, she glanced up. “I was just thinking about that.”
“And what were you thinking about?”
“It ended several years ago,” she hedged.
He read her expression for a long moment and then shook his head. “Nope, there’s something behind that.”
She glared at him. “What if I don’t want to talk about it?”
He shrugged. “That’s your choice. Chances are the guy slept with somebody.”
She nodded. “Yeah. He wasn’t faithful, and I decided I didn’t need that or him.”
“Good. He wasn’t ready to settle down, and you needed something different. That’s what relationships are all about, finding what works and what doesn’t.”
She stared at him for a long moment. “Most people don’t have that attitude.”
“I’m not most people,” he said quietly. He again studied her. “And neither are you.”
She could feel the blush warming her cheeks. She lowered her gaze and continued to eat.
“So, about that dinner …”
She shot him a look. “You’re very persistent.”
“I am. Because I really want to get to know you.”
“I don’t have a problem with getting to know you. I do have a problem having a relationship with someone who’s a suspect in an active case. No, I don’t think you killed Marsha.”
“Thank you,” he said quietly. “I know the paperwork still hasn’t cleared me because you haven’t found the guy who did it, but I appreciate you saying that.”
She gave him a small smile. “But I’m new in my job, and the rest of the office will not look on this favorably.”
He thought about that for a long moment. “Now that I can see. And, because it makes sense to me, I’ll accept that as a reason. So we’ll take it a little slower than I would like. But we can work toward getting to know each other better.” He stared at her for a long moment. “Deal?”
She laughed. “Deal.”
Just as she lay down her fork, her phone buzzed. She glanced at it and frowned. “I have to return to the office. Somebody’s there to see me.”
“So why the frown? That could be a good thing.”
She nodded. “It just means work intrudes once again.”
Hearing that, he gave her a bright beam of a smile.
She stared at him in confusion. “What, that work intrudes?”
“No, that you consider this lunch not work. That means I’ve gone from being part of the job to something personal.”
She rolled her eyes and laughed. “Don’t let it go to your head.”
He leaned forward and whispered, “Never. It has already gone to my heart.” He chuckled when he saw she was flustered.
She shook her head, stood, pulled out her wallet.
He grabbed her hand. “Lunch is on me.”
She hesitated, but she was already late. “Fine, but I’m paying for the next lunch.” When she saw the cool satisfaction in his eyes, she said, “You did that deliberately.”
He chuckled. “Sure did. Where do you want to go for dinner?”
She groaned. “No idea. But I’ve got to run.” She snatched her keys off the table and walked out.
Alex couldn’t stop chuckling inside. Macklin might have manipulated her into another date, but it was hard to get angry. She really liked him; she loved their banter, the lighthearted attitude. Physically there was a hell of a lot more to love, but that was just because he was a huge man.
His sense of humor caught her the most. She hadn’t realized how dry and boring her life had become. He added some sparkle.
The traffic was much heavier on her way back to the station. She only had a few blocks to go, but it seemed like forever. She parked, strode into the station, and headed to her office. She barely had time to check her emails to make sure nothing else drastic was coming down on top of her before Lance poked his head in the door and said, “Are you ready for her?”
She looked up and nodded. “Who is she again?”
“You’ll see. This could be big.”
He disappeared only to reappear a few minutes later with an older woman—mid-fifties, maybe early sixties—in tow. She clutched her handbag nervously.
Alex rose and motioned to the visitor’s chair in front of her desk. “Have a seat please.”
Lance left them alone, closing the door with a sharp snick. The woman made a jump at the sound. Alex walked around the desk and hitched her hip on the corner. In a gentle, easy tone of voice, she said, “I’m Alex. What can I do for you?”
The woman took a deep breath. “I’m Betty. My last name is Kroger. And I live on Wagner Road.”
“In Silver Strand’s?”
The woman nodded. “Yes, but I’ve been away for the last ten days. I don’t spend a whole lot of time here now, as I lost my son in active duty three months ago, and I just can’t stay here. We don’t have to move out for another nine months, but I want to move out earlier, only I’m still too emotional to pack up his stuff.”
Inside Alex winced. “I’m so sorry. That’s extremely devastating for anybody.”
Betty’s shoulders shook, but she regained a bit of control after a moment. She took a deep breath again, let it out, and then tried for a third time.
“Whenever you’re ready, just tell me what’s going on.”
Betty shot her a grateful look. “I think my house was broken into,” she said in a rush.
Alex turned her gaze to the map. She had to get up and walk closer to find Wagner Road. It was within the area she had marked off for the B&Es. “What makes you think that?” She turned to face the woman who, now that she’d gotten the words out, seemed to be calmer.
“Well, that’s the thing. See? That’s why I didn’t want to come in. My daughter told me that I should. She says there’s been a lot of break-ins and that you needed to know about my place.”
“Why didn’t you want to come in?”
“Because I can’t see that anything is missing,” she said in frustration. “I don’t know how to explain that I know somebody was in there, but it …” She lifted her hands in appeal. “It feels different. It feels like a stranger was there. For all I know, he stayed there.”
“Interesting. As in, you’re afraid he stayed in the spare bedroom? Crashed on the couch? Moved into your room?”
The woman shrugged. “I don’t know, but potentially yes to all of it.”
“Okay. Start from the beginning. You got home from visiting your daughter …”
Betty nodded. “Yes. I’ve been spending a lot of time there with her in San Diego. I’m moving to a house on her street,” she confessed. “I have to move anyway, and the sooner the better, after this.”
“Completely understandable. Now what happened when you got home?”
“The door was locked. I unlocked the door, and I walked in,” she said and then retraced her steps. “But it was like being hit almost immediately with a sense of wrongness. I stood in the front entranceway, and I just didn’t know what to do. Now I know I’m very emotional about that property. I spent a lot of time with my son there. I get that. But this just didn’t feel right.”
“Okay. So tell me what felt wrong.”
“The smell for one.” She held up a hand. “I know you’ll say the house had been closed up, and of course it was stuffy smelling with no fresh air. But it was cigarette smoke. I swear to God it was cigarette smoke.”
Alex settled back on the desk, her arms crossed over her chest as she questioned the woman. “And you don’t smoke?”
“I hate cigarette smoke. My son never smoked either.”
“Friends of yours?”
“I can’t stand being around anybody who smokes. It clings to them. It’s in their hair. It’s in their clothing. It’s just terrible.”
“And how strong an odor was it?”
She slumped in the chair. “That’s the thing. It wasn’t that strong. So of course I thought I must be making it up.”
Alex smiled at her gently. “Sometimes our instincts are right. Don’t always knock them.”
Betty managed her first smile. “Thanks for that.”
“What happened afterward?”
Betty seemed to pull herself together, thinking for a long moment, then said, “I took off my jacket and hung it up in the front closet. And that was also off.”
“Off?”
Betty nodded. “All the jackets were pushed to one side. But they weren’t pushed to the side that was easily accessible. They were pushed to the far left, so I had to open both doors to get my jacket. I never open that door because it’s behind the front door so it’s awkward to get at. I only open the right-hand door, grab my jacket, and leave.”
“This time you’re saying, all the coats had been pushed to the left?” At Betty’s nod, Alex walked around the desk, sat down, and grabbed her notepad. “This is good. What else do you remember?”
“I hung up my coat, went to the kitchen, and put on the teakettle. I dropped my purse on the table there, and that was a sign I wasn’t feeling very secure. I normally put my purse right away in the entryway closet.”
“So you thought maybe you would need to grab it and run?” Alex asked out of curiosity.
“I don’t know. It was just one more thing that was off.” The woman shrugged. “I guess it was ten nights and eleven days I was gone, so I knew no food would be in the fridge.” She shook her head. “The thing is, I opened the fridge, maybe out of habit. I normally have milk in my tea, and of course there was no milk. Shouldn’t have been any milk. But I was so rattled at this point, that it was automatic to open the fridge. And milk was there.”
Alex sat back slowly. “The same brand of milk you use normally?” She studied the older woman, wondering how much of this was memory, how much of this was an intruder, how much of this was a friend who maybe took advantage, and how much did the woman not recollect, given her state of mind before she left.
“Well, yes. And it was a half-gallon. But it was also open. I wouldn’t have left milk for that long in the fridge. And that was the other thing. It was still good … after ten days?”
Her tone was almost apologetic, as if she was sorry she’d had to come and say these things.
“Okay, so let me get this right. You got home. The closet was not the way you’d left it, but the kitchen was the way you’d left it?”
Betty nodded.
“The fridge held fresh milk or at least milk not past its due date. And if you were gone ten days …” Alex nodded. “Okay, so what else?”
“I was a little freaked out over the milk, and I kept looking around to make sure nobody would pop out at me from behind the counter. I told myself that I needed to learn to live alone and not be so scared. And I didn’t have any reason to be scared. It’s not like my son was murdered in his house or anything. And I just didn’t have any reason, but I was jumpy, so I did a quick search of the downstairs. There’s not very many places anybody could hide, behind the couch maybe, but it’s sitting in the middle of the living room, so I could very quickly verify nobody was there. I couldn’t hear anybody, but I found the kitchen door to the backyard was unlocked.”
“And you normally keep it unlocked?”
“When I’m there, yes. But I know I locked it before I left.” Betty started to shake. “There are a lot of little things here, and I know they could be attributed to memory loss because I was upset. But I think, when added up, maybe they mean something other than that.”
“Well, let’s not worry about potential memory loss issues now,” Alex said. “What happened when you found the kitchen door unlocked?”
“I stepped out on the back porch and looked at the backyard.”
“And?”
Betty shrugged. “Nothing was obviously different or wrong. Nobody was there. Nothing had been added or taken away that I could see. It’s just a simple backyard with a couple lawn chairs and a table.”
“Were those chairs and table still in the same place?”
Betty nodded. “Yes, they were.”
“Okay. What did you do next?”
“I went back in and closed the kitchen door. I did not lock it, but that was a deliberate decision.”
Alex understood. Betty was not only giving herself a chance to grab her purse but she was giving herself an exit. “And then?” Alex prompted.
“I walked around to the front stairs and made it to the second floor. At the top landing, I saw my bedroom door was closed.”
Alex tapped the notepad with her pencil. “And I presume that’s not something you would normally do?”
“Not when I’m there. The only time I would close it would be if I was getting changed. That’s just out of habit.”
“Do you have any other bedrooms?”
“Yes, one. That door was open.”
Alex didn’t like where this was going. “Did you check out the spare bedroom?”
The woman nodded. “I checked out the spare bedroom. I checked out the bathroom. And honestly I was terrified to open up the master bedroom door.”
“With good reason. All right, you should’ve called us then.”
“And have you laugh at me? I’ve had just about enough of people telling me how I should feel and shouldn’t feel, and what I should do and shouldn’t do for the last three months.”
Alex could relate. Nothing like a disaster to have the world give an opinion about how you should handle things—with very well-meant personalities attached. But those words were not always welcome. “And did you open the door?”
Betty nodded. “I did. I told myself to stop being a baby, that I had nothing there anybody would want, and it was my home, and I needed to deal with this.”
Alex settled back and waited. Betty would get through the story on her own time; pushing wouldn’t help.
“I opened the door, and there was no sign of anyone. I stepped in. It looked the same, except for one thing.” She winced. “I swear to God, it wasn’t the same bedding I had on my bed before.”
*
Macklin paid the restaurant bill and headed off to work again. He was attending a series of computer security seminars, and they were all on base. The military was good at constantly upgrading the men’s skill sets. It seemed like the criminals of the world were split in two—those who used muscles and guns to get their way, and those who used computer hacking skills to get their way. Mac was strong on the assholes who liked to shoot and cause mayhem that way—but knew he could never become complacent with his IT skills. The good news was, it meant every one of these seminars was fascinating. There were always new ways to hack systems, new ways to bypass authentication systems, and new ways to hack into bank accounts and government databases. There was just no end to it.
He’d often wondered about going into that field as a specialty, but he wasn’t quite ready to stay at a desk. That really was a different way of life. Now he got to get the hell out, and he got to visit places all over the world. He was active; he’d always been a bit of a field junkie. But he had to admit that he was fascinated with this whole computer-hacking stuff too; he just didn’t have the innate talent for it. He worked at it. He knew other guys who were unbelievably good. And then of course there were the women he knew, like Tesla, Mason’s girlfriend, and Devlin’s girlfriend, Bristol, both of whom were brilliant.
But then they both used computers as an adjunct to their actual design work. They were big thinkers, global thinkers. They could see systems helping people when others were stuck considering how their inventions would work on a smaller scale. Those two women were special that way. He was grateful for the hours he got to spend with them, but he always walked away in awe of just where their brainpower took them. And they were both so damn normal. That really made it nice.
When the seminar ended, Corey smacked him on the shoulder and said, “You want to go for a run?”
Mac looked at him in surprise, then thought of the burger and fries he had for lunch. “Yeah, I do. You got a place in mind?”
Corey nodded. “I heard through the grapevine there could have been another house broken into.”
“How did you hear that?”
“The woman who lives there—her son died in the accident overseas. She’s been visiting her daughter in San Diego instead of staying alone at the house. The daughter is friends with an airman buddy. She told him, and he told someone else. … You know how it is. Apparently Mason heard about it. He’d planned to talk to you about it, but he’s in a meeting. It looks like we could be heading overseas pretty quick, and I figured, in the meantime, we should maybe take a run and assess the location of that house versus the others.”
The two of them walked out, notebooks in hand. “We could just look on a map too,” Macklin said in a dry tone.
But Corey was a physical guy too. Any chance he had to do things with his legs, he did them. “Yeah, but I could use the exercise,” Corey said with a groan. “And, if we are heading out soon, you know what that can be like. It will screw up our fitness routine completely.”
“And sometimes these trips exhaust us to the point we need a week off before getting back into doing anything.”
“Exactly what I meant.” With a big grin, the two headed off to get changed. Just before they separated at the parking lot, Corey said, “Ten minutes.”
“Where do you want to meet?” Macklin asked.
Corey looked at him with a smirk. “At your house, bro. We’re going for a long run today.”
Once home, Macklin raced up the stairs. Corey would be here in less than five minutes. He was up for the run, but at the same time, he was stressed and frustrated. Maybe that was why Corey had suggested a longer run, to do something to wear all that stress down.
He was dressed and back outside when Corey ran up to him. He tapped Macklin lightly on the shoulder and said, “Let’s go for it,” and he bolted.
Sprinting and laughing at the same time, Macklin raced to catch up. “We don’t have to sprint, do we?”
“Nah, just for the first couple minutes to get really warmed up. I feel like we haven’t had a good run in weeks.”
Macklin groaned. “Are you telling me that we’re settling in for something really big?”
“I figure we could do 10k easy.”
Relieved, Macklin picked up the pace, and, as he caught up with Corey, he smacked him on the shoulder and said, “You’re it.” And raced past him. Corey swore, gave a great big shout, and picked up the pace again. Macklin could hear his footsteps pounding behind him. But no way in hell would he let Corey catch up.
Making a game out of it made the 10k easier to get through. Nothing like a little friendly sibling rivalry to make them all happy.
After about 6k, Corey said, “We’re taking a right up here.”
Macklin turned to look around the area and said, “We’re pretty close to the other break-ins.”
“Exactly. There’s also something weird about that latest break-in.”
“What? You’re not exactly giving me details here.”
“There’s a chance the intruder might have moved in for a few days.”
That almost brought Macklin to a stop.
Immediately Corey raced ahead. “Got you.”
Swearing, Macklin caught up with Corey. “So did you mean that, or was that just to set me off my stride?”
“I meant it. Apparently the bedding had been changed and there was milk, potentially food, in the fridge—as if the guy decided the house was empty, and he should have a place to stay.”
“So that was likely his base of operation.”
“Maybe, but the mother’s home now. So what the hell will happen when he finds out?”
Swearing once again, Macklin pulled out his phone and dialed Alex. He was running, so he tried to stabilize his breath so he didn’t sound like he was a complete moron when she answered. But instead her phone went to voice mail.
Corey looked over at him. “She already knows. Mason will have contacted her. Plus the daughter said she had convinced her mother to talk to the police.”
Relieved, Macklin put away his phone. “I want to see this house.”
“I think everybody does.”
“But, more important, we need to know if that was his base. And if he made those four hits from there. We still don’t know why he entered those places, and what we really need to know is what his plans are.”
“If she doesn’t go home again, he might go back on his own.”
“Well, I’ve already heard about it, and you know the police have heard about it, so what’s the chance this guy has heard it too?”
The two men exchanged glances.
“Somebody needs to make sure she’s not going back to her house,” Macklin said. “We’ve already had enough women injured and killed.”
“Do you really think Marsha’s death is involved in this?” Corey asked.
“It’s hard not to. Just think about it. How often do we have this many crimes in this area? Serious ones, like this? They’ve got to be connected. Nothing else makes any sense.”