Before He Feels

CHAPTER FIVE

Shortly before Frances brought in the coffee, Officer Lambert returned. Now that he was not texting on his phone, Mackenzie saw that he was a younger man, in his early thirties. She found it odd that an officer was serving as Clarke’s right-hand man rather than a deputy but didn’t think much of it.

Small town, she thought.

The four of them sat around Clarke’s desk, going over the material. Clarke seemed to be more than happy to let Mackenzie run with it. She was happy to see that he appeared to be coming around quickly…accepting her as more than an equal.

“So let’s start with the most recent,” she said. “Ellis Ridgeway. Fifty-seven years old. As I’m beginning to learn, she has a very arrogant and self-important son. Other than the fact that she was obviously blind, what else can you tell me about her?”

“That’s about it, really,” Clarke said. “She was a sweet lady. From what I can gather, everyone at the home loved her. What scares me about this whole situation is that the killer has to be familiar with her, right? They had to have known she had left the home to target her in such a way.”

“My brain wanted to go there, too,” Mackenzie said. “But if these deaths are connected – and it certainly seems they are – that means that for someone local who knows her to have done it, there would have been a lot of traveling involved. The other death was what…two and a half hours away?”

“Almost three,” Clarke said.

“Exactly,” Mackenzie said. “You know, I even wondered for a while if it could have been another resident, but I got it on good authority from Randall Jones that no one followed her yesterday. There’s apparently video evidence of this which we haven’t seen yet, thanks to Langston Ridgeway’s interference. And in terms of residents or employees leaving the home when Mrs. Ridgeway was absent, there is no evidence to support anyone else leaving during that time – not residents, not employees, no one.”

“And then, going back to that first murder,” Ellington said, “we’ll need to head over to speak to family members soon. What can you tell us about the first victim, Sheriff?”

“Well, it was at another home for the blind,” he said. “And all I know about it is in that same file you have, I’m sure. Like I said, it’s almost three hours from here, nearly up in West Virginia. A rundown sort of place from what I gather. Not really a home, but like a school, I think.”

He slid a sheet of paper over to her and she saw the brief police report from the first scene. It was in a city called Treston, about twenty-five miles away from Bluefield, West Virginia. Thirty-eight-year-old Kenneth Able had been strangled to death. There were slight abrasions around his eyes. He’d been discovered stashed in the closet of the room he stayed in most of the time within the home.

The facts were very robotic, with no details. While there were notes about the investigation being ongoing, Mackenzie doubted it was anything serious.

I bet it is now, though, she thought.

This new death was too explicit to deny. The victims were far too similar, as were the signs of abuse on the bodies.

“I’ve got Randall Jones compiling a list of employees or others associated with the home that could be even the least bit possible,” Mackenzie said. “I think our next best bet is to speak with this place in Treston to see if there are any links at all.”

“The downside here is that Treston is so damned far away,” Ellington pointed out. “Even if this turns out to be a cakewalk, there will be some travel involved. Seems we might not get it all buttoned up as quickly as the illustrious Mr. Ridgeway would like.”

“When will a full forensics workup be done on Mrs. Ridgeway?” Mackenzie asked.

“I’m expecting to hear something within a few hours,” Clarke said. “A preliminary investigation showed nothing obvious, though. No fingerprints, no visible hairs or other materials left behind.”

Mackenzie nodded and looked back to the case files. As she had just started to properly dig into it, her cell phone rang. She snatched it up and answered: “This is Agent White.”

“It’s Randall Jones. I have a list of names for you, like you asked. It’s short and I’m pretty sure they’ll all check out, though.”

“Who are they?”

“There’s a guy on the maintenance crew that isn’t very reliable. He worked all day yesterday, clocking out just after five. I’ve asked around and no one ever saw him come back in. There’s another man that works for a special outlet of social services. He comes in and plays board games sometimes. Sort of just hangs out and jokes around with them. He’ll do some volunteer stuff like cleaning or moving furniture from time to time.”

“Can you text me their names and any contact information you have?”

“Sure thing,” Jones said, clearly not happy to even be considering either of the men as suspects.

Mackenzie ended the call and looked back to the three men in the room. “That was Jones with two possible candidates. A maintenance worker and someone that comes in to volunteer and hang out with the residents. Sheriff, he’s going to text me the names any moment now. Could you look them over and – ”

Her phone dinged as she received the text in question. She showed Sheriff Clarke the names and he shrugged, defeated.

“The first name, Mike Crews, is the maintenance guy,” he said. “I know for a fact he wasn’t killing anyone after hours last night because I had a beer with him down at Rock’s Bar. That’s after he went by Mildred Cann’s house to fix her air conditioner for free. I can tell you right now that Mike Crews is not your man.”

“And what about the second name?” Ellington asked.

“Robbie Huston,” he said. “I’ve only ever seen him in passing. I’m pretty sure he’s sent by some sort of social services outlet out of Lynchburg. But from what I understand, he’s like a saint up at the home. Reads to the residents, is really friendly. Like I said, he’s out of Lynchburg. That’s about an hour and a half away from here – right on your way to Treston, as a matter of fact.”

Mackenzie looked back to Jones’s text and saved the number he had provided for Robbie Huston. It was a flimsy lead at best, but at least it was something.

She looked at her watch and saw that it was nearing six o’clock. “When are your deputy and other officers due to report back in?” she asked.

“Pretty soon. But no one has called in with anything yet. I’ll keep you updated if you want to head out and get your bearings.”

“Sounds good to me,” Mackenzie said.

She gathered up the case files as she got to her feet. “Thanks for your help this afternoon,” Mackenzie said.

“Of course. I just wish I could offer you more assistance. If you want, I could get the State PD back out here to assist. They were here this morning but scattered pretty quick. I think there might even be a few of them staying here in town for a day or so.”

“If it comes to that, I’ll let you know,” Mackenzie said. “Good night, gentlemen.”

With that, she and Ellington took their leave. The front lobby was empty now, Frances having apparently clocked out for the day.

In the parking lot, Ellington hesitated for a moment as he took the keys out. “Hotel or a trip to Lynchburg?” he asked.

She thought about it and although the lure of continuing the investigation even into the later hours was a strong one, she felt that trying to get in touch with Robbie Huston on the phone would yield the same results as a trip to Lynchburg. More than that, she was already starting to believe that Sheriff Clarke knew what he was doing – and if he had no real reservations about Huston, then she would rely on that for now. It was one of the better things about working a case in a small town – when everyone knew everyone else on an almost intimate basis, the opinions and instincts of local police could often be heavily relied upon.

Still worth calling him once we settle down, she thought.

“Hotel,” she said. “If I can’t get what I want out of a call to him tonight, we’ll stop by Lynchburg tomorrow.”

“On the way to Treston? Seems like a lot of driving.”

She nodded. It was going to be a lot of back and forth. They may be more successful if they split up tomorrow. But they could discuss strategy after they were checked into a room with the case files before them and an air conditioner blasting away beside them.

Never one for the lure of luxury, the idea of an air conditioner in this oppressive heat was too good to resist. They got into the blazing hot car, Ellington rolled the windows down, and they headed west, into what served as the heart of Stateton.

Stateton’s only motel was a surprisingly well-kept little square of a building called the Staunton County Inn. It held only twelve rooms, nine of which were vacant when Mackenzie walked into the lobby and requested a room for the night. Now that McGrath knew about their relationship, she and Ellington no longer worried about renting two rooms just to hold up appearances. They booked a single room with one bed and, after a stressful day of driving in the heat, made good use of it the moment the door closed behind them.

Afterward, as Mackenzie showered, she couldn’t help but appreciate the warm feeling of being wanted. It was more than that, though; the fact that they had started peeling off clothes the moment they were alone and had access to a bed made her feel like she was about ten years younger. It was a good feeling, but one she tried very hard to keep in check. Yes, she was enjoying things with Ellington, and whatever was occurring between them was one of the most exciting and promising things to happen to her in recent years, but she also knew that if she wasn’t careful she could let it interfere with her work.

She sensed that he knew this, too. He was risking the same things as she was: reputation, mockery, and heartbreak. Although lately, she wasn’t sure if he was too worried about heartbreak. As she got to know him better, she was pretty sure Ellington was not the type of guy who slept around or treated women poorly, but she also knew that he had just come out of a failed marriage and was being very cautious about their relationship – if that’s what they were choosing to call it.

She was getting the sense that Ellington would not be too shaken up if things ended between them. As for her…well, she wasn’t sure how she might take it.

As she stepped out of the shower and dried off, Ellington was there, in the bathroom. It looked like he had planned to join her in the shower but had just missed his chance. He was giving her a look that held a bit of his usual slyness but also something concrete and stoic – something she had come to think of as his “work expression.”

“Yes?” she asked playfully.

“Tomorrow…I don’t want to do it, but maybe we should split up. One of us head up to Treston while the other stays here and works with the local PD and the coroner.”

She smiled, realizing just how in sync they could become from time to time. “I was thinking the same thing.”

“You have a preference?” he asked.

“Not really. I’ll take Lynchburg and Treston. I don’t mind driving.”

She thought he was going to argue, wanting to take the time on the road instead. She knew he didn’t particularly like driving, but he also didn’t like the idea of her being out on the road all by herself.

“Sounds good,” he said. “If we can wrap the day up with new information from the home in Treston with whatever information we get from the coroner down here, we could maybe get this thing tied up quickly like everyone is expecting.”

“Sounds great,” she said. She planted a kiss on his mouth as she passed by.

A thought passed through her mind as she headed back out into the room, one that made her feel almost lovesick but could not be denied.

What if he doesn’t feel the same way about me as I feel about him?

He’d felt slightly distant over the last week or so, and while he had done his best to hide it from her, she’d seen it here and there.

Maybe he realizes just how much this could affect our work.

It was a good reason – a reason she often thought about herself. But she couldn’t worry about that right now. With a coroner’s report being delivered any moment now, this case had the potential to get rolling pretty quickly. And she knew that if her mind were on matters of Ellington and what they meant to one another, it might roll on by completely.

CHAPTER SIX

When they split up the following morning, Mackenzie was surprised to notice that Ellington seemed particularly somber about it. He hugged her a bit longer than usual in the motel room and looked rather depressed when she dropped him off at the Stateton PD. With a wave through the windshield as he walked inside, Mackenzie headed back for the main road with a two-hour-and-forty-minute drive ahead of her.

Being in the woods, the signal on her phone was spotty. She was not able to place a call to Jones’s second potential suspect, Robbie Huston, until she was about ten miles outside of Stateton city limits. When she finally got the call to go through, he answered on the second ring.

“Hello?”

“Is this Robbie Huston?” she asked.

“It is. Who’s asking?”

“This is Agent Mackenzie White with the FBI. I was wondering if you’d have time to chat this morning.”

“Um…can I ask what about?”

His confusion and surprise were genuine. She could tell even over the phone.

“About a resident of the Wakeman Home for the Blind that I believe you know. I can’t reveal more than that over the phone. If you could give me just five or ten minutes of your time this morning, I’d appreciate it. I’ll be coming through Lynchburg in about an hour.”

“Sure,” he said. “I work from home, so you’re welcome to just come by my apartment if you want.”

She ended the call after she got his address. She plugged it into her GPS and was relieved to see that getting to his apartment would only add another twenty minutes to her drive.

On the way to Lynchburg, she found herself far too distracted by the facts of this current case, bogged down with the hundreds of unanswered questions surrounding her father’s old case and the new death that had brought it back to light. For some reason, the same people who had killed her father had killed someone else in a very similar fashion.

And once again, they had left a cryptic business card behind. But why?

She’d spent weeks trying to figure it out. Maybe the killer was just cocky. Or maybe the cards were supposed to lead investigators to something else…like a twisted sort of cat and mouse game. She knew that Kirk Peterson was still on the case – a humble and dedicated private detective back in Nebraska whom she didn’t know well enough to trust completely. Still, the fact that someone was actively keeping the trail as fresh as possible was reassuring. It made her feel like the puzzle might be nearly shut to her but that someone had snuck a piece off of the table and was holding on to it, determined to put it in at the very last moment.

She’d never felt so defeated by anything else in her life. It was no longer a question of whether or not she could bring her father’s killer to justice, but more about putting a decades-old mystery to rest. As her mind was wrapped around it all, her phone started ringing. She saw an the sheriff’s number in the display, answering and hoping for some sort of clue to the current case.

“G’morning, Agent White,” Sheriff Clarke said on the other end. “Look, you know the cell reception down here in Stateton is crap. I’ve got Agent Ellington here, wanting to speak to you really quick. His cell phone couldn’t get the call out.”

She listened to the phone being jostled on the other end as it was handed over to Ellington. “So,” he said. “Lost without me yet?”

“Hardly,” she said. “I’m meeting with Robbie Huston in a little over an hour.”

“Ah, progress. Speaking of which, I’m looking at the coroner’s report right now. Hot off the presses. I’ll let you know if I find anything. Randall Jones is coming in pretty soon, too. I might see if he’ll let me speak to a few of the other residents up at the home.”

“Sounds good. I’ll be driving past cow pastures and empty fields for the next three hours.”

“Ah, the glamorous life,” he said. “Call if you need anything.”

And with that, he ended the call.

This was how they exchanged barbs back and forth all of the time. It made her feel a little foolish for her earlier worries about how he was feeling about whatever it was that was evolving between them.

With the phone call having brought thoughts of her father’s old case to a close, she was able to better focus on the case at hand. The digital thermometer on her car’s dash told her that it was eight-eight degrees outside already…and it wasn’t even nine o’clock yet.

The trees along the side of the back roads were impossibly thick, hanging over the road like an awning. And while there was something mysteriously pretty about them in the weak light of an early southern morning, she couldn’t wait for the wider expanses of major highways and four lanes that would lead her toward Lynchburg and Treston.

Robbie Huston lived in a trendy little apartment complex near the central heart of Lynchburg. It was surrounded by college-owned bookshops and coffee corners that likely only thrived due to the large private Christian college that loomed over most of the city. When she knocked on his door at 9:52, he answered almost right away.

He looked to be in his early twenties – wiry, uncombed hair, and the sort of soft complexion that made Mackenzie think any work he’d ever done was from behind a desk. He was cute in a frat boy sort of way and was on the verge of either excitement or nervousness to actually have an FBI agent knocking on his door.

He invited her inside and she saw that the inside of the apartment was just as nice and modern as the outside. The living area, kitchen, and study were all one large room, separated by small ornate dividers and flooded with natural sunlight that poured in through two huge picture windows on opposite walls.

“Um…can I get you some coffee or something?” he asked. “I’ve still got some left in my morning pot.”

“Coffee would be great, actually,” she said.

She followed him into the kitchen where he poured her a cup and handed it to her. “Cream? Sugar?”

“No thanks,” she said. She took a sip, found it quite good, and got to the point. “Mr. Huston, you often volunteer at the Wakeman Home for the Blind, is that correct?”

“Yes.”

“About how often?”

“It depends on my workload, really. Sometimes I can only make it down once or twice a month. There have been months when I was able to make it down once a week, though.”

“How about lately?” Mackenzie asked.

“Well, I was there on Monday of this week. Last week, I went on Wednesday and the week before that I was there on Monday and Friday, I think. I can show you my schedule.”

“Maybe later,” she said. “Speaking with Randall Jones, I found out that you will go to play board games and maybe help move furniture and clean. Is that right?”

“Yes, that’s right. Every now and then I’ll read to them, too.”

“Them? Which residents in particular have you read to or played board games with in the past two weeks?”

“A few. There’s an older gentleman by the name of Percy that I play Apples to Apples with. At least one caretaker has to play, too…to whisper what the cards say to him. And last week, I talked quite a bit with Ellis Ridgeway about music. I also read to her for a while.”

“Do you know when you spent this time with Ellis?”

“The last two trips down there. Monday, I let her listen to Brian Eno. We talked about classical music and I read her an article online about some of the ways classical music is used to stimulate the brain.”

Mackenzie nodded, knowing it was time to throw her biggest card on the table. “Well, I hate to tell you this, but Ellis was found murdered Tuesday night. We’re trying to find out who did it, and as I’m sure you understand, we had to look into anyone who had spent time with her recently. Especially volunteers that aren’t always in the home.”

“Oh my God,” Robbie said, his face going paler and paler by the moment.

“Before Mrs. Ridgeway, there was another murder in a home in Treston, Virginia. Have you ever been there?”

Robbie nodded. “Yes, but only twice. Once was for a sort of community service thing we do through Liberty, my alma mater. I helped remodel their kitchen and did some landscaping. I went back a month or two later to help where I could. It was mostly just relationship-building stuff.”

“How long ago was this?”

He thought about it, still shaken by the news of the two murders. “Four years, I’d say. Maybe closer to four and a half.”

“Do you recall meeting a man named Kenneth Able when you were there? He was also killed recently.”

Again, he seemed lost in thought. His eyes almost seemed frozen. “The name doesn’t sound familiar. But that doesn’t mean I never spoke to him while I was there.”

Mackenzie nodded, growing more and more certain that Robbie Huston was far from a killer. She couldn’t be sure, but she thought she saw his eyes gleaming with tears as she gulped down some of the coffee he had given her.

Can’t be too careful, though, she thought.

“Mr. Huston, we know for certain that Mrs. Ridgeway was killed half a mile away from Wakeman’s grounds sometime between seven-oh-five and nine forty on Tuesday night. Do you have any sort of alibis for that stretch of time?”

She saw that searching look for a third time but then he started to nod very slowly. “I was here, in the apartment. I was on a conference call with three other guys. We’re starting this small little organization to help the homeless downtown and in other surrounding cities.”

“Any proof?”

“I could show you where I logged in. I think one of the other guys keeps pretty good notes of the calls, too. There will be all kind of time-stamped message threads, note edits, and things like that.” He was already heading for his laptop, sitting on a desk in front of one of the large windows. “Here, I can show you if you want.”

She was now positive that Robbie Huston was innocent but she wanted to see it through. Given the way the news had affected him, she also wanted Robbie to feel like he had contributed something to the case. So she watched over his shoulder as he went to the conference platform site, logged in, and pulled up his history not just for the last few days, but the last several weeks as well. She saw that he had been telling the truth: he’d been taking part in a conference call and planning session from 6:45 to 10:04 on Tuesday night.

The whole process took him less than five minutes to get through, showing her the notes and edits, as well as when he logged in and signed out of the call.

“Thanks so much for your help, Mr. Huston,” she said.

He nodded as he walked her to the door. “Two blind people…” he said, trying to make sense of it. “Why would someone do that?”

“I’m trying to find that out for myself,” she said. “Please do call me if you think of anything that might help,” she added, offering him one of her cards.

He took it, waved a slow goodbye, and then closed the door as she made her exit. Mackenzie almost felt like she’d just delivered the news of the murders to family members rather than a kind-hearted young guy who seemed to genuinely care about both of the deceased.

She almost envied that…feeling genuine remorse for strangers. Lately, she had seen the dead as nothing more than corpses – unnamed mounds, ripe with potential clues.

It wasn’t the best way to live a life, she knew. She couldn’t let the job wipe out her sense of compassion. Or her humanity.