Before He Harms

“I know. But today it’s my mom. Tomorrow, what if my sister wants to step up and be an aunt all of a sudden?”

“Then you have to let her. Or, at the very least, let her try.”

“Oh, but you haven’t met Stephanie…”

“And I hadn’t met your mother until yesterday. Yet here we are, in the sky while she and my mother are down below, taking care of our son. And if I can be honest…?”

“Please do.”

“I think you’re worried about it because you aren’t worried about it. You and I were both rocked by how natural it felt. Maybe we just need to go with it and focus on this case. Our mothers raised us and we turned out fine, after all.”

“Did we, though?” she asked with a smirk.

“Eh, good enough.”

Mackenzie continued to sip from her coffee and did exactly what Ellington had suggested, turning her thoughts away from the surprising result back home and toward the case.

***

They drove their rental car sixteen miles outside of Salt Lake City, on task to beat McGrath’s projection of a noon arrival by nearly an hour. The town where the woman without an identity had been murdered was a cute little place called Fellsburg. It was a slightly upscale town, likely the sort of town that thrived only because it was so close to Salt Lake City. Mackenzie imagined most of the population made that commute daily, working in the city and then coming back to their homes in one of the numerous neighborhoods in Fellsburg.

Following the file notes and instructions in the information McGrath had emailed to them, Ellington drove them to a subdivision called Plainsview. It looked like the two other subdivisions they had to pass to get there—two-story houses, cookie-cutouts of one another. Nice trimmed yards, security streetlights every one hundred feet or so.

But they didn’t have to venture far into Plainsview. Four houses after the entrance, there was a cop car parked on the side of the street. This was the officer who had arranged to meet with them when Mackenzie had called from the airport to announce their arrival. He was already getting out of his patrol car when Ellington pulled in behind him.

The three of them met between the cars, going through a round of introductions. The badge and pin he wore on his chest indicated he was Sheriff Burke.

“Agents,” Burke said. “Thanks for coming out. I’m Sheriff Declan Burke.”

Mackenzie and Ellington gave their names, shaking hands with him. Mackenzie guessed Burke to be about fifty or so. He had a thick beard that could use a trim and a hardened face. His eyes were hidden behind a pair of aviator sunglasses even though the morning was not bright at all.

“This is where the body was discovered?” Mackenzie asked.

“It is. Right there.” Burke pointed to a spot just slightly right of center.

“According to the report, there was nothing on her except a driver’s license, correct?”

“That, and a pair of sandals. They were wet from the little bit of rain we had gotten that day. She wasn’t wearing the sandals, though. At first, I thought the car knocked her out of them, but the MD pointed out that there were cuts and abrasions on her feet that indicated she took them off in the hopes of maybe running faster.”

“Any idea how far she had been running?” Ellington asked.

“We’re not really clear on that,” Burke said. “There’s a field about a mile and a half away from here that shows some signs of someone passing through that same night. But the growth of weeds and wild grass makes it impossible to tell for sure if it was this woman—or even a human being at all. Could have been a deer or something.”

“And no one around here saw anything?” Mackenzie asked. She looked down the street, to the slightly sloping road and the nice homes. There were plenty of streetlights. It was hard to believe no one had seen anything.

“My men and I questioned every homeowner on this street. We have one night owl who claims to have seen an old town car driving through the neighborhood with its lights off. But they didn’t get a plate number.”

“And what about the girl?” Ellington said. “No known identity at all?”

“None that we can find. The driver’s license was a fake. And a damned convincing one at that. We of course took her fingerprints and drew blood. None of them match to anyone in the system.”

“That makes no sense,” Ellington commented.

“And that’s why we called you guys out here,” Burke said. “You saw the pictures of the body at the scene, I assume?”

“Yes,” Mackenzie said. “Black duct tape over her mouth. The ME believes it was placed there postmortem.”

“That’s right. Checked the tape for prints and got nothing.”

Mackenzie had studied that strip of tape in the photographs for a while last night and on the plane this morning. She figured it could be symbolic, some way of the killer letting the woman know even in death that she needed to be quiet. But why? What did she have to say?

“With no identity, I guess it’s been next to impossible to identify friends or family members,” Ellington said.

“Yeah. We have nothing. So I will now gladly hand this over to you. Need anything from me?”

“Yes, actually,” Mackenzie said. “No prints were found on the driver’s license?”

“Just the girl’s.”

“What’s the forensics lab like at your station?”

“Not state of the art by any means, but better than most in towns of this size.”

“Get your forensics guys to take a closer look at that license. Check it under a microscope with ultraviolet light. Some forgers put a little signature or mark on their work. It’s always hidden well, but sometimes it’s there. Sort of a sneaky little middle-finger to people like us.”

“I’ll do that,” Burke said. “Anything else?”

Mackenzie was about to ask Ellington what he thought, but she was interrupted by the ringing of her phone. It was on silent, but they could all hear it buzzing from inside her coat pocket. She turned away and pulled the phone out of her pocket. She was irritated and a little alarmed to see it was her mother. She nearly ignored it but the thought of her and Frances keeping Kevin sat heavy on her mind.

She took a few steps away and answered the call, already dreading the news that may be waiting on the other end.

“Hey, Mom. Is everything okay?”

“Yes, everything is good. Kevin is perfectly fine.”

“So then why the call? You know I’m right at the start of case, right?”

“I do. But I just need to know something. Is Frances always this overbearing?”

“How do you mean?”

“Just being bossy. I know she’s been around Kevin more than I have but she’s acting like she knows every single detail about him, and questioning everything I do.”

“That’s why you’re calling me?”

“Yes. I’m sorry, Mackenzie, I just—”

“Both of you are big girls. You’ll find a way to work together. For now, I have to go. Please, Mom…don’t call me again unless it’s urgent.”