She walked up to a rusted fence behind her property. Across a stretch of green grass was a cluster of trees. That was where he was, somewhere in those shadows.
“Who are you? Why do you do this?”
There was no answer. There never was. She turned away and walked back inside the house. She slammed the door behind her and locked it, although locks couldn’t protect her. Somehow, he always knew how to get inside. She emptied the cartridge from the gun and laid it on the kitchen table, and at that point, she finally broke down. Her knees buckled, and she slid to the floor. Tears fell down her face. Her shoulders jerked as she sobbed, letting out all her fear.
When she was done, she wiped her face and got up again.
The foil box waited for her on the kitchen table. It was like all the others before, silver, with a yellow bow on top. Her fingers trembling, she took it and removed the lid. She knew what she would find inside. A suncatcher to add to the collection he’d created for her. This one was round, with a white dove in the center, its wings spread. The bird flew in front of a yellow sun, which gave out beams of light that broke into pieces of red, blue, green, orange, and purple glass.
The suncatchers had arrived many times in the past seven years. She’d never seen who it was; she’d never been able to catch him in the act. In the early days, he’d been discreet, leaving the boxes outside, on a doorstep, on the railing of her back porch. It had seemed like a game then, surprises from a secret admirer. Later, he’d grown bolder and darker, breaking inside her house to leave his tokens behind. That was when she was alone and divorced.
She had more than twenty of the suncatchers now. Instead of smashing them, instead of throwing them away, she kept them. At some point, she’d begun to hang them on her kitchen window. She couldn’t even explain to herself why she did that. Maybe she wanted him to see them and realize she wasn’t scared of his nighttime visits.
Or maybe it was something else.
It had been nearly a year since the last one arrived. That was the longest gap without receiving one, and she’d assumed he was done, or gone, or dead. Strangely, she’d almost missed him.
But now he was back.
The timing couldn’t be a coincidence. He’d come back right after Ned Baer’s body had been found, which had a strange symmetry. The very first of the suncatchers had shown up the summer that Ned Baer arrived on her doorstep. Someone had been sending her a message. He still was.
She took the suncatcher out of the box and held it in her hands, and then she looked for the note. There was always a note, written on a fold-over card in block handwriting.
It was the same message every time.
Forgive every sin.
14
Dan Erickson hadn’t changed.
Maggie hadn’t seen Dan in more than five years, but when he came into the conference room the next morning, it was as if no time had passed. His cologne always advertised his arrival. He wasn’t tall, but if she measured by ego, he was a basketball player, and he walked into every room like he owned it. His skin had the artificial glow of hours spent in a tanning bed. His hair was blond, with a trimmed corporate cut. He wore a well-tailored dark suit with a loud red tie that made people notice him.
She couldn’t deny to herself that he looked good. He always did. He still made her feel like a naïve kid, having sex with a married man, foolishly thinking he’d leave his wife to be with her. Dan slumped into a chair and leaned far back, putting his leather shoes on the table. His lips drew into a Tom Cruise grin.
“Maggie, Maggie, Maggie.”
“Hello, Dan.”
“I like the long hair. It looks good. I was never a fan of the bowl cut.”
“I’m so relieved. If you didn’t like it, I would have gone right out and cut it off.”
He chuckled at her sarcasm. “Oh, Maggie, still the same. Still that sharp tongue of yours. Of course, I won’t lie, your tongue was always one of your best features.”
“Fuck you, Dan.”
He didn’t look offended. “And the nasty mouth, too! Dirty talk turns me on, but I’m sure you remember that. Come on, Maggie, lighten up. I was excited when K-2 said we’d be working together. You, me, just like the good old days.”
“I don’t remember the old days being very good,” Maggie replied.
“Seriously? I’m disappointed. How many years has it been since we had our little fling? I assumed we were finally past the hard feelings. I mean, come on, it didn’t last long.”
“As I recall, nothing about you lasted very long.”
“Ouch! Another poison arrow. Look, I know you and Stride were hoping you’d seen the last of me, but here I am. The bad penny back again.”
He was right about that. Dan was a punching bag who kept bouncing back and never stayed down for too long. In his early years as the St. Louis County Attorney, he’d been buzzed about as a statewide political candidate. He had the right connections, the right look, the right wife, the right bank account. But when his appetites got the better of him, he’d lost it all, including his wife. Dan had resigned in disgrace, but he’d remade himself since then as a corporate lawyer. Judging by his appearance, he’d made back most of the money he lost.
Dan opened the thick police file in front of him. “Shall we get down to work? What do you think? Did Stride do it?”
Maggie gave him a frozen look. “Dan, if you can’t be objective—”
“I’m being completely objective,” he replied. “I read the file. I heard your interview. Stride’s the obvious suspect.”
“Well, he didn’t do it. He told me flat out in my interview that he didn’t do it.”
“Oh, wow, a suspect denied committing murder during interrogation? Shut down the investigation and let’s all go home. Is that the standard you’d apply in any other case, Maggie? Seems to me the only one not being objective here is you.”
Maggie hated being outdueled, and she hated even more that Dan was right. “Okay. You’re in charge, not me. How do you want to proceed?”
Dan’s eyes glittered with satisfaction. “That’s more like it. I like seeing the submissive side of you. Look, I know you and Stride go way back and you think he’s innocent. I also won’t deny that he and I have had our difficulties over the years. That doesn’t mean I’m out to get him, but it also doesn’t mean he gets a free pass. As far as I’m concerned, we treat him the way we would any other suspect. We go where the evidence takes us. Period. That work for you?”
“Fine.”
“So what do we know? Not what do we think, not what do we assume, not what do we hope, not what anybody else tells us. What do we know?”
“Everything we know is thanks to Stride,” Maggie replied. “He opened up the case himself, which he didn’t need to do. He’s the one who told us about Steve Garske’s dying declaration. That’s the only reason we found the body.”
“Okay,” Dan agreed. “Point goes to Stride. Have we heard anything from the medical examiner about the autopsy?”
“Yes, Violet just sent over her report. She confirmed the body is Ned Baer. We got records from Ned’s dentist in Colorado, and the match is perfect. It’s him. Cause of death was exactly what it looked like, 9 mm to the skull. Violet recovered the bullet, and we’re sending it through the BCA to see if any matches show up in the system. That’ll take a while.”
“What else do we have?” Dan asked.
“Not much. Seven years ago, we were still trying to ascertain why Ned disappeared. We didn’t uncover any evidence to suggest a crime had been committed, so we didn’t investigate it as a murder. The circumstances suggested that it was probably an accidental death.”