His voice flat, he responded, “Yeah… I had a feelin’ that’s what you were gonna say. Jeezus… What the hell’ve you stepped in up there, hon?”
“I don’t know yet,” she admitted. “But I’m pretty sure the sheriff isn’t the only one holding out on me.”
“Feeb central?”
“Possibly. I don’t know. I just don’t want any red flags popping up until I’m sure, so if you could mask the queries somehow that would help. I just definitely don’t want them coming from my computer with my ID.”
“Okay, tell me exactly where you’re stayin’,” he said. “I’m on my way.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean I’m comin’ up there.”
“No,” she objected. “I need you to stay right where you are and do that background check for me.”
“Constance, think about it. You’re in the middle of north fuckin’ nowhere, workin’ a jacked up serial case, and now you’re tellin’ me your own people might be coverin’ somethin’ up. You need backup, hon, and you need it yesterday.”
His reaction wasn’t wholly unexpected, and it made her glad she’d held back on the emotional information dump. If she’d told him about the anonymous email and texts, or especially the incident at the soda machine last night, he would probably already be halfway here. There were times when it was cute that he wanted to come to her rescue, but this wasn’t one of them.
“Don’t overreact, Ben. I appreciate your concern-really I do-but I can take care of myself.”
“I know you can, but this could be different.”
“I’m a big girl, Ben. With a badge and a gun and bullets and everything.”
“I just dunno… What if-”
She cut him off. “I can take care of myself. Think about it… I took you to the mat, didn’t I?”
“Two outta three falls.”
“Well?”
“It’s that one outta the three that worries me, hon.”
“I wasn’t going to tell you this, but I let you win that time. I didn’t want you to feel totally emasculated by a woman who’s more than a foot shorter than you.”
“Dammit, I’m serious, Constance.”
She puffed her cheeks as she blew out a protracted breath, then answered, “I know you are. But I’m serious too. I can take care of myself and you know it. Besides… This is all just speculation at this point. I’m not even sure there’s a cover-up, but even if there is, there have been too many agents involved before me, and they’re all still alive and kicking. If there’s a danger in this, it will most likely be to my career, not my life.”
“Jeezus…” he moaned. “I still don’t like it. Not at all.”
“Don’t worry so much,” she appealed. “Just see what info you can get for me. Maybe then I’ll know where I stand.”
“Yeah… Okay… Let me make some calls. I dunno how quick this is gonna happen with it bein’ a holiday, especially if I gotta fly low. I’m prob’ly gonna hafta call in some markers.”
“I understand. But the sooner the better.”
“Yeah… Always is.”
“Okay… Well, I have some leads to follow up, and then I need to try to grab a nap. We’re staking out the repeat crime scene tonight,” she said.
Ben huffed out a sympathetic sounding snort. “Hell of a way ta’ spend Christmas Eve.”
“Tell me about it,” Constance agreed.
“How late can I call ya’ back? Don’t wanna interfere.”
“You’re probably good up till ten.”
“Gotcha.”
“I’ll try to check in later if I don’t hear from you first.”
“You’d better,” he returned. “Ya’ got Kevlar with ya’?”
“Of course. It’s out in my trunk.”
“Damn lotta good it’s doin’ ya’ in there,” he spat.
“Don’t worry so much.”
“Get the vest outta the trunk and wear it, hear me?”
“I will.”
“And watch your back, okay?”
She sighed. “Stop worrying… I need to go… Later…”
“Yeah… Later…”
Constance started to pull the phone away from her ear then pressed it back up and said, “Oh… Wait… Are you still there?”
She heard a quick fumble then his voice came back on the line, a bit of sudden concern evident in the tone. “Yeah, I’m here, what is it?”
“Nothing really important. I just have a weird question. Kind of a riddle someone asked me,” she explained. “What would you say is ‘heavy symbolism of the Christmas season’?”
She lied about the importance. She was already asking him to do enough, but if the searches set off any flags, he shouldn’t be the one to take the heat; it would come down on her. However, she had no idea what was in that hidden file or from whom it had come. If it turned out that it was something she wasn’t supposed to be seeing, then it was definitely not something Ben should know about. She wanted to keep that brand of trouble contained to herself if possible. Besides, she didn’t need him rushing up here to save her right now.
“Heavy?” he snorted. “That’s easy. My Lieutenant’s wife’s godawful homemade fruitcake.”
CHAPTER 21
After thumbing the ‘end’ button on her cell, Constance quietly stared across the narrow space between where she was sitting on the corner of the bed and the desk that was positioned against the opposite wall. Her notebook computer sat there waiting, the screen empty and dark at the moment because the unit had finally dropped into standby mode due to inactivity. It mimicked her blank stare, patiently awaiting a key press or even a quick tap on the touch pad to bring it to life. While it was only a few feet away in physical distance, for all the bad luck she’d had with cracking the encryption key thus far, the gulf might as well have been countless miles.
And now that she had reached out for help, all Ben had to offer was “fruitcake.”
That was definitely one she hadn’t tried. But then, it had nine characters, not eight. Not to mention it really didn’t jibe with the theme of the song to which the mysterious file was attached. Things like silver and gold decorations, shepherds, kings, and all of the other associated religious myth surrounding the Christmas holiday. She had exhausted those clues to the best of her ability, using kludged together pieces of the lyrics, and even going so far as to try various permutations of-and words from-“The Christmas Story” in the books of Matthew and Luke, but she still had no luck. She was pretty sure she had tried all of the secular options even remotely related to the song by now as well-all of them that she could think of, anyway.
She could probably have given him some guidance by throwing the song out there too, but doing so might have led to questions, and it wasn’t easy for her to lie to him. In the long run, the less he knew about that segment of this debacle, the better. Besides, the song was really just a delivery vehicle. There was nothing to say it was absolutely connected to the answer. That was just a guess on her part.
She muttered, “But fruitcake? Yeah…right,” and then she shook her head and sighed.
After a handful of minutes spent staring off into space, she stood and deposited her cell phone onto the desk next to the computer, then proceeded to make the bed. She had placed a standing “do not disturb” request with the office when she’d checked in, as was her SOP while working. It was just safer for everyone concerned that way.
Before heading out for breakfast, she had tucked all of the carefully sorted reports into her suitcase, out of sight, just in case the housekeeper didn’t get the message about the DND or the wind took off with the door hanger. None of the information she currently had was sensitive, otherwise she would have taken it with her. However, being not sensitive didn’t necessarily make any of it fit for public consumption either.
She dug out the semi-ordered stack of paper and began systematically arranging the different parcels of documents atop the now mostly smoothed comforter. She had no idea what a third run through was going to do for her at this point, other than confuse the issue more, of course. Nothing at all seemed to add up where any of these murders were concerned. A locked, empty house with no forced entry. Not only that, a locked, empty house with no forced entry and cops watching it inside and out. But like magic, out of nowhere, a body appears-or parts of one, to be more accurate.