I live for it. I’d die for it, that’s how much I love getting to the bottom of things. I have never been tolerant of mysteries. I need answers and I need them immediately. But I force myself to be patient when I’m working. Force myself to be calm, and still, and quiet as I listen for lies, or missing truths, or wasted opportunities.
And Atticus Montgomery gives me all that and more. Because the first thing out of his mouth is, “We might have a problem.”
“How so?” I ask, leaning in.
“These two men started working for the company at the same time. Fifteen years ago, to be precise. And they were working on the same project.”
“What project is that?”
“I can’t tell you specifics, as it’s highly secret. But it’s enough of a coincidence that I’m worried.”
“Well, tell me everything you can and I’ll try to figure it out.”
He tells me some, but it’s mostly corporate double-talk. I might as well be a member of the press. So I leave there with no idea what’s going on and with no possibilities rambling around in my brain.
But I did get a name, and after a visit to the wife of the last suicide victim, an inkling. Top-secret project was all she knew. No specifics, so that was a dead end. But she did say the job was weighing on him and he had been feeling out of sorts. Irritability and loss of interest in her and their children. Hopelessness and insomnia. All typical signs of severe depression. This is something I have firsthand knowledge of.
But she also said he was talking about moving away. Getting out of science and retiring early. And when I pressed her, asking if he was doing this in secret or if she felt he was trying to set her up to go on after he killed himself, she said no. They were making plans to buy a small bed-and-breakfast business in the tropics.
It’s possible she misread him and he was setting her up for after he was gone. Giving her a headstart on a new life that didn’t include him. But it didn’t feel that way. It felt like… she was describing an escape.
It’s not much. Hardly anything at all. But it’s always the small things that solve a mystery. So I tuck it away and head back to the department.
Chapter Eight - Molly
Chief is yelling my name the moment I walk through the front security doors at CCPD and I wince. “In my office. Now!” he bellows across the room.
Jesus. Can this day get any worse?
I woke up drunk.
Wearing strange lingerie.
Was late for work.
Blue Corp has some serious internal issues, but I’m never gonna be able to solve a case when everything is top secret.
“I said now, Masters!”
I leash the internal list and make the walk of shame to the boss’ office.
“Do you know who I just got off the phone with, Detective?”
“Um—”
“Close the goddamned door. Do I look like I want an audience?”
Holy fuck. Please make this day end. I turn and tap the door so it swings closed with a loud click, and then turn back to the chief. “Was it Mr. Montgomery?” I take a wild guess.
“It was, Masters. It was. And do you know what he told me?”
“I’m a shitty detective?”
Chief screws up his face at me. “No, Masters,” he says in his almost-never-present I’m-a-human voice. “He says you were the epitome of professionalism and the department is lucky to have such a competent detective on the case.” Chief sneers at me like he’s taking that as a personal assault on his character. “And he wants to have breakfast with you tomorrow because he talked his father into giving you more clearance. Be there at six AM.”
“Great,” I mutter under my breath.
“Oh, and Masters? There’s a party this Friday at the Thirteenth Cathedral in honor of some new rich fuck moving his business here. You’re the new man in town, so you’re in charge of security. My other detectives all have real cases. Wear a dress. And”—he looks down at my shoes—“get rid of those.”
Thirty minutes later I’m pulling into my driveway across town. I don’t live in a city condo like most of the other cops in the department. I like my space and since I practically grew up a gypsy in a circus tent that allowed me unprecedented freedom as a child, I got used to my space.
So it’s a suburban two-bedroom townhouse in a quiet neighborhood for me. I have a lot of neighbors, but it’s mainly older people who grew deaf to the call of the city a long time ago.
I get out of my car, curse the never-ending rain, and jump when my neighbor yells out from across the street. “I hope you don’t plan on playing loud music like that every weekend. This is a nice, quiet, orderly neighborhood, Detective.” The old woman practically snarls the word.
“I don’t,” I say back, as amicably as I can. Then I turn and walk up my front porch steps.
The party. I forgot how trashed my house was. I open the door and wince at the sight. The liquor bottles, the paper plates. There’s even food. Several pizza boxes, hamburger wrappers, old French fries, and at least a dozen protein shakes. Jesus Christ. What the hell was I thinking?
“Well, Molls,” I say, channeling my brother. “You made this mess, now you have to clean it up.”