way regarding the death of Garth Hubbard, the indie presidential hopeful beloved by so many that he might’ve been the first man to take the White House on such a ticket. The cause of his death had been deemed natural. He’d been at home with his wife, alone in their bedroom. Paramedics had been called; his family doctor had come, too, and signed the death certificate. But this was Washington, DC, so, of course, there was talk of conspiracy.
“Ah, yes, good morning!” she muttered to herself.
The news anchor—after waiting an appropriate beat or two—offered her viewing public a wide, toothy smile and went on to recount some of the good news of the day. Maybe it wasn’t such a bad morning. An attractive reporter related a story about the heroics of a young man as he dived after a woman, a stranger, who had nearly drowned while tubing in West Virginia. She then had another story about a young girl saved from an abusive teen by the intervention of a stray dog—the dog now, happily, had a home.
Meg realized she was just staring, somewhat hypnotized, at the television.
She had to get going. There was an orientation class she was required to attend and she wanted to get through it quickly so she could concentrate on moving into her little town house before her life began anew.
As she relished the hot water pouring over her in the shower, Meg considered the life she was about to start.
As a child, she’d dreamed of changing the world. That had meant to her that she had to be a policewoman or run for president. Maybe a policewoman—and then the president.
And when she was ten years old, her family had fallen victim to a horrible crime.
She would never forget it. She could still remember that time as clearly as if she’d just lived it. Her cousin, responsible and steadfast, had gone missing. Then the ransom note had come.
But Mary Elizabeth’s body had been found. Meg had known they’d find her before they did. Everything about those days, that experience, had been shattering and devastating, and for a long time, she’d thought she was crazy. But she hadn’t been.
And now...
Now, all she could only hope to do was put away some of the bad guys. Just as they’d put away the man who’d taken Mary Elizabeth.
In her classes, they’d recently had guest speakers, agents and scientists from the behavioral science units. Listening to what man was capable of doing to man had been horrifying, despite what she already knew. The academy classes lost students along the way because sometimes it was too much to bear.
In her case...
She was even more determined. She had every reason to be.
Because it hadn’t ended with Mary Elizabeth.
Sometimes she met people who’d been tortured.
And killed.
And she’d wanted to help.
She liked to feel that she’d grown strong. Her superiors and teachers knew about her past—about Mary Elizabeth being kidnapped and murdered. She was honest about her desire to be with the Bureau. She was careful not to dwell on the past in case someone believed that her previous experience might hinder her work.
It would never interfere with her work; she was sure of that.
Dressed and ready for the day, she checked her reflection in the mirror. She wore a blue pantsuit, very regulation. Her shirt was white, but she was allowed pinstripes, thin lines in a pale blue. Somehow, they made her feel a little brighter.
She was young, but at a height of five-ten she was often assumed to be older than her actual age of twenty-six. She had a wealth of thick, nearly black hair, which she’d pulled back into a bun. She almost turned away from the mirror, but then studied her reflection more closely. She thought her mouth was too big, as were her eyes. At least they were a clear, dark sky blue. She studied herself critically and decided she looked presentable. And especially dressed like this, she seemed to exude confidence, maybe even authority.
With a shake of her head, she finally turned away. She really wanted to believe that she had the right stuff. She’d gone through college, studying criminology, become a cop in Richmond for a couple of years and then been accepted to the academy. It was the career she wanted; she’d gone after it step-by-step.
She reached for her phone in the charger at her bedside and realized the message light was blinking.
Lara had called her. She frowned; the call had come in the middle of the night. Lara never called her that late. She listened to the message.
“Meg, it’s me, Lara. I wanted to let you know I’m going home. Home, as in getting out of DC. I’m going as soon as it’s daylight. I’ll talk to you when I can. Love you. Don’t say anything to anyone else, okay? I have to get out of here. Talk soon.”
There was a second call, a second message. But Meg heard nothing—except what sounded like a rush of wind and a muffled thump.
A purse dial?
Perplexed, Meg played the message again and tried to phone Lara back. The call went immediately to voice mail. Her friend had seemed breathless, so she’d probably been walking when she’d made the call.
But she’d sounded distracted—and a little frantic.
Meg left a message herself. “Call me back. You’ve got me really worried. Please, call me as soon as you possibly can.”
Disturbed, she added a last “Please!”
She told herself that Lara had just become disgusted with politics; many people did.
Not Lara! she thought.
Lara had been a media and research assistant in the offices of Congressman Ian Walker. Lara had admired the congressman from his first speeches, when they were still in high school in Richmond. Walker was passionate about equality, whether racial, religious or sexual. He was also critical of irresponsible spending, the unusual politician who managed to be both fiscally responsible and socially liberal. He fought hard for his causes on the house floor.
Why would Lara suddenly decide to go home? It didn’t make sense!
* * *
She lay on the silver gurney as if she were sleeping, and Agent Matt Bosworth believed that she’d once been a lovely young woman.
Death had not been kind. She was now a bloated, pallid corpse, ravaged by the river and creatures of the water. It was difficult to tell where the autopsy Y incision had actually been made; he knew she’d been ripped from throat to groin, disemboweled and stuffed with rocks. But time had caused the rocks to dislodge from their human cave and she had floated to the surface and then the riverbank, where she’d been found by the boat motor of a pleasure sailor on the Potomac.
Matt knew that another woman had been found at the beginning of June—but she’d washed up on the Maryland side of the river.
The woman now lying on the gurney before him had shown up on the DC side. She’d come to the office of the chief medical examiner, or OCME, for the District of Columbia. It was a relatively new, state-of-the-art facility that handled about seventeen hundred cases a year—of death
