Текст книги "All The Pretty Girls"

Автор книги: J. T. Ellison

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Текущая страница: 14 (всего у книги 20 страниц)

“Baldwin…”

“I know, man, I’m grasping at straws. I’m just trying to think…”

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“No, Baldwin, wait. I think I’ve got an idea. Student health centers, right? They probably wouldn’t have any ability to do lab work. Maybe they send out.”

“Grimes, that’s a great idea. Start at UNC–Asheville, it’s the school closest to the hospital. Double-check they don’t have anyone missing, make some calls to the other schools, try to track this down. Then you can head out to Louisville. I’ll do what I can here to find out what’s going on.”

Disappointment spilled from Grimes’s mouth. “Oh. Okay. I’m waiting on some more information to come in from Louisville, but I’ll check things out here. In the meantime, you’ll let me know as soon as you hear something?”

“Will do. Go get the college checked out. I’ve got a feeling about that.”

Thirty-Six

Grimes drove through the gates of the University of North Carolina at Asheville and was struck by the beauty of the campus. It seemed like a very nice place to spend four years of your life. He followed the entrance drive to a large board that had all of the buildings laid out in a map. He looked for the student health center, found it and drove over there.

He got out of the car and went into the quiet building. There was a reception area, and he asked a pretty, blond girl sitting behind the desk if he could speak to the head of the center. She told him to hold on and disappeared. While he waited, he thumbed through a brochure that extolled the virtues of the campus health system.

A few minutes later, a woman came out from a back room, black hair shot with gray, hard lines etched deep in her upper lip. “I’m sorry, sir, but this is a private health center for the students of the university and you have to leave.”

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He badged her, making sure she saw the large blue-andwhite FBI card first and foremost. She was still mouthy.

“I suppose you have questions about that poor dead lamb that showed up here in town. Well, that wasn’t one of our students and we didn’t have anything to do with it. So I’d appreciate it if you left.”

“Are you done, lady? ’Cause I’ve got a few questions and I’d appreciate it if you’d shut up and answer them.”

The rudeness shocked her into silence, and Grimes took advantage of the quiet.

“I need to know if you ever send lab work or anything else to the Asheville Community Hospital.”

The woman looked at him for a moment. “If there’s something that needs to be done for a student we simply send the student there, to the hospital. They can do things we can’t in a few cases. A very few cases. We do have a full-service health center here,” she boasted.

“Give me an example. When’s the last time you sent a student down to the hospital?”

“Well, we had to send one young lady down yesterday for a chest X-ray. Our machine is down. She’s been ill and the doctor thought it would be a good idea to rule out pneumonia.”

Grimes leaned into the woman’s face. “Who is the girl you sent?”

“Now, I can’t tell you that. That’s private information. I would—”

“Lady, tell me who it was or I’m going to arrest you, so help me God. I don’t have time for this crap from you. Who? ”

The woman became indignant. “Well. You don’t have to yell. Her name is Noelle Pazia. There, satisfied?”

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“No. Tell me how I can get in touch with Noelle.”

“Well, I suppose I could call her if you insist.”

He put a hand on her elbow and propelled her toward the door to her tiny office. “Let’s go make that call. I’m trying to make sure one of your students isn’t in trouble.”

The woman gave him a look that made him think of his daughter’s pet rabbit, nose twitching in fear, and picked up the phone. She dialed an extension, asked for Noelle Pazia and held up a finger to indicate she had been put on hold.

“The campus operator is routing the call,” she whispered, though there was no reason for her to keep her voice down. Grimes paced a few feet in either direction until the woman spoke again. “Is Noelle there? This is Nurse Brooks at the student health center. She isn’t. When did you see her last? You know she’s very ill, she needs to be in bed. She didn’t? Oh my. Yes dear, thank you.” She hung up the phone and gave Grimes a look he could not distinguish, whether it was anger or delight he would never know.

“She wasn’t in her room. She didn’t sleep there last night as far as her roommate can tell. I assume that means she went to stay with one of her male friends.”

The nurse sniffed self-righteously, obviously not approving of such outrageous behavior. “A lot of the girls here do that.”

“You know that Noelle has a boyfriend?”

“Well, no, I don’t, I just—”

“Call that number again, I need to talk to the roommate. Tell her to meet us, right now. Go on, dial the phone. Then take me to her dorm.”

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The woman started to sputter but picked up the phone. She got the roommate and told her to meet them downstairs in her dormitory. The second she hung up, Grimes got a hold of her arms and propelled her toward the door before she had a chance to speak. She was in his car a moment later and pointing him toward the residence halls. His heart was sinking with every moment, he had a bad feeling that Noelle Pazia wasn’t staying in a boyfriend’s room, but was lying on the side of a road in Louisville, Kentucky.

He got out of the car and made his way to the front entrance of the dorm. A very pretty redhead stood in the doorway, a multicolored scarf wrapped around her neck, ends trailing almost to her knees. She looked concerned, and as soon as he was within earshot he heard her ask, “Where’s Noelle?”

“I don’t know. I was hoping you could help me with that.”

“I spent the night at my boyfriend’s place.” Another, more audible sniff came from the nurse and Grimes turned, pointing a finger at her, a warning not to interrupt.

“Go on,” he prompted. The redhead complied. “He lives here in town, he’s an artist. She wasn’t here when I got in this morning, around eight. Her bed was made, but she always keeps her bed made, and she gets up early, so that didn’t strike me as strange. I assumed she went to breakfast. But she hasn’t been back in the room.”

“When is the last time you saw her?”

“The last I saw of Noelle was yesterday morning. She was going to go to the health center again, get some more medicine and try to take it easy. She’s got a heavy 282

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courseload this semester, so she was spending a lot of time studying, in groups and alone. She would have had her study group at the library. All I know to do is talk with them. Here’s a list of their numbers, Noelle had it on the refrigerator door. Please, just tell me she’s okay. Her father’s going to flip if something happened to her. She’s too good of a kid, straight, doesn’t drink, doesn’t even date, for God’s sake. She’s here to get her education.”

Grimes gave the nurse a dirty look. See, it said, she wasn’t with a boyfriend after all. He was ready to be out of her company. “Do me a favor, okay. Please go back to the health center. I’ll contact you if I need anything.”

“Gladly,” the woman snorted and stalked off. Grimes took the list from Noelle’s roommate. He leaned against the hood of his car and opened his phone. The roommate took the cue and looked at the list, running her finger to the bottom, tapping on the last name. She’d start there.

Grimes got two voice mails before a young man with an Indian accent came on the line.

“This is Harish?” He spoke with an inflection on all of his words that made every statement sound like a question.

“This is Special Agent Grimes with the FBI. Have you seen Noelle Pazia today?”

“Noelle? No, I haven’t? She left our study group last night? I didn’t see her after the break? Is she okay?”

The last sentence was a real question and Grimes could hear the concern in the boy’s voice.

“What time was this break last night?”

“I don’t know, around nine-thirty? Noelle was sick, she looked terrible? We suggested she go home, but she All the Pretty Girls

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said she would be okay to finish out the group? We took a break, she got a phone call and she left? That’s the last I saw of her?”

“And that was around nine-thirty, you say. She had a call and she did what?”

“Well, Noelle was very polite? She didn’t want to take the call in the library, especially in our study group, and so she took the call outside? She told whomever it was to hold on, and she walked out the side door? She had her backpack with her, when she didn’t come back we just assumed she went on home to bed? It would have been the best thing for her, she was really looking awful?”

Grimes thanked him and hung up. Left out the side door to the library. Damn. He turned to the roommate.

“Do you have a recent picture of Noelle?”

She hung up her own cell phone and nodded. “Yes, in the room. Hold on and I’ll go get it. You think she’s gone, don’t you?”

“I don’t know, but I really need that picture. Thanks.”

The girl trotted toward the stairs and Grimes dialed Baldwin’s number. He answered on the first ring. Grimes filled him in on the situation, including the fact that the missing girl had gone to the Asheville Community Hospital for chest X-rays because the school’s machine was down. As he finished, the roommate came back with a picture.

Grimes stared into the soft brown eyes, thanked the roommate and took her cell phone number, promising to call her within the hour with information. He got into his car, prepared to drive out of the campus, but he saw the library on his right and slowed. The poem. Baldwin said there was a poem sent to the reporter in Nashville 284

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that indicated another girl had been taken. He decided to check the library. If it was there, they’d have one more set of confirmations that this was their guy. Man, he was getting sloppy. He should have thought about that earlier.

He parked and walked around to what he assumed was the side entrance that young Harish had mentioned Noelle went toward when she got her phone call. He scanned the ground, the doors, and saw nothing out of place. He noticed that there was a bulletin board next to the door, sheltered from the weather by a plastic covering. He walked toward it, searching through the wanted messages and For Sale notices. Tutoring, no he didn’t need that. Didn’t need a new yoga ball and mat, didn’t need…yes, there it was. Under two colored pieces of paper he saw a stark white sheet pinned to the board. He pushed open the plastic, and with a pen he grabbed from his pocket he pushed aside all the surrounding paper. Sure enough. Damn if he hadn’t posted this for all to see, right there on the bulletin board. Son of a bitch.

Grimes read the poem aloud.

“Mark but this Flea, and mark in this, How little that which thou deniest me is; It suck’d me first, and now sucks thee, And in this flea our two bloods mingled be.”

Shit. Another one. He looked around wildly, as if the killer would be sitting nearby, enjoying the show. There was no sign of anything amiss.

The fact that he’d been left behind was not lost on him. All the Pretty Girls

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Baldwin, the FBI’s glory boy, off chasing his solid lead while Grimes the grunt stayed behind, trying to play catch-up yet again. At least he had found the newest poem.

A girl in a stocking cap walked by, grinning at the crazy man mumbling to himself. He flipped his hand in front of his face, hoping to dismiss her gaze. He took a bag out of his pocket, angled the pushpin out of the note and the corked bulletin board, and managed to get it into the bag without touching it. He held the note by the edges and put it in the bag after the pin. Maybe they’d get prints off this one, who knew. But it wouldn’t stand to do anything less than try everything they could. Grimes went back to the car and drove out of the campus and toward his hotel. He had laid the photo of Noelle Pazia on the front seat facing him. Noelle’s eyes stared up at him, accusing, sad, lonely, and he feared for her. He’d know soon enough.

He opened his cell phone and punched in a number he knew by heart. A man answered the phone.

“It’s me,” Grimes said.

“Hey, Dad, what’s up? Have something new for me?”

“I do. Just found out there’s a girl missing from Asheville, name’s Noelle Pazia. There’s also been a body found in Louisville, Kentucky. I’m assuming it’s her, you’ll have to do the rest on your own.”

“Thanks, Dad, I appreciate it. Gotta run. I can get this on the wire right away.” The phone went dead. That’s just how my life is, Grimes thought. Screwed up the case by not getting the poems, wife gone for going on four months now, a spoiled daughter who 286

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never spoke to him unless she needed money, a son that used him because he could give insider information and bolster the boy’s fledgling career as a news producer in New York. Baldwin would kill him if he knew where the leak was coming from. Well, fuck Mr. Perfect Profiler.

He pulled into the lot of the hotel and parked. Taking the picture of Noelle with him, he went to the front desk. The information should be in from the Louisville office. Maybe Perfect Boy Baldwin had sent some of his profiling guidance too.

“Do you have a fax for me? Grimes, FBI?”

The man behind the desk gave him a nasty look. “I do, sir, and I have to ask that you refrain from having this kind of material sent over our fax lines. It’s just outrageous. I won’t stand for it, and neither will my manager—”

“Shut up and give me the fax.” Grimes was so far out of patience that he wanted to punch the mouthy brat. Maybe he could arrange for the nurse at the school and this man to have a date.

The man flounced around the side of the desk and disappeared into the back room. He came out a moment later with a manila folder in his hand. “There,” he huffed dramatically. Grimes just gave him a smile and slid the folder under his arm. He walked over to the bar and ordered a scotch. It was drawn and poured, and he took a sip, trying to calm his heart. He didn’t want to know if Noelle Pazia was dead. He didn’t want to imagine those bottomless brown eyes dull and gray. But he didn’t have a choice. He could hardly ask the bartender to compare the photos.

So he swallowed the liquid courage in a single gulp, All the Pretty Girls

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pulled out the picture Noelle’s roommate had given him and set it on the bar. He poised the folder above the picture and opened it. The sight made him want to vomit.

There was no question. Noelle Pazia was dead. He looked away from the file and caught the bartender’s eye, signaling for another shot. The man slid the bottle to him, it was as if he decided it wasn’t worth the time it would take to refill the glass again and again. Grimes nodded his thanks and poured himself a glass to the brim. His hands were shaking as he brought the liquor to his lips. He needed to call Baldwin, give him the confirmation. Before he had a chance, his phone rang.

The call didn’t take long. As he hung up, staring in disbelief at the cell, all thoughts of calling Baldwin left him. He set the phone down on the oak-planked bar. He pulled out his credentials case, eyes lingering on his FBI shield. All the things it meant to him. Fidelity, loyalty, bravery. Ah, this fucking case.

All he wanted to do was suck down a few more drinks and float away.

Fuck the Southern Strangler.

Fuck Baldwin and the FBI while you’re at it. Fuck it all that seven girls had died at the hands of this maniac. The hand burglar. For fucking what?

Noelle stared up at him with those baby-brown eyes, and he heard her voice in his head. “You’re drunk, Grimes. It’s okay, you don’t have to get so upset. These things happen. You know that. These things happen and there’s nothing you can do about it, you just have to try and catch the man who did this to me. To all of us. Do 288

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you understand what I’m saying? You need to catch him and stop him, he’s going to do this again.”

The big brown eyes started to cry and Grimes slammed the folder closed. Jesus, he couldn’t take this anymore. What was this freak hoping to accomplish? And here he was sending the poems to a reporter. Did he want to get the story out on the news? Or did he just have the hots for this chick? Did he just want to impress her?

Well, it was going to be pretty hard to impress her now, buddy. She’s dead, and you don’t even know it. You can come and fuck her and get off on all the wonderful things you did for her, you stupid son of a bitch. She’s dead and cold, and all of these girls are dead and cold, and you can’t have any of them anymore, you bastard. Grimes was shouting, hysterical, flinging his arms around and becoming more incoherent by the minute. He’d chugged his way through more than half the bottle of scotch and was looking like he needed a good place to sleep it off. That’s what the bartender saw, he had come over to try and slow him down. Grimes was crying and blubbering, spilling liquid from his glass on the bar and the seat next to him. His hand was on his gun, and when the bartender tried to get him to stop he swung out his arm. Crying, he told the man to tell Baldwin he was sorry. He put the gun to his temple and pulled the trigger.

Thirty-Seven

Baldwin beat the early-evening traffic out of town, heading south on I-65 to Franklin. He took the exit onto Highway 96, into the heart of downtown Franklin, passing picturesque row houses and the quaint downtown square. Precise choreography got him through the traffic circle, he came out the other side and found himself in front of Health Partners headquarters. He parked and went inside. The cool air-conditioning gave him goose bumps. He introduced himself to the receptionist, who sat behind a clear glass desk, showing off young supple legs. He was expected. She gave him a charming smile that he returned, then rose and indicated a door to her left. Coming out from behind the desk, she brushed against him provocatively as she walked to the door. He smiled, the girl couldn’t be more than eighteen. Nice to know he was still remotely attractive to the younger generation. Not attracted to, of course. With a woman like Taylor at home, he wasn’t attracted to much else these days.

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“Do you need anything?” she asked, and he shook his head.

“Too bad.”

The girl pushed a combination of numbers on a keypad and the door unlocked with an audible click. He followed her through the door, down a spare hallway and into a larger, more comfortable waiting area. A tall black man with crinkly gray hair came out of an office and made his way to Baldwin. He stuck out a hand and introduced himself.

“Louis Sherwood. You’re Agent Baldwin? Good to meet you. That will be all, Darlene, thank you.” The girl shot her boss a look of annoyance and left them. Sherwood ushered Baldwin into a spacious office decorated in dark mahogany. Just the kind of office you’d expect from a CEO. Tastefully decorated, expensively accented, yet understated enough to make it seem that Health Partners wasn’t totally rolling in dough. A nice presentation, overall.

Sherwood motioned to a matching set of overstuffed brown leather chairs with brass nails running up the sides. Was there an office anywhere that didn’t have this kind of chair? Baldwin took a seat, and Sherwood sat opposite him.

“Can I get you anything, Agent Baldwin? Coffee, tea?”

“No, thanks, I’m fine. Darlene already offered.”

“So then, what is it that I can do for you?”

“Like I said on the phone, I’d like to ask about your traveling employees.”

Sherwood leaned forward and started running a rake through a Zen garden. “Any in particular?”

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Baldwin’s antennae went up. “Are there any in particular that you think I should be looking at?”

“No, no. I just wondered if you’d narrowed it down. We’ve got quite a few travelers on our rosters, as you can imagine.” Rake, rake, rake. Baldwin sensed the man was killing time.

“How about we narrow it down to your people who have traveled to the cities in question, the cities you’ve lost employees.”

“What cities exactly would those be?”

Baldwin gave Sherwood a long, level gaze and spoke as clearly as he could. “I’d appreciate it if you’d drop the act and tell me what I need to know.”

Sherwood leaned back in his chair, appraising. Baldwin just stared him down.

After a moment, Sherwood broke into a huge smile.

“Just testing there, son. Wanted to make sure you was on the up-and-up, you know? Just can’t ever tell with folks these days. Now, you want to know about our travelers. Mostly, we send the girls on the road. Our marketing team only has one gentleman.”

“Jake Buckley?”

Sherwood’s eyes popped open. “Why, yes, as a matter of fact. Jake is one of the finest men I’ve ever had the privilege to know. One of the finest.”

“That’s great. Does Jake Buckley cover your interests in Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi, Georgia, Virginia and North Carolina? And has he been traveling in those specific areas recently? I’m aware that he was here in Nashville during some of that time. That’s all I need to know.” He sat back in his chair and waited. Sherwood’s mouth drew into a firm line. “And I don’t 292

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think it’s wise to go around sullying the man’s name, if you know what I mean. He has a lot of very powerful friends…but that’s neither here nor there.”

“Mr. Sherwood, you don’t seem to understand. You’re in an interesting position. Several of the killer’s victims worked for your companies. The media hasn’t seized upon the connection, but rest assured, they will.”

Sherwood’s eyes narrowed, and Baldwin could see the wheels spinning. He picked up a pen and started twirling it, breaking eye contact as soon as he started to speak. Baldwin prepared himself for the lies to come.

“Now, Agent Baldwin, you have to understand. We’re a small company here, just trying to make the world a better place for some people that normally wouldn’t have the chances we give them. Do you understand that, son? It breaks my heart that we’ve lost three employees to violent deaths, it surely does. But could Jake Buckley be involved in those deaths? There isn’t a snowball’s chance in hell of that, you mark my words.”

He leaned in close, ready to impart a great secret. Baldwin stayed put. “Buckley hardly knows what to do with a live woman. I can’t imagine he’d know what to do with a dead one.”

Sherwood leaned back, guffawing. “Naw, good ole Jake couldn’t have done this. He’s too twitterpated by that wife of his. He can’t afford to fuck things up. She’s got the money, not him. God knows I’m not paying him enough to live on.”

“How much are you paying him, Mr. Sherwood?”

Baldwin felt pure disgust. Over the phone he sounded like a man seriously intent on helping with the investigation. Now it was obvious that he was just an ass. All the Pretty Girls

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“Aww, son, that’s neither here nor there. Isn’t much more than a couple hundred, give or take. How much they paying you FBI boys these days? Bet I could make you an offer that would blow your socks off. How ’bout it? Come work for me, personal security. I can make it worth your while.”

This was a fruitless endeavor. The man wasn’t going to tell him anything. If he were a bit more jaded, he would think Sherwood brought him in to gauge his knowledge of the cases and the company, but he dismissed that thought. No, this was just a guy who had some power being a jerk.

“That’s awfully kind of you, Mr. Sherwood, but I’m happy with my current position. I suggest you think about cooperating with me. It won’t take me long to procure a warrant for your records.” He stood and stalked to the door.

Sherwood just laughed. “You get a warrant, and then I’ll chat with you.”

“Count on it.” Baldwin grabbed the handle and threw the door open, then retraced his steps to the locked entrance that led to reception. He banged through it to find Darlene, smiling expectantly at him. Seeing the fury on his face, she dropped the cutesy affectation and gave him a sympathetic smile. He realized she was older than he first thought, probably more like twenty-five.

“Sherwood being an ass again?” she asked with a sigh. Baldwin nodded. “I don’t know how you stand him.”

“I don’t. Here. I have something for you.” She handed him a plain manila file folder. He opened it and read ITINERARY in boldface at the top. “Jake 294

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Buckley” was directly underneath. A quick scan showed that Jake’s travel had taken him all over the Southeast, confirming Baldwin’s suspicions. No more wasting time, and no need to get that warrant.

Baldwin looked up to see a tear in Darlene’s eye. But her voice was hard. “Nail him, if he did this. Nail him for me.”

Baldwin nodded, not knowing exactly what to say. He had the impression that perhaps Jake Buckley did know what to do with a live girl after all. He took her hand, squeezing it gently, and sincerely promised to do just that.

Baldwin was finally home. The weather had cooled off after the storms, so he’d showered and defrosted a container of Taylor’s homemade vegetable beef soup. He settled in to wait for Taylor to come home. He was also waiting to hear from Grimes. The man should have called by now to let him know if there had been any reports of a missing girl in the Asheville area. He’d talked to the men on the ground in Louisville, and it was starting to seem like this may be a different killer. Though the girl they had found was a brunette that seemed to be in her late teens or early twenties, there was no visible cause of death, and she still had her hands. The Louisville police were desperately searching their databases and tip lines to see if anyone had reported a girl missing that fit the description of their Jane Doe, but there hadn’t been so far. Maybe they were in luck. If Buckley was their killer, he seemed to be taking a break.

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of the refrigerator, popped the top and poured it into a glass, then walked back into the living room. He should call Grimes, check his status.

He dialed the number, and an unfamiliar voice came on the phone.

“Who is this?” the voice demanded.

“This is Special Agent John Baldwin with the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Now, who are you?”

“I’m the one wiping blood off this damn phone so I can answer it. Do you know a Jerry Grimes?”

Blood? Shit, what was happening? Had Grimes managed to get himself into an accident?

“Yes, I do. I’m working a case with him. Can I speak to him?”

“Um, I’m sorry, sir, but you’re going to have to wait on that. I’m Detective Moss, Mike Moss, with the Asheville police. It seems your friend Grimes had a little accident with his gun. Shot himself in the head. I’m sorry, but he didn’t make it.”

Baldwin sat in silence for a moment. Accident. Blood. Gun. Head. None of the words added up, and he shook his head, trying to sort them out.

“Wait a minute. Are you saying Grimes shot himself, or was shot by someone else?” Baldwin was up off the couch. This was bad. Very, very bad.

“No, sir, he shot himself. We’re in the bar of the hotel that Mr. Grimes was staying in. It’s absolute pandemonium here. Apparently he’d been in the bar drinking for a couple of hours and just lost it. Started yelling and throwing his arms around, the gun went off right next to his right temple. I’m willing to bet that our M.E. will find a way to call it an accident, but I’ll tell 296

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you for true, he shot himself. Now, are you coming up here to claim the body, or what?”

“Whoa, man, slow down. I need something from you first, then I’ll decide what to do. Did Grimes have anything with him? Files, his briefcase? Anything?”

He could hear the man asking the question to the room. He came back on the line.

“Yeah, there’s a file that was sitting on the bar next to him, a manila folder with what looks like crime scene photos. And there was a picture on the bar, a real pretty little thing. Oh…” He got silent for a few moments.

“The picture of the girl on the bar is definitely the same girl from the crime scene photos. There’s also a plastic bag in the file, looks like it’s got a note and a pushpin in it.”

“Read me the note, please.”

Baldwin listened as the man recited the first few lines of “The Flea.” Dammit, Grimes.

“Tell me, does the picture have an identification with it? Is there a name or anything?”

“Yeah, there’s a picture here, looks like an official school photo, you know, with the border along the bottom? Ah…damn, man, she’s a student here in town. Goes to UNC–Asheville. There’s a hand-written name on the back of the photo. Noelle Pazia, 2004. Damn, guess I have a dead body on my hands. Where do you think he left her?”

Baldwin realized the officer thought Grimes had committed the murder, then killed himself. “Whoa, no, Grimes didn’t kill her. I believe that’s the identity of a body found in Louisville, Kentucky. You’re looking at the crime scene photos that were sent to Grimes from All the Pretty Girls

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the Louisville police. We’re operating under the assumption that the murder was perpetrated by the Southern Strangler. Which means I need to get the Louisville team up to speed on this. I need you to fax that information you’ve got in front of you to me immediately. Send it to this number—615-555-9897. And where are they taking Grimes?”

“He was declared here at the scene. Been transported to our M.E. Is there a family that we need to notify?”

“I’m going to call my boss. His name is Garrett Woods. He’ll call you and get everything worked out. Damn. Grimes was a good man. You take care of him, okay?”

“Will do, sir.”

They hung up and Baldwin sank into the sofa. Shit. What the hell had happened? He knew Grimes was tense and not holding up great. This was his fault, if he had stayed there maybe he would have been able to stop his suicide. He heard the phone ring and the fax tones kick in. He went into the office and watched as the photo of Noelle Pazia scrolled out of the fax machine. He looked in her eyes and for a moment thought he understood what Grimes had done. He’d been there himself once, too. But this girl, she was so full of innocence and hope and it spilled out of her eyes like a waterfall of goodness. And he was just looking at a fax, he couldn’t imagine what the real thing looked like.