I didn’t specify what else Christopher had been planning on doing to that girl, but I knew Agent Sterling well enough by now to know that her mind would go there, the same as mine.
“What about her?” Sterling’s voice was slightly hoarse. I wondered how many nights she’d spent like this one, unable to sleep.
“Who was she?” I asked. “Why was she meeting Christopher?”
“She worked at the coffee shop,” Sterling replied. “She’d been conversing with someone on an online dating site. He used a fake name and only accessed the account from public computers, but it stands to reason that it was Christopher, taking things to the next level with victim selection. His mother was dead. He’d killed Emerson—that could have given him a taste for college-aged girls.”
Strangers on a train, I thought. “Christopher had an alibi for his mother’s murder. Clark had one for Emerson’s.” I swallowed. My mouth had gone so dry, I had to work to push out the next words. “Maybe that was it. Maybe now that Clark’s dead, Christopher was on his own—but Redding knew that someone was going to die soon, besides Clark. It was planned. And if it was part of the plan…”
I sat down next to Agent Sterling, willing her to understand what I was saying, even though I wasn’t sure I was making any kind of objective sense.
“What if Christopher wasn’t the one communicating with this girl online? What if he didn’t choose her?”
Clark chose Emerson.
Christopher chose his mother.
They both had ironclad alibis for the murders of the women they had chosen. What if they weren’t the only ones?
“You think there’s a third.” Sterling put the possibility into words. That made it real. I braced the heels of my hands against the edge of the bed, steadying myself.
“Did Christopher confess to Emerson’s murder?” I asked. “Is there any physical evidence tying him to the scene? Any circumstantial evidence? Anything, other than the fact that he was planning to kill another girl?”
Agent Sterling’s phone rang. The sound was garish, jarring in contrast with my quiet questions. Phone calls at two in the morning never brought good news.
“Sterling.” Her posture changed when she answered the phone. This wasn’t the woman with tousled hair, sitting on the edge of her bed. This was the agent. “What do you mean, ‘he’s dead’?” Short pause. “I know the literal meaning of the word, Dad. What happened? When did you get the call?”
Someone was dead. That knowledge weighed me down and set my heart to beating a vicious rhythm against my rib cage. The way she’s talking means it’s someone we know. As that realization occurred to me, a plea wrenched its way through me, taking over my thoughts, silencing everything else in its wake. Please don’t let it be Briggs.
“No, this isn’t a blessing,” Agent Sterling said sharply. “This case isn’t closed.”
Not Briggs, I thought. Director Sterling would never have referred to the death of his former son-in-law as a blessing.
“Are you listening to me, Dad? Director, we think there might be—” She cut off. “‘Who’s we?’ Does it matter who we is? I’m telling you—”
She wasn’t telling him anything, because he wasn’t listening.
“I know it would be to your advantage, politically, if this case was closed, if it never had to go to trial because our first killer took out our second killer and then strung himself up by the bedsheets once he was caught. That’s neat, and it’s tidy. It’s convenient. Director?” She paused. “Director? Dad?” She punched her thumb viciously onto her touch screen and threw down her phone.
“He hung up on me,” she said. “He told me that he’d gotten a call from the prison, that Christopher Simms had been found dead in his cell. He hung himself—or at least, that’s the going theory.”
I read the implication in those words: Agent Sterling thought that there was at least a chance—and possibly a good one—that Christopher Simms had met with foul play. Had Redding somehow managed to have him killed?
Or had the person who had killed Emerson Cole—and maybe even Clark—come back to finish the job?
Three UNSUBs. Two of them are dead.
If there was a third, if someone was still out there…
Agent Sterling slammed her suitcase open.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
“Getting dressed,” she said tautly. “If there’s even a sliver of a chance that this case isn’t over, I’m working it.”
“I’ll go with you.”
She didn’t even look up at the offer. “Thank you, but no. I still have a few scruples. If there’s a killer still out there, I’m not putting your life on the line.”
But it’s okay to risk yours? I wanted to ask, but I didn’t. Instead, I went upstairs and changed clothes myself. I caught Agent Sterling in the driveway, headed toward her car.
“At least have Briggs meet you there,” I called after her, running to catch up. “Wherever there is.”
She hit the unlock button on the car. The headlights flashed once, then darkness set back in.
“It’s two o’clock in the morning,” Agent Sterling said, clipping the words. “Just go to bed.”
A week ago, I would have argued with her. I would have resented her for shoving me onto the sidelines. But somehow, a part of me understood—even after everything she’d had us do, her first instinct was still to protect me. She’d take risks with her own life, but not with mine.
Who’s going to protect you? I thought.
“Call Briggs, and I’ll go to bed,” I promised.
Even in the dark, I could make out the annoyance on her face. “Fine,” she said finally, pulling out her phone and waving it at me. “I’ll call him.”
“No,” a voice said, directly behind me. “You won’t.”
I didn’t have time to turn, to think, to process the words. An arm locked around my throat, cutting off my air supply and jerking me to the tips of my toes. My body was pulled flat against my assailant’s. I clawed at the arm around my neck. It tightened.
I couldn’t breathe.
Something metal and cool grazed my cheek and came to rest at my temple.
“Put your gun on the ground. Now.” It took me a moment to realize that those words were aimed at Agent Sterling. A second after that, I realized that I had a gun at my head, that Sterling was doing exactly as she’d been instructed.