CHAPTER FIVE
“There,” Laura said, pointing ahead of them. There was a police car parked at the side of the road, obvious from its markings and from the way the officer was pacing ahead of it, his hands on his hips. When he saw Laura slowing the car down and pulling up in front of him, he walked towards them, tilting his head to look through the windshield as if trying to identify them.
“Finally,” Agent Won said, practically clapping his hands together in glee at this development. “We’re here?”
Laura nodded up the road a short way as the officer approached her open window. “GPS says the town boundary is just over there. We’re here.”
It was a pleasant day, despite it being winter. Next to the cooped-up air of the plane, the fresh breeze coming off the sea was actually refreshing. It was a picturesque part of the California coast, too – down below their car, past a railing, the waves foamed on rocks that looked to have been placed there perfectly by some Hollywood crew. Scrubby trees and dry, old grass indicated that this was probably a lush paradise in the summer, and ahead Laura could see signs for a turning that would take them to a local beach.
Pacific Cove was obviously a nice place to visit all year round, but much nicer when the weather was warm and the flowers were blooming. Laura was already forming a picture in her head of what to expect. A quiet town, much larger than it needed to be, because they were used to large numbers of tourists coming through. Most likely a close community, where everyone knew everyone. That could make their job easier, and it could also make it harder. Rumors could travel fast, and they weren’t always accurate.
“Ma’am,” the officer said, leaning down to speak to her through the window. He was younger than she’d expected, with sandy-brown hair that seemed to curl in every direction but the one he likely intended when he took off his hat. “I’m Detective Scott Waters with the Pacific Cove PD. Are you the agents we’ve been expecting?”
“That’s right,” Laura said, taking her hands off the wheel to reach for her badge. “I’m Special Agent Laura Frost.”
“Special Agent Eric Won,” Won added quickly, throwing his own badge out in front of Laura so rapidly that she actually had to pull herself back to avoid the danger of being hit with it. “Oh, sorry.”
“Our chief asked me to meet you here and escort you wherever you’d like to go first,” Detective Waters said. “He felt I could be of the most help to you, as I was the first responder on the scene at both murders.”
“Is that so?” Laura asked, lifting an eyebrow. “How big is your police department here?”
“Not big,” Waters shrugged. “There’s five of us, in all.”
Laura nodded. So, a coincidence, then, most likely. If the department had been larger, she might have eyed Waters himself with a lot more suspicion. But since there were so few officers to begin with, the likelihood of the same one finding each of the bodies was a lot higher. Still, it was something to keep in the back of her mind, just in case.
“Let’s go to the latest crime scene,” Laura said. “You’ll lead us there in your car?”
“Yes, ma’am,” Waters nodded respectfully. “I’ll take you there right now.”
He hustled back to his car with a half-run. Laura was pleased, at least, to see a little deference from the locals. Her last case had been something of a nightmare, always butting heads with a Captain who clearly didn’t want them there. This one, though, was young and probably in awe of having real-live FBI agents come to his small town. Her seniority here, with Won rather than Nate, might actually be something of a gift.
Not that it made up in any way for not having Nate around.
Laura started the engine up again as the police cruiser in front of them started up, then pulled out after it. They made a solemn procession down the road that led into town, past aesthetically pleasing rock formations, more foamy cliffs, and that beach, covered in soft white sand below them. From there, they wound between quaint little hillside houses, each of them spaced widely apart, and soon entered the town itself.
Pacific Cove was much what Laura had pictured in her mind: old-fashioned white-fronted buildings flanked both sides of the street, still bearing old-style banners and signs as if the town was stuck in a previous century. The stores and businesses were brightened with painted window frames or facades, with jolly stars and stripes bunting and flags hanging from storefronts and lampposts. It was a tourist town. Even the few modern interventions – a nationally-known chain café tucked beside a barber shop, a couple of luxury hotels and a new block of condos – managed to fit in with the overall style of the place.
And Laura didn’t fail to notice, too, how people watched when they drove by. Staring at the cop car first, then the fact that another was following it. Word was going to spread that the FBI were in town very fast – and that, too, might end up being the kind of thing that could cause them problems.
“It’s beautiful here,” Agent Won said, wistfully.
“Hmm,” Laura replied, her mind on other things. She had a good idea of where Waters was taking them, and she had a feeling it wasn’t going to stay beautiful for very long.
Sure enough, he pulled up suddenly in a spot along the side of the road, clearly an approach to a marketplace. Laura saw the yellow police tape fluttering in the breeze before anything else. This was it.
She got out of the car without comment to Won, figuring he ought to be smart enough to know to follow her if he’d managed to make it through Quantico.
There was a slight possibility that she was being a little unfair, and a much higher one that she was being more unfriendly than Agent Won deserved. It wasn’t really his fault that he wasn’t Nathaniel Lavoie. But that fact rankled in her throat all the same, and Laura hadn’t exactly been given the time required to come to terms with it.
“This is it, up ahead,” Detective Waters said, gesturing ahead. He hung back, as if reluctant to go any closer. “She was put there yesterday evening. We got an anonymous tip from a caller who used that payphone right next to it.”
Laura took in the position of the payphone, against the wall of a nearby business, glancing around quickly. “No camera footage from around here?”
Waters shook his head no. “There used to be a camera up on the corner, but it got defaced last year by some drunk tourist and they took it down. I guess they were getting around to replacing it, but it just never got done.”
Laura nodded. Figured. If it would have been that easy, the locals wouldn’t have needed to call the FBI. “So, walk me through it,” she said. “You were first on the scene. What did you see?”
“Did you get my briefing notes?” Waters asked, glancing at her almost pleadingly.
“We did,” Laura said. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Agent Won helpfully holding them up with a grin. He was acting like was on vacation, not attending a crime scene. “But I want to hear it from you, now. Paint the picture for me.”
Waters swallowed, braced his jaw, then nodded. “So, my partner drove down here, and I was in the passenger seat. We parked about where we’re standing now, and we could already see something on the ground, so I got out and rushed ahead.” He walked forward a few paces quickly, as if demonstrating. Laura followed him and couldn’t help noticing Won copying the same quick paces as if he was literally walking in Waters’s footsteps. “As I got around here, I could make out what it was. Ashley.”
“Ashley Christianson,” Laura said, recalling it from the notes.
“She was a twenty-two-year-old local woman who worked at a diner near here, right?” Agent Won spoke up. Like he was trying to prove he’d read the case notes, too.
“That’s right,” Waters said, glancing back at him. Laura wished Agent Won would shut up. Waters was obviously battling emotions right now, and she wanted as much of the story from his mouth as she could get. She wanted the raw, visceral reaction of the person who had been on the scene, because that was more valuable than any impression that she could get from the scene herself – especially now that the body had been taken away.
“Where was she?” Laura asked, prompting Waters to get back on track and hoping they hadn’t lost too much steam.
“Right here,” he said, moving forward and ducking under the tape. It was only a small area that had been marked off, and people were already placing bouquets of flowers all around it. It was a couple of feet from the payphone, right in the center of the street.
Up ahead, market stalls with quaint wooden boards painted with flowers and hand lettering stood empty, no doubt a permanent fixture of this part of town designed to draw in buyers during the tourist season. Right now, their metal frames, devoid of the normal drapes and goods that would pretty them up, seemed almost ominous. The street opened up into a market square which extended towards the shore, making this very obviously a focal point for the town.
“This is extremely public,” Laura said. “Was there anyone else around when you found her?”
“No,” Waters said. “It was pretty late, so I guess no one had come by here for a while. I was the only person on the scene.”
It made sense. That was how the killer had managed to put the body here without being caught. In order to put it down in such a public place, it had to be done under cover of night. A time when everyone else was sleeping. And yet, the candle had been lit – as if drawing attention to her.
“Tell me about the candle,” Laura said. “Describe how she was laying.”
Waters swallowed again, cleared his throat, and quickly shook his head as if to dislodge something. “Sorry,” he said. “I went to school with Ashley, you know? She was a couple years younger than me, but…”
“It’s alright, take your time.” Laura watched him carefully, how he seemed to be trying to put a professional face back on. Was it real? She thought so, by her gut instinct. So far, Waters was checking out. But she’d been fooled before, and she was going to keep her eye on him for the rest of the case as well.
“She was flat on her back,” Waters said. “Fully clothed, and everything. There was blood on her shirt and her chest, where her throat had been cut, but there was no blood on the ground.”
“She must have been moved,” Won spoke up. The obvious.