Chapter 4
TURN OF EVENTS
ORI
This was bad.
I swore it felt like that had been my sentiment with everything in my life lately but this was something beyond the norm.
I kept my eyes on the scene taking note of everything I could, as others walked through the snow, processing evidence that could be safely touched without damaging it.
Natalie Rawlins was found. Unfortunately, she’d been found near Hains Point the place where the Potomac and the Anacostia met just downriver from half of our national monuments.
This felt like a fucking sign and I didn’t know what we were being warned about but I knew it was pulling me deeper into my work when I had been battling to get out of it.
Can’t ever make a clean break from bullshit.
The press was going to have a field day with the suppositions on why the Rawlins girl, and by proxy her family, had been targeted in whatever this was.
Natalie Rawlins was dead. Her body a shade of white indicative of extreme blood loss that wasn’t evident on the ground beneath her.
Which meant she hadn’t been killed here and we still had a primary location that needed to be found.
That complicated the search for who this was, since this was only a dump site and was surrounded by buildings that were mixed use and historic.
We were technically in Virginia but just across the river were multiple national monuments.
Every angle of this mystery had to be discussed before we could even begin to narrow down who wanted her dead and how they could accomplish it.
I glanced around the area noting that the trees opened up to an almost unobstructed view of a building in the distance.
I continued to focus on it and I didn’t understand why.
It was the tallest on the left-hand side of the river in Arlington directly across from several monuments and near where we were located.
The way Natalie had been displayed made it seem like someone from that building could’ve had a line of sight to her especially since the foliage on the trees was gone.
It was early February so nothing was blooming yet so the sightline was clear.
The construction was purely residential, with balconies on each level and one not visible from the ground that belonged to the penthouse suite.
My eyes focused on the units that could see this specific spot of the river, which was most of them on that side of the building since the leaves hadn’t started to bud.
“What do you see?”
Alec was behind me having questioned the witness who’d found her body.
A man had come out to fish illegally and was now the center of a murder investigation.
For his sake, I hoped he had friends in high places.
Half of the agents here had been giving him shit like they’d already decided he was guilty despite all signs pointing to his innocence.
I looked back at Alec as he adjusted the collar of his heavy coat before my eyes were drawn back to the building that loomed in the distance.
“Something about that place is throwing me off.”
“The apartment building?” The ice on the ground crunched as he came to stand next to me.
I nodded not taking my eyes off the building.
The way the sun rose caused the light to hit the building and almost reflect directly on the spot we were in.
It was early as hell like the murder scene was set here purposefully.
“We need to find out who lives on the upper floors.”
“It’s weird as fuck the way the sun is highlighting this spot. Almost like a beacon for us to find her body here.” I nodded my agreement as I turned to face him. Now Alec’s eyes were trained on the upper levels of the apartment building.
“Weird isn’t it?”
“That might be a good place to look but you know people in those buildings are gonna have a lot of shit to say about their privacy and being questioned.” His warning was clear because the income needed to live in a place on the river meant that lawyers would immediately be involved and it would be a minute before we could pin people down for questioning.
“And they can kiss my ass when it comes right down to it. I told you nothing is going to keep me from getting both of us out of here with an unblemished record. This case isn’t about to slow us up.”
“It ain’t all on you, Ori.”
I looked around at the other officers and agents that were on the scene before I gave him a knowing look.
“Them dumb asses over there are more than willing to pin the blame on whoever just to make themselves look good in front of our new overseers. I might want to get this shit done but I want it right.”
Alec nodded as he pulled his hat down further on his curly black hair.
Unlike me, he hadn’t grown up in DC and the weather fluctuations always irritated him.
It made sense that he would head back south when we were done with this.
“Heard you. Guess we won’t be making any friends on this case either. ”
I smirked knowing he couldn’t care less about making friends. “Like you give a fuck.”
The look on his face matched mine: the arrogance of having outperformed everyone in our unit fueling the confidence on our faces. “I live to piss them off. That shit makes it all the better when we make them look bad.”
“And that we will do. I’ll have to pull the names of everyone who lives in those places and start to cross-reference to see if they have any connection to the Rawlins girl.”
“This is looking more and more political with every new piece of evidence that we find.”
“That could just be a coincidence.” I wasn’t playing devil’s advocate; I was silently hoping that both of our guts were wrong.
“The fact that we’re this close to the National Mall and the center of the government.
I know it’s hard to wipe your ass in this town without hitting something; stranger things have happened.
” He waved his hand around the area pointing out the landmarks he’d mentioned.
They couldn’t completely be seen through the trees and buildings but you could tell they were there.
“I doubt anybody on that side of the aisle finally took their heads out of their own asses to actually do their jobs instead of manipulating shit so their portfolios grow. If it was something that was going to be a rebuttal to the bullshit we’ve already seen I doubt it would be this.”
“Foreign agents?”
My brain went directly to some of the operatives I’d met and ended in my life and I knew that was always something that was possible.
Plenty of people didn’t want the mad dash to conservatism that the country was heading in because they knew it would eventually trickle down and affect them.
And quickly based on the stupid moves that were already being made.
“Could be. But if this is the opening volley what is the end goal? Hell, we weathered an insurrection and it’s clear that keeping the masses too fixated on holding on to crumbs to see what’s really going on is working. The public at large isn’t much of a threat to anyone and they know it.”
Working in government only gave me a greater disdain for people in power and the idiots who continued to elect them into office.
The woman in red ran across my mind again and the ease in which she divested a man of his money before he knew her name only proved my point.
People were playing games with lives without truly giving a shit about the consequences so long as they made money.
And the money didn’t even make them happy since they didn’t have to do much to earn it.
Which led them to seeking more depraved ways of getting their fix.
Shit, this case is going to be much more involved than I want.
We both stood silently for a moment, watching them collect evidence and do what they could to provide Natalie with a semblance of dignity as they placed her body in a bag for transport.
“Can’t lie, I feel like we’re missing something and I don’t know what it is. Like we’ve come in on the middle of a plot and the piece of shit who did this is already four steps ahead of us.”
I silently agreed with his assessment watching how the people with us interacted with the scene.
“They’ve already interviewed some of the people she knew but hopefully we can get access to her computer and her phone.
Last known location is one thing but I want to check and see what areas she frequented.
No matter how we see conspiracies in everything it could be as simple as she met up with the wrong person at the wrong time.
No shortage of men just killing women for no reason.
You act like the manosphere red pill bullshit isn’t prolific. ”
He looked around again his frustration with more than this case mirroring mine.
“Forgive me for forgetting that some shit as lame as blaming women, who have been artificially held back for hundreds of years, for all the issues in the world that white men created. That shit is incomprehensible and just a reminder that white supremacy fucks everything up.”
“Facts. But thankfully, it seems like the time is coming for it to implode.”
“But at what cost?”
His words halted my thoughts, the look we shared was one that felt foreboding.
We both had seen the terrible shit that could happen in the world and although I’d seen more combat than Alec he’d been in the middle of shit because of this country as well.
When bodies were needed to protect the empire, they didn’t care about you as a person or what your desires were.
You were just the next available meat shield to be used for fodder.
Sad as it was I had to take his words to heart.
I nodded toward the car, and we moved in tandem to leave. When we were a few feet away I finally spoke again. “Yet another reason why I’m ready to be done with this shit.”
“Tired of playing Captain America?”