CHAPTER TWO
The old Eagleton school had served generations of children. Years after the final class left, the three-story building still occupied the center of town.
Selena Raven stood beside her car and studied it from the cracked parking lot.
It felt strange being there just one town over from Elmsview.
The central section rose above two shorter wings, its stone entrance framed by square columns and a weather-worn carving that still read EAGLETON GRADED SCHOOL.
Someone had removed the flagpole years ago, leaving four rusted bolts in a concrete base near the front steps.
Ivy climbed the western wall in tangled ropes, turning red at the edges as fall settled over Harlan County.
Three weeks earlier, the building had become the FBI’s newest field office.
At least, that was what the plaque beside the entrance claimed. The temporary sign was smaller than the old school's name and had been mounted slightly crooked. Behind the glass doors, a strip of brown paper covered a broken pane.
Selena took out her phone.
The call connected on the fourth ring.
“Hey, Selena,” Meg Calloway said. “How are you settling in?”
Selena kept her attention on a gutter that had pulled away from the roof above the east wing. Rainwater had stained the brick beneath it in a long dark trail.
“Meg, it’s been three weeks, and I’m still here on my own.”
A pause followed. Office noise carried faintly through the phone. Voices, a ringing line, someone closing a drawer.
“We’re doing everything we can to rectify that,” Meg said. “You should have another agent very soon. A matter of days.”
“One agent?”
“I saw your request for a couple more.”
“And administrative staff, Meg. I’m answering calls, filing intake reports, dealing with property management, setting up equipment, and trying to work cases. I spent forty minutes yesterday finding out who was authorized to replace a toilet valve.”
"That sounds character-building."
“It was leaking into a bucket.” Selena grimaced.
“Well, you have a bucket. Things are looking up.”
Selena pressed her lips together. Meg’s dry delivery made it difficult to tell whether she expected a laugh. Usually, she did not.
“I’m doing everything myself in an old school building,” Selena said. “Half the rooms don’t have power, and the heating system makes a noise like somebody trapped a lawn mower in the basement.”
“It was the only building we could get in the heart of Harlan County that would keep you close to the action. If it’s selected as your permanent new office, we’ll get in contractors to spruce it up a bit.”
“It’s falling apart, Meg.”
“I sense you’re not happy.”
The faint amusement in Meg’s voice loosened Selena’s irritation without removing it.
A breeze moved across the lot, lifting grit around the tires. Beyond the school grounds, Eagleton’s main road curved between a hardware store and a low brick church. Morning traffic amounted to two pickups and a county bus carrying no visible passengers.
“I don’t know,” Selena said. “It’s weird being back permanently.”
“Nothing’s forever.”
“You keep saying that.”
Meg paused. “Because it’s true. If you set up and head the Harlan County office for a year or so, I am certain an opportunity to come back to the Washington office will present itself.”
Selena walked toward the front steps but stopped at the first one. The school’s double doors reflected her in pieces where the old glass had warped.
“And then what?” she asked. “The higher-ups in Washington welcome me back with open arms?”
“It’ll work out, Selena. We just need things to calm down.”
“Things were calm until they decided they weren’t.”
“You ruffled feathers here by going against them in a case that was covered by national press.”
“I disagreed with people who were wrong. It was about catching the real killer, not massaging their egos.”
“Yes, and you did it publicly, repeatedly, and in a way that allowed them to remember every word,” Meg said.
Selena shifted the phone to her other ear. “I was asked questions under oath.”
“I know.”
“I answered them to the best of my ability.”
“I know that, too. It isn’t fair. But I’m trying to protect you and your career.”
Meg’s voice had lost its humor. The change brought Selena back to a conference room in Washington, where three senior officials had asked why she bypassed a supervisory chain during an investigation.
The answer had involved an endangered witness, withheld information, and a decision Selena would make again. That had not made the answer popular.
Meg continued, “This is the best option for you to do what you do best and not lose your career.”
Selena ran a thumb along the edge of her phone case.
The field office had been presented as an opportunity. A regional violent-crime post in an underserved county. A chance to develop better cooperation between federal agents and rural departments. The word exile never appeared in the paperwork, but the arrangement carried the same message.
“I suppose,” Selena said.
“You don’t have to sound so grateful.”
Selena looked at the place in dismay. “I’m standing in front of a condemned school pretending it’s a federal facility.”
“It isn’t condemned. Now you’re exaggerating, Selena.”
“Maybe.”
Meg sighed. “Send me the property report. I’ll push it again to see if we can get someone in to look at the place for you.”
“I already sent it after the IT team finished installing everything.”
“Then resend it and copy me directly.”
Selena climbed the steps. One concrete corner had crumbled away, exposing stone beneath.
“How’s the Washington field office doing without me?”
“Fine. Fine.”
“That sounded convincing.”
“We’re surviving. Tanya has been promoted in admin. She’s taken over questioning every expense request since Martha retired a few weeks ago, though she lacks patience.”
“Patience is overrated.”
Selena reached the doors but did not enter.
Meg lowered her voice. “Brent’s pining after you.”
Selena gave a small shake of her head. “He is not.”
“He’s been a real grump since you transferred away.”
“Brent’s a grump whenever he isn’t the center of attention.”
“He claims the office has lost its best investigator and its only tolerable lunch companion.”
“He eats at his desk.”
Selena rested her palm against the cool metal doorframe.
Meg said, “You two wouldn’t have been an item, would you? That would have been a problem.”
“Of course not.”
The denial came too quickly.
Brent Mayfield had been a colleague, an occasional mistake, and for several months something neither of them had bothered to define.
They had seen each other a few times, usually when work left them too tired to make better decisions.
But ever since her first case back in Elmsview, she had distanced herself from him.
Old news, at least to Selena.
The final weeks before her transfer had been different. Brent had called more often. He had offered to help pack. Once, in her apartment doorway, he had started a sentence with “I thought we might” and then changed the subject before finishing it.
Selena had let him.
Selena opened the door. The hinge gave a drawn-out squeal that echoed into the entrance hall.
“Before you go,” she said, “how’s the Morimer investigation?”
Meg did not answer at once.
Selena stepped inside and let the door swing shut behind her.
The lobby had once held trophy cases on both sides.
One remained; its glass filmed with grime and its shelves empty except for a tarnished plaque awarded to the 1987 girls’ basketball team.
A coil of network cable sat on the floor beneath a federal security camera that had not yet been connected.
“He’s still under surveillance,” Meg said. “Financial team is tracing businesses tied to him. We have eyes on his known associates. So far, nothing we can move on.”
“For a man who runs most of the organized crime in Kentucky, he’s showing impressive restraint.”
“Men like Morimer don’t stay in business by panicking when law enforcement pays attention.”
“He knows he’s being watched,” Selena said.
“Undoubtedly.”
Selena started along the main corridor. Classroom doors stood open on either side, revealing old desks, stacked chairs, and chalkboards scarred by years of writing and erasure.
Fine gray powder dulled the floor near the walls.
A line of hooks remained outside one room, some still labeled with strips of yellowed tape.
“That’ll come,” Selena said. “He’ll make a move.”
“We’re counting on it.”
Connor entered her thoughts without invitation.
He had compromised himself with noble intentions.
Six thousand dollars paid to Walton Morimer in exchange for information to help Connor find the person who killed two of his friends.
Then Morimer’s men had delivered Marlene Schmidt to the sheriff as if returning misplaced property.
Connor had admitted the payment, but only after Selena cornered him with the truth.
He had called it a desperate decision made for Victor Schmidt, one of his best friends.
Morimer had called it the beginning of a debt. In the end, Marlene was not even the killer.
The FBI did not know Connor had compromised himself. Selena had kept that detail out of her report, telling herself that the money had not affected the case and that exposing him would damage an already strained investigation.
The reasoning felt thinner each time she repeated it.
If Morimer collected that debt with blackmail, forcing him to do anything illegal, Connor might not tell her. Pride would keep him quiet until the situation became impossible to contain.
Meg said, “You still there?”
“Yes.”
Another pause. “Is there something going on?”
Selena passed beneath a ceiling tile stained by an old leak.
“No.”
The answer lodged between them.
Meg had known Selena too long to miss a hesitation. Still, she did not press.
“I’d better go,” Meg said. “I’m due in a meeting, and I’ve already ignored two people waving at me through glass.”
“Sounds serious.”
“It’s budgets. People become territorial when you mention taking away office chairs.”
“Send me some. I’ve got four desks and two chairs. But first, give me the people to fill them.”
“I’ll add it to the list. Let me know if you need anything.”
Selena glanced along the deserted corridor.
“Sure thing. Just please get me some help around here. Another couple of agents. Anything.”
“Bye, Selena.”
The call ended.
Without Meg’s voice, the hallway returned to silence.
Selena slipped the phone into her jacket pocket and continued toward the rear wing.
Her footsteps carried along the tiled corridor and returned from the stairwell.
Three weeks of contractors, delivery crews, and technicians had produced one operational security system, a temperamental internet connection, and an office printer that displayed a paper jam even when its tray was empty.
The first week had been consumed by logistics.
Evidence storage needed a lock that met federal standards.
The interview room required recording equipment.
Local departments wanted to know which cases qualified for referral and whether Selena had authority to cross county lines.
Washington sent forms instead of answers.
By the second week, she had stopped expecting anyone else to solve the practical problems. She called vendors, met inspectors, carried boxes, and learned which breaker controlled the rear wing.
None of it resembled the work she had returned to Kentucky to do.
The lack of people made every small task more visible.
No conversations drifted over cubicle walls.
Nobody appeared in the doorway with a question or a file.
When Selena left a mug beside the sink, it remained exactly where she placed it.
The building offered no sign that anyone else intended to arrive.
A former principal’s office near the entrance would have made the obvious headquarters. Rain had damaged its outer wall, and the room smelled of old plaster. Selena had chosen the teachers’ lounge instead.
The door still bore a faded sign:
FACULTY ONLY
Someone had crossed out FACULTY years ago and written COOL PEOPLE in marker beneath it.
Selena pushed inside.
Four metal desks occupied the room. Three were bare.
Hers stood near the windows, supporting a laptop, two case files, a phone dock, and a stack of forms that needed scanning.
Filing cabinets lined one wall. A cork board held a county map, contact numbers for local police and fire departments, and an FBI memorandum reminding personnel not to use unsecured wireless networks.
A small kitchenette filled the opposite corner. The sink worked when it wanted to. The refrigerator hummed steadily but froze anything placed on its top shelf. Selena had not tested the stove.
Sunlight reached through bent blinds and striped the empty desks.
She set her keys beside the laptop.
The incoming agent would take the desk closest to the door. Assuming the person arrived. A second agent could work opposite Selena. Administrative staff would need somewhere else, perhaps the old language classroom across the hall once the electrical outlets were repaired.
Planning the room made the office feel less temporary.
That troubled her more than she wanted to admit.
A cardboard box remained beneath her desk, still sealed from the move. It contained books, framed certificates, and a photograph of Selena with her father and Diane taken before any of them had learned how long a family could carry the same argument.
She had told herself there was no point unpacking until the office was ready. The rest of her stuff was still in her room at the Wilson Motel on the outskirts of Elmsview.
Her phone rang.
The screen displayed the Harlan County Sheriff’s Department.
Selena let it ring once more before answering.
“Agent Raven.”
“Hello, Agent Raven.”
Cheryl’s voice was polite in the careful way people became polite when friendliness was not available.
“Nice to hear from you, Cheryl.”
“Sure.”
Selena sat behind the desk. “What can I do for you?”
“I’ve been told to give you an address. The sheriff needs your assistance. I just sent the location to your phone.”
A message notification appeared at the top of the screen.
“My assistance?”
The wording caught her attention. Connor could have called directly. Instead, he had asked Cheryl to contact her, formal enough to keep distance between them.
“What does he need?” Selena asked.
“I think he needs you to look over a crime scene.”
Selena reached for a notebook and opened it to a clean page.
“What sort of scene?”
“A woman’s been killed at the old Montgomery place.” Cheryl paused, and a trace of strain entered her voice. “It’s pretty brutal, by all accounts.”
Selena picked up her pen.
“I’m on my way.”