CHAPTER FIVE
Hope Springs looked like it had been built for a postcard.
Rachel noticed it the moment Novak turned onto the secondary road nine miles outside of Arlington.
There was a literal town square with a white gazebo at its center, a hardware store with hand-painted lettering on the window, a diner advertising two-dollar coffee on a sandwich board out front.
Flower baskets hung from every lamppost, even though it was barely spring and most of them were still empty dirt.
“Looks like Mayberry,” Novak said, though the smile on his face suggested this wasn’t necessarily a bad thing.
Novak had called Diane Mott from the hotel lobby at seven that morning before he and Rachel had breakfast. He’d kept the conversation vague, the way he'd promised. He’d reported that she was very open to a visit, and invited them to come as soon as they could.
Diane Mott answered the door before they'd finished walking up the path, as though she'd been watching for them through the front window.
She was a tall woman in her early fifties with graying hair pulled back in a loose bun.
She wore a cute cardigan over a nightgown despite having clearly been awake for a few hours.
Her eyes were red-rimmed and swollen, making it looked like she hadn't slept properly in days.
Rachel assumed her being awake at this hour spoke to sleeplessness rather than a refined routine.
"Agents," she said. "Come on in. I made coffee."
The house was small but well-kept, the kind of place that had clearly been furnished with care over decades rather than all at once.
Rachel noticed the details as they followed Diane through the front hall: a wall of family photos in mismatched frames, a needlepoint pillow that read Home Is Where The Heart Is propped in an armchair, a shelf of ceramic birds that looked handmade.
It was warm and inviting in a way that made the grief that was also evident in the place sort of pop out and seem sharper.
It was like walking through a beautiful house but also expecting a ghost to jump out at you from every corner.
One such ghost jumped out slightly when she noticed a man's jacket still hung on a hook by the door.
Diane led them into the kitchen, where she sat at the table, a scarred wooden thing with mismatched chairs. Diane poured coffee into mugs that were just as mismatched as the chairs. Her hands shook slightly as she set the pot back on its warmer.
"I know why you're really here," Diane said, sitting down across from them. "You can drop the act about a broader review…or whatever you called it."
Rachel exchanged a glance with Novak. "What makes you say that?"
"Because nobody from the FBI drives out here to talk about a heart attack unless they don't believe it was a heart attack.
" Diane wrapped both hands around her mug without drinking from it.
"I've been telling people for two weeks…
but nobody wanted to listen. The sheriff's department closed the file before I even had the funeral arranged. "
"We're looking into some irregularities that might connect Gerald's death to another case," Rachel said carefully. "We'd like to ask you some questions, if you're willing."
"I'm more than willing." Diane's voice cracked slightly on the word. "I've been waiting for somebody to ask."
Novak took out his phone and set it on the table between them. "Do you mind if I record this? Just so we don't miss anything."
"Record whatever you want," she said with a flippant wave of her hand. Diane looked at Rachel instead of Novak, as though she'd already decided which of them she trusted. "That app killed my husband. I don't care how that sounds. I know it sounds goofy and batshit crazy, but it’s the truth.”
"Tell us what you mean by that," Rachel said.
"The Apogee. That stupid watch." Diane's jaw tightened as she shook her head. She spoke the word as if it were a very bad curse. "It told him when he'd die, and then he died. Exactly when it said he would."
"His peak day," Rachel said.
"Peak day," Diane repeated the phrase like it tasted bad in her mouth.
"That's what they call it like it's a good thing.
Like it's a milestone you're supposed to celebrate.
Gerald posted about it that morning. He was so proud of himself, working out five days a week for damn near a year to get his numbers up.
He put a picture on Facebook of himself at the gym, flexing like a teenager.
" Her eyes filled, but she didn't cry. "He looked very good in it, too.
But…by that night, he was dead in our living room floor. "
"The medical examiner's report listed cardiac arrest," Rachel said. "Given his cholesterol history and the family history of heart disease, it wasn't flagged as suspicious at the time."
"I know what the report said." Diane's tone sharpened and grew a bit pointed.
"I also know he'd never had a single symptom.
No chest pain, no shortness of breath, nothing.
He went to his cardiologist every year and always came back clean.
And then the one day that app told him he'd hit his peak, he just dropped dead. "
“In the living room, right?” Novak asked.
“Yes.”
“Where were you when it happened?”
“Upstairs, getting ready for bed.” She grinned and a bit of red went into her cheeks.
“If you want the full truth, I had planned to call him up and be waiting in my birthday suit. The way he looked in that picture, his body all toned…it was quite nice.” The smile faltered and she added: “But then I heard him cry out, and then there was a thud. I ran downstairs and…there he was. Dead in the floor.”
“No signs of a break-in?” Rachel asked.
“No. The cops never even looked. I asked them about it and they seemed surprised. I think one officer did look just because I mentioned, but…I doubt he gave it any real attention.”
"When did you start looking into the app itself?" Rachel asked, trying to keep the conversation moving before Diane lost herself to grief.
Something shifted in Diane's expression, a mix of embarrassment and defiance. "About three days after the funeral. I couldn't sleep, so I started reading about it. Forums, mostly. Reddit threads. There's a whole community of people who think something's wrong with that company."
"What kind of something?" Novak asked.
Diane leaned forward, and for the first time since they'd sat down, some of the grief in her face gave way to something closer to urgency.
"There are people who've been tracking every reported Apogee death for the last two years.
Somebody built a spreadsheet. I saw it myself.
Every single case, the person died within days of their predicted peak.
Not weeks before, not months after. Right around the date. "
"That could be explained a number of ways," Rachel said gently. "If the algorithm is modeling someone's cardiovascular decline, it's not unreasonable that a person nearing serious health risk might also be nearing their statistical peak."
"That's what everyone says." Diane shook her head and there was a look in her eyes that reminded them that this woman had already had a lot of cops wave off her concerns.
"But some of these people were young. Healthy. No history of anything,” she said.
“There's a theory going around that the company sells the predictions, that somebody's paying to know exactly when a person will be vulnerable so they can time something.
Poison, maybe. There's a whole thread about untraceable compounds that make it look natural. "
Novak's expression didn't change, but Rachel saw him glance briefly at his phone screen, where the recording light blinked steadily.
“Are these actual studies or just things you found online?” Novak asked. It sounded like he was choosing his words quite carefully.
“Just online. And it’s not like it’s a ton of deaths out there, but it is quite a rabbit hole.
There’s some very shady stuff centered around this app…
this company. There’s another theory too," Diane went on, and now she was talking faster, the words tumbling over each other.
"That the company's own founder is behind it.
That he's sick himself and he's testing something on people without their knowledge, using the app to track who's the best candidate.
I don't know which one is true. Maybe none of it is.
But I know my husband is dead and that watch told him exactly when it would happen, and nobody wants to explain how that's possible if it's all just a coincidence. "
The kitchen went quiet except for the tick of a clock somewhere in the next room. Rachel let the silence sit for a moment before she spoke again. She strongly felt Diane was falling prey to false hopes, seeking any possible answer for the sudden death of her husband.
"Mrs. Mott, I understand why you'd want an explanation,” she said. “Losing someone suddenly, with no warning, it's disorienting in a way that makes any answer feel better than none."
"Don't do that," Diane said quietly. "Don't tell me I'm imagining it just because it's easier for you."
"I'm not saying that." Rachel kept her voice even.
"I'm saying grief can send people looking in a lot of directions at once, and not all of them lead somewhere real.
But I also came here because I think there might be something to what you're describing, even if it's not exactly what the forums are saying.
Something a little more grounded in logic.
That's why we're asking questions instead of closing this out. "
Diane studied her for a long moment, as if deciding whether to believe her. Eventually she nodded. Rachel could see some of the tension leaving her shoulders.
"There's more," Diane said. "If you want it."
"We do," Novak said.
"I learned that it’s a local company. I mean, they have little satellite offices all over, but the corporate headquarters isn’t too far away—in Reston, believe it or not.
People post pictures of it, protest outside sometimes.
" Diane got up and crossed to a drawer near the refrigerator, pulling out a folded printout.
"It's not far from here. Reston is just forty minutes, maybe less depending on traffic. "
Rachel took the paper and unfolded it. It was a printed map with an office park circled in red pen, the kind of thing someone prints out at two in the morning when they can't stop thinking about something.
She chose not to comment on how strange it seemed that she had gone to the lengths of printing it out.
"You've been there," Rachel said. It wasn't a question.
"I drove past it once." Diane sat back down, suddenly looking exhausted, as though the admission had cost her something. "I didn't go in. I just sat in the parking lot for a while. I just…like you said," she said with a shrug. “Just looking for answers.”
Rachel folded the map and slid it into her bag. "Thank you for this. And for talking to us."
"Just find out what happened to him," Diane said. "I don't need it to be some grand conspiracy. I just need it to be true."
Rachel nodded even though a small, nagging voice in the back of her head told her that with a big company like Apogee, a conspiracy might be exactly what they were stepping into.