CHAPTER TWENTY FOUR
Miles woke to the sound of his own screaming.
In the dream, she'd been calling to him from somewhere in the house.
Her voice had sounded so real, so desperate.
He'd searched every room, following that voice, but she was always just around the next corner, just up the next flight of stairs.
He'd come into his office, where all of the information about the elemental murders was waiting for him, and Elena had been there, too, screaming as the weight of all the research buried her alive.
He stumbled to the bathroom and splashed cold water on his face. The mirror showed a stranger—hollow cheeks, bloodshot eyes, two days of stubble. When had he last eaten? When had he last showered?
He returned to the bed, wanting so badly to sleep.
But he felt he had to do something. He felt alone and as if his world had been ripped apart.
There was no way in hell he could sleep.
So, he pulled on yesterday's clothes and walked downstairs.
The house felt different now. Contaminated.
Every surface Elena had touched seemed to mock him with her absence.
The kitchen still smelled faintly of fluorine. He knew he was imagining it; the crews had confirmed that the house was safe shortly after 7:30 that afternoon. He wondered if he would always smell it for the rest of his life as he wandered around the downstairs portion of his house.
Miles found himself standing in the spot where Elena had collapsed. The crime scene techs had taken the device, bagged the evidence, photographed everything. But they couldn't take away the knowledge that she'd died here. Alone. Scared. Calling his name.
He walked to the front door and checked the locks.
Then the back door. Then every window on the ground floor.
The killer had gotten in somehow, probably by picking the lock on the back door.
But the preliminary search by federal agents had not shown any clear evidence, even though they’d dusted for prints.
His phone buzzed on the kitchen counter. He looked to it but ultimately ignored it. He did, however, see that it was somehow already 3:47 in the morning.
Miles sat at Elena's personal laptop, her work laptop having been taken in by Vic.
He scrolled through her recent emails, not even sure what he was looking for.
Some of her work material was often routed to her personal email, but it was small-time stuff.
Work schedules. Meeting invitations, things like that.
He also came across a message to her sister about bridesmaid dresses that would never be worn.
The phone rang again. He let it go to voicemail.
His mother had been trying to call off and on and though he did want to talk to her eventually, he simply couldn’t right now.
He wondered how she had found out. He certainly hadn’t called her.
In fact, most of the time between Elena’s death and Vic dropping him off at home was like a fog of shattered memories. He could recall very little.
The phone rang again. This time he answered without looking at the caller ID.
“What?” he moaned.
“Miles, it's your mother. Honey, I've been trying to reach you for—”
“Mom, I’m sorry. But not right now, okay? I love you, but not right now.”
He hung up and sat on the spot where he had found Elena dead. He started to cry and then lay out on the carpet. And at some point, he faded out again into something resembling sleep. It was a restless and fitful nap, plagued by another dream.
This time Elena was sitting at the kitchen table, working on wedding seating charts. She looked up when he entered, smiled that warm smile that made everything else disappear.
“You're late,” she said. “We need to talk about the caterer. I’m having second thoughts on chicken.”
“Elena, you're—”
“Dead? I know. But we still need to figure out the menu.”
He woke in the same spot. He got up and walked to the kitchen counter where he had placed Elena's engagement ring.
He'd taken it from the medical examiner.
Couldn't bear the thought of it sitting in some evidence locker.
He looked to the kitchen windows and saw murky sunlight spilling in.
He looked at the clock on the microwave and saw that it was 6:55 in the morning.
He walked through the house again, looking for anything the crime scene team might have missed.
In Elena's home office, he found notebooks filled with her neat handwriting.
Project notes. Chemical formulas. A reminder to pick up the wedding invitations.
He then went to the back door and looked over the entire surface.
If the killer had indeed picked their lock, there would be some sign, right?
He wandered around for a while and somehow found himself in the basement.
He had intended to start searching the vents for any sign of evidence, but was suddenly frozen in front of a small shelf where Elena had set up his old chemistry set a good a few months back.
It was a set his parents had given him for his eleventh birthday.
Elena had teased him about keeping it, called it his “museum of nerdiness.” Now it seemed prophetic.
Everything in his life had led to this moment, this case, this loss.
The doorbell rang. It was loud and intrusive and it nearly made him scream.
He considered just ignoring it, but somehow, the idea of someone being outside of his house while he was going through this, felt like an invasion.
And in some sick corner of his broken heart, he wondered if it might be the killer coming to gloat.
As he stormed back up the stairs, he checked his watch and was shocked to see that it had somehow got to be 8:50 AM. He could barely remember anything he’d done since waking from that second dream.
The bell rang again and this time it was followed by three hard knocks. And then, a voice: “Miles? It's Vic.”
He froze. Vic wasn't supposed to be here.
They had both decided that it made the most sense for Miles to step away—to willingly stay at home rather than have Hayes actually remove him from the case.
But hearing her voice brought a surge of something that might have been hope.
He and Vic were far from being friends; really, they were just getting used to working with one another, but the simple familiar ring of her voice brought him around to something like clarity.
He finished his slow trek to the door and opened it. Vic stood on the front step. She looked exhausted, with dark circles shadowing her eyes. She held two coffee cups and a paper bag that smelled like bacon.
“Hayes doesn't know I'm here,” she said. “But I thought I should come by and check on you.”
I’m glad you did. Come on in.”
She handed him one of the coffee cups. “I thought you’d want to know that I found something in Elena's notes. And I’ve already spoken with one of her coworkers about it.”
Miles felt his pulse quicken. He sipped from the coffee and went into the living room. He sat down, gesturing for Vic to do the same. “What kind of something?” he asked.
Vic set the paper bag on the coffee table and started unpacking it. She’d gone by a fast-food place and gotten him breakfast. He instantly grabbed a bacon and cheese biscuit, wolfing it down.
“Elena was working on a new project,” Vic said. “Something that hadn't gotten FDA approval yet. She'd signed NDAs and the whole shebang.”
Miles thought about it as he swallowed down the biscuit and drank more of the coffee. Elena was usually open about her work, at least in general terms. If she'd kept a project secret, it must have been significant. Or maybe she had told him and he simply didn’t remember.
“So what do you know about the project?”
“That's the problem.” Vic reached onto the table and grabbed a biscuit of her own.
“Her employer is pushing back on my attempts to learn more.
They're citing proprietary research, trade secrets, all that corporate bullshit. Which is frustrating because I thought they were going to play ball. They agreed to meet me very early this morning and everything.”
“The nature of the work isn't what's important,” he said, the realization hitting him. He was surprised he could think rationally at all, given how scattered his brain felt at the moment. “It's who knew about it.”
“My thoughts exactly. If we can figure out who knew about Elena's secret project, who had access to information about her work...”
“It could lead us to the killer.”
She nodded. “I was able to get the cyber geeks at the field office to crack the passwords on Elena's work laptop. I didn't think you'd mind.”
Miles shook his head. “Of course not. What did you find?”
“A list of names that appears to be a small research team for the project.” She took a bite of her breakfast, more of a nibble than Miles’s ravenous bites. “Five people total, including Elena.”
She pulled out her phone and showed him the screen.
Miles scanned the names, trying to place them from Elena's occasional mentions of coworkers.
At first, none of them stood out. He sort of recognized them just from passing conversations around dinnertime or getting ready for bed.
But then one name jumped out at him: Daniel Crawford.
“That one,” Miles said, pointing. “ heard Elena mention him before.”
“What did she say?”
Miles tried to remember. Elena's work stories usually blended together in his mind, a stream of office politics and research protocols. So if this name was sticking out in his mind, the story behind it must have been significant. Slowly, it started coming to him, bit by bit.
“She said he was smart, but strange. Quiet. Always seemed to be watching people… nearly to the point of being creepy.” Miles felt a chill as some of the pieces finally started snapping together. “When did he join the project?”
Vic consulted her notes. “About six months ago. But here's the interesting part—he took a sudden leave of absence two weeks ago.”
Two weeks ago. Right around the time the fluorine murders started. And now Vic mentioned it, Miles was pretty sure Elena had said something about the “quiet, creepy guy” being absent as of late.
“That's our guy,” Miles said.
“Maybe. We need to look into him more. I can—”
“I'm coming with you.”
Vic shook her head and set her biscuit down. “Miles, you need to stay here. Grieve. Be with family and friends. This is too soon.”
“I'll grieve when this fucker is caught.”
The words came out harder than he'd intended. The rage he heard in his own voice made him uneasy. Vic seemed shocked, too. A flicker of surprise passed across her face.
“Hayes will lose his mind if he knows you're working the case. Especially this soon.”
“Then we don't tell Hayes.”
Vic studied his face for a long moment. Miles could see her weighing options, calculating risks. He hated to put her in this situation, but he couldn’t just let this go.
“Vic… please.”
Finally, she nodded. “Okay. But we keep it quiet. As far as anyone knows, you're home grieving and I'm working Elena's connections alone.” She sighed and looked as if she regretted it immediately.
Miles felt something shift inside him. Purpose, maybe. Or just the need for revenge dressed up as justice. “Deal.”
“But first, finish that breakfast and get the rest of that coffee down. You look like hell.”
He did what she asked, not because he was hungry anymore, but because he knew he’d need fuel for what was coming. “What else do you know about Crawford?” he asked, in between mouthfuls of food. “Is there anything?”
“Not much.” She consulted her notes while eating.
“Thirty-three years old. PhD in biochemistry from Georgetown. That’s all I’ve got.
But… hold on…” She started tapping around on her phone, frowning and then letting out a little growl.
“Hold on a second. I’m trying to log on to the database but it’s a pain in the ass on my phone. ”
He nodded and let her work. He managed to finish the biscuit and though it had served to wake him up, his stomach was still trying to decide if it had been ready for it. He sipped on his coffee for a minute or so before Vic managed to find what she was looking for.
“Okay, it says here… yeah. Thirty-three. Georgetown. Looks like he worked at three different pharmaceutical companies over the past eight years. No criminal record, but...”
“But what?”
“There was a call to the police from his previous employer. He was getting very agitated during a conversation about safety policies concerning chemicals and certain pollutions. He said he couldn’t work for a company that was so willing to kill the planet.”
Miles was already reaching for his jacket. It wasn’t exactly a bullseye, but it fit everything they were looking for. And, to top it all off, Crawford had worked closely with Elena. For the first time since Elena's death, he felt like he could breathe again.
They had a lead. A real suspect. And if he was right, then this same person was responsible for Elena’s death. He looked to Vic with tears brimming in his eyes and said, “Let's go catch this son of a bitch.”