Blake Pierce - Silent Neighbor

But the number she saw on the display was neither her father’s nor Danielle’s. It was a line from the bureau. She cringed a bit as she answered it. A call on a Sunday was sure to set up a stressful Monday.

“This is Agent Fine,” she answered.

“Fine, it’s Johnson. Where are you right now?”

She actually had to bite back a small laugh before answering. “In town,” she answered as vaguely as possible.

“I need you to visit a crime scene in Falls Church. Seems to be right in the area of your expertise. Wealthy neighborhood, murdered socialite-type.”

“Today?”

“Yes, today. The body was discovered Friday morning. The police have done their part and are coming up blank.”

“Just one body?”

“Yes. But we need an agent on it to ensure that it isn’t linked to a similar case in that area last year.”

“Sir…do you think Rhodes can handle it alone? I’m sort of dealing with some personal things.”

There was a brief moment of silence on the other end. “Is someone dead? A loved one pass away?”

“No sir.”

She knew that Johnson knew the scantest details about her father’s history. She wondered if he was silently considering all of that on the other end.

“Sorry, Fine. You’ve spent three weeks in an office, putting a profile together. I want you out in the field. I want you and Rhodes both down in Falls Church within three hours. Two if you can manage it.”

She opened her mouth to protest but stopped herself. She had no desire to be knee-deep in a murder investigation given everything she was dealing with. But at the same time, she knew that getting involved in a case might be exactly what she needed. It would not only distract her from the drama with her dad, but it might put her in the right frame of mind to figure out a way to bring down her father.

“Yes sir,” she said. “I’ll call Rhodes right away.”

And just like that, she had her first active case in three weeks. The timing wasn’t the best but who was she to argue? At the end of the day, she’d joined the bureau to help people in need—to help bring a sense of justice to a criminal system she had never fully trusted.

In light of all that had happened concerning her father in recent weeks—including her own misconceptions about him—it seemed almost fitting that it was this mindset that followed her as she got into her car and called up Agent Rhodes.

If Rhodes suspected that Chloe was dealing with personal issues, she made no mention of it as they rode out into Falls Church. In fact, she had not said anything about a change in Chloe’s personality for the three weeks they had been working together on the profile project—trying to come up with a profile on a man believed to be leading the charge on a series of armed bank robberies in New York. Then again, Rhodes was something of a hard ass and kept to herself. Even when their partnership had hit a new level after Chloe had saved her life following a near-fatal gunshot wound, Rhodes showed no signs of wanting to know Chloe on a deeply personal level.

And that was perfectly fine with Chloe.

In fact, most of the drive from DC to Falls Church, Virginia, was covered in silence. Johnson had not given them much to go on; the details on the murder were practically nothing. All he’d told them was that the local deputy would be on the scene to debrief them when they arrived.

The closest they came to a meaningful conversation occurred just as they got off on the exit ramp to enter Falls Church. “You know much about this city?” Rhodes asked.

“A bit. Mostly upper class, I think. But this neighborhood we’re headed to, if I remember correctly from a case study back in the academy, it’s one of those areas that’s rich mainly because of what they call old money .”

“Ah, you mean rich people that are rich because mommy and daddy were rich and didn’t have anything to do with the money after they died.”

“Basically, yes.”

Rhodes chuckled and looked out the window. “It seems to me that you and I have become the go-to agents on things like this. Well…you, anyway. How do you feel about that?”

It wasn’t anything Chloe had really considered before. She simply shrugged and answered honestly: “I guess everyone needs a niche to specialize in.”

Rhodes let it go after that. Chloe was doing her best to convey that she had no interest in small talk right now—trying to get the point across without being too rude. Apparently, it worked. They made it to the crime scene—a beautiful two-story home in an affluent neighborhood—without another word spoken between them. Most of the lots were either wooded or boasted huge backyards. The neighborhood itself was a bit removed from the more densely packed neighborhoods, giving each home a bit of space to breathe.

The presence of a single police car in the driveway seemed terribly out of place. It gave the residence an almost haunted feel after having seen so many of the other homes. It was like a blemish on the neighborhood.

They parked the car and walked up to the porch. The door was closed, so Chloe knocked, not wanting to be presumptuous by just walking in when there was an officer there waiting for them. Her knock was answered right away. The officer who opened the door looked to be in his early thirties. He was clean-shaven, quite plain looking, and appeared surprised to find two women on the other side of the door.

“We’re Agents Fine and Rhodes,” Chloe said. “We were sent to look into the murder of Jessie Fairchild.”

The officer extended his hand and introduced himself. “Deputy Ed Nolan. I’m running the wrap-up on this. Come on in.”

He ushered them inside, where Chloe discovered the house was larger inside than it had appeared outside. The foyer was nearly the size of the living room in Chloe’s apartment and the ceilings were at least twelve feet over her head. The place felt as if it hadn’t been lived in for quite some time, giving Chloe a creepy vibe.

“So what’s the story here?” Chloe asked. “All we’ve been told is that we need to rule it out as connecting to a case from last year.”

“What case is that?” Nolan asked.

“Three strangulation deaths about five miles away from here,” Rhodes said. “All women, all between the ages of forty and sixty.”

“Yeah, I think we’ll be able to rule that out pretty quickly.”

“Why is that?” Chloe asked.

“Well, the body has obviously been moved by now, but I can show you the pictures. Mrs. Fairchild wasn’t killed by strangulation, although she had been strangled too. It was more like a slice to the throat…but in a weird way that I’ve never seen before.”

He led them into the kitchen and grabbed a file folder from the bar. He used it to point up the stairs as he said, “The house cleaner discovered the body in the master bedroom upstairs. She went up while leaving the utility sink in the mudroom going. She obviously got a little sidetracked by finding the body, so much so that the utility sink overflowed.”

“Let’s go take a look at the bedroom, then,” Chloe said.

Nolan nodded and took the lead. As they passed through, Chloe noticed that either the cleaning lady was exceptionally good at her job or the Fairchilds just naturally kept a clean house.

The upstairs hallway was just as impressive as the downstairs. A bookshelf stood at the end of the hall, built into the walls. There were four rooms along the hall, two of which were bedrooms, the third a secondary bathroom, and the fourth an office.

Nolan led them to the master bedroom. While the body had of course been moved, Chloe saw that the sheets had not been removed since the murder.

“The room is exactly as it was when the body was discovered?” Chloe asked.