Julie Garwood: The Ideal Man

He tried to be objective but found it impossible, for the more he learned about her, the less inclined he was to let anyone know she had witnessed anything, which was ludicrous considering the other agents in the park had watched her stabilize Sean Goodman, knew she had operated on him, and by now had heard that she had seen Calvin Landry shoot the agent.

While he had waited for Ellie in the hospital, Max had quickly pulled up all the superficial information on her: her phone numbers; addresses both in St. Louis and in Winston Falls, South Carolina; and her position and schedule at St. Vincent’s Hospital. When he dug a little deeper, however, he uncovered something disturbing: court documents detailing five separate incidents involving Ellie and a teenager named Evan Patterson. The first document was filed when Ellie was only eleven years old. According to the records, Evan, who was seventeen at the time, had become infatuated with the young girl after the two attended a science camp sponsored by the Winston Falls School District. His obsession grew, and when he physically assaulted her, Ellie’s family brought charges against him. Since he was a juvenile with no previous record, he was given leniency.

The second time, Patterson became more aggressive. He tried to force her into his car. His statement to the police said he couldn’t stop thinking about her, that they were kindred spirits, and once she was alone with him, he would be able to convince her that they belonged together. Patterson was given probation with court-ordered therapy.

Despite the strict rulings of the court, Patterson did not keep his distance, terrorizing the girl on two more occasions. His anger over her rejection had grown to an alarming intensity. For these offenses, he was ordered to undergo yet another psychological evaluation and a thirty-day hospitalization; however, with shrewd attorneys and plea bargains he bypassed judge and jury.

There was no plea bargain for the fifth offense of attempted murder.

Ellie was on her way home from school. She was with three girls who tried to protect her, but Patterson was big and strong. He grabbed Ellie and threw her into his car. The authorities found her two hours later, brutally beaten and left for dead in a ravine two miles out of town.

By the time she reached the emergency room, she had lost a lot of blood and her prognosis was bleak. She was flown to a trauma center, and the surgeons worked through the night to save her. She spent her twelfth birthday in the ICU.

“Ah, man,” Max whispered as he read the last report. “That son of a bitch.”

He was sitting in the local FBI office across from his partner, Ben MacBride, who had just hung up the phone.

“What are you reading?” Ben asked as Max was closing his laptop.

“Ellie Sullivan’s background.”

“Must be bad,” Ben said. “The look on your face when you were reading… like you wanted to kill someone.”

Max nodded. “Then I nailed it.”

Ben rubbed the back of his neck. “It’s bad, huh?”

“Yes.”

“Want me to read about her now?”

He shook his head. “No need.”

Ben pushed his chair back. “Does Hughes expect us to file our reports tonight?”

Max said, “How long have you been an agent, Ben?”

His partner laughed. “Long enough to know that I just asked a dumb question. Still, I always hold out hope.”

“Hope for what?”

“That we get finished at a normal time.”

“Are you in a hurry to get back to the hotel?”

Ben was going through the drawers in the desk. “No. I’m in a hurry to eat. I’m starving.”

“What are you looking for?”

“Candy, gum, anything.” He shut the last drawer and shook his head. “Maybe we should move Sullivan’s interview to tomorrow.”

Max stood. “No, we need to talk to her tonight while it’s still fresh in her mind.”

“I’m betting she won’t be forgetting what happened for a long while.”

“Doesn’t matter. We need to do it tonight,” he countered, walking to the door.

Ben trailed behind. “Okay, so here’s what we do. We talk to her quick, grab something to eat, then come back here and finish our reports. Right?”

“Right.”

“The interview will be quick, won’t it? She’s not one of those arrogant, obnoxious doctor types, is she? If she is, we could be there for hours before we get the information we need. You know what I’m talking about. Some of those older, crabby doctors have the superiority complexes, and they have to impress you with their knowledge before they’ll answer questions. I hate that type. Is she one of those?”

Max remembered Ben hadn’t met Ellie yet. He had been stationed on the other side of the park when the shooting started, and Max hadn’t felt the need to tell him about her. It was going to be really interesting when he did meet her.

“Is she that type? Ah, hell, she is, isn’t she? We’ll be there till morning.”

Max didn’t answer but was smiling as he tossed the car keys to Ben.

Ellie’s home was a sparsely furnished studio apartment a block west of Cranston and Glenwood. Just five miles from the hospital, it was an easy commute. Her apartment was on the second floor of a redbrick building that sat between two similar structures on a quiet, tree-lined street. Built in the 1940s, it still maintained some of the charm of a bygone era when even the smallest apartments were constructed with high ceilings and intricate moldings. For a studio, it was large and spacious, but it didn’t offer much of a view. Her living room window overlooked the Dumpsters in the back alley.

There wasn’t anything luxurious about the place, but it was home, and she was comfortable there. Each tenant needed a key to get into the front door of the building, and there were strong dead-bolt locks and peepholes on all the apartment doors. The super had keys to each apartment and each dead bolt, which meant he could walk into any apartment anytime, so without asking permission, her father had installed a second dead bolt that only she had the key to unlock.

If anyone were to ask her to describe her home, she could do it with one word: safe. Or better yet, two words: minimalistic and safe. Almost everything in the apartment was the uninteresting yet soothing color of cream. The walls, the down-filled, oversize sofa she’d purchased for forty dollars from a pampered housewife in Chesterfield who had grown tired of it just six months after she had bought it, the oversize chair she’d thrown in for free, the drapes, the blinds-all cream. The only break in Ellie’s furniture color scheme came from a swivel chair a friend had given her. It was beige.

There were hardwood floors throughout, which was one of the reasons she had rented the place. The faded and worn-out floors were in desperate need of refinishing, but Ellie loved them because she felt the flaws gave them a lovely patina. They were also much easier than carpet to keep clean.

She did try to give her place a little personality. She bought a couple of brightly colored pillows from Macy’s midnight madness sale, and she thought they added a little cheer. She would have loved to have covered the walls with beautiful contemporary paintings, but she couldn’t afford them. She shopped at Goodwill, not Neiman Marcus.

The desk she had purchased from Goodwill had cost only fifteen dollars. One leg was considerably shorter than the other three, but a brick she found when she took the trash out was the exact size needed to balance the desk perfectly. She also purchased a pretty red lacquered tray for two dollars that was only slightly chipped on two corners, and a seriously battered coffee table that cost seven dollars. Added up, she spent less than a hundred dollars to furnish the living room and twice that much to have the sofa and chair cleaned.