Tess Gerritsen - Last to Die

“Who was Anna Welliver?” Maura asked. “I saw her autopsy. Her body is covered with old scars from torture. I know her husband was murdered, but what happened to Anna?”

He shook his head. “Will it always be this way between us?”

“What do you mean?”

“Why can’t we have normal conversations, like other people? About the weather, the theater? Instead we talk about your work, not the most pleasant of subjects. But I suppose that is what keeps bringing us together.”

“Death, you mean?”

“And violence.” He leaned forward, his eyes as intense as lasers. “We’re so much alike, you and I. There’s a darkness in you, and that’s the bond we share. We both understand.”

“Understand what?”

“That the darkness is real.”

“I don’t want to see the world that way,” she said.

“But you see the evidence every time a corpse lands on your autopsy table. You know the world isn’t all sunshine, and so do I.”

“And that’s what we bring to this friendship, Anthony? Doom and gloom?”

“I sensed it in you the first time we met. It runs deep in you, because of who you are.”

Who I am . Queen of the dead. The daughter of monsters. The darkness extended as deep as the blood in her veins, because it was the same blood that ran in her mother Amalthea, a killer who would spend the rest of her life in prison.

His gaze was so intent that she could not bear to maintain eye contact. She focused, instead, on his briefcase. They had known each other for almost two years, yet with just a look, he could still throw her off balance and make her feel like a specimen under glass, examined and exposed.

“I’m not here to talk about myself,” she said. “You promised you’d tell me the truth about Anna.”

He nodded. “What I can tell you, anyway.”

“Did you know that she was a victim of torture?”

“Yes. And we knew she was still deeply haunted by what happened to her and her husband in Argentina.”

“Yet you hired her. Brought her onto your staff as a counselor to vulnerable children.”

“The Evensong school board hired her.”

“You must have personally approved it.”

He nodded. “Based on her references, her academic qualifications. Her dedication to crime victims. And she was one of us .”

“A member of the Mephisto Society.”

“She, too, was personally scarred by violence. Twenty-two years ago, Anna and her husband were working for an international firm in Argentina when they were abducted. Both Anna and her husband were tortured. Her husband, Frank, was executed. The killers were never captured. That experience taught Anna that justice is unreliable. That monsters are always with us. She left the company she’d been working for, went back to graduate school, and become a counselor for crime victims. Sixteen years ago, she joined us.”

“You’re not exactly in the Yellow Pages. How did she learn about the society?”

“The way all our members do. Through an intermediary.”

“She was recruited?”

“Her name was proposed to the society by a member who served in law enforcement. Anna came to his attention because of her excellent work as a counselor. He knew that she’d lost her husband to violence. That she was especially effective with childhood victims, and she had multiple contacts within law enforcement and child protective agencies around the country.” He lifted the briefcase he’d carried into the library and set it on the table. “After I got news of her death, I reviewed her membership file.”

“Every member has a file?”

“Compiled at the time of proposal. I’ve redacted the sensitive information, but here’s what I can share with you.”

“I can’t be trusted with the complete file?”

“Maura.” He sighed. “Even though I trust you, some information can be shared only among members.”

“Then why show this to me at all?”

“Because you’ve made yourself part of the investigation. You attended the autopsy. You requested a comprehensive tox screen on Anna’s blood, so I assume you have doubts it was a suicide. When you raise questions, I listen. Because I know how good you are at your job.”

“I have no evidence yet to support my doubts.”

“But something’s triggered your instincts. Something in your subconscious has picked up details that you’re not even aware of yet. It’s telling you something is wrong.” He leaned closer, studying her face. “Am I correct?”

She thought of the empty sugar bowl. And the baffling phone conversation between Jane and Anna. She looked down at the file that Sansone had slid to her, and opened the folder.

The first page was a photo of Anna, before her hair had turned silver. It was taken sixteen years earlier, when she’d been proposed for the society. As always, she wore a modest dress with long sleeves and high collar, a wardrobe choice that made her seem eccentric, but which Maura now understood was meant to hide the scars of torture. Nothing in Anna’s smile, in her eyes, spoke of old torments or a future suicide.

Maura turned the page to a dry compilation of biographical data. Born in Berlin to a US Army officer and his wife. Earned a degree in psychology from George Washington University in DC and married to Franklin Welliver. Along with her husband, she worked for an international headhunting firm with offices in Mexico, Chile, and Argentina.

She turned the page and saw newspaper articles about the couple’s abduction and Franklin’s subsequent murder in Argentina. A second clipping stated that the killers were never apprehended.

“Anna personally experienced the failure of justice,” said Sansone. “That made her one of us.”

“Not the sort of membership qualification anyone wants to have.”

“None of us joined the society because we wanted to, the way you want to join a country club. We were each compelled to join because of personal tragedies that left us angry or hopeless or in despair. We understand what ordinary people don’t.”

“Evil.”

“That’s one word for it.” He pointed to the file. “Certainly Anna understood. After her husband’s death, she quit her job and returned to the US to go back to school. Earned her degree in counseling. In her own way, she was trying to fight evil, by working with the families of victims. We offered her the chance to be even more effective, to reshape a whole generation of lives. Not just as a counselor, but as our admissions scout. With her contacts within child protective agencies and law enforcement, she could identify prospective students all over the country.”

“By trawling through murder cases? Targeting the wounded?”

“We’ve had this conversation before, Maura. I know you don’t approve.”

“Because it smacks of recruitment for your cause.”

“Look at Julian and how he’s blossomed. Tell me this school hasn’t been good for him.”

She didn’t respond because she had no rebuttal. Evensong was exactly where Julian should be. In just these few months he’d gained both muscle and confidence.

“Anna knew he would do well here,” said Sansone. “If you judged him only by his school records in Wyoming, no one would consider him a promising candidate. He was failing half his classes, getting into fights, committing petty crimes. But Anna saw in his file that he was a survivor. She knew he’d kept you alive in those mountains for no other reason but compassion. And that’s how she knew he was a student we wanted.”

“So she made that decision?”

“Anna’s approval was key. She handpicked half the students you see here.” He paused and added: “Including Claire Ward and Will Yablonski.”