Serrano watched the TV vans with contempt. Camera operators were already setting up for live shots. The reporters themselves were hidden, waiting by the heat vents until it was time for their close-up.
“ME is ten minutes out,” Montrose said. “How do you want to handle this?”
“Ice is too thin for the wagon,” Serrano said. He pointed at the patrol boat. “And if the boat comes any closer, this whole sheet could crack.”
“Snowmobile,” Tally said.
Serrano nodded. “Good call.”
Tally continued. “Have them attach a litter basket stretcher to the back of a snowmobile. The basket will prevent her body from dragging along the ice. We need to get her out of here, without any further damage to the body.”
“I’ll call it in,” Montrose said.
“What about them?” Tally asked, motioning over to the news vans. Serrano sighed. He didn’t especially enjoy live shots, especially in this kind of weather, when there was a decent chance of a high-definition booger making it into viewers’ living rooms. A small crowd of onlookers had begun to gather on the bank of the river. At this time of night, they were mainly rubberneckers, drunks, and vagrants.
“Call dispatch,” Serrano said. “Tell them we may need crowd control. And with the media already here, Lieutenant George will want me to make a brief statement. Nobody gives Wright’s identity to the press.”
Tally nodded. “You know, if you asked me a few years ago, I would have said Constance Wright had a shot at the White House.”
“Me too,” Serrano said.
“Even after what she did to you?” Tally said, surprised.
“Even after that.”
Tally offered a weak smile. “Go get ’em, Tiger.”
Serrano trudged off to the bank of the Ashby River, where he planned to tell the assembled media crews absolutely nothing of substance. Still, one question gnawed at him. It had been two years since Constance Wright’s life had gone up in flames. The woman had endured indignity, malice, mockery, and cruelty on an unfathomable level. But she’d kept on living. Two years, and nothing.
So why would she suddenly decide to end it all now?
CHAPTER 4
Eric finished his breakfast in silence and left the table without so much as a thank-you. Megan, thrilled to have her mother’s sole attention, gushed about the new book she was writing.
“It’s a mystery and an adventure story,” she said. “Like Wonder Woman meets Dora the Explorer.”
“I would totally read that book,” Rachel said, completely serious.
“It’s going to be a whole series. My character’s name is Sadie Scout. She’s superstrong and has a pet tiger.”
“Of course she does,” Rachel said. “And what’s her pet tiger’s name?”
“Roxy.”
“A pet tiger named Roxy. And where does Roxy sleep?”
“In the bed with Sadie, of course,” Megan said, annoyed that her mother even had to ask such a silly question.
“I should have assumed the tiger slept in bed with Sadie. So when do I get to read the first Sadie Scout story?”
“When I’m done,” Megan said, slipping off her chair. “And not a minute before.”
“Well, I’ll be waiting.”
Eric came downstairs, slinging his backpack over his shoulder.
“Have a good day!” Rachel shouted. Eric said nothing, merely nodded and put on his headphones. Then he was gone. Minutes later the school bus pulled up. Rachel knelt down so Megan could wrap her little arms around her, planting a kiss on her daughter before she sped out the door. Rachel watched as she climbed aboard and took a seat next to her best friend, Simone Watson.
When did my peanut become a kid? At least she’d outgrown her previous favorite toy, something called a “Blingle,” a kit that allowed children to design their own glittery, sparkly stickers, which could then be affixed anywhere within reach. Rachel was convinced Blingles must have been invented by a pure sociopath, given that they essentially gave your child the ability to make your home look like a low-rent strip club. It wasn’t long ago that Rachel had opened the toilet seat lid to find a bedazzled unicorn staring back at her.
When both kids were gone, Rachel planted herself at the kitchen counter; made an egg white, spinach, and feta frittata; brewed a pot of french press coffee; took a stool at the counter; and streamed the news from her laptop while she ate.
She tuned in to Channel 8. The weatherman, sporting a tan that no December sun could have possibly bestowed on him, informed viewers that temperatures would top out this week at fifteen degrees, with a windchill factor around zero. Rachel grimaced as she sipped her coffee.
They cut back to the local anchors: a fiftysomething man with a wavy blond comb-over and chin sharp enough to cut glass and a smiley young brunette whose early-morning perkiness had to either be espresso or meth related.
“Now to follow up with our top story, breaking news from late last night,” the man said. “A body was found at the base of the Albertson Bridge in the early hours of the morning. Ashby PD was on the scene, as was our own Charles Willemore.”
Rachel put her coffee down and leaned in closer. The stream on her computer was choppy. She hoped it wouldn’t cut out.
The feed cut to a recorded shot from early that morning. The chyron read 2:00 a.m. The shot had been filmed from the eastern bank of the Ashby River. In the background, Rachel could see four cops with Ashby PD jackets examining an illuminated area at the base of the bridge. The scene had a radius of about thirty feet. The body itself was blocked off by a yellow tent. The camera showed a dozen or so pedestrians gathered at the edge of the frozen river, watching the grim scene. The feed then cut to a taped report.
“Charles Willemore for Channel 8, here at the Albertson Bridge, just across from Woodbarren Glen. Ashby law enforcement responded to a 911 call just after 1:00 a.m. for what at first glance appears to be a suicide at the iconic structure. As you can see, the scene behind me is quite unusual, in that the investigation is taking place atop the frozen Ashby River, necessitating extra caution by police investigators.”
Video showed a patrol boat cutting through the ice. A spotlight from the boat lit the crime scene with a harsh glow. The Channel 8 camera zoomed in to show a fortyish white male detective and a younger black female detective kneeling beside the tent covering the body.
Willemore added, “We were able to speak with one of the officers on scene.”
The camera cut to a man identified by the chyron as Detective John Serrano of the Ashby PD. Serrano looked to be between forty-two and forty-four, with dark-brown hair and light-gray sideburns peeking out from under a wool trapper hat. He had green eyes the color of pine needles and a several-days-old beard with graying whiskers. He looked tired and annoyed.
“Detective, can you tell us whether you’ve identified the deceased?” Willemore asked.
“As of right now we’re still performing preliminary forensics and have not made an official identification,” Serrano said. “Once we do, we will notify next of kin prior to releasing any statements regarding the identity of the victim.”
“You refer to the deceased as a ‘victim.’ Does that mean you believe this might have been something other than suicide?”