Evelyn
Chapter 19
Exhaustion and anger are etched in the face of the woman who hesitantly opens the door. Kate holds up her badge. "Emily Ratched?"
"If you're looking for Norris, he isn't here," Emily spits out. "I haven't seen him in a year, and if it weren't for the money he owes me, I'd be happy to never see him again."
"Actually, he'd be the last person we'd expect to see. If you're Emily Ratched, we're here to see you," Castle explains.
"Can we come in?" Kate asks.
Shrugging, Emily waves them inside. "Detective Beckett and Mr. um, Castle, is it?"
Kate and Rick nod.
"If you don't want Norris, why are you here?" Emily demands. "Cops never did me any damn good. You'd take him away, but he was never gone long."
Kate clips her badge back on her belt. "I'm sorry about that. If I could change the way the system handles domestic violence, I would. But we are here about Norris. We have reason to believe that he's dead."
"What, so you want me to identify his body?" Emily queries. "Happy to. The world is better off without him."
"There's no body, but his blood was found on the weapon of a suspected serial killer, one who appears to believe God sends him after people who deserve to die," Kate replies.
"If he took out guys like Norris, someone should pin a medal on him," Emily declares. "That bastard broke my arm twice, cracked my ribs, and knocked out four of my teeth. And God knows what he did to the people he went after out there. He came home with blood on his clothes. I never asked where it came from, or there would have been more of it – mine."
"Who do you think it came from?" Castle asks.
"Probably Puerto Ricans. He has – had – a real hate-on for them. He claimed they were stealing jobs and crapping on the city. He was always ranting that they should be wiped from existence, or at the least, deported. I was stupid enough one time to tell him they were American citizens. I got a black eye and a split lip out of that. I wasn't about to bring it up again."
"Is there a way someone could have found out what your husband was doing?" Kate inquires.
"Yeah! Norris really pissed off Julio Rodriguez. He owns the bodega two blocks over. Right before Norris disappeared, Mr. Rodriguez had cards printed up telling his customers what an asshole Norris was. They were in Spanish, but I think Norris got the idea. On the street in front of everyone, he threatened to burn the store down. I think if he showed up at the bodega again, Mr. Rodriguez would have called the cops, but after that, Norris didn't show up anywhere. I hope to hell he never does. If you can prove he's dead, this neighborhood would throw a party."
"You know," Rick confides, as Kate fights the traffic on the way back to the precinct, I'm beginning to like Ralph Johnson a little. You have to give it to the man. He may have done the public a service."
"I doubt that Hannover Payton would agree with that, Babe. The system is far from perfect, but we can't have people running around in costumes taking out the bad guys."
Rick's mouth tilts in a crooked smile. "I think you could find many Marvel and D.C. readers who would fervently dispute that. But you know, we did promise Montgomery we'd try to weave some work on the death of Evelyn's birth parents in with the interviews in Ralph Johnson's killings. Your shift will be over about an hour after we get back to the 12th. That should give us a chance to do a little research."
For a fraction of a second, Kate's gaze shifts to the time displayed on the dash. "That should work."
"You have the accident report, don't you?" Rick asks as Kate settles in front of her computer screen.
Kate points to a file on the corner of her desk. There's a copy in there; what there is of it. The best work in it was tracing the VIN to Mara and Paul Stoot. The license plates were gone. The cop who investigated the accident thought that maybe someone viewed it as an opportunity to steal them. The car wasn't stripped, though. The Stoots had an eight-track player that was still in it. But neither Mara nor Paul had any I.D."
"Like someone was trying to turn them into nonentities," Rick suggests.
"Hmm. You could have a point," Kate acknowledges. "Which would mean…"
"That someone really hated them," Rick finishes. "There were more than enough hate groups around when they were killed. If someone caused an accident, hate wouldn't narrow it down much."
"But an M.O. might," Kate considers. "Remember what Emily Ratched said about her husband wanting Puerto Ricans wiped from existence. So maybe…"
"A hate group feeling that way about African Americans went after Paul and Mara. They might even have picked them as invaders because the car was from out of state. After they caused the accident, they could have taken the Stoot's I.D.s and Michigan plates, but it would have taken too much time to get rid of the VIN, especially from the engine block."
"Right," Kate agrees. "And with no internet, by the time anyone knew that Paul and Mara died in that car, Evelyn was lost in the social service maze. With Paul and Mara off from work for the summer and no family looking for them, no one did much of anything about their deaths beyond that memoriam Evelyn found."
Rick drums his fingers on the thin case file. There are registries of hate groups, and a hell of a lot has been written about them. I delved into some of them for one of my early Derrick Storms, back when he was just a P.I. I thought he might get entangled in a case dealing with one, but I could never make the plot work. We can start online, but a lot of what goes back to 1970 wouldn't be digitized. I have a pretty good idea about where to look, though."
Leaning over her desk, Kate gives Rick a quick peck on the lips. "I don't doubt that you do. Let's see what we can finish up here, and we'll check out your sources in the morning. Deal?"
"Deal."
"Have you experienced any more memories or flashes of images since yesterday?" Burke asks as Evelyn curls herself into a familiar chair.
"Yes to both," Evelyn confides. "I've been researching what I could about where my parents might have come from, and things keep coming, but I still can't put anything together. I remember a Christmas morning. I got a doll and a little doctor's kit. Maybe I told my parents I wanted to be a doctor. It seems like I might have. I used a toy stethoscope to listen to my doll's heart. Mama let me use her lipstick to draw boo-boos on her, and I put band-aids on them."
"Later in your life, did you keep feeling pulled toward medicine?" Burke queries.
"Not to be a doctor. After I saw the angel of death, I hated the sight of blood. I learned to live with that." A smile touches Evelyn's lips. "Women don't have a lot of choice. But I guess I still had a little of the urge. I work for a company that makes health care equipment. I'm just in the office, but I match people up with what they need and help them find ways they can pay for it."
"Sounds like a lot of patients couldn't do without your work," Burke notes. "No matter what happens, some inclinations stay with us."
Evelyn's smile widens. "I guess they do."