AN: See! I said they'd be coming quickly! :)
SPOV
We were waiting on five for an update when Ranger got the call in his office. He came to my cubicle where I was chatting with Lester and delivered the news. I promptly threw up into my garbage can and saw spots for a few seconds then was overcome by a weird calm. Lester punched the cubical wall so hard he put his fist through it.
What I wasn't prepared for was Meagan when we got to the hospital. Frankly, she scared the shit out of me. She was covered in Morelli's blood. He'd landed on her and she had to stay under him while the paramedics got him stable enough to move. Les brought her a change of clothes, but motioned for us all to stay back when we got into the waiting room.
I've seen Meagan resourceful, I've seen Meagan feeling a tad violent, and I've seen Meagan at work getting herself out of a tight spot but I've only ever seen the expression Meagan wore on her face, one other place before. It was the same one Ranger had on his face when he and Joe more or less decided that Abruzzi had to die if I was going to live. Then a few days later Abruzzi committed suicide.
Her face was completely devoid of all emotion except for one. Anger.
"Steph, meet the Pixie," Bobby muttered. "Let Les diffuse the situation… that is if I can diffuse Les. He's looking like he's willing to let her do whatever the fuck she wants. Excuse me." He touched Lester's shoulder and began whispering urgently to him.
Eddie and a bunch of off-duty TPD were crowding the waiting room. Honestly, St. Francis was probably the safest place in the world right now. Half of TPD, a good chunk of the New Jersey Branch of the FBI, and almost all of Rangeman were crowding the waiting room. I went to Eddie, "What happened? We didn't get much, just that he'd been shot and that Meagan took Beals out."
"Well, near as I can tell, Major Crimes in Trenton is going to be getting a new Section Chief and the current dumb ass, dude by the name of Kawolski, will be lucky if he's able to get a job at McDonalds as the mop boy when Princess finishes with him," Eddie said, "and I expect it will be with the blessing of everyone in this room."
"What happened?"
"Well, Princess worked out the confession and some evidence from Beals like the pro she is. Some tech spazzed when they went to arrest Beals and fell into Meagan. Beals pulled his gun, aimed it at Morelli and she started trying to talk him down. She just twisted him up in his own head to get him willing to surrender to her and Joe by convincing him that she was, is and always will be Ranger's partner. Everybody was listening to what she was doing and it was obvious this guy is all about her being only with Ranger forever. She had him believing that she was, then Section Chief Ass Hat radios and says, 'your partner's coms cut out. Can we make entry?' Beals lost it. Started calling Princess a disappointment. Morelli pulled her behind him just as Beals fired. Head shot for her went into his vest.
Problem is it was point blank. Two rounds pierced the vest and one hit his shoulder so he's basically going to have to have a couple of surgeries to put the shoulder back together. That's the least of his problems, though. Not sure what the other bullet hit but apparently it did a lot of damage. If he survives the surgery, his prognosis is good; but he has to survive the surgery first."
"And how is that looking?"
"Santos Senior was asked to scrub in. I guess he's a highly sought after trauma surgeon and he was more than willing to scrub in to assist. He peeled in here in Ranger's Turbo so fast I was impressed that he didn't come through the ambulance bay doors. He said that he would come out as soon as he could to give us an update."
Eddie, who had been staring at the doors as if willing Julio to come out, turned to look at me. "You all right, kid? I know that you and Joe had your problems and all but I know he's still a friend."
"I'm weirdly okay. I think I'm in denial, my freak out will come when I see him."
"It's just that after Ranger got shot that one time you were a mess."
"I know; I'll be okay."
I looked around the waiting room and saw Angie Morelli looking like she was barely hanging on. I hugged Eddie quickly and went to join her. When I sat down, she took my hand gripping it hard. She was shockingly strong for someone so dainty. Her smile was fragile but polite, she wanted silent support and she was going to get it from me.
We sat quietly for a few minutes. "Though she be but little, she is fierce," Angie said with a brittle smile. "Do you think Shakespeare had a dream about her when he wrote that line?" She was looking at Meagan. "I just wish she'd go change and take a shower."
"She can't, Mrs. Morelli; she's got to be processed for evidence."
"Oh, I see. Yes, that makes sense. She's a well brought up girl so I didn't think it was carelessness," She whispered, "You know, when I met her, first thing I did was compare her to you?"
"Oh, no," I groaned.
"I thought, 'she's sweet but she's not Stephanie. Joe needs someone like Stephanie.' "
"Yeah, just with a job that won't give him heartburn," I said with a chuckle.
"Exactly. That nurse he was seeing? Linda? She's far too domestic for him. He'd be bored in a month. Meagan, well I hate to say this about my boy, but he's not nearly open-minded enough for someone like her. She's too everything."
I laughed softly. Yup, that was a good way to put it; Meagan was a little too… everything. Joe wouldn't be able to handle the way everyone's eyes were always drawn to her. Right now, though, people were staring but nobody was approaching her; they were giving her a wide berth. Well, almost nobody.
Lester sidled up to her and draped an arm around her shoulders and whispered something at her temple. Her lips twitched but the hard expression stayed.
"Oh, well. I tried." Lester said, "Do what you gotta do, Gorgeous."
"Thanks for your permission, Dear." Her voice was dripping with sarcasm.
"Hey, I came here under protest. I'm all for whatever you have in mind and, uh, since when have I ever been in a position to give you permission to do anything ever… well, besides Thursday night in bed… but that's different, you like that shit."
That did it. Meagan cracked a real smile. "You're an ass," she said with a slight laugh.
"Yeah, but you love my ass."
"What's not to love about it?"
"You good?"
"I'm pissed. How this clown got to section chief is beyond me. We told him that given our new evidence Beals wasn't the killer but he knew something. He knew I needed to question Beals. Now Beals is dead, Morelli could be dying and it was all because Kawolski couldn't wait two minutes and because he didn't have two brain cells to rub together. Beals had just gone on for half an hour about how Carlos and I were meant for each other; calling another man my partner? Dumbass thing to do. Why tell them my wire was out at all? Why not just ask for a fucking Sit Rep? I'm have half a mind to charge the shit with obstruction of justice."
"Can you do that if it's an agent involved in the investigation?"
"Want to see me do it?"
"Right, forgot who I'm talking to. My brain isn't functioning. My wife, you see, is this little, tiny force of nature and I adore her. She almost got shot in the head tonight while being badass and she's covered in blood because a friend jumped in front of her bullets. It's all I can do not to drag her off somewhere and inspect every square inch of her for damage."
"I'm sorry, Les. I'm just…"
"Oh, believe me I know. Can we get you processed before you kill the Section Chief. I'll gladly assist any way that I can."
"I'm not going to kill him. In order to gauge my response I have to wait to find out if Morelli is going to live and what kind of quality of life he's going to have. So Fuckwit will just have to sweat,. How much he is going to be wishing he was dead is going to depend on Morelli."
"That's my girl. Come on. Let's get you cleaned up," Lester flagged one of the female agents in the waiting room and took Meagan off to an exam room.
"He's good for her," Angie said, "I like them together."
"You and everyone else who sees them together."
"That's what I want for my Joey. He might have found it with you if he hadn't been so pigheaded, but he won't find it with this Linda person and definitely not with Terri. You and Ranger have it. Your parents have it. You're partners. Equals."
That was strangely true about my parents. My dad hardly said anything but he always listened to what mom had to say, even when she was being crazy. They were firm in their traditional division of labor in the house but it was an equal division and they were weirdly happy although you didn't alway see it.
"Out of curiosity, why don't you think he will find that with Linda?" I asked.
"She's not herself around him. She's very clever but she pretends she isn't. A good marriage is about making compromises. You shouldn't have to give up anything fundamental about yourself to make your relationship work. Look at you and Ranger? You eat better and you exercise and carry a gun because you know he worries if you don't. He opens up to you but for a guy like him that's a huge sacrifice.
"Meagan and Lester? She needs to be with someone who isn't at all intimidated by her big brain or her need to excel at everything and she needs someone who she can't walk all over but, at the same time, doesn't ever try to hold her back. Even now he just wants her head clear before she decides what she's going to do." She thought carefully, "No, Linda was more herself with me than she was with Joe. That's not sustainable; she'd grow to hate him and he'd get bored."
"When did you meet her?" I asked.
"A few weeks ago. Joey came over to visit Bob and she showed up at the house. She just finished her shift and saw Joe's jeep in the driveway."
"How'd Joe take it?"
"He was thrilled and introduced us. We talked pasta for half an hour," She was about to say more when the door opened and we looked up hoping to see Julio. Instead we saw an orderly walk in to get coffee from the vending machine. Angie had gripped my hand harder when the door opened but hadn't released any of the pressure yet.
"He's going to be okay; I just know he is," I said to reassure us both.
"Oh, I know he is, too. That's why I'm not a complete mess right now, and I'm very proud of him for what he did."
Meagan returned, her hair in an extremely tight French braid that threw her features into sharp relief and she was wearing almost exactly what she had been wearing before only the windbreaker said Rangeman instead of FBI. Her timing was excellent because Julio walked into the waiting room. He glanced at Meagan and asked, "Amada, why are you favoring your wrist?"
"Jesus, Julio nobody gives a shit about my achy wrist. What the hell is going on with Joe?"
"Give me your arm, I'm perfectly capable of looking at your wrist and speaking at the same time."
She rolled her eyes and pulled off the windbreaker. Her arm was actually rather bruised. "Joe is going to be fine. He's got a long road ahead of him but he will be okay. He has three broken ribs and he's going to require another surgery to fix his shoulder. I had to remove part of his spleen and he had some internal bleeding that needed cleaning up. He will be in recovery for a little while longer and then, we're putting him in ICU tonight and possibly, tomorrow depending upon his vitals, but he's doing very well. Mrs. Morelli, you should be able to see him in about an hour.
"I will warn you, he's not going to be conscious and, to be frank, he looks like shit; but he's breathing unassisted which is more than we could say when they brought him in."
"Thank you, Doctor Santos," Angie said, "when can I take him home?"
"Not for a couple of weeks at least. We'll play it by ear," Julio said. It was hard to be anxious around Julio. He exuded calm, and reassurance. He had none of the usual arrogance you expected from surgeons. He was approachable and friendly, and it was easy to see why Ranger and Meagan looked up to him.
"Thank you again," Angie said. He took a couple of steps closer to her and wrapped her in a tight hug.
"No, I should be thanking you," he said meaningfully. "You don't know how much I should be thanking you for raising your son to be the way he is." He then looked at Meagan, "Your wrist is probably broken…again. How have you been walking around with a broken wrist and not complaining?"
"I've had other things on my mind."
"Well, come on, let's get you x-rayed." Meagan followed him dutifully to another doctor and then they left in the direction of the radiology department. It's sad that I knew this hospital so well that I knew simply by the direction they were heading that they were going to Radiology instead of an exam room.
"She shot Beals with her wrong hand," Lula said which startled me since I hadn't even seen her in the waiting room. She was with Burrows and Terri.
"I'm sorry?"
"Meagan is right handed. If Super cop landed on her and broke her right wrist, she couldn't have shot a gun with her right hand. She shot Beals with her left hand."
"That's what you're choosing to be impressed about?" Terri asked, "Of everything that we've heard about today you are impressed by the fact that she shot him with her left hand?"
"Yeah. I can hardly hit the broad side of a barn with my good hand." Lula said with a shrug.
"You heard her talking to Lester, right? They know that Beals wasn't the killer. You're still in danger Terri and we're at a dead end," I said to her.
"I know. I heard."
"I feel bad." I told her, "I was as sure as the rest of them that Beals was the killer."
"Don't, Plum," she snapped. "I saw all of the evidence, too, and so did about twenty experts. They all liked Beals for it based on what little evidence there was. As soon as they got more evidence, they eliminated him. The man was a freak and a killer and good riddance to him. Now what we need to do is go over everything again-with fresh eyes."
RSRSRSRSRSRSRSRS
"A pink cast?" Joe croaked. "Seriously?"
"Honestly, those are your first words after being out for twenty-four hours?" Meagan was incredulous.
"If I think about what hurts, I'm going to disgrace myself and cry. So…wanna tell me why you have a cast?"
"An idiot man I owe my life to, fell on top of me. He's basically double my body weight and he landed on me funny."
"Sorry about that," he groaned involuntarily, his face contorted with pain.
She handed him a remote and pressed a button on another, "The magic morphine button, it's your friend. Use it."
"Ah, hello, old friend, we meet again," then he clicked the button. "Where's my mom?" she tried not to smile at the query. She knew how he felt. Everyone always wants their mom when it hurts. Well maybe not her. She borrowed moms. Mira Santos, Ella, Rosa Manoso… She gently brushed his hair out of his eyes for him and sat back in her seat.
"She's getting something to eat and then, I think, she was going to the hospital chapel. She needed a bit of a break and Julio threatened to have her sedated if she didn't take one. I'm hanging with you until she gets back."
"How long has she been gone?"
"About half an hour."
"Don't call her; I'll be out again before she gets back."
A nurse bustled into the room. "Agent Morelli! Nice to have you back with us. How are you feeling?"
"Like I was shot. My partner reintroduced me to an old friend of mine," He clicked the button again.
"Only works the once," Meagan said.
"A man can dream." He groaned, "Don't tell me what's wrong with me. I don't want to know yet."
"You're going to be fine, Agent Morelli," the nurse said.
"If you say so," Joe said with a lopsided grin. Meagan shook her head. The man was incorrigible. He was half dead and attempting to flirt with the nurse, but she rolled her eyes at him and scribbled on the chart. Turning back to Meagan, he asked, "What happened to Beals? You're running the interrogation, I hope?"
To which Meagan smoothly responded, "Beals was about to kill us both so I put enough bullets into him to turn his chest cavity into hamburger. He won't be answering any questions." Morelli glanced at the nurse expecting some kind of reaction to that statement, but the nurse kept busily scribbling away on his chart. She felt Joe's scrutiny and looked up.
"I saw the body," she said nodding toward Meagan, "She's not wrong about what his chest looked like. Your partner's a good shot...full clip, close groupings. It was a bit overkill; but, I guess, in the heat of the moment she wanted to be sure." The nurse flipped the chart closed and shoved it into the foot of his bed. "Doctor Santos said he was going to drop in to chat with you later to explain your treatment. Your shoulder is going to need more work and he wants to discuss options."
Meagan's phone rang and, with a glare from the nurse that she completely ignored, she answered it. After the obligatory "Yo," the only word she said was "fuck." When she hung up her phone, she very calmly heaved it at the wall where promptly shattered. The nurse jumped while Joe cocked an eyebrow.
"We were right about Beals," she said then looked at the nurse. "I'm putting men on the room, big fucking scary-looking men. They will be heavily armed and they will have ID tags like this one." She held hers up then reached into one of her many cargo pockets, pulled out a device and handed it to the nurse.
"Before they are allowed anywhere near the room you will scan their badges with this machine. Their picture and their ID number and whether or not they are in fact members of my security firm will show up on this screen." She scanned her own ID and the screen showed a decent picture of Meagan, her name and position in the company, and an ID number. "If their badges are forged, the men guarding the door will be alerted. If the picture on the screen doesn't match the face of the man in front of you, or you are unsure, press the green button and let them through. It will alert the men at the door as well and they will handle it. Do not try to stop them. My men know the drill. If they see you press the green button, they will wait patiently for someone on duty to come to the nurse's station to confirm their identity."
"Oh-oh okay," the nurse stuttered.
"Do you know Angie Morelli?"
"Yes."
"She is the only person without a Rangeman ID who will be allowed access to Agent Morelli."
"Y-yes, ma'am."
"Terri is going to be pissed," Joe said.
"I can give Terri a pass if you want," she replied.
"Fuck, no, don't do that!" He tried to laugh but groaned again instead.
"Sleep, Joe." Meagan said, "I have to go; I have a crime scene to get to."
RSRSRSRRSRSRSRS
Meagan came into the waiting room looking extremely frustrated. She exchanged some words with Ranger and Bobby hopped to his feet and followed her outside. Lester scowled after them. "She shouldn't be on duty right now," he said when she was out of earshot.
"Are you seriously considering telling her she shouldn't do her job?" Ranger asked skeptically.
"I'm not fucking stupid!" Lester snapped, "I'm telling you she shouldn't be doing the job right now! I was barely okay with her being bait when we all were sure it was Beals. I am not okay with her being bait when we have no fucking clue who is out there targeting her and don't tell me we don't think he's targeting her. This latest woman is a 19-year-old Army Captain. How old was Meagan when she made Captain? Nine-fucking-teen! Whoever this is, wants her dead."
'This is why I sent Brown with her. You aren't thinking clearly," Ranger said, "You need to get a grip. She needs your help."
"I should be out there watching her back not stuck here watching the waiting room."
"You telling me you don't trust Brown to guard her with his life?"
"Argh! You know that's not what I'm saying." Julio walked into the waiting room just as Lester looked like he would be more than a little happy to take a swing at Ranger. Ranger stood there with his arms folded across his chest looking impassive. Lester could try to hit Ranger but it probably wouldn't happen.
"S'up, Primo?" Julio asked, strolling over to the pair.
"New Body. Meagan and Bobby have gone to the scene; Lester isn't pleased." Ranger coolly replied.
"I'm not exactly pleased either; you sending anyone else out there?"
"Nope. The state she's in right now, I think she might find that her guns would just get in the way if anyone tried anything. Brown is there for show and to try to chill her the fuck out because Lester is in no shape to do that right now."
Julio looked at his royally pissed off baby brother and did a quick assessment. "Come with me to check on Morelli, Dickhead." He said to Lester, "Ask him the fucking questions she probably should have when he woke up. Channel your wife and cool the fuck down so you can be useful." Wow, harsh! Lester glared at Ranger and followed Julio out of the room.
"Played that one pretty cool there, Ric," Tank said. "I'd probably have shit myself. Last time he looked like he wanted to hurt someone that bad, that someone was me. It wasn't cool."
"As long as Lester thinks he can't take me, he won't be able to take me," Ranger said, "and as long as she's alive, that's what he's going to think. If something happens to her, I might have a problem. Hard to say."
"Whatever, Ric. What are we going to do about this? He's right though, The Pixie is a loose cannon lately and we both know it. She came back to work too soon."
"I know. We have to close this case and send her wherever the fuck they go when he needs to get her head right. In the meantime…" he turned to me, "Babe, anything you've got would be helpful."
"All I have are a bunch of questions. Like, why are we sure it's men doing the killings? How do we know it's not a man and a woman or two women?"
"The rapes. The types of injuries they have only occur with rape," Ranger said. "It's something to do with the pelvic bruising, classic rape trauma."
"So a man has to be involved," I chewed on my thumb nail, "Okay, so if it's a man, I understand using the drug to incapacitate them; but why not let the drug wear off? Isn't that part of what these guys get off on? If someone tortures his victims before they die, wouldn't he want to, you know, hear the screams? Orin, he got off on the pain of the kill not…"
"Orin was a different kind of fucked up than these guys," Tank interrupted, "These guys are in control of everything, use forensic countermeasures, leave no useable evidence. Orin didn't care if he left evidence. He wanted Ric to find him so he would know why he was being targeted. These guys don't want to be found."
"But the motivation is similar right?"
"Maybe. These guys could be anyone. She pissed off a lot of people simply by existing." Ranger said, "She was thought of as an ice princess in school. You've seen the pictures; she didn't look 12. You know about the football captain. That was just the first assault. She was attacked by various members of the football team afterwards. He was obsessed with her. It could be him and this dumb assed basketball player that used to harass her. They couldn't have her so they go after women like her."
"She had to fight harder than anyone else in Ranger school just to get respect." Tank added, "yeah she earned it, but there were a lot of men there who didn't want her to be. It could be someone who didn't like how fast she was promoted. It could be someone like Beals who she busted for fucking up."
"Then there is anyone who has worked for, and has been fired from MacDunnaugh," Ranger added.
"So the suspect pool is massive," I said, "What about revenge for one of your ops?"
"Nope." Tank said, "Those bastards work on a completely different level. They would be far more creative in their method of killing and they would want to make it last longer."
"So we're talking talented amateurs."
"Yeah." Tank said, "We should explore the street angle. Her thesis…"
"Fuck," Ranger said.
"Her thesis?"
"Yeah, it was on street gangs and domestic terrorism. She spent a lot of time around a lot of bangers. She's got a street name and everything." Tank said, "I'll call Hector."
Hector arrived twenty minutes later with a laptop and Meagan's threat matrix up on the screen. It was giving me a headache just looking at it. It would have been easier to just ask the question who didn't want her dead. "Julio and I can get you the street information for New Jersey and New York. If you want Boston and Miami, well, the lady herself is going to have to make that call. Her connections are better than ours. She's tight with an Inca in Miami. He'll take her call any time of the day."
"Which one?" Ranger asked.
"Aguilar," Hector said, "I'm pretty sure they slept together once, and she dated Jose Guzman for a little over a year. They broke up when he proposed to her."
"You're shitting me," Tank said, "Fuck, could he be behind this?" Well, now I needed to know who the hell Jose Guzman was.
"No, it's not him," Hector said, "He's got word out to the Princes that she's not to be touched. She was only 19 when he proposed and she told him she was too young to think about marriage; he accepted that. They broke up just after she graduated Ranger School. Fuck, he was at her graduation."
"I didn't know that," Ranger said. Hector shrugged.
While Tank looked for a wall to bang his head against I asked, "Someone want to enlighten me?"
"Jose Guzman is what's known as the Corona of the Princes. It means that every member of the Princes, nationwide ultimately answers to him. Aguilar is like his lieutenant and is in charge of Florida," Ranger said.
"How the fuck did she even meet these guys?!"
"Her research," Hector answered. "Meagan was 18 and invincible. She was already working on her second PhD; her first dissertation was designed to catch the attention of the military. It worked. They wanted her bad but she wanted it to be on her terms and she got what she wanted. Her second dissertation was the one about the street gangs. She told her bodyguard, Jorge she was going to start speaking to the hoods on the street. That was fine in New Jersey because she had my reputation as protection. However, she wanted to talk to the hoods in New York and Miami as well. Jorge said Jose owed him a favor, so he called it in and asked Jose tp at least meet with Meagan. They hit it off. She got permission to talk to his boys and she was given protection.
"A few weeks later I came home one morning to find Jose sitting in my kitchen in his boxers eating Froot Loops. He'd taken Meagan to some gun range to learn how to shoot her birthday present from him and one thing led to another. She met Aguilar a little while later. Though she's never confirmed it, I'm almost positive she slept with him after a fucked up mission sometime before she met Lester and after she broke it off with Jose."
Well, that would explain why she was picked to lead the task force against the Slayers. I mean she has kick ass street connections.
They continued to speculate about her possible enemies while my head spun. I had Hector email me the threat matrix and drove back to Rangeman. I needed a shower-a long one. I'd been in the hospital waiting room so long I'd started redecorating it in my head. While I was in the shower, I decided I needed to kick this around with people on my level instead of trying to work this out with Ranger and his super spies. I had to start looking at this the way I looked at every other investigation I had ever conducted. I had an almost perfect capture rate for a reason and my unorthodox way of investigating is what got me my answers. What I needed was coffeecake, my mom's kitchen and Lula and Connie would be good, too. I got out of the shower and dressed in my old t-shirt and jeans uniform then dragged Lula and Connie from their desks while Burrows and Gillman followed. We made it as far as the door when we were stopped by Hal.
"Terri can't leave."
"Fuck that. I've got Lula and Burrows and Stephanie. They're all Rangewomen, they're all armed and they're all trained to protect people. I need to get out of this fucking building."
"Just please, Bomber, do me a favor and let me put someone on you guys. The boss will kill me if I don't. Let me put Jimmy and Ram on you."
"Fine, but they don't come into the kitchen" I said. The men in question were summoned. After they arrived the girls and I squeezed into one of the explorers, the men followed in another and we made the short drive to my mother's house. As usual, my grandmother and mom were waiting at the door as if summoned there by some mystical force that let them know progeny was returning home. We piled out of the Explorer like it was a clown car and went up the steps to the house.
"Wow! Lookee here!" My grandmother said with a giant smile, "We've got ourselves a good old-fashioned hen party going on!"
"Hello, grandma, I think you know everyone…well, except Jeanne Ellen." I indicated Burrows, "Jeanne Ellen Burrows, meet Edna Mazur." They shook hands.
"I think I have met you once before. You usually look more like catwoman," she said. Jeanne was dressed casually again and Grandma asked her, "Where do you get all the leather exactly? I want a pair of them leather pants."
"Do not even think about telling her," my mother said before Burrows could answer. "Please, everyone come in. I just bought a fresh coffee cake this morning and I'm trying a new blend of coffee. It's decaf and I'm hoping your father won't notice the switch."
"I'm telling you a man can tell," Grandma argued, "you'll see. It's not going to work."
"We're going to try it. Now get out of the way so everyone can come inside. I'm sure Ranger wouldn't be pleased to have them all hanging out on the steps like this. She's got men following her again. She must be in trouble."
"I'm not in trouble," I said, "Ranger had a stalker and the stalker is dead now so everyone is just being overly cautious. I just needed to get away from the office since I'm getting tunnel vision there. Do you mind if we brainstorm in the kitchen?"
"Fine, just don't go into gory details. You know what your grandmother gets like."
My mother led the gang into the kitchen and Lula and I grabbed a couple of extra chairs from the dining room. Mom was pouring coffee and my grandmother was cutting the coffee cake and passing it out when we got back. When I sat down at the table, pulled out my laptop, and the threat matrix appeared on the screen, Terri and Burrows looked at it and whistled.
Grandma looked at it, sucked at her dentures and observed, "What you've got is too much information. You need to stop looking at this and think 'Who can't it be?'" I borrowed Grandma's printer and printed out the matrix which showed a huge spider web of threats that all led back to Meagan.
"It's not street," Lula said, "Bangers would take credit for it. They ain't exactly shy 'bout that shit. They like everyone on the planet to know when they's threatenin' someone."
"She's right," Burrows said.
I crossed off the gangs which lopped off a quarter of the possible threats. "It's not Family. Uncle Vito would have heard by now," Terri said.
Connie agreed and another chunk, though not as big, was lopped off.
"Tank doesn't think it's op related and that kills off another quarter of the matrix. That leaves the people who hate her for existing."
"The who?" Lula asked. I shared what happened to Meagan in high school.
"They could be good for it." Burrows said, "I can make some calls and find out alibis."
"That doesn't help us with the other problem. Meagan is on paper as CEO of MDI," I said.
"Oh, perfect, that's thousands of suspects," Terri said.
"I don't think it's related to that," my mother chimed in much to my surprise. "I didn't realize Meagan was that Meagan Harris. Trust me, it wouldn't be someone from MDI."
"It's a huge company, Mom. There are bound to be a few disgruntled people."
"They wouldn't take it out on Meagan," my mom said. "You probably don't really remember what it was like when her parents died but the entire company and half of Congress and the Senate turned up for their funeral. I remember seeing pictures of Meagan standing on the steps of the church with the President of MDI. She reminded me of the princes at Princess Di's funeral. She looked so stoic. You could tell she was hurting but she was staying strong, especially when she gave a beautiful eulogy for them. It was all on TV. After that, she was like a symbol for the company. There was this big deal about the employees rallying around her saying they would keep the company safe for her until she was ready to take it over.
I remember a few years back I was reading this article about how she was sort of an honorary CEO of the company while she served in the military and how everyone was proud of her for serving her country. As far as MDI goes, she's never had bad press and you know how those newspaper types hate anyone who seems too perfect. They would be looking for ways to vilify her. They'd look for anyone in the company who held a grudge against her and was willing to speak. Now the President of MDI, he gets plenty of bad press ."
"Well, thanks, Mom." I sighed and scratched out yet another large portion of the suspect pool.
"That just leaves the people who hate her for existing," Terri remarked, "and that list isn't small."
I listened to them kick things around for a while. "Terri, do you remember anything at all about the people that grabbed you? Anything specific?"
"They were short…maybe 5'7. They weren't that strong either; it took both of them to get me into the car."
"That's odd," I said. Hector is around 5'8" and skinny but he could easily lift me and I had about 15 lbs on Terri. I stared at Terri then turned to Jeanne Ellen, "Burrows, you saw them put Terri into the car. How did they do it?"
She grabbed Connie and they recreated the action with Terri using the table as a representation of the back of the car. Jeanne stood at one end of the table and hooked her arms under Terri, Connie picked up her legs then Jeanne pulled Terri across the table. It was quick, efficient and caused no strain.
"Jesus, Mary and Joseph!" My mother blurted out. My grandmother had been playing with my laptop and I spun it around thinking that she had stumbled upon crime scene photos; the last two murders had been particularly gruesome. I really wished I hadn't turned the screen.
"You're mom put all these parental controls on my computer." My grandmother said, "I just knew you wouldn't have those restrictions up!" My grandmother was logged onto a porn site and the screen of my laptop was filled with video thumbnails depicting everything from Blow jobs to butt-sex. "My friend Mabel at the beauty parlour told me about this site. She found it on her grandson's computer. She said it had everything and she wasn't kidding. She said the best thing about it was that the videos weren't that long and that her husband Elmer…." I clapped my hands over my ears so I didn't have to listen anymore about the uses Seniors might have for porn. It didn't work and I don't know why I still believed it might when the theory is pretty much disproved when you are kids. Hands are not sound proof. Lula had no such qualms about aiding my grandmother in her porn viewing and walked around the table to take over the mouse.
"Look here, it's all organized and shit right, so you don't have to scroll through all the stuff you don't want to see. You just click here on the side and it takes you to a page that shows you all of the categories." It was like a train wreck I couldn't look away. My grandmother was listening to Lula like she was spouting off the wisdom of the ages. My mother wasn't even pretending anymore. She was no longer sneaking tipples into her decaf she was just taking a hit directly from the bottle.
"Is it always like this?" Burrows asked.
"Actually the plums are pretty normal. Have you met Joe's Grandma Bella?" Terri replied. I toasted Terri with my coffee. My grandmother may be scary but she's a hoot. Bella was just plain fucking scary.
In light of that I decided not to confiscate my computer. So what if my million year old grandmother wanted to look at porn? She'd earned it. I was watching her scroll through, she was completely fascinated. She paused at on clip and held the mouse over it, to get a preview, and my eyes nearly popped out of my head. Holy crap! How had they never considered it? That sure as hell was a simpler explanation than anything else we could think of!
"Holy shit! I know who did it!" I exclaimed and shot to my feet., "We have to call Meagan." I dialed her phone and it went straight to voicemail. "Dammit!"
RSRSRSRSRSRS
Meagan stood at the crime scene with Bobby. She was combing through everything while Bobby watched. She never took a note and ignored the crime scene techs. Going on other people's information is what landed them here. When CID showed up, they took one look at her and a flash of her credentials and they quickly beat a retreat. She crouched down over the body. The woman's face was unrecognizable she had been beaten so badly. The pictures on the wall, however, showed she bore a startling resemblance to Meagan. The victim was taller, a little heavier, her features softer with eyes not nearly as dark; but the resemblance was still there. "B, I want you to examine her," she said. "Just a preliminary exam, not here but in the coroner's van; something isn't right."
The sad thing about it was they both knew what they were looking for. They had examined and counseled too many rape victims in their line of work. The M.E. and his assistant put the victim's body on the gurney and wheeled her out of the house then into the back of the coroner's wagon. Meagan and Bobby climbed in after them and closed the doors.
The M.E. watched the two investigators work and was ready to offer assistance. He was sick of getting these women on his table, their injuries progressively worse. If they wanted to personally examine the body, he was fine with it. He knew Bobby was a professional.
Bobby pulled on a pair of gloves and did a quick pelvic exam, and deflated, his face look pained, "Fuck."
"What?" she asked, though she suspected she knew the answer already. She was so young…
"She was a virgin before last night." His confirmation of her suspicions somehow made the whole thing that much worse. He finished the examination and snapped off his gloves.
"Something is odd, right?"
"Yes," he said, "everything's consistent with rape but you're correct. Something is wrong. She had sensitive skin and she's got chafing from something. It's almost like the unsub tried to keep as many clothes on as possible during the assault."
"It looks like what happened when I wore my stupid thigh holster with shorts," Meagan said. "Is it possible that she did the same thing?"
"No, those marks took place just before death; they didn't have time to heal at all." The M.E. said, "It had to have happened either right before or during the rape."
Meagan started going through the victim's clothes. She was still fully clothed wearing a cropped jacket, a short skirt and a long tank top. It was something Meagan herself would wear if going out for a night with friends. When she checked the pockets of the jacket, she found a sealed envelope and pulled it out. The M.E. pulled out his camera and took a picture of the envelope then Meagan carefully opened it.
Inside was a computer print out of what looked like a picture taken from a cell phone. It was a picture of Anthony Beals' body slumped against the wall. The angle was awkward as if it had been taken from the doorway and then cropped to zoom in on the body. The words, 'You were wrong, bitch.' were scrawled across it in what looked like pen.
Meagan closed her eyes and sighed. "Why the fuck does anyone ever waste time not listening to Steph's gut?" She asked rhetorically, turning to Bobby, she said, "I know who did this. Can I borrow your phone? I want to call Stephanie and I smashed mine."
Bobby pulled out his phone and Meagan dialed Steph, "Yo, Steph, I know who did this."
"Meagan, I was just trying to call you." Stephanie replied, "I know who did it, too. We just have no way to prove it. I need your help figuring that part out."
