Without waiting for an answer, I pulled up a nearby chair and crowded Becks’s space. She didn’t seem to mind. “What do you need?”
I flipped through my notes, finding what I required. “I need to know if one of the men the women accused of their murder had previously fractured fingers.” It was the only thing I could think that might be easily found.
Becks’s fingers hovered over her computer keys before she abandoned her position and reached into her laptop bag. Instead of a computer, she pulled out a thick folder. “That’s an oddly specific question.”
“Too specific?”
“Not for me.” Becks gave me a crooked grin. “But it is a little unsettling. I’m not sure what prompted you to ask, and I’ve got a feeling I’m not going to like the answer.”
“You’re probably not wrong.”
“That’s what I’m afraid of.” Flipping through her folder, Becks found what she wanted and pulled out a couple of sheets. “Here.” She pointed at what appeared to be medical notes. “I came across this when I was looking into Edwin Clark.”
“Gladys’s son?” She was our older victim. Still blond or maybe grayer by the time she was murdered. She was also the soul that Boone said was more sad than angry regarding her death.
“That’s the one,” Becks confirmed. “It came up because Edwin was young at the time, and there was some question regarding how the fracture happened. Child Protective Services were called in, so it was documented and in the database.”
“Anything come of their investigation?”
Becks shook her head. “No. It was determined to be accidental. There were witnesses that backed up Gladys’s claim that Edwin fractured his fingers when he fell out of a tree. Do you want to know the interesting part?”
“I’m all ears.”
Becks grinned. “It was Edwin that accused his mother of fracturing his fingers.”
I sat back while digesting that bit of information. “Was the witness unreliable?” Could be that Edwin was telling the truth, and Gladys got someone to cover for her.
“Not even close. Turns out, there were two separate witnesses. One was a neighbor, and the other was someone random walking down the street. Child Protective Services claimed there was no prior history between the witness on the street and Gladys. In other words, they didn’t know each other, and the witness would have no conceivable reason to lie.”
“But Edwin did?”
Becks shrugged. “I can’t comment on that. There’s nothing in the file indicating why they thought Edwin claimed his mother fractured his fingers.”
I didn’t know what to say. If it became more pertinent, I’d need to consult with a child psychologist to get more insight. “Which fingers exactly?”
Becks rattled off what the report said. It was more medical than I could follow, but I understood enough to gather it was the same two fingers Dr. Stowe told me about. My earlier exhaustion returned with the weight of a thousand suns. I stared down at my clasped hands as my mind spun.
“O’Hare?” Becks’s dark fingers against my pale skin pulled me from my circling thoughts. “What’s going on? What do you know?”
My barked laughter rode that razor thin line of insanity. “Know? Not much. Suspicion? That’s a different kettle of fish.”
“Okay, then what do you suspect?”
“Something that sounds far-fetched.”
“You and I both know that far-fetched doesn’t mean impossible, so spill.”
Rubbing my tired eyes only made them burn more. “I think that what we’re going to find is that the male remains cooling their skeletal heels in the morgue are the men our female victims accused of murdering them.”
Becks jerked back, her lips falling open. A little squeak of sound managed to escape before she slammed her mouth closed again. “That’s…odd.”
I choked on a laugh. “Yeah, you could say that.”
Becks didn’t question my reasoning. She simply eased back into her seat, her eyes distant as her fingers tapped along her desk. “Vigilante?”
Mimicking Becks’s posture, I considered the thought. “Could be. But how do the women relate? How would our vigilante know all six of them given their lack of connection and even greater distance across the country? And why bring them into our neck of the woods to bury?”
“I doubt a human would,” Becks answered.
