Chương 9
“Restraint?”
“Possibly.”
“You still haven’t arrested them.”
“We need the warrant search, toxicology, and complete autopsy.”
“She was held.”
“We don’t know that.”
“She was drugged.”
“We don’t know that.”
Daniel stepped close enough that Ortiz had to look up slightly.
“Then what do you know?”
Ortiz did not move.
“I know your wife was afraid,” she said. “I know evidence was removed from your house. I know her original death narrative is incomplete. I know two people have lied about the timeline. That is enough to keep working and not enough to skip the work.”
Daniel stood in the cold until his anger passed through him without finding an action.
Then he nodded.
The following morning, the Army placed Daniel on emergency leave.
Colonel Briggs called at six thirty and spoke with the stiff gentleness of a man who had rehearsed the conversation with legal counsel.
“You’re not under investigation by the command,” Briggs said. “But the media has your name, rank, and photographs from the funeral home. Public affairs wants all statements routed through them.”
“My wife was murdered.”
“I understand that is what you believe.”
“It’s what she said.”
“I’m not disputing it.”
“You’re careful not to agree.”
“I’m trying not to make your life worse.”
Daniel stood in the bedroom doorway. Elena’s side of the bed remained unmade from the morning she left. The cleaners had changed the sheets but placed her flattened pillow back against the headboard.
“What do you need from me?” he asked.
“Stay away from Fort Belden until we have a clearer picture. Secure any personally owned firearms according to regulations and local law. Do not carry while drinking.”
“I’m not drinking.”
“Good.”
“Did someone tell you I was?”
“No. It’s the sentence I’m required to say.”
Daniel almost laughed. The sound did not come.
Briggs paused. “Hayes, I’m sorry.”
“Thank you, sir.”
After the call, Daniel opened the closet.
Elena’s clothes filled half the space. She had arranged them by color during the first week of January and abandoned the system by February. A red blouse hung among black dresses. One of Daniel’s old field jackets was wedged between two expensive coats.
He took it down.
The sleeves had been rolled to fit her. A receipt crackled in one pocket.
Daniel pulled it out.
It was from a pharmacy near Vale House, dated twelve days before Elena’s death. The listed purchase included bandages, antiseptic wipes, disposable syringes, and a prescription identified only by an abbreviated name.
The customer name was Margaret Vale.
Daniel photographed the receipt where it lay on his palm, then called Ortiz.
She arrived within forty minutes.
“Do you know why your wife had this?” she asked.
“No.”
“Why was the jacket in her closet?”
“She wore it when she gardened or walked in the rain.”
“Who had access to the pocket?”
“Anyone in the house.”
Ortiz placed the receipt in an evidence envelope.
“The prescription abbreviation may be unrelated,” she said.
“Syringes.”
“Margaret has a dog receiving veterinary medication.”
“She doesn’t.”
“You’re certain?”
“She hates animals.”
Ortiz looked at him.
“That sounded less useful after I said it.”
“It’s still information.”
She turned the receipt toward the window. “The warrant team found an empty package of disposable syringes in a utility closet at Vale House. Margaret’s name is on a prescription for a medication used in fertility treatment.”
“She’s sixty-two.”
“The prescription was not written for her. It was purchased through an account using her payment information and name as pickup authorization.”
“For whom?”
“We’re checking.”
Daniel sat on the edge of the bed.
Ortiz continued, “We recovered fragments of documents from a fireplace ash bin. We also found blood traces on a rug that had been rolled and placed in the garage.”
“Elena’s?”
“Testing is pending.”
“What did Margaret say?”
“That Elena cut her hand on a broken vase two weeks earlier.”
“Did she?”
“Did you see an injury?”
“No.”
“Naomi?”
“She didn’t mention one.”
Ortiz looked at Elena’s pillow.
“There’s more,” she said. “A neighbor’s security camera captured Ethan’s car leaving Vale House at two forty-one. It returned at three twelve. Emergency services were called at three eighteen.”
“He lied about leaving her alive at two thirty.”
“Not necessarily. He said he left around two thirty. The car supports part of that.”
“Where did he go?”
“We don’t know.”
“His phone?”
“Powered off from one fifty-eight until four ten.”
“Margaret’s?”
“At the house. Several calls were deleted, but carrier records show she contacted Graham Pike at two forty-seven and again at three oh five.”
“Before calling an ambulance.”
“Yes.”
Daniel stared at the floorboards.
“Can you arrest her for that?”
“No.”
“Can you make her explain it?”
“She says she called Pike because Elena had threatened legal action and she wanted advice after the argument.”
“While Elena was injured.”
“Margaret says Elena was awake and refusing assistance at that time.”
“Elena was injected.”
“We still don’t know with what.”
Daniel stood. “You keep giving me facts in one sentence and taking them away in the next.”
“I’m telling you where the evidence ends.”
“Do you have children?”
Ortiz’s expression closed.
The question embarrassed him immediately.
“I’m sorry.”
She tucked the evidence envelope into her case. “My sister was killed by her husband when I was twenty-three. He said she fell in the shower. For twelve hours, everyone in my family knew he had done it. Knowing did not tell us how.”
Daniel looked at her.
“He was convicted because an emergency-room nurse documented bruises from an earlier assault and because his timeline failed against parking-garage records,” Ortiz said. “Not because we hated him correctly.”
The bedroom’s silence changed.
“What happened to your sister?” Daniel asked.
“She died.”
He nodded.
Ortiz picked up her case. “Call me before you touch anything else in this room.”
After she left, Daniel sat on the floor beside the closet.
May you like
He found himself thinking about toothpaste.
Elena squeezed tubes from the middle. Daniel rolled them tightly from the bottom. During their first year of marriage, he bought two separate tubes to avoid the argument. Elena accused him of turning intimacy into logistics. He accused her of manufacturing a conflict over dental hygiene.
