The 7th Victim - Alan Jacobson [41]
She didn’t know how to start. “Anyone else around? Manette, Hancock—”
“Came and went. No one else is here. Just us.” Bledsoe gave her a second, but she still didn’t say anything.
She noticed his eyes brighten—she figured the light had come on. Having worked with Vail so closely during the task force’s first tour of duty, Bledsoe knew the garbage she had to navigate during her custody battle with Deacon.
“Your ex, something happen with him?”
Vail nodded.
“Did he touch you?” Bledsoe waited a beat, got no response, and then was out of his chair, hands on his hips, pacing. “You going to file a report? I can write it up, assault, and have him brought in. Scare the shit out of him.”
She thought about it, then shook her head. “Truth is, I don’t know what happened. I went there to talk to him about changing our custody arrangement, and about an hour later I woke up on the floor of his living room.” She hesitated, unsure if she wanted to go any further.
He stopped pacing and pulled his chair beside Vail. He rested his elbows on his knees and looked into her eyes. “You know what happened. It’s enough to file a report. Get it on record.”
“Bledsoe, I don’t know what happened. I can piece things together, make inferences . . . but it’s not the same as knowing. Besides, it doesn’t look good for me to have gone to his place. He’ll just say I started the argument.”
Bledsoe sat there staring at her, then finally asked, “You think he raped you?”
“No.” Bledsoe was a good cop; she knew that—but she had never been on the receiving end of his investigative sensibilities. He had put it all together, perhaps seen something in her body language. He’d been around the block with enough victims to know what had transpired.
“But if you don’t remember what happened, how can you be so sure?”
She tilted her head and gave him a stern look. “I would know if he—if something penetrated me.”
Bledsoe stood up and faced the wall, as if he were studying the accumulated stains and layers of paint drips. Finally, he turned to her. “We gotta nail this guy, Karen. Just file the damn report.”
“Yeah, that’ll go over real well, especially when the investigating dick pulls out his pad and says, ‘So, Agent Vail, tell me what happened. ’ And I say, ‘Gee, detective, I don’t know what happened. I can’t remember.’ Even if he goes the extra mile for the uniform and runs Deacon, how’s it going to look in court? The defense attorney will tear me apart: ‘Are you saying, Agent Vail, that you reported being assaulted, even though you can’t remember actually being struck? Maybe you tripped and fell and hit your head. In fact, you can’t remember anything about what happened, isn’t that true?’” To say nothing about leaving my Glock in his house, then threatening to blow his brains out. She waved a hand. “There’s no case.”
And that’s when it hit her. “The case, shit. That’s what I was supposed to do at ten. Meet with my attorney about Jonathan.” Vail pulled out her cell phone and rescheduled the missed appointment, then called the school to get a message to Jonathan explaining why she hadn’t come for him.
When she hung up, Bledsoe’s face was still crumpled in concentration. “We can bring him in, I can lean on him, get a confession. I know I can, Karen. And even if I don’t, it’ll be worth it just to see him squirm.”
Vail slumped back in her chair. “I’ll deal with this in my own way. Thanks, though. I appreciate the offer.”
Bledsoe regarded her for a moment. “Just don’t do anything you’ll regret later.”
“I’ll let my attorney handle it, okay?” She managed a thin smile. “I’ll only regret it when I get his bill.”
eighteen
After talking with Bledsoe about Deacon’s attack, Vail settled down at the long folding table set up in the living room and began thumbing through the Dead Eyes file. She knew there was something in there she had missed. More than that, however, there was information she had not yet had time to adequately analyze.
Around one thirty, Mandisa Manette arrived with a shoulder bag slung across her back stuffed with files and supplies. She