Chapter 31 Chapter 31: Echoes of the Past
Two years after veteran support programs had become a model for the nation, I thought I had retired from being a detective forever. I was wrong.
It was a Tuesday morning in September, and I was reviewing budget proposals for extending peer counseling to rural communities. Captain Rodriguez's name flashed on my phone, and an icy feeling settled in my stomach.
"Jenkins? I know you're not a cop anymore, but we need your expertise."
"What's going on, Captain?"
"We have a case that is too familiar. Too familiar." His voice was weighed down with bad news. "Three women were found in Manhattan alleys within the past month. Same position, same signature as the cases you cracked three years ago."
I watched the color drain from my face. "That's impossible. We arrested him. Harrison died in prison."
"That's what we thought too. But Rachel, these latest crime scenes are just like the others. Three fingers out, two fingers clenched down, a dignified arrangement of corpses. Either there is a copycat who is privy to information that was never released, or."
"Or what?"
"Or we missed something the first time."
I closed my eyes and pushed aside hidden recollections. The case that had almost derailed my career. The serial killer who'd terrorized New York City for months. The case that had brought Alex and me together but also shown us the extent to which a single man could cause damage.
"Captain, I'm no longer a detective. I'm on staff with Congress now."
"I know what you work for, and I know why you quit. But Rachel, you knew Harrison better than anyone. You knew his habits, his psychology. If there's something we overlooked, you're the only one who can spot it."
"Jameson? He led the task force."
"Jameson retired last year. Moved to Florida. And in any case, he wasn't the one who got inside Harrison's head. That was you."
I stared out the window of my office into the dome of the Capitol, wondering how far I'd wandered from those dark months trailing a killer across New York streets. I'd found purpose in policy, meaning in helping veterans heal from trauma. The thought of returning to crime scenes and autopsy reports was repulsive.
"Captain, I'll have to see it all. Every new case file, crime scene photo, autopsy report. And I'll have to see the original Harrison files to compare them."
"Already set up. Detective Martinez from your previous precinct is heading up the investigation. She's waiting for your call."
After I hung up, I sat in silence for a few minutes. What I'd been doing with veterans had taught me that sometimes the past refused to stay away, that recovery meant facing the things we'd rather forget.
My phone beeped with a text from Alex: "Heard about the new murders. You okay?"
I called him instead of responding with a text.
"How did you already know?" I asked.
"I still listen to police scanners, and I have a few NYPD friends. Rachel, the details they're releasing sound like Harrison's stuff."
"That's not possible. We saw his body."
"I know. But someone is re-creating his crimes with precise accuracy. The issue is how."
"Alex, I have to ask you something. When you were researching Harrison, did you ever release some of the precise details on the hand placement? The three-finger signature?"
"No, never. That was always withheld by police. Why would I compromise the investigation by releasing that?"
"Because someone knows those details. Someone who had access to case files or."
"Or what?"
"Or someone who was present when Harrison staged the bodies."
The dawning of what I was suggesting hit both of us simultaneously. If Harrison did have an associate, someone who'd watched him work, apprenticed under him, and now carrying on his work, then we'd never really cracked the case to begin with.
"Rachel, I'm heading to New York."
"Alex, you don't have to—"
"Yes, I do. This thing started with both of us, and if it is still happening, we have to face it together."
I took the train to New York that afternoon for the first time in two years. The city itself remained the same but was experienced differently, similar to going back to a childhood home as a grown adult. Streets that were once stalking grounds seemed so ordinary now, menacing memories condensed into routine corners.
Detective Martinez welcomed me to the precinct, a woman in her mid-twenties with the deliberate air of one who'd been stuck with a bad case.
"Detective Jenkins—sorry, Ms. Jenkins—thanks for coming. I know this's not easy."
"Just Rachel. And you're right, it's not easy. But if these murders are connected to Harrison, we need to work out how."
She led me to a conference room where there were three case files opened on the conference table. The photos of the crime scene upset my stomach, not because of how graphic they were, but because of how familiar. The arrangement was the same as Harrison's report, down to details never made public.
"Describe the victims," I instructed, trying to focus on facts rather than emotions.
"Jennifer Walsh, 29, art curator. Maria Santos, 31, jeweler. Lisa Chen, 28, photographer. Single, all alone at home, all in tight alleys between buildings."
The names stilled me. "Wait a minute. Walsh, Santos, Chen? They have the same last names as the people who have some connection to the initial case and the veteran services programs."
Detective Martinez frowned. "What are you saying?"
"Jennifer Walsh—would she be sister to Sarah Walsh, the first victim in New York of Harrison? Maria Santos—there's a Gunny Santos who helped with the veteran programs. Lisa Chen—Harrison's sister, Alex's sister, was Lisa Chen, murdered in Chicago."
"You believe that the murderer is selecting victims with a link to the initial case?"
"I think someone wants us to take notice. Someone knowledgeable about the Harrison case, the veteran programs, and all those who worked on both."
My phone was ringing. Alex.
"Rachel, where are you?"
"Police precinct, working my way through case files. Why?"
"Because I just got a call from someone who claims to have information on the new murders. They insist they meet tonight, at the same coffee shop where we originally met and talked about Harrison."
"That's no accident."
"No, it isn't. Rachel, I think we're being manipulated. Someone wants us back on this case."
"Did they say their name?"
"Just said they knew the truth about what really happened three years ago."
I looked at the crime scene photos spread across the table, at the precise positioning that matched Harrison's signature perfectly. Someone was recreating the past with surgical accuracy, and they wanted Alex and me to notice.
"Alex, this feels like a trap."
"Maybe. But at least it's the only clue we've got. Rachel, what if we've overlooked something? What if Harrison wasn't working alone?"
"Then we have to be very careful about what we do next."
That evening, I strolled through the West Village again, by the alley where Sarah Walsh had been found, to the coffee shop where Alex and I had first talked about a serial killer. The symmetry was deliberate, as though we were being forced into following the same route.
Alex sat and waited, in the same corner booth we had used three years earlier. But he was accompanied.
A woman in her early forties sat across from him, gray streaked through brown hair, eyes filled with secrets. She was familiar, but I couldn't remember where I had seen her.
"Rachel," Alex said as I reached him, "this is Dr. Patricia Williams."
The name registered. "Dr. Williams of the Congressional Veterans Affairs Committee? What are you doing here?"
"trying to prevent further killings," she whispered. "Please, sit. We need to talk about what really happened during the Harrison investigation."
I slipped into the booth, my mind racing. "Dr. Williams, you have some connection to the Harrison case?"
SAXON
SAXON SAXON
SAXON
SAXON
"I was counseling the FBI in the initial investigation. Providing psychological profiles, analyzing behavioral patterns." She paused. "There is something we never told you, something which can be used to account for these most recent murders."
"What?"
"Harrison was not acting alone. We knew it at the time but were unable to prove it. When he died in custody, the FBI closed out the accomplice theory to prevent copycat killings."
I felt the world turn around me. "You're saying that there was another murderer?"
"A partner. Someone who mastered Harrison's technique, helped with logistics, and disappeared when Harrison was arrested."
Alex rested his elbows on his knees. "Why didn't you tell us this three years ago?"
"Because we had nothing, no leads, and we thought the threat was eliminated when Harrison was killed. We were wrong."
I looked at her from across the table, trying to understand what she said. "Dr. Williams, if you believed there might be another murderer, why wasn't the FBI continuing to investigate?"
"They were, off the books. But without Harrison to provide information about his partner, the trail went cold. Until today."
"Why do you believe the partner has returned?"
"Because the new murders aren't just copying Harrison's methods. They're killing people connected to everyone who was on the original team." She extracted a folder from under her arm. "Jennifer Walsh was Sarah Walsh's cousin. Maria Santos is Gunny Santos's sister. Lisa Chen was living with Alex's sister in Chicago before she was killed."
The connections were too precise to be a coincidence. Someone had spent a lifetime charting Harrison's victims against those who had been solving his crimes.
"Dr. Williams," I said deliberately, "are you saying Alex and I are in jeopardy?"
"I'm saying you're being targeted by someone who blames you for Harrison's arrest and death. Someone who wants you to know that the game is hardly begun."
As we lingered at the coffee shop where our partnership had begun, I realized that the case that had brought us together was not concluded. The legacy of Harrison lived on through one who had learned from his strategies and was now using them to bring about a new kind of fear.
The hunt was beginning anew, but this time we were the prey.