“I had a run-in with two creeps the other night. They killed a man. I’d like to catch them.”
Bill grabbed her wrists and held up her hands. “What did they do to you?”
“Nothing broken. Just cut. It would have been much worse if Jessie hadn’t come along.”
Bill nodded approvingly at Jessie. “I told you she had an aura.”
“I want to give the FBI sketches of the guys,” Kendra said. “And there’s nobody better than you.”
“I agree with you. Hardly a week goes by that I don’t get a call from somebody wanting me to make a sketch. I’m officially retired, Kendra. You may find this hard to believe, but I don’t even keep a pad anymore.”
Jessie thrust a large sketch pad toward him. “Will this work?”
Bill laughed. “Pencils?”
Jessie reached into her jacket and produced a fistful of pencils. “We wanted you to have a choice.”
“You get extra points for being prepared.” Bill sighed and motioned toward an outdoor table near the fountain. “We can set up here. Did you get a good look at the guys?”
“Good enough.”
They sat around one of the round tables, and Bill flipped open the pad. “This won’t take long. You’re always so clear and specific about everything you see, Kendra.”
“It’s because I couldn’t see the first twenty years of my life. Now that I can, I want to soak in every detail.”
“So I gathered. I always thought you should be able to just draw these yourself.”
“No way. I’m the worst artist you’ve ever seen. Blind kids don’t grow up drawing like other kids do. No crayons, no coloring books. My artwork hardly rises above the level of stick figure.”
“Well, I guess that’s what I’m here for.” Bill selected a pencil and put the rest down on the table. “Let’s start with the shape. Was it a long face, round face, or somewhere in between?”
* * *
It took Bill less than forty-five minutes to generate sketches of both men with enough character and detail to rival a good photograph. As always, he was able to tease the tiniest details from her memory and perfectly reproduce them onto the sketch pad pages, as if a laser printer had been hardwired to her brain.
Kendra held up the sketches side by side. One of the faces was heavier, with thick lips and bushy eyebrows that she recognized as the man who’d jumped after her into the factory. The other was sleek, with a thin nose, high cheekbones, and wide-set eyes. Both of them appeared to be somewhere in their thirties or forties. “These are good. Too good. Just seeing these faces again makes me a little sick.”
“Good. It means I did my job.” Bill stood. “Now, if you ladies will excuse me, I have a conversational French class to get to.”
“French?”
“Oui. A group of us are going to Paris next spring.” He tipped an imaginary hat toward Kendra and Jessie. “Good luck. And be careful.”
Bill turned and walked away with a decided bounce in his gait.
“Hard to believe that’s the same guy you were just talking about,” Jessie said.
“Tell me about it. That’s how I want to be in my retirement years.”
“Ah, you’ll never retire, Kendra. You’ll still be walking into crime scenes and dazzling police detectives well into your nineties.”
“Don’t say that. I don’t want to dazzle anyone. And I can’t imagine being able to stand those kinds of depressing scenarios for that long a time. That’s definitely not where I want to be.” Kendra laid the sketches on the tabletop and used her phone’s camera and scanner app to make two PDF files. She sent both to Metcalf. “These sketches are good enough that the FBI might be able to use their facial recognition systems to see if either of these matches anyone in their database.”
Jessie clicked her tongue. “That’s a real long shot.”
“It may be the only one we have.” Kendra took one last look around and suddenly frowned. “I wish every retirement facility was like this one. There should be better care for all our seniors. Life should be lived to the fullest like Bill is doing.”
“I’m with you. But not everyone is lucky enough to come into a little extra money,” Jessie said gently. “I know you’re all set to mount your soapbox and see what you can do about correcting a massive problem, but put it on hold for the time being. Just enjoy it for Bill until we get this case solved.”
Kendra nodded. She was right, of course. “I know. Think about