“You really know how to push me into an uncomfortable corner.”
“Is there a comfortable corner? Because I’ve yet to encounter one in my life.”
“We’re women, Carol, we can multitask.”
“Since I am a woman, I can tell you that’s a glib retort but doesn’t really answer my question.”
Pine stared down at her hands. “When I was a kid, I never thought about working in law enforcement. When I lost Mercy, I just closed up inside. I didn’t make any friends. My parents were there, but there was this void, you know?”
“Yes, I can see that.”
“I found my calling in sports. I could play any of them and do well. I enjoyed it, but those were all team sports. I…I had to be part of something and it was hard. Really hard. I found I couldn’t connect with people. I was terrified that eventually the conversation would come around to family, and then what would I say? It was like I was carrying around this terrible dark secret. I know it makes no sense, but I felt ashamed.”
“I can understand how that would be very difficult for you.”
“Then I started the competitive weightlifting. With that, it was just me against everyone else. I didn’t have to relate to anyone. I just had to beat them.”
“I get that. But it must have been very lonely for you.”
Pine let out a long breath and looked up at her friend. “Incredibly so. Especially after my mom left. Then I got out of college, wandered around for a bit, and then something happened to change my life.”
“What was that?”
“I was walking down the street one night when this guy suddenly bursts out of an alleyway. He almost knocked me down. I jumped back and saw that he was armed. I panicked. I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t know what was happening. It was like out of a movie.”
“My God,” exclaimed Blum.
“A split second later another person came out of that alley. It was a woman. She had a gun, too. By that time, I had planted myself behind a trash can and ducked down. The guy turned and fired at her but missed. Then she was on him like a runaway freight train. She disarmed him so fast I could barely follow her movements. He was down on the ground and being handcuffed before I could even let out a breath. Then some other cops showed up. After that, she came over to me and asked if I was okay. She was super nice. Super calm, especially after what had just happened. I was still shaking.”
“Who was she?”
“FBI Special Agent Marilyn Shales. She’d been staking out this guy for about two weeks. He was bad to the bone. Drugs, armed robbery, murder in multiple states. Marilyn probably came up to my chest and weighed maybe a hundred and ten pounds soaking wet. But she was the toughest person I have ever met in my life. I told her how blown away I was by what she’d done. She gave me her card. I called her a week later. We met, and a week after that I filled out my FBI application.”
“Did you keep in touch?”
Pine nodded. “She really became a mentor to me as I went through the process. She even came to my graduation from Quantico.”
“Do you still see her?”
“I wish I could. She died three years ago. Breast cancer.” Pine drew a short, hard breath. “I love being an agent, Carol. I love everything about it. But mostly I love the good I can do with the shield that comes with it. The little girl, Holly? She was surprised that a woman could be a FBI agent. I told her girls can do anything they set their minds to. Because that’s basically what Marilyn Shales told me.”
“So you were being a mentor of sorts to Holly. Who knows, maybe you’ll be attending her FBI graduation one day.”
Pine smiled at this. “That would be cool,” she said quietly. Then she rose and said abruptly, “So off we go to Savannah.”
“I hear it’s very pretty. I’ve never been there.”
“I have, and it is beautiful. Have you read the book Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil?”
“Yes. It was wonderful.”
“But it shows that even beautiful places have very dark sides.”
Chapter 36
LAYNE GILLESPIE’S LAST KNOWN ADDRESS was in a part of Savannah that was as far from the town’s historic Garden District as it was possible to be. Tiny homes with laundry on