me.”
Faith still couldn’t wrap her head around what Amanda had told them. Attacking a woman, raping her, terrifying her, murdering her, were all bad enough. To torture her in that way, to paralyze her so she couldn’t fight back—was a whole new level of terror.
She said, “Sara found knife wounds around the abdomen and around the armpits. The killer must know something about animal behavior, right? He sliced open McAllister’s skin to draw blood so that the predators would eat the evidence.”
Will shoved a handful of chips into his mouth. He was staying away from the Sara part of the discussion. Or maybe he was still processing the grisly details, the same as Faith. Most killers were not caught because they left at the crime scene a grain of sand from a remote island that only they could’ve visited. They got caught because they were sloppy and stupid.
This killer was neither of those things.
“Brad Stephens.” Will opened the bag of Cheetos. “He’s missing from the list of cops in the COVER-UP section.”
“He must’ve been fresh out of the academy when this happened.” Faith knew exactly what that looked like. “He would’ve been doing the scut work, gathering all the reports, filing, canvassing, door knocking, talking to secondary witnesses.”
“He would’ve seen everything.”
Faith glanced at her partner. He was brushing crumbs off his tie. The more they talked about the case, the better Will sounded. She asked, “Take me through your thinking. How do you draw the line between Gerald Caterino and Brad Stephens?”
“I’m Gerald Caterino,” Will said. “My daughter has been gravely injured. I’ve got to deal with that in the immediate, right? Her recovery, physical therapy, whatever. And all that time, I’m thinking the guy who hurt her is behind bars. The guy goes through two appeals that he loses. Three years pass. I’m rocking along with my life, but then the guy I think is guilty writes to me and tells me he didn’t do it.”
Faith nodded, because that seemed like the most likely turn of events. “You wouldn’t believe that guy.”
“I would not.” Will dumped the rest of the Cheetos into his mouth. He chewed, then swallowed, then said, “I’m a dad, though. I can’t let it go. I’ve got this guy who I think hurt my daughter, but he’s telling me it was somebody else who’s still out there, possibly hurting other women. What do I do next?”
“You’re a middle-class white man, so you assume the police will help you.” Faith handed him her Diet Coke to open. “Five years ago, Matt Hogan was gone. So was Tolliver. Frank Wallace was the interim chief. Lena was chief detective. Brad was a senior patrolman.”
Will passed back the open soda. “Frank would be zero help. Lena might try to help, but not in a meaningful way.”
Faith could imagine Lena trying to control the situation and watching it blow up like a roadside IED. “The civil suit wouldn’t get Nesbitt access to the Truong and Caterino files. Nesbitt was only the assumed perpetrator. His conviction was based on the child porn.”
“Right, but there’s only a few ways you can personally sue a cop. Excessive force. A fourth amendment violation for unreasonable search and seizure. A charge of discrimination and/or harassment.” Will explained, “You can’t base your case off of one bad act. You need to show a pattern of behavior. That’s how they get access to the Caterino and Truong files. They tell the judge they need to look at previous investigations to establish a pattern.”
Faith took a sip of cola. As legal strategies went, it was a good one. “Gerald Caterino must’ve been pissed off when Daryl Nesbitt dropped his suit in exchange for medium security.”
“He still kept in touch,” Will said. “He sent the articles to Nesbitt in prison.”
“Just the articles,” Faith said, reminding him of the detail Amanda had passed on. “There were no letters, no Post-it notes. Just the clippings in an envelope with a PO box for the return address.”
“GDOC only keeps mail records for three years. We don’t know if they corresponded before that.”
Faith figured Gerald Caterino was the only person who could fill in the details. If he agreed to talk to them. “You still haven’t connected this to Brad Stephens.”
“Easy. Frank and Lena aren’t going to help. So, I start looking for weak points on the Grant County force. Someone who was there when it happened. Someone who isn’t invested in being right. Brad Stephens is my only choice.”
Faith didn’t buy it.