Page 74 of Fallen

CHAPTER 32

Day 5

It’s been nearly eight hours since Dane Fletcher committed suicide. The scene at the park has replayed a thousand times in my head. I’ve critiqued my every move, my every word, everything I did and didn’t do—and yet the end result is always the same. Intellectually, I know there was nothing I could have done to stop him. I should be thankful he didn’t rely on me to do his dirty work for him.

By all accounts, Dane Fletcher was a duplicitous son of a bitch, a rapist, a disgrace to the badge—to all men—and likely a murderer. Despite all of those things, there is no satisfaction that comes with the end of his life.

I spent several hours in an interview room with Sheriff Rasmussen and Tomasetti. I gave my official statement to the best of my ability, but I was exhausted and shaken. I answered dozens of questions, drank too much coffee, snapped at both men a few too many times. Because I was at the scene when Fletcher committed suicide, the Holmes County Sheriff’s Office will oversee the investigation. Normally, I’d put up some token argument. This time, I’m relieved to step aside. I’m pissed at Fletcher for using his badge to prey on women, and when he got caught, for taking the cowardly way out. What kind of man does that to his wife and children? What kind of man pulls over a seventeen-year-old Amish girl and demands sex in exchange for letting her walk away from a DUI?

It was after two A.M. when I left the sheriff’s office. Tomasetti followed me home. I tossed my blood-specked uniform into the hamper and went directly to the shower and stood under the spray for ten minutes. I didn’t cry or curse. I didn’t close my eyes, because I knew if I did, I’d see Fletcher drop, his face destroyed, the back of his head a gaping wound.

By the time I meet Tomasetti in the kitchen, I’ve pulled myself together. He’s already poured two fingers of scotch into a couple of tumblers. The window above the sink is open and I can hear the chorus of spring peepers from the marsh down by the pond, singing their hearts out. The simple beauty of the sound makes me feel like crying. Of course, I don’t. Instead, I pick up the tumbler of whiskey and take a long drink.

Tomasetti goes to the radio on the counter and fiddles with the knob. An old Led Zeppelin tune about rambling on fills the silence around us. It’s a pretty song full of memories and its own unique beauty, and suddenly I’m absurdly thankful to be here in the kitchen of our modest little farm with the man I love.

“Any word on how Fletcher’s wife is doing?” I ask, already knowing the answer, hating it because it hurts.

“The chaplain stayed with her until her parents got there,” he tells me. “That’s all I know.”

I nod, take another sip. “I didn’t know him that well.”

“The people who did are about to realize they really didn’t.”

“What kind of man does that to his wife and kids? What kind of man uses his position to rape a seventeen-year-old girl?”

“A predator. A dirty cop. A sick bastard.” He shrugs. “All of the above.”

Leaving his place at the counter, he crosses to the table, takes the chair across from me. He’s looking at me as if he’s searching for something I’m not quite ready to reveal. Or maybe I’m just tired and looking for things that aren’t really there.

“So what else is bothering you?” he asks.

Over the last hours, my brain has been preoccupied with witnessing the death of a man I’d once respected. On doing my job and figuring out how it fits into the investigation at hand—the homicide of Rachael Schwartz. Now that I’m settled and thinking more clearly, I’m starting to analyze more closely the exchange between Fletch and me during those final moments.

“Fletcher admitted to pulling her over and sexually assaulting her,” I say. “He admitted to preying on other women. He acknowledged that Schwartz was blackmailing him. To having paid her somewhere around twenty thousand dollars over the years. He admitted to meeting with her at the bar.”

Having been present for my interview and having read my official statement, he already knows all of those things. “He knew we had him.”

I nod, but I’m still mulling the conversation, the words running through my head like a script. I can’t get the sound of Dane Fletcher’s voice out of my head. The look in his eyes.

… if you believe one word of what I’ve said tonight, believe this: I did not kill Rachael Schwartz.

I’ve heard too many lies over the years to believe anything an admitted rapist would say. Fletcher lied and cheated and hurt people for years. He doesn’t deserve the benefit of a doubt.

So why the hell can’t I set aside his sham denial and close my damn case?

I lift the tumbler, set it down without drinking.

Tomasetti sips, looks at me over the rim of his glass. “A moment ago, you reiterated all the things Fletcher had done. The one thing you didn’t mention was the murder of Rachael Schwartz.”

“You’re pretty astute for a BCI agent, aren’t you?”

“Every now and then I get something right.”

You want the truth?… keep looking.

I meet his gaze, hold it. “I know he was a liar. Desperate and willing to say anything. But, Tomasetti, he walked onto that trail to take his life. He had nothing to prove. Nothing to lose. Why deny the murder? Why not try to rationalize or explain why he did it?”

Tomasetti looks at me over the rim of his glass and scowls. “Fletcher had motive. He had means. And he had opportunity. Rachael Schwartz was bleeding him dry and enjoying putting him through the wringer.”