Face of Murder

It was Zoe and Dr. Applewhite against the world now, and she wasn’t going to let her down. Not when Dr. Applewhite had been the only person who always had her back. She was going to fight on her behalf, and she couldn’t stand hearing the accusation and the suspicion.

“Even if she didn’t,” Shelley said, pausing with an emphasis that seemed to suggest that she was not convinced, “we still need to keep her here. Tick the boxes. This is the way we work cases, Z, and you know that. We don’t get to break the procedure just because we know someone personally.”

Zoe opened her mouth to reply, but she never had a chance.

“If I may interrupt,” Dr. Applewhite said, her tone mild. “I don’t mind staying until this is sorted out. Really, it’s no problem. I’ve already cancelled my appointments for the rest of the day, so I have nothing to rush back to.”

“But,” Zoe began, about to protest on her behalf.

“It’s really fine,” Dr. Applewhite said, firmly and with a meaningful glance her way. “I mean it. I have nothing to hide, so what’s the harm?”

Zoe’s shoulders slumped, and she couldn’t quite bear to face Shelley as she nodded assent.

The three of them marched silently back through the corridors of the J. Edgar Hoover building, out of the labs and back toward the holding rooms, to a place where they could leave Dr. Applewhite for a few hours. They took the turns and chose the right floor in the lift without discussion. Zoe did not feel up to interrogating Dr. Applewhite about the equations, and she couldn’t imagine that Shelley wanted to at that moment either.

Instead she counted their steps, listening to the rhythm and cadence of a pair of heels and two pairs of flats. The harder, heavier thud of her own boots, the slightly faster patter of Shelley’s dress shoes, her stride shorter than that of the other two women. The pattern that echoed against the walls as they fell more or less into step with one another, as humans who walk together are wont to do.

Zoe stayed out in the hall when Shelley showed Dr. Applewhite into the questioning room where she would wait for them, and asked her about wanting a drink, and made sure that she was seated comfortably. She stared straight ahead down toward the next bend, and hated herself for flinching when Shelley closed the door and locked it.

“I know you aren’t happy with me right now,” Shelley sighed. “But it’s only for a few hours. Like you said, she’s innocent. Once we have this done, we can move on to other things. Maybe someone’s targeting Dr. Applewhite by pointing to her equations. Who knows? Maybe they were there as a clue, and we just saved her life by keeping her in a secure building while the killer waits outside her apartment.”

That was some consolation, but it did put a shiver down Zoe’s spine. “You think we should assign her a police escort when she leaves? Make sure that no one is stalking her?”

“It’s worth thinking about.” Shelley cocked her head and smiled at Zoe in a way she didn’t totally understand. “You know, there’s one nice thing come out of all this. I feel like I’m getting to know you better. I didn’t know you had someone you felt so strongly about.”

Zoe was taken aback by the observation. She looked toward the door, even as she knew that there was no way Dr. Applewhite could hear them through the reinforced material. “I… I suppose we are close. Dr. Applewhite was the first person to… diagnose me. She supported me.”

“I know it can’t be easy seeing her in here.” Shelley sighed and gestured to the next door along the hall. “Come on. We can sit on the observation side and wait for the call. Keep her company, of a sorts.”

***

After several hours of continued staring at the equations, Zoe was still no closer to figuring it all out than she had been the first moment they were handed the case. No matter how she looked at them, she couldn’t figure out how they worked or even why they were broken. And worse: the more she looked, the less convinced she was that it really was a coincidence. Those last lines made a perfect copy of Dr. Applewhite’s theory.

That kind of thing didn’t happen by accident.

Shelley’s cell rang, and the two of them snapped to attention. They looked at it for a second, buzzing on the ledge in front of them, before Shelley grabbed it and answered.

“Hello, Anjali? Yes… Right. And you’re absolutely sure? Okay, thank you. Yes, I do owe you one. Well, all right, two. Thanks again.”

Shelley finished the call and put her cell down, biting her lip. She hadn’t taken her eyes off it yet, or looked up any higher than Zoe’s knee since she had answered it.

Zoe, who had observed that Shelley spent around seventy-five percent of her time looking at people’s faces, and perhaps thirty percent looking someone directly in the eye, considered this to be a very bad sign indeed.

Shelley’s face was pale when she did look up, and then she had to glance away again before she spoke. “The DNA is a match.”