Chapter 12

After cleaning up the majority of the black fingerprint dust from most of the first floor, Pearl sat in her living room chair and stared out at the house across the road. She was inside her own place, the men standing around, talking over her. The bloody mess remained to be cleaned up, but she just disconnected from it the moment she'd walked in earlier this morning. She wasn't even sure what it would take to get her to acknowledge the blood on the floor and to do something about it. It was just beyond her for the moment.

Gideon sat down on the chair beside her. She didn't look at him, didn't look at anything. "What are you thinking?" he asked.

She pointed at the house across the way. "I was thinking about how little we know about others in our world," she murmured, "how little we interact with anybody. Then this chaos happens, and we never had the slightest idea anything was going on."

"But why would you? He lived over there, and you basically stayed inside. The base is a small, connected community, but you won't know everyone. You didn't work with him, or have anything in your lives that caused you to interact. He was just some stranger you may have passed by on a daily basis, and that was it."

She nodded. "What if that somebody is different than the body who was cremated? What if another person is in that urn? How do you reconcile that, when there could be a whole family grieving who doesn't need to, and another family is looking for a missing loved one, with no clue what may have happened?"

"That's one of those hard questions to answer," he admitted. "Obviously we'll do everything we can to get to the bottom of it."

"Of course if my neighbor faked his death on purpose, he can't access his bank accounts, can't keep his cell phone, and things like that, unless he wants to get caught," Pearl noted. "So how do you trace someone who is trying to hide?"

"Don't worry about it, sweetheart," Gideon replied, with a smirk. "We're on it. We're also picking up some food and going back to my place for dinner."

"I can't. I need to stay here and clean up this mess."

"That's not happening," Gideon noted. "Jasper has the base bringing in a cleaning company."

"I won't argue about that," she muttered, studiously ignoring the mess behind her. "It is not something I ever want to see again. I live and work in the medical field, but I don't deal well with death at this level."

"I understand. It's personal. A gunman entered your home. Your privacy was invaded." Gideon nodded. "I don't know how you feel about it, but we could apply to get you moved to another location."

She stared at him, looked around, gave a tiny shudder that she tried hard to hold back, and nodded. "That might not be a bad idea."

"I think it would be smart," he agreed, with a smile, "but I didn't want to start an application process without talking to you first."

"No reason for me to stay here." She shook her head. "I would have these horrid memories if I do."

"How do you feel about sleeping in this house?"

"Terrible," she muttered. "I feel terrible, but I have to deal with my life again. So it doesn't matter how I feel, does it?"

"You don't have to be strong and stoic all the time," he pointed out.

"I find myself wondering why this didn't bother me so much this morning. We both were dealing with getting rid of all the black fingerprint dust. Yet I was here all that time with Tristan, and, while we didn't focus on it, we didn't specifically avoid it either."

"Honestly, that's one of the reasons I chose him. He's got the personality that can keep someone occupied."

She laughed. "He does have the gift of gab, that's for sure. I guess I was so busy keeping up with what he was saying that I didn't have the time or the energy to look around, or to feel terrible about being here."

"Let's leave this for another day and get you out of here," Gideon suggested. "No reason for you to stay here and feel uncomfortable."

"Maybe so, but it's not as if I have too many options right now," she replied, as she got up. "However, if the cleaning can be done without me, and I can walk back out of here without having to face this right now, that would be lovely."

He led her outside, and she realized that when he meant everybody was leaving, he meant everybody. She glanced again at the house across the road and thought she caught sight of somebody in the window. In a whisper, she asked in earnest, "Has somebody new moved into that house?"

"No, at least not as far as our records show."

"Don't look now but the curtains just twitched."

He stared at her. "Are you sure?"

"As sure as I can be." She shrugged. "I can't just stand here and stare over in that direction, can I?"

"You could," Gideon said, with a smirk, "and you would probably get away with it, but, in our case, not so much."

"If you want me to, I will," she offered. "Just tell me and I'll do it. I'm happy to help in any way I can."

"If you happen to see anything, let me know."

"I already told you that I saw the curtains twitch, but I didn't see a face or anything." She casually glanced around and once again caught the curtain twitch. She nodded at him. "Definitely somebody is in there."

"Good enough." He walked over to talk to Jasper, who was talking to Tristan.

Pearl couldn't hear the conversation, but it was obvious from their heads bent together that the topic was what she had just told Gideon. Tristan nodded and walked down the street, away from the dead guy's house. She wasn't sure what he was doing but figured he would end up checking out the house in question.

Almost as soon as he disappeared, Jasper headed to her and explained, "You'll leave with Gideon, and he will take you to a nice spot so you can pick up some food, and then you'll stay at his place tonight."

She stared at him, then nodded. "How about you just let me walk over to that house, knock on the front door, and see if anybody answers."

He asked, "Do you think anybody will?"

"I don't know," she admitted, with a smile, "but somebody is there, who keeps twitching the curtains, so they are interested in what's going on here. Why don't I just try it?"

And without waiting for him to answer, she turned and headed toward the house in question. She heard Gideon call out to her, but she ignored him, walked straight up to the front door, and rang the doorbell. When no answer came, she knocked several times, then called out, "No point in hiding, I already saw you."

The door slowly opened, and an older woman stood there, staring at her.

"Hello," Pearl said. "Are you related to Drew?"

The woman nodded slowly. "Yes, my brother."

"I'm so sorry for your loss. Are you staying here? I hope you don't t mind my asking. This is base housing and all."

"I know," she said, with an apologetic tone. "I'm just here for a few days,… figuring out what happened."

"I'm so sorry. It must be so difficult to lose your brother."

"Even more difficult when they tell me that my brother committed suicide, but it so wasn't like him. If they'd told me that he'd been shot, murdered, by some jealous husband, or if one of his shady partners in those get-rich-quick schemes had taken him out, I would have understood, but he wasn't the kind to take his own life."

"Was he involved in anything shady, where somebody might have murdered him and tried to make it look like suicide?"

The older woman had gray hair, was easily in her fifties, looking very tired and sad. She shuddered. "I have no idea. We weren't close, and I'm sure I have no right to even be here," she said, with a wave of her hand. "However, I found the back door unlocked, and I just wanted to come in and get some understanding of his life."

Behind Pearl, Gideon approached, calling out to her.

She smiled and called him over. "I am Pearl, and what's your name?" she asked, turning back to the woman at the door.

"I'm Suzan," she replied, just as Gideon came up behind Pearl.

Pearl introduced Gideon to Suzan. "This is Drew's sister. She just wants to make some sense of what happened, especially since she does not think her brother committed suicide."

Gideon looked at the older woman kindly. "I'm sorry. That's got to be one of the hardest things."

"It is."

"She also just told me that, if Drew had died by a jealous husband or from some crooked deal that he was involved in, it would make far more sense to her than a suicide. She doesn't believe he would have killed himself. I just now asked her if she knew of anything he might have been involved with that could have resulted in someone killing him, then making it look like a suicide."

Gideon addressed Suzan, "Do you?" He spoke with a gentle quality, clearly attempting to put her at ease.

"I honestly didn't have a whole lot to do with my brother's life lately," she shared, looking nervous. "That's why, when the back door wasn't locked, I just came in to try and make sense of it all." Her shoulders started to shake. "How do you reconcile an unexpected death like this?" She had tears in her eyes that she tried hard not to shed. "He appeared to be in good health. He never told me that anything was wrong."

"He may not have wanted you to know either," Pearl suggested. "Men in particular tend to stay quiet when something's terribly wrong in their lives."

"That could be it," Suzan replied, gazing at Pearl with gratitude.

Gideon asked, "Have you had any contact with any of his friends or coworkers or anybody along that line?"

"No, not at all. I paid for the cremation, and I've got his urn at home," she shared, with half a smile. "I followed his instructions, which the lawyer told me that Drew had set out just a few days before, which lent credence to the idea that he committed suicide." She sniffed, holding back the tears again, "I'm just struggling with that whole concept because Drew was always so full of life. So full of plans and ideas, most of which led to trouble. My brother was the guy who always got in and out of trouble. He was always getting involved in shady deals."

Gideon nodded. "I'm an investigator here on base. Can you give me the name of Drew's lawyer?"

She frowned but held up one finger. She returned with her purse and pulled out a card, which she handed over to him.

"Thank you. We'll speak to him. But back to what you said earlier, what kinds of deals was Drew apt to get involved in?" Gideon asked.

"He was always looking for shortcuts to getting rich. He was into shoplifting as a teen and stuff like that. When he went into the military, our parents were grateful because it seemed to be a good answer for him. He got into trouble there too, several times," she added, with a chuckle. "Somehow it never seemed to be so bad that he got seriously punished. Once I thought he was up for a promotion, but, when I didn't hear anything more about it, I asked him about it. He told me that there weren't promotions for guys like him."

"Do you know what he meant by that?"

"I assumed because he had enough things on his record that he wouldn't move up in military rank. I don't know, but honestly, I'm not surprised. What did surprise me after all this time was this whole thing about suicide."

"Exactly," Pearl agreed. "If he didn't commit suicide, the other option is that somebody else killed him and made it look like a suicide. Maybe it was an accident or something that ended up ruled as a suicide."

"Drew left a suicide note with his lawyer, so I don't think anybody was looking at anything other than a suicide in this case."

"No, I imagine not," Pearl murmured. She looked over at Gideon, before addressing Suzan again. "The only other thing I would suggest, and I'm not a counselor, so obviously I can't counsel you on anything, but it's probably not healthy for you to be here."

Suzan slowly nodded.

"Has anybody else come to the door at all?" Gideon asked. "Has anybody asked you any questions about Drew or what happened?"

"No, it's been strangely quiet," Suzan shared. "I hadn't realized how few friends he had. You would think that, if a friend of yours died, you might want to mourn his passing."

Pearl asked, "Usually suicide follows the loss of someone, or financial problems, or mental health diseases. Did Drew have any major issues like that in his life? Did he divorce recently, file for bankruptcy, start seeing a psychiatrist or the like, or had medications prescribed?"

Suzan sighed. "Not that I know of. How sad is it that I don't know more about his life?"

"Maybe," Pearl noted calmly, "but unfortunately, a lot of times, particularly in the case of mental illness, they tend to chase people away from their world, and, by doing so, just reaffirm their ideas that they have no reason for living."

"Also," Gideon added, "if Drew had any health condition or something along that line that he refused to deal with, that's something else that can chase people away. What about his doctor? Have you talked to him at all?" Gideon asked.

"No, it never even occurred to me." Suzan gave her head a shake. "Why didn't it occur to me?"

"That's all right," Gideon said, with a smile. "I can contact his doctor and confirm nothing is there that you should know about."

"Thank you," Suzan said gratefully, as she stepped out onto the front porch. "I still don't even know why the back door was unlocked."

"Was anything disturbed?"

"Not that I know of, and I didn't move anything. I figured that essentially everything here is part of the military housing and all, so nothing's been touched. Although the house is basically empty of Drew's personal effects, it still has furniture. I presume just as it was the day he died."

"Have you seen any estate documents at all?" Pearl asked.

"Yes, more or less. It seems the lawyer must still deal with some things because that's just how probate works, but Drew left behind no money at all. That actually surprises me, and yet"—she laughed—"it doesn't surprise me at all. My brother lived large and didn't particularly care about tomorrow."

Pearl found that interesting because, if he was leaving or had a backup plan to get the hell out of here, then it was quite possible that he had moved a fair bit of money ahead of time. "He may also have given away a lot of his money prior to his death," she suggested. "That's also another sign of someone planning suicide."

Suzan frowned. "I never thought of that, but the lawyer did say some huge transfers had been made in the prior six months, but, when he had talked to my brother, it was all legit."

"Good," Pearl said. "Let's not have any other worries come out of this."

"Exactly." Suzan asked Gideon, "Could you lock up? I don't feel good leaving this wide open."

Gideon immediately nodded. "Yes, of course. And I'll get the housing commission to come over and confirm everything is secured. When you say that nobody's been here, you haven't had anybody come up to the house? You haven't had anybody ask you anything or stop by?

"No," Suzan said, "not today. I did drive by earlier, maybe a week after his death, and I just sat in the car for a long time. That day a couple people went up to the door, banging on it, obviously looking for him. I didn't say anything to them, but they seemed irate that Drew wasn't here."

"And that makes sense too, if they didn't know that Drew had died."

"I felt as if I should say something, but I didn't want to," Suzan shared. "I just wanted to stay out of it all."

"With good reason," Gideon noted. "You didn't recognize the two men, did you?"

She shook her head at that. "No, although one of them was big and burly."

Suddenly Gideon pulled out his phone and brought up a picture of the dead man from Pearl's house and showed it to her. "I don't suppose this would be him, would it?"

Suzan raised her eyebrows and nodded. "Yes, that's him." Then she squinted at the picture and gasped. "Oh dear, is he dead?"

Gideon nodded. "Yes, he died in that house across the street." Gideon pointed to the one across the way.

"Oh, my goodness, do you think he had the wrong house then, and he was looking for my brother's house?" she asked in confusion, looking from one house to the other.

"No, that's my house over there," Pearl noted. "The guy who broke into my house was interested in Drew's house, and he kept staring over at it."

"Oh my," Suzan said. "Now that would make a terrible sense because Drew always had these people around, people you just wouldn't necessarily want your family members to hang out with. Drew kept all those kinds of people around. It was a strange thing about him, but he always had friends that I never quite trusted. So I presume that, when he died, he may have left people in the lurch. Maybe Drew owed them some money or something of that nature," Suzan suggested, still sorrowful, but some anger was there too. She shivered, wrapped her arms around her shoulders, and added, "If that man is dead too, that can't be good either."

"No, it isn't. Yet maybe we'll get a few answers about your brother's death."

She replied with a sad gratefulness. "If you could, I would appreciate it." With that, she walked over to her car and added, "I won't be back. This hasn't been good for me." She sighed. "Even though I was hoping that coming here would give me clarity and would help me find some closure, it feels just the opposite. If anything else, it has just brought up more questions." And, with that, she got into her vehicle and drove away.

Gideon escorted Pearl back to his vehicle. "That was a foolish thing to do," he muttered, as he got her inside.

She smiled and looked over him. "I think your job makes you see shadows in every doorway," she pointed out, with an odd look. "I think there should be a bit of balance."

"Why would you assume it was safe to go up to that door?" he asked, looking at her strangely.

She shrugged. "It seemed like it was a feminine thing to do, to twitch the curtains like that, thinking you're hidden when you're not," she murmured. "I just thought about all the families and friends who were in Drew's life who maybe don't understand what's happening either, so, yes, it was an impulse."

"But it wasn't a smart move, Pearl."

"I get that, and I'm sure you'll wring me out over it. Given the circumstances, it was probably a very foolish thing to do. Yet you and Jasper and Tristan were right here," she explained. "So it turned out okay."

He shook his head at that. "No, it didn't, and we know nothing to prove that."

"If you want to work me over about it, can you wait until we get to your house?" she muttered, holding up a hand, because that was not what she needed right now. "I'm getting tired." Sure enough, she yawned several times.

He stopped at the Italian restaurant to pick up the food he had ordered. When they got to his house, she helped him carry everything in.

"What are you thinking about now?" he asked. "You've been awfully quiet."

She shrugged. "I'm not sure what to make of this whole thing. It just feels so very strange to even think of somebody setting up his own fake suicide."

"Unless he had a reason."

"The reason could easily have been because he was the shooter of your guy, Mason, because Drew was a sniper. Yet it could be because he was afraid of the man who came to my house. And you mentioned Drew was under investigation for gun smuggling. I would lean toward that as probably true enough, just to have the navy checking into that. So faking his death, or even really committing suicide could easily be for just these reasons alone."

"But, if he did fake his death, what are the chances that he's even still alive?"

"Why wouldn't he be? If he faked his death, you would think he had enough skills to potentially get himself out of whatever trouble he got himself into."

"Yet he has some equally skilled people after him, from the navy investigators to these hoodlums who maybe Drew owed money to or the guy who may have hired him to shoot Mason. Drew is company with some heavy-duty bad guys."

"And that all might be true," she admitted. "It just seems that everything is up in the air and that nobody knows what the hell is going on right now. These are all just theories, right? No proof yet?"

He burst out laughing at that. "You got that right."

She helped him sort out the food, then looked at it and asked, "Are you extra hungry? An awful lot of to-go food is here."

"I'm expecting Jasper and Tristan and possibly even Masters to show up," Gideon explained. "This is one of the few places where we can talk confidentially."

"Right, I hadn't considered that," she said. "Do you want me to disappear when they arrive?"

"No, I sure don't," he told her cheerfully, "That's not part of this. Besides, you keep getting yourself into the middle of my investigation, and you do have a perceptive take on things."

"Ha," she snorted. " I haven't done anything to get inside your cases. Other people are bringing me in, maybe, but I haven't done anything as of yet."

"What do you call this latest little visit you had at Drew's house?"

"It wasn't a problem," she noted, with a smile. "If anything, it helped clarify some things, though still not enough."

"No, not enough," he agreed, "but we'll take the little bits that we get."

Within a few minutes, Jasper showed up with Masters.

She greeted them by saying, "Gideon hasn't killed me yet for knocking on a neighbor's door, so it's probably safe to talk to him."

Gideon groaned. "I wanted to wring your neck, then realized it wouldn't do any good."

"Good, that makes it a little easier on me."

"Although," Gideon pointed out, "you didn't listen or even answer when I called out to you."

"No, I didn't," she confirmed, with a quick look at him. "Sorry about that."

Yet it was obvious that she wasn't terribly sorry at all, and he sighed. "Are you always this disruptive?"

"No, not necessarily," she noted, with a smile in his direction, "but I do think it's important that we sometimes follow our instincts."

"Absolutely," he replied. "It just would be nice if it weren't when people are getting killed."

She winced at that. "Okay, okay, point taken." With that, she looked over at Masters. "Hello. I don't think we've officially met. I'm Pearl."

He smiled. "It's a pleasure," he replied, as he introduced himself. "I'm Masters, one of the other investigators."

"You guys have your own team here, don't you?"

"We're getting there, and we're hoping that, with the extra manpower, we can get ahead of this crime wave, but that's not happening, at least not easily."

"You'll get there," she said, with a careless wave of her hand. "You just have to find out where this Drew guy is."

"But we don't even know that this Drew guy," Masters pointed out, looking at the others, "was Mason's shooter. That is the main case we are all focused on, when not dealing with these side cases that show up in the meantime."

"And yet," Gideon added, "Drew's a sniper, and he's gone missing, and he quite possibly has faked his own death, so that makes him a very good suspect."

"It does, but suspects are just that, suspects ," Masters replied. "We need something that locks him down into a whole lot-more-than-a-suspect category."

Pearl nodded, as she picked up a plate and served herself. "You'll get there," she said, "and you have my undying gratitude for dealing with Betty."

"Now that," Jasper interjected, "is a seriously sad situation."

"Is there any connection between the lieutenant and Drew's suicide?" she asked suddenly, and silence fell all around for a few moments.

The men shared looks, as Gideon asked, "Why would you even bring that up?"

She looked at them and shrugged. "Why wouldn't I? If Betty was blackmailing the lieutenant, how many other people could Betty be blackmailing over something similar going on, yet not be related to each other?"

The men raised eyebrows at each other, as she shrugged.

"I did ask Gideon today if you wanted to be an investigator," Jasper joked. "I gather that you think we don't know anything and aren't doing anything, but we are."

"Of course you are," she replied. "I would never say otherwise. It's just, like everybody else, it seems we take one step forward and ten steps back."

"Unfortunately that seems to be the nature of this particular investigation into Mason's sniper, and, no, it's not what we want."

Gideon looked over at the other men. "Any recent updates about Drew's life and possible death?"

"Tesla checked in," Jasper replied, with an odd tone, "and the coroner called me back. He went through everything he had, and, short of initially doing a DNA test and having a second person do a physical identification—which, remember, involves a damaged face," he shared, "the coroner would still have made the same determination of suicide."

"Of course. The death was more or less suicide, but is there any chance that it wasn't Drew?" Pearl asked.

"That's why we're waiting for further evidence in order to support that theory, like a DNA match to the military database," Gideon explained. "The coroner's waiting for more as well and is prepared to change his report, if we get evidence to support it. He's also quite angry that something like this could happen, as it's not the world that he generally lives in."

"No, it's not," Pearl agreed. "He works on base and expects a higher degree of honesty and ethics here. That's just what is expected of the navy. That's a fact of life here. Is suicide a little more common on base?"

"It is, unfortunately," Masters stated. "Not everybody is geared for the world of the military," he noted, with a smile in her direction.

Pearl sighed. "I know. I didn't think I would be coming back here myself."

"And yet you did," Gideon muttered, reaching out and squeezing her hand.

She smiled. "That doesn't mean I'm staying though."

"I'm surprised you stayed at all," Jasper noted, "considering the witch you worked with."

"Yeah, and I had to do some deep soul-searching as to why I stayed too," she admitted, with a half laugh. "At the end of the day, I didn't know where else to go."

"So, that's a good thing," Jasper said, "because sometimes your instincts are telling you that it's not the time to go anywhere, that it's just time to stay where you are. Do what you need to do and wait for life to show you the next direction. It sounds to me as if life did."

"Maybe, though I'm not sure I appreciate this direction now."

"Doesn't matter whether you do or not," Gideon said cheerfully. "Life isn't full of answers. It's more full of guidelines."

She chuckled. "I'll go with that too." She finished eating, then looked over at Gideon and said, "If you don't mind, I'll go upstairs."

"I don't mind in the least," he said. "Meanwhile, I'll be down here, as we do have business to talk about."

She nodded. "Good timing for me to go get some sleep."