McCoy speaks into the mike on her collar. “See the hubby?”
Owen Harrick answers back. “Yeah.”
“He doesn’t do a very good job of looking broken up aboutthe whole thing. His wife just kicked it?”
“Ex-wife,” Owen clarifies.
“That’s cold, Harrick,” she says, but she chuckles.
“He looks more bored than sad,” her partner agrees. “So whatdo we do?”
The service is breaking up. The whole thing didn’t last morethan fifteen minutes. A closed-casket affair, the coffin already in the groundwhen the attendees arrived. Mat Pagone rises with his daughter, holding herhand. Together, they scoop a piece of dirt and drop it onto the coffin.
“We do what we do best,” Jane McCoy says into her collar.“We wait.”
FOUR DAYS EARLIER…
McCoy is out of the vehicle before her partner has evenstopped the sedan in Allison Pagone’s driveway. McCoy jogs up the steps to thehome, glancing at windows as she passes. She rings the doorbell and knocksurgently on the door.
“Mrs. Pagone,” she says. “It’s Special Agent McCoy.”
She looks at Harrick. He has stepped around to the passengerside of their Mercury, around to the side of Allison’s garage.
McCoy knocks again. “Allison,” she calls out. She looks ather watch. It is close to seven o’clock in the morning. People are walkingtheir dogs and going for their pre-work jogs. McCoy likes to run in themorning, too, but today she did not have that luxury.
“Her car’s here,” says Harrick.
They look at each other for a long moment. For this kind ofdecision, there is no strict protocol.
“Back door,” says McCoy.
The back door is an easy decision. There are neighborsoutside now-people who have undoubtedly grown curious at the sight of the twoserious-looking people in blue coats with the FBI insignia in yellow on theirbacks who have run up to the front doorstep of the Pagone residence. Better todecelerate the attention by going in the back way. Plus, McCoy knows the backdoor will be easier to get through.
McCoy pops the trunk of her Mercury Sable and removes herMag-Lite, a wide, black flashlight. She could call a federal magistrate and geta warrant. That would make some sense. But technically, McCoy has onlyspeculation to support her fears that something bad has happened inside thehouse. And you have to be careful what you tell a judge in an application for awarrant. To say nothing of the fact that the news could leak and the mediacould jump on it. It’s a small miracle, frankly, that there are no reportersparked along the street right now.
No. No time for legal niceties. This is what is known as an“ exigent circumstance,” meaning action must be taken immediately to preventsomething irreversible from happening, be it destruction of evidence, gravebodily harm, or death. The courts, in their roles as guardians of theconstitution and as law-enforcement tutors, have pronounced that warrants arenot required in such instances. The exigent circumstance is an FBI agent’s bestfriend, right up there with plain view.
Anyone listening to the voice mail Allison Pagone left onMcCoy’s cell phone last night would find these circumstances to be plenty exigent.
Standing on the back patio, Jane McCoy flicks her Mag-Liteagainst the glass window of the back door. The glass shatters and falls intothe small curtain covering it. McCoy scrapes the edges of the window clean ofglass and carefully reaches through to unlock the back door.
She opens it and waits. No alarm. She had noticed anintruder alarm last time she was here. Allison Pagone would be foolish not tohave one. McCoy finds the alarm pad on the wall. Nothing. No silent, oraudible, alarm. It is disarmed. She walks through the kitchen into the den. Shesees the burgundy couch where Allison Pagone was sitting the last time theyspoke.
“Allison Pagone!” she calls out. “Federal agents in thehouse!”
McCoy listens but hears nothing.
“Special Agents McCoy and Harrick, FBI,” she calls.
“Maybe she’s not home,” Harrick offers.
McCoy shakes her head. “No. Her car’s here. She’s here. Youdidn’t hear that phone message. You didn’t-I didn’t mean to-to-”
“Nothing’s even happened yet, Jane. There’s nothing to worryabout until there’s something to worry about.” Harrick looks around, calls outAllison Pagone’s name.
“I’ve got a bad feeling.” McCoy walks through thedownstairs, then meets Harrick back in the den. “I’m going upstairs.”
McCoy calls out the nameAllison Pagone several times as shetakes the stairs.Jane McCoy, FBI. Federal agents in the house. No response.The lights are on, all the lights you would expect to be on if someone werehome.
She walks into the master bedroom. The bed is made. Theoverhead light is off. The bedside lamp is off. But there is illumination fromthe master bathroom.
“Allison Pagone.” Jane McCoy braces herself. “Special AgentMcCoy, FBI,” she says with increased urgency. “Are you in there?”
She takes a few steps toward the bathroom and pauses. Shelooks around. Then she sticks her head into the bathroom. Allison Pagone islying motionless in the bathtub, her head tucked into her chest, wearing herpajamas. A handgun dangles from Allison’s left hand, resting on her chestprecariously. Behind Pagone’s head the tile on the wall is covered with asplatter of crimson.
“Oh, no.” McCoy stumbles several steps back and sits on thebed. “What did I do?”
Her partner, Owen Harrick, makes his way in and makes eyecontact with McCoy.
“She’s in there.” McCoy’s voice is lifeless. She nods in thedirection of the master bath. She watches Harrick walk up to the bathroom, thenin. She hears his reaction, similar to hers. He stays in there a while,presumably checking the body.
McCoy looks around the room, at the bedside table holding anoversized, antique brass telephone, an alarm clock, and a lamp. The room has aceiling like a cathedral’s, about twenty feet high. The walk-in closet is aboutthe size of McCoy’s bedroom. She thinks of the voice mail Allison Pagone lefton her cell phone last night-about nine hours ago.
Harrick walks back out and looks at McCoy. For a moment heis silent. “She’s been dead for hours,” he says.
“Yeah.”
“Revolver in her hand.” Harrick looks back at the bathroom.“No footprints on the tile. Towels are neatly hung. There’s a bandage on herright hand but it looks a few days old. Far as I can see, there’s no sign of struggleor force-”
“Oh, for God’s sake, Owen, she shot herself.” McCoy shakesher head. “There’s no mystery here.” She throws up a hand helplessly. “Iscrewed up, Owen. I fucked this up.”
Harrick blows out a breath, takes a seat on the bed next toMcCoy. “She killed a guy,” he says. “And she was covering up, too. We knowthat. She did this to herself.”
“Literally, maybe.”
“Not just literally. In every way. She put herself in thesoup. You were doing your job, Jane. She killed a man. You and I both know it.”
McCoy goes to the window opposite the bed, opens it, andtakes in some fresh air.
“They were going to convict her and give her the needle,”Harrick adds. “Don’t make this your fault.”
“You didn’t hear her message,” McCoy says. She looks outthrough the window at the backyard. For living in the city, Allison has arelatively big lot. This is a neighborhood on the northwest side, which is moreresidential, more
