Page 7 of The Perfect Crime

"I was just going to ask that you not disturb our son's room when I realized I have to tell him."

Jessie and Ryan exchanged confused looks.Whitaker saw it and explained.

"Our son, Rob, is away at college in New Hampshire," she said, choking up."I'm going to have to call him and tell him his father is dead, that he was murdered.I don't know how I'm going to do that."

Even though it wasn’t standard protocol, Jessie moved toward the woman and put her hand on top of Whitaker’s.

“As someone who has been in your situation, my one suggestion is to be supportive but direct.No ‘he passed on’ or ‘he’s not with us anymore.’Tell Rob that his father died.It will be painful, but he’ll process it better if you’re forthright about things.”

“Thank you,” she said, squeezing Jessie’s hand.

“I’m sorry I can’t help more.”

“You can,” Whitaker said.“Just do what you always do—catch the bastard responsible for my husband’s death.That’s all I ask of you.”

“We’ll do our best,” Jessie promised.

***

Ryan was already on the phone with Jamil Winslow, the head of the HSS research department, moments after they left Sarah Whitaker.

“We want a list of every employee and customer at the restaurant, Daddio, from last night,” he explained, “along with as much info as you and Beth can get on Whitaker’s co-workers and clients at his firm, Wiley McComb.”

Beth was Beth Ryerson, Jamil’s lone employee in the research department.Whatever he said in response to Ryan was brief.Based on everything Jessie knew about him, it was likely something along the lines of “we’re already doing all that.”

After Ryan hung up, they walked out of the hospital in relative silence.Jessie was focused on what kind of person would force someone to watch their loved one die slowly over the course of hours, and why he would want to be there for the process.

Most killers she investigated preferred their murderous violence to be more dramatic.Whether via shooting, stabbing, or strangling, they typically favored the thrill that came with the suddenness of death at their hands.But not this one.

She glanced over at Ryan and saw that he was deep in thought too.

“Any epiphanies yet?”she asked him.

He seemed startled by her question.

“I wasn’t actually thinking about the case, at least not in the way you’d expect,” he said.

“What do you mean?”

“It’s just—I was thinking about the call that Sarah Whitaker is going to have to make to her son and it reminded me of the conversation we had last week with the adoption counselor.”

Jessie recalled the meeting.It was the first formal step they'd taken to explore the idea of adopting a child.For months now, they'd been sparring over the idea of having a baby.Ryan wanted one.Jessie was less enthusiastic, worried about the impact of a pregnancy on her career and her physical health after suffering multiple serious injuries since becoming a profiler for the department.She'd eventually suggested that they investigate the possibility of adoption, which led to the meeting last week.

“What about the conversation?”she prompted.

"Well, do you remember how the counselor said that they sometimes worried about placing children with couples that have high-risk jobs?"

“Of course,” Jessie said.“She said that many of these kids are without parents because of some trauma related to abandonment by a parent, or even their death.”

“Exactly,” Ryan said, “so hearing Sarah Whitaker talk about breaking the news of a father’s death to his son made me wonder what would happen to a child we adopt—one who might already have lost a parent.It would be a double trauma if they settled into a new life and then lost one or both of us.I don’t know if the adoption service would consider us too risky, or if we should even be putting ourselves in that situation.”

“It’s definitely something to think about,” Jessie agreed, though she was less concerned about the issue than him.She’d lost both her birth mother and her adoptive parents to murder, and she was still plowing ahead.

Of course, she periodically had a near-uncontrollable desire to inflict bodily damage on those she deemed guilty of a crime.So maybe she wasn't all that emotionally healthy after all.Beyond that, part of her wondered if this was some coded hint from Ryan that they should reconsider having a child themselves.She chose not to engage on the issue for now.

"Let's worry about our parental risk level later," she said crisply."Right now, we've got a killer to catch."

CHAPTER FOUR

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