Page 6 of Husband Missing

Then again, death didn’t care about the joy it stole. It took blindly.

Josie tore her eyes from the key chain. The crime scene tape stretched for several yards from the site entrance down the sidewalk adjacent to the chain-link fencing. Yellow evidence markers had been placed at uneven intervals. One of the ERT officers followed the trail of them back toward the tent, taking photos as he went.

“We’ve got a real shitshow,” Brennan informed her.

“Gretchen said there was some kind of fight. A fatality.”

He dragged a hand down his face. “Yes and yes. There was a brawl. We got a couple of different stories as to what started it, but it seems like the protestors got a little too close to the gate, one of the guards came out to ask them to back up, and that didn’t go over so well. They started fighting—four security guys against seventeen protestors. When the crowd cleared, there was a woman on the ground, bleeding. Already dead. Female, mid-fifties. Security tried stepping in to render aid at the same time several of the parents did and there was another scuffle.”

Josie shook her head. “None of them rendered aid.”

Brennan’s features twisted in disgust. “Like I said, a shitshow. By the time 911 was called and the EMTs got here, it was too late.”

THREE

Josie gave the scene another quick scan. The security guys stood several feet from one another, two of them being questioned by uniformed officers. All their eyes were locked on the tent. One swayed on his feet, his face taking on an unhealthy green hue. Maybe they were worried about being held liable for the fatality but the twinge of unease in her gut told her it was something more. She scanned the evidence markers on the sidewalk again. The brawl had taken place directly in front of the entrance, but she had a feeling that whatever led to the fatality had started down the street.

“You said the deceased was bleeding.”

Brennan glanced back at the tent. “She was stabbed. There’s a trail of blood from a half-block away. The perpetrator dropped the knife, left it behind.”

The victim had managed to get away from her attacker, fleeing toward the crowd, perhaps hoping for assistance. Or the perpetrator left her on the sidewalk, believing she would die before she could find help.

“Do we have an ID yet?” asked Josie.

Brennan tucked his clipboard under one arm and shifted his weight from leg to leg. Then he rolled his shoulders as ifto loosen tension. He rarely got ruffled. In fact, the last time Josie had seen him flustered was when they’d found an infant abandoned in the city park and he’d been tasked with holding her. “Brennan,” she prodded.

“Oh yeah. We got an ID.” He scanned the area once more before lowering his voice. “The victim is Gina Phelan.”

Josie managed to hold back her “oh shit.”

Brennan watched her carefully. As if he’d heard her silent curse, he said, “Total shitshow.”

In recent weeks, WYEP had done several profiles on Phelan Construction. It was family-owned. After World War II, a returning veteran, Oren Ellis, had started the company, calling it Ellis Development, headquartered in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. When he passed away, the business went to his only heir, a daughter named Tilly and her husband, Clint Phelan. Eventually, the couple rebranded the company as Phelan Construction and moved its offices to Harrisburg. Although Josie had seen the elderly couple, now in their eighties, in several interviews and news pieces, she knew that their children were now responsible for the company. Their son, Mace, was the CEO. His older sister, Gina, was the company attorney.

Now she lay stabbed to death in front of their most consequential project in decades.

“Did anyone see anything?” Josie asked.

“We’re still getting statements but so far, no one has admitted to seeing anything. We don’t even know what she was doing out here. One of the security guys said she drove in through the back entrance this morning.”

From the interviews Josie had seen, Gina Phelan was shrewd. She would have known better than anyone that showing up at the front entrance without notifying security while it was packed with angry protestors was potentially unsafe. Then again, maybe she hadn’t intended to make contact with theprotestors at all. Maybe it was only after she was attacked that she’d turned toward them. Or perhaps one of the protestors had spotted her a half-block away, recognized her, and decided to confront her.

Josie surveyed the witnesses still present at the scene. “You said seventeen protestors.”

“That’s how many were here when the first units arrived. There might have been more, but we won’t know until we get some surveillance footage.”

Josie nodded. “There are only thirteen protestors here.”

“Four of them had blood on their clothes so they were taken to the station.”

Over twenty people at a murder scene was a logistical nightmare. Ideally, all of them would be taken to the stationhouse for interviews but they’d have to be transported separately and kept apart once they were at police headquarters. Denton PD didn’t have the manpower or the necessary number of rooms at the stationhouse to accomplish that, which was why only the people with torn clothes, visible injuries, or blood on their person were taken in. The officers on-scene would get IDs and contact information from the rest of the witnesses in case they needed to be contacted at a later date.

“It’s Saturday,” said Josie. “Did they have a full crew working today?”

Brennan nodded. “Just like any other day. The project never stops, from what I’m told.”

“Is there a field administrator on-site?” Josie asked. She glanced up, scanning the top of the fences for cameras. There were two—one on each side of the gate—pointed at the entrance. Denton PD would also be able to narrow the list of people who should be taken for immediate questioning based on the footage from those cameras. More importantly, it would show them whether anyone fled the scene and in which direction.

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