“I’ll re-write the charge sheet.” Jo smiled at her. “We got him, guys.”
Jenna followed Kane down to the cells. “Dave, don’t do anything stupid.” They stopped in the hallway to lock up their weapons. “I know you want revenge, but he’ll pay for his crimes.”
“I just want to look into his eyes, Jenna.” Kane met her gaze. “I have to do this and put Annie’s ghost to rest.”
Swallowing the lump in her throat, Jenna nodded. When they reached the cell door, she swiped her card and as Kane walked inside, she operated the recording app on her phone. “Mr. Thompson, Deputy Kane would like to speak with you. You have been advised of your rights.”
“I know my rights.” Thompson sat on the bunk, passive and unthreatening.
“We have evidence against you for the DC bombings and the local ones, fingerprints, DNA from Pamela Stuart.” Kane stood hands by his sides, relaxed. “I understand revenge and figure that was your motive for killing people. Being abused as a kid always leaves scars. Seeing your son taken away and then dying in a fire must have been devastating.”
“I made them pay.” Thompson lifted his gaze to Kane. “They deserved to die.”
“You believed that innocent children just like your son deserved to die?” Kane inclined his head.
“No, they died to revenge my son.” Thomson glared at Kane. “An eye for an eye.”
“And what about the people in the truck you bombed?” Kane hadn’t moved a muscle. “Why did you bomb their vehicle?”
“He was collateral damage.” Thompson shrugged. “She was the target. That bitch refused to give me an appointment to see the magistrate. I’d sit there all damn day and he’d slip out the backdoor.”
“That was pretty slick, getting a bomb into an agent’s vehicle.” Kane shook his head. “Now that took skill.”
“It was easy.” Thompson stood, placed his hands on his hips and smiled. “I waited for her to leave her desk and slipped a device inside her purse. She carried a nice big purse and then I followed her. As soon as she slipped into the truck, boom.”
“So, for following orders, because it wasn’t her decision to give you an appointment,” Kane’s expression hardened and he clenched and unclenched his fists, “you wiped out an entire family?”
“Can’t you see why I hated happy families?” Thompson looked at him and smiled. “Those people needed to be stopped. First, the people in DC destroyed my life by not listening to what happened to me in foster care and then when I’d gotten my life back together, another group of so called, do-gooders took my son and destroyed my family. Why should they be happy when they were responsible for the death of my son?”
“So, you burned them all?” Kane’s eyes flashed in anger.
“Yeah and I’d do it again in a heartbeat. They all deserved to die but the secretary, she just pissed me off. I didn’t destroy her family, just her and her husband. So what?”
“Yeah, you destroyed her family.” Kane stood rigid. Every muscle had tightened like a coiled snake. “She was pregnant.”
The words hit Jenna like a sledgehammer. She let out a gasp and stopped the recording, that was privileged information. She had to get Kane out of the cell now. “Kane, I think that’s enough.”
“Not yet.” Kane stepped closer but didn’t touch Thompson. He just stared at him. “You’ll be charged for killing a federal officer and officers of the court in DC. They’ll want the death penalty and when that day comes, look out into the audience because I’ll be there watching the show. No lethal injection for you, you’ll swing or fry.” He turned slowly and nodded to Jenna to open the door. “Let’s go.”
As they left the cells and the main door clicked shut behind them Kane sagged against the wall and closed his eyes. Jenna put her arms around him and hugged him. “I’m so sorry.”
When he buried his face in her neck, she could feel dampness on her skin. She held him until he straightened and looked down at her. Not able to express the words to give him the comfort he needed, she patted his arm. “Will you be okay?”
“Yeah.” Kane pushed a hand through his hair and cleared his throat. “I could almost feel Annie with me, as if she was standing beside me, confronting her killer.” He looked at her, his eyes tragic. “She’s at peace now. I can feel it in here.” He touched his heart.
“You caught her killer and now her work here is done.” Jenna leaned in and hugged him again. “She’d be so proud of you.”
“The nightmare is over, Jenna. The image of her that haunted me has gone. From now on she’ll only be a beautiful memory.” Kane stepped back and looked into her eyes. “Let’s finish up here and go home.”
Epilogue
Three months later
As August arrived spreading more color across the landscape, Jenna leaned back on the new porch swing and watched Kane moving along the fence line with Rowley making repairs. The Thompson case had taken a long time to wind up. The amount of evidence they presented had been more than any case she’d handled before and the hours had been long and tedious. One of the most chilling pieces of evidence they’d found during this time were the cryptic posts Thompson had made on social media. Each one coincided with the bombings and gave a frightening insight to his disturbed mind. They’d searched his house and found a cellar, the entrance hidden inside a closet with all the evidence they needed to prove without doubt, he was making explosive devices. For now, Thompson waited in federal prison, without bail until his case came to trial but with all the evidence against him and the confession she had taped, the chances of him walking free was more than a million to one.
Roger Suffolk remained a free man with no charges laid against him. Dawn Richardson had been placed with a foster family out of Snakeskin Gully, and no amount of persuasion would make her return to Louan to stand witness against Suffolk. With no other women coming forward with a complaint, he had no charges to answer. After extensive investigation into Mrs. Suffolk’s car wreck, the case stalled when they discovered the vehicle had been crushed by the insurance company. All they had as evidence was the previous examinations of the vehicle, which cleared Suffolk of any wrongdoing.
It had been great working with Jo and C