Hindsight Read online

  Kendra looked up as Griffin negotiated the long driveway that rose to the Woodward Academy’s main entrance. Darkness had already fallen, but even at night the main building was astonishing. Situated on the top of a tall hill thirty-eight miles north of San Diego, the three-story structure looked like it belonged on a Northeastern Ivy League campus instead of the beach town where it had existed for over seventy years. The building had been constructed as the fourth home for one of California’s wealthiest oil families—the Woodwards, who had lived here in splendor before finally deeding the mansion and grounds to create Woodward Academy in the late 1940s. The extensive grounds upon which it was built were equally impressive. Rolling hills, meadows, and cliffs towered over the crashing Pacific Ocean, and the many outbuildings and lovely chapel in the garden were also magnificent. The school was world-renowned for its work with the physically challenged, and many of its alumni went on to great success in a variety of fields.

  “How long were you here?” Griffin asked.

  “I left after the eighth grade. I could have stayed through twelfth, but I wanted to go to a regular public high school.”

  “Did you regret leaving when you did?”

  She shook her head. “Never. I was ready. But I had some good times here. It felt like home to me. The teachers are the best anywhere.”

  “So I’ve heard. I once thought this was just a school for the blind, but it’s more than that, isn’t it?”

  “Much more. It’s for the hearing impaired, kids confined to wheelchairs…This school helps a lot of people. I still keep in touch with some of the teachers.”

  “So you’ve come back to visit?”

  “Occasionally.” Kendra looked at the file in her lap. She had to clear her throat. “But I never thought I’d come back under these circumstances.”

  She was staring at photos of Elaine Wessler and Ronald Kim, two staff members she’d known since she was five years old. Dear God, she had hundreds of memories of them from the years after her mother had brought her here as a nervous little girl. She remembered how tightly she’d held her mother’s hand as she’d been driven up this driveway to the front door. But more with excitement than fear, because her mother had prepared her for that first venture into the world outside the safety of the only home Kendra had ever known. She had been sure that she would be greeted with only kindness by everyone here at Oceanside.

  But neither of the people in these photos had been met with kindness. Kendra was looking at crime scene photos of their bloody corpses.

  They had been murdered.

  Their bodies had been found on opposite sides of the campus within a day of each other. Elaine Wessler, who specialized in real-world survival skills for the visually impaired, had been stabbed on the flat rocks of the school’s west side, a boulder-laden area that offered a spectacular view of the Pacific Ocean. Groundskeeper Ronald Kim, wearing the same blue overalls Kendra remembered from her campus visits, had been killed by a single gunshot behind his left ear. He’d been found on the far side of the great lawn adjacent to the campus’s main building.

  “Did you know them?” Griffin asked.

  Kendra nodded. “Almost for my entire life.” Her lips tightened. “They didn’t deserve this.”

  “No one does.”

  “Why are you even handling this investigation? Shouldn’t it be an SDPD case?”

  “The director asked us to offer our services. Several of the resident students are the children of very powerful foreign diplomats.” He grimaced. “And the fact that the entire student body is made up of special-needs kids has already started generating a lot of public pressure. We have to close this case very quickly.”

  “Yes, we do. And I didn’t see anything in the file about suspects.”

  “That’s because there aren’t any.”

  “None?”

  “Not yet. At least none we’ve been able to identify. Neither of the victims had enemies anyone knows about, and they didn’t have criminal associations. They weren’t drug users, had no criminal records.”

  “Robbery?”

  “No. Elaine Wessler was wearing a fairly expensive Movado watch, and it was still on her wrist when her body was found. Ronald Kim was found with a wallet full of cash, which was normal for him. He didn’t use credit cards. We’ve ruled out robbery as a motive.”

  Kendra looked out her window at the Latin phrase chiseled in stone over the main entrance: AD ASTRA PER ASPERA.

  Griffin squinted at it.

  “It means ‘To the stars in spite of difficulties,’” she said.

  Griffin nodded. “I know, Kendra. Despite what you may think, my education didn’t begin and end at Quantico. Good motto.”

  “Sorry for underestimating you.”

  He shrugged. “Non forsit.”

  “Now you’re just showing off.” She looked ahead at a Ford Explorer parked on the stone driveway. “Looks like Metcalf beat us here.”

  They pulled up behind the Explorer just in time to see FBI Special Agent Roland Metcalf climb out. He was a tall, handsome man with a fit, muscular body and floppy brown hair.

  “I had an amazing presentation prepared for you at the office, Kendra.” Metcalf shook his head. “A PowerPoint extravaganza. Photographs, crime scene video, pithy yet informative bullet points…”

  “Sorry, Metcalf. Tonight I needed to be here.” She held up the file folder. “This helped catch me up.”

  “A poor substitute.”

  “Maybe you’ll run your extravaganza for me later.”

  “Perhaps, if you’re extremely lucky.” He smiled. “Good to have you home. Sorry it’s under these circumstances.” He grimaced. “And I don’t mean Lynch getting you kicked out of Afghanistan. I know this case is going to be difficult for you.”

  “Obviously. Or you wouldn’t have been the one to win the office prize on how to draw me into the game Griffin set up.” She saw him flinch and felt a moment of regret. He was clearly sincere. Lynch, her best friend Olivia, and even her mother insisted that Metcalf had a crush on her, and she’d only recently admitted that it was probably true. “He’s right, you do know me well enough to know I’d want to be here and work this case. That’s all that’s important now.”

  Griffin glanced around. “Seen anybody here yet?”

  “I called on my way down,” Metcalf said. “I talked to a night supervisor, Dr. Madeline Turman, and told her we were coming. She didn’t seem thrilled about it.”

  “That’s because she’s responsible for a hundred and fifty resident students who are trying to sleep in that building over there.” Kendra motioned toward the dormitory, a four-story building with a sloping bonnet-style roof. “Maddie doesn’t like anything to come between her and her kids.”

  “Did you stay there when you were a student?” Metcalf asked.

  “No, I was a local. More than half of the students live in the San Diego area with their families. This school was the main reason my mom moved us here. It’s a special place.”

  “So I gather,” Griffin said. “But a great many parents have taken their students home in the past day or so, and more are coming tomorrow.”

  “Can’t say I blame them,” Kendra said. “Parents of special kids are very protective of them. It’s ingrained the instant they realize their child has a problem. This would set off more alarms than an EF-5 tornado warning. I’m surprised they haven’t closed the place down.”

  A woman’s sharp voice came from behind them. “It could still happen.”

  They turned to see a tall, slender woman in her late sixties. Kendra instinctively tensed. It was Dr. Allison Walker. The school’s head administrator had lost none of her power to cast an imposing figure. Her long, straight hair was now gray, but her slender physique appeared more toned than ever. Kendra had once assumed it was the result of some serious gym time, but a colleague told her Allison never exercised or even watched her calories. Lucky woman.

  “Good to see you, Kendra,” Allison said quietly. “I hoped you would come.”

  “You couldn’t keep me away.”

  Allison raised an electronic cigarette to her lips and took a puff. “Please excuse this. It’s not allowed here, but it’s been that kind of week.”

  Kendra nodded. “I understand. I take it you’ve met FBI Agents Griffin and Metcalf?”

  Allison nodded. “Yes. Yesterday morning, after Elaine Wessler’s death. Good evening, gentlemen. I didn’t expect to see you again so soon.”

  “Didn’t expect it, either,” Griffin said as he cast a sour glance at Kendra. “Plans change.”

  “I’m only just now getting brought up to speed,” Kendra said. “I’m sorry, Allison.” The name caught in Kendra’s throat. After all these years, it still felt strange not to call her Dr. Walker. “Elaine Wessler and Ron Kim were good people.”

  Allison nodded. “You’d realize that more than most. They were part of the heart and soul of this place. Each of them in their own way.”

  “I know.”

  Allison said fiercely, “It’s just…senseless.”

  Evidently Allison was feeling a bit raw. Kendra instinctively stepped closer to her. “Did they have any connection to each other?”

  “Elaine and Ronald? Not at all. Ronald was always around, tending to the lawns, his flowers and shrubs. The teachers might give him a smile or a quick hello as they walked past, but mostly he was just…there. We’ve all been racking our brains for a common thread between them, but we haven’t come up with anything.”

  “Enemies? Volatile personal relationships?”

  “No. Nothing like that. Ronald’s wife died of cancer a few years ago. Elaine’s divorced and she hasn’t been seeing anyone we know of.”

  “We’ve been digging into their friends and associates
,” Metcalf said. “I’ll give you a rundown, but so far there isn’t anything promising.”

  “Okay.” Kendra glanced around them. “Allison, I’d appreciate it if you could walk with us. Would you mind?”

  “Where?”

  “I want to see where each body was found.”

  “It will be difficult to see at night, especially where we found Elaine.”

  “I know. I’ll come back tomorrow, but I need to see these places now.”

  Allison turned toward Griffin and Metcalf. “I take it you’ve already tried to talk her out of coming here tonight?”

  “We have,” Griffin said with a sigh.

  Allison took another puff from her electronic cigarette. “I sympathize. Even when Kendra was here as a little girl, it was difficult trying to talk her out of anything she’d set her mind on.”

  “Sorry,” Kendra said.

  “No, you’re not. I know you better than that, Kendra.” Allison motioned toward the great lawn that extended to the south of the main building. “I hope you brought flashlights, otherwise it’s entirely possible one of us will end our evening tumbling headfirst into the Pacific Ocean.”

  “We’ll try to avoid that.” Griffin and Metcalf fired up their flashlights and shone the way across the lawn as they walked.

  “Ronald Kim’s car was in the parking lot overnight Monday,” Allison said. “It was logged by the security officer on duty.”

  “Didn’t anyone think that was unusual?” Kendra said.

  Allison shrugged. “It was an older car. The officer thought it probably had engine trouble and Ronald just caught another ride home.”

  Kendra sniffed the air as they walked. Gardenias. Mr. Kim based his planting on scents as much as visual aesthetics, so the sightless students always knew where they were on campus. Even after all these years, Kendra knew she’d soon be smelling roses, followed by a wisp of honeysuckle.

  “The security officers’ shift change came at seven A.M.,” Allison said as they approached the rose garden. “That’s when Ronald’s body was discovered, when the daytime officer made his first patrol around campus.”

  Metcalf shone his flashlight toward a large stone wall at the far end of the lawn. “His body was found there, on the ground at the base of the trellis.”

  Kendra slowed as they approached the scene. The grass had been matted by the dress shoes of more than a dozen cops, FBI agents, and evidence teams, along with the thin wheel marks of the gurney used to cart away Ronald Kim’s body.

  Griffin directed his flashlight beam along the ground in front of them. “He was here, mostly covered by these trellis vines down to almost his knees. He was killed by a single nine-millimeter shot to the back of the head.”

  Kendra pulled out her phone, activated its flashlight, and studied the scene. “Were these drag marks here or did the M.E. make these removing the body?”

  “They were there already,” Metcalf said. “He was moved just a few feet, enough to hide the body. He appears to have been murdered here at close range. A silencer was used to muffle the sound.”

  “So no one heard the shot?”

  “No one,” Allison said. “And in the dormitory, we have dozens of children with highly developed senses of hearing, as I’m sure you can imagine. Stray cats a hundred yards away are known to cause a disturbance around here.”

  Holding her phone flashlight in front of her, Kendra walked down the length of the stone wall.

  “What are you looking for?” Griffin said. “We searched this entire area.”

  “I’m sure you did.” Kendra didn’t look up as she continued her scan of the area. She had no idea what she was looking for, but a lawn and garden this pristine would make it easier for her to spot something, anything, that could give them a lead.

  Or it could give them nothing.

  She’d definitely have to come back the next day when the sun would light up the area far better than her phone. In this respect, Allison and the agents had been right to question her wisdom in visiting the scene in the dead of—

  She stopped.

  She turned her head and took half a step back.

  “See something?” Metcalf called out.

  “No.”

  Metcalf, Griffin, and Allison joined her next to a clump of tall bushes. “What is it?”

  “Ronald Kim stood here.” She looked over the wall, which was about four feet tall at this point. “He was here for quite a while, probably looking at the access road leading to the Pacific Coast Highway.”

  Griffin squinted at the ground. “I don’t see how you can tell that.”

  “I couldn’t if I was only using my sight.” She grabbed a branch from the nearest bush, leaned in, and took a deep whiff. “Try it.”

  Only Metcalf moved closer and sniffed the bush.

  “Smell that?” she asked.

  “I’m…not sure.”

  “You’d probably be surer if you’d been paying attention to what the others smelled like.”

  “How is this one different?” Griffin said.

  “It’s been bathed in cigarette smoke. And not just a few puffs. Probably several entire cigarettes. The smell wouldn’t linger this long otherwise. Which means he was standing here for quite a while.”

  “How do you know it was Ronald Kim and not someone else?”

  “The scent of this tobacco is sharp, very distinctive. It’s a Korean-made cigarette brand, Raison. The odor was always on Mr. Kim’s clothes. A young woman in your office also smokes this brand, by the way.”

  “What woman?” Griffin asked.

  “The forensic accounting specialist two cubicles down from Metcalf. Special Agent Park.”

  “Huh.” Griffin’s forehead creased in surprise. “I didn’t even know she smoked.”

  “Me neither,” Metcalf said.

  Kendra turned back toward the wall. “Something here interested him. He stood here for a reason.”

  “Maybe he just came here for his smoke breaks.”

  “No,” Allison said. “No staff member is allowed to smoke anywhere a student may see them. There’s only one smoking area, and it’s near the garbage dumpsters behind the dining hall.”

  “He only would have smoked out here late at night, when no one could have seen him,” Kendra said.

  “Interesting,” Metcalf said. “You would have known this if you had attended my scintillating presentation, but crime scene techs found six cigarette butts in the left pocket of the coveralls.”

  Kendra nodded. “Of course. He wouldn’t have littered in his garden. So it was that night. He was waiting out here for a reason.”

  “Maybe to meet someone,” Metcalf offered.

  Kendra glanced around. “Kind of an out-of-the-way place. It seems more like a spot where he could look down to that area below without being seen.”

  Griffin stood between the tall bushes and looked down toward the access road. “Yes, it does.”

  Kendra turned and continued her scan of the area, but nothing else caught her attention. “Okay.” She braced herself. “Now I’d like to see where Elaine Wessler was found.”

  Allison motioned toward the far side of the campus. “It was on the hillside, on the other side of the athletic building.”

  “On the Slide?”

  Allison wore a pained expression. “I strongly discourage that name.”

  Kendra smiled. “Still?”

  “Yes.”

  Kendra turned toward Metcalf and Griffin. “For years, students have grabbed flattened boxes to slide down the hill over there.”

  “Even the blind kids?” Metcalf said.

  “Of course. Some of the best times I had here were over on the Slide.”

  “Dodging any teacher who might try to stop you,” Allison said sarcastically. “And you and your friend Olivia always led the pack. Fun times. Until someone inevitably gets hurt. The area should have been cleared and leveled to take away the temptation.”

  “But that would have broken our hearts.”

  “Better your hearts than your heads. You students had enough problems to worry about.”

  “But Elaine Wessler wasn’t sliding on boxes,” Griffin said grimly.

  Allison shook her head. “No. This way. I’ll show you the best way to get there without hurtling into the ocean.”

  They followed Allison past the main building and around the athletic complex and swimming pool. A paved stairway took them down a long slope that appeared to end at the ocean. Kendra knew, however, that it was merely an illusion, since a fence and service road separated the base of the hill from the water. The school did have a private beach on the coast, but it was closer to the cliffs.