Requiem for a Love (Requiem #2) [ON HOLD]

Chapter 13: Ryan

January 23

Ana

There's a weird silence in the car as Ben drives us back from the weekly appointment with my therapist. He's been really quiet and distant since we moved into our new safehouse three days ago, enough to make me wonder if I really upset him with my outburst that day, but this silence is different. There's something hanging over us right now and I don't like it. I'd ask what it is, but I'm not sure I really want to know.

Uncomfortable, I look out the window to draw my thoughts away from the growing tension inside the car. Then I sit up straighter. We're driving into the downtown part of Phoenix. This isn't the way to the safehouse.

"Where are we going?"

"The FBI building," he says, keeping his gaze on the road.

"Why?"

"They have more questions."

"Why now, all of a sudden?"

"New information has come to light."

"What does that mean?" He's being weird. I would expect any new information unearthed in this case would be a cause for celebration. He's acting like it's not.

He sighs and glances away from the road for a moment to look over at me. "I found something, Ana. It might help the case, but you're not going to like it."

He refuses to say anything more, leaving me with mounting levels of anxiety as our destination draws nearer. My heart feels like it's beating too fast. My mouth is unquenchably dry and my appetite from earlier has vanished, replaced by a vague feeling of nausea. I wish he would just tell me whatever it is and make this awful apprehension go away.

He's still not talking as he parks the car and we enter the building. Getting through security is a welcome distraction from my racing thoughts, but too soon we're walking to the elevator and riding up in deafening silence. I feel my body beginning to shake involuntarily. As we walk toward the offices where Agent Givens works, I try to suppress the light shudders.

"Just tell me what's going on," I say as soon as Givens walks into the interview room.

Givens looks expectantly at Ben. Ben places a manila folder on the surface of the table and hesitates, not opening it. Then he looks up at me and takes a slow breath.

"I found Ryan."

I just stare at him. I don't know what I thought he was going to say, but it wasn't this. Ben seems to expect me to say something, but my mind is practically blank.

"Wh-what?" I stutter, feeling my head swim as the world around me seems to be fracturing and shifting into a new form. "How did... who-" I don't finish the question.

"He was pronounced dead on arrival at Fairbanks Memorial Hospital on November 3rd," Ben says, not needing to open the folder to recite this. "Cause of death was a gunshot wound to the chest. He didn't have any photo ID, but when they ran the serial number on his gun, they came back with a name. He owns property north of Fairbanks and from the looks of it, he doesn't leave it often. There are no credit cards to his name, hardly any trace he exists. The precinct up in Fairbanks sent a picture, hoping we could give them a positive ID."

Ben pauses and opens the folder, the contents visible to him but hidden from me by the cover. He lifts a thick piece of paper and holds it carefully, angling the image away from me.

"I know this is going to be really hard for you, Ana, and if you can't do it I completely understand. But please look at this picture."

He places the image flat against the table and slides it halfway between us.