Running

Chapter 4

~ Washington Police Department, October 29, 2019, 4:30 PM ~

Paperwork.

Ugh.

She hated paperwork.

Gracie was sitting at her desk in the Washington DC Police Department, writing her report and checking over a stack of files. The smell of Graham's now forgotten coffee lingered in the air, the soft clatter of keyboards filling the silence a comforting sound. The Davis case had left what felt like mountains upon mountains of paperwork, and she had to go through every. Single. One. She rubbed her hand across her face and pinched the bridge of her nose to keep an upcoming headache at bay as she refocused on Oliver's psychiatric report, only to look up when Jackson stood in front of her desk.

"We have another case, Grace," Gracie placed the papers on her desk and reached for her water bottle, focusing on him.

"Another one so soon? What is it?"

"There was a murder in an alley near the Holocaust Memorial Museum. Captain Allen wants us to go over and check the crime scene." Jackson responded, holstering his gun.

"Any chance this might be correlated with the latest cases of unsolved murders and disappearances?"

"No way to know until we get there."

She sighed, holstered her gun, and grabbed her pager and badge.

"At least now I have an excuse to get out of doing paperwork."

~

Katherine Smith.

The Daily Scoop's newest rookie reporter. Her article starring Congresswoman Lena Adler, emphasizing "not all that glitters is gold" had such a huge impact that she had been elected to speak more in-depth about the subject on the show Good Morning Washington.

Now her body laid stiff on the pavement, blood still oozing and plastered on her forehead as Gracie and Jackson looked around the crime scene.

"It's a shame. I was looking forward to seeing her talk on Wednesday." Gracie said, trying to ease the tension in the air.

Jackson snorted.

"Any cameras around this place catch anything?" He nodded to the closest officer to him.

"Neither the bakery nor the law firm has any footage of the time the crime was committed. There's a big chance that it was deleted." The officer replied.

"Which means we're back to square one," Gracie sighed.

"Not quite. At least we can link it to the other murders. Same M.O. and from what I can see, same bullet. We'll have to wait for the M.E. to confirm that."

"Have the CSIs found any bullet casings?"

"Not yet, detective," the officer said, handing them both a pair of latex gloves, "They're still looking."

"I don't think they'll find any," Gracie said, squatting next to the body to take a closer look, noticing bruising on Katherine's left arm, "There's not even a hair that isn't Katherine's lying around. Whoever did this knows what they're doing."

"It's frustrating," Jackson growled.

"Quite," she stood up and gave the body one last glance, "Give her a once-over, just to make sure I didn't miss anything. I'll look around again."