Forgive or Forget

Chapter 27

-Detective Mike Riggs-

I just hung up the phone with Detective Lynch. He called me after the Westerlys left. I was not surprised to find out from Lynch that Mr. Westerly was able to identify the five murdered women in Philadelphia. Lynch informed me that they had sent officers over to Mr. Matthews' home. Unfortunately, he was not there, so they are monitoring his home to see if he shows up.

Lynch also told me that Mrs. Westerly had given him a fair idea of the location where Matthew took her. Lynch will check to see if Matthews has any property in that area or if any of his family members did.

I decided to contact the Dover, Delaware Police Department. Fortunately, they had no murders of women with Mathews' MO. So, it looks like he just murdered Mr. Westerly's hookups. No one that he murdered could lead back to him, that is, until Miss Conrad. The reason Matthews went dormant for three years is because Westerly met and fell in love with his wife.

I decided to call it a night. Tomorrow, when I get into the office, I'll contact the Westerlys. I need to talk with them. I believe that they might hold the key to the whereabouts of Todd Matthews.

***

I couldn't sleep last night; some cases like this keep me awake because it's like a puzzle I must solve. As always, on those sleepless nights, I find that there are pieces to the puzzle that I'm missing. 

Grabbing my coffee, I head into my office and decide to wait and call the Westerlys later in the morning. They had a rough day yesterday, so I want to give them some time today to decompress, but not too much time. We must find Matthews as soon as possible since he's devolving, first, with Miss Conrad. It looks like she was the only murdered woman that he knew personally, then Cheryl. My biggest fear is that he'll stop at nothing to get revenge on her.

My phone rings. Pulling me from my thoughts. I answer, "Detective Riggs."

The front desk informs me, "Reed Westerly on line one."

"Got it, thanks." I'm impressed that Mr. Westerly beat me to the punch. "Good morning, Mr. Westerly."

"Good morning, Detective. First, thank you for sending the officers to clear our home and for the officer watching the Fowler's house. It has given my wife and me a true sense of safety," he says in appreciation.

"You're very welcome. I'm glad that we were able to do that for you," I reply.

"I know that you wanted to meet with us. I feel that the sooner we meet with you, the better. We want to do everything in our power to assist you and Detective Lynch in getting Todd off of the streets before he claims another innocent victim or tries to get to my wife," Mr. Westerly states pragmatically.

"I agree. I was waiting to contact you later this morning so you could have more time to decompress. How soon can you get here?" I inquire.

"Thirty minutes," he replies.

I lean back into my chair. "Perfect. I'll see you then. Goodbye, and thank you for calling."

He responds, "No problem, we want to be able to put this behind us. Goodbye, Detective."

After we hang up, I gather everything I'll need for the interview with the Westerlys.

True to his word, the Westerlys arrived half an hour after I hung up with him.

The front desk officer relayed to me that they had arrived. I meet them out front and greet them with a handshake.

I bring them into one of our meeting rooms. "Please have a seat. Can I get either of you something to drink?"