For the next three weeks, nothing happened. I went back to my normal, present-day cases, and had no appearances from Melanie. Maybe the progress we were making was satisfying her spirit, and she was giving me a chance to relax and recharge. I had made the time to call Paul, and we made plans for me to meet up with him, his wife Ellen, and my granddaughter Erica one Saturday in the coming weeks, maybe visiting Christie’s grave before having lunch or dinner. I was really excited about this. I hadn’t seen them in the months since Christie’s funeral. Melanie couldn’t be reunited with her family, but I could, and for the first time in a while, the loneliness and depression that had hovered over me seemed to go away.
The call came in on a Wednesday morning.
“I’ve got something for you, Bill,” Tony Barrett excitedly exclaimed on the other end. “We got a hit out of CODIS. Not a direct match, but a familial one. We’re looking at a near-perfect partial profile match—enough shared alleles across the board to mean our 1976 perp is almost certainly the biological father of a Navy petty officer currently in the system.”
“Alright Tony, don’t leave us in suspense—who’s our sailor?”
“Our guy is Petty Officer First Class Brad Elliott,” Tony answered. “He’s thirty-three years old, so he’s definitely not our perp, but like I said, there’s a good chance his father is.”
“Tony, you are a genius! Thanks for everything. We’re gonna go locate our Petty Officer Elliott and ask him about his old man.”
“No problem, Bill. Good luck, hope this info brings a solution to your cold case,” Tony said, ending the call.
I slammed the receiver down and looked over at my partner. “We’re in business, Keith. Get on the horn to the local NCIS field office. We need everything they have on a Petty Officer First Class Brad Elliott.”
Keith’s fingers were already flying across his keyboard. “NCIS? What’s the Navy got to do with a forty-year-old cold case?”
“Familial DNA. CODIS flagged Elliott's profile. Tony says our killer is almost certainly the kid's old man.”
“Got the number for the NCIS duty desk,” Keith replied, pausing his fingers over the keyboard. “But Bill... if we go through official military channels asking about the kid, word might filter down to him. If he calls his old man to ask why civilian cops are digging into the family tree, our perp goes on the run before we even get a warrant.”
“Good point, buddy,” I said, mapping out our next move. “Let's bypass the kid entirely. If we pull his personnel files, they should list his dad as next of kin. We get a name and an address without ever making a wave.”
I grabbed my desk phone and dialed the number Keith pulled up. As with most government agencies, NCIS left me on hold for what seemed like an eternity. Finally, a click broke the static, and a young-sounding female voice answered the line.
I gave her my badge number, keeping my story as bare-bones as possible. I told her we were working a cold case and needed the next-of-kin contact information for a Petty Officer Elliott to help clear up an old lead. I held my breath, waiting for her to ask for a formal subpoena or supervisor sign-off, but after a few minutes of heavy keyboard clacking, she came back on the line.
“Alright, Detective. I’ve pulled up Petty Officer Elliott’s next-of-kin info. I can email the file over to you now.”
“Thanks, I appreciate the help,” I said, rattling off my department email address before she could change her mind.
I hung up and looked at Keith, a grin breaking across my face. “That girl must be a green recruit. She never asked for a warrant, a case number, or anything.” I gave a soft laugh, though a small prick of guilt hit me. “Hopefully she won’t get into any trouble. But if she does, I’ll vouch for her and tell the powers that be the whole story. Assuming this lead pans out.”
Fifteen minutes later, the email hit my inbox. I clicked it open. Keith leaning over my shoulder. There on the screen printed in bold type was the name and address of our killer.
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