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Carl Webber.
She clicked on it instantly as her mind drew up the scene at Carl Webber’s run-down apartment. She also recalled how looking at the save dates on his freelance work had made her doubt he could be the killer…but how it had not ruled him out completely.
There were nine emails in the folder, and two of them consisted of rather lengthy exchanges. In Webber, Stanley Cooper had found someone who felt just as strongly as he did about his objections to stem cell research. More than that, both men had actually once been a part of the field, which made them even more sympathetic.
Within the first few mails, she found out that though the men had been aware of one another, they'd only met a single time. The exchanges began with Cooper reaching out to Webber and presenting the gist of his research paper with him. He addressed his passionate concerns about the use of stem cells, mainly how dangerous and immoral it seemed to be growing now that it wasn't considered nearly as controversial a topic as it had once been. Rachel read back and forth between the men as they shared these same views and concerns.
But it was near the end of the list of mails that things seemed to take a turn. It was Cooper who first suggested that they meet up, maybe over dinner or a few beers. And based on how the follow-up mails went, she assumed they had indeed met up…maybe even several times. While this seemed promising enough, there was one particular email that sent a chill through her—a sort of instinctual red lag rising up and flapping in a breeze of suspicion.
You know, Webber had written eight months ago, I can take you to the old research center and show you around. I sneak down there sometimes just to remember it all, as sick as that may sound. It started by hoping there might be some paperwork or data left over, something left behind from the move to the bigger facility over at VexoCorp. There’s nothing, but it does help clear my head in a way that I never expected. I do my best thinking there.
Cooper’s response had come a day later, and they’d agreed to meet at the old research center (wherever that was) and have a few drinks.
It was just as the reality of what this might mean began to sink in that Rachel's phone rang. It startled her badly, and she had to clamp her lips together to keep from screaming out. She pulled it out of her pocket and saw that it was Sullivan calling. She answered it right away, her eyes trailing back to the emails.
“This is Gift.”
“Hey, Gift. Look…it seems like Cooper may not be our guys after all. Based on what the coroner said—and then even with a call to forensics to get their opinion, too—the hand shape on Molly Steven’s neck is too large to be Stanley Cooper’s. Even an untrained set of eyes like mine could see it. The fingers are too thick…too long, too. Not by much, but I think it might be enough to prove his innocence.”
Though she hadn’t been quite sold on Stanley Cooper being their killer, Rachel still felt a sting of disappointment. “Thanks for looking into that. And you know, I think I may have found something, too.”
“Yeah, what’s that?”
“I’m looking through these emails and there’s a pretty long string of communication with Carl Webber. And it’s getting juicy. I assume you aren’t in the interrogation room with him right now, are you?”
“No. But I can be.”
“Yeah, I’d like to speak with him.”
“One second…”
She could hear Sullivan moving and then the sound of a door opening and closing. This was followed by Sullivan's muffled voice and something being slid around—maybe a chair. She then heard Sullivan's voice again, much clearer this time, as he said: "Okay, Gift. I'm sitting here with Cooper, and you're on speaker mode."
“Good. Mr. Cooper, I’m looking at a thread of emails between you and Carl Webber. Webber is someone we spoke with earlier in the case. He had alibis that were good, but not quite airtight. I need you to tell me about anything that was discussed when you met in person that you would consider strange, or a red flag.”
“Webber? Yeah, he’s an interesting one. He did provide me with a lot of information for the paper, though. He’s passionate to the point of being nearly obsessed.”
“About what, exactly?” Rachel asked.
“Making sure the public sees the immoral side to stem cells and how they’re procured. He’s brilliant but…I don’t know. Sort of creepy if you get right down to it.”
“Did the two of you have some sort of falling out?”
"No, not at all. But I did want to sort of stay away from him after a while. He was getting too chummy. I made the mistake of venturing out to this old research center he used to work at, and after that…I don't know. It's like he thought that made us best friends or something. So in the end, just to distance myself from him, I lied to him and told him I was all set. He reached out a few more times, but I sort of pushed him off…said I was too busy or made promises to get back in touch with him. But I have to actually had an exchange with him in about—"
“About eight months, from the looks of your emails,” Rachel said.
“Yeah, that’s right.”
“So tell me about this place…this research center. The emails say it was somewhere he went to think clearly.”
Cooper chuckled in a nervous manner and sighed. “That place was creepy as hell. It’s this small building in one of those old business parks that sort of fell apart a few years ago. I don’t know the full story, but I think a lot of the folks that are now doing research for VexoCorp came out of that center. And there were people like Webber and Dr. Willis, too.”
“And do you happen to know anything about the project Webber, Ellis, and Adler were working on out in Nevada, at Grayson Labs?”
“No. I mean, I know about it, and I know that they were all on some sort of superstar team, but I don't know any of the specifics. I have the bare bones of it all in my paper, though."
Rachel took a moment to think it all through, and found her thoughts coming back to the research center Webber apparently went to from time to time. She wasn’t so bold as to think it might be the key to everything, but something about it did seem slightly off.
