The Stranger You Know

  “What about Tribeca?” Ryan asked.

  “That’s iffy,” Hutch interjected. “When he gets that close, he might want to perform his big finale and go after Casey. But it can’t hurt to double-check the names on the list and see if any of them has ties to Tribeca.”

  “I’ll pull the Glen Fisher file and start researching,” Patrick said. He gave Casey a questioning look. “I hadn’t come on board FI yet when you worked that case. I assume it was in conjunction with the Twelfth Precinct?” He referred to the area where Tompkins Square Park was located.

  Casey nodded.

  “Fine. I’ll swing by there and see what they’ll share with me.”

  Claire rose. “Casey, do you want to come with me to see Daniel Olson?”

  “Yes.” Casey got to her feet. “I also have some arrangements I need to make.”

  Hutch recognized the expression on her face. And he didn’t like it. “What arrangements?”

  “I plan to get permission to visit Auburn.”

  “You’re visiting Glen Fisher?” Hutch looked more pissed than he did surprised.

  “Damn straight.” Casey raised her chin. “Fisher wants me up close and personal? Let’s give him exactly what he wants.”

  Chapter Twelve

  Later that day, Casey and Claire—with one of Patrick’s bodyguards glued to their side—visited Daniel Olson to pay their respects. There was little they could offer him except their condolences and offers to help with Jan’s funeral arrangements. Mr. Olson quietly told them he had everything taken care of, and thanked them for getting to the truth, as well as for recovering his daughter’s body. He begged them to make sure that the monster who’d done this to his child was locked up forever, so he could never hurt another man’s daughter.

  That plea doubled Casey’s determination to ensure that Glen Fisher rotted in prison for the rest of his days. She drove away from the Olson house, watching Jan’s father in her rearview mirror. He stood in the doorway, frail, broken, himself on the verge of death. Casey had to look away, the emotion was so great. But so was the resolve. That miserable son of a bitch was going to pay for the rest of his life. She would see to it herself.

  She’d made the necessary phone calls to set things in motion. Now she just had to wait for the official word that she was on the visitors’ list. As soon as that happened, she’d jump in the car and make the five-hour drive to upstate New York, where Auburn Correctional Facility was located.

  There was plenty of time to ponder how she was going to handle Fisher as she left Brooklyn now and headed back to Tribeca. The van was silent, with Claire gazing out the window with tears in her eyes, and their bodyguard texting Patrick with an update on their whereabouts. There was nothing to say, anyway, no peace in this kind of closure.

  But there was a world of planning to do. And Casey used that quiet time to do it.

  Her cell phone rang just as she turned onto their street.

  She glanced at the dashboard, recognizing the number in the display. “Hi, Ryan.”

  “Hey. You guys okay?”

  “It was tough. But we expected that. Any news on your end?”

  “Yeah. The cops got their search warrant for Glen Fisher’s apartment. They’ll meet us there at seven tonight. They’re anticipating that his wife, Suzanne, will be home from work by then.”

  “Us?” Casey repeated. “Does that mean FI is actually invited to accompany the detectives on the search?”

  “After a good word from Captain Sharp, yes. Remember, he owed us one because of the Olson case. Not to mention how central you are to the ongoing case.” A wry note crept into Ryan’s voice. “Why? Did you think the lack of an official invite would keep us away?”

  “Not for a second. Still, it makes things a little easier when we get official permission.”

  “True. But not nearly as much fun. I kind of like when my creativity is tested.”

  “Oh, it will be,” Casey assured him. “The NYPD’s generosity toward us will only go so far. Especially now that the FBI has been notified and is on the scene. In no time at all, we’ll be steering our own course.”

  “And you and Hutch will be fighting,” Ryan pointed out in a teasing tone.

  “No doubt.” Casey sighed. “Anyway, I’m pulling up to the brownstone now. I see a parking spot right out front. So Claire and I will be inside in a sec. I want to sit down and review every shred of information you dug up on Glen Fisher.”

  “No problem. I’ve got plenty. But it’s still a work in progress,” Ryan reported. “I’m also running a full background check on Fisher’s wife, Suzanne. From the interviews I read in the original police report, it sounds as if she’s scared shitless of the guy—not that I blame her. That could work in our favor.”

  Casey pulled into the parking spot and turned off the ignition. “I’m sure Hutch will be on the scene during the police search. I want FI to meet with him beforehand. He’ll give us a profile on a serial sexual homicide offender’s spouse. Is he with the NYPD detectives now?”

  “Nope. He’s here. He figured you’d want to go over a few things before leaving for Suzanne Fisher’s. He’s upstairs somewhere, reviewing Fisher’s case file and bringing himself up to speed.”

  “Good. We’re on our way in.”

  * * *

  Casey held up her access card to the card reader and punched her security code into the Hirsch keypad. Opening the front door, she stepped into the FI lobby.

  She’d barely hung up her jacket when her iPhone rang. This time when she saw the blocked caller ID, she felt a wave of anger rather than fear.

  “Yes?” she said cryptically, expecting the worst.

  “You can sense when it’s me. I’m flattered.” The scrambled voice echoed in her ear.

  “Is there another victim you want to tell me about?”

  An eerie chuckle. “Even I need a little prep time. No, not yet. I called to commend you on your touching visit to the Olson father. Also to applaud you for your initiative on the Holly Stevens case. Your friend was an easy mark. Very submissive. She hardly fought me. Just cried and begged.”

  Casey’s fist clenched until her nails bit into her palm. But she wouldn’t give in and lose control. That was exactly what he wanted. She’d keep her cool, stay outwardly calm and collected.

  “Was there any other reason for your call?” she inquired.

  “You know what my reasons are.”

  “To scare me.”

  “To remind you,” he corrected. “Your turn is sooner than you think. You’ll be stripped of your bravado, of your supposed calm demeanor and of everything else. You won’t be able to hide then, Red. Not your emotions. Not your body. Not your life. You’ll be at my mercy. What exhilarating divine justice.”

  The call was disconnected.

  “Son of a bitch!” Casey exclaimed as she punched off her phone.

  “It was him again,” Claire said quietly. “He wants to shove himself in your face, so you’ll know he’s watching your every move.”

  “He also wants you to know that, no matter which lead you pursue or how much progress you make, he’s still in control.” Hutch had come downstairs to the front hallway a few minutes ago, and was leaning against the wall, listening to Casey’s end of the conversation.

  Casey nodded, meeting Hutch’s eyes. “Did I handle it right?”

  “Yes. You didn’t break, but you let him have the last word. If you challenge him too much, he’ll lose it. That will escalate his rage and make him twice as dangerous. Plus, he might stop calling, and reserve his anger for acting out. That would up the number of victims. You’ve got to play this very carefully.”

  “Do I go along with the pretense that he’s Glen Fisher?”

  Hutch frowned thoughtfully. “It’s interesting. He never refers to himself by name, never throws the whole Glen Fisher charade in your face. That goes along with our theory that he’s a different offender, one who’s alluding to—or pretending to be—Fisher, but is, in fact, eager
to outdo him. I’d lay off any personal reference. Just keep treating him the way you are—as an anonymous enemy. The more he toys with you, the more he talks, the more likely he is to give something away.”

  “Okay.” Casey sent Hutch a questioning look. “Are you officially on the case?”

  “Yup. I got the call from my supervisor while you were out. Brian Gardiner is driving up as we speak. He’s a good guy and a good agent. We’ve partnered up quite a few times recently. We’ll be assisting the NYPD and the Hoboken police department in this investigation.”

  “Any other Feds coming that I should know about?”

  A corner of Hutch’s mouth lifted. “That you should know about or that you should avoid?” He shook his head. “Right now, it’s just us. The NYPD is on top of things. If that changes, there’ll be additional agents assigned.”

  Marc heard their voices, and came downstairs from the kitchen, half a sliced turkey sandwich in his hand. “I got a call from Captain Sharp.” He took a bite of his sandwich, chewed and swallowed, holding Casey’s gaze as he did. He was alerting her to the fact that he was about to deliver the news that she both wanted and dreaded.

  “The lab ran the traces of semen found on Holly Stevens’s clothing through NCIC,” he said gently. “The DNA conclusively matched Glen Fisher’s. You have your answer, Casey. Glen Fisher was responsible for both Holly Stevens’s and Jan Olson’s murders.” He paused. “I’m sorry.”

  “I’m not.” Casey’s reply was firm, with absolutely zero element of surprise. “The horrifying part happened fifteen years ago. Putting a name to the offender is good news, not bad. Now Jan and Holly can get the justice they deserve. I’ll make sure of it.” She continued without missing a beat. “FYI, you’re a minute too late with your announcement. I was just told about Holly from the horse’s mouth.”

  “You got another phone call?”

  “Indeed I did.” Casey relayed the details of the phone conversation—as well as of Hutch’s analysis—to Marc.

  “This psychopath really wants to get all the accolades he feels he deserves,” Marc responded.

  Hutch’s forehead was wrinkled in thought. “He wants to be Glen Fisher, but better than Glen Fisher. His technique is more polished than Fisher’s. His signature red ribbon and the lock of hair is more intricate than anything Fisher did. All of that suggests he wants to outdo the master. On the flip side, he’s obsessed with revenge against Casey, and with letting her know it every step of the way. That suggests he wants to convince us he is Fisher. Also, the original two bodies—Jan’s and Holly’s—had semen present. The current crimes have none.”

  Marc pursed his lips as he digested that. “There was no semen present on the bodies recovered last year, either.”

  “True,” Hutch acknowledged. “Clearly, Fisher realized that DNA analysis had become far more sophisticated, and he didn’t want to get caught. But that’s not what this is about, at least not entirely. Sure, the new offender might be in the system and is protecting himself. But he’s also taunting Casey. The lack of DNA evidence is meant to keep her off balance and wondering, on some level, if it just might be Glen Fisher committing these crimes—even though that’s a virtual impossibility.”

  “Head games.” Marc nodded. “Good point. So we can’t assume the killer’s in NCIC and is using condoms to avoid getting caught.”

  “Right. It could very well be that he is in the system. But it could just as easily be that he’s not.”

  “So we’re standing here with nothing.” Casey sounded as if she wanted to slug someone—and that was exactly the way she felt.

  “No,” Hutch corrected her. “We’re standing here with lots of information that we have to process in order to come up with answers.” He glanced at his watch. “We’re due at Fisher’s residence in a few hours. Who from FI is coming?” He shot Casey a questioning look. “You and Marc?”

  “I’m coming, too,” Claire said at once. She and Casey had discussed this earlier in the day. “Casey and Marc will join you and the detectives for the search and questioning. I’ll go where the energy takes me. Maybe I can pick up on something that will translate into a lead.”

  Hutch nodded, but said nothing. It was no secret that he was on the fence about the whole psychic phenomenon. The BAU operated on scientific and psychological principles that were all rooted in logic. But on a personal level, Hutch couldn’t argue with Claire’s success rate. He felt tremendous respect for her. So he might not be an active proponent, but he didn’t condemn it, either.

  “It looks like we’ll have a full house,” he noted.

  “That’s good. We’ll cover all the bases.” Casey inclined her head. “Hutch, can you give us a half hour of your time before you take off for the Fisher place? Anything you can share that would help us profile Suzanne Fisher would be great. Nothing from the classified section,” she said. “Just something beyond the basics that might be useful.”

  Hutch seemed mildly amused. “I think I could make that happen—if I’m invited to the meeting you’re about to have with Ryan.”

  “Fair enough.” Casey was more than happy to meet him halfway.

  “Good. Then we’ll pool our resources.” Hutch gestured toward the stairway. “The main conference room?”

  “Yes.” Casey quickly texted Ryan to meet them upstairs with everything he had on Glen and Suzanne Fisher. “Let’s do this now.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  At a true New York pace, Casey, Claire and Marc strode from the Lexington Avenue subway stop to East 52nd Street and Glen Fisher’s midtown apartment. Casey’s gaze darted up and down the block. Tree-lined sidewalks. Low-rise brick buildings. A local deli. A few small restaurants. A produce store. A stream of people arriving home from work. Some were hurrying inside their apartment buildings, ready to call it a day. Some were walking their dogs. And some were carrying bags of groceries they’d stopped to pick up for dinner.

  Everything seemed so normal, just as it probably had last year, when a homicidal monster was living here without a single person’s knowing it.

  A bone-chilling reality.

  Ryan’s comprehensive background check on Fisher had given the team—and Hutch—the big picture on what the killer was about. The original stats the cops had provided last year had listed his age as approximately thirty-two or thirty-three. As it turned out, he was older—thirty-nine to be exact—with a trim physique, close-cropped hair and a smooth-shaven face that made him look a lot younger than almost forty. Professionally, he was a CPA in a medium-size accounting firm, where everyone pretty much operated autonomously, the only interaction among them being in the coffee room.

  Upon Fisher’s arrest, all the employees had been interviewed, and it seemed that no one knew very much about him. They had, however, all thought of him as very sharp—a real go-getter with a long list of clients—and perfectly affable, and they’d been shocked by the details of the crimes he’d committed.

  Personally, Fisher and his wife, Suzanne, had been married for ten years, and they had no children. Suzanne was thirty-six, and a piano teacher in midtown. Money wasn’t an object, since Glen Fisher’s parents were both deceased, and had left him a large sum of money. That, in addition to the sizable trust fund his grandparents had left him, alleviated any monetary concerns. He’d had one brother, ten years his senior, who, along with his wife, had been killed in a car accident a dozen years ago. Their nine-year-old son, Jack, had come to live with his uncle and had remained there until seven years ago, when he’d taken off on his own.

  There was very little outside the norm about Glen Fisher—at least on paper. That made the whole situation more terrifying.

  Casey knew that the NYPD detectives were already on the scene, as were Hutch and Brian Gardiner. She and her team had intentionally arrived a little late, when Suzanne would be preoccupied with the search taking place in her home, and might be more receptive to some human interaction.

  The FI team climbed up the four flights of stairs to
the Fishers’ two-bedroom walk-up, and rang the bell.

  Suzanne Fisher opened the door. She was just as Casey had remembered her from the media footage of the trial—a thin woman with straight, light brown hair that touched her shoulders, angular features and brown eyes that were currently wide with apprehension. She looked like a frightened deer, one who wanted to run but had no idea in which direction to take off.

  “Mrs. Fisher?” Casey asked politely. It was a rhetorical question, not only because Casey recognized her but because diagonally behind her were two detectives, rummaging through a rolltop desk in the living room.

  “Yes.” Suzanne studied Casey quizzically, as if trying to place her. “Are you with the police?”

  “No.” Casey steeled herself for the inevitable reaction. “I’m Casey Woods. This is Marc Devereaux and Claire Hedgleigh. We’re with Forensic Instincts.”

  Sure enough, Suzanne’s entire demeanor altered like the flick of a light switch.

  “I remember you. What do you want?” she asked in a clipped tone.

  “Just to talk to you.” This was a time when candor was Casey’s best ally. “I realize you have no great love for us. But we’re hoping that, by speaking with you, we can help make sure that justice is done.”

  “You’re the reason Glen was arrested in the first place.”

  “We were assisting at the request of law enforcement,” Casey responded in a calm, straightforward tone. “Unfortunately, your husband attacked me at knifepoint in an alleyway. He was trying to rape me when Marc stepped in.”

  Marc didn’t say a word. Casey understood that he was letting her take the lead, which was exactly what she wanted. A woman would have much more success with Suzanne. Not to mention that, between his powerful build and hard features, Marc was the epitome of intimidating. He could scare off a timid woman like Suzanne with one wrong response.