“I’ve got the wrecked car, its contents, his personal effects, the body, a bunch of photos, security disks, and a stack of interviews. You’ll need to send someone to pick them up.”
“Done. I need to see the day planners as soon as possible.”
She opened her flight bag and held up a manila envelope sealed in an evidence bag. “Three day planners and my code-breaking how-to guide, driver’s license, car registration and insurance, credit cards and gas card, a still image from the bank security camera of the man before he died, and as an added bonus I tossed in fingerprints and photos of the two who might have acquired the briefcase. I just need a signature for the evidence chain of custody.”
He held up the pen. “Got the paperwork?”
She handed it to him.
He signed with a bold, legible signature, printed his name, and added a federal case number beneath it.
She handed him the evidence bag.
“We didn’t have her initials,” he said. “And the guy in your morgue might be Charles Ash.”
“See? You’re already making more progress than I did. You can have fun with it, and I can go enjoy a ball game.”
“You don’t want to stay on the case?”
“Why would I? Assuming my idea of a tail is accurate and someone intentionally took the briefcase and the rest of the day planners, they know by now three day planners are missing. They are going to want them back. I’d just as soon they try to take them from you than from me.”
“The wreck was four weeks ago. They likely would have tried by now.”
“I’m reasonably sure they have, and failed in the attempts. They tried for the wreck and found it guarded by a very unfriendly police dog, who was keeping a restored Corvette in the same warehouse safe. They tried for the evidence room, but it’s a former bank vault. Jesse James tried to rob the bank back in 1871, blew a hole in the building, and still couldn’t get it open. They may have tried to hack the department computer system, if you can call a couple connected PCs a network. I’m hoping they made it to the case files, because if they got a copy of the property inventory, it lists three day planners with the notation destroyed by water, unreadable.”
“Nicely played.”
“I wasn’t sure, but I was working a hunch even back then. The pictures from the warehouse break-in didn’t give me much to work with—two middle-aged white guys, jackets, hats, gloves—but they didn’t stay ghosts. They tried a tail on and off for the first couple weeks, but it’s hard to tail me in my own backyard. I reversed it back on them a couple times and showed them some very boring countryside and dead ends. Restaurant staff said Southern accent for both of them, which gets interpreted in my stretch of the world as Georgia rather than Texas. I haven’t seen them in the last couple weeks. I figured they would send someone representing a loved one of the victim and try to claim the driver’s possessions, but there have been no inquiries. I’m still surprised they haven’t gone that route.
“They may have concluded the risk is passed, so why stir up trouble by pursuing it further. As far as anyone watching could tell, I worked the case for three days, touched it again briefly in weeks one and two, and haven’t done anything on it the last couple weeks. The ME is done and the body will be cremated in three months by the county if a loved one isn’t located. The car wreck will go to scrap once the paperwork goes through the bureaucracy. The personal belongings will linger in storage for a year or so depending on when space is needed to be reclaimed. The case is over.”
“Who knows about the day planner code and what you figured out?”
“Me. You.”
“You’ve told no one the day planners were in code, told no one you had a puzzle to solve?”
She liked the fact he was a skeptic, and smiled at him. “I recovered the day planners at the scene, including the one from his shirt pocket, and it’s my handwriting putting them into evidence. No one else ever opened them. And I’m good at keeping my mouth shut when it suits me.
“I burn my trash—it’s the country. My scratched-out attempts to crack the code no longer exist. I’m about six months behind in finishing my reports. I have them transcribed from audiotape so the law clerk has enough work and can keep her job. The tapes for this case and several others are still in the evidence vault in a box I misfiled a decade ago, where I keep all kinds of personal things, including a few nicely autographed baseball cards. When I say it’s possible for you to collect and have everything that exists on this case, I’m being literal.”
She rose. “You want to get busy with those documents, and I want to get to the game, so I’m going to head out. Why don’t we leave it that you’ll call me tomorrow when you have arrangements made to pick up the wreck and the rest of it.” She clicked off the recorder, ejected the digital card and the tape duplicate, and handed them to him.
He stood up. “Better yet, let me head down with you. We’ll stop on three and get an evidence guy scheduled to pick up the wreck and then talk to the ME about transferring the body. I can at least escort you to the lobby before I dive into this.” He locked the evidence bag and the tapes in his office safe. “Can you have the rest of it, the security tapes and interviews, packed up and under seal to be picked up tomorrow?”
“I can.” She picked up her bag and followed him. Falcon led the way to the elevators and pushed the down button just as the stairway door opened and an agent walked through, scanning a report in his hand.
“Dave,” Ann said.
Kate’s husband, Dave Sinclair, glanced over and his face lit up with a smile.
“Ann’s in the house.” Dave slung his arm across her shoulders and hugged her. “I gotta feed you, woman, and bug you with toddler pictures.”
“Got them on you?”
He reached for his wallet and dumped out a handful of photos.
“Holly’s got her mom’s smile.” Ann turned one of the photos toward him. “I told you she was going to love the wrapping paper.”
“She’s eaten the ear off your fuzzy kitten.”
“I figured she would.”
“Coming to dinner?”
“Lisa and I are hitting the game.”
“Perfect day for it. Come for breakfast then. Kate would love to see you. She’s setting you up with her new hire, some guy from Scotland Yard.”
“Not this trip, but I’ll enjoy dodging her attempt.”
“Something interesting bring you our way?”
“Just dumping what I can stretch to be federal.” The elevator opened. Ann held the door but didn’t step on. “You still need me to ferry the plane to Wichita Saturday?”
“I’d love it if you could,” Dave replied. “They gave me a six p.m. slot, and promised a seventy-two-hour turn. They are dropping out the rudder assembly to replace a recalled actuator.”
“I’ve got to be in Salina Monday anyway. Henry Stanton got a new trial.”
“How did he manage that?”
“A very fine lawyer. I’ll handle the FAA for you, then maybe do a checkout ride south on the loop home.”
“It’s an enjoyable ride.”
She smiled. “It is that. Tell Kate I’ll tag her once I link up with Lisa.” She stepped onto the elevator. The doors closed. She glanced at Falcon across the elevator. “Sorry about that.”
“No problem.” Paul pressed the button for floor three. Something special there, he thought. He’d known Dave for too long not to recognize the delight when he had looked up and seen Ann. She had to be nearly family for him to have that relaxed joy show up just on seeing her. It would be easier to ask Dave about that than Ann. “How long have you been flying?”
“I paid for college ferrying planes around. Now it just cuts down on travel time.”
“That sounds like serious fun. What did you fly in on today?”
“I took a Cessna with a flaky autopilot into Milwaukee for repairs, and caught a lift south with highway patrol. There’s a stranded floatplane on Lake Michigan that needs someone to baby it h
ome. If waters are calm enough in the morning, I may fly that one back.”
“You enjoy the air time.”
“Like some guys enjoy fast cars.”
The doors opened on three. Paul got an evidence guy assigned to head south, and the ME to agree to arrange the transfer of the body by the end of the day. They headed from the third floor down to the lobby. Ann turned in her visitor credentials.
“Enjoy the ball game, Ann.”
“I plan to. It’s been a pleasure, Falcon.”
He watched until she cleared the front doors and caught a cab. He hadn’t been expecting to meet someone today, the kind that went on the personal side of the ledger and deserved a second look, and he thought he just might have. Ann Silver. He was going to come back to that name before the day was done. Paul pulled out his phone and headed back to the elevators. “Sam, push off sleep for a few more hours. I need everyone to the conference room. We just got a break on our lady shooter.”
2
Paul slid his credentials through the security scanner, punched in his code, and entered the secure conference room on the eighth floor that he considered his second office. The walls around the room were old school case boards, filled with photos and reports and timelines, keeping the progress visible to everyone working on his team. And his team had gotten large.
It baffled him how many people he had collected. The early days it had been Paul and Sam, with Rita being the agent Paul pulled along with them through every promotion. She could think on her feet and, more important, put up with Sam, and Paul knew a good thing when he found it. The three of them had worked together on cases, content to stay out of the flow of office politics.
Now he walked in on a mass of humanity. He had fifteen agents assigned to him. Four were seasoned homicide guys, eight were here by request of his boss who wanted him to rub the rough edges off the new guys, and three were here because he’d given in to pleas from experienced guys who otherwise would have been assigned to foreign liaison jobs in the last personnel shuffle.
Get murdered carrying a federal badge and having a security clearance, odds were good he saw the paper on the murder or his guys worked it. He pointed them toward where to start and tossed them out to work the cases, and he played lifeguard if they got into trouble. He didn’t have to manage them. Rita handled that for him. She was either their mother, friend, or boss, depending on what she knew was needed.
He scanned the conference room to find Sam and realized the people count had grown even more since he had made his trip down to the lobby. The legal expert who did warrants for the team had appropriated a table for himself, and three interns were clustered around his data expert. He missed the Paul, Sam, and Rita days more every time he walked into the conference room. But for right now, today, he could use them all. He might even need to borrow a few more.
“Rita, case five.”
“Really?” Her face lit up and excitement rippled among those in the room. “Case five, coming up, boss.” In moments she had boards moving across the walls until the entire room featured one case. Thirty murders, each one displayed in the sequence it had occurred. Tracking down the lady shooter and those who hired her had consumed more man-hours than any other case they had worked, and he had inherited it from the guy before him. Falcon wanted to be the one to close this case.
“Arnett, there is a Diet Coke can on the coaster in my office. Get it to the lab. I need fingerprints for elimination purposes. I’ll wait for you before I begin the briefing, so don’t get delayed by chatter.”
“Two minutes, boss.” Arnett headed to the door.
“Listen up, everyone. What you are working on, put it to bed. If you’ve got calls or interviews scheduled for the next three days, hand them off or push them out. Everyone’s in on the first round. We hit a wall, I’ll push you back to current assignments.”
Around the room, people picked up phones to begin clearing schedules.
Paul set the evidence bag and the audio digital card and tape on the table he used as his desk. He got lunch from the deli tray perched on the half-sized refrigerator. He could feel it now, the relaxed emotions yet intense mental focus that came when a case began to move and there was something interesting to pursue. This was why he was a cop. He had run hundreds of cases over the years, and he never failed to enjoy the detail work and the chase that was at the core of the job.
Arnett returned, and the last phone calls finished. Paul moved to the front of the room.
“I’m going to play a tape, a long tape, and I want it quiet while it plays, no multitasking, everyone doing nothing but listening. Her name is Ann Silver. She’s a downstate cop, and she showed up this morning to bring us the best lead we’ve had on the lady shooter in ten years. She understands exactly what she’s got, she’s handing it to us, and she doesn’t want in on the case. You won’t meet many like her during your entire career, so pay attention.” He settled into a chair and turned on the tape.
Ann was an even better storyteller the second time around, when he knew what was coming, and he could see her play it out with that refined sense of timing.
He watched his team as the audio played.
He could tell they didn’t know what to think of her. The younger ones around the room were thinking small-town cop and beginning to fidget, but the older, more experienced guys were leaning forward, recognizing something in her voice, in the verbal execution of her report, and starting to sense this was more than just a good cop. Sam was leaning back, hands folded across his chest, a small smile on his face. He’d pegged her for what she was, a master class of cop, and was enjoying the story and its telling.
Ann began to elaborate on the day planners, and Paul scanned the room, knowing what was coming.
“July 7, 1999, and Saw news YM died, turns out to be a rather unique combination. My search turned up the name Yolanda Meeks. And I landed in your murder investigation.”
He heard a gasp from Rita.
“VR and October 7, 2002, gave me Victor Ryckoff. And there I was again. In your murder investigation.”
Christopher couldn’t resist getting up to walk to the murder boards, scanning the history.
“So—I know it’s thin, but is it enough I can dump this guy and this wreck off my desk and onto yours?”
And then Paul’s own voice on the tape.
“I’ll take it all.”
Jason tried to sneak in a few keystrokes to bring up a file on his console. Paul held up a hand to stop the whispered conversation beginning in the back of the room. No one was fidgeting now. Sam looked happy, and Paul caught his gaze long enough to share the smile. There was reason to be happy. He let the tape play through to conclusion and then clicked it off. Conversations erupted.
Paul smiled as he got to his feet. He picked up the evidence bag and held it up. “Settle down, people. We’ve obviously got some work to do. Assignments first, then I want to hear what you think.
“William, the initials L.S., T.M., G.N.—check every name anywhere in the case file, people who were interviewed, friends of the victims, every address book, letter, and scrap of paper in evidence. Check it all.
“Kelly, the medical examiner and everything he can tell us about this man. Work the prints, DNA, and photo through everywhere we can touch. This guy might be Charles Ash.
“Peter, the two who were tailing Ann Silver, trying to retrieve the three planners. Who are they, where are they, and are they still a danger to my cop? I want an answer on that today, so use our chits to get others making it their priority too. Who sent these two? Who were they working for? Someone knew the middleman well enough to know he was closing that box, and can give us his name.
“Arnett, forged documents. Who, what, where, when—everything they can tell us. Have we seen documents like them before, who created them, where do they lead us to look next?
“Daniel, those three day planners. Are there any fingerprints that can be recovered other than hers? Then scan the pages, pulling the six dates sh
e gave us first. Use her code how-to guide and throw the decoded pages up on the board as fast as you work through them.
“Christopher, the other notations in the day planners. What do they tell us, where can they lead us?
“Jason, the bank. Did he have an account there as well as a safe-deposit box? Where did they mail his bill for the box fee? And I want the records on that safe-deposit box, every date he signed in for the last thirty-eight years. Signature cards, anything he ever signed or filled out. I want you on a plane today and the president of the bank your new best friend.
“Franklin, talk to the other guys in the sandbox—Treasury, CIA, DEA, other pockets around here—high-value middleman making connections for people. Who are they hunting? Our guy will be doing business with more than just our lady shooter if he’s been active this long. We’ll share what we have as long as they give us someone inside their loop. I don’t want heads bumping. Only one agency is going to go through the door when we find his home, and I want it to be us. We’ll share what we find if there are cases overlapping with other agencies. Get Montgomery up to speed; he’s going to be our guy working the politics and making that happen.
“Sullivan, the car, its contents, and the other items coming into evidence tomorrow. I want to know what was missed.
“Rita, I need a transcript of that audio, and new boards started, a timeline on the middleman, and one working the day planners.
“Sam, you and I are going to focus on the murders of Yolanda Meeks and Victor Ryckoff. I’m convinced there is enough here to put names on who paid to have them killed. The initials, the dollar amounts paid, and dates the deposits cleared—we’ll find a thread to link old and new.
“I’ll want people in the field in forty-eight hours working whatever we find, so rearrange your personal schedules and get freed up to travel. Those of you married, with kids, go home for dinner and stay to put them to bed. You can come back in tonight if you must. Transportation is approved for anything you need while this is hot on the board, so commute on the bureau and maximize your time.