The Blackout

by K J Kalis

  The three of them left, Sal Manko trailing behind, eyeing each of them as he walked away.

  Bart looked up as they left. “Yeah, I recognize that. That was the fraternity I was in during college. What does that have to do with Theresa?”

  Kat could tell from his facial expression he knew exactly what they were asking and why. The question was whether Yasmin could get him to talk about it. Yasmin stepped forward and whispered just loud enough for Kat to hear her, “You know exactly what I’m talking about. How about if we stop playing games? What’s going on here?”

  Bart looked away as if he was trying to decide if he should cooperate or not. “I don’t know. That’s probably a coincidence. I’m just looking for Theresa.”

  Kat could hold herself together no longer. The fact that Bart was stonewalling them when his face told her he knew exactly what they were talking about caused her stomach to clench in fury. She pushed through the agents, “Bart! Tell her what she needs to know!” Kat’s voice was just loud enough that people in the waiting areas had turned to look. “All of this ties back to you — Theresa, the marina fire, the church fire, the wildfire from last night. All of it!”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “That wildfire from last night? The one where your company plunged us into darkness for no reason? That one was started by someone who could override your system and send power surges to transformers, unless you did it yourself. We were nearly killed!”

  Freddie spoke up from the back of the group, his voice low, “Two people died last night. That’s murder, my friend.”

  “Whoa, whoa, whoa! I didn’t have anything to do with that!”

  Kat looked at Van, his face ashen. “I highly doubt that. It’s time to talk. Who is coming after you?”

  Bart looked at the ground again. Kat couldn’t tell if it was shame or if he was calculating what to do. There was a pause. He looked up rolling his head from side to side.

  Yasmin looked at her agents, “Okay, enough with the games. Cuff him. Let’s take him in for questioning.”

  Bart’s eyes got wide. “No, no. I was just thinking, that’s all. I’ll cooperate.” The agents stayed in place, waiting. “It wasn’t me. Yes, we’ve been having trouble with someone from my past. He thinks I stole something from him when we were in college. We’ve been trying to work with him, but he’s been uncooperative.”

  Yasmin tapped her foot on the floor. “Name of this mysterious person?”

  There was another pause. Kat could tell that Bart knew if he gave up the name, the whole scenario would be out of his control. Bart bit the inside of his lip as if he was unconsciously trying not to tell. “He was a fraternity brother. Connor Lewis.”

  Kat felt a surge of relief when Bart said the name. She had to hold herself back from yelling “I knew it!” at him. Yasmin, with her cool demeanor, squinted. “What’s his beef with you?”

  “He thinks I stole some technology he developed. I didn’t. We built it together in college. I just knew what to do with it. Connor was always kind of a loser, if you know what I mean.” He offered a weak smile, one that didn’t play well with Kat.

  Kat was just about to yell at him again, looking forward to her voice bouncing off of the stone walls, when Van touched her arm and nodded. Bart had pulled his phone out of his pocket, his face going pale. Van spoke quietly, “What is it, Bart?”

  “The blue dots. They’re back.”

  * * *

  The agents pulled Bart outside to the curb. Bart’s team was still waiting for him, looking anxious. Yasmin cornered Bart by his car, “What do you mean, ‘the blue dots?’”

  Kat knew that Yasmin was well aware of the blue dots and what Freddie and Chuck had found. Yasmin was trying to get Bart to admit to what he knew, Kat realized.

  “The blue dots. We don’t know where they are coming from.” He looked up at Kat and Yasmin, “Connor. I’m pretty sure Connor is doing this.” He tapped on his phone. “Wait, there’s an alert. Someone is in the building.” Bart looked at Yasmin. “I’m sorry, I’ve gotta go.”

  Before Yasmin had a chance to say anything, Bart jumped in the car where Sal and his lawyers were waiting, the car screaming away from the curb. Kat ran behind Freddie and Van and got back into Cal Fire’s SUV and followed the FBI agents. Freddie glanced at his phone and flipped on his sirens. “Where are we going?” Kat leaned forward between the two front seats. Van had his hand on the passenger side handgrip that was built into the door. Freddie veered around a corner. “Yasmin texted. They are heading to the Palm Coast headquarters to stop the intrusion.”

  “Do we really think Connor Lewis did this?” Van asked, leaning from one side to the other as Freddie took a sharp turn and got on the highway.

  Freddie shook his head. “I’ve got no idea, but no matter what, we’ve got to stop whoever it is. I’m afraid we are running out of time.”

  42

  The server room at Palm Coast Electric & Power was dark and cool, just like the last time Connor had been there. This was his last trip, though he hadn’t planned it. Just some minor upgrades, he smiled. The code finished uploading. He unplugged the cable from his laptop and started to slip his computer back in his bag when his phone beeped. He looked down and tapped on the screen, seeing multiple views of the interior and exterior of the building. Everything was working as planned, except for the people who arrived at the building.

  The FBI or some other arm of law enforcement pulled up in front. He knew he needed to get out, or he’d never finish what he needed to do. He dipped the hard hat he was wearing down a little further on his face and shouldered his bag. It was time to go.

  Connor left the server room just as a young woman wearing a Palm Coast Electric & Power ID badge came in. “Hello,” she said and kept walking. In a big building like Palm Coast, there were so many employees that you couldn’t possibly know everyone. Connor nodded and kept walking.

  During his time as a janitor, one of the old-timers had shown him a back entrance no one ever used. It was part of the original structure, largely built over by now with a newer updated complex. Connor turned into the furnace room, still watching his laptop. The agents were in the building now, crossing the lobby. His heart quickened. He needed to get out before they found him. He picked up his pace and found the door for the utility tunnels, traveling in the darkness. There were no cameras here, only pipes and wires that carried power and water back into the building. The tunnel was about fifty yards long. He knew if they found him there, he’d never be able to get away. Sweat started to run down the back of his neck. At the end of the tunnel, he opened the door and climbed the concrete steps, barely putting a hand on the rusted railing.

  Just beyond the tunnel exit was a patch of woods. A few months before, he had found an old logging road that was still passable about a quarter-mile from the tunnel entrance. The truck was parked there. As he made it into the woods, he checked his phone. The agents were in the power control room now, talking to the people working at the monitors.

  He’d be long gone before they ever figured out what he’d done.

  43

  “There’s no one here, I promise,” Roger said, looking at Candace. “Just these pesky blue dots that keep coming up on our screens.”

  “You haven’t seen anyone come in or out that you don’t know?” Kat’s eyes were searching the room, wondering if Connor Lewis would come out from behind the console to surprise them.

  “No. We were just on the phone with Power Control Solutions again about the blue dots.” Roger looked at Bart Walsh. “Mr. Walsh, didn’t you design the software? Do you know what they are?”

  Kat stared at Bart, his face ashen. “No, I don’t. That’s what we are trying to figure out.”

  Roger blinked, “So you wrote the program, but you don’t know what they are? No wonder everyone is so freaked out about them.”

  With just a nod, Yasmin sent her agents to search the building, bringing the Palm Coast Electric & Power security team alo
ng with them. Yasmin, Bart, Kat and Van headed out to the lobby. Sal Manko was waiting there for them. “Find him?”

  Yasmin squinted at Sal, “You mean Connor Lewis?”

  Sal nodded.

  Yasmin shook her head. Kat could tell she was losing her patience. Before she could say anything, she looked at her phone. “He’s not here. They’ve searched the entire place. He’s gone.”

  44

  Connor stopped at home for a moment to get what he needed. He went into the house, grabbed the bag he had ready with clothes and a few things for his trip and started to head out the door when he passed a picture of Janet and Grace. It was from the birthday party they had for Grace right before they left for Africa. He looked at it, tracing his finger over their images. Rage boiled up inside of him. He grabbed the picture and hurled it to the floor, the glass and frame skittering away. Connor didn’t move. He just stared at the shards that had scattered all over the floor. He knew that if Bart hadn’t stolen his life from him, he’d feel differently now.

  He bent over and brushed the glass fragments off the picture, popping it out of what was left of the frame. Folding it, he jammed it in his back pocket and headed to the garage. He opened the passenger door to the truck and put his bag in, slamming it closed. As he went to the driver’s side, he stopped, looking at Janet’s car. He reached for the trunk release but drew his hand back. “This wasn’t supposed to happen,” he said, staring at the back of Janet’s car where Theresa’s body was. “You got caught up in Bart’s mess. It’s not your fault, really, but I have to leave now. You should have made a different choice. It would have saved your life.”

  Connor calmly got into the truck and pulled out, knowing that if the FBI had finished their search of Palm Coast, they likely knew it was him behind the fires, or at least they were suspicious. He drove around the block and pulled his truck into a park where he could see his house. Connor wanted to see them come, to see them breach the house.

  He didn’t have to wait long. Five minutes passed, and he saw a trail of vehicles approach, agents getting out of vehicles, guns drawn. Connor reached for his phone and typed in the code to execute the program he had loaded earlier in the day just in case they caught him. He waited for a moment to make sure the program had been activated. It had. He gripped the gear shift and put the truck into reverse, slowly backing out of the parking spot he had taken. It was time to go.

  45

  “He’s not here,” Yasmin said about two minutes after the group had arrived at Connor Lewis’ house. “The house is empty. Just some broken glass on the floor.”

  Kat got out of the car, “Can I go in?”

  There was a pause, as if Yasmin was considering what to do. “Yes, but don’t touch anything, okay? This is an active crime scene now.”

  “Of course.” Kat walked in the front door, Van following her.

  The agents were already swarming Connor’s house, their hands gloved to prevent any errant fingerprint from contaminating the scene. Kat watched them. She had worked with the FBI before, when she had helped to find Carlye Morgan, a little girl that had been kidnapped and sex trafficked by a billionaire. This group of agents was different. They were quiet and serious, moving silently through Connor’s house, taking pictures. Kat wondered if Yasmin had trained them that way.

  The house was older, probably built in the 1960s. Some things had been updated, some had not, a hodgepodge of newer and dated styles. There was a plaid couch in the family room and yellow Formica countertops in the kitchen. An agent was hunched over something on the floor. Van called to her, “Kat, take a look at this.” He pointed to the shards of glass that had scattered. “Looks like he threw a picture, but there’s nothing in the frame.”

  Freddie joined them, standing behind Van. “That’s what we’d expect to see in an arsonist. They are very controlled and have outbursts of anger they can’t contain. That’s why they like fire. It helps them to resolve their fury.”

  Kat listened and shook her head, folding her arms across her chest. The house felt cold, not in temperature, but emotionally. Her gut told her something bad had happened here. She walked toward what looked to be an office. If there had been a laptop it was gone, the desk almost completely bare. A few pictures hung on the paneled walls. Kat walked toward them.

  The first picture looked to be of Connor and his wife and daughter. The girl was young in the picture, probably three or four. They were at Disneyland. Connor had his arms wrapped around the young girl, his wife standing close by. The next picture was of a wooden boat, with a man driving, his hair blowing in the wind. It wasn’t Connor. She wondered if it was Connor’s father or grandfather. The last picture, an eight-by-ten in a thin plastic frame was of Connor and his family standing on the porch of a cabin. There were no markers to tell her where it was located, just their smiling faces.

  “Guys, look at this.” Kat unfolded one of her arms and pointed at the picture. “Looks like some sort of family cabin.”

  Freddie glanced at the picture. “Yeah, that looks like the Santa Theresa peak.” Freddie looked over his shoulder, stepping back to let Yasmin have a look. “Is it possible…”

  Their conversation was broken by shouts from the garage. “Special Agent Lee!” The group followed the voices.

  In the garage were two blue jacketed agents wearing rubber gloves. “Ma’am, there’s a body,” the one closest to the door said. Kat watched as Yasmin walked over to the car with no more excitement than she might if she was shopping for groceries. She leaned over and then stepped back.

  “Kat?” Yasmin waved her over to the car.

  Kat walked over, her stomach churning, glancing around her. She was sure whatever they had found was dead. The smell told her that. She wasn’t sure she wanted to see what was in the car trunk, but she walked toward Yasmin anyway.

  The afternoon sun casted long shadows on the ground. In the corner of the garage was a push mower and some tools and a stack of plastic lawn chairs that looked like they hadn’t been used. Near the empty spot where Kat guessed Connor Lewis parked his car, there was a girl’s bicycle, pink with streamers on the ends of each handle.

  Kat stepped around the side of the car and looked in. It was a dead body. The woman was laying on her side, dark patches of black skin gathering on her face where the blood had pooled after it stopped pumping. Her eyes were wide and vacant, her hands curled into claws. Kat moved her eyes down the body, not breathing. One leg was bent forward, the other one twisted and turned the other way, broken fragments of bone sticking out through torn flesh.

  Kat turned and ran out of the garage, a wave of nausea coming over her. She retched into the bushes, her hands on her knees, her stomach convulsing until there was nothing left in it. “Kat, are you okay?” Van asked, his hand on her back.

  “I think so.”

  “Was it the smell?”

  “No,” she stood up, trying to spit out the bitterness that was left in her mouth.

  Freddie ran past them and came back with a bottle of water. “Here. Drink this.”

  Kat took a sip and realized she felt far away. She didn’t know if it was almost getting killed in the fire just a few hours ago or the reality of the mangled body she had just seen. She whispered, “That’s Theresa.”

  * * *

  Once Kat confirmed it was Theresa Walsh’s body, the scene at the Lewis house took a turn. Agents escorted Kat, Van and Freddie down to the lawn while they sealed off the house and called in a forensic investigation team, the local police department and the coroner. Kat heard Yasmin talking to the police chief, “This is just a courtesy call. We will be handling the case.”

  While they were waiting for Yasmin to make arrangements, Kat, Van and Freddie sat on

  the curb and waited. Kat’s head was spinning. The fires, the people that had gotten injured. She knew it was all retribution. The group sat in silence for a few minutes. Kat realized they must have all been trying to process what they’d found.

  “Kat, you’re su
re that’s Theresa Walsh?” Yasmin said, striding over to them.

  “As sure as I can be.” Kat swallowed, “How long do you think she was in there?”

  “Probably since she went missing. The coroner will have to tell us for sure, but it looks like he rammed into her with the car — there is damage to the hood and the bumper — and then tossed her in the trunk. I’d suspect he just left her there.”

  Kat shook her head, as Theresa’s voice and mannerisms floated through her head. They didn’t know each other well, but the idea that someone she knew, the mom of one of Jack’s best friends, was murdered, left her feeling like there was a hole in her chest. She blinked a couple of times and stood up, brushing off her backside. “What do we do now?”

  “There’s nothing more for you to do. We’re going to track down Connor Lewis.” Yasmin turned on her heel to walk away.

  “Hold on there, missy,” Freddie said before she moved away from them. “With the arsons, this is also a Cal Fire issue. The guy you want is out there somewhere. We’ve got no idea what he’s capable of.”

  Kat glanced at Van. He had a look on his face that told her he wanted to say something to Yasmin but wasn’t sure he should. She looked at the ground, knowing she and Van had only been along on the search because of Theresa. Now she was gone. Kat took a deep breath and looked up at Freddie and Yasmin, who appeared to be having a standoff. One of them was going to have to bend or they would end up working the investigations on their own. Kat knew that working in a team helped to get things done faster. It helped with every investigation she’d ever done. “What about that picture? The one of the cabin? How about if we work on that, Yasmin?”

  Kat waited. Yasmin looked to the side, her lips pursed. She didn’t say anything. Kat imagined she was weighing what to do next.