“Yes, we met in court once.” The coroner was too old to even guess his age, but he refused to retire.
“The Turnbull case. I remember.” McCullen nodded toward the body. “What have we got?”
“Female, probably between twenty-five and thirty-five—based on the condition of her teeth—and dead for at least a week. Maybe longer. She also has quite a dent in her skull, so it looks like someone clobbered her.” The coroner moved toward the driver’s side. “I’ll do the autopsy tomorrow and send over my report, but don’t get your hopes up. The forensic evidence is long gone.”
“Thank you.” Please don’t let it be Emma. McCullen braced himself and started for the motel office.
Inside, the smell of cigarettes and burnt coffee was a welcome relief from the wet cadaver odor clinging to the inside of his nostrils. He showed his credentials to the young man at the counter and followed him into a small back office. A fifty-something man with a toupee looked up from his computer.
“Agent McCullen, FBI. Are you the manager or owner?”
“Bob Hamper, owner. I assume you’re here about the body?”
“Yes.” McCullen took a seat in a plastic chair that looked like it had been made in the sixties. “The victim could have been a guest here. Any idea who she is?” He wondered—even hoped— she was a prostitute who worked out of the motel.
“Yes and no.” Hamper took a pull from a silver flask that came out of nowhere. “I’ve been thinking about it since I found her, and she might be connected to the rental car that was left in the parking lot two weeks ago.”
Two weeks ago Emma had been fine. McCullen pulled out his notepad, thinking more clearly now. “What date was that?”
“I’ve been trying to pinpoint it. I think I noticed the car on Thursday, April 25th, so it was probably there before that.”
“What happened?”
“Like I said, the car had been sitting for a couple days, but the license plate didn’t match any guests. So I opened the vehicle and found papers from Shasta Rentals.” Hamper took another pull. “The name Charlotte Archer was on the contract. She’d been a guest here on that Sunday and Monday night and left without turning in her key.”
McCullen jotted down the name but had a sinking feeling it was as fake as the license plate number she’d given the motel. A woman with something to hide. “Did you report any of this to the police?”
“I didn’t have a reason to. She paid for the room in advance, and there was no indication anything had happened to her.” A bead of sweat formed on Hamper’s upper lip. “Shasta Rentals was happy to send someone over to retrieve the car. She may have owed them for a couple more days, but that wasn’t my problem.”
Jackass. McCullen resisted the urge to correct the man’s thinking. He might need the leverage later. “How did she pay?”
“With cash.”
Of course. “Describe the woman.”
“Early thirties, short blond hair.” He paused, as if searching for the right word. “Curvaceous.”
That sounded like Emma. Just a coincidence, he told himself. “Did she say where she was from?”
“She listed Sacramento.”
That could be phony too, but it was a place to start. “What about the room she stayed in? Did she leave any luggage? Or anything unusual?”
“The maid didn’t report a thing, but you can ask her yourself. She’s cleaning in that area now.” Hamper glanced at his monitor. “Charlotte Archer stayed in room eight. It’s right next to the pool.”
An image of a man dragging her body in the dark popped into his brain. “I need copies of anything she filled out or signed, and I want to see the room.”
Hamper stood. “You’re lucky it’s empty this morning. But we’ve had guests in there since the Archer woman.”
McCullen knew he probably wouldn’t find anything, but if she had been murdered, he needed to see the crime scene. He tried to visualize the scenario: An assailant killing the woman and dragging her to the pool. Then what? Back to the room to get rid of her luggage and anything incriminating. “How often do your dumpsters get emptied?”
“Once a week. They came on Monday.”
Shit. He hoped he didn’t have to search the damn landfill.
Down the walkway, he found the maid in room nine. The tiny Latino woman remembered nothing unusual about room eight on any recent morning. Charlotte Archer, the mystery woman, had left nothing behind—except a rental car.
An inspection of the room turned up nothing obvious: no blood stains in the patterned carpet that he could see, no broken or scratched furniture. He didn’t even know for sure that the dead woman had stayed in this room or if Charlotte was her real name. He took one last look around to visualize the crime. What would he use for a weapon if he hadn’t brought one with him?
A lamp on the nightstand caught his eye. The heavy ceramic base could do a lot of damage to someone’s skull. It looked clean, but trace evidence was hard to completely eliminate. With gloved hands, he carried the lamp to his car and placed it in an evidence bag. He would overnight it to the crime lab at Quantico. Maybe they’d find a fingerprint, blood, or scalp tissue.
If not, the case looked impossible. Still, he had to give it his best effort. A woman had been killed and dumped, and her family, if she had one, needed to know what had happened. McCullen gathered up the orange-floral bedspread, thinking it might not have been washed and could possibly contain DNA. As he stuffed it into a plastic bag from the trunk of his car, the maid hurried out from next door.
“I think I remember something,” she said, sounding a little winded. “The worried lady from room eight asked me where she could buy a sledge hammer.”
What the hell?
Chapter 8
Wednesday, May 8, 6:45 a.m.
Spencer woke feeling upbeat for a change. For the first time in two years, his thoughts were not about his sick wife or the uncertain future. Instead, Sonja Barnes was on his mind. The young woman had commented on his blog a few days ago, then engaged him in a lively conversation about water-purification tablets versus portable purifiers. Yesterday, after she’d applied to join their community, he’d checked out her Facebook page. Her photo had pulled him in like a magnet. She was more than pretty—she was intensely compelling, with bright blue eyes that dared anyone to tell her no.
Now she was here in Redding and wanted to meet for lunch! The thought gave him a rush of pleasure. He headed for the bathroom, catching sight of himself in the mirror. Not bad for forty-two, he thought. No stomach fat, no gray hair. He could still attract a younger woman.
Lisa’s feeble voice called to him from the next bedroom, and a stab of guilt sliced through his heart. He was still a married man who loved his wife. Spencer pulled on a robe and rushed to see what she needed.
“I’m thirsty, hon.” Her cracked lips had dried blood on them.
Had he forgotten to apply lip balm the night before? He’d given her a gentle rubdown with lotion. “Your water bottle is right here.” Spencer grabbed the container and handed it to her. Had she been unable to reach it or did she just need attention? Others in the community helped care for her, but Lisa was still alone for periods of time.
He worried she no longer had the strength to even stay hydrated. How many days did she have? Would she die before he set off the financial trigger? That could be a problem. He would need to report her death to the county coroner—who would want to come out. Spencer shook off the worry. They had made it through rounds of FBI questioning about Emma, and they would get through this.
After a workout on the weight machine, which he hadn’t used in a while, Spencer headed for the data center. Raff was already at work, and he’d been there at midnight when Spencer finally called it quits. The hacker looked up. “You’re late, buddy.”
Spencer laughed. “How’s the progress?”
“Slow. Morgan’s key employees change their passwords twice a day, and they don’t open unsolicited email.”
“Kee
p at it for now.” Spencer wondered if they could go ahead without Morgan Bank and still achieve the same effect. “We need to start thinking about a plan B.” He had a second assault lined up that would cause power outages in ten major cities, but it would be more effective if the financial collapse was already happening.
Raff turned to him. “As a prepper, what is your biggest fear?”
“I’m a futurist.”
“Same question. What are you most worried about?”
“Global climate change caused by cars and companies that pump massive carbons into the atmosphere. And by climate change, I mean major storms, droughts, and temperature shifts that make our planet uninhabitable for humans.”
“That’s some serious shit, man.” The hacker cocked his head. “You think you’re going to save the species, don’t you?”
Spencer squared his shoulders. “Yes.”
“Cool.” Raff went back to work.
After an hour of grouping emails into sendable chunks, Spencer’s mind drifted back to Sonja and her sudden appearance in his life. An unpleasant thought gave him pause. Was she a scammer? An opportunist? He would be careful until he knew more, but he really wanted her in Destiny. They needed young people, especially women. He didn’t care that her skills had little to offer in the way of technology or medicine.
“Oh, shit.” Raff bolted upright in his chair.
“What is it?”
“They’ve made me. We’ve got a pingback coming.”
A cold fear seized Spencer’s chest. “I thought we had proxy computers.”
“We do.” Raff’s voice was tight, and he didn’t look up as he madly worked the keyboard. “I’m just deleting all my files over there before anyone sees them and figures out what we’re up to.”
“Can I help?”
“Just let me focus.”
Spencer moved toward the window, too nervous to sit and wait. If Morgan’s security pieced together their attack plans, it would warn its customers, and their assault would likely fail. Would they be able to trace control of the proxy computers to Destiny? If they did, Spencer would go to jail, and the community might fall apart. Raff had assured him a trace was impossible, but Spencer knew that in the tech world, nothing stayed impossible. Should he move the computers to an office in town? He could rent a heated storage unit as an immediate backup, then look at available office rentals after his lunch with Sonja.
For five long minutes, the only sound in the room was Raff clicking the keyboard like a transcriptionist on speed, with only an occasional soft grunt. Spencer tried not to pace.
Finally, the clicking slowed and Raff let out a small whoop. “I think I cleared it all in time.”
Relief washed over Spencer. “Thank goodness.” He strode over and stood near the hacker. “We need new proxy computers.”
Raff got up and stretched. “That’s the easy part. I think we need to forget the banks and try an asset management firm. They have less security.”
“But what can we accomplish?”
Raff laughed, almost scornfully. “Bentley & Eastman is an international firm that controls the money of Standford Oil, Conner’s Electric, and the governments of Lebanon and Syria. Just to name a few entities with mad cash. We could cause a major shutdown if we started making their money disappear.”
* * *
Raff was totally charged. He’d been hacking since he was twelve, but compared to this new gig, everything he’d done up to now seemed like goofing off, including hacking into a casino and shutting it down for a few hours. The Palm Royal had lost a lot of money that day, but none of it had gone into his pocket. He was proud that he’d never stolen anything, no matter how easy it would have been. That was important, because until now his life had been a wasteland with little to be proud of. But hacking was an addiction—kind of like gambling, he figured, but with a different kind of payoff. It gave him the only sense of power he’d ever had.
The Claytons were a different kind of power hungry. Maybe a little insane. They wanted to take down society and send everyone back to an agrarian culture. Raff respected the balls it took to launch such a project, but he had to be skeptical. World commerce would likely rebound. Still, with his help, they could do some serious damage, and in the long run, maybe some good too.
He got back to work, scanning Bentley & Eastman’s website. This would be a major coup. If only he had more time… But Spencer was in a hurry and wanted everything done by Friday. Why was May 10th so important? Oh crap. If Friday was May 10th, this was May 8th, his mother’s birthday. Raff jumped up, excused himself, and went outside. He’d better be able to make a call. The service out here was shit.
The call went through and his mother answered right away. “Good morning, Gabriel. How wonderful to hear from you.”
“Happy birthday, Mom.” Only his family called him that. He’d adopted a pseudonym for hacking long ago. “What have you got planned?” He knew what she would say, but he had to ask.
“Just a quiet dinner with Alima.”
His sister, the lawyer, who made their parents proud. “What’s new? How are you doing?”
“I don’t see you enough, but my health is fine, and the business is finally starting to pick up.”
“It’s all good.” His parents owned a bakery in New York, where he’d grown up. They’d immigrated to the city as young, Middle Eastern refugees, a Jewish man and a Palestinian woman who’d run from the violence and condemnation. His grandmother was still in Gaza. “How’s Noni?”
“Her eyes are very bad now, but she’s found a family to live with.”
“Good. I didn’t like that she was alone.” Raff had only met her once, and he’d hated everything about his trip to Israel—except his grandmother. Her life was poor and tragic, but she’d kept her sense of humor.
“Still, I’m worried about the trouble with Syria,” his mother said. “It could become a regional war.”
In the Middle East, that was always the case. Raff didn’t respond.
“How are you, Gabe? Are you tired of the desert? And the stripper girls? We want you to come home.”
This was how it always ended. “Not yet, Mom. I like Vegas. But when I move again, I’m heading to Hollywood.”
“What about a girlfriend? Have you met anyone?”
“I know lots of girls. I just haven’t settled down yet. I’m still young.”
“But we’re not and we want grandchildren.”
They must have given up on his sister. “Some day. I’ve got to get back to work now. Happy Birthday.”
“You have a job?”
He was already hanging up. Raff stared at the phone, visualizing his mother’s face, her mixed emotions. He wished he hadn’t mentioned work, but if it gave her a little peace of mind, what the hell. She had no idea he was a hacker. She thought he made money online buying and selling things. Close enough. He went back inside to see if he could Trojan-horse his way into a firm that controlled billions of dollars—and cause a little chaos while he was in there.
Chapter 9
Wednesday, May 8, 7:15 a.m.
Dallas drank a cup of coffee and thought about swimming laps in the motel pool, then decided it wasn’t warm enough. Maybe by midafternoon. She changed into workout clothes and headed for the small gym at the end of the building, relieved to find an elliptical machine. The glider faced out the window, and the view of the snow-covered Mount Shasta was stunning. She wondered for the hundredth time why she didn’t leave Phoenix. Would she still be compelled to do undercover work if she lived somewhere aesthetically pleasing?
After a shower, she slipped into a black skirt and low-cut, sky-blue blouse for her lunch with Spencer, then applied more makeup than her usual foundation and mascara. Time to try the pheromones she’d purchased for this assignment. Strictly her own idea, but the bureau rewarded creativity and success. Dallas applied the liquid to her wrists and neck, curious to see if the potion would work and if she would notice the difference. The goal was to win Spence
r Clayton’s affection as quickly as possible. She hoped the pheromones didn’t backfire and attract the wrong person.
With time to kill, she opened her laptop and checked her various email accounts. In her work folder, McCullen had sent her a message saying Emma’s gas tank was empty, reinforcing her theory that the Claytons had engineered the abduction. Their motivation was still a mystery though. In her personal file, Dallas found a sad little note from Trevor, which she ignored. In Sonja’s email, there was a message from Spencer: Thanks for applying to join us at Destiny. You can meet the other members for an informal interview this evening at our monthly gathering.
Yes! She wondered if he had run background checks on her. The undercover unit at Quantico could create a whole life of details in a matter of hours, so she was good either way, but she’d expected more paranoia from a prepper. Their website clearly stated that only those with some college education were welcome, so that limited the applicants to the small group of people who were smart but a little crazy. Dallas responded to his email, then read more of Spencer’s blogs, hoping to get to know him better. Thanks to FBI analysts, she already knew where he’d attended college, what music he liked, and every job he’d had since high school. All of it could be used to establish a connection.
Her Skype icon pinged, startling her. Then she remembered her bi-monthly therapy session with Doctor Harper. Oh crap. She really wasn’t in the mood, but she clicked the answer button anyway.
The therapist’s wrinkled face quickly came into view. Doctor Harper was almost seventy, which had made Dallas uncomfortable at first, but she’d come to trust and respect the shrink. Still, their progress was slow, and Dallas’ patience was growing thin.
“Hey.” She never quite knew what to call her.
“Good morning.” Doctor Harper wasn’t smiling. “I see that you’re not at home. Where are you?”
“Redding, California. It’s a new assignment.”
The Trigger Page 5
