by Ponzo, Gary
When Kang finally stopped by to check on me in person, similar to his last visit, Po Po sent him upstairs to my office unannounced. It’s a good thing I don’t work in the nude.
“We caught a break.”
I spun around in my chair in time to see Kang enter my office. Before I could react, he took a seat next to me and started talking. “A day after our investigation at the apartment, one of the uniforms on perimeter patrol mentioned to me that he’d spotted a cab driver parked in the alleyway next to the building.”
“I like it when people do their jobs, don’t you?”
“Yeah, I already gave him an earful. Anyway, he never got a name or plate, but he said it was a Yellow Cab. So I visited our friend at the cab company—”
“The one with the grungy nails and an office that resembled the city dump?”
“That’s the one. He did some digging and came up with two names for me. I questioned them both.”
“And?” I asked, my body tensing a bit.
“One of them was the driver in the alley that day.”
I smiled at Kang. “Good work, Detective.”
“Thanks. By the way, how’s the leg?” he asked, pointing.
“Meh. It’s slowly healing. What’s to say? Tell me more about this cab driver.”
“Immigrant from Pakistan.” Kang removed a small notebook from his jacket. “His name is Yousuf Ijaz. He confirmed that our guy was his fare and that he had promised him $100 to wait in the alley. The pick-up address was a home on Russian Hill.”
“Near you?”
“Nah, this was a nice house on the east side with views of North Beach and the bay. Above my pay grade.” Kang chuckled. “I got a search warrant and hit the place ASAP. We found plane ticket stubs, originating from Toronto, suggesting they’re Canadians.”
“Married?”
“Seems like it. We also found multiple passports and fake facial hair. Looks like the guy sported a disguise as well. They’re pros, and know how to cover their trail. Right now, we’re working with authorities in Toronto to ID them. Our findings don’t stop there, though.”
I gave Kang my best Oliver Twist impression. “More, please.”
“We found a laptop with pictures and videos that document their crimes.”
I threw myself back into my chair. “No way!”
“Yeah, pretty stupid, huh?”
“How incriminating is it?”
Kang leaned forward. “Devastating. One of the videos shows the woman striking your vic with a hand axe.” His hands emphasized his words. “Pretty gruesome stuff, and it nails the case shut. We’re pretty sure their real names are Jerry and Vicki Carlson. Once we confirm it, we can file the case away.”
“What you do mean ‘file it away’? What about the staging at the crime scene? Or our theory that it was done for someone else or a group of people?”
“We solved the murder. We found our victim’s killers.”
“Did we? I think we found two of the people involved. There’s more to it. I can feel it.”
“Why couldn’t the photos and videos be souvenirs, something to inflate their egos? Maybe they got off watching themselves in action. There are plenty of documented cases where a serial killer keeps photos or clothing or something from the crime scene.”
“I hear you, but this is different. If it were for their pleasure, why go through all that extra trouble of coming up with presentation that tied into an SF icon? It makes no sense. Something or someone else prompted them to act this way.”
Kang leaned back. His ego and mood deflated and swooshed out of his lips.
“Look, I know if we keep digging, it prevents you from closing the case on your end, which keeps your a-hole boss on your back. It also prevents me from closing my case. But we both know there’s more to this story.”
I knew that was the last thing Kang wanted to hear. To be inches away from putting this case to bed and then realize there might be more to it had to be irritating. The other part of the equation: if I was wrong, Kang got skewered. Not an easy decision. Cavanaugh didn’t care about the truth. He cared about stats. Kang said the department had a ninety-percent solve rate for their cases and staying there was what mattered. Cavanaugh made me appreciate Reilly.
“So what do you want to do?” he asked with a shrug.
“What else was on the laptop?”
“The photos and videos were the only incriminating thing we found. The rest were just personal files and programs.”
“That’s what we need to be paying attention to. It may give us a clue as to who else might be involved.”
“Well, we combed all their email and social media accounts, and nothing came up.”
“My guess is you were looking for the wrong thing.”
“What do you mean?” he asked, his brow crinkled.
“You were looking for evidence that ties them to our victims. We need evidence that ties them to their audience.”
Chapter 48
“No way. I can’t do that. If Cavanaugh finds out I’m intentionally derailing his closure rate, I’ll be relegated to foot patrol faster than you can spew a quick remark.”
Did he slam me or compliment me? “Look, I know I’m asking a lot, but if we’re right, not only will we put away another degenerate, but this will put you in a better light with your captain. That has to earn you some extra donuts in the morning, right?”
Kang rubbed his chin and chewed his bottom lip. I had never seen a cop mull over a decision to chase a bad guy. Well, maybe I had, but this was Kang. This guy was straighter than a baton when it came to policing.
“Do you really need the laptop?”
“How else am I to find the information? Where is it now?”
Kang shifted in his seat and looked away. “It’s bagged and sitting in the evidence room under lock and key.”
“Will it be a problem to get it?”
“This evidence seals the case. If anything happens to it, or it gets damaged, or the contents get erased… we’re screwed.”
“Hulk be careful. Hulk no break laptop. Hulk promise,” I grunted.
Kang shook his head. “I don’t know, Abby. Can’t you come down to the precinct? I can probably get you access for a few hours.”
I looked at my injured leg and then back at him, triggering his eyes to roll upward.
“Come on, Kangster,” I pleaded. “Kangman,” I continued. “Kangis Khan. See? I can do the name thing too… Kangaroo.” I batted my eyelashes, threw in a pout and waited for him to cave. It took two seconds. You still got it, Abby.
While I had enjoyed watching Kang succumb, I had a better solution than just snagging the computer. I really didn’t need the laptop. If I could copy the entire contents of the hard drive, I’d technically have the laptop without needing the actual laptop. And to be honest, I really didn’t need his permission for him to agree. As an FBI agent, I had the authority to confiscate the contents of that laptop for the purpose of my investigation if needed. I was being mindful of his situation with his supervisor—which was so unlike me. I sent an email to Reilly to keep him in the loop in case the SFPD found out and cried about my methods. He sent his usual reply. “Do what you need to do to get the job done.”
Later that evening, Kang returned with the laptop, and I copied the entire contents over to an external hard drive. He was eager to get it back into the evidence room and was out the door as soon as I had finished. I didn’t bother to wait for him to return before I checked out the contents.
“Anything yet?” Kang asked when he returned a half hour later with two plates of food. He noticed the look of confusion on my face. “Oh, your Po Po gave this to me on the way up.”
He handed me my plate and proceeded to shovel beef and broccoli into his mouth. “She’s a good cook,” he managed between bites. “This is the real deal.”
“Tell me about it. I overeat at every meal.”
“So what’s the latest?”
I swallowed before answering. �
�Nothing yet. I went through his email, his documents folder and the trash.”
“So did we. We also looked through his photo organizer and video folders.”
“What about his Internet history?”
“We looked at it, but nothing popped out.”
I opened the browser. A quick scan showed a lot of SF searches for information on sights and attractions. It didn’t take long before I found dirt. “Looks like they’ve visited the personals on a few adult directories. Escort services.”
“Yeah, we saw that. He’s got an active life back home.”
“The searches appear to be for escorts here, not Toronto.”
Kang stopped chewing. “Why would he want an escort in SF?”
“Maybe he and the woman were platonic.” I shrugged.
“No sex, just kills?”
“Yeah, it doesn’t make sense to me either.” I pulled up a few of the pages they had visited. “Well this is interesting. The searches are all for male escorts.”
“So the woman wanted action.”
“I wouldn’t judge too quickly. We don’t know that it wasn’t the guy.”
Kang’s head bobbed from left to right as he continued to eat.
I tapped a finger on my desk. “You know, they could have been trolling for another victim.”
“A male escort? What’s the connection to SF?”
I raised an eyebrow at Kang. “You ever get out of Chinatown?”
He still had a puzzled look on his face while he scooped food into his mouth.
“San Francisco is a hotbed for porn production specializing in the alternative scene,” I said. “Maybe they were planning something in the Castro. They’ve visited at least twenty different ads on this site alone. Let’s see if they reached out to any men of the night.”
I opened the mail program and checked the emails they had sent.
Kang must have noticed the smile on my face. “Did you find something?”
“They contacted a bunch of them. Let’s see who responded.” I checked the inbox on the days they were on the hunt for an escort. “I’ve found some replies.”
“Well?”
“Hang on.” I scanned a few emails. “Seems as though their interests with the escorts had to do with their size, and I’m not talking height. I see some back and forth with an escort who calls himself Sampson… Here we go. They had a meeting set up with him at the Parc 55 Wyndham.”
“We don’t have a victim named Sampson, so maybe he was a potential.”
“I doubt that’s his real name, but none of our victims fit Sampson’s profile. He’s a six-foot-three, muscular black man.” I shrugged. “He’s worth seeking out. Let’s set up a meeting.”
“You really think this escort was involved?” Kang asked.
I leaned back in my chair and patted my belly like a bongo drum. “I’m not sure. It could have been a legitimate hire for an adventurous threesome.”
“Or there’s more to it.”
“Exactly. But we won’t know until we talk to him.”
Chapter 49
I set up a new Gmail account and typed out an email to Sampson, explaining that we were a Chinese couple seeking his services for a threesome. “Anything else you think we should mention?” I asked Kang.
“That sounds like a typical query. It should work.”
I hit the send button, and the email swooshed its way to our escort. It was nearing nine at night. I told Kang I would text him when I had a response. As I walked him to the front door, he mentioned, “I know the manager of the Hyatt in Chinatown. I can arrange for a room if this thing gets that far.” I nodded my agreement and said goodnight.
Ryan was the only one up; Po Po and Lucy had gone to bed earlier, at eight. Once I had tucked him into bed, I had the house to myself with no distractions.
I popped back into my office and continued with my search through the Carlsons’ computer files. I wasn’t hopeful with the escort angle. My gut told me he showed up, did his job and left. There had to be something we were missing. They knew how to cover their tracks and they had multiple identities, so they clearly had experience. Yet they had taken pictures and made videos of their crimes. Why go through all the trouble of disguising themselves and leaving no evidence or witnesses at the crime scenes, then erase all of that by keeping evidence of their deeds on their computer? Someone that good wouldn’t do that unless there was a valid reason, like proving they had killed a person. Was that it? Did they document their crimes to prove they had done them? Was this about showmanship or proof? A contract killer might be required to provide proof. But I didn’t believe these were contract kills.
I looked in the all the obvious places more times than I could count, thinking maybe I had missed something. To be sure, I looked in every folder. Sometimes people hide the good stuff in places that are right out in the open but where you would never think to look, like in an Applications folder—better yet, the Utilities folder.
I clicked on the Applications folder and saw a list of the usual programs that came loaded on a Mac. The only additions were Adobe Photoshop and Microsoft Word. I scrolled until I found the Utilities folder. Again, normal stuff needed to keep the laptop functioning. I didn’t find any strange, out-of-place folders. What am I missing?
I began to think they kept a laptop primarily to store videos and photos and to surf the Internet. Outside of the escort emails, the rest of their email activity was tourist related: hotel and flight bookings, purchasing tickets to attractions and, of course, things to do in San Francisco. The same went for their online activity. Each corroborated the other.
The staged crime scenes, the pictures and videos—this was all for someone else. Another person viewed our couple in action, but how? Could they have hand-delivered the evidence of their deeds on a flash drive? If that were the case, then tracing their steps back to that person would be difficult, if not impossible.
I went back to their Internet history. The couple had visited the Kayak website a lot, and Kayak memorizes your last search. Maybe their next step could tell me more.
No such luck. The “to” and “from” fields were filled in with Toronto and San Francisco. What about a return flight? I dug back into the emails and found the airline confirmation email. They had purchased one-way tickets. Did they not intend on returning? Were they planning on staying in San Francisco? Were they last-minute travelers who bought their plane tickets days before travel? I went back to the airline confirmation email. The date they booked and the date of travel were separated by two days. I wondered if their travel plans were dependent on another trigger, like permission or instructions. Or were they simply not sure of their next move? What am I missing? What else could tell me more about these two individuals that I don’t already know?
There were no Word files saved in their Documents folder. I even booted Word to see if there were recent files opened. None. I did the same for Photoshop, Excel and more. And then my eye caught their Games folder. Hmmm, a serial killer that plays Angry Birds. Who would have thought?
I opened the game. There appeared to be consistent gameplay since they had completed five levels. I opened a few other games, unsure if it would lead me to anything, but it was something to do. As I moved from game to game, all I gathered was that they liked to play the popular ones, all of them PG rated. I didn’t see any shoot ’em up or fighting games. You would think a serial killer would rather play those than Mahjong or Solitaire. Go figure. I was a click away from closing the Applications folder and calling it a night when I spotted an app with a dragon icon. There was no file name, just a blank space next to the icon, which explained why I had missed it on the first pass.
I clicked on the app, and the screen went black. An animated, fire-breathing dragon materialized. It put on a brief show before morphing into the game’s logo: Chasing Chinatown. I leaned back in my chair as both sides of my mouth climbed higher. I got you guys.
Chapter 50
It was near midnight when I received
a text from Kang that he was standing outside my home. When I opened the front door, I was amused by his down dressing. He had on sweatpants, a hoodie and a baseball cap.
“What?” He asked, his body language defensive. “You said get over here as fast as I could. I was already in bed.”
I motioned for him to hurry inside. “We hit the jackpot,” I said as I skip-hopped past him and up the stairs. “Come on; I’ll show you what I found.”
I moved up the stairs and into my office as quickly as my leg would allow. Slightly out of breath, I pointed to the laptop. “Take a look.”
Kang took a seat at my desk and stared at the screen. On it was a simple outline map of the world with the major cites of various countries represented by glowing red dots. A blue trajectory line connected Toronto and San Francisco.
“Is this some sort of a game?”
“Yes. It’s a game that our killer couple has been playing.”
“Wait, you got me out of bed to look at a game?”
I stood with my weight resting on one leg and my hand on my hip. “It’s more than a game. I’ve been poking around this program for the last hour or so, not to mention I had to crack a password to even get access. Let me explain. It’s kind of like a travel log. It keeps track of their expenses and the miles they’ve logged and the most interesting—”
Kang held up his and interrupted me. “Hold on, Abby. I’m still not seeing the importance.”
“Well, if you would zip it and let me finish, you would.”
“Fine.” He turned back toward the laptop, giving me the floor.
“As I was saying, the most interesting part of this all is that it keeps track of their kills.”
Kang straightened up.
“That got your attention, didn’t it?”
“Keep going.”
