The McKays Box Set - To Kill For, Blood Sport, Hard Time & Gang Land

by A. J. Carella

  “Nothing. Dammit, I was so sure.”

  Kat looked up to where Kyle sat back on his heels, looking deflated. “It doesn’t mean it’s definitely not connected, though, does it.”

  “No, but it’s going to make it a damn sight harder to prove and to get anyone to listen to us.”

  She had nothing to say to that, knowing he was right, so she just leant down to check under the last cabinet, and froze. Sitting there surrounded by dirt and dust, but somehow still gleaming as if it had just been placed there, was a pearl.

  “I don’t believe it,” she said under her breath, almost reverently. “Kyle, get over here!” She spoke up so he could hear her. Grinning, she sat back while Kyle dropped to his stomach and looked. He looked up at her triumphantly before sliding his gloved hand under the cabinet to try and retrieve it.

  “I can’t reach it, my hand’s too big. You try.”

  Taking his place, Kat slid her hand under the cabinet and, her hands being smaller, she was able to get slightly further under. Feeling around she felt its round shape under her fingertips and gently rolled it until it appeared out in the open on the kitchen floor. Both of them sat and looked at it for a moment before looking at each other and grinning.

  Carefully, Kyle picked it up and placed it into a small plastic bag taken from his pocket before holding it up and taking a closer look.

  “You can see flecks of blood,” he pointed with his finger, “there, and there. That should be enough to prove that it came from the crime scene.”

  Kat stood and brushed the front of her pants which were grubby from crawling around on the kitchen floor. “It still doesn’t prove he didn’t do it, though.”

  “No,” Kyle agreed, also getting to his feet. “But it’s a start.”

  Fifty-One

  Callahan had tried every trick he knew to get the warden to talk during his interrogation the day before, but by the end of the day, he still hadn’t got anything out of him. He hadn’t even asked for a lawyer; he’d just sat there, refusing to talk.

  The guard known as Red, real name Arnold Hicks, had been more forthcoming, but he’d known nothing about who was behind the hits or how the victims were chosen so he’d been unable to give them the information they wanted. He had been charged and after spending the night at the local jail, would today be sent to a prison out of state to await trial.

  He and his boss had checked into a local motel for the night last night, wanting to get started on the warden again early this morning. She wasn’t the most sociable of people and, after eating together, she’d taken herself off to her room and left him alone. He’d thought about phoning Kat but he was still angry. Admittedly, he didn’t know her well but his impression of her had been of someone who would fight hard to do the right thing, someone who was passionate about justice. That’s what had drawn him to her, seeing the way she had fought for Daniel and to put the monsters who’d abused him away. He’d obviously gotten her wrong, though, which was unlike him. Usually, he was a good judge of character but the person he’d asked out on a date would never have hid a fugitive, no matter who he was, and wouldn’t have tried to take matters into her own hands. There was no denying he was still attracted to her, but he was no longer sure that he wanted to date her.

  In the end, he’d decided not to call her. He was under strict instructions from his boss that he wasn’t to discuss the case with her and he wasn’t sure they had anything else to talk about right now.

  Instead, he’d gone back to his room and sat up for a few hours, going over his plans for the interrogation today.

  “You know where you’re going with this?” Agent Shaw asked him as she entered the small room the local P.D. had set aside for them to use while they were there.

  “Yes. Are you going to speak to the district attorney?” While he’d been sitting alone last night he’d run over that day’s interrogation in his head. The only time that the warden had seemed rattled was when Callahan had pointed out that an ex prison warden going to prison wasn’t likely to have a very long life expectancy. When he’d met with Shaw this morning over breakfast, he’d suggested that they offer him a deal, if the D.A. was willing. They’d allow him to serve his time at a prison at the other end of the country where no one would know him or anything about him in return for his cooperation.

  Shaw checked her watch. “As soon as the D.A.’s office is open I’ll call them and run it past them. I can’t see it being a problem.”

  “Good. Okay, let’s get this done.”

  The local P.D.’s cells were in an annex to the building that had been added some years ago. There were only six cells and it was rare for more than one or two to be occupied. After showing his I.D., a deputy opened the outer cell door, allowing him entry to the row of six cells, three on each side of a short corridor. The warden was in the cell at the far end on the right hand side.

  The swinging feet didn’t register immediately and it wasn’t until his eyes reached the warden’s neck, which was bent at an unnatural angle, that he sprang into action.

  “Quick, open the cell!” he shouted as he grabbed at the barred door, willing it to open. With a clank, it was unlocked before slowly sliding open. As soon as the gap was wide enough for him to fit through, he squeezed in and grabbed the warden around his thighs, lifting him to take the weight off his neck.

  He heard running feet and another pair of arms wrapped themselves around the legs, helping him.

  “Have you got anything we can use to cut him down with?” Callahan asked. The warden had taken off his shirt and torn it into strips, fashioning a makeshift noose. Taking advantage of a bad design, he had looped it over a water pipe that ran the length of the ceiling before standing on the edge of the bunk and stepping off.

  “I’ve got a pen knife in my desk drawer.”

  “Go and get it, quickly.”

  Taking the full weight of the body once more, Callahan cursed under his breath as he waited for the deputy to return. They needed him to be okay. If he died they were at a dead end.

  Running footsteps told him that the deputy had returned. Callahan’s arms were burning with effort of holding the dead weight so they swapped places and he climbed up onto the edge of the bunk and, balancing with one hand holding the water pipe, he sawed at the fabric until, with a loud tear, it came loose. The warden crashed down, landing on top of the deputy who quickly scrambled out from under him.

  “Get a paramedic, quick.” Callahan said, stepping down from the bunk quickly and rolling the warden onto his back. There was no sign of any breathing and his lips were blue. Damn. Damn. Damn. Remembering his CPR, he tilted the warden’s head back and started mouth to mouth and chest compressions.

  He had no idea how long he was there for, but he was completed exhausted by the time he felt a hand on his shoulder.

  “We’ll take it from here.”

  Gratefully, he stood and moved out of the way to allow the professionals to get to work. Agent Shaw had obviously been told what was happening and he caught her eye and shook his head as she appeared in the doorway.

  He looked back to what was happening on the floor, hoping for a miracle, but he didn’t get one.

  “I’m sorry, he’s gone.” The paramedics stopped trying to revive him and stood. “There’s nothing more we can do.”

  “Thank you for trying.” Callahan turned to the deputy. “You can take care of things here, can’t you?” He didn’t wait for a reply before walking out of the cell.

  “How did this happen?” Shaw asked him as they walked along the corridor and out of the cell block.

  “I don’t know, but someone’s going to have some explaining to do.” He was furious. “Damn. Now what?”

  They walked into their office and closed the door. “We’re just going to have to come at this from a different angle.” Shaw walked over to the single desk they’d been provided and picked up a file. “We’ve got a list of all the ‘hits’ here. We’ll just have to go through each and every one and see i
f we can find a link. Granted, it’s going to be harder, but if we can find that link, we might just find out who it benefited to see them dead.”

  Fifty-Two

  Kat had called Finn from the car on the way back to Brecon Point. The pearl changed everything, they were sure of it, and they needed his help once again. He’d agreed to meet them at the station and he was there waiting for them when they arrived.

  Kat told him about what they’d found this morning and its significance.

  “That’s two crime scenes, exactly the same M.O. and with the same calling card. This proves that Alex is innocent.”

  “Actually Kat, it doesn’t. It just means that Alex might have committed another murder, too.”

  Kat was taken aback. He was right, of course; she just hadn’t thought about it like that. “Okay, that’s true, but I’m sure we’ll be able to establish he didn’t commit the L.A. murder.” She exchanged a glance with Kyle. “We’d like you to check something for us. We think this guy is a serial. If we’re right, then it’s likely there are other victims that haven’t been connected yet. We haven’t got access to the system to search, but you do.”

  It looked for a moment as if he was going to refuse when he didn’t answer immediately, but he eventually nodded his head. “You could be right. Okay, let’s take a look.”

  Swiveling his computer screen around so they could all see, Kat watched as he inputted the search parameters. They only had two victims, so there wasn’t a lot of information they could provide. The search would mainly focus on the unusual M.O. Kat was sure she wasn’t the only one holding her breath when he hit the enter button.

  It didn’t take long for the results to appear and there was a collective intake of breath in the room when they did. There were over fifty potential matches based on the M.O.

  “Okay, so now we need to go through them and see if any are actually matches.” All three of them had experience of the system and Kat knew that of those results, it was entirely possible that no single one would be an exact match. The system was reliant on the human inputting the information and so was not always one hundred percent accurate.

  ***

  The last rays of sun had gone and the air in the office had cooled by the time they had finished examining all the files that Finn had printed off the computer. The coffee pot, now cold, sat half empty on Finn’s desk, all of them having drunk enough to keep them awake for days.

  “That’s it. We’re done,” Kat announced, putting the last of her files on the pile of those that had been examined. Out of the fifty-four potential matches, they’d established with very little doubt that nine were the work of the man they were looking for. Geographically, they were all within a three hundred mile radius. All the women had suffered the same injuries, but the thing that really removed any doubt was that all the women had been found with a pearl sitting in the hollow of their necks.

  “So now what?”

  “Now we hand it over to the FBI, Kat.” Finn gave her a hard look. “You know that as well as I do. You two have done great,” he included Kyle in his look, “but this is where you leave it. I’ll contact Callahan and hand everything over to him. He can take it from there.”

  Fifty-Three

  The house was a sprawling affair, three stories high and surrounded on all sides by immaculately maintained lush lawns.

  Callahan found himself adjusting his tie as he stood on the porch, waiting for someone to answer his knock. So far, he’d visited the families of three of the victims and had failed to find a link between any of them. Shaw wasn’t good at dealing with grieving families so she’d decreed that he would do the visits and she would get the files on the victims from all the local police departments and go through them. The perks of being the boss, he thought ruefully.

  At last, he heard movement on the other side of the door and he dropped his hand to his side.

  “Yes? Can I help you?” A woman’s face peered from behind the chained door.

  Holding up his ID so it was clearly visible, Callahan introduced himself. “I’m sorry for your loss, Mrs. Romero. I wondered if it would be okay to speak to you about your husband?”

  The door closed and he heard the rattle as the chain was removed before the door was opened fully.

  “Please,” she stood to one side, “come in.”

  Mr. Romero had been a psychiatrist. A very successful one, Callahan thought as he took in the opulent interior of the house.

  “Please, follow me.”

  Callahan did as he was asked and followed Mrs. Romero to an enormous living room and through a set of doors which led to a glass greenhouse.

  “Botany was my husband’s hobby,” she explained as he took in the mass of exotic plants that filled the room. There didn’t seem to be a spot that wasn’t filled with a plant, many of which he’d never seen the like of. At the center, there was a table and chairs and it was here that she sat, indicating he should take a seat opposite her.

  “So, how can I help you?” she asked once he was seated. “Do you have any new leads?”

  It had been three months since Mr. Romero had been shot one evening coming out of his clinic. The local police had investigated but there had never been any leads, nor had they managed to find a motive for the killing.

  “Actually, yes, we have identified the person who murdered your husband and he is in custody.”

  “You have?” Mrs. Romero raised her hand to her mouth and pressed her fingers to her lips as tears filled her eyes. “Who is he and why did he kill my husband?” she asked once she had regained her composure and swallowed her tears.

  “Well, that’s why I’m here,” Callahan answered and went on to explain. “What we still don’t know is why. I’m hoping that you might be able to tell me something, anything, which will help me find a link to the other victims.”

  Mrs. Romero shook her head. “I can’t think what. I told the police at the time everything I knew. He didn’t have any enemies that I know of and we were very close, Mr. Callahan. If there had been something for me to worry about, he would have told me.”

  “Did any of his patients worry him at all? Any of them threaten him?”

  “Not at all. My husband dealt with troubled teens, kids who normally wouldn’t need to see a psychiatrist but whose parents felt that they needed to. More often than not, the kids didn’t have any problems other than a lack of attention at home and discipline.” She chuckled. “He used to say that if their parents suddenly started parenting, he’d be out of work.”

  Callahan was getting frustrated. This was turning into another dead end. There had to be something that connected all these people, but what? So far, he’d seen a farmer, a lawyer and a psychiatrist. None of them knew each other or had any friends in common and their paths didn’t seem to ever have crossed.

  “Okay, Mrs. Romero you’ve been a great help. Just one thing before I go. Could I have a look at Dr. Romero’s files? The local PD told me that they’re no longer in his office.”

  Mrs. Romero nodded. “That’s right, they’re all stored here now. But I’m afraid I can’t let you see them. As I told the other officers, they’re confidential.”

  “Mrs. Romero, the contents of those files could help us find out why your husband died. Surely you want that?”

  “Of course I do, but I would be breaking the law if I let you see them. Truly, if I could allow you to see them, I would.”

  Callahan believed her, but she was right. The files remained confidential, even after the death of the doctor. Disappointed, Callahan was just about to stand to leave when she beat him to it.

  “I’ll let you let yourself out, if that’s okay. The news has left me feeling a bit unwell and I need to go and rest for a bit.” She gave him a long look. “I expect I’ll need to rest for at least an hour.”

  He immediately understood what she was saying and stood to shake her outstretched hand.

  “Thank you for letting me know. I hope you find what you’re looking for.” She pr
essed his hand in her own before turning and leaving him standing there amongst the plants.

  He waited a few minutes before tracing her steps until he was back in the main entrance hall. Where would you keep a home office if you had one, Callahan? He pondered, looking around. Not upstairs. You would want to be near the kitchen if you were working at home. You wouldn’t want to be going up and down stairs all day. Ground floor, then. Working quickly, he checked all the doors on the ground floor until he found it.

  Unlike the rest of the house, this was clearly a simply functional room and not a lot of attention had been paid to the décor. The walls were painted a pale, moss green which were set off by the dark oak furniture. There was a single desk which faced out of a window onto the lawn and the rest of the room was filled with books and boxes which had been clearly recently placed there as no attempt had been made to put them in any order.

  With a sigh, Callahan slipped off his jacket and rolled up his sleeves. He had work to do.

  ***

  It was nearly two hours later when he quietly let himself out of the house and got back into his car. He hadn’t had time to thoroughly examine the files so he’d quickly flicked through, skimming over them as best he could. Nothing had jumped out at him, though. It was as Mrs. Romero had said; nearly all her husband’s clients were nothing more than spoiled rich kids.

  It was way past lunch and he hadn’t eaten since grabbing a light breakfast at the motel so when he spotted the roadside diner, he didn’t hesitate and pulled into the parking lot.