by Ed Markham
David shook his head and sat down at the table. “When did Lauren head up?” he asked.
“About an hour ago, and reluctantly,” Martin said.
“I’m surprised she made it that long,” David said. “She was up at five this morning for a training run. She’s running the Marine Corp Marathon this fall.”
“She told me,” Martin said. “This whole running for recreation thing is still lost on me, but then the list of shit that doesn’t make sense to me gets longer every day. Anyway, let’s hear it. What did Carl want with you?”
“Brad Ketchner is dead,” he said matter-of-factly.
Martin frowned for a moment, trying to place the name. “Is that the Internet guy I’ve been reading about? The one worth more money than god?”
David nodded.
Brad Ketchner had gone missing from his Northern California home four days earlier, and during that time his disappearance had dominated the daily news cycle.
“Murdered?” Martin asked.
“That’s not clear yet.”
“What does that mean?”
David swept his open palm softly across the tabletop between them. His mind was back in his boss’s office, listening to Carl relate the specifics of the dot-com scion’s death.
“Mr. Ketchner’s body was discovered this morning in a forest—some kind of state park about ninety minutes from his home in Palo Alto,” Carl had told him.
Now David related these same details to his father. “Some hikers stumbled onto the body. It was resting against a tree in plain sight. Only a preliminary medical exam at this point, but apart from the fact that he’s dead they can’t find anything wrong with him.”
Martin grunted. “I’d say being dead is a big enough thing.”
“No major wounds,” David elaborated. “No sign of heart attack or stroke. Early toxicology is negative for any kind of poison or contaminants in his blood.”
His father shrugged. “Something will turn up. What’s it got to do with you and the Bureau?”
“Someone else is missing, as of this morning. A man named Garrison Pool.”
“Doesn’t ring a bell.”
David shook his head. “It didn’t for me either. Carl told me he’s some kind of serial tech investor—someone with money who funds startups in exchange for company stock. He helped get Ketchner’s company off the ground, and since then he’s had his hands in half a dozen other Internet firms that have done well and made him enormously wealthy.”
“Computers,” Martin said, frowning.
If there was one thing David could count on from his father, it was Martin’s reflexive disdain for technology. The older Yerxa eschewed computer work whenever possible, and still had the same Nokia flip phone his late wife had made him buy a decade earlier.
David went on, “The head of Pool’s personal security detail has also disappeared, and Pool’s vehicle turned up in the lot of the same state park where Ketchner’s body was discovered.”
“Okay,” Martin said. “I’ll ask again, what’s this got to do with you or the Bureau?”
“You, me, and the Bureau,” David answered. “Apparently when two people worth more money than God go missing, the FBI gets to step in and lend a hand. Carl’s sending both of us to Palo Alto. We leave tomorrow morning.”
.
Chapter 5
Looking through his kitchen window, David could see his father standing by the patio table, his trusted thermal coffee mug clutched in one hand as he held his day’s lone cigarette in the other.
David poured himself a cup of coffee and walked outside to join him.
It was cool out, but not cold. Northern Virginia had already had a few ninety-degree days, but the nights and mornings were still refreshingly crisp.
“I don’t get this,” Martin said, watching as his son stepped out through the back door.
David took a drink of his coffee and waited for his father to go on.
“A rich guy turns up dead,” Martin said. “Another one goes missing. In California. What the hell does that have to do with us? Local crimes, local cops should be handling it.” He paused to shake his head and take a drag from his cigarette. “Even if it makes some sense for the Bureau to peek in on something this high profile, we’re Mid-Atlantic. We’ve got Left Coast agents who know the players and the lay of the land. Why aren’t they handling this?”
David had asked himself these same questions the night before as his section chief had described his assignment. After careful consideration, he had decided they were worth voicing to Wainbridge.
Now, to his father, he said, “I asked Carl those same questions last night. He said it’s precisely because we don’t know the players or the lay of the land that we’re being brought in. The deputy director thought it best to enlist fresh eyes that can look at things without preconceptions clouding their vision. The local guys will also be involved, but only to assist us and answer our questions.” He swallowed hard, as though what he was about to say were distasteful. “The deputy director also told Carl he wanted his best people on something this newsworthy.”
Martin smiled. “The deputy director’s bright idea, huh? Our old pal Reilly?”
David nodded.
Deputy Director Jonathan Reilly had once removed David and his father from an investigation after he had concluded his agents’ course of pursuit was both too ponderous and wildly off target. When David’s theories had proved accurate—and one of the principal perpetrators turned out to be the United States Speaker of the House, with whom Reilly was personally close—the deputy director had done an about-face on David and his tactics. Since then, whenever he had the opportunity, Reilly had gone out of his way to commend David and hold him up as an example of the archetypal FBI investigator.
The fact that Reilly would now choose to send him and his father to handle such a high-profile investigation was not out of step with the deputy director’s somewhat impetuous style of leadership—though it still didn’t make much sense to David’s way of thinking.
Martin smiled. “Well the son of a bitch is right to flatter us after we made him look good—despite his own poor judgment.” He took another reflective drag on his cigarette. “But assigning us to head something like this makes me think his judgment hasn’t improved.”
David drank his coffee but didn’t answer.
.
Chapter 6
Eight hours later, David and Martin’s plane touched down at SFO. They’d spent the bulk of the flight reviewing the Bureau’s files on Brad Ketchner and the peculiar circumstances of his disappearance.
Ketchner was forty-seven years old at the time of his death. An Oregon native, he’d studied computer programming at Cal Poly, and had then bounced among a handful of computer technology firms before recognizing the iron was hot for companies that could help people navigate the nascent World Wide Web. He launched Ketchy, and became very big in a very short amount of time—thanks in part to an early injection of capital provided by Garrison Pool.
Unlike Ketchner, Pool was old East Coast money—the great grandson of a shipping magnate who’d monopolized several prime routes across two of the five Great Lakes. Like Ketchner, Pool had seen where the wind was blowing in the early 1990s and had moved most of his inheritance (and himself) to California, where he’d backed a few modestly successful technology firms before placing a stack of his chips on Ketchner. That bet had paid off in a very big way.
“I can’t believe the money these people have to futz around with,” Martin had said. More than once, he’d whistled to himself at the sums Ketchner and Pool were estimated to be worth. “It’s like that cartoon you watched as a kid where the duck would dive into a vault of gold coins.”
They disembarked and were met by the section chief of the FBI’s Northern California office.
“Andrea Dean,” the woman said, not smiling as she shook their hands. She looked over their attire—David’s in particular—and made a face.
Unlike most of the Bur
eau’s field agents, neither Yerxa wore a suit or tie. Martin tended to dress in khaki or olive slacks and a plain oxford shirt, over which he often pulled a navy windbreaker. His son’s “uniform” never varied; David wore durable charcoal trousers, dark hiking boots with heavy rubber soles, and a gray t-shirt. He found this attire most suited his professional purposes; people had preconceptions and—in many cases—apprehensions about the FBI, and all those negative feelings were inextricably wrapped up with the classic image of a G-man in a dark suit. By distancing himself from this imagery, David found people were more forthcoming with him. His superiors at Quantico had at first challenged him on it, but as his status within the Bureau had advanced so had his ability to operate on his own terms.
Dean said to him, “Were you planning on changing after landing? Because we have someplace to be.”
She looked to be in her early fifties. Her gray-black hair was cut neat and short so that it hugged the contours of her skull, and her eyes blinked rapidly as they waited for David’s reply.
“No I wasn’t planning on changing,” he said to her, not aggressively.
Again she made a face, but she left the subject alone. Skipping the usual pleasantries, she motioned for them to follow her. Speaking to them over her shoulder, she said, “I have people to collect your baggage.”
She led them to a black Chevy Suburban parked on the tarmac a hundred yards from the Bureau’s jet. She waited as they climbed inside the vehicle. When Martin had arranged himself in one of the pilot’s chairs and David had taken the back row, Dean climbed in, took the second pilot seat, and told the driver they were ready to depart.
“My plan,” she began, “had been to take you back to our field office so you could meet with the members of my team who keep an eye on Silicon Valley and are in regular contact with Ketchner and Pool’s private security personnel. But plans have changed.” She’d been looking straight ahead as she spoke, but now she turned to regard David and his father in turn. “I’ve just received word that Walt Bowie, the head of Pool’s security team—and a former agent, by the way—is dead. SFPD found his vehicle about an hour ago, parked in a garage in Presidio Heights. They found Bowie in the trunk with a gunshot wound in the back of his head. Small caliber, no exit wound.”
She paused to swallow, and when she did Martin spoke up. “So we’re going to see Bowie’s body in . . .what did you call it? Something Heights?”
“Presidio Heights,” she said. “No, we’re not going to see Bowie’s body in Presidio Heights. Let me finish.”
Martin smacked his lips and shot his son a look, but he didn’t comment.
Though he wasn’t familiar with her usual demeanor, David could tell from Dean’s voice and body language that she was annoyed to be escorting a pair of Bureau outsiders onto her turf. In fact, he and his father had discussed this predictable tension during the flight out from Northern Virginia.
“I’d be ready for a rude reception,” Martin had said. “I’d be hot as hell if I ran NoCal and got a call from D.C. telling me I was being benched in favor of two Quantico agents.”
“That had occurred to me,” David had said. “Let’s try to be diplomatic.”
Martin had grinned. “You know me. Plays well with others.”
Though Martin now looked to be itching for a fight, David was relieved when his father didn’t take Dean’s bait. Martin could be antagonistic—his old South Philly sense of humor shining through. But he tended to let that antagonism off its leash only when it was tactful to do so.
“Bowie’s death is news,” Dean continued, “but that’s not why our plans have changed. Plans have changed because I received a call from my chief medical examiner. He asked to speak with me in person. This was on my way to pick you up. I told him we’d all be down to see him soonest, so hopefully you two had a bit to eat during your flight.”
She paused to look at her phone. As she did, she asked them, “What kind of name is Yerxa anyway?”
“American,” Martin said.
Dean looked up at him blankly, and he added, “But back before my grandfather changed the spelling, it was Dutch. Same pronunciation though.”
She returned her eyes to her phone and said, almost as though she had to say it to clear the air, “It goes without saying I’m bothered by this arrangement—handing control of this off to two D.C. agents who, as far as I know, have no knowledge or experience in Northern California.”
“None whatsoever,” Martin put in, with relish.
Dean pursed her lips and said, “I’m aware of your past accomplishments and your demonstrated skill as investigators. I have nothing but respect for the work you’ve done out east. But I don’t understand the thinking behind this.”
“That makes three of us,” Martin said to her. She glared at him, and he added, more softly, “We all just do as we’re told, Andrea.”
David listened to their exchange, but said nothing.
.
Chapter 7
The chief medical examiner of the FBI’s San Francisco office met David, Martin, and Section Chief Dean in the foyer of the downtown building that housed his department.
Fred Takagi had thick black eyebrows, and he raised them questioningly at the two strange agents until Dean explained that David and Martin were specialists in from D.C., and would be taking charge of the investigation.
Takagi extended his hand first to David and then to his father. “Specialists in what?” he asked them, looking genuinely curious. “At this point, we don’t even know what happened to Mr. Ketchner.”
“We were hoping you’d shed some light on that,” David said.
Takagi furrowed his brow and asked them all to follow him to his office.
Together they took an elevator to the building’s third floor and exited into a windowless laboratory space. Takagi ushered them through it to a conference room with a large window that looked out onto the main floor of the lab’s office space. He waited by the door until they’d entered and had taken seats, and then he closed the door behind them.
“I’m afraid I have news that will disappoint you,” he said when he had taken a seat. There was a stack of files before him on the table. He placed his hand on the folders but did not move to open or distribute them. “Our preliminary medical and toxicological examination of Mr. Ketchner’s remains had determined heart failure to be the effective cause of death, but at this point we still have not identified the underlying explanation for that heart failure.”
“So his heart just stopped?” Martin asked.
Now Takagi leaned forward and opened the topmost folder on the stack in front of him, though he didn’t appear to be reading his report as he spoke. “Some mild swelling of the brain, consistent with encephalitis,” he said, his eyes shifting among the faces of his audience.
Dean said, “Ketchner’s business partners told us he had been ill for a few days before he went missing.”
Takagi nodded. “It’s possible he had the flu, and this swelling is unrelated to his death.” He looked down and flipped ahead in his report. “Mild to moderate contusions on limbs and torso. Diffuse, not acute.”
“Consistent with what sort of trauma?” David asked.
“Unknown,” Takagi answered. “But we did find twin lesions on his abdomen and blistering of the surrounding flesh, both of which suggest electrocution.”
“Someone tased him?” Martin asked. “That could have stopped his heart, couldn’t it?”
“It could have,” Takagi answered, “but it’s clear it didn’t in Mr. Ketchner’s case. The lesions had been healing for several days at the time of his death.” He paused and touched the tip of a finger to his mouth before slowly turning a page in his report, taking time to ensure he was not leaving out any information. “Inflammation of the gastrointestinal tract also suggestive of infection. We found abundant fecal material on his skin, hair, and clothing.”
“Jesus,” Martin said.
Takagi went on, “Mild muscle atrophy, more present on
the right side of his body than on the left. We’ve conducted analyses of serum and spinal fluid, and both show an elevated presence of encephalitis antibodies, though not in quantities that would suggest a lethal infection. Finally, we found evidence of subdermal bruising on his wrists and ankles, suggestive of some type of ligature.” He flipped through several more pages, paused to read quietly, and then closed the folder.
Reserving the top copy for himself, he handed one folder each to Dean, David, and Martin. “In summary,” he said, “I see evidence of a non-lethal viral infection consistent with the flu his colleagues said he had been suffering from before his disappearance. I see signs of physical abuse. I see some evidence Mr. Ketchner was bound or somehow restrained, which could explain the presence of the ligature marks and fecal matter.”
“And you see Taser marks,” Martin said.
Takagi inclined his head slightly in a gesture of assent.
Martin went on, “So we can assume Mr. Ketchner didn’t just wander into the woods in a fever delirium, shit himself, fall down a few hills, and then give up the ghost kneeling against a tree.”
“That’s correct,” Takagi said.
“But you can’t tell us what stopped his heart?” David asked.
“No I cannot.”
“What other tests are we running?” Dean asked her man.
“I received permission from Mr. Ketchner’s family to perform a brain biopsy, which I sent along with samples of his serum and spinal fluid to our central facility at Quantico, as well as to the state’s facility in Sacramento, for direct-florescent and immunohistochemistry analysis.”
David watched Dean fidget, and could tell it bothered her that her specialist thought it necessary to involve Quantico in his arm of the investigation. While her reaction was understandable, it still concerned him.
He flipped through the report quietly as his father questioned Takagi about the possibility of a blood clot or extreme stress event stopping Ketchner’s heart—possibilities Takagi politely considered before informing Martin that neither could explain Ketchner’s death given the results of his examination.
