by Debra Webb
“I’ve got the list of names and addresses from Wilcox’s call log. I’d like to start with that this morning. Bill is going back to the hospital to interview more of the personnel there. He thinks he’ll eventually find someone who knows something and will talk.” He seemed to consider the idea before adding, “It’ll take time, but it could pay off. Carter is getting an update on the Peterson and Hanes homicides and the search for Wilcox.”
She shifted, in hopes that he wouldn’t notice her preoccupation with his charcoal-gray suit and crisp, silver shirt. How could he still look this good after living through the hell of ten years on the Bureau’s payroll as a profiler specializing in missing children? Everything about him screamed masculinity. From his tall, lean yet muscular frame, to the chiseled good looks of that square face. And the eyes, the deepest blue she’d ever seen.
Damn! Those perceptual eyes were searching her face…trying to read her expression.
“Did you read those articles?” she asked, redirecting her dangerous thoughts and needing desperately to get past this awkward moment. Her nerves were frazzled to the point of distraction. That’s all this could be. Nerves…stress.
“No, but I will get to it this morning.” He smiled and her heart lurched.
What the hell was wrong with her this morning? Had some crazy kind of hormone suddenly awakened? Had last night’s uncomplicated kiss turned her ability to reason into something unreasonable and immensely complicated?
“I was thinking,” she began, going for a professional focus once more. “You said that we could accomplish more if we worked on different aspects of the case. I’d like to follow this lead of mine while you and Bill move forward with yours.” She needed to do this and she needed some distance.
He passed a hand over his smooth, chiseled jaw, but the move did nothing to clear away the lines of concern that surfaced with her proposition. “Mel, I’m not sure that’s a good idea. I—”
“Look, I know what I’m doing. I’m fine now. I can do this. I need to do this.” He was going to argue, she could see it in his eyes. “Ryan, I’ve had the same training you have. I know what to do.”
He expelled a weary breath. “All right. But if you get into trouble or just feel like you need me, call.”
She nodded, grateful. “Do you mind taking me by your hotel to pick up my car?”
“I mind because I’d rather you stick with me or Bill,” he said truthfully, “but I’ll do it, anyway.”
Mel locked her front door and followed him to his rental car. Surely with all the leads they had now, a break would come soon. It had to.
It just had to.
* * *
BY 10:30 A.M. Ryan had scratched off most of the names on the list. He had two more. One was the clinic, which he intended to visit again today but it wasn’t top priority, and the other was an uptown law firm. The attorney had been the one who’d left the threatening message for Wilcox. He’d stopped at Rodney Mason’s office earlier that morning but the hours of business indicated that the place didn’t open until nine-thirty. He might as well head back there now.
He’d checked on Melany about an hour ago. She had visited three of the funeral homes in town already and had come up empty-handed. He wasn’t sure what she was looking for but he was certain she had an appropriate agenda. As she’d said, they’d had the same training. He knew she was capable. Letting her out of his sight had been the hard part. He didn’t even want to think about when the time came for him to return to Chicago. Leaving was not going to be easy.
Mason’s office was nothing to write home about, far from upscale but not the worst Ryan had seen. He parked in one of the half dozen slots reserved for clients and made his way to the door. He frowned when he discovered it still locked. Since the entry door was glass, he could clearly see the reception area. No lights were on and there definitely didn’t appear to be anyone on the premises. The hall beyond the reception area looked as dark as midnight.
The hair on the back of Ryan’s neck stood on end and his gut knotted with anticipation. He needed to get his hands on this guy. If Wilcox was running some sort of baby-selling scam using the north side clinic and perhaps other means, he would definitely need an attorney to work the deals, to draw up the contracts. Mason was the only connection of that type they had to Wilcox.
Before he ran down Mason’s home address, Ryan decided to take a little stroll behind the building. But first, he retrieved his weapon from his briefcase. He didn’t carry it much anymore, but at times like this he’d rather be safe than sorry. If the two homicides were connected to Mel’s daughter, as he suspected, being armed was a good thing. He swore under his breath. Mel wouldn’t be armed. Dammit, he should never have let her go off on her own. As long as she stuck to the agenda she’d mentioned she should be safe. There would be employees, possibly grieving families, at the funeral homes. She wouldn’t be alone. Still, he didn’t like it.
Ryan slipped through the alley between the law office and a manicure salon. The rear alley that stretched between the buildings offered parking for employees and shop owners as well as Dumpster storage for trash. Behind the law office sat one car, a fairly new Mercedes. It could be Mason’s. Glancing from side to side to make sure no one was watching, Ryan eased into the wide rear thoroughfare and crossed to the back entrance of the building. To his amazement, the door opened without resistance when he turned the knob.
For a few seconds before opening the door, he listened for any movement inside. Silence. He eased the door inward and stepped inside. The back corridor leading toward the front of the building was dark as he’d noted earlier. After palming his weapon he flipped the closest switch and the overhead fluorescents flickered to life. Still no sound, no movement. Allowing the door to close behind him he stepped cautiously toward the front of the building, checking each door he passed. Bathroom. Supply closet. Mini conference room. And, finally, Mason’s office.
The brass desk lamp was on, bathing the mahogany surface in a warm glow. But there was nothing warm about the dead man sprawled across the floor in front of it, an ugly hole right between his eyes.
Ryan scanned the area, then crouched next to the body and checked for a carotid pulse. The flesh was room temperature, the complexion gray. Definitely dead. A quick look in the guy’s wallet identified him as the former Rodney Mason, attorney at law.
Leaving the wallet on top of the corpse, Ryan pushed to his feet and did a quick check of the rest of the small building to ensure the place was clear as he punched in Bill’s cell number. “We’ve got another homicide,” he told him without bothering with hello.
“The mouthpiece?”
“Yeah.” Ryan checked the final room, the lobby, and found nothing that looked out of the ordinary. “Listen, can you hold off on reporting this for, say an hour? I’d like to take a walk through this guy’s files and get out of here before it becomes an official crime scene.” He didn’t have time to deal with questions unless it was crucial to his investigation. They’d find his prints and Bill would explain.
“One hour,” Bill agreed. “Have you heard from Mel?”
“About an hour ago. She seemed fine, but why don’t you check on her again?” If he kept calling, she’d know he was checking up on her.
“I’ll do that now.”
Ryan closed his flip-top phone and dropped it back into his pocket. He moved swiftly to the back door and locked it. Surprises were not a good thing when one was ensconced in an office with a dead man.
Forty-five minutes of the hour he’d requested had flown by before Ryan found what he was looking for. Like Wilcox, Mason had taken precautions. Taped under a drawer in his desk was a computer disk that contained his secret files.
Ryan shook his head as he scanned file after file of so-called private adoption proceedings. And this could only be scratching the surface. Most of the adoptions were fairly recent. Who knew how many other disks were hidden away or, perhaps, had already been destroyed.
He slowed his s
earch when he came to a file created only three days after Melany’s accident. A couple in Dallas, Texas, were set to adopt a little girl matching the description and approximate age of Katlin.
Adrenaline rushing through his veins, he sent the document to the printer, then continued viewing the remaining files. Where were they getting all these children? Most were newborns but every now and then there was a toddler like Katlin. And then it hit him.
The clinic.
He remembered all those pregnant teens at the clinic.
And then he thought of Mel and the assumption that she had been Rita Grider at the time of the accident. Single parent, no health insurance listed, no family other than her child…no ties. She fit the criteria of someone who wouldn’t be missed.
Ryan stared at the screen, his mind racing with scenarios. Each file was coded with a string of four numbers. Somewhere hidden away, maybe in this office, was a disk or document with a list of names that matched the coded families to the children. He needed that list.
He punched in Bill’s number again. “I’m gonna need some backup over here,” he told his friend. “I want the best hacker you can get your hands on and a team of techs to tear this place apart.”
“Mason’s the key?”
“He’s definitely the linchpin that facilitated at least part of the operation.”
“I’ll see what I can rustle up for you,” Bill told him before ending the call.
“I’ll be here.”
Ryan went back to his car and dug a pair of latex gloves from his briefcase. He didn’t intend to wait. He tamped down the urge to call Mel. She would want to know what he’d found and he wasn’t ready to tell her just yet. Though he still had no concrete reason to believe Katlin wasn’t dead, her body having been disposed of to cover up a medical screwup, he had a feeling that her name was here somewhere among all these other children’s.
All he had to do was find it.
* * *
MEL PARKED her SUV in the lot of the sixth funeral home on her list. There was only one more after this. The one where Katlin had been taken. She was saving that one for last. Wasn’t even sure she could handle going in there, but she’d damn sure try.
The director at the last funeral home had behaved nervously from the moment she mentioned the autopsies. He’d assured her he’d seen nothing out of the ordinary, but she had the distinct impression that he was lying. But, of course, she had no proof and couldn’t exactly push the issue. After all, she was a mere civilian. At least to a degree.
“May I help you?” The lady who greeted her in the entry hall of the lavish funeral home smiled, the surface convention genuine. She dressed in the same dark, reserved manner in which all the others had. But her smile was definitely nicer.
“Yes. I’d like to see Mr. Walton.” Mel manufactured a smile for her though it wasn’t easy. There was something about the smell in these places. Something artificial and overly sweet. A shudder quaked through her.
“Certainly. I’ll show you to his office.”
The lady with the nice smile led Mel through the lavishly appointed house of the dead. No matter how you dressed it up, she mused, it was still eerie.
The lady paused outside a suite of offices. “May I give Mr. Walton your name, ma’am?”
“Melany Jackson…with the FBI,” she added. God, she’d gotten almost as good with that lie as Ryan.
The brief flare of surprise in the other woman’s eyes was swiftly concealed. “Right this way, Ms. Jackson.”
Zacharius Walton was no young man by any stretch of the definition. But he had a presence about him that made him seem decades younger. He deftly moved around his desk and offered his hand when his employee introduced Melany.
“Ms. Jackson, please have a seat and tell me what we can do for you.”
The lady who’d showed her to the office discreetly vanished. “Thank you,” Mel said to the director.
When they’d both taken a seat, she got right to the heart of the matter. She would ask him the same questions she’d asked the other directors. “Mr. Walton, I’d like you to tell me which of the following names you recognize.” She then called off the remaining seven names on her list.
After she’d finished, he braced his arms on his desk and steepled his hands in front of him. “Why, Ms. Jackson, I believe all of those names are familiar. Of course I’d have to check dates of birth and the like to verify that we’re talking about the same folks.”
“These names all belonged to children,” she said pointedly.
He tensed, just the slightest twitch. “Then I would have to say that they have all likely passed through our doors. If I may, can I ask what the nature of your investigation is?”
This was the sticky part. “What I’d like to know is if you or one of your employees noticed anything peculiar to these children.” She didn’t want to put words in his mouth so she didn’t mention autopsy.
He leaned back in his chair then. “I have two morticians on staff, Ms. Jackson, both worked with two or more of these children.” He leveled his gaze on hers. “Both noticed, shall we say, oddities in the manners in which the autopsies had been performed.”
Her heart leaped against her sternum. “Can you be more specific, Mr. Walton?”
“I can be considerably more specific,” he said flatly. “We took pictures and prepared a file.”
His answer stunned her. “You did? What did the authorities have to say?”
“I never went to the authorities. I confronted the hospital and they explained that a new M.E. was being trained and that I should overlook the situation.”
Mel frowned. That wasn’t the answer she’d wanted to hear. “Did you believe that to be a reasonable explanation?”
He shook his head resolutely. “But I kept my mouth shut. Especially considering the number of deceased that I’ve been called to pick up at Memphis General has dwindled to nothing in the intervening time. I’m sorry if that offends you, but it’s the nature of the beast. We cannot survive in a marketplace where our good name has been blackballed. Ultimately, the children were dead and forcing the issue would only have injured the surviving families. We chose to look the other way but we didn’t have to like it.”
Mel took a deep breath and lied, “I understand, sir. Can you tell me any further details about the abnormalities you noted?”
He looked away for a moment, then drew in a heavy breath of his own. “There appeared to be items missing.”
“Items?” Her pulse raced.
“Organs.” He shrugged. “We even opened a couple of them up just to see. We have documentation.”
Mel jetted to her feet. She had to get this information to Ryan. “Mr. Walton, I appreciate your candor. You must realize, sir, that you and your employees may be called to testify to what you’ve just told me and that those photographs will be evidence.”
Walton pushed up from his chair, matching her stance. “We have the files and photographs locked away safely. In fact, I have a second copy at my attorney’s office. I knew that evidence would serve two purposes, to cover my butt and to bring to justice those vile hypocrites. But let me warn you, unless you bring down the hierarchy behind this evil, you won’t stop this. I’ll do my part, but it’ll be up to you to stop them or we’ll both lose.”
“They’re going down,” Mel assured him before walking out.
* * *
ZACHARIUS WALTON watched the lovely young woman in the red jacket hurry from his office and he silently cheered. By God, someone was finally going to get those bastards.
Reveling in the victory, he picked up the telephone and entered the number he would never forget if he lived a dozen lifetimes. When the bastard answered his cell phone Zacharius smiled. “Well, well, you’ve finally been caught.”
The voice on the other end of the line demanded to know what he was talking about.
“I’m talking about the pretty young lady from the FBI who just dropped by my office. They’re building a case against you ba
stards. And I have a feeling they’re going to get you. I hope you burn in hell!” He slammed the phone down and took a deep, calming breath. God had finally answered his prayers.
* * *
WALTON’S WORDS echoed again and again in Mel’s head as she drove away from the funeral home. She punched in Ryan’s number but got his voice mail again. “Dammit,” she muttered. “Ryan, I’ve found the proof we need. Meet me at Forest Lawn. Jesus, Ryan, it’s just like Alder Hey.”
Half an hour later, as she waited to see Clyde Desmond at Forest Lawn, she struggled with the images her mind kept conjuring. They’d brought her baby to this place. It smelled, just like all the others. Deathly sweet. That man, Garland Hanes, had signed for her. And that’s where the trail ended. She looked at her list of names. They’d all been checked off. None of the autopsied children had been brought to this funeral home. That seemed odd. Why wouldn’t Forest Lawn have gotten at least one?
Maybe because they provided another service for Wilcox. Maybe they took care of the live ones. Mel shuddered and hugged herself. She had to be on the right track.
Annoyed that she hadn’t heard from Ryan, she pulled out her cell phone and checked the ringer volume. He should have called her back by now.
“Ms. Jackson?”
She got up and faced the man who’d called her crazy just a few days ago. “Mr. Desmond.” She didn’t even bother with a smile and certainly not a handshake.
“Is there something I can help you with? I believe I’ve already answered all the questions your friends at the Bureau had as thoroughly as I can.”
“I’m not here to ask you any questions,” she said saccharinely. God, she was going to enjoy this. “I just wanted you to know that we know what you and your friends have been up to.” She did smile then. “And we’re going to stop you.”
Crimson climbed up his throat and spread across his pudgy cheeks. “I realize you’ve been through an ordeal, but I will not tolerate your threats.” He kept his voice low but the tone was deadly.
“It’s not a threat, Mr. Desmond, it’s a promise. Do yourself a favor and cooperate with us and maybe you’ll get off with a slap on the hand.” She looped her bag over her shoulder. “You have our number, give us a call before it’s too late to save yourself.”
