When the Storm Breaks

by Heather Lowell

  “Yes, I know all about cleaning up after oneself. I assume you have the skills to do that?”

  “Piece of cake. What’s this guy’s name and number?”

  “His name is Sean Richter. I don’t have his number, but I do have an address for him.” The man read off the address and watched the nerd get to work.

  The next quarter hour passed with Scott muttering to himself and typing furiously. Occasionally he would stop and jot down something on a yellow pad next to his computer.

  “Hmmm. Unlisted number, but that shouldn’t be a big problem,” Scott said to himself and opened another window on his screen.

  The man stood motionless during the whole process, his heart pounding. He was so close he could taste it.

  “Got it! Here we are.” Scott magnified the size of the type on the screen and turned around triumphantly.

  The man stepped forward to read over the geek’s shoulder. The screen showed a list of calls, including the phone number and duration of the calls that originated from Richter’s home telephone number.

  Starting last Sunday, the day after Marie Claire had disappeared, the cop made two calls a day to a number in Fairfax County, Virginia. Every day, like clockwork, morning and evening. It had to be connected to Marie Claire and her current location. He was close, so close.

  Rich tried to disguise his eagerness, aware the geek was looking at him. He had to be really careful here. He reached out with a steady hand and pointed to the number in Fairfax County.

  “That number there,” he said. “It might belong to my girlfriend’s best friend. It would be just like that bitch to cover for her. Can you get me a name and address to go with it?”

  “Sure. You don’t even need to hack for that. Lots of websites let you do reverse number searches.” Scott pulled up a browser window and selected a website. He typed in the information and hit send, and a reply came back within thirty seconds.

  “That number is registered to Mitchell Johnston at three twenty-three Crepe Myrtle Lane, Alexandria.”

  “Damn. I don’t recognize that name. But my girlfriend’s friend just got married—can we find out who this Mitchell is and see if he’s connected somehow?”

  “Sure, I’ll just run a search on Johnston and see what kind of hits we come up with,” Scott said, typing rapidly.

  A few moments later, Scott shifted uncomfortably in his chair. “Seems Mitchell Johnston is a detective with the DCPD.”

  Rich smacked his forehead. “How could I have forgotten. The girlfriend married a cop a few months ago. She must not be on the phone listing yet.” He spoke automatically, while his mind changed gears as he processed this new information.

  “Is there anything else you need today?” Scott asked. “I’m in the middle of something online.”

  Wilkes had already memorized the address, so he stepped away from the screen. “Would you mind printing it out for me? I’m going to hire a private detective to see if my girlfriend has been using this house for her little affair.”

  “Sure thing.” Scott typed in the command, and then waited as the printer began to warm up. He took the opportunity to check his own work e-mail. “I can send you the whole file if you want.”

  Wilkes thought about the rubber gloves in a pocket of his shorts, but he was afraid that even Scott would notice if his unexpected guest snapped on gloves. With a mental shrug, Wilkes pulled a gun out of his shorts and grabbed a cushion off the floor to muffle the shots and keep the gore off of him.

  “That won’t be necessary,” he said and fired into the back of Scott’s head. He set the cushion aside, put the gun back in his waistband, and pulled on the rubber gloves. He looked at the blood splattered over the computer monitor and keyboard, and decided to shut off the machine manually rather than power the system down properly and risk getting bloody.

  Watching where he stepped, he saw that the printer still hadn’t processed the earlier request. Impatient at the delay, he reached behind the unit and unplugged it from the wall. His memory was as good as, and certainly faster than, the printer. From there he went to the nerd’s closet, frowned at the clothes, and pulled a wrinkled button-down shirt over his bloodstained T-shirt.

  As he checked his appearance in a mirror, he hummed quietly. Tonight Marie Claire would be his.

  Chapter 64

  Washington, D.C.

  Wednesday, late afternoon

  Sean stepped into the offices of Camelot and tried not to think of how many times he had seen Claire there, and how much he missed seeing her now. Nor was he likely to be seeing her soon—his three hot suspects hadn’t worked out. One of them had been overseas. The other had a broken foot that was still in a cast.

  “Thank you for letting me disrupt your work schedule and agreeing to stay late,” Sean told Afton.

  “No problem. Mom has the boys and she’ll keep them all night if necessary.” Afton tilted her head and studied the detective’s tired features. “Things aren’t going well.”

  “There has to be some clue here that we’ve overlooked,” Sean said. “This is where it all started, so this is where I’m going to start all over again.”

  “Any particular place you want to begin?”

  “Remember how we agreed to eliminate the male clients who had been entered in the database after the night of the murder?”

  Afton nodded. “Yes, because Claire felt she’d seen the killer’s picture in our database the night the murder took place.”

  “We’ve been through all the names of men who were members before the murder, and we don’t have anything useful. Now I want to go through the rest of the clients.”

  Afton looked doubtful. “All right.”

  “Aidan is at the station right now,” Sean said, knowing how lame his idea sounded. Lame or not, he just knew they must have overlooked something, and this was the most obvious place to start. “He’s waiting for us to fax him over a list of the remaining names in the catalogue. He’ll run them through the computer. I’ll compare photos with sketches the department artist drew based on Claire’s description of the man she saw in the backyard of your house.”

  Afton went to her computer. “I’ll print a list of names sorted by date of membership initiation. Do you want pictures, too?”

  “Yes, but send Aidan the text list first and do the photos separately.”

  Within five minutes, she had a list of male clients who had signed up since the night of the murder. She handed the printout to Sean, who scanned it quickly.

  “That’s almost a hundred more than there were the last time we checked,” he said. “Do you normally get this many new clients within a couple of weeks?”

  “No. It’s the publicity from that news story. Last week we were swamped with inquiries and new members. It’s ghoulish if you ask me. Give me Aidan’s fax number and I’ll send the names. The photos are up on my computer.”

  Sean wrote Aidan’s number across the top of the list and went to Afton’s desk. He stacked the files he’d brought in alphabetical order across the desk. After a few minutes of flipping back and forth in his own files and on the screen, comparing faces with sketches, he made a frustrated sound. “Do you have a room with more table space and network access?”

  “Let’s go to the conference room down the hall. It seats about ten, and it has a computer that can run the catalogue database.”

  Sean gathered files, followed Afton down the hall, and set his papers in orderly piles on the big table. She went to the computer at the head of the table and turned it on.

  “This will take a few minutes,” Afton said.

  Sean stifled his impatience and stuffed his hands in his pockets, then began to pace the room. Outside the window, the sun was setting in a blaze of summer color. He glanced back at Afton, who was still waiting for the database to come up. Cursing technology, he resumed his pacing of the room.

  As he walked around, he noticed that there were framed photos hung on every wall in the room. He stepped closer to examine the near
est ones, then slowly made his way down the entire wall. Studying the photos of happy, smiling people hoisting drinks or making silly faces, he felt a sudden clenching in his gut.

  He turned and went down the next wall. More pictures of people, sometimes alone, sometimes in groups. They were all dressed in professional clothes and seemed to be having a good time.

  Afton watched while Sean walked purposefully around the room, staring intently at the pictures that were hung on the walls.

  “Is something wrong?” she asked.

  He whipped his head around, jolted out of his concentration. “Are these all Camelot members?” He pointed to the framed photos.

  “Not necessarily. The pictures were taken at the corporate mixers my sister used to host.”

  “So, for example, the men in this group here,” Sean pointed at a picture, “aren’t necessarily in Camelot’s catalogue?”

  Afton came over to study the picture herself. “No. See the photo next to it? That’s my sister, and the two men standing with her are executives at a high-tech company that folded a couple of months ago. The executives were never members, but they hosted singles parties for their employees. Some of the workers later joined Camelot, but not all of them.”

  “Was Claire ever in this room?” Sean asked.

  “Yes. This is the room we generally use for the client’s first visit and review of the catalogue. It’s much easier to spread out here than in my office.”

  “When was she in here?”

  “It must have been—” Afton gasped and looked at Sean, who had already put the pieces together. “Oh my God. It was on the night Renata Mendes was murdered. Claire spent several hours in this room with me, going over the questionnaire and photos.”

  “The killer was never in the catalogue,” Sean said. “God damn it. We’ve been chasing our tails for weeks, and he’s been here all along.” He turned to Afton. “I need to identify the men in every picture hanging in this room, and any other place in the offices where Claire might have been.”

  “Most of the pictures have the names printed at the bottom, or they have labels taped to the back. You read them to me and I’ll start a list right now,” Afton said, sitting at the computer.

  “Okay. At the same time, we’ll cross-reference that list with the catalogue, and eliminate anyone who is a Camelot client and has already been investigated. After that, we’ll get Aidan to expedite a background check on the remaining names of non-members.”

  Sean walked around the room, removing pictures and reading names to Afton, who typed them into the computer. Anyone who was a member had a flag placed on his file in case they needed to return to him in the future. When they came across a man who was not a client, his name was entered on the new short list of suspects. Then Sean placed the picture on the table and went to the next photo. It took almost half an hour to enter all the names into the computer.

  “Okay, now we’re sure this new suspect list includes only names that were not in the Camelot database?” Sean asked.

  “Yes,” Afton said. “We’ve got twenty-seven men who appear in photos in this room but were never investigated as Camelot clients.”

  “Let’s get this list to Aidan and cross our fingers.” Sean picked up his cell phone and called his partner.

  Aidan answered on the fourth ring.

  “It’s Sean. We fucked up big time, buddy.” He quickly explained about the photos in the conference room and the list of twenty-seven men they had compiled.

  “Shit,” Aidan said. “Shit. How did we miss that?”

  “It doesn’t matter. We caught it now. I just faxed the names over to you.”

  “I’ve got it,” Aidan said as someone handed him a fax marked Urgent. “I’ll drop everything and get right on the new list.”

  “How long do you think it will take?”

  “I’ll pull in some of the other guys, but it will be at least an hour for a prelim check. Sit tight, partner. We’ll get the bastard.”

  “I’ll be here with Afton, running through the rest of the names and double-checking.”

  Aidan hung up, then quickly dialed the number of the safe house. He started speaking as soon as the officer picked up.

  “Diaz, it’s Burke. I want you to stay with Claire and Olivia for a couple of hours. We’ve had a big break, and I’m needed here at the precinct to follow this lead.”

  “No problem. I’ll let Brown know he’s in charge of securing the perimeter alone until further notice.”

  “Right. If you need anything, you’ve got my cell. Don’t tell the women yet. I don’t want to get their hopes up,” Aidan said, then hung up.

  He rushed into the room that housed the computer investigators, or the techno-nerds, as they were more or less affectionately known. The four people on duty were already checking through the list of names Aidan had given them.

  “Everybody, drop what you’re doing and listen up. I’ve got a new list with twenty-seven names. These individuals have never been checked, and there’s a strong possibility our killer is among them. We’ll divide the names among you, then I’ll take the extras and use the spare terminal over on the end.”

  There was some good-natured grumbling, but everyone closed files and waited to receive the new names. Aidan took the last names for himself, then sat down at a computer and began to run his searches. He wasn’t nearly as fast as the others, but he was thorough.

  Half an hour later, one of the technicians called him over.

  “I’ve got a sealed juvenile record here. Thought you might want to take it and run. It was a DCPD arrest, so you should be able to dig around without too much trouble. The guy was even fingerprinted.”

  Aidan ripped the papers from the printer tray. “Richard Gerald Wilkes the Second. Fancy name. Any relation to Wilkes Brothers Software?”

  The technician typed briefly, then grinned at Aidan. “He’s a vice president and holds a seat on the board. His father, Richard Gerald Wilkes the First, is the president and CEO.”

  “A spoiled rich boy with a sealed juvenile record,” Aidan said gleefully. “Would your wife mind if I kissed you, Cal?”

  “Get away from me, Burke.”

  Aidan laughed and waved the papers triumphantly. “I’m going down to Latent to see if we can do anything with the fingerprints taken from Wilkes at the time of his arrest. Could you do some more digging and find out who the investigating officer was?”

  “As long as you don’t come near me,” the technician yelled after Aidan’s retreating back.

  Chapter 65

  Washington, D.C.

  Wednesday evening

  Afton paced around the conference table, stopping occasionally to sift through the framed photos and criticize herself for not putting the pieces together sooner. “It’s been so long since I even looked at these pictures. They were all taken before my sister died, before I was involved with Camelot. Still, I should have thought of it.”

  “It’s okay,” Sean said. “We all assumed Claire had seen the guy in the catalogue. And you know what they say about assumption.”

  “No, what?”

  “It’s the mother of all fuckups.” He laid the police artist’s sketch alongside the photos of several men. He moved down the table, comparing the drawing with the pictures, until he found one with a superficial resemblance.

  Afton looked at the sketch, then at the photo, and frowned. “Other than the smile, I don’t see much similarity.”

  Sean grunted.

  She studied the picture Sean had selected. From the date, the photo had been taken at a corporate mixer a year ago. It featured a man in a business suit with a bored smile holding up his drink and wryly saluting the photographer.

  “I think I’ve seen that man before,” she muttered.

  “You’ve been in the conference room a lot.”

  “No, I meant more recently.” She flipped the picture over and read the caption, hoping it would jog her memory.

  “Richard Wilkes II, Vice President of M
arketing at Wilkes Brothers Software, comes along to offer moral support at his company’s first meet and greet party.”

  She frowned over the name, then turned the frame to look at the photo again. “I think he was in the office not long ago, but he didn’t use the name Richard Wilkes the Second.”

  “Are you sure?” Sean asked.

  “Absolutely. I would have remembered, because the Wilkeses—father and son—are executives with Wilkes Brothers Software. The company was one of my sister’s biggest clients, so I would have paid special attention if I’d seen their name in my appointment book.”

  “Did you ever meet him or his father?”

  “No. They ended the contract before I moved here. But I know I’ve met this man before. And his name wasn’t Richard Wilkes the Second.”

  “Do you remember where you met him, and why?”

  “We met here—recently. He wanted to join Camelot right away, but only if he could look through the catalogue first. Basically, he wanted to see if the women were worth paying to date.”

  Sean looked up. “Did you show him the catalogue?”

  “No, it’s strictly against our new policy. I told him he’d have to fill out a questionnaire and wait for a background check before he saw our female clients.”

  “Did he fill out a questionnaire?”

  Afton shook her head. “He tried to pressure me to change the rules for him, but I wouldn’t. So he put away his wallet and walked out.”

  “Did he say why he chose your dating service?”

  “He must have read the name in the papers, because he asked about the police investigation.”

  Sean went still. “What name did this guy use?”

  “I don’t know, I’d have to check my calendar.”

  She hurried down the hall toward her office, with Sean following close behind. When she opened her computer calendar and ran through the appointments for the last week, he was leaning over her shoulder.