“Wait!”
They turned to stare at Russo. He sat, hunched in on himself, breathing hard, as if the effort to make the decision was taking a physical toll on him. “Okay, okay. Mason Pate. He runs the Chesapeake Community Corrections Service Center. He funnels victims to us for a cut of the profits.”
The gleam in Van Cleave’s eyes was pure triumph. He pulled out his chair and sat down again. “Okay, tell us everything. And don’t leave anything out or the deal’s off.”
The circle was collapsing in on itself.
CHAPTER 25
Clear: A call by a handler to the officials of a canine nose work trial that an area has been searched and no target odor was found.
Thursday, July 27, 4:54 PM
FBI Field Office
Norfolk, Virginia
As she entered the field office, Hawk heeling beside her, Meg scanned the far side of the bullpen, only to find Van Cleave’s office with the lights on, but empty.
“Guess he’s still in interview. Come on, Hawk, let’s take a load off while we wait.”
They crossed the office and Meg dropped down gratefully into one of the overstuffed chairs outside of Van Cleave’s office. “Hawk, down.” Hawk lay down at her feet, looking up at her with luminous brown eyes. “While we’re waiting, I want to check in with Emma and see how things are going. It’s been a few days since I talked to her, and I bet she’d appreciate a friendly voice.” As if understanding the importance of her task, Hawk crossed his front paws and laid his head down on them with a gusty, patient sigh.
She pulled out her cell phone and called up her contact list, scrolling through it to find the number Van Cleave had sent her for the cell phone he’d given Emma so she could contact him anytime, day or night.
More than just trying to close this case for her, Emma’s long-term prospects gnawed at Meg. The girl was eighteen, so juvenile assistance was no longer an option, and she didn’t want the girl back out on the streets, where she’d possibly go back to her previous life because she had absolutely no choice.
It had only taken a single short phone call with Meg’s parents, to explain the situation, for a potential solution to be found. Jake and Eda Jennings were just in the process of loading up all their newly rescued animals, some of which would require significant care, and they were more than happy at Meg’s suggestion that Emma help with the rescue. Meg was grateful to her parents because, for all Emma’s bravado, she knew that Emma herself would require some care. But her mother was an old hand at raising teenage girls, and she knew Emma would be fine, given a few weeks to settle in and bond with the animals.
If Meg could talk her into going.
Meg sat back in the chair, the phone at her ear, listening as the phone rang once . . . twice . . .
“Hello?” Emma’s voice was tentative.
“Emma, hi, it’s Meg.” Meg kept her voice light. “It has been a few days since I touched base with you, so I wanted to check in and see how you are.”
“Good. Lily’s been great. She doesn’t crowd me or hang over me. It’s giving me time to adjust to the new place.”
“Do you like it?”
“I have my own room.” When Meg stayed silent, she continued. “I haven’t had a room to myself in . . . well, I don’t know how long. It was weird that first night. Nobody whimpering in their sleep or whispering in the middle of the night. The silence kept waking me up.”
“If that place doesn’t suit you—”
“No, no, it does. It’s just a little strange right now. But not bad strange. And I’ve met some new girls. For the most part they’ve been friendly. How’s the case going?”
“Good. We’re making progress. Nothing I can tell you about yet, but I’m confident we’re going to take down more of the ring than we thought possible. No news yet on the missing girls, but local police are investigating some promising leads, and no one has given up hope. Have you heard anything about Mary?”
“I gave her parents Lily’s number since Van told me to keep this one secret. They called after her surgery. Everything went well and she’s expected to make a full recovery in a couple of months.”
“That’s great news,” Meg said. “You know, I’ve been thinking. What are your plans when all this is over?” The deafening silence on the other end of the line answered the question for her. “This isn’t something you need to do, or, if you think it’s not a good fit, you can say so, but I have somewhere you could go. Not only to stay for a while, but to do good work. Work that will make a difference.”
“Where?” The single word was full of suspicion.
“Cold Spring Haven. It’s the animal rescue my parents run just outside of Charlottesville, Virginia.”
There was a long pause. “What would I do there?” Emma asked.
“It’s more of a matter of what wouldn’t you do. Hand-feed babies of every size, shape, and variety, from kittens to egrets to a litter of Southeastern shrews that were displaced by Hurricane Cole. Help care for sick and injured deer, eagles, and turtles. Feed Auria, our horse, and Jeeves, our emu, the rescue’s two permanent residents. Muck out stalls, mend fences, empty and scrub litter boxes.”
“You’re really selling it.”
Meg laughed. “That’s life at any rescue, so there’s no point in not being honest. But even mucking stalls can be satisfying because no matter how messy the job, it’s all for them. Everything we do is for them. And the animals know it, and pay us back a hundredfold.”
“You’ve worked there yourself?”
“I was going through a bad time a few years ago.” She reached for the handblown glass pendant that hung over her heart, rubbing the smooth surface between thumb and forefinger. “I’d just lost a partner, my patrol dog from when I was still on the Richmond PD. Losing Deuce just about killed me. So I quit the force and went back to my parents’ to rebuild my life. Within a couple of days of my arrival, someone abandoned a critically ill black Lab puppy on the doorstep. That was Hawk. I nursed him back to health, he helped heal my broken heart, and we’ve never looked back. It’s good work, Emma. Satisfying work. A good place to find your center again when it feels like the world has been yanked out from under you.”
Van Cleave suddenly appeared in the bullpen, stalking right past and into his office without seeing her. He slammed his office door, rattling the glass of his windows. He stood stock-still for a moment.
Then he kicked the desk.
Uh-oh.
“Emma, I have to go. Promise me you’ll think about it.”
“I will.”
“Great. I’ll call you again in a few days. Sooner if anything breaks in the case. Bye.”
“Hawk, come.” Meg stood, crossed to his office, knocked on the door, and entered without waiting for a reply. “What happened?”
She found Van Cleave sitting in his desk chair, his right ankle crossed over his left knee, squeezing the toe of his perfectly polished leather shoe. The look he sent her was overflowing with fury. “Absolutely nothing.”
“What?” Meg closed the door. “Hawk, come. Sit.” She sat in her usual chair opposite his desk and Hawk settled beside her. “Did you not get Mason Pate? Is he out of town?”
“Oh, he’s here. He’s lawyered up and not saying a word. Nothing. Not to defend himself, not to refute any of my accusations. And he’s totally calm. Peaceful even. He’s not even breaking a damned sweat!” He picked up a piece of paper, crumpled it into a ball, squeezed it brutally hard, and then tossed it into the blue recycling bin beside his door. It bounced off the rim and rolled three feet away. Van Cleave cursed and hung his head.
“Hawk, fetch the ball. Fetch.”
Hawk retrieved the ball of paper. He brought it back to deposit it carefully in Meg’s hand. She gave it a gentle toss and swished it into the recycling bin.
“Thanks. Both of you.” Van Cleave’s foot dropped to the floor and he sat back in his chair, his body limp and wrung out.
“Didn’t get that thirty-minute nap, did
you?”
“Never had the chance.”
“That level of exhaustion sure won’t help your day go smoothly. Okay, fill me in. What happened when I went to get Hawk and you went to bring in Pate?”
“Not a whole lot.” He loosened his tie and flipped open the top button of his shirt. “I took one of my agents and we went over to the correctional facility. We called first, to make sure he was there. He was, so we went. He’s one cool customer, let me tell you. Didn’t blink an eye when I told him we were taking him into custody for interfering with a police investigation, obstruction of justice, money laundering, conducting a criminal enterprise, and all the other charges related to human trafficking and the trafficking of minors. Didn’t blink when I read him his rights. We got here and he politely asked to call his lawyer. The lawyer gets here and we start the interview but it goes nowhere. He’s the perfect client. He shuts up and lets his lawyer do all the talking.”
“Perfect for everyone but us,” Meg mumbled.
“We get a grand total of nothing. And Mr. Serenity just sits there, all Zen, like he’s meditating.” His fist thumped down on the desk, making his empty coffee cup jump. “What does he know that we don’t?”
“What do you mean?”
“I’ve been at this a long time. I know when a perp is hiding something. I may not know what it is, but I know there’s something. They’re nervous, and nerves result in physical tells. But I got nothing from Pate. We know he’s guilty. Why isn’t he concerned?”
“That’s a good question. I’ve never had a perp like you’re describing.”
“I’d like to give him a drug test. He’s got to be on something for that amount of calm.”
“Where is he now?”
“We’re holding him for now, based on Russo’s testimony. I’m also getting a warrant to search Pate’s house and workplaces, and to take all of his remaining electronics into custody.”
“You have his Harper Group computer, right?”
Van Cleave nodded. “Already at the Computer Forensics Lab. But with what Russo is accusing him of, I doubt he’d have those kinds of records on any work machine. That would be at home. We’ll get those too. And I guess we’ll have to hit him with more evidence to really crack him.” His eyes dropped to the surface of his desk and locked onto a paper bag. “You need to see this.”
“A paper bag?”
Van Cleave smiled for the first time since she’d walked into the room. “Not just any paper bag.” He opened it up and reached in to pull out a small, spiral-bound notebook with a black plastic cover and backing. “I sent agents back out to Deep Creek Lock Park. It was a needle in a haystack kind of search, but we were unbelievably lucky. One of the guys found it only about thirty feet from the body.”
Meg lunged forward to snatch the book from his hand. “It’s not.”
“It sure is. Reed’s notebook.”
Meg carefully opened the book, its pages stiff after soaking and drying again. “Do the crime scene techs think they got any evidence off it?”
“You might be surprised by some of the new techniques to pull prints off of wet, porous surfaces. The lab techs took a shot at it and they’ll let me know if they can pull a positive ID from it.”
Slipping a nail under the edge, Meg turned a page. Handwriting in blue ink ran down the page, lying in a cloud of blue haze where the ink had run. “Some of this is pretty hard to read. That’s going to be a problem.”
“You’d think so, but I called in a favor.” Turning to his computer, he pulled up a file and turned his monitor so Meg could see better.
An image of the book she held in her hands splayed across the screen. “They scanned it?”
“The whole thing, so if it fell apart we’d still have the evidence. Then they did this magic.” A single click and the image on screen clarified, the looping scrawl of letters popping from the paper and the smears of ink fading in the background.
Meg couldn’t help the small gasp. “That’s amazing.” She closed the book and set it on Van Cleave’s desk as she moved forward, staring at the screen. The words were amazingly clear—names, places, dates, amounts, and payment methods. “My God, Van, we’ve got them.”
“We have a damned good start. It will be even better if we can trace any financial transactions between them, but that’s all going to be part of the larger case. That part is going to take months.”
“Not the kind of job security anyone wants, but it will all be worth it to slam the door on them one by one for abusing children like that. And maybe, just maybe, the security footage from the tavern Reed liked to hang at will bury a few of the recent johns. Written notes tied to actual video footage would be a real slam dunk.”
“We have that footage. We’re building a solid case here, Meg.”
“I know.” Meg sat back in her chair. “You should be proud of the job you and your agents are doing. It’s first-class work.”
Van Cleave bowed his head in a gracious nod. “Thank you, ma’am. Did you ever hear from your sergeant?”
“I did. He emailed me earlier today, but it got lost in the shuffle. He gave me a couple of names of local PD brass who might be able to help.” She pulled out her cell phone, called up her email program, and forwarded the email to Van Cleave. “There you go. Any of the names seem familiar?”
Van Cleave downloaded and opened the message. He scanned the text. “Yeah, I know a couple of these guys. Solid cops. I’ll keep them in mind.”
“If you need to contact them, drop Archer’s name. That could help open some doors. Now, you.” She punctuated the word with a stabbing index finger. “You’re done for the day. More than done.”
Van Cleave heaved a big sigh and tipped back in his chair, his head tilted back against the headrest. “I think you’re right.”
“Do you need a lift home?”
“No. I can get myself home, but I swear I’m having a scotch with dinner with my beautiful wife, going to smoke a pipe to relax for a few minutes, and then I’m falling into bed. My wife will keep everyone at bay unless it’s a life-or-death emergency.”
“That sounds pretty good.”
“Doesn’t it?” He rubbed his face with his open right hand. “I’m about ready to drop.”
“We’ll get out of your way then. Hawk, come.” Meg stood, Hawk following suit. She turned at the door to look back at Van Cleave. He looked like he’d aged a decade in the past few days alone. “You’re sure you’re okay?”
“Definitely, go.”
“See you tomorrow then.”
Near the outer door, she glanced back into Van Cleave’s office. He was on his feet and reaching for his suit coat.
He’ll be fine.
She looked down at her dog. “Come on, Hawk. Let’s go see Todd and Clay.”
She wanted to run today’s case advancements by them. Webb was a purely logical thinker, where McCord drew from his myriad experiences to spin a bigger picture.
Together, they might be able to make some sense out of the day.
CHAPTER 26
Head snap: An abrupt change of direction by a scent-work dog when it crosses a scent plume.
Thursday, July 27, 6:13 PM
Motel 6
Norfolk, Virginia
McCord’s voice carried through the cheap hotel door even before she knocked on it. The voice stopped momentarily and then the daylight leaking through the peephole disappeared for a few seconds before returning as the viewer stepped back.
McCord opened the door, pulling it wide. “Come on in. And say hi to Cara while you’re at it.”
“She’s on the phone?”
“Skype.” He pointed at his laptop on the desk.
“Hawk, come.” Meg stepped into the room, and walked past the bathroom to find Webb stretched out on McCord’s bed. The muted TV was on in front of him, showing the Washington Nationals in the outfield at Nationals Park. “Hey, didn’t see you there.” She circled the bed to his side, bent down and pressed a quick kiss to his grinn
ing lips.
“Hey! Knock it off and come say hello to your sister.”
Meg turned at the sound of Cara’s voice. “Spying again, are you? Been doing that since you were old enough to toddle after me.”
Cara’s smile on screen was pure triumph. “You never could get away with anything while I was around.”
Chuckling, Meg turned back to Webb. “How did it go today?”
“Good. They’re only going to need me for one more day, then they’re releasing me at the end of tomorrow. I’m back on shift at DCFEMS on Monday.”
“And thus endeth your vacation.”
“This was not a vacation.” He gave her shoulder a gentle shove. “Go talk to your sister, then we can catch up.”
Meg rose and moved to the chair in front of McCord’s laptop. “Hey. How are things at home?”
“Good. Where’s my main man?”
“I assume you don’t mean McCord.”
“I’m right here, you know,” McCord said. “I can hear you.”
Meg tipped the laptop to where Hawk had jumped up and settled beside Webb.
“There he is. Hey, Hawk.” Cara waved into the camera.
Hawk’s head rose and he looked in the direction of the laptop, clearly mystified that while he could hear Cara, he couldn’t smell or see her.
Laughing, Meg set the laptop back on the desk. “Now you’ve confused him.”
“That always amuses me. We’ve been confusing Cody all week in exactly the same way. Speaking of which . . .” Cara tipped sideways and the screen was filled with the snout of a bobbing golden retriever.
“Hey, Cody,” Meg said. “Who’s a good boy?”
The screen abruptly went black as Cody lunged toward the camera, and then the dog was gone and Cara sat alone again.
“I swear that dog never stops moving,” Cara said. “It’s good to actually see you instead of just catching you by phone. How’s your case going?”
“It’s coming . . .” Meg’s tone was anything but sure.
“That doesn’t sound very reassuring. What’s going on? Last time we talked was a couple of days ago and you’d just been to that bar where the guy running the sex ring used to do business.”
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