“We couldn’t live together, but I loved him. He was a great father. Never missed a child support payment. We had dinner together every Sunday, for the kids.”
When the police arrived, they found evidence that someone had picked the garage door lock. Duane didn’t have an alarm system, he lived in an attractive middle-class rural neighborhood—everyone had a couple acres, the modest ranch-style homes were set far back from the road, and a flood canal separated the front yards from the street. There were no fences, but no one would have been able to see inside the house. The blinds were all closed.
Johnson had been attacked in the garage after pulling in and closing the door behind his truck. The garage light had been loose, and while no fingerprints were on the bulb or surrounding assembly, the dust had been disturbed, indicating that someone had deliberately disabled the light. Johnson’s hamstrings were cut in the garage, then he was dragged into the house and duct-taped to a chair.
“Here,” Hans said, tapping a toxin report. “He had trace amounts of a tranquilizer—benzodiazepine class. He was a big guy. I wonder if he fought back even after being sliced.”
“Or,” Megan said, “maybe he saw someone. It says in the report that there was a disturbance and possible scuffle in the garage—two paint cans and a box of screws had been knocked over.”
“Did you get a tox report before CID took Price’s body?”
“No, but there are blood samples at the morgue and the pathologist sent them to his lab.”
Megan finished reading the reports, viewed the crime scene photos. The killers were precise. They knew their target and why they chose him. They had all the necessary supplies—knife, duct tape, needles to torture their victim. The attack and murder were well planned and well executed.
“I know what’s been bugging me,” she said.
“Shoot.”
“The evidence here—the plan. The methodology. This wasn’t their first kill. At least one of them had to have practiced, wouldn’t you think?”
Hans weighed her statement. “It’s a good bet that Johnson wasn’t their first victim, but there’re no other like cases in the country that have been reported to the FBI. I scoured the databases. I have an analyst on it full-time as well, contacting smaller local agencies who don’t regularly report or where the information was incomplete. Maybe something will pop—”
“But it might not be exactly the same. Maybe the first victim wasn’t hamstrung.”
“I’ve taken that into account.”
Megan looked at the photos but didn’t really see them. She wasn’t articulating her point well. “Where would someone learn how to use needles to torture? It’s like acupuncture, but with pain as the goal instead of relief.”
“A doctor. A trained acupuncturist. Anyone in the medical field or with some anatomy training.” Hans wrote rapidly on his pad. “I can’t believe I didn’t think of that before. But it makes sense. I’ll talk to my analyst and see what she finds after adding in that information. Perhaps an army medic.”
“But we don’t train our soldiers to torture like this,” Megan said.
“I wouldn’t know.”
“What if they practiced and then hid the evidence?”
“Such as destroying or burying the body?”
“Yes. Or allowing the wounds to heal. The coroner wrote in his notes that he almost missed the punctures, they were so small and many had already started to heal. I think we should be looking for executions.”
“Executions?”
“People killed with a bullet in the back of the head.”
“Ballistics would have matched Johnson’s with anything in the system. I have the ballistics report right here.”
“The detective in Vegas said they didn’t have their report back yet.” Ballistics could take weeks, sometimes months, to run through the system and find all crimes where the same gun was used. Unlike television, they couldn’t pop the bullet in a machine and yield every crime in which a particular gun was used within an hour, primarily because of a backlog of work. Expediting such tests and analysis was certainly something the FBI could help with.
All ballistics reports eventually ended up in an FBI database, but it was a product of time and manpower. The system was as up-to-date as possible, but still there were thousands of local law enforcement agencies sending in their records. A clearinghouse, yes, but nothing happened overnight.
“Maybe we should put out a call for execution-style murders within the last …” Megan paused. She wasn’t sure how long these two had been operating.
“Let’s go back twelve months to be safe,” Hans said. “Once they perfected their system, they would want to get started right away. I’ll call in the information. Good thinking, Megan. I should have thought of it earlier.”
The farther they drove away from Hidalgo, the more upset Ethan became. Agony tore at his gut. His intestines slithered around: snakes, twisting, tightening, poisoning him with sharp fangs. He’d fucked up. He let one get away. The overwhelming urge to turn around and cut the priest’s heart out had him whimpering.
She said, “It’s over, Ethan.”
“We can still go back.”
“No.”
Ethan slammed his head hard enough on the steering wheel that they swerved into the next lane.
“Don’t,” she said.
He slammed his head again. “I have to go back.”
“We stick to the plan. We’re halfway to Santa Barbara. There is no turning back.”
He cried out. “I can’t let him go. I can’t let him go. You changed the plan. It’s your fault!”
“You’re tired. Let me drive.”
“No!”
“Ethan, honey, listen to me. If we turn around we won’t be in Santa Barbara by Friday, and then we’ll have to wait a month. Do you want to wait an entire month to punish General Hackett?”
“We’ll do it the same way as the others. In his house—”
“He’s married.”
Ethan snorted, then he laughed so hard she had to grab the wheel to stop them from hitting an eighteen-wheeler head-on.
“Dammit, Ethan! Pull over.”
He did, still laughing. He didn’t know what was funny anymore. Or even if it had been funny. He just felt like laughing, the sound bubbling out before he could stop it. His sides hurt, those vile snakes slithering around, but he couldn’t stop.
She got out of the car and paced, swearing. Ethan couldn’t hear her words, but he recognized the body language, her clenched fists, that look on her face that said, I could kill.
It made him laugh harder.
His door opened.
“Move over.”
He couldn’t talk. Tears ran down his face. She unbuckled his seat belt, pushed him over, and got into the driver’s seat. “You bastard! Driving like that, you’re going to get us pulled over. Stupid fool.”
She pulled back into traffic. Ethan’s laughter began to subside when he pissed in his shorts.
“Whoops,” he said, giggling.
“We’re staying in Benson for the night. You need sleep. I need sleep.”
“Let’s go back to Hidalgo and kill Cardenas.”
She didn’t answer.
“I don’t need you.” He pouted and crossed his arms. He stared straight ahead. The endless road widened and shrunk in front of him. The cars passed and he kept turning to look. His fingers began to tap. He shuffled in his seat, rolled the window up and down. Up and down.
“I have to drive.”
“We’re almost there. Less than ten miles.”
“I can’t sit. Not here. Not doing nothing. I have to drive. Please. And we’ll go back to Texas.”
“Ethan, I’m not missing this opportunity with General Hackett. It’s all set up. We can go back to Hidalgo after.”
“Really?” He brightened. “I can poke the priest?”
“Yes.”
“I knew you’d see it my way. We can’t leave the job undone, right?”
&nb
sp; “You’re absolutely right, Ethan.”
Karin stared at the road, trying to tamp down on her anger. She wanted to kill Ethan in the worst way. She couldn’t look at him. He was almost over the edge permanently. She’d saved his life at least a half dozen times over the past two years, three of them in the last six months. His hold on reality had been diminishing, though it had been tenuous from the moment they’d hooked up.
She’d been working in a gym in New York City, trying to forget how screwed up her life was, when Ethan came in. He’d been ordered to exercise by his doctor to work the muscles that had weakened while he’d been tortured. At the time she didn’t know what had happened to him, had assumed he’d been in some sort of accident. But she quickly saw in Ethan a quiet lunacy that she could use. And when she learned of his skill with needles … a plan was born.
She gradually pulled him away from his shrink, away from his doctor. Karin became Ethan’s caregiver. She gave him everything he needed—someone to talk to, someone to fuck, someone who cooked for him and cleaned up after him, someone who stopped him from killing himself. She gave him a purpose: torture those who had left him to die. “An eye for an eye, Ethan. You do to them what was done to you. Then you’ll be healed.”
He had believed her. And all he had to do was believe her for two more days. Once they took care of General Hackett, she wouldn’t need him anymore.
And Karin would kill him before letting him go back to murder Father Cardenas.
CHAPTER
TEN
“What was with the questions? Do you know something?” Jack asked Padre as they drove to Carlos’s house outside of the city limits. If Hidalgo had a pricey area, this would be it. Everyone had a small yard that they watered and kept green behind chain-link fences and broken sidewalks. Carlos had three cars when his brother couldn’t afford even one. Oh, yeah, he was dirty. Jack would take care of him later.
“I had a visitor last night at the church as I was locking up. A woman. White. But … I don’t see the connection.”
“What did she look like?”
“Long dark hair. Medium height, maybe five foot five. Pretty, but a little thin.”
“How old was she?”
“Forty, forty-five. I’m not as good with ages. Clean appearance, clean clothing. Dark slacks and a white blouse. A dark windbreaker.”
“And?”
“She wanted to confess.”
“You take confessions at midnight?”
“If someone needs it. If you came to me at three a.m., I’d listen.”
“Don’t wait up for me,” Jack said, but he was thinking. Picturing Scout dead on the floor, hamstrings cut, bullet to the back of the head. Not a female touch, but they say the sexes are getting closer.
“Was she driving?”
“On foot.”
“Then she had to have a place to stay.”
“Or a car parked elsewhere.”
“The church is a good two miles from El Gato. A white woman isn’t going to walk through town at midnight, alone or not. She was alone?”
“I believe so. I didn’t see or hear anyone else. She didn’t act like anyone was waiting for her. But, well, she didn’t confess.”
“I don’t understand.”
“I brought her into the church, she wanted to pray, and I gave her privacy. Then she left.”
“Did you check the silver? You’re not a softie, Padre. You left a stranger alone in the church?”
“I was in the chapel, waiting for her. And yes, I walked through the church. Nothing was taken or vandalized. The prayer candles were extinguished. I sensed that she’d been walking, saw the church, saw me locking up, and thought it was a good time to confess, but then got nervous. People don’t like to talk about their mistakes.” Padre glanced at Jack. “Do they?”
“What mistakes?” Jack got out of the truck and strode up to Carlos’s front door. Two pit bulls, chained to a lone tree, barked ferociously at the men. Padre approached more cautiously.
Jack pounded on the door. “Carlos! Open up. It’s Jack Kincaid and we need to talk.” He heard shuffling inside. “Now, Carlos.”
A minute later a young woman—if she was eighteen, Jack would eat his hat—answered the door. The security screen was still locked, but through it Jack could see she wore a bra and shorts and nothing else.
A distraction.
Before Jack even heard the car start, he was running across the lawn full speed. Carlos put the car in drive at the same time Jack grabbed a chunk of his hair through the open window and pulled. Carlos tried to drive, but Jack held tight and Carlos slammed on the brakes as Jack pulled open the door. He yanked Carlos from the driver’s seat. The car rolled forward and Jack barely noticed Padre jump in and put the car in park before it rolled into the street.
Jack pushed Carlos to the dirt and straddled him, slamming his palm against the side of his head. “What are you running from, asshole?”
In rapid Spanish, Carlos said, “I don’t know what you’re talking about, Kincaid. I was just going to the store for my girl and—”
Jack pulled him up by his black T-shirt and slammed him back down. “Don’t fuck with me, Hernandez. Scout is dead and I want to know what you know.”
“Scout? Dead?” He tried to sound like he hadn’t heard, but Jack wasn’t buying it.
“I said don’t fuck with me.”
“I’m not! I swear I’m not!”
The girl from the house came running out, pulling on a T-shirt. “Let him go! Let him go!”
Then she saw Padre and her eyes widened. “Father Francis, I—”
He stared at her with narrowed eyes. “Emilia. I am sure your mother doesn’t know you are skipping school, does she?”
“I—no, I—” She turned and ran back into the house.
Jack silently thanked the power of Catholic guilt and focused his attention on Carlos Hernandez.
“Tell me about the boys from San Antonio.”
“I don’t know—” But he looked Jack in the face. “Look, it was nothing, a onetime sale, just—”
“They’re your mules, aren’t they?”
“I don’t— You’re fucking with the wrong person, Kincaid. You think you’re a saint? You think you’re the morality cop of Hidalgo? You’re an outsider, no matter how much money you throw around or how many kids you send to college. Your money is a drop in the bucket. Just because you got the priest on your side don’t think you’re indispensable. Or him.”
Jack changed his position, pinning Carlos with a knee firmly planted in his groin. Carlos twisted in pain, but the more he moved the more it hurt.
“Do not threaten me, puta. Tell me about Scout. Now.”
“I didn’t do nothing to him. I don’t know nothing about it. I swear to God, in front of your fucking priest, I don’t know nothing that happened to him.”
“Did you talk to a woman in the bar last night? Gringo? Thirties, wearing a ball cap?”
“Maybe—” Jack pushed his knee higher, and Carlos’s voice rose a pitch. “Yeah!” He was breathing faster. “Just passing through.”
“What did you tell her?”
“About what? It was chitchat. About owning a bar, shit like that.”
“Did she ask about Scout?”
“Naw, she didn’t ask questions, maybe how’s it going and crap. She bummed a cigarette off Enrique Roscoe. Yeah, right before she left. I swear he holds those cigs in tight fists, so she must have winked at him or something. Maybe he knows something. I don’t know, I just didn’t say nothing about no one, and you’d better get off me or I’ll call Perez and have you thrown in jail. And if you think I can’t, you’re a fool.”
Jack suspected Carlos was blowing smoke, but he didn’t want to test it. Perez would be livid when he learned Jack was asking questions about Scout’s murder. Delaying that revelation as long as possible was to Jack’s advantage.
He pushed off Carlos, who scrambled up and moved away while adjusting his aching dick. “Keep your
bitch in line, Padre,” he said as he got back in his car and sped away.
“Jack—” Padre said.
Jack walked off his anger. Carlos Hernandez wasn’t worth it, but the asshole was messing with the wrong people if he thought he could be a major player in the drug trade. The kings down in Mexico would eat Carlos for breakfast. Jack could care less about the jerk, but he feared collateral damage. Naïve girls like Emilia.
“You might want to turn up the fire and brimstone in your homilies,” Jack said. “Too many people are turning the other cheek—for the wrong people.”
Jack got back in the truck. “Let’s find Enrique. Maybe he can give us more information about this wayward Catholic brunette.”
* * *
It was after six that evening when Detective Vasquez drove Megan and Hans to Duane Johnson’s house.
Hans walked around the house alone while Megan stood in the garage and tried to put herself in the killers’ shoes. Waiting for their target to come home. It took a patient killer. Someone who planned. Three murders, no evidence yet that pointed to any specific suspect. Generalities only—likely someone affiliated with the military— current or in the past. Someone with a grudge against the army specifically, and possibly Duane Johnson and the others individually. Someone who had access to information about the veterans and where they lived, worked, their schedules.
The killers had to have stalked Johnson before killing him. And Dennis Perry. How had they traveled? Plane? Car? She could pull flight records for specific flights, but to pull multiple flight records without knowing the specific airline, both the destination and the origin, or the date of travel … it would be virtually impossible to find out if an UNSUB had been on flights to Austin, Las Vegas, and Sacramento. If Megan had only a name, they could get the information, but it would still take time.
It bothered her more than she’d let on to Hans and her boss, Bob Richardson, about receiving Price’s dog tag at her apartment. The killers had to have been watching the crime scene, otherwise how could they have identified her? She wasn’t a spokesperson for the department, though she’d had her moments in the limelight. Last year the Sacramento Bee had done a huge article on the serial killer she’d killed who buried his victims alive. Richardson had thought it had been a great idea for her to do an interview with the press; she had hated every minute of it. Her brother Matt, the district attorney, handled the press much better than she did. But it had been good P.R. and Richardson was all about the image of the bureau. And that led to the television interview and that would have led to a national spot, except Megan told her boss no more. She couldn’t do her job if she was too high profile, and she didn’t want to be the public information officer.
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