He glanced around, taking in the laundry room and Gaines’s escape route. “Self-recrimination’s not gonna help us catch this knucklehead. Yeah, had we known he was going to come at us with guns blazing, we would’ve done things a little differently. But given what we knew, he was not an extreme threat. And there’s no way in hell we’d think he built a tunnel. It didn’t work out the way we wanted, but I don’t think we blew it. Sometimes shit happens. Way I see it, no one got killed—on our team or innocents in the area. Only bad thing in all of this is that one of our prime witnesses is not in our custody answering our questions.”
Vail put her phone away. “Then I suggest we turn our attention to getting a warrant and tossing this place, see what we can learn about Gaines and Marcks and their relationship. Maybe we’ll get lucky and find a cell phone he left behind with Marcks’s number in it.”
“Don’t count on it,” Curtis said. “Too goddamn easy.”
“Plain sight stuff,” Hurdle said to everyone. “We need something that’ll give us probable cause for a warrant.”
They fanned out, all of them but Vail and Curtis heading back upstairs.
Vail shoved the Samsung in her pocket, pulled on a pair of gloves, and wandered around the room. There was not much “in plain sight,” so she made her way over to the living area—the entertainment cabinet and loungers—while Curtis checked out a nearby walk-in closet.
She noticed something wedged into the side of the recliner—a DVD case with a handwritten note in Sharpie marker:
7 y/o
Vail bent her head and read the spine from a different angle. Seven-year-old?
She pushed down hard on the leather seat and the cushion parted from the armrest, revealing part of the DVD’s cover. “Uh, got something.”
Curtis joined her just as she held up the disc. “Are you shitting me? Child porn?”
A photo of a naked boy had been inserted inside the clear plastic sleeve of the case. She pulled it open and found a burned DVD marked in the same black handwriting:
Jimmy
“Yo, Hurdle,” Vail called out.
A few seconds later he came halfway down the steps.
“We’ve got our probable cause. Not exactly what we were looking for, but it’ll do.”
Given Curtis’s firsthand knowledge of the scene and police department procedure, he drove back to Fairfax to videoconference with a magistrate. If all went smoothly, he would have the warrant in hand in about an hour.
“Makes me want to vomit.” Hurdle tossed the disc onto the recliner. “At least it’ll get us the warrant. Good job.”
“I’m afraid to see what else we’ll find. This cabinet could be filled with more of that shit.” She sat down on the lounger and thought a moment. “Can I ask you something?”
“You’re asking me permission to ask me a question?”
“No. Yes.” She glanced around and saw that they were alone. “I want to know what’s up with Rambo. I mean, you know him. Pretty well, I take it.”
Hurdle pulled out a pack of gum and folded a stick into his mouth. “How do you mean?”
“Kind of chomping at the bit.”
“His time in Iraq, urban warfare. Changes you, your outlook. Asked him about it once. He said, ‘You can’t be afraid to go after the baddies or you shouldn’t be carrying a badge. Risk is part of the job.’”
“I’m okay with smart risk. Even desperate risk. But not foolish risk.”
“Every circumstance is different. You never did something that, in the moment, seemed like it had to be done, but in retrospect was a foolish risk?”
Hmm. Let me count the times.
Hurdle did not wait for a reply—or he read Vail’s face and got his answer. “I guess one man’s smart is another man’s foolish.”
“Not sure I agree with that.”
“I take Rambo for what he is. A good cop, solid task force member. He just needs some policing at times.” He headed toward the stairs. “I’m gonna get up there and finish looking around.”
Vail checked her watch, then called Jasmine to see if she remembered anything about Gaines, whether or not she might have an idea as to where he would go, places he used to hang out. She doubted Jasmine could offer anything of value, but it was a logical question to ask.
The call went to voice mail and Vail left a message. Maybe she turned the ringer down while she was in a movie and forgot to fix the volume.
As she sat down to clear her mind and think, Walters and Tarkoff joined her with reports of what they had seen in the bedrooms, most of which seemed to pertain to the homeowners. However, it did appear that two beds had been slept in recently. They would need a more thorough evaluation with forensics to know for sure.
Hurdle followed moments later with his assessment of the caliber and type of weapon Gaines had used. Based on the spray pattern and shell casings, it looked to him to be .40-caliber rounds from a semiautomatic weapon. “Not very helpful—we pretty much knew that when we were under attack. But I think there’s evidence of two shooters, one of whom only had a handgun. We really need to wait for crime scene and their analysis. And no sign of that teen the neighbor told you about.”
“Could be we were right before,” Vail said. “About finding Scott MacFarlane. Just a guess, but it’s an educated one. That group seems to have been together since middle school, if not before. No reason to think MacFarlane was an aberration. And it would explain why we haven’t been able to find him.”
By the time they finished their discussion, Curtis texted her that the warrant was approved.
They all returned to their floors and Vail began by rummaging through the basement closet, picking up where Curtis left off. It doubled as a second pantry and storage room. She saw winter clothes, ski equipment, and other assorted items a family stuffs into available spaces.
Vail saved the entertainment center for last, partly out of avoidance. She already knew what she was going to find.
When Curtis returned with the warrant, she briefed him on what he missed, including the potential second occupant in the house. She then moved on to the cabinet beneath the television. They were full of old DVDs and tapes of family videos from the last twenty years or so.
Well that was a pleasant surprise.
Until she opened another drawer. “Here we go. More DVDs. And not the G or PG rated kind. Except …”
Curtis crossed the room and knelt beside her. “Gay porn?”
They looked at each other.
“Wonder if Gaines—is he, was he, Marcks’s lover?”
“Interesting question. Or MacFarlane, if it was him who was shacked out here with him. Let’s keep looking.”
Vail returned to her area and found sex videos with handwritten labels. She put one into the DVD player and fired up the TV.
“Oh shit,” Curtis said. “More child porn.”
Vail wanted to turn away but could not—she needed to see who was in the video; specifically, which adults, if they revealed themselves to the camera. “There’s Gaines. Right?”
Curtis, his eyes narrowed as if to lessen the impact of what he was viewing, tilted his head.
Vail hit rewind on the remote, got the spot she wanted, and hit pause. “Only got a portion of his face in the frame.”
“The lab can do a better job with this, but I’d say, maybe. Maybe not. Don’t know, could be him.”
Based on what she was seeing, she thought again about that teen the neighbor mentioned. But the age was not right. These were not young men, they were boys. “When’s crime scene due here?”
“They’re here. Started on the main floor.” He held up one of the DVDs with a gloved hand. “If it is him in these videos, or some of them, we’ve got him dead to rights.”
“Either way,” Vail said, doing her best to keep the bile from rising in her thr
oat, “really wish we had this bastard in custody.”
“We’ll get him,” Curtis said, averting his eyes from the screen. “Turn that shit off. We’ll let the guys at the lab analyze it, see if we can get some other faces and IDs. Maybe we’ll get lucky and get MacFarlane in it, too.”
“Hopefully they can pull some metadata off the DVDs that can tell us where they were made, shut them down. Vail returned the disc to its holder and pulled out her radio, told Hurdle what they had found.
“I’d like to get some agents in the Cleveland FBI field office over to the house where these homeowners are staying. Break the news to them about their property and unwelcome guest. Leave out the part about him shooting up their place. But we need to cover all the bases and ask if the husband had a secret collection of child porn. And if he’s gay.”
Hurdle snickered. “That’s gonna be a fun conversation.”
“Got a better idea. Have them arrange for a Skype session when they get there. I want to see their reaction. No—I want to interview the husband, away from the wife. If this is his shit, he won’t admit it in front of her.”
“Will he admit it even in private? It’s a federal offense.”
“I’m not expecting a verbal admission. That’s why I want to Skype. I need to see his reaction.”
“I’ll have someone arrange it. Over.”
Vail continued looking through the collection. “Assuming this stuff belonged to Gaines, I can see why the asshole ran. Might have nothing to do with Marcks. You got anything over there?”
“Male porn. Bondage stuff. Nothing like what you found.” Curtis tossed a stack of magazines to the ground. “Like you said, maybe this is just noise.”
“If we catch Gaines, this isn’t noise, Curtis. It’s leverage.”
35
Marcks sat in his ’64 Buick, windows closed and the Nats hat pulled down low over his forehead. With the sunglasses and beard, he hardly looked like himself. Which was the point, of course.
Once the car he had been following turned into the Lake Ridge neighborhood, he knew where Vail and company were headed. It allowed him to drop back and keep a discreet distance.
Unfortunately, because he no longer had a cell phone, he could not warn Booker and Scott who was on the way to their place. So he did the next best thing.
Blaring his horn from over a block away would be heard—but he could not be seen because of the trees and the curved angle of the streets.
There was no way for him to know for sure, but he was reasonably certain that they had gotten the message. He moved farther down the road and parked on a side street while waiting for Vail to leave—assuming his buddies did not kill her.
But when the SWAT truck rumbled past him, his shoulder muscles tensed and his level of apprehension clicked up several notches.
Almost four hours later, Vail and a couple of other cops drove by, headed away from Booker’s house. Though he wanted to double-back and check on his friends—were they in body bags or had they gotten away?—he started up the Buick and followed Vail’s vehicle, keeping as far back as he could without losing her.
Thus far, she seemed to have no idea she was being shadowed … which was exactly what he hoped.
IT WAS NEARLY 8:00 PM when Vail pulled into the driveway of a residential neighborhood. Marcks coasted down the street, several car lengths behind her, and came to a stop against a curb. Idling, observing.
He killed the engine and sat there, wondering what his next move would be … what it should be.
One thing was certain, however: he was building his book of intelligence, and now he had a key piece of information, one with potential leverage: he knew where Karen Vail lived.
36
Robby slid into bed beside Vail and touched her foot with his.
She jumped. “Oh my god, that’s cold.”
“Sorry. I’m freezing. Warm me up.”
The down comforter had trapped her body heat and banished her own chill ten minutes ago. Now toasty warm, she cuddled up to him and wrapped her arms around him.
They slept without interruption until a noise startled Vail. She sat up, the cool bedroom air snapping her mind to attention. Or the most attention it could muster at 3:00 AM.
She put a hand on Robby’s shoulder and shook him. “Hey, honey. Wake up.”
He groaned. “Tell me it’s not morning.”
“Yeah, it’s morning. Three in the morning.”
He rolled over and faced her. “What’s wrong?”
“I heard something.” She reached over to her night table and unholstered her Glock, then threw the covers back and stepped onto the cold wood floor.
Robby swung his legs over the side of the bed and likewise grabbed his handgun. In a low voice: “What did you hear?”
“Not sure, but it woke me.”
“Maybe you were dreaming.”
And then she heard it again: a thump. She glanced at Robby: he nodded.
They advanced toward the bedroom door.
“Where was it?” he whispered.
Good question. “Kind of sounded like it was behind the house or—”
“In front of it.”
Vail nodded. “Which doesn’t make sense. How could it be in both places?”
They walked down the hallway, lights off, their eyes acclimated to darkness and wanting to keep it that way. The second they turned on a lamp, their night vision would be shot.
Another thump. Vail stopped.
“Could it be your aunt?”
“She sleeps like a rock,” Vail said. “Never gets up in the middle of the night.”
“Still, we want to be absolutely sure before we pull the trigger. You know?”
“Yeah, fine.” She moved to the front window and peeked through the curtain. “I see a late model pickup halfway down the block and something behind it, looks like an old sedan.”
“Anything else? You see anyone?”
Vail swung her gaze left and right. “No.”
Again. A thump.
“This way. Definitely out back.” He led her to the rear door and they took up positions on either side.
“Ready?”
Robby tilted his head. “I guess so.”
Vail pulled on the knob and Robby pivoted into the yard—where he came face-to-face with a raccoon creeping out of the crawlspace beneath the house. It saw him and got up on its hind legs.
“Are you serious?” He stepped toward the animal. “Get out of here. Go on!”
It turned and scurried off.
“A raccoon ruined our night’s sleep?”
Robby yawned. “Apparently. Either I’m sleeping like a log or you’re sleeping lightly.”
“This Marcks case has me a little jumpy. With him out there somewhere, it’s a perpetual feeling of unease. I’m worried about Jasmine.”
He led Vail back into the bedroom, where they reholstered their weapons. “Look, it was her decision to go it alone, without your help.”
“Only because we failed her. The cop paid with his life, which sucked big time. But I can’t fault her. I might’ve done the same thing.”
Robby groaned as he pulled the covers back over his body, shivering from the now-cold sheets against his now-cold body. “You’ll catch him soon.”
Vail sat up in bed, her mind a tangle of competing thoughts on the case. “Yeah,” she said absentmindedly. But it didn’t matter because Robby was already asleep.
37
Vail spent the morning at the BAU planning the interview that she had requested with the owners of the Lake Ridge home and setting up a secure Skype connection with the Cleveland field office agents.
“Knock, knock.”
She looked up from her desk and found Art Rooney standing there.
“Got a minute?”
&n
bsp; “I’ve got five.”
Rooney grinned. “Good. I only need two. Want to know what I just found out?”
Vail lifted her brow. “Let me guess. Forensics on that new arson scene.”
“The accelerant.”
She leaned back in her desk chair. “What was it?”
“Kind of interesting. So you know the common ones: petrol, kerosene, mineral turpentine, diesel. Complex mixtures of hydrocarbon molecules.”
“Yeah, that much I remember.”
“Well, my guy didn’t use any of these—which are all pretty much readily available. For some reason, he used a non-halogenated ether.”
“Ether.” Vail drew her chin back.
“I know, not something you’re familiar with.”
“No, that’s not it. I came across it. Recently, too.”
“Well, it’s not rare or anything like that. It’s a chemical used in all sorts of things. When I was a kid they sprayed a variant of it, ethyl chloride, on baseball players who got hit with a pitch to freeze the area and reduce the swelling.”
“No, I mean I saw it in a case of mine.” She snapped her fingers. “That’s what Marcks used to subdue his victims. He soaked a cloth with ether and then held it over their mouths and noses.” Vail thought a second, then said, “Wait, you said your arsonist used it as an accelerant?”
“The kind he used is very volatile. Extremely flammable. Gives off irritating or toxic fumes—or gases—in a fire when exposed to open flames, sparks, that sort of thing. Gas/air mixtures are explosive. So when combined with what we found there—a Sterno flame—it’d work pretty damn well. Unconventional, but effective.” Rooney handed her a folder. “Copy of the forensics reports for you to read while you’re eating breakfast.”
“Can’t wait.”
“Unfortunately, we’ve got laboratory proof of how well that chemical works as an accelerant. It’s the same non-halogenated ether used in this UNSUB’s other arsons.”
“That’s weird, though, don’t you think?”
“That he used an unusual accelerant? It’s not unheard of.”
The Darkness of Evil Page 22
