by M. Z. Kelly
I didn’t break eye contact with Macy. “I’m saying we try this our way. Your client is the one facing multiple counts of murder and conspiracy. She’ll eventually get the death penalty, whether her conviction is due to an admission or trial.”
“We’ll see about that.” Macy’s unblinking eyes remained fixed on mine. Her head finally moved up and down. “Okay. We’ll try it your way.”
We made our way downstairs through an elaborate maze of elevators and corridors before we got to the secure interview room where Janice Taylor was waiting for us. We stopped at the one-way glass, where I studied the prisoner for a moment. I was again struck by the dramatic change in Taylor’s appearance. In addition to the tattoos and carvings, it looked like she’d pulled out more of her hair. There were now only a few strands of dark hair that hung over her face like a curtain concealing her dark eyes and the madness therein.
Gwen Macy turned to me. “Ready?”
I took a breath, nodded, and followed her inside, while the others trailed behind. I took a seat next to Macy, directly across from Janice Taylor. Greer and the others took seats at the side of the room, a few feet behind us, in an effort to minimize their presence.
As I settled into my chair, I realized Taylor’s eyes were locked on me. My own eyes came up and fixed on her. The stare-down lasted for a full minute before Macy broke the silence.
“I have the previously discussed paperwork…”
“NO!” Taylor’s voice blasted through the room like a loudspeaker. She jutted her chin toward my entourage. “They have to leave.”
Her attorney tried to explain. “They’re here representing their agencies. I promise they won’t…”
Taylor was defiant, uncompromising, as she cut off Macy. “Either they leave, or I do.”
I studied her for a moment. The prisoner was wearing the same khaki shirt and pants issued to her in Florence. She had her hands cuffed in front of her and she wore belly chains but still managed to partially fold her arms across her chest in defiance. Her gaze came back over to me at the same time Macy also looked in my direction, lifting her brows.
I knew this was my decision. If I insisted the others stay in the room Taylor would make good on her word and not cooperate. That meant there would be months, if not years, of legal proceedings before she was finally convicted. There would also be lots of ensuing publicity, probably increasing interest in The Swarm and her followers.
I stood up and walked back to Greer and the others. “You need to wait outside.”
Dawson shook his head. “I don’t like this. She’s…”
“She’s in chains, Joe. You’ll be right outside.” I held on his pale eyes. “Please. Let’s just get this over with.”
Dawson glanced at the others. He looked back at me and nodded. In a moment, the door had closed behind them. I returned to the table, sat down, and said, “Let’s finish this.”
While Gwen Macy shuffled the packet of paperwork in front of her, Taylor said, “My sentiments, exactly.”
I turned to Macy while she organized the papers and didn’t see the sudden movement across the table. The room exploded in a frenzy of activity that caught me by surprise. It took me a moment to realize that Janice Taylor had flung herself across the table. Then I saw the shiny improvised knife in her hand. I tried to reach up to stop her, but it was too late. Blood spurted across the room. Gwen Macy had been stabbed in the throat.
FORTY
Even as I pulled Taylor away from her lawyer she continued to lash out at her. Macy was on the floor, screaming, and bleeding profusely.
“You’re also a dead woman,” Taylor screamed at me. She swung the makeshift weapon in my direction but missed when I took a step back. She then fell to the floor, balling herself up and rolling away from me.
I heard alarms sounding, and there were lights flashing outside the interview room. I looked up, realizing that Dawson and the others were trying to get back inside the room but the door was locked. I then heard faint voices, something about an override to the system.
Taylor was still on the floor, now using her feet to try and keep me at bay until she could use her knife again. “It’s happening,” she screamed. “This can’t be stopped.”
“What’s happening?” I demanded as she kicked at me. “What are you going to do?”
Taylor’s lips twisted up into a grin. “I’m going to be leaving you shortly, but the others—The Swarm—they’re coming.”
I glanced over and saw that Dawson and Greer were kicking at the door, trying to break it down.
I left Taylor, who was now screaming at me like a mad-woman, and checked on her attorney. The color was gone from Macy’s face and her breath was shallow. I knew she’d be dead in a matter of minutes if I didn’t do something.
I went over to the door. It had one of those automatic locks that was controlled by a guard station. I pulled on the handle, at the same time the others tried to break it down.
I screamed at one of the guards in the control station, “Try to unlock it.”
The guard looked baffled, but did as I said. The lock clicked several times but remained in place. I took a chair and slammed it against the door but it was useless. The glass was unbreakable and it remained locked. I was still working on the door when Taylor came for me. I turned, just in time to grab hold of her as she pushed up from the floor. The makeshift weapon in her hand clattered to the ground.
I then used my size, and the advantage of having my assailant in chains, to gain control of her. I knocked Taylor back and pinned her down. “You aren’t going to get away with this.”
She laughed in a way that made me realize I was dealing with someone who had lost any hold she’d once had on her sanity. “You don’t understand, Detective. It’s already over.”
I used my forearm, pinning her head harder against the cement floor. “What do you mean?”
“I’m dying…” She seemed to lose focus for a moment. I felt her body slacken. She then said, “I took a fatal dosss…” Her eyes rolled back in her head.
I gripped her harder and shook her, trying to force her to talk to me. “Tell me about the others, the original seven. Who is left?”
Her laughter was weak as a breath rattled in her throat. “There’s only one…”
“One what?”
She wheezed. Her voice was barely audible, “One that…you need to…worry about…”
“Who…who are you talking about?”
Janice Taylor’s chest heaved and her breathing seemed to completely stop. I moved closer to her, thinking she might be dead. I pleaded, “Tell me, please.”
I had almost given up hope when she gasped some air into her lungs. The final words she spoke blasted through me, nearly shattering my own sanity. “Ice is one of us…he’s got your sister.”
FORTY-ONE
The only thing that saved my sanity turned out to be a fight for my life and for the lives of those around me. One of the guards managed to use a pry bar to open the door to the interview room. Dawson and the others immediately went over to check on Taylor and her attorney.
“They’re both dead,” Dawson said, turning to me. “You okay?”
I was about to answer and tell him what Taylor had said when we heard the sound of automatic weapons firing somewhere in the building.
John Greer said. “It sounds like it’s coming from upstairs.”
Dawson turned to one of the guards. “Guns…we need guns.”
We were unarmed due to courthouse security measures. If someone was coming into the building with guns, we wouldn’t stand a chance.
“There’s an emergency arsenal upstairs,” the guard said. We heard more shots being fired somewhere above us. “I’m not sure if you can get to it.”
“Show us.”
We followed the guard upstairs and through a doorway. The sound of gunfire was louder here, but it sounded like it was coming from the floor above this one. In a moment, the guard unlocked a small cache of weapons and handed th
em out.
Another guard came up from the basement floor we’d just left and said, “I just got a radio call. There’s a bunch of people with automatic weapons upstairs. They managed to take over the first floor.”
John Greer had been on his phone. He ended the call and said, “The perimeter of the building’s been breached. There are mass casualties upstairs but the building is surrounded by our side. We think there’s a couple dozen of Taylor’s followers, all on the next floor up.”
“Taylor?” Greer said to me, at the same time I noticed Rob Nelson. The commander looked like he was ready to pass out. “Did she tell you anything?”
“Just that The Swarm is coming and…”
My words were interrupted by a loud blast of gunfire. I realized our assailants were coming down the stairway, firing as they came.
“Spread out and take cover,” Dawson yelled. “Wait until we have visual contact before returning fire.”
The firefight that followed was bloody and violent. The smell of gunpowder filled the room, along with the screams of those who went down during the assault. Bullets flew all around us as we fought off the attackers and defended our ground.
The battle for the United States Federal Courthouse in Denver lasted almost an hour. In the end, all of Janice Taylor’s followers were killed, along with two casualties on our side. One of the courthouse guards had gone down, along with Rob Nelson. The commander had seemed unprepared for the assault and had been shot through the head in the early stages of the gun battle.
After we secured the scene I told Dawson and Greer what Janice Taylor had told me about Lindsay and Ice. My voice rose to a frantic pitch as I added, “We’ve get to go to Boston. Now!”
***
The plane ride to Boston seemed to take forever, even though we’d gone directly from the courthouse to the airport. John Greer had called the local FBI office in Boston, as well as the police, and told them to respond to Lindsay’s apartment. In the meantime, I repeatedly tried my sister’s number, not getting any response.
When I’d given up on the calls Dawson came over to me. He put a big hand on my shoulder. “Hang in there.”
I tossed my phone on the empty seat next to me. “I can’t believe this is happening. If Ice is part of Taylor’s group, it means this has been planned for weeks, if not months.”
“You think he’s one of The Swarm?”
I shook my head. “I think he’s higher up than that. He could even be one of the original seven.”
Dawson was quiet for a minute. He rubbed a hand over his wide jaw. “Why do you suppose Taylor killed herself?”
My chest rose and then fell. “She probably knew the assault on the courthouse would fail and she’d being going back to supermax. She took the easy way out.”
“She had to have help, from the inside.”
He was talking about the improvised weapon and whatever drug Taylor had taken to end her life. It seemed likely that one of her recruits was working inside the courthouse, helping her. It all seemed unimportant now, especially in view of what she’d said about Lindsay.
John Greer came over and joined me and Dawson, asking me, “What do you know about this Ice person?”
“He and my sister have been together a little over two months. His real name is Brody…” I took a breath. “I don’t even know his last name. They’d recently moved in together, but he’d battered her. I arranged for her to come back to Hollywood, but Ice had convinced her to come back and live with him. She recently told me that she’d fallen in love with him.”
Greer tried to sound encouraging. “We’ll get his full name and run all the background checks. We’ll eventually find them.”
When we arrived at Logan International Airport in Boston, there was a car waiting for us. Twenty minutes after landing I was standing in Lindsay’s apartment. The other FBI teams and local police had beaten us there. The small flat was empty. There was food on the kitchen counter, making me think they’d left in a hurry.
I wandered aimlessly around the apartment, noticing a sweater and a pair of shoes that belonged to my sister. I blinked hard when I found a necklace that I’d given her. It was an inexpensive trinket that I’d bought for her when we’d gotten together on a trip to Catalina Island.
“We talked to the neighbors,” Dawson said after coming over to me. “The couple down the hall think they left sometime early this morning.” His eyes held on me for a moment and I knew there was more.
“What aren’t you telling me?”
“They said there was lots of yelling over the past couple of weeks, people arguing.”
My shoulders slumped as I thought about Ice battering Lindsay again.
One of the Boston cops came over to me, removed his cap, and introduced himself. “I’m Wade Dempsey. We spoke about your sister a few days ago.”
“You took the original domestic violence report.”
He nodded. “I’m sorry about what happened here.”
“What was…” I tried to gather my thoughts. “My sister, Lindsay…what was her state of mind when you took the original report?”
Dempsey was around thirty-five, with dark hair and green eyes. He had a build that made me think he worked out a lot. “She was pretty upset at the time. It was obvious she’d been hit and was afraid of her boyfriend.”
“Do you remember his last name?”
He shook his head. “Sorry.”
“Ice…or Brody…what can you tell me about him?”
Dempsey rubbed his forehead as he considered my question. “He seemed…” He exhaled and found my eyes again. “I won’t sugar coat it. He didn’t show any remorse. He was one of those guys who was pretty full of himself.”
“Was there anything else, anything out of the ordinary that seemed important?”
“Not really. I’m sorry.”
I thanked him. He started to walk away but then came back and said, “The neighbors…I got here just a couple of minutes ago. Did you talk to them?”
“The other officers did. They pretty much confirmed there was a lot of commotion and arguing going on.”
He nodded. “I know this area well. I went to Boston College just up the street. The coffee shop downstairs was my favorite hangout back then.” He put on his cap. “I’ll ask around about your sister.”
I thanked him and went over to Greer and Dawson. The apartment was still being dusted for prints, and teams of agents were going through the personal belongings. I held Lindsay’s necklace in my hand and said, “Where do we go from here?”
Greer glanced at Dawson, then back at me. He tried to sound encouraging but I’d seen that look before. It told me we had nothing to go on. “The taskforce will meet here in Boston first thing in the morning. We’ll map out a strategy and take things from there.”
FORTY-TWO
After my long, fruitless day searching Lindsay’s apartment and coming up empty, I collapsed onto my bed in a Boston Holiday Inn. After unwinding for a few minutes, I used my iPhone to FaceTime my friends. After getting them on the line I took some time explaining about Lindsay. I then told them, “I’ll be here at least another day, if you can watch Bernie for me. I should know more about my schedule tomorrow.”
“And you think that asshole Ice is somehow connected to The Swarm?” Mo asked.
“That’s what Janice Taylor told me before she died.”
My friends were in their living room. Natalie raised her voice, startling Bernie, who had been sitting at her feet. “We heard that grot-bag drank the Kool-Aid, took the easy way out.”
“That’s the way it looks.”
“Watcha gonna do ’bout Lindsay?” Mo asked. “If that monster’s got her, there’s no telling what he’ll do.”
“The taskforce is meeting in the morning. Hopefully we can come up with a plan.” Even as I said the words, I doubted that was likely. We had nothing to go on regarding my sister’s whereabouts.
Natalie tried to bolster my spirits. “Lindsay’s tougher than she l
ooks. My money’s on her.” I saw her wince and she said, “Ouch.”
“What’s the matter?”
Mo answered for her. “Baby sis spent the night with Izzy, preparing for Armageddon. They seemed to come through it with just a few muscle strains here and there, if you know what I mean.” She looked at Natalie. “But I didn’t get a wink of sleep.”
Natalie explained, “It was just a little slap and tickle session. We just wanted to make sure we didn’t leave nuthin’ on the table in case it was the end.”
Mo yawned. “Nuthin’ was left on the table, and that includes baby sis.”
I started to end the call when Natalie mentioned our meeting with Lana Palmer, adding, “Me and Mo checked out that Kellen Malone bloke. He’s bad news, Kate. He could be the one that ordered your love-dad whacked.”
“What do you mean by bad news?”
Mo answered. “I got some information on him from the streets. He’s a player going way back. He’s still into a lotta bad shit. Wouldn’t surprise me a bit if he took out Jean Winslow and then your dad.”
If Kellen Malone was a major player in anything illegal, I’d never heard about it. I made a mental note to talk to Leo and some of the other detectives about him. “I’ll try to get more information about him when I get home. Take care of my dog and I’ll see you soon.”
“Bernie’s in hog-heaven,” Natalie said. “There’s a boxer that moved in a couple of apartments over and he’s ’bout ready to bust his hump.”
I ended the call, got something to eat from room service, and collapsed back into bed. I had a restless night, before finally dozing off a little after four in the morning. I awoke with a start, the memory of yesterday’s events trickling back into my consciousness. My sister, out there somewhere, being held captive by a mad-man who was in league with Janice Taylor, sent a wave of cold fear through my blood stream. I vacillated between feeling hopeless and restless, knowing that I had to do something but having no idea where to even begin.
