Dark Angel (Lassiter/Martinez Case Files #2)

by Joseph Badal

  A grainy video played. The time clock at the bottom left side of the picture read 1:13 a.m. The camera must have been mounted directly above the residence’s side door. It caught what appeared to be a dark-colored Ford Explorer approach the house. Three men quickly bailed from the Ford and ran to the side door. Each of their faces were tinged green from the infra-red video. The first man kicked in the door; then all three charged inside. Then the video went dead until the men exited the house carrying boxes, and they casually walked back to their vehicle. They all seemed to be laughing. The time clock at the bottom of the video now showed it was 3:22 a.m., a little more than two hours after the men had busted down the door.

  Race suddenly gasped. He hadn’t realized he’d held his breath. It was the third man in line at the back door who he recognized. The beak-of-a-nose, the tattoo of a knife on his neck, the scar that bisected his left cheek and lips were all unmistakable. Even as grainy as the video was, he was absolutely certain it was the same man who had beaten him with a tire iron over three years ago. The same man who, along with two other men, had tortured and murdered his wife and daughters. Perhaps all three of the men in this video were the ones who’d invaded his home.

  His nerve endings tingled as though electrified. The emotional pain that had engorged his mind after the deaths of his family, and which, at times, had simmered under the surface, and, at others, had boiled to the point of uncontrolled rage, now exploded inside him. His mind reeled with thoughts of the home invasions and murders that he’d researched. More than a dozen of them over five years. In multiple states, from one side of the United States to the other. But there’d never been enough evidence to identify the perpetrators . . . until now.

  DAY 7

  CHAPTER 19

  It took an order from a District Court judge to get the credit card company to release Eric Matus’s records. Once the court order was presented, the credit card company emailed the records to the Second Judicial District Attorney of Bernalillo County, who forwarded them to Barbara Lassiter at the BCSD.

  “Sonofabitch,” Susan exclaimed. “It’s him. It’s really him.”

  “I’ll be damned,” Barbara said. “Matus was in every one of the places on the exact dates when a vigilante murder took place.” She tapped the copy of the credit card bill with a finger. “Look at these entries. Fastway Gas and Frontier Restaurant in Albuquerque the day before the O’Neil murder; Motel 6, Thrifty Gas, and Sunshine Café in Las Vegas the day before and the day of the crimes at the law office and at the Bellagio; Residence Inn—”

  “Don’t forget the car fires and the three bodies in Vegas at that same time,” Susan interjected.

  “There’s that, too. There’s been what appears to be a vigilante killing in every city when Matus was in that city.”

  “It’s interesting that there are no charges for flights or rental cars. You think he drove to all the locations?”

  Barbara shrugged. “Coulda taken a bus, for all we know. But, if I had to bet, I’d say he drove. Should have paid cash instead of using credit cards.”

  “Huh. I feel kinda let down. Didn’t expect to find the guy this easily.”

  “Neither did I. He’s been ultra-careful all along. The incident in the office building parking lot in Las Vegas seems out of pattern. That’s why it’s been difficult for me to accept that the same guy was responsible for those deaths.”

  “Maybe you ought to call Sophia. I’m sure she’ll want to hear the news.”

  Barbara nodded, picked up her cell phone, dialed Sophia Otero-Hansen’s number, and punched the speaker button.

  “I was just about to call you,” Otero-Hansen said.

  “Oh, yeah?”

  “You first. You called me.”

  “We placed Eric Matus in the vicinity on the same day of every one of the killings you identified.”

  “I hate to ruin your happy moment, but before you put out any press releases you might want to try to answer a question: how did Matus’s SUV wind up in a parking garage in Henderson, Nevada?”

  “He could have left it there before going to the meeting in the parking lot,” Susan offered.

  “Nope,” Otero-Hansen said. “First, there was no vehicle in the parking lot that could be tied to any of the three men who were killed there. So, how’d they get there? We checked with cab companies, and none of them dropped off the men at that site or in the immediate area at the time of the incident. We think they got there in Matus’s vehicle.”

  Susan responded, “They could have been dropped off by someone.”

  “Yes, that’s a remote possibility.”

  “You said first; is there a second?” Barbara asked.

  “The driver side of the vehicle found in the Henderson parking garage is fire-damaged. It had been wiped down. No prints.”

  After a moment, Barbara said, “You mean Matus had a partner?”

  “Yep.”

  The three women went quiet for a few seconds. Then Susan said, “You know, I’ve wondered how people get hold of the killer. I mean, it’s not like you go to Google or the Yellow Pages and look up Assassin or Vigilante.”

  “Hmm,” Otero-Hansen said. “Maybe there’s a killer-for-hire network out there.”

  “Think about it for a minute,” Susan said. “Maybe after you’ve knocked off a dozen or so scumbags, you develop a reputation and then word of mouth kicks in. But there’s a problem with that.”

  “Yeah,” Otero-Hansen said. “Word of mouth can sink you. Word gets to the wrong people, like the police, and you’re screwed.”

  Barbara interjected, “Also, how do you get your assignments before you develop a reputation? How do you get your first assignment?”

  More silence.

  Susan said, “You could get your assignments by meeting with a family member of a victim and offering to take revenge. You screen the families before you make a call to determine whether they have the wherewithal to pay your fee. Then you make the deal.”

  “But what if you call someone and they tell you to go to hell and then call the cops?” Otero-Hansen asked.

  “Good point,” Susan said. “Maybe it’s all done electronically. No one sees your face or knows your name.”

  Otero-Hansen countered, “The lawyer in Las Vegas and the man and woman in the hotel room at the Bellagio saw his face.”

  “But their descriptions of the guy were very different,” Barbara said. “Maybe he’s a master of disguise.”

  “Or, there’s more than one guy out there. There could be a whole crew of these guys. Dark angels wreaking murder and mayhem against bad people. We need to consider something else, ladies,” Otero-Hansen said. “If Matus had a partner or partners, maybe it was that partner or partners who committed the murders.”

  Race barely slept after he watched the previous night’s news report about the home invasion and five deaths in Flagstaff. At 8 a.m., he booted up his laptop and tried to find updated information about the crime. There was nothing new available other than an announcement that the chief of police would hold a news conference at 11 that morning. Race could barely sit down during the three hours until the news conference.

  “Will you guys shut the hell up?” Reese McCall shouted as he drove onto Interstate 40 and sped east toward the New Mexico state line. He stroked the knife tattoo on his neck, as he always did when he was aggravated.

  “Whatsamatter?” Kiley Lewis said from the front passenger seat.

  Gerome Bryant, in the backseat, said, “He’s pissed off about his cut from the jobs we’ve done.” Bryant laughed.

  “Is that right, Kiley?” McCall asked. “You unhappy about our arrangement? You and Gerry been talking about things?”

  “Hey, wait a minute,” Bryant blurted.

  “I told you to shut up.” McCall flipped on the radio and tuned it to a Country & Western station. No more than five seconds of music had passed before the only sound in the Explorer was the voice of a radio station DJ.

  “We have news about the ma
ss murder in Flagstaff last night. As we reported earlier, the scene of the murders is gruesome, savage. Five people were killed, including three children aged seven to thirteen. The Flagstaff Police Department—”

  “Holy shit,” Gerome Bryant said. “They found them already. How the hell—”

  “Quiet,” McCall shouted.

  “The children’s parents returned from a trip and went to pick them up at their grandparents’ home. They found the bodies and called the police.”

  “That musta been a shock for Mommy and Daddy,” Kiley Lewis said. He chuckled.

  The radio DJ continued: “The Brownell home was equipped with a motion detection, infra-red security camera. A source with the Flagstaff Police Department told us the camera captured the perpetrators and their vehicle. They’ve broadcast that information to all law enforcement agencies in the region, as well as to the FBI.”

  “Oh, shit,” McCall groaned.

  At one minute before 11 a.m., Race moved a chair so that he was perched on it less than three feet from the television screen. He watched a gray-haired, uniformed man climb three steps to a stage and stop behind a podium.

  The man announced, “I am Wilbur Hamilton, Chief of Police of Flagstaff, Arizona. I’ll make a statement and then take a few questions.” He waited for the reporters in the audience to settle down. “At 1:13 the night before last, three men—two white and one black—broke down the back door of William and Yvette Brownell’s home in the Sunrise Estate’s Country Club community. They brutally murdered the Brownells and their three grandchildren, aged thirteen, eleven, and seven. They were in the Brownell home for approximately two hours. It appears the men robbed the Brownells after they murdered them.”

  Race was so fixated on the screen that it took a minute before William Brownell’s name jogged something in his memory bank, but he couldn’t immediately drag it up.

  “We are communicating with the Federal Bureau of Investigation and all law enforcement agencies in Arizona, as well as in surrounding states,” the police chief continued. “The suspects in these crimes are believed to be in a three-year-old, dark-red Ford Explorer.”

  The chief looked around the room and then stared into the camera. “The men who committed these crimes are suspects in similar crimes that occurred in multiple states over the past five years. I encourage the media to broadcast the video from the Brownell home security system every day, multiple times a day, until we catch these sadistic killers. This is the first time we have had pictures of these men. We must find them before they strike again.”

  The police chief’s eyes half-closed as he visibly swallowed. He took a deep breath and said, “Finally, I want to warn everyone these men are probably armed and extremely dangerous. Anyone with information about them should call their local police or the FBI.” He cleared his throat. “I will now take questions.”

  The media reps immediately went into hyperactive mode and shouted en-masse at the chief, who raised his hands until quiet had been restored.

  “Another outburst like that and I’ll walk away. Raise your hands if you have questions. I’ll point at whoever I want to hear from.”

  A communal groan came from the press reps, but they followed the chief’s instructions. The first reporter asked, “Can you tell us anything about how the victims were killed. Were they sexually assaulted, or—”

  The police chief glared at the reporter. “No comment.” He looked at another part of the room and pointed at another reporter.

  “Would you go through events from the time the children’s parents discovered the bodies to the present time?”

  The police chief briefed the reporters on the general activities associated with the investigation, from the time the 9-1-1 call came in.

  Another reporter asked, “Have you been able to determine why the Brownells were targeted?”

  The police chief shook his head. “At this point, we assume the murderers picked the Brownell home at random.”

  Race turned down the volume and thought about what he knew. There was no question the killers were psychopaths. What they did to their victims was inhuman. They enjoyed inflicting pain as well as committing murder. But, despite their heinous crimes, they were clever enough to not have been identified or caught. They’d been on a rampage for years. They’d left DNA and fingerprint evidence behind when they’d murdered Race’s wife and children—and had done so at other crime scenes—yet the police hadn’t been able to identify them. The men had probably never been fingerprinted.

  “What would I do now if I were them?” Race said aloud. He had a momentary sinking feeling as the thought hit him that he, too, was probably considered a psychopath because of the murders he’d committed. He shook his head as though to clear it of that errant thought and then took a pen and piece of paper from his briefcase. His mind worked in an organized, logical fashion, as though it was fabricated out of computer code. He considered the actions he would take if he was a member of the gang. He’d dump the Ford Explorer; get another vehicle. Then he’d get as far away from Flagstaff as possible and lie low somewhere. He also figured they would need to offload the loot they’d stolen.

  He tried to come up with other answers, but nothing came to him. “Come on, come on,” he rasped as he paced the motel room. “What else?”

  Then it hit him. They had a problem. Their faces had been caught on the security camera. The infra-red images had not been the best, but they were clear enough to show features and had picked up the scars and tattoo on one of them. Every person watching television or accessing the Internet would now know what they looked like. And they would know that the threesome included two white men and one black man.

  Race added to his mental list: the men would need to change their appearances and split up. Two white men and one black man traveling together would attract attention now that their descriptions had become public.

  Race prioritized what he thought the men would do. Number one on his list was stealing another vehicle. If and when that happened, he suspected the police would broadcast the news. But that wasn’t a certainty. Maybe only law enforcement agencies would be notified. Wherever they got rid of the Explorer and replaced the vehicle with another one . . . or two, or three vehicles, if they split up, would broaden the search zone. He snatched a burner phone from his briefcase and dialed a number in Amarillo, Texas.

  “Forrester.”

  “Detective Forrester, it’s Race Thornton.”

  There was a slight pause before Forrester said, “Hello, Mr. Thornton. How’ve you been?”

  “Fine. How about you?”

  “Same here. I assume you heard about Flagstaff.”

  Race took in a quiet breath, let it out. “Of course. That’s why I’m calling.”

  “You think they’re the same guys who killed Mary and the girls?” Forrester said.

  “I can tell you one thing with a certainty, Dennis. One of the men in the video from Flagstaff is the one who tried to kill me with the tire iron. Same nose, same tattoo, same scars down his cheek and across his lips.”

  “You absolutely certain?”

  “Without a doubt.”

  “Sonofabitch. I thought so. When I saw the video on television this morning, your description of your attacker immediately came to mind. Maybe the same three men. Hopefully, we can compare DNA and fingerprint evidence. That still won’t identify them, but it will tell us if it’s the same crew.”

  “Anything new on them?”

  “You know I’m not supposed to put out that information.”

  “What harm will you do telling me anything?”

  Race waited for an answer, but none came.

  “You can do some good, Detective. Keeping me apprised of progress in finding these guys will give me some relief from the pain I’ve suffered for all these years.”

  Again, Forrester didn’t respond, but, this time, Race waited him out.

  Finally, the detective said, “They abandoned their vehicle in an arroyo in Gallup, New Mexic
o.”

  “Any reported stolen vehicles in the Gallup area?”

  “Yeah, but that’s a regular occurrence there. The New Mexico State Police put out BOLOs on all stolen vehicles, but nothing’s come up yet.”

  “I hope someone gets these guys before they murder more people.”

  “Me, too, Mr. Thornton.”

  Race was about to thank Forrester, when he remembered why the name William Brownell had tickled his memory. He sucked in a huge breath and his heart seemed to stop for a second.

  After a long pause, Forrester asked, “Are you still there?”

  “Oh, sorry, Detective. I just had a thought.”

  “Yeah?”

  Race cleared his throat. “I’m not sure.”

  “Come on, Mr. Thornton; tell me what’s on your mind.”

  “Can you check something for me?”

  “Depends,” Forrester said.

  “I understand.” Race took in another long breath. “I knew a man named William Brownell . . . by reputation only. Was a big-time coin collector. The man murdered in Flagstaff might not be the same guy.”

  Forrester paused. “Coin collector, huh?”

  “Yeah. I was just wondering. I read an article by a William Brownell several years ago about pre-Civil War U.S. coins. I’m not certain, but I seem to recall he lived somewhere in Arizona.”

  “Okay, I’ll check. There was nothing on the wire or in the NCIC system about a coin collection. What are you . . . hey, I remember you had a big coin collection.”

  “I did. But there are a lot of people with coin collections. This is probably just a coincidence.” Race spread his arms. “But if it’s the same Brownell, and they stole his coin collection, that stuff won’t do them any good unless they can find a buyer with a lot of cash. The coins stolen from my house never turned up on the market.”

  “Makes sense. But with their faces plastered all over television and the Internet, what legitimate coin dealer will do business with them?”