by Blake Pierce
Oh no, Mackenzie thought. Not a brown-noser.
“So am I going solo on this?” Mackenzie asked.
McGrath grinned at her and shook his head. It was almost a playful kind of gesture that showed her that she had come a long way with McGrath since their first awkward and borderline hostile meetings.
“No way am I sending you out there by yourself,” he said. “I’ve arranged to have Agent Ellington work this one with you.”
“Oh,” she said, a bit stunned.
She wasn’t sure how to feel about this. There was a weird sort of chemistry between her and Ellington—there had been ever since she had first met him while working as a detective out of rural Nebraska. She had enjoyed working with him for that short span but now that things were different…well, it would make for an interesting case to say the least. But there was nothing to worry about. She felt confident that she could easily divide whatever personal feelings she had for him from the professional ones.
“Might I ask why?” Mackenzie asked.
“He’s got a brief history of working with the local field agents out there, as you know. He’s also got an impressive record when it comes to missing persons cases. Why?”
“Just asking, sir,” she said, easily recalling the first time she and Ellington had met when he had come out to assist with the Scarecrow Killer case when she was still working for the PD out there. “Did he…well, did he ask to work with me on this?”
“No,” McGrath said. “It just so happens that you’re both perfect for this case—him with his connections and you with your past.”
McGrath stood up from his chair, effectively ending the conversation. “You should be getting e-mails about your flight within a few minutes,” McGrath said. “I believe you’ll be flying out at eleven fifty-five.”
“But that’s only an hour and a half away,” she said.
“Then I suggest you get moving.”
She exited the office quickly, looking back only once to see Agent Harrison still sitting in his seat like a lost puppy, unsure of what to do or where to go. But she had no time to worry about his potentially hurt feelings. She had to figure out how to pack and get to the airport in less than an hour and a half.
And on top of that, she had to figure out why she dreaded the idea of working a case with Ellington.
CHAPTER TWO
Mackenzie arrived at the airport running, with barely enough time to reach her gate. She rushed onto the plane five minutes after the flight had started to board and ambled down the aisle slightly out of breath, frustrated and thrown off. She briefly wondered if Ellington had made it on time but, quite frankly, was just glad she had not missed the flight. Ellington was a big boy—he could take care of himself.
Her question was answered when she located her seat. Ellington was already on the plane, sitting comfortably in the seat beside hers. He smiled at her from his place by the window seat, giving her a little wave. She shook her head and sighed heavily.
“Bad day?” he asked.
“Well, it started with a funeral and then a meeting with McGrath,” Mackenzie said. “I then had to rush home to pack a bag and run through Dulles to barely make the flight. And it’s not even noon yet.”
“So things can only get better then,” Ellington joked.
Shoving her carry-on into the overhead compartment, Mackenzie said: “We’ll see. Say, doesn’t the FBI have private planes?”
“Yes, but only for extremely time-sensitive cases. And for superstar employees. This case is not time sensitive and we are most certainly not star employees.”
When she was finally in her seat, she took a moment to relax. She peered over at Ellington and saw that he was thumbing through a folder that was identical to the one she had seen in McGrath’s office.
“What do you think of this case?” Ellington asked.
“I think it’s too soon to speculate,” she said.
He gave her a roll of his eyes and a playful frown. “You’ve got to have some sort of first reaction. What is it?”
While she didn’t want to offer her thoughts only to be proven wrong later on, she appreciated the effort of jumping on things right away. It showed that he was indeed the hard worker and committed agent McGrath painted him to be—the same kind of worker she had kind of hoped he was.
“I think the fact that these are being called disappearances rather than murders gives us some hope,” she said. “But given that the victims are all being taken from rural roads also tells me that this guy is a local that knows the lay of the land. He could be kidnapping the women and then killing them, hiding their bodies somewhere in the forests or some other hiding spot only he knows about.”
“You read deep into this yet?” he asked, nodding at the folder.
“No. I haven’t had time.”
“Help yourself,” Ellington said, handing it over.
Mackenzie read over the scant information as the flight attendants walked through the safety lecture. She was still studying it moments later when the plane took off toward Des Moines. There wasn’t much information in the file, but enough for Mackenzie to map out an approach to take when they got there.
Delores Manning was the third woman to be reported missing in the past nine days. The first woman was a local, reported missing by her daughter. Naomi Nyles, forty-seven years of age, also taken from the side of the road. The second was a Des Moines woman named Crystal Hall. She had a slight record, mostly promiscuous stuff in her youth, but nothing serious. When she was abducted, she had been visiting a local cattle farm in the area. The first case had shown no traces of foul play—just an abandoned car on the side of the road. The second abandoned vehicle had been a small pickup truck with a busted tire. The truck had been discovered in the midst of having its tire changed, the jack still under the axle and the flat propped against the side of the truck.
All three instances appeared to have occurred during the night, sometime between 10 p.m. and 3 a.m. So far, nine days after the first abduction, there was not a single shred of evidence and absolutely zero clues.
As she usually did, Mackenzie scanned the information several times, committing it to memory. It wasn’t hard in this case, as there wasn’t much to take in. She kept going back to the pictures of the rural settings—the back roads that wound through the forests like a massive snake with nowhere to go.
She also allowed herself to slip into the mind of a killer using those roads and the night as cover. He had to be patient. And because of the darkness, he had to be used to being by himself. Darkness would not concern him. He may even prefer to work in the darkness, not only for the cover but for the sense of solitude and isolation. This guy was probably a loner of some sort. He was taking them from the road, apparently in different stressful situations. Car repair, busted tires. That meant he was probably not in this for the sport of killing. He just wanted the women. But why?
And how about the latest victim, Delores Manning? Maybe she was a local with a past history of the area, Mackenzie thought. Either that or just brave as hell to travel those back roads at such an hour…I don’t care how good a shortcut it is, that’s pretty reckless.
She hoped this was the case. She hoped the woman was brave. Because bravery, no matter how staged, could often help people deal with tense situations. It was more than just a badge of honor, but a deep psychological trait that helped people cope. She tried to envision Delores Manning, the up-and-coming writer, winding down those roads at night. Brave or not, it simply wasn’t a pretty picture.
When Mackenzie was done, she handed the folder back to Ellington. She looked past him and to the window beyond where white tufts of clouds were drifting by. She closed her eyes for just a moment and took herself back there, not to Iowa but to neighboring Nebraska. A place where there was open land and towering woods rather than mangled traffic and tall buildings. She didn’t really miss it but found that the idea of returning to it, even for work, was exciting in a way she did not fully understand.
“White?”
She opened her eyes at the sound of her name. She turned to Ellington, a little embarrassed that he had caught her zoning out. “Yeah?”
“You sort of went blank there for a minute. You okay?”
“I am,” she said.
And the hell of it was that she was okay. The first six hours of the day had been physically and emotionally draining, but now that she was sitting down, suspended in the air and with an unlikely temporary partner, she felt okay.
“Let me ask you something,” Mackenzie said.
“Shoot.”
“Did you put in a request to work with me on this?”
Ellington didn’t answer right away. She could see the cogs turning behind his eyes before he replied and wondered why he might have any reason to lie to her.
“Well, I heard about the case and, as you know, I have a working relationship with the field office in Omaha. And since that’s the closest field office to our target in Iowa, I threw my hat in the ring. When he asked if I minded working with you on the case, I didn’t argue.”
She nodded, starting to feel almost guilty for wondering if he had any other reason for wanting the job. While she had been harboring some sort of feelings for him (whether strictly physical or somehow emotional, she had never been sure), he had never given her any reason to assume he felt the same. It was far too easy to recall coming on to him when she had first met him out in Nebraska and then getting rejected.
Let’s just hope he’s forgotten all about that, she thought. I’m a different person now, he’s far too busy to worry himself with me, and we’re working together now. Water under the bridge.
“So how about you?” she asked. “What are your initial thoughts?”
“I think he has no intention of killing the women,” Ellington said. “No clues, no showing off, and, like you, I think it’s got to be a local doing it. I think he’s maybe collecting them…for what purpose, I won’t speculate. But that worries me, if I’m right.”
It worried Mackenzie, too. If there was someone out there kidnapping women, he would eventually run out of room. And maybe interest…which meant he’d have to stop sooner or later. And while that was theoretically a good thing, it also meant that his trail would go cold without any further scenes to possibly leave evidence at.
“I think you’re right about him collecting them,” she said. “He’s coming after them in a vulnerable state—while they’re messing with cars or busted tires. It means he’s sneaking up rather than being in your face. He’s likely timid.”
He grinned and said, “Huh. That’s a good observation.”
His grin turned into a smile that she had to look away from, knowing that they had a habit of locking eyes and letting the stares linger a bit too long. Instead, she turned her eyes back out to the blue sky and the clouds while the Midwest quickly approached below them.
***
With very little luggage between them, Mackenzie and Ellington made their way through the airport without any trouble. During the tail end of the flight, Ellington informed Mackenzie that plans had already been made (presumably while she had been rushing to her apartment and then to the airport). She and Ellington were to meet two local field agents and work with them to get the case wrapped up as quickly as possible. With no need to stop by the luggage carousel, they were able to meet with the agents with no problem.
They met in one of the countless Starbucks in the airport. She let Ellington lead the way because it was apparent that McGrath saw him as the lead on the case. Why else would he leave Ellington in charge of knowing where to meet the field agents? Why else would Ellington have been given a proper heads-up, with plenty of time to comfortably make his flight on time?
The two agents were hard to miss. Mackenzie sighed internally when she saw that they were both men. One of them, though, looked like he was brand new. There was no way the guy was any older than twenty-four. His partner looked rather hardened and older—probably reaching fifty any day now.
Ellington headed straight for them and Mackenzie followed. Neither of the agents stood but the older one offered his hand to Ellington as they approached the table.
“Agents Heideman and Thorsson, I take it?” Ellington asked.
“Guilty,” the older man said. “I’m Thorsson, and my partner here is Heideman.”
“Good to meet you,” Ellington said. “I’m Special Agent Ellington and this is my partner, Agent White.”
They all shook hands in a way that had become almost tedious to Mackenzie ever since she had joined the bureau. It was almost like a formality, an awkward thing that needed to be done in order to get to the task at hand. She noticed that when Heideman shook her hand, his grip was weak and sweaty. He didn’t look nervous but perhaps a bit shy or introverted.
“So how far out are the crime scenes?” Ellington asked.
“The closest one is about an hour away,” Thorsson said. “The others are all within ten or fifteen minutes of one another.”
“Have there been any updates since early this morning?” Mackenzie asked.
“Zero,” Thorsson said. “That’s one of the reasons we called you guys in. This guy has taken three women so far and we can’t generate as much as a single scrap of evidence. It’s gotten so bad that the state is considering the use of cameras along the highway. The hurdle there, though, is that you can’t really keep over seventy-five miles of back road under surveillance with cameras.”
“Well, you technically could,” Heideman said. “But that’s a ton of cameras and a huge chunk of change. So some folks at the state level are only viewing it as a last-ditch effort.”
“Can we go ahead and see the first scene then?” Ellington asked.
“Sure,” Thorsson said. “Do you guys need to handle hotels and things like that first?”
“No,” Mackenzie said. “Let’s get to work for now. If you guys are saying there’s that much road that needs to be covered, we can’t waste any time.”
As Thorsson and Heideman stood, Ellington gave her a peculiar look. She couldn’t tell if he was impressed with her dedication to get out to the first scene as quickly as possible or if he found it amusing that she wasn’t letting him take the entire lead on this. What she hoped he couldn’t sense was that the thought of going anywhere near a hotel with Ellington made her feel far too many emotions at once.
They left the Starbucks in something of a single file line. Mackenzie was slightly touched when Ellington waited for her, making sure she didn’t bring up the back of the line.
“You know,” Thorsson said, looking back over his shoulder, “I’m glad you guys want to get out there right away. There’s a bad vibe going around about this whole thing. You can feel it when you talk to the local police force and it’s starting to rub off on us, too.”
“What kind of vibe?” Mackenzie asked.
Thorsson and Heideman shared a foreboding look between them before Thorsson’s shoulders slumped a bit and he answered: “Like it’s just not going to happen. I’ve never seen anything like it. There’s not a single clue to be had. The guy’s like a ghost.”
“Well, hopefully we can help with that,” Ellington said.
“I hope so,” Thorsson said. “Because as of right now, the general feeling among everyone working this case is that we might never find this guy.”
CHAPTER THREE
Mackenzie was rather surprised that the local office had provided Thorsson and Heideman with a Suburban. After her own clunker and the template rental cars she’d been stuck with over the past few months, she felt like she was traveling in style while sitting in the back with Ellington. When they arrived at the first scene an hour and ten minutes later, she was almost glad to be out of it, though. She wasn’t used to such nice perks with her position and it made her feel a little uncomfortable.
Thorsson parked along the edge of State Route 14, a basic two-lane back road that wound through the forests of rural Iowa. The road was bordered with trees on both sides. Du
ring the few miles they had been on this road, Mackenzie had seen a few small dirt roads that seemed to have been long forgotten, chained off by a thin cable and two posts on either side of the tracks. Other than those few breaks, there was nothing more than trees.
Thorsson and Heideman led them past a few local cops who gave perfunctory waves as they passed. Up ahead, in front of two parked police cars, was a little red Subaru. The two driver’s side tires were completely flat.
“What’s the police force like around here?” Mackenzie asked.
“Small,” Thorsson said. “The nearest town to here is a little place called Bent Creek. Population of about nine hundred. The police force consists of one sheriff—who is back there with those other guys—two deputies, and seven officers. They had a few suits from Des Moines come in but when we showed up, they stepped back. It’s the FBI’s problem now. That kind of thing.”
“So they’re glad we’re here, in other words?” Ellington asked.
“Oh, absolutely,” Thorsson said.
They approached the car and all circled it for a moment. Mackenzie took a look back at the officers. Only one of them seemed legitimately interested in what the visiting FBI agents were doing. As far as she was concerned, that was fine with her. She’d had her fair share of meddling small-town police officers making things harder than they had to be. It would be nice to work a job without having to tiptoe around the sensitivities and egos of the local PD.
“Has the car already been dusted for prints?” Mackenzie asked.
“Yeah, earlier this morning,” Heideman said. “Help yourself.”
Mackenzie opened the passenger side door. A brief look around told her that while the vehicle might have been dusted for prints, nothing had yet been removed and tagged as evidence. A cell phone still sat in the passenger seat. A pack of gum sat on top of a few scattered and folded pieces of paper in the center console.
“This is the author’s car, correct?” Mackenzie asked.
