Get him talking.
“Why are you calling me?” Marina asked. “I’ve made it clear that I don’t know you.”
The caller’s words were poison-dipped. “You will come to know me… very soon,” the man said. “I’m going to take everything and everyone away from you, starting with your business.”
Marina was not easily rattled. But the pain and conviction in his voice managed to silence her.
“Your operation is over, done.”
“Operation?” Marina said. “What you are talking about? I don’t have an oper--.”
“I know about the girls, the transfer points in Los Angeles, Miami, Moscow, Riga, Minsk, Tokyo, Abu Dhabi, your connection to Russian organized crime, The Company... all of it.”
Marina turned off the recorder. She had heard enough. She settled back in her seat, made herself comfortable, sipped her latte.
“You know,” Marina said, “in certain cultures there are lines one is advised are best never to cross. To do so is to upset the natural order of things. Russia is one such country. You must know the information you just shared with me has now placed you well over that line.”
“I’m going to take it all apart. In ways you can't even begin to imagine.”
Marina laughed. “I really don’t think so.”
“I’ll start with your company…”
“Bold threats for one man.”
“…and end with you.”
“How entertaining.”
The caller paused. “Tell me, is Ilya enjoying his studies at Cal State? He has a girlfriend now. Did you know that? Pretty little thing. They spend a lot of time together. Mostly in Marina del Ray and Santa Monica.”
The smoothness of the latte did nothing to alleviate the course dryness Marina suddenly felt in her throat. She wanted to speak, couldn’t. Her son. How did he know about Ilya?
“I don’t hear you laughing anymore.”
“Poshel na khui!” Marina yelled. “Fuck you!”
The line went dead.
Marina stared at the phone.
CHAPTER 13
THE “BIG THREE” had arrived at the murder house. CNN, FOX NEWS and MSNBC mobile broadcast satellite trucks lumbered into position and stopped outside the iron gates of the Rosenfeld mansion.
Jordan and Chris stepped out of the FBI Mobile Command Unit. A reporter from FOX called out from behind the barricade. Her cameraman focused his camera squarely on Chris.
“Agent,” the woman yelled. “What progress has been made in the investigation so far? Do you have a suspect yet? How bad is the crime scene?”
Chris started to walk toward the reporter. Jordan grabbed him by the arm. “Don’t,” she said. “She’s not worth it. None of them are.”
Agent Janet Lynch stepped in front of the two agents. She smiled and addressed the journalists, “I’ll be happy to give you a statement,” she said, then turned and warned Chris. “Don’t even think about talking to the press, Agent Hanover.”
“Maybe we should escort her inside,” Chris said to Jordan as they walked away. “Show her what a real murder scene looks like, right up close and personal. Give her the full backstage pass. But first I’m going to set the timer on my phone, because once we get upstairs and she meets the Rosenfeld’s I’ll bet it won’t be more than five seconds before she pukes her guts up.”
“Rein it in, Chris,” Jordan said. “We’ve got more important things to worry about right now than her.”
“The flash drive and the computer.”
“Precisely.”
Chris and Jordan found Agent Hawkins sitting behind the Chippendale desk in the waiting room outside the entrance to the master bedroom.
“What have you got for us, genius?” Jordan asked.
Hawkins motioned for them to take a chair on either side of the desk and settle in beside him.
“Lots,” he replied. “I’ve been trying to wrap my head around this for the last hour. But now I think I know what we have here. Let me start with the flash drive.”
Hawkins plugged the drive into the computer. The file labeled “AWP” flashed onto the screen.
“I still don’t know what AWP stands for yet,” Hawkins continued, “but that’s not important right now. This is what’s important...”
He opened the file. Five alphanumeric lines, the entire contents of the file, appeared on the screen.
“Look at first line: DM 14PFnFlenmalGdqFNkdGkajnsDh6JnrFks. It line starts with two letters, then a space, and is followed by an alphanumeric code. It was those first two letters that kept throwing me off.”
“How’s that?” Jordan asked.
“I though they were part of the code. They’re not. I believe they’re identifiers for that particular string of code.”
“Meaning? Chris asked.
“Each of the identifiers is separate from the rest of the code. Like this one, starting with ‘DM.’ Each varies in length. The shortest is twenty-four characters long, the longest thirty-four.
“And that tells you what?” Jordan asked.
“My guess? These are Bitcoin keys.”
“Bit-what?” Chris said.
“Bitcoin keys are account numbers generally used to facilitate financial transactions on the Internet between electronic wallets,” Hawkins explained. “Bitcoin is money, just like regular currency. It’s a popular means of transferring funds from one account to another between criminal organizations on the Dark Web. Each of these character codes meets the criteria for a Bitcoin address. A second key is required to withdraw the money from the account. All Bitcoin transactions are encrypted.”
“Can we open these accounts and see what’s in them?” Chris asked.
“Not without knowing the private keys,” Hawkins replied. “I think these are just the public account keys. My guess is that the identifier signifies who the account belongs to. But truthfully, VT, RI, GA, PM, HJ could mean just about anything.”
“So, the question remains,” Jordan said. “What reason would the killer have had to put this drive in Dr. Rosenfeld’s mouth?”
“Because he wants us to open those accounts,” Chris suggested. “Maybe there’s something going on in the good doctor’s life that he didn’t want the world to know about.”
“Probably,” Hawkins said. He removed the flash drive from the laptop, opened the main drive containing two files labeled Account 1 and Account 2 and resized them so that they appeared side-by-side on the computer screen.
“There are pictures of hundreds of girls in these files,” he continued. “No names, just pictures and corresponding codes. I think I know what this might be.”
“Me too,” Chris said.
“A shopping list,” Jordan said.
CHAPTER 14
BEN EGAN watched the silhouettes enter through the receiving door at the back of the factory.
The group yelled, screamed and tested the factory walls for echo.
“I told you guys this place was cool!” one of the men yelled as he ran into the plant. He picked an object up from the floor and threw it. One of the windows shattered.
“Yeah,” one of the others replied. “The Sons of Satan used this place as their clubhouse for a while.” He football-kicked an empty paint can. The container sailed through the air for nearly the entire length of the factory, bounced along the floor and spun to a stop in front of the pallets behind which Egan was hiding.
“Those guys used to do all kinds of weird shit in here,” still another called out. “Animal sacrifices, devil worship, all sorts of stuff. My uncle’s a cop. He talked about them all the time. Said every last one of those guys was bat-shit crazy.”
Not professionals, Egan thought. Teenagers. Local toughs. Wannabe thugs.
The burliest of the men and apparent leader of the group stepped out from the shadows and crossed the factory floor to where an old furniture inspection station stood.
He barked an order at one of the men. “Get over here. Grab an end. Move it over there.”
&n
bsp; Together they slid the heavy wooden table aside. Remnants of old cloth and cotton batting covered the floor where the table had been situated. The leader kicked away the refuse. “This is what we came for,” he said.
A bright beam of sunlight poured in through a cluster of windows that somehow had remained relatively free of dirt and grime and placed a spotlight on the area where they stood. A five-point pentagram was etched into the concrete floor. A horned goat’s head stared up at the men from the middle of the satanic symbol. The words ‘ETERNALLY S.O.S’ surrounded the pentagram.
“Holy shit, Colin! You knew this was here?”
“Yeah. My brother rode with Sons of Satan ‘til he got sent upstate,” the leader replied. “He told me about it. He and the guys used to have what they called ‘coming of age’ parties here.” Colin talked about his brother’s experiences with the motorcycle gang as if they were his own.
The smallest kid in the group spoke up. “What’s a coming of age party?”
Colin smirked at the kid then shook his head, as if to infer he was stupid for not understanding the term. “S.O.S would bring their new prospects here. They’d tell them there was going to be a huge party… strippers, booze, coke, weed…whatever they wanted. Everybody was gonna get laid and get wasted. Except that was never the plan. Instead they'd get jumped in, right here, on this very spot.”
“Jumped in?” the same kid asked.
“They’d get the crap beaten out of them. Fuck them up a little. Not so much that they couldn’t walk or talk... nothing that bad. They’d make them swear their allegiance to the club. Called it, ‘becoming eternally S.O.S.’ Then they’d make a blood bond. The new prospects had to do something that bound them to the club for life.”
“Like what?” the kid asked.
“They’d send out a full-patch member to pick up a hooker and bring her back here. The guys would take turns partying with her. Then sometime before daybreak…”
Colin walked over to the wooden fabrication station. He removed a black-handled knife from a leather scabbard that had been fastened to the underside of the table.
“…they’d have a blood sacrifice. They’d force the prospect to kill her with this dagger while the rest of them watched. A whole club full of witnesses… a blood bond.”
Colin opened the drawer of the table and removed a cloth bag. He opened it and took out its contents: five black candles, several books of matches, a silver bell and a black leather-bound book. He laid the items out on the table.
“What are you doing?” the kid asked.
“Shut up, Kevin,” Colin said. He knelt down, placed a candle on each point of the pentagram and lit the wicks.
Kevin protested. “I don’t like this, Colin.” The boy was scared. “Not one bit.”
“I said shut up!” Colin yelled. He stood and motioned to the teen on his right. “Get the little shit out of my sight, Jacob.”
Jacob grabbed Kevin by the collar and held him tight. Kevin tried to struggle free, but it was no use. He was no match for the much stronger Jacob.
Colin picked up the silver bell and rang it once. Its clear tone resonated throughout the factory. He turned it counter clockwise to signify the commencement of the ritual.
“It’s time,” Colin said.
The teens gathered around the pentagram. Jacob locked Kevin’s arm behind his back, held him tight.
“Where is she?” Colin asked.
“Waiting at the back door,” Jacob said. “She said the place creeps her out.”
Colin walked to the table, picked up the black book, slipped the dagger into his belt. He turned to Lenny, his second in command.
“It’s time. Get her.”
Lenny nodded. He turned and headed toward the receiving area at the back of the factory.
“No!” Kevin struggled to break free of Jacob, couldn’t. He tried to scream. Lenny clamped his hand tightly over his mouth, muffling his words. “Rnnn, Lorrrennn! Rnnnnn!”
From the back of the factory Lauren thought she heard her older brother’s muffled cry. She called out. “Kevin? You okay?”
Kevin bit down hard. Jacob screamed and pulled back his hand. Kevin shoved him aside and yelled. “Lauren! Get out of here now! Run Lauren… Run… RUN!”
Kevin heard his sister scream.
“Lenny, you asshole,” Lauren said. “Take your hands off me! Let… me… go!”
Lenny walked back toward the group, pulling Lauren by her hair, holding her at arm’s length. Suddenly he stopped dead in his tracks.
Colin looked at him. “What’s wrong with you? Bring her over here!”
Lenny didn’t reply.
“Jesus, Lenny! I said…”
Lenny pointed past the group.
At the back of the factory a man stood in the shadows. He stepped into the light.
“Let the girl go,” he called out.
Startled, the group turned in the direction of the stranger’s voice.
“I said, let her go. Now.”
CHAPTER 15
HALLIER WAS greeted in the lobby of the FBI’s Los Angeles field office by Special Agent Brent Cobb. Cobb pressed the elevator call button for the seventeenth floor.
“ADC Ridgeway is waiting for you, Colonel,” he said. “She asked me to provide you with any assistance you’ll need.”
“That won’t be necessary,” Hallier said.
“Sir?”
Hallier didn’t reply.
The elevator whisked the men to the seventeenth floor. “On your left, Colonel,” Cobb said as the men exited the elevator.
Assistant Director in Charge Ann Ridgeway was speaking to her administrative assistant when Agent Cobb and Hallier walked through the double glass entrance doors into her office.
“ADC Ridgeway,” Agent Cobb introduced, “Colonel Hallier from DARPA.”
“Good to meet you, Colonel.” The Assistant Director smiled and shook his hand.
“Likewise,” Hallier replied. “We’re on the clock Agent Ridgeway. You ready?”
Apparently as arrogant in person as he had been on the phone, Ann Ridgeway forced a smile and reminded herself of the Bureau’s commitment of fostering healthy inter-agency cooperation.
“Of course, Colonel. Please come in. And it’s Assistant Director if you please.”
Agent Cobb tried to follow them into Ridgeway’s office. Hallier stopped him at the door.
“Sorry son,” he said, “you’ll have to wait outside. You’re not cleared for this discussion.”
Cobb looked to his boss for direction.
“It’s all right Agent Cobb,” Ridgeway said. “I’ll contact you if I need you.”
“Yes, ma’am.” The agent nodded and left the office.
The Assistant Director’s office was furnished more like a home than a place of business with a large rosewood desk and plush high-back leather chair. The wall-to-wall bookcase behind the desk contained FBI procedural manuals as well as framed photos of special events in her life: hamming it up with friends over drinks, a family picture with her husband and two kids, all of them dressed in white, and their three German Sheppard’s. A framed basketball jersey signed by Los Angeles Lakers basketball star Kobe Bryant hung on one wall. On the other, the FBI Medal of Valor.
“I see you’re a Lakers fan,” Hallier said, pointing at the jersey.
Ann Ridgeway seated herself in her chair. “My brother-in-law is the Lakers strength training coach. Kobe’s a friend.”
“I’m more of a golf man myself,” Hallier said. He turned his attention to the framed medal. “I’m impressed,” he said.
“Don’t be,” Ridgeway said. “Any number of agents should have received that medal that day. I keep it there to remind me never let my guard down again. And of how an otherwise average day can go straight to hell in a heartbeat.”
“Mind if I ask what happened?”
“Three agents and I were assigned to a return-to-prison transfer detail for a convict, Anton Carpaccio.”
“I
know the name from the news. Serial killer. Twelve victims, right?”
“Fourteen,” Ridgeway corrected. “Carpaccio drew a shiv on the wrong guy in prison. Ended up on the business end of the blade and took nine stab wounds for his trouble. Unfortunately for the rest of humanity the bastard didn't die. The prison rushed him to Cedars-Sinai Hospital for emergency surgery. Two weeks later the docs declared him well enough to leave and the State called us in to facilitate return transport. When the orderlies were helping him out of his wheelchair Carpaccio doubled over. One of the agents stepped in to help him. Big mistake. It was a setup. Carpaccio grabbed him around the neck, then got hold of his gun. He drew down on another agent, Bill Cooper. Coop was on my left. I knew Carpaccio was going to shoot him, which he did. I threw myself in front of the shot and knocked Coop out of the way. Carpaccio’s round caught me in the shoulder when we fell. Another agent, Trevor Johnston, was standing beyond of the line of fire. He shot Carpaccio just as he turned on him. One round, a perfect shot, right between his eyes. Blew out the back of his head. Bad for Carpaccio, good for us. We all went home to our families that day. Around here we call that a happy ending.”
“You saved Agent Cooper’s life,” Hallier said.
“Not me. Agent Johnston did. He saved all our lives when he took that shot. The only reason they gave me the medal is because I caught a bullet covering Coop."
“How’s the shoulder now?”
ADC Ridgeway pointed to the framed basketball jersey and smiled. “Let’s just say Kobe doesn't have anything to worry about.”
Hallier cracked a smile.
The Assistant Director sat back in her chair. “So tell me, Colonel. What’s so important that DARPA needs the Bureau’s help? I thought you guys always flew solo when it came to matters of national security.”
“Normally we do,” Hallier replied. “But there’s someone I need to find fast, and I can’t rally enough manpower to cover the ground as quickly as you can. I need your help to track down a missing scientist by the name of Dr. Jason Merrick.”
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