Blood Silence (22 page)

Speedy knew what they were thinking. “It’s not a competitor, it’s not a professional, and you haven’t been the least bit replaced. We haven’t contracted with someone else, although to answer your question specifically, I don’t know exactly who is ‘watching’ McRyan. It’s someone the boss knows and trusts who is watching matters in a different way but has eyes on the situation. Look, as of now, McRyan’s in the Twin Cities, and we just need him to stay there, and thanks to you two, there is plenty to keep him occupied down there.”

“There’s nothing in the law firm files,” Royce stated. “We have everything from Sterling’s and Gentry’s briefcases and all the documents they had that matched up with what Weatherly had. So if McRyan just sticks to trying to get Sterling’s wife off, we should be fine. If he engages in mission creep and decides to spread beyond that …” He let the words hang in the air.

Speedy shrugged. “Let’s cross that bridge when—
and if
—we get there.”

“Let’s hope we don’t get there,” Royce replied. “He’s an hombre we have to respect. He’ll fight back, and he is not the least bit afraid to throw down.”

“Well, he’s not here now,” Speedy answered.

“I can tell you this much,” Clint stated, kicking back. “It feels good to be back here, hundreds of miles away. I feel like I could sleep for days.”

“Me, too,” Royce muttered.

“Then get some sleep and lie low for a few days,” Speedy suggested. “If anything comes up, I’ll call.”

M
ac took a two-hour nap when he got home, followed by a quick shower, and then a late lunch of tomato soup and a grilled cheese sandwich. By 4:00
P.M.
, he was energized enough to get back at it, the adrenaline of an interesting case coursing through his veins.

Since he stopped being a cop full-time, he didn’t miss the day-to-day paperwork and other mundane aspects of the job. He liked his freedom, the ability to take on other projects, and to live life on his terms. But that didn’t mean he wasn’t bored from time to time. And what he really did miss about the job was the juice he got from an interesting case. When he had a complex case, he could stay up all night thinking, ruminating, and noodling on it until he put the puzzle together.

Suddenly, that was this case.

It had gone from the simple question of did his ex-wife murder her husband to a possible layered conspiracy involving multiple murders in three different locales.

What would have made this even better in some respects would have been to have his usual white boards, lamps, and FBI or police resources at the tips of his fingers. Even better would have been to have his partners, whether they be the boys, whom he would see later, or Wire. She loved convoluted cases. The boys liked the rough and tumble of police work, the sweating of suspects, the confrontation of it, but Wire, ex-FBI, was a little more intellectual. She liked puzzles as much as he did, and the more twisted the better.

Alas, he didn’t have the resources or his partners, for the most part. So for now, the long sheets of paper on the wall in his basement would just have to do. By the time he’d dried off from his shower, he had Coolidge’s case file in his e-mail. Now it was printed off and spread across the banquet folding table he’d set up in the basement opposite the murder wall.

Coolidge’s investigative file had a ballistics analysis. The bullets used on Weatherly and Kane were from a .22, and it was thought a suppressor was used. Mac inspected the casings from last night—those from Meredith’s bed and from his chase—and he knew they were for a .22, and a silencer, one that effectively suppressed the sound, was used. Meredith said there was a “pop” when the intruder shot at the bed but that it wasn’t very loud, and Mac concurred based on his experience from the chase. Using a .22 and a quieter popping sound from a suppressor and Coolidge’s theory that these guys used a Ruger was making more sense. Discreetly, Gerdtz and Subject were going to see if there was a ballistics match with the weapon in Coolidge’s case. Mac wasn’t holding his breath, but it was worth a shot.

The dirt in Kane’s car was mud with some sand mixed in. The sand was a high-purity quartz type not necessarily indigenous to Virginia or Maryland. The boot tread was for a Lowa Renegade Hiking boot, size twelve, a popular hiking boot sold in stores all over the country. That was it for the forensics from Coolidge.

The credit cards or cell phones for either Kane or Weatherly had not been used since stolen. Other than Mac’s call to Coolidge about the Gentry connection, Coolidge’s investigation was ice cold, and he was working another homicide now—such was the life of a homicide detective in DC. Nevertheless, Weatherly was connected to Meredith’s case, which necessitated a new sheet for his murder wall, entitled Connections—Weatherly and Sterling/Gentry. When he started looking at the connections, the evidence started to fit together and make some sense.

The original connection was the check to Weatherly from Soutex Solutions, which was signed by Callie Gentry.

There were bodies in Washington, in the Twin Cities, and as he’d now learned, possibly in North Dakota. The Buller family murders, and more so how they were committed, created another possible connection.

According to the investigative report, Harold and Melody Buller and their two children were murdered nearly seven months ago, on April 19. All four of them were shot multiple times in the torso, but for all of them, the kill shot was the one to the forehead.

“That’s a connection,” Mac muttered when he wrote “Head Shots” on the page.

Sterling, Gentry, Weatherly, Isador Kane from the EPA, and now the Bullers, all shot multiple times, but all were also shot in the head, execution style, either in the front or the back. Even if they were found immediately, there would be no heroic medical saves.

“Even the kids,” Mac muttered, shaking his head, angry at the depravity of it.

The only saving grace was that at least with the head shot, death was instant. If their eyes never opened, then they didn’t suffer the fear of it. The lights just never came back on after they went to sleep. But the murders, the method of it all evidenced a special kind of ruthlessness and viciousness he’d seen before but still had difficulty getting his mind around. He just couldn’t imagine how a person could get there, no matter how many times he saw it. He accepted it, wasn’t even that fazed by it anymore, but it still mystified him. A person simply lacked a soul if they would murder an innocent child lying in bed.

A Google Maps search showed the Bullers’ land was two miles west of the small town of Ray in northwestern North Dakota, which was thirty miles, give or take, northeast of Williston. This put the Bullers right in the middle of the oil boom in North Dakota.

Since the mid-1950s, it was known that a massive oil pocket existed underneath western North Dakota, eastern Montana, and southern Saskatchewan. It was known as the Bakken Formation, named after the farmer who owned the land where the formation was initially discovered. However, the oil was buried deep down in shale, and the technology did not exist to extract it. Many attempts over the years were made to vertically drill for the oil but to no avail. Then, in the early 2000s, the technique of hydraulic fracturing and horizontal drilling advanced enough that it became possible to extract the oil and gas buried miles down in the rock below the earth in North Dakota. The resulting success of the drilling had led to the long-awaited oil boom in North Dakota.

The boom required workers, many more than the lightly populated northwest corner of North Dakota could supply. The boom coincided with the economic collapse of 2008. Workers, having lost their jobs in other industries, came from around the country to get in on the jobs and riches in North Dakota. And it wasn’t just field workers—you could get work for $18.50 an hour working a drive-thru in Williston, the shortage of workers was so acute. However, the workers flooding in from around the country weren’t always of the best character. Those of less character brought with them crime and drugs, both of which were now in heavy abundance, and there wasn’t nearly enough law enforcement and government resources in the desolate reaches of northwest North Dakota to deal with it. As a result, Mac was not surprised the Buller murders remained unsolved, particularly if they were the work of professionals.

As Mac read the investigative report, the narrative reflected that those involved in investigating the case were not in complete agreement regarding what happened at the Buller house. The investigation of the Buller murders was conducted jointly by the Williams County Sheriff’s Department and the Northwest North Dakota Drug Task Force. The Task Force was developed to deal with the drug issues becoming more prevalent in the oil lands. The investigation did not turn up a suspect or suspects. The Task Force strongly believed the Buller murders were related to methamphetamine, as the break-in bore many of the characteristics of other meth-related crimes, and there was evidence of removal of items from the home often used to make it. All of the cleaning supplies were gone, and the medicine and kitchen cabinets were emptied. However, the way the report was written suggested, at least to Mac, that the drafter didn’t necessarily believe that was the
only
possible reason for the murders. The investigative report was signed by Sam Rawlings, the sheriff for Williams County.

A discussion with Rawlings might be in order.

The Buller family was running a farm operation on the two thousand acres. The farm operation was owned by Gentry Enterprises.

“Why keep these records separated from the law firm files?” Mac asked out loud, standing, twirling a black marker in his fingers, soaking in the details on his murder wall. These records were held out of the law firm files, and he suspected the murders were why.

But why hold them out?

Were these just a copy?

Did Sterling have another copy of the report? Would that have been in his briefcase? Would there have been more with it? Was that why his briefcase was empty? Was that why Gentry’s briefcase wasn’t found?

Why was all of this relevant to Sterling and Gentry?

Were those murders why they made all the trips to North Dakota?

It didn’t fit.

Sterling wasn’t a criminal attorney of any kind, although he was a trial lawyer—an exceptional trial lawyer, which could suggest a personal injury case, so maybe that was the angle. But it didn’t feel right. That wasn’t the right connection. With the children deceased, who would be damaged enough to bring some sort of lawsuit? There was nothing in the documents to suggest a family member was pushing it. He wrote Bullers with a “?” under Connections. They were connected, but how they fit wasn’t clear—at least not yet.

He left the Bullers and looked at the check from Soutex Solutions.

That was another connection.

The check being in the file at Sterling’s tied the murders of Shane Weatherly and Isador Kane in Washington, DC to Sterling and Gentry. Judge Dixon had suggested Weatherly was, in addition to being a geologist, an avid environmentalist, and Kane worked for the EPA. The Bullers were farming land in oil country.

Was that the connection?

Was there oil being produced on the Bullers’ land?

Did the Bullers want the oil drilled on their land?

Did Gentry?

Did someone else?

Mac had read stories about how landowners in North Dakota sold the mineral rights under their land to speculators decades ago. This was due in part because the oil and gas was so far below the surface that the technology didn’t exist, and at the time there was reason to question if it ever would. So landowners took the money for the mineral rights while maintaining ownership of the land for farming and cattle purposes. Now those mineral rights holders were showing up to extract the oil and gas. Companies that owned the mineral rights could go onto land and pretty much put a well wherever they wanted, with little regard to the people occupying the land, the mineral rights trumping the land rights.

Was Weatherly evaluating whether there was oil under the Buller land?

Did Gentry own the mineral rights?

Those were questions that required more digging. Searching property records was not his thing, but he made a note to get Summer Plantagenate on that.

Mac took a look at his watch, and it was approaching 5:30
P.M.
Thirsty, he went to the small bar refrigerator and grabbed a bottle of Vitamin Water. He sat back down on the floor with Sterling’s cryptic notes. There was a notation for Adam Murphy.

Who was Adam Murphy? Next to that notation were the words “Deep Core.” Was Deep Core a name, or did it reference something else?

Mac pulled over his laptop and a half hour later, he had what he thought was his answer with an article from the Williston Herald. Adam Murphy, aged thirty-four, found murdered in his Williston apartment six days ago, shot multiple times, including once in the head. He was a geologist employed by Deep Core Drilling, one of the many drilling companies operating in the Williston area. The police viewed it as a likely robbery, as his wallet, watch, car keys, computers, and vehicle were missing.

“I’m sensing a trend,” Mac muttered as he touched his forehead, thinking,
Don’t become one of these people with a bullet to the brain.
That also made two geologists who were now dead—that also tied in. Geologists studied the earth. In northwest North Dakota, there was nothing else to study in the earth but oil and gas and their impact on the earth.

Murphy’s murder, and more importantly its method, pointed to another connection. Sterling and Gentry, the house was broken into; the Buller family, the same thing; Murphy, and now Meredith last night. “Going in on the prowl, not a coincidence, but a commonality,” Mac murmured quietly as he wrote it up on the white sheet. Even Weatherly and Kane’s murders, while occurring outside, shared some of the same commonalities with the others.

Commonality was a good word.

There
was
a commonality to all of the murders, head shots, going in on the prowl, and no witnesses, no suspects. If they all were connected, then the murders were staged to look like one thing, such as a robbery or spurned spouse, when they were clearly for another purpose. That was evidence of trade craft. “Professional or professionals,” Mac said as he wrote those words under the Connections heading. The lone exception seemed to be Sterling and Gentry, where there were witnesses, but Mac and Lich viewed that as intentional—the killers wanting the vehicle seen so as to set up Meredith.