Caribbean Rain (32 page)

“I could, but . . .”

Josh’s voice grew soft as he spoke. “There are a few rules about working the case of someone close. I—”

Chloe took Julia’s hand. The detective lifted herself from the chair, brushing at her cheeks. “For once, there’s a freaking rule that makes sense. I need to think.” Then she left, pushing away Chloe’s attempt to console her.

Josh motioned for Manny to return his phone, then dialed a number and waited. “I’ll call the department’s counselor and let them know she just left. They’re probably expecting her anyway.”

He finished the call and looked around the room. “Manny’s right. It’s going to be tough, but we can’t do anything about what’s already happened. We need to find this guy before anymore funerals are scheduled. Let’s get to this. Sophie? Flores’s list?”

“Yeah, you’re right. It just seems like it gets harder,” she answered.

“Let’s hope it never gets easier,” said Manny.

“I’m done if it does. All right. There were six names that fit what we were looking for, at least from the roster Flores gave us and the killer’s approximate height based on what Manny and Alex put together at the latest murders. Josh sent teams out to each address, but it’s Saturday and who in the hell knows if we’ll find any or all of them at home. Besides, these guys are just leads, like Sam. Maybe the killer never even belonged to one of these fencing outfits.”

“That’s true, but it’s a good start. What about the auction houses that specialize in those swords?” asked Manny.

“We’re checking out that angle and, with any luck, we won’t need subpoenas to get records,” said Josh. “Meanwhile, we’ll keep pounding the other leads.”

“What about this number thing?” asked Sophie.

“I don’t know what it means—”

“Wait,” interrupted Alex. He was looking at his laptop screen, scowling as he did.

“I got an e-mail back from my friend in Michigan. He worked late, and I owe him tickets to the Redwings and the Tigers, but he’s got something on the metal we sent. He says it’s unique to the sixteenth century, a rapier with a slightly wider blade and a grip that was probably quite ornate. He said the steel was pure, but littered with small idiosyncrasies that went with the steel folding criteria of that time. German, he thinks. He says this type of sword was kind of a hybrid between a thrusting blade and a cutting blade. That makes it a sixteenth-century weapon, probably designed by someone named Peter Munich Solingen. Then he says ‘Go Blue’—he hates the MSU Spartans.”

“Excellent. Let’s get that information over to the auction houses, too. That’ll narrow the search,” said Josh, becoming a little more enthused. Manny was glad someone was enthused because he was having a hard time gleaning information into something that made sense. It was making him crazy.

“Manny?” said Sophie. “You here?”

“Yeah. Just thinking.”

“While you’re thinking, let Dean and I give you some more information to stoke over,” said Alex, squirming in his seat. He stood, shifting to one leg, then the other.

“What the hell’s wrong with you, Dough Boy? Underwear issues?” teased Sophie.

“Sort of, but that’s none of your business.”

“Rash, isn’t it? What have you been doing?”

“Maybe, but like I said; it ain’t your business, wench.”

“Wench? That hurt, and don’t say I didn’t warn you about those gloves.”

“Later, you two,” warned Josh, though his eyes were smiling.

Alex grimaced and shifted again. “Anyway, we’ve got all of the pictures from the other two murder sites and we found more numbers. Site one had a ‘2,’ site two had a ‘0,’ site three had a ‘6,’ the altar site had the ‘2’ Manny found, and the last site had the ‘1,’ which gives us, in order, 2-0-6-2-1.”

“You could reverse it,” said Dean. “But either way it makes no sense to me. I took a few classes on numerology and cryptology, and there’s about a million things those numbers could mean.”

“The Zodiac killer did this in the late sixties, but his code was more complex, and he made mistakes in it, supposedly. But if this is all we got, it’s a start,” said Manny.

“Could the numbers be translated to letters?” asked Chloe.

“They could, but the trick is to find out which numbers correspond with which letter. It’d be too easy to start with A as zero,” said Dean.

“We have to think simple and go from there. I mean start from the most obvious and work our way up. Maybe Occam’s Razor will apply here. God knows we need a simple, obvious explanation,” said Manny.

“Damn. This could be anything. In the movies, the numbers are always a longitude, latitude clue,” said Sophie.

“Good guess, but not enough numbers,” said Dean. Manny noticed the CSI’s look of worship toward Sophie was back and wondered briefly if he did the same thing himself when he looked at Chloe.

“Could it be a significant—wait!” Manny jumped up. “Alex. I need to see the pictures from the morgue. I thought there was something weird there. I couldn’t figure out why he’d dragged the body. I thought he was simply screwing with us.”

Still trying to get comfortable, Alex punched a couple of keys and turned the computer in Manny’s direction. “Have at it. Just push this arrow to go to the next one. This will take you back to the previous one.”

The others had gathered over Manny’s shoulder as he clicked pictures of the dark red smears running in different directions on the floor. They watched in silence as he worked the slideshow.

“You might get this tech junk yet,” said Sophie.

“God forbid. How do I isolate four pictures in an up-and-down row?”

“Which four?” asked Alex.

After Alex had them lined up, Manny could only stare.

“Well, kiss my ass and give me a Valentine,” whispered Alex.

The large “P” was rough, but unmistakable.

Chapter-62

The sounds of the casino echoed through the lobby as he sat patiently in one of the padded chairs in the lounge, pretending to play on his tablet. He’d already been for two walks, and then decided he couldn’t risk taking any more. He didn’t know when Special Agent Manny Williams would return to the hotel, but he needed to be here when the object of his hatred showed himself. The arrogant prick would probably be surrounded with “his” people, but that didn’t matter. Williams would go to his room, eventually, and when he did, it would be his time to shine. And shine he would, wouldn’t he? He hadn’t prepared all of these months to fail. That wasn’t in the cards: his or Williams’s.

“Do you mind if I use that outlet to plug in my phone?”

The heavyset man with the Southern accent smiled at him, and he smiled back.

“No problem. I’m not using it.”

“Thank you. I’m waiting for my wife and that could be a while. Being married to her sure has taught me patience, but she’s been worth it.”

He stood, stretching his legs to his full height. “I know exactly what you mean. Rewards come to those who wait, do they not?”

“Oh, are y’all waiting for the love of your life?”

“Something like that.”

Chapter-63

“Great. Now we have a ‘P’. What good does that do?” asked Sophie.

Manny ran his hand through his hair, studying the pictures. “I don’t know, Sophie, but I think the puzzle’s still not complete. We’ve found what he left in El Yunque and the morgue, but what about the body parts? Especially the last one. Dean?”

“The heart?” answered Dean. “What about it? Same MO for delivery, same box type, same amount of puking when the cops opened it. Even the label print had the same sub-pattern inside the letters, but—”

“But what?” asked Alex, tapping him on the shoulder. “You didn’t have any ‘buts’ when you and Julia left the office, and the techs took the heart for more work.”

“I don’t know, I think Mucus’s butt is kind of cute,” said Sophie.

“It’s Mikus. And . . . really?” asked Dean.

“Focus, Mikus, focus,” said Manny.

Dean searched Manny’s face, glanced at Alex, then raised his hands in surrender. “I wasn’t sure, okay? Besides, the CSU was in a hurry to get the thing processed, and that’s just my first impression. I’m a science guy so I don’t like to guess, but I kind of have a thing for spatial relations. You know, how something should be in comparison to other traits. I thought there was something wrong with the size of the heart. Like—”

“Like it was male, not female?” asked Manny.

“Yeah? How’d you know?”

“I didn’t, but given his profile, a change-up like that is no surprise. He’s telling us to think differently because he is, so I’m betting you’re right.”

“Anna could have had an enlarged heart,” said Alex.

“True, but it didn’t seem like that. Most men have a twenty-five percent larger heart than women. That’s what it seemed like to me,” said Dean.

“Okay. Say you’re right; where did he get it and what does ‘change-up’ mean?” asked Josh.

“I can answer that,” said Chloe quietly, “at least the ‘where he got it’ part. It’s probably Sam’s.”

Sophie nodded. “If it’s the same killer, and Josh said it wasn’t pretty, then that only makes sense.”

“Say Dean and you are right. The question is why? He takes a hand and a foot from a female, from Anna, then Sam’s heart, then makes sure the police get it, guaranteeing that we see it too,” said Manny.

“Yeah, but maybe he doesn’t care if we see it. Maybe he’s in his own world and just doing what comes next in his mind,” said Sophie.

“Or maybe what the voices are telling him. This kind of psychosis probably includes some delusional activity,” said Chloe.

“Both good observations. If he’s hearing voices, then the game gets more complex, but those killers tend to be more reckless because the voice is almost always God, or at least an authority figure the killer wants to impress. That usually leads to some kind of public appearance to strut their invincibility. But say that’s not the case. Say he’s sending these displays to get a message to a particular group, maybe even to a special individual,” said Manny, leaning on the edge of the table.

“Taking that further, I can see trying to play with the FBI because we get that all of the time. But if you’re correct; who is he trying to connect with?” asked Josh.

“I don’t know. I may not be right, but this has a different feel. He’s not following the profile completely, and that worries me. This escalation is unique even for a serial killer.”

“He’s not like Argyle?” asked Alex.

Manny shook his head. “No. His thought development was incredibly exclusive. None of these people do things the same, but the reasons for doing them don’t fall far from the tree.”

One of the local agents brought in more coffee and a tray of sandwiches that made Manny’s stomach rumble. It was almost two p.m., and they hadn’t had lunch. The five of them dove in, eating quietly. Manny was sure they all had thoughts of what to do next haunting them. Then Sophie broke the silence.

“This feels like a freaking last meal or something.”

“Naw. More like it’ll be a while before we do this again,” said Manny.

His confidence in that statement wasn’t exactly brimming. He couldn’t shake the feeling that Sophie was right. Add the fact that he was sure they were running out of time, quickly, and that made a recipe for disaster unless they got it together soon.

Writing on his legal pad, Manny wrote out 2-0-6-P-1-2, then drew a hand, a foot, and a heart. After that, he mapped out, to the best of his ability, the murder sites in the rainforest in relation to how highway 191 wound through. Next, he wrote down his first impressions of the crime scenes individually, then what he believed they had in common, and finally what differences they had.

Alex and he had always debated the concept of instinct versus a subconscious analysis of the facts that led to conclusions that led to clues that led to solving a case. Right now, he didn’t give a rat’s ass how it all worked; he just needed to find some answers.

Chloe leaned over to see what he’d written, touching his arm with her breast. It was like a static electricity shock, but fifty times stronger. By the way she jerked back, and then smiled, she’d felt it too.

Not now, Williams, not now.

“What were you writing like a crazy man? And you two stop touching. It makes me nervous,” said Sophie.

“We weren’t touching, sort of. Anyhow, let’s do this the old-fashioned way, it might shake something loose. Josh, go to the dry board. We’re gonna brainstorm.”

The collective moan was substantial.

“Just do it. You never know.”

“What could the numbers mean?” asked Manny.

“License plate?” said Dean.

“Post office box or bank vault box?” asked Alex.

“This is killing me, but how about an address or birthday?” groaned Sophie.

Twenty minutes later, they had five categories of questions posted on the board: the numbers, the reasons for intentional placements of body parts, the murder site pattern in the rainforest, the reasons for the altar, and what the sites had in common versus what was different about them.

“This is all good thinking, but I’m not getting it,” said Josh.

Manny turned his scribbled-up notebook over. “This is damn frustrating. He’s left some clues consciously, but it’s not ringing my bell either.”

He ran his hand through his hair. “Wait. If he’s giving us this junk on purpose, maybe we have to sit on the other side of the table and see if he’s giving us anything subconsciously.”

“Great. How in the hell do we do that? Group hypnosis?” asked Sophie.

“Better than that. Close your eyes. Open them, look at each scene, close your eyes again, I’ll call your name, then just start writing your first impressions.”

“Aw Manny, I tried this in school doing a book report and got sent to the principal’s office. He said people didn’t want to know any of my first impressions, ever.”

“Knowing you, the book was something about whips and chains,” said Alex.

“Did I tell you that one before?” she grinned.

“Come on, just do it,” Manny snapped.

“Okay, okay. Grouchy jerk.”

The room grew quiet. A few minutes later, Manny stopped them.

“Okay. One word from each of you. I’ll go first. Puzzle.”