Divine Intervention (24 page)

Brandon's pale eyes searched hers. "Maybe Gibney's who we're after?"

Jasi shook her head. "He wanted Washburn to disappear, but he wanted him to go quietly."

"Plus Gibney's got an alibi. A room full of board members," Ben added, stepping into the room behind her.

The tension in the hotel room mounted. Thick and pervasive, it brought the entire investigation to a crashing halt. The four of them stood there, staring at each other.

Their list of suspects had just self-destructed.

The case was ice cold.

"Damn!" Jasi muttered, frustrated.

She grabbed a pop from the bar fridge and dropped into a chair. Then she stretched her head over the chair back.

"Natassia!" she called. "Got anything on the yellow fabric yet?"

Her partner's face beamed. "They just found it under the pilot's seat. It's been logged in and scheduled for testing. The ev-tech on duty promised we'd have the report first thing in the morning."

Jasi ordered up Washburn's file on the vid-wall.

Her vision at the cabin had proved that the doctor somehow knew the killer.
Or the killer knew him…

"We've been acting on the assumption that Washburn
knew
his killer but didn't recognize him because of the mask," she said as a trickle of excitement slithered up her spine. "What if Washburn didn't really
know
him?"

Ben twisted a chair in one hand then straddled it, backward. "I'm not sure I understand."

"I think the killer is someone from Washburn's
past. Someone Washburn hadn't seen in years. In your dream, Natassia, the abortion was key. And the babies in the incubators."

Jasi beckoned to Brandon with one hand. "Give me some ideas."

Brandon stretched his legs in front of him, crossed them at the ankles. "What if Natassia was seeing the
birth
of the twins? Not an abortion. Maybe the boy from Natassia's vision is related to the mother, the woman Washburn killed."

"Then the boy would be one of the twins," Natassia exclaimed.

Jasi tried to focus on their conversation but something kept bothering her. What was there about this whole mess that seemed so damned familiar?

"Data-com on!" she barked.

When the familiar welcome screen popped up, she said, "Newspaper search, Kelowna. August 1979, births."

She glanced at Natassia. "I need you to search the birth registries in the area."

While her partner busily hunted through the birth records, Jasi scrolled the headlines. Discovering that there were a substantial amount of listings, she decided to narrow down the field.

What could she add?

T
wo
babies.

"Same parameters,
twins
," she commanded.

There were two newspaper headlines.

One read,
Oil Tycoon Strikes Oil with the Birth of Twins
. She quickly read the report but realized that the twins were safe and accounted for. The mother was a well-known lawyer, not a prostitute. And the twins were female.

When Jasi's eyes fell on the second headline, she gasped in shock. The alarm that had been persistently ringing in the back of her mind was now an earth shattering 10.5 on the Richter scale.

Oh, shit!

20

The headline read:

Newborn Twins Found Alive in Dumpster!

August 21, 1979 ~ Victoria, BC

Early this morning, an elderly transient woman discovered two newborn babies in a back alley Dumpster. The twins, a boy and a girl, are alive but severely dehydrated.

Gina McNeil, a homeless woman in her mid-eighties, was walking with two other women near the Ross Bay Cemetery at St. Charles Street and Fairfield Road when she heard the cries.

"She pulled them out of the garbage and wouldn't let anyone near them," one witness stated.

A local storeowner, Sharif Kabar, called the Victoria Police Department after seeing the two infants in McNeil's shopping cart.

"I did not believe my eyes," Kabar said. "The old lady with babies? I knew it was a mistake."

When emergency response teams arrived, the twins were barely conscious, unresponsive and lethargic. Victoria PD confronted McNeil and she handed over the twins, stating that she was on her way to the hospital.

"Gina McNeil climbed into a filthy Dumpster," Officer Dan Wilkins, first officer on the scene, told reporters. "She saved those babies. That makes her a hero in my eyes."

McNeil, the hero of the day, has led police authorities to the Dumpster, where a thin, bloody blanket was recovered. A thorough search of the Dumpster has revealed no other clues at this time. The identification of the newborns remains a mystery.

"We're hoping that the mother will come forward and claim them," Officer Wilkins stated.

The twins have been airlifted to the Children's Neonatal Intensive Care Unit at the Children's Hospital in Vancouver,
where they remain in critical condition.

"Hypothermic and hypotonic," ER Dr. James Doucette confirmed. "After being exposed to the elements for about five hours, both babies are suffering from a multitude of symptoms― including decreased heart rate and circulation, dehydration, and they're overwhelmingly septic."

Dr. Doucette went on to say that it would be "miraculous if they survived without brain damage. The babies' prognosis is uncertain but, because of Miss McNeil's valiant and quick response, there is hope for the twins."

Victoria PD is requesting the public's help in locating the mother. She may also require medical attention.

If anyone knows her whereabouts…

Jasi's mind worked quickly, putting together pieces of the puzzle.

Twins in a Dumpster.

Cameron Prescott had told her a similar story.
The reporter had also mentioned that she was a Leo.
August!
There was no doubt in Jasi's mind that Cameron and her brother were the very same twins that Washburn had tried to get rid of.

"I know who the babies are," she mumbled.

Three heads snapped in her direction.

She transferred the newspaper clipping to the vid-wall, then straddled the chair beside Ben.
Indicating the screen, she repeated Cameron's story about being abandoned at birth.

"All this time we were focusing on Natassia's vision, we forgot about the money she saw in her hands. And Natassia heard a woman's voice say '
I'll take care of everything'
."

She paused, gathering her thoughts. "Washburn tried to get rid of Cameron and her brother by tossing them in the Dumpster. If the Dumpster had made it to the dump, the babies would have died. That's what the good old doctor wanted. To kill them. Dispose of his infidelity."

"But someone found them," Brandon pointed out. "Washburn was afraid the police would get wind of his involvement so he paid Charlotte Foreman to keep his
bastards
hidden from the public."

"Yeah, but Norman Washburn was the real bastard," Jasi seethed.

Reading the file on the wall, she smiled bitterly. "He paid the foster mother to keep Cameron and her brother away from some other well-meaning foster parent, someone who might try to discover the identity of the birth parents."

"But Jasi, no one else knew they were Washburn's," Brandon stated.

"Except Gibney," Ben reminded him.

Brandon's head dipped in a nod. "So Gibney obviously knew that Washburn had dumped them and left them to die. He would have read that in the papers. So why didn't Gibney tell you?"

"He's petrified," Ben frowned. "Gibney's already looking at charges of accessory to murder in the death of the prostitute. He didn't want to add two counts accessory to attempted murder for the twins."

Folding her arms across her chest, Jasi listened while pacing the room. Furious, she muttered, "Martin Gibney is just as guilty as Washburn."

"
And
Charlotte Foreman," she heard Natassia say behind her.

Brandon's blue eyes followed her. "Maybe the brother, Ronald, did it."

Jasi shook her head. "No, Ronald Jones drowned when he was a kid. An accidental death. In the river behind the house."

"What else do we have?"

"We have the twins," she acknowledged. "They're the main connection in both cases. But who would want to kill for them?"

Brandon stared at her, hard. "Ronald is dead, Jasi. That only leaves one other person with motive, means…and opportunity."

Stunned, her head jerked toward him.

"Cameron Prescott?"

"She could be the one we're after," he suggested softly.

"But I sensed a male mind, not female," she protested, dropping onto the bed. "And Natassia saw a young man in a yellow jacket."

Natassia raised her hands, then dropped them in her lap. "I don't know, Jasi."

"She doesn't fit your profile, Ben," she argued, rolling over on her side, one hand propped beneath her head.

Ben shrugged. "Theoretically, Cameron is the
perfect
suspect. Washburn abandoned her, Foreman abused her and her twin brother drowned while in Charlotte Foreman's care. And the low voice you heard in your vision? You said yourself that her throat had been damaged. Revenge is a deadly thing, Jasi. We can't rule her out."

"But, Ben―"

He gave her an apologetic look.
"My profile is based on commonalities. Arsonists
are
predominantly male but not always."

Brandon settled beside her on the edge of the bed.

"Ben's right," he remarked softly. "Women commit about ten to eighteen percent of all arson crimes, Jasi. I've apprehended a few myself. And most of them reported abusive adult relationships or childhood abuse."

Jasi frowned, remembering the scars on the reporter's arms. "Cameron had cigarette burns on her arms…a childhood injury, she told me."

Brandon lowered his voice. "The evidence is all there."

She shook her head. "It can't be her. I would have sensed something."

"Hey, Jasi?" Natassia interrupted softly. "I know what happened to her brother."

Jasi sat up hastily. "What?"

"Ronald Jones went swimming with a foster brother in the river out back. The brother told police that Ronald went too far into the water and was swept downstream by the current. Search and Rescue found some of Ronald's clothing covered in blood, and a running shoe, but they couldn't recover his body."

Brandon turned to Natassia. "How'd you come up with all that?"

"I'm psychic. Remember?" Natassia grinned. "Actually, while you were all talking I ran a search through the newspapers. After the twins' arrival at Vancouver General, they were placed into Child Protective Services. I just followed the trail from there."

"But how'd you get into the CPS records?" Brandon asked, surprised.

Jasi locked her eyes on his. "She hacked in, Brandon. Natassia's good at that." She smiled at Natassia and was rewarded with a wide, proud grin.

"The kid who went swimming with Ronald. I think that was Baker," Jasi suggested. "Maybe he can tell us something about Cameron."

Ben connected with Baker's message system. "Baker's not picking up. I'll leave him a message." He left an urgent message telling Baker to call right away, and then he hung up.

Jasi flopped in the chair beside Natassia and mulled over the sudden change of direction their investigation had taken. How could she have known that when she sat at
Bits & Bytes
drinking coffee with Cameron Prescott, she had been sitting across from a serial killer?

I should have known!

Shit!

How was she supposed to bring Cameron in? Yeah, some of the evidence pointed to her, but some of it just didn't add up. How did a woman her size drag a heavy man like Washburn across the cabin floor? How could she have watched while three people burned to death?

How could she have murdered a little girl?

Jasi leaned forward in her chair, her hands clasped tightly between her knees.

"When I read the crime scene at Washburn's cabin, I experienced the killer's rage. But at Charlotte Foreman's I sensed remorse―regret. The killer knew that the child was being released from something worse than death."

A horrible thought flickered in her mind. Cameron would have seen the death of Samantha Davis as a mercy killing.