Missings, The (32 page)

The tenth anniversary of the sentencing for Leopold Bonzer loomed a little over three months away. It had been Bonzer’s bad luck to get caught red-handed. He’d killed a postal worker vacationing at Maroon Bells, and then got stopped on his way to dispose of the body. The murder of a federal employee on public land received the attention of the FBI, and Nick had smelled more blood from his very first meeting with the suspect. He hadn’t quit in ten years.
Be damned if I’ll quit now.

Slow to give up, the supermarket rags had continued to cook the Bonzer story at a slow spin, like a pig on a spit. They fanned the flames just enough to get a little sizzle, especially on the anniversary of his sentencing, but never so much that the story had dropped into the flames and smoldered away to an ashy memory.

The guard nodded and looked at Nick. “Some guys, their families try to get in to see ‘em even when they know they can’t. Bonzer’s family, if he’s got one, is smart enough to have cut him loose. Your guy is almost as big a media draw as our resident terrorists in H-Unit.” The prison guard leaned back in his chair and used a toothpick to dig out what Nick assumed were remnants from his lunch. The man sucked some spit, then motioned to one of the camera images with the tiny wooden pointer. “They’re loading him in now, Agent. What’s your plan this time?”

Nick tensed his jaw.
Is that a smirk? A dig at my lack of success over the last ten years? Professional, not personal, right? Don’t let this guy get to you. He’s a friggin’ security guard for crying out loud. Besides, he has a point.
He shrugged. “Wish I had a plan. Nothing’s worked so far. He’s looking for some kind of deal in exchange for details on the bodies but I’ve got nothing to offer. He doesn’t even want to try to negotiate his way to a different facility. Claims he’s happy here.”

“I’d help you if I could. You’re different from the other feds we’re expected to work with, and if I could think of something to get you what you need, I’d do it. So would most of the staff here. You want to help those families, not just move your own career a rung up the ladder. And it’s pretty clear the Bonzer case is more of a career killer.”

A sudden wave of doubt poured over Nick. His success rate at the bureau put him near the top, but the one criticism he’d endured review after review was that he might be too soft. His superiors claimed he got too involved in his cases and failed to maintain enough professional detachment.
But if you don’t care, why put your life in jeopardy in the first place?
The day he developed “professional detachment” would be the day he would know he needed to get out.

Nicholas Grant thought about the parents and other family members who had lost loved ones at the hands of Leopold Bonzer. Even with his confession to their brutal murders, there would always be one huge loose end for thirteen families. The lack of a body always fosters impossible images and irrational ideas in the minds of a mom or dad, a lover or friend. Until he could give them irrefutable proof, unquestionable evidence that a life had ended, hope would push to the surface.

“Well, if it isn’t Agent Grant.” The clean-shaven man wore his wrinkled prison uniform as if it were a thousand- dollar suit.

“Hard to believe I surprised you, Bonzer, seeing as how I’m the only visitor you get other than your legal team. And how long has it been since they were here?” Nick set two frosty cans of soda pop on the table in front of him. He opened the top on one, then purposefully sat so he could cross his legs while Bonzer’s ankles remained shackled.

The inmate swung his head to the side, arched his neck and rolled his shoulders, flexing as much as his confinement with his wrists in the table restraints allowed.

A stretching snail.
“Feeling confined, Bonzer?”

Bonzer fixed Nick with a glare. He took a breath. Released it. Another breath. Release. “You know I like my privacy.” His right eye twitched and the fingers on his right hand fiddled.

“How big is the window in your
private
cell?” Nick took a long swig from his can, his gaze not leaving Bonzer’s face.

“A perfect four feet.”

“That’s four feet
wide
. How high is it?”

“I told you. I like my privacy.”

“Four friggin’ inches, that’s how high. See much of the world from your room at this hotel?” Nick popped the top on the other can and shoved it across the table, then called the guard in to release Bonzer’s hands from the restraints.

“Go to hell!” Bonzer took the can. Held it in front of him, temptation warring with pride. His eye continued to twitch.

When Nick went through his training he heard stories about Supermax prison, but he’d seen some pretty tough correctional institutions in his time and figured the stories for so much hype. His first visit here to meet with Leopold Bonzer almost ten years ago had opened his eyes.

Supermax, officially known as the United States Penitentiary Administrative Maximum Facility—or ADX— housed some of the worst criminals the Bureau of Prisons offered. The Alcatraz of the Rockies remained the most restrictive and punitive federal prison in the United States. Mafia family members, terrorists—homegrown and otherwise—drug kingpins, white supremacists and gang leaders all resided within its walls. Even a few serial killers, including a physician who got off on poisoning people, made Fremont County, Colorado their home.

Most of the cells were furnished with a desk, a stool and a bed, all poured concrete. If a prisoner attempted to plug his toilet for whatever reason it would automatically shut off. Showers were available in each cell, but they ran on a timer to prevent flooding. If a prisoner earned a few privileges he might have a polished steel mirror bolted to the wall, an electric light, a radio, and a black-and-white television that broadcast recreational, educational and religious programming. Other than the mirror, each privileged item was remotely controlled so the inmate never actually came into contact with them.
Even though people often compared Supermax to Alcatraz, its namesake never imagined the security this prison would boast, nestled in a valley at the foot of the Rocky Mountains. A multitude of motion detectors, cameras placed in every conceivable location, fourteen hundred remote-controlled steel doors, twelve-foot-high fences topped with razor-wire, laser beams, pressure pads and attack dogs all made Supermax one of the most secure facilities in the United States.

Nick believed the attack dogs were the real dissuaders. Dogs were predators. Carnivores. At their core they lived to rip open flesh and devour warm, raw meat. Other prisons might have them, but he could only imagine the extra genetic encoding the dogs at this prison must have.

“Heard the dogs barking lately?” The words were flippant, casual, but Leopold Bonzer had been badly mauled by a dog as a child. He’d endured seven surgeries: one to save his life and six more to give him a reason to live. Nick could relate.

The usual venom glinted from Bonzer’s eyes, but Nick saw something else in them too. Something new flickered behind the mask. There’d been a shift of some kind. He would wait and think this development through before he chose the direction this interview would take. And maybe in the meantime Leopold Bonzer would give him some kind of clue. If he did, it would be the first.

Nick sat back, sipped his cold drink and considered his options. Two minutes of quiet might feel like two hours to a restrained prisoner alone in a room with a fed even if that prisoner spent hour after hour alone. Nick thought,
Maybe especially if that prisoner spent hour after hour alone.
Nick reached into his pocket and pulled out a pair of fingernail clippers. He didn’t really need a manicure, but it would give him something to do while he waited. Weapons weren’t allowed into the interior of the prison, but clippers still passed the innocuous test.

He pretended not to notice Bonzer trying to twist on his seat, or hear him sucking air between his teeth or even when he hocked a wad of spit and who-knows-what onto the floor near the door. Instead he focused on getting just the right shape on his pinky.

When Leopold Bonzer’s face reddened, then emptied of color almost as quickly, Nick slowly closed his fingernail clippers, rubbed them free of smudges and tucked them back in his pocket. For the first time in a very long eight minutes, he looked directly at Leopold Bonzer.

Bonzer narrowed his eyes then arched his back a fraction of an inch. “I might want to talk about relocating.” Nick nodded but said nothing. Instead he leaned forward, put both elbows on the table and rested his chin in his hands.
Bonzer said, “I might be ready to give you what you want... for the right
hotel
.”
A million questions played through Nick’s head, but he didn’t dare interrupt the process. “I’m listening,” Nick said.

“Not today. Next week.” Bonzer’s eyes brittled with intensity. You get me the paperwork so I can look at it... let me see you sign it in front of me. I’ll want confirmation from my legal team that it’s a done deal. Then I’ll talk.”

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