by BJ Bourg
“I would never suggest that.” Susan realized her friend didn’t appreciate the accusation, so she decided to soften her tone. “I’m just wondering if someone might’ve overheard your conversation with Clint. I pulled up Clint’s phone records last night. He called you at exactly three-o-three in the afternoon and the attack began at three-fifty-three. If someone overheard your conversation with Clint, it would’ve given them enough time to formulate a plan and head out to the victim’s house, which is exactly eight minutes from your office.”
Susan paused to take a breath before continuing. “Whoever did this knew his vehicle would be picked up by the camera that’s mounted over the front door of the house, so he parked in a field north of the driveway. That’s why Clint never saw the suspect leave while he was parked on the shoulder of the road waiting to get the green light from you.”
Mallory’s face softened and her brow furrowed as Susan continued.
“I need you to remember exactly where you were when Clint called you, and you need to think of who might’ve overheard you,” Susan said. “And then I need you to check your indoor surveillance cameras to see if anyone left right after you spoke with Clint.”
Mallory began mumbling to herself, and it appeared to Susan that she was trying to retrace her steps during her conversation with Clint. Finally, she snapped her fingers.
“I know,” Mallory said, waving for Susan to join her on the driver’s side of the desk. “Not only can I check who left, but I can also see who was around me when I received the call.”
Susan rounded the corner just as Mallory began accessing the bureau’s indoor surveillance system.
“I was walking back from the bathroom when he called,” Mallory explained. “If I’m remembering right, there was no one in the hallway that leads from the bathroom to the bureau door, and I don’t remember seeing anyone on the way to my desk. I do know my office door was open, so someone might have overheard me talking to him. I wouldn’t know who they were because of the cubicle walls, but this might help.”
Susan nodded as she waited for Mallory to navigate back to the date and time in question. She finally located herself walking down the hall, and Susan could see that she had been correct—there was no one in the hallway.
Mallory switched to a different camera angle and the women watched as she entered the bureau, shut the door behind her, and ambled toward her office, chatting casually as she walked. Susan studied every inch of the camera’s angle, which took in the holding bench for the prisoners, the secretary’s desk, the outer walls of the nearest cubicles, and the outer walls of the sergeant’s office. The door on the sergeant’s office was closed, so they couldn’t tell if anyone was inside. The secretary was at her work station, but it didn’t appear she was paying any attention at all to Mallory. In fact, she hadn’t even looked up from her cell phone as Mallory walked by, leaving Susan to believe she didn’t even know anyone else was in the building with her.
“Do you remember where you were when y’all discussed the iPad?” Susan asked, knowing it would probably be next to impossible to answer such a question.
“No,” Mallory said, “and the surveillance system isn’t equipped with audio.”
Susan cursed under her breath as the video continued to roll long after Mallory had disappeared into her office. A few employees came and went, and Mallory called out their names and offered a brief and verbal biographical sketch on each detective. None of them looked interested in what was going on in Mallory’s office and none entered the cubicles across from her office.
The door to Mallory’s office remained open, but not one person who walked by even glanced in her direction. The secretary, who had remained there the entire time, had never moved or even glanced in the direction of Mallory’s office. She was too far away to overhear Mallory, so she could safely be ruled out as a suspect.
“This seems to be a dead end,” Susan said with a sigh. “I’m sorry I accused one of your people.”
“It’s okay,” Mallory said, still allowing the video to roll. “I would’ve thought the same thing if I were you. But now that we know it didn’t come from here, do you think it’s possibly one of your people?”
“No.” Susan shook her head confidently. “Everyone on my end who knew about it found out about it much earlier. If they had killed Ralph and wanted the iPad, they wouldn’t have waited that long to retrieve it. They knew we were going interview Kim, so they would’ve gotten there long before we did. No one could’ve predicted that Kim wouldn’t let us in the safe, so they wouldn’t have taken the chance.”
“Ah, I see your point.” Mallory was still watching the video and her eyes suddenly narrowed. She leaned closer to the screen, reversed the footage, and pointed. “Did you see that?”
Susan leaned closer as well and squinted. Mallory was pointing toward the entrance to the cubicles directly across from her office. As the video played, a faint shadow moved fleetingly across the floor and then all was still. It was obvious the movement originated from within the bank of cubicles, but they could see no head movement from above the walls.
“How many cubicles are in that section?” Susan asked.
“Eight.”
“And who all works in there?”
Mallory rattled off eight names that meant nothing to Susan. There had been a slew of recent promotions at the sheriff’s office—many detectives had left for higher ranked positions in the patrol division, which opened up slots in the bureau—and Susan hardly recognized any of the names.
As Susan and Mallory watched, everything remained still for about five minutes, and then the shadow moved again. There was a brief motion at the far end of the cubicles, where a narrow alley led from the rear portion of the bureau—where other cubicles were located—to the employee entrance. Susan pointed to the top edge of the cubicle wall where she’d seen the movement.
“Can you zoom in on that section?”
Mallory nodded and did so. For all of her efforts, the best she could do was isolate a head of dark-colored hair moving briefly toward the door. About a second later, there was a triangle of sunlight from the entrance, and then everything returned to normal.
“I’ll be damned!” Mallory said breathlessly. “You were right!”
Susan asked her to back out and replay the footage again. This time, she focused on the secretary, who didn’t bat an eye when the door opened and shut. Whatever she was looking at on that phone, it had her undivided attention. None of the other employees who had entered the bureau earlier seemed to notice anything suspicious. At least, their heads didn’t pop up above the cubicle walls to see what was happening.
Susan focused on the upper right hand side of the screen, which covered what could be seen of the entrance, but all that could be detected was the back of a figure scurrying through the door. It looked to be a man, and he was hunched over as though trying to keep his head below the top of the cubicle wall.
“How can we find out who left the office?” Susan asked, stabbing at the head of dark hair. “That’s our suspect, right there!”
Mallory was already on it. She had begun accessing the surveillance cameras from outside the building, and they were soon looking at the door to the employee entrance. When she maneuvered to the correct time, she scowled. The man had lowered his face and lifted a hand to seemingly scratch his head, but it was clear he was hiding his identity from the camera as he hurried across the parking lot and out of the camera’s view.
“Do you recognize him?” Susan asked.
“It could be any one of the guys except for Lou, Sean, or Mack.”
Susan nodded. Lou was the only black detective in the bureau, Sean was heavier than the man in the video, and Mack was bald. She tapped the top of the screen to indicate the boundaries of the camera’s eye. “Why doesn’t this cover the entire parking lot?”
“If we angled it to cover the entire parking lot, we’d lose the front portion of the building,” Mallory explained with a sigh. “Our detectiv
es know this, which is why most of them park on the edge of the lot. They don’t want us knowing what time they leave each day. To be honest, as long as they get their jobs done, I don’t care what time they come or go—and they know this—but some of them just don’t like the fact that Big Brother’s watching them.”
“Damn it, Mallory, who was that?” Susan asked, pacing back and forth in the tiny runway behind Mallory’s desk. “He’s our suspect! He was creeping around those cubicles listening to every word you said, and then he hauled ass to go get that iPad.”
“I agree.”
“I mean, we’ve got the bastard on tape, but we still can’t identify him.” Susan threw up her hands in frustration. “How in the hell is this happening?”
“Back when they set up this system, they weren’t trying to spy on our own people,” Mallory explained. “They only wanted to catch someone trying to break in or damage the building, so there’re no cameras set to see who comes out of the building. I guess I’ll have to change that for situations like this.”
“But there’s got to be a way to figure out who comes and goes at any particular time.” Susan was feeling desperate. The man she loved—the father of her child—was sitting in jail right now, and it was up to her to get him out. When she had been in a similar situation, he had been willing to move Heaven and earth to get her out. Now it was her turn. “Come on, Mallory—think! How do we identify that piece of shit in the video?”
“Wait, I’ve got this!” Mallory suddenly snapped her fingers. “There’s another way!”
CHAPTER 42
Empyrean Parish Detention Center
The very second I walked back into the dorm I knew something was amiss. Ever since I’d first arrived, the dorm had been segregated. While there had been exceptions, most of the white prisoners were set up on one side of the room and the black prisoners on the opposite side. There were a few smaller factions scattered about, but the room was mostly divided into two groups. Now, though, they were all intermingling and speaking in hushed tones. Some were near the phone banks, some were near the bookshelf that was mostly filled with law books, and some were hanging around the bunks, but they all seemed united in some singular cause. It was as though they’d all found a common enemy. As I caught the eyes of a few of the prisoners, I realized immediately that I was the subject of their conversations—I was that enemy.
Lane Brady wasn’t near his bunk when I reached mine. I saw Ethan standing with his crew talking to a few of the black inmates, and they all seemed to agree on something.
The guard had brought a breakfast tray to me while I’d been meeting with Perry, so I was no longer hungry. However, since I hadn’t slept much last night, I was dead tired. The mood in the room was such that I knew better than to fall asleep. Something was about to go down, and I felt like it would be directed right at me.
I leaned my back against the cinderblock wall and cocked my left leg up on my bunk. If one person attacked me, I could easily fight him off, but if a number of them decided to rush me, things would get ugly in a hurry. Without being obvious, I tracked Ethan’s movements. After talking to the black inmates, he moved closer to the guard’s position, stood there for about thirty minutes with his crew, and then they returned to their corner of the room.
As the day drew on, my head began to nod. I must’ve dozed off at one point, because I suddenly felt a presence standing over me and I jerked wide awake. It was Lane Brady, and he looked nervous.
“Hey, man,” he began, his head on a swivel. “How’s it going?”
“I’m good.” I glanced toward Ethan and his crew, but they weren’t milling around anymore. It looked like they had all bedded down, and I knew that wasn’t a good sign. They were resting up for something. I turned back to Lane and asked, “What’s going on?”
He licked dry lips and dropped nervously to his bunk. “There’s gonna be some trouble. They’re coming for you.”
That much I had already deduced by the actions of Ethan and his crew.
“Where will it happen?” I asked. “In the cafeteria during lunch?”
“No, it’ll go down here in the dorm.” He indicated the bank of phones. “They want to put a serious ass whipping on you and then they want to hang you from one of the phone cords. They…they’re not playing around. They want you dead. Well, Ethan wants you dead. I’ve never seen him like this before. He’s always been dangerous, for sure, but this is next level crazy. He’s fit to be chained.”
“Do you know when it’s going down?”
“This evening around shift change, which is usually around five o’clock.” Lane leaned closer so he could lower his voice. “It’ll be Ethan and his boys, but they’ve got help. Some of the other inmates are gonna cause a…a…um, I don’t remember what they called it, but it’s to distract the guard.”
“A diversion?” I offered.
“Yeah, that’s what they called it.” Lane nodded. “They said they would cause a diversion to distract the guards while Ethan and his boys do what they want with you.”
“Is it because I’m a cop?” I asked.
Lane shook his head. “It’s more than that. It seems Ethan found out you had something to do with his lawyer’s murder and his wife being attacked. He had the best lawyer money could buy, but now he’ll have to settle for a public defender like the rest of us, and he knows he’ll lose. He blames you for that.”
“I didn’t do anything to his lawyer or the wife.” I studied my surroundings carefully. I made a mental note of every object that could be used as a weapon. From ink pens to chairs to the bar of soap resting on Lane’s footlocker—I made a note of them all. “What do you plan on doing during the action?”
“I…I don’t plan on being around.” He swallowed hard. “I’m sorry, but I can’t get involved. You’ll probably bond out within a few days and then I’ll be left alone with them. If I get involved, things could get really bad for me in here. They…they might kill me next.”
“No, I don’t want you to get involved,” I said. “I was just asking to see if I needed to worry about you, too.”
He raised both hands. “You don’t have to worry about me. I’ve got nothing against you or any other cop. My brother-in-law’s a cop and he’s always been cool, so I ain’t got nothing against any of y’all.”
I nodded, glanced back toward Ethan’s bunk. Except for a steady rise and fall of the large lump under the blanket, there was no movement from the man.
“Can you do me a favor?” I asked.
Beads of sweat began to form on his forehead. “As long as it doesn’t mix me up in this shit. I mean, I don’t want them to kill you, but I can’t afford to have then come for me next. I’ve got a kid on the outside and I need to get back to him. And the guards in here don’t care about me.”
“I don’t want you to get hurt either,” I assured him. “I just need some sleep. If I take a nap, can you keep an eye on things for me?”
“And what if they know I’m working with you?” There was genuine panic in Lane’s eyes. “I’ve already risked my ass by letting you know what’s coming. If they ever find out I warned you, they’re gonna kill me.”
“I’ll make sure they don’t.” I said. “I’ll start an argument with you a little later so they think we’re on the odds.”
He seemed to like the idea.
I was about to turn over and get a little sleep when something occurred to me.
“Hey, Lane,” I suddenly asked. “Why are they waiting until five o’clock? Why don’t they just come over here now?”
“Because blue shift’s coming on tonight,” he explained.
“What’s with blue shift?”
“Red shift—the one that worked last night—they don’t take no shit. If there’s a disturbance in the dorm or we start rioting, they come in here guns blazing—not really with guns, but you know what I mean. They bust some heads. But not blue shift.” Lane lowered his voice. “Ethan knows he can get away with murder on blue shift. If we start
rioting, the lieutenant won’t send in his men. Instead, he’ll pull the guard out, lock down the dorm, and call in SWAT. But…”
“But what?” I asked when he didn’t continue.
“But by the time the SWAT team gets here,” he said in a voice so low I almost couldn’t hear him, “it’ll be too late for you. When I said he knows he can get away with murder, that’s exactly what he and his crew plan on doing. And everyone’s too afraid to rat him out, so whatever happens to you will go unpunished.”
CHAPTER 43
Chateau Parish Criminal Operations Center
Susan stopped pacing and watched as Mallory accessed a visitor management program on her computer.
“This software helps us track who logs into the building and what time they do it,” Mallory explained. “Since a code isn’t required to exit the building, the software doesn’t track who leaves. However, it’ll give me the names of everyone who logged in that day. Once we have their names and the time they logged in, we can then go to the surveillance footage and see what each person was wearing. Once we know that, we can then continue through the footage and see what time everyone leaves—”
“And whoever’s unaccounted for will be our suspect,” Susan said, interrupting and finishing Mallory’s sentence.
Mallory nodded. “Exactly.”
Susan glanced at her watch. It was almost noon now and she felt like she was running out of time. While Mallory worked on the program, she stepped to the far side of the office and called Amy.
“Anything on the evidence?” Susan asked when Amy answered.
“I turned everything over to the lab in La Mort and they said they would get on it right away.” Amy paused to curse at someone who had apparently cut her off. When she got back on the phone, Amy said Tracy Dinger had a contact at the state lab and she would work with him to make things happen fast. “If her people are able to extract DNA from the swabs I submitted, she’s going to drive it over to the state lab and have her contact compare it to the known sample David got from Clint.”