Suicide Bomb

by Bobby Nash

  “Good to see you, Sam.”

  “Bob.”

  “Nice shooting. I see exile has not dulled your senses.”

  Samantha plucked her spent shells from the courtyard. She would have to turn them in to the range boss before starting her next run.

  “What brings you down here to the cesspool, Chief?”

  Special Agent Corwin plucked one of the shells Samantha had discharged from a small patch of brown grass growing through a crack in the concrete.

  “Would you believe me if I said I came to see how you were doing?” he asked, flashing a crooked, insincere smile.

  “Not really. I haven’t seen you in, what’s it been, two years?” she inquired, holding her hand out for the shell casing Corwin was fingering.

  He tossed it to her and she caught it easily.

  “That sounds about right.”

  “So, I guess we’re good for another two then, yeah? For you, I could probably go as much as five between reunions if I had to.”

  She smiled conspiratorially.

  “Don’t tell anyone.”

  Corwin let out a small chuckle that told her he didn’t think her little jab was all that funny, but since he didn’t comment further on her disrespectful attitude, she knew he wanted something from her. She found the notion intriguing, but she would be damned if she would make it easy for him. Not after what he put her through.

  A moment of silence passed between them as Samantha picked up her remaining shell casings before Corwin dropped his bomb.

  “Actually, I have a proposition for you,” he finally said.

  “I’ve already been married, Chief. Once was definitely enough. Besides, you’re not my type.”

  As she checked her clip and holstered her gun, Corwin knelt beside the final “villain” Samantha had put down and ran a finger along the splintered hole she had added to the paneled bad guy.

  “You know, you’re still one hell of a shot, Sam,” he said.

  “Thanks.”

  “And you didn’t even blink. What if it had been a hostage?”

  Samantha shrugged.

  “Then I wouldn’t have pulled the trigger.”

  “Really?” he asked, incredulous.

  Suddenly, another hydraulic jack hissed and directly behind Samantha another target sprang up with its loud SNAP! BANG! of hydraulics ratcheting it into place.

  Samantha spun, pulled her gun, and fired instantly.

  No hesitation.

  The Special Agent whistled his approval as he walked over and inspected the target, which had remained upright, wobbling on its hydraulic legs. As with the other, a single bullet hole sat between the painted eyes of the attacker. What was even more impressive was the fact that the hostage the man was holding by her neck was untouched. In real life, had he been holding an actual hostage, she would have been covered in the perp’s blood and probably screaming hysterically from shock, but she would have been alive.

  “Really,” Samantha said with a sarcastic wink.

  Corwin ran his finger across the deadly wound. He was rather impressed, despite himself.

  Agent Patterson let out an irritated breath as she holstered her weapon.

  He didn’t seem to notice.

  “Now, I’ve got a busy day ahead of me, so I’ll ask again. What can I do for you, Bob?”

  Corwin turned away from the hostage and, with that stupid ass grin that she hated so much firmly in place, said the last thing Samantha Patterson expected to hear.

  “How would you like to come work for me?”

  three

  Washington DC

  Saturday

  “Well, this is a circus.”

  When Detective Catherine Jackson arrived on the scene, it was not quite what she had been expecting. Although Washington D.C. was the center of the political world, it was still an American city, with all the baggage that came along with it. Like New York, Los Angeles, Atlanta, and Boston, the District of Columbia had its fair share of murders, prostitution, embezzlement, forgery, drugs, violent outbursts, and traffic accidents. For good or ill, those things were simply a part of life. And that’s before factoring in the seedier elements of politics into the mix.

  Once politics entered the equation, all bets were off.

  They do make for strange bedfellows though.

  Even though it was scarcely nine a.m. a crowd had begun to gather outside the townhouse on Maitland Avenue. Three squad cars and an EMS unit were blocking off traffic and two uniformed officers were making every effort to keep the gawkers at a respectable distance. The two uniformed officers were moving along the barricade taking photos of the crowd. Just in case. In many crimes, the criminal came back to watch their handiwork. Some had even gone as far to line up to be a witness because they got off on screwing with the cops. Usually, those were the ones most easily caught.

  Jacks parked her unmarked Saturn well out of the way of the emergency vehicles. Sadly, she knew, they would leave the scene long before she would.

  As she walked down the sidewalk, her boot heels click, click, clicking with every step, she prepared herself, both mentally and physically. Over the course of her career, Detective Catherine Jackson had been actively involved with no less than sixty or so homicides. Although she loved her job, the sight of a crime scene was not something she liked to wake up to any day of the week. It was doubly worse on her day off. And she knew that if Homicide was called in, it was very likely to be messy.

  Pulling on her rubberized gloves, Jacks stepped under the Crime Scene Tape Officer Hecht lifted up for her.

  “Hey, Don,” she said in passing, flashing a smile. “How's the family?” She and Donald Hecht often played on the same co-ed softball team and had become pretty close over the years. She even shared meals with Don and his wife, Angela from time to time. He had a lovely family.

  “Mornin’, Jacks,” Don said with a smile. “Everyone's great. Angie’s got her daughter next weekend so we’re heading to the circus. Should be fun.”

  “If you say so.”

  “You got something against the circus, Jacks?”

  “Yeah. Clowns.”

  “Clowns?” Don asked with a raised eyebrow.

  “Damned things scare the hell out of me,” she said with a halfhearted smile that made him wonder if she was serious or not. “You guys have a good time.”

  “We will. Now watch yourself,” he said as she stepped up on the walk. Don was always looking out for her, like a big brother or something.

  She chocked a thumb toward the crime scene.

  “Who’s running this circus?”

  “Your partner was spouting orders last time I checked,” Don said and chucked his thumb in the direction of the appropriate door. “He’s inside.”

  “Thanks. I’ll catch you in a bit,” she said as she ran up the stairs to the front door. The door was open. She signed in with the officer at the door while she slipped on the Tyvek boot covers before she eased inside. The foyer was not well lit. She heard voices and could make out shapes, but everyone was silhouetted by light from various flashlight beams.

  After spotting a familiar roundish-shaped shadow, Jacks hurried over.

  “What you got, Mel?” she asked.

  “Jacks! So glad you’re here!” the rotund man she called Mel shouted. Even in the darkness, Jacks knew two things: one, Mel was smiling, and two, he was chewing a big, nasty wad of gum.

  “It’s supposed to be our day off, Kimosabe so just give me the bullet so we can wrap this up and get the hell out of here, all right?”

  “You got it, boss.”

  Catherine Jackson and Melvin Walker had been partners for a little more than five years. In all that time they had gotten to know one another fairly well. They got along great and, more importantly, they knew how to work well together, which made crime scene reports easy. They got down to business without any preamble or off topic chit-chat.

  “We’ve got four vics,” Mel began pointing to sections of the room with a small
flashlight. The beam played across dark, shiny splotches on the wall Jacks knew to be blood.

  “As you can see, it wasn’t pretty,” he continued, pulling a stick of gum and passing it in his partner’s general direction. Without a word, she accepted the offer. This too was part of their ritual, not to mention a necessity when dealing with smelly dead bodies. The gum helped a little.

  “That’s an understatement,” she said as she intuitively unwrapped the gum and popped it in her mouth. The gum helped dissipate the smell of drying blood, a smell you simply never got used to no matter how often you encountered it.

  “Number one: Male Caucasian, age 35. Malcolm Washington. He’s a political analyst over on The Hill. Looks like he was doing work for some Senate Oversight Committee, whatever that means.”

  “It means he makes more money than we do.”

  “Who doesn’t? I’ve got Jonesy working on a warrant, but I’m not going to hold my breath.”

  “Are you implying that a United States Senator would impede a murder investigation?”

  He gave her a look that said, get real, but he said, “do you really want me to answer that?”

  “Not really. No.”

  The bodies were gone, having been removed by the Medical Examiner’s people, but Melvin played the light across where the bodies had been found. Silhouettes were taped to the floor to show where the bodies had been found.

  The man had died in a small office area that was a converted den. Bloodstains covered the drab brown carpet, the desk, chair, books, and computer. The computer was still running.

  “A lot of blood.”

  “I noticed. Looks like something out of a horror movie.”

  “Cause of death?” Jacks inquired.

  “Severe head trauma.”

  “Object?”

  Melvin pointed at the desk.

  He played the flashlight beam across the desk to emphasize the large section of blood on the desk, keyboard, and screen. There were a few chunks of skin and hair dried into place.

  “Self-inflicted? Or did he have help?” Jacks asked.

  Her partner shrugged.

  “Time of death?”

  “Liver temp put his T.O.D. after the others. Sometime last night, between seven and nine, give or take. Mitch says the spray indicates repeated impact at high velocity as if he were thrown into the desk several times.”

  “That’s different,” she commented. “We thinking murder/suicide or did someone make him watch while they killed his family, then kill him?”

  “He was killed in here, but there is a blood trail from the kitchen that leads down the hallway into this room. He must have been injured in there then led in here where he was killed.”

  “Why?” Jacks asked. “What’s in here someone would want to steal?”

  “Beats me,” Melvin shrugged. “We took a quick look through the computer, but there doesn’t seem to be any top-secret stuff there. Nothing incriminating either.” He chucked a thumb back toward the direction of the kitchen.

  “CSU is going to take it with them and comb through everything once they get it back to the lab. Moretti’s already promised me this one’s getting moved to the head of the line.”

  “Sounds like a plan. What did the vic analyze over on The Hill?”

  “Not sure, yet. I had the captain send a couple detectives over to interview his boss and check out his cubicle before word of this gets back to the FBI. We should have everything on this guy by tonight.”

  “Who did he work for?”

  He flipped open his small notebook where he kept his notes in handwriting no one but he could decipher and read off the name. “Pearce Analysis. They’re a group of number crunchers with offices in DC, Colorado, Atlanta, and Virginia. Looks like they do contract work with the spooks mostly, but also do other contract work too.”

  Jacks knew Spooks meant FBI, CIA, NSA, etc. to Mel. Her partner was not a big fan of any the federal police agencies. Too many years of squabbles between the different branches for too many years had bred an inherent distrust. The Feds often looked down on lowly little police officers like them. It was a sore spot for many an officer, but for her partner, the eternal conspiracy theorist, it went a little deeper. He took it personally.

  “Anything else of interest in here?” She motioned toward the cluttered desk.

  “Not really,” Melvin said. “The vic wasn’t very neat. There are papers scattered on the desk and the drafting table. Looks like he was something of a pack rat.”

  “Reminds me of your desk, partner,” Jacks added with a wink. “Well, except I don’t see any week-old pizza sitting on his.”

  He gave her a look that said, Very funny, Jacks.

  “Maybe his wife kept it clean. She was a stay at home Mom and homemaker.” He threw up his hands in a shrug. “I don’t know. There’s nothing here worth stealing. They weren’t rich and appeared to be living hand to mouth, paycheck to paycheck. Just some bills, catalogs, and promotional items. Apparently, this guy was seriously into mail order.”

  “Poor bastard.”

  “Tell me about it. It’s a sickness, I tell you. My Mom was seriously into that shit. Got into some serious debt because of it too.” He went around the room, pointing out odds and ends for her as he reported. "The last straw were those damned collector's plates with paintings of celebs on them. I hated those things.”

  “Why?”

  “Have you seen them? They’re pretty damn ugly.”

  “Home shopping is not one of my favorite pastimes, Mel. Who has time to watch TV?”

  “I hear ya. Nothing on since the Sci Fi Channel stopped playing sci fi shows and changed their name to Syfy,” which he pronounced as sif-fee. It was an old joke he loved to repeat.

  Mel pointed to the far wall.

  “The book shelves don’t appear to have been rummaged through. The desk drawers are still full,” he said. “My guess is this was just a senseless, brutal killing, but don’t quote me on that until we finish the preliminaries.”

  Jacks chuckled. “Wouldn’t dream of it, Mel. Wouldn’t want to spoil your average, huh?”

  “Funny,” he said in a manner that was anything but humorous. “I see someone woke up in a mood this morning.”

  “I’ll remember that the next time you cuss me out for a two a.m. case call.”

  “Moving right along,” Melvin said, quickly changing the subject. He continued the walking tour, pointing out bits of information.

  “Number two: Female Caucasian, age 29. Janine Washington. The aforementioned house wife.” Melvin pointed the flashlight beam to an outline on the kitchen floor. Blood spattered the cabinets in a pattern consist with the victim’s head continuously being slammed against them.

  “And the murder weapon here was...?” Jacks prodded, already guessing the answer.

  “The cabinet. Her head was repeatedly slammed into them. Pretty hard from the looks of it.”

  “Terrific,” Jacks muttered. “At least the killer was consistent. I don’t suppose there’s any good news?”

  “Not really,” Melvin said. “It actually gets worse.”

  He pointed his flashlight beam toward the overturned kitchen table.

  “Number three: Female Caucasian, age twelve. Angela Washington.”

  The outline of the daughter’s body was not far from that of her mother.

  “Doesn’t look like she put up much of a struggle.”

  “Nope,” Melvin agreed. “And there’s no way they wouldn’t have seen an intruder coming down the hallway.” He pointed to the front door that was easily seen by anyone sitting at the kitchen table.

  Jacks shrugged as she looked back and forth from the kitchen table down the hallway to the front door. There was no denying Detective Walker’s assessment of the scene.

  “And the daughter was...?”

  “Kitchen table. Right over there.”

  “So, what do you think, Jacks?” Melvin asked.

  Jacks played the events over in her mind. “Wha
tever happened either took her completely by surprise and she had no time to run, scream for her dad in the den, throw something, whatever. Or what she saw scared her so badly that her body just shut down, preventing her from moving. At thirteen, I would have panicked.”

  “Somehow I doubt that.”

  “Hey, you didn’t know me at thirteen, buster. I could have been more girlish and less ass-kicky than I am now.”

  “Uh huh.” He said, sounding less than convinced. “Were you?”

  She smiled. “No.”

  “I didn’t think so. Anyway, I’m assuming we can rule out the Invisible Man as a suspect.”

  Ignoring her partner’s usual attempt at levity, Jacks looked around the kitchen, tapping her forefinger against her chin, as she often did when trying to piece together evidence that just didn’t fit.

  “You said there were four vics, didn’t you?” she suddenly realized they had only looked at three outlines.

  Melvin shuffled his feet.

  “What?”

  “Number four is upstairs. Allyson Washington. Age....”

  Jacks’ eyes pleaded for an answer. An answer Melvin did not seem to want to provide.

  “Jacks, it was a baby. Couldn’t have been more than three, four months old.”

  Uncontrollably, Jacks felt her head fall into her hand, her fingers massaging just above her eyes. “Fuck! This is not the kind of shit I need to start my weekend off with, Mel.”

  “I know.” His face softened. She didn’t handle cases involving kids, especially young ones, well. “Look. You’ve got enough down here to get started. I’ll do the prelims upstairs. You tell me what happened down here then we can worry about what kind of sick fuck did all this.”

  Now it was his turn to give the pleading stare.

  “Okay?”

  She nodded.

  “Scoot. I’ll be back down in a bit.”