by David Archer
Sam looked down at where the old man lay, his face swollen and bloodied and his eyes filled with tears for his wife. “You told me something that she didn't want me to know,” he said. “And now you've told me exactly who I'm looking for.”
18
The second ambulance arrived a few moments later, and Sam got out of the way so they could help the old man. He walked out the front door of the house, headed across the street to where the Osgoods lived, and knocked. A short, thin man opened the door.
“You must be Ronnie,” Sam said. “I'm Sam Prichard, a private investigator. Are you folks okay over here?”
Ronnie shrugged. “Well, it's not every day you find out your wife has been cheating on you with the guy who got murdered next door, but I guess we're coping. Is there something I can do for you?”
Sam nodded. “Yes. Keep your doors locked and stay inside for a bit. The person who killed Carlos is apparently trying to eliminate any possible witnesses. The old couple across the street was attacked just a short time ago, and since your wife and Carlos were involved, she might be considered another potential risk. Has anyone come around here, asking questions today?”
“Only the police,” Ronnie said. “Do they know who killed Carlos yet? I might want to send the guy a thank you card.”
Sam glared at him. “Mr. Osgood, what you need to do is try to figure out how to save your marriage. And if anyone comes around here acting suspicious, especially a tall woman, you call the police just as fast as you can.”
Sam turned around and walked away, heading back to his car. He took out his phone and called Karen as he climbed inside.
“Karen, I know who it is, but you're going to have a hard time believing me. It's Jackie Porter. I don't have a clue why, yet, but she's the only person who knew that it was the Howdens who tipped me off to Marcy, and said they had seen other women at Carlos's place. They've been attacked, and Mr. Howden says it was a woman who is taller than me and has long black hair. Two plus two makes four, even in this messed-up world.”
Karen was quiet for a moment, but then she said, “Remember all those crime scene reports we went through? Every single one of them was prepared by Jackie. If there were any similarities in those cases, who better to cover them up than the crime scene technician handling the case? Sam, how sure are you of this? I'll stick my neck out with you, but you'd better be able to back it up or we’re both likely to lose our heads.”
“I'm certain,” Sam said. “Still, what kind of motive could she possibly have had? Jackie is one of the best CSIs in the business, what would make her turn to murder?”
“Tell you what,” Karen said. “We'll ask her that once we've caught her. I'm going to give her a call and ask her to come down and go over the McAlester report with me. If she isn't aware that you're on to her, she'll probably try to act like there's nothing out of the ordinary.”
“Good,” Sam said. “I'm on my way there.”
He cut the call and fired up the Corvette, then started back toward the police station. As he drove, he was wracking his brain, trying to figure out any possible motive for Jackie to kill Carlos.
Suddenly, it hit him—the pieces started to fall into place. Whitaker had told him that Carlos had the ability to make evidence disappear, and Marcy told Karen that she had seen a tall woman with black hair going in and out of Carlos's home. If Carlos and Jackie were involved, it was quite possible that he convinced her to tamper with evidence from time to time; it would be easy for her, with her position in the department. Almost every kind of physical evidence from any type of case passed through her office.
When he added in the fact that only Jackie knew about the Howdens filling him in on Marcy, she was the only possible person who could want them silenced. She would need to be sure they couldn't tell anyone about her own visits to Carlos, because that would automatically put her on the suspect list.
Suddenly, Sam thought it made sense that she hadn't caught on at the crime scene. She should have realized on her own that Carlos knew and trusted his attacker, and would have already written that into her report, except that she needed to reinforce the police perception that Candy was the killer. Sam's fortuitous appearance had thrown a monkey wrench into her plans, which explained why she tracked him down earlier; she was trying to find out if he was getting any closer to connecting her to the crime.
His phone rang, and it was Karen calling. “Sam, she's not answering her phone. Think about it, is there any way she could know you're onto her yet?”
Sam took a deep breath. “I don't know whether she was still around the Howden house when I got there or not,” he said. “It's quite possible she was still there, and saw me come roaring in. On the other hand, she's smart, and she'd know that Mr. Howden was going to describe her. With everything I've got, she might expect me to put it together.”
“Then she's bolting,” Karen said. “I'm sending some plainclothes out to her place now, to see if they see any sign of her. You got any other ideas where we might look?”
Sam thought for a moment. “I don't know her that well,” he said. “She had a new partner, a guy named Ned, the other day. See if you can find out how to reach him. Jackie tends to fraternize, or at least she did back when I was in homicide. Some of the people she worked with should know more about her.”
“Gotcha, I'll get on that.” The phone went dead again.
Sam kept going over the little details of the case, trying to think of anything that might give him a clue to what was going on in Jackie's mind. She had been an excellent CSI, and there were literally dozens of men and women sitting in prison because of evidence she had uncovered that everyone else had missed. Now, all of those cases would be called into question. If she were connected to Carlos, and he was known for being able to make evidence vanish, then she had to be an accomplice.
Still, it's a big leap from tampering with evidence to murder. Sam couldn't imagine any circumstance that would take a brilliant CSI scientist and turn her into a killer.
His phone rang again, and this time the caller ID was blocked. He answered warily. “Hello?”
“You seem to have set off a beehive,” said a voice, and Sam recognized it as Randall Whitaker. “I'm hearing rumors that McAlester's killer has been identified, and it's got an awful lot of people upset. Care to tell me who it is?”
Sam thought for a moment, and decided that having Whitaker on his side could come in handy sometime, and would keep the man from realizing just how determined Sam was to bring him to justice. “Her name is Jackie Porter, and she's a crime scene technician for the Denver PD. You said Carlos was able to make evidence disappear? Well, I'm pretty sure we know how, now. I don't know what the connection between Carlos and Jackie was, yet, but when I put the pieces together, they all add up to her.”
Whitaker whistled. “No joke? I wonder why she killed him?”
Sam shrugged, even though Whitaker couldn't see him. “That's the thing we need to find out, or one of them. It turns out she may have been responsible for other murders in the past, and with her position, she could cover it up and let it remain unsolved, or let someone else take the fall. I'm working with the police on this, and we're trying to get enough pieces to put this puzzle together.”
“Do you think it has any connection to me? I mean, could she have wanted revenge over something I arranged?”
“Still no clue. We made a deal, though, so if I find out you'll be the first to know.”
Whitaker was satisfied, and ended the call only a moment later after promising that Sam would not regret his cooperation. Sam grimaced as he put the phone back into his pocket, but it rang before he could even let go of it. He snatched it back out and shoved it to his ear. “Prichard,” he said.
It was Karen Parks again. “Sam, Jackie's partner Ned seems to be missing. The lab says he got a phone call about an hour and a half ago, and left suddenly. No one knows who the call was from, but we called his home, and his father says he isn't there and has no idea where
he could be.”
Sam shook his head in frustration. “They could be working together,” he said, “or she might have called him out on a pretext. I think you should get an APB out on both of their personal vehicles, and make sure the CSI van is accounted for.”
“What, do you think I'm stupid? Already did that. The van is at the lab, right where it's supposed to be. Jackie's car is a brand-new Mustang, and Ned Jacobson drives a 2014 Challenger. Sam, if she's running, she can be just about anywhere within a hundred miles right now.”
“No, she hasn't gotten that far. When I got to Mr. Howden, she had only been out of the house for a short time. Even if she saw me show up there and took off, she's only had about a twenty-minute head start. It wouldn't be that easy for her to get out of town without somebody on our side spotting her.”
“Fine, I'll keep you posted. If you think of anything, you let me know.”
Sam was quivering with frustration, kicking himself for not having caught on sooner. Still, he knew that it wasn't until Mr. Howden's description that all the pieces suddenly fell into place. He tried to think of anything that would lead him to Jackie now, but he had no clue what her plans were.
Sam started trying to think like a fleeing killer, planning how he would escape the city without running across police officers who might be looking for him. There were a number of roads that went out into the countryside, but there was little doubt they would be heavily patrolled at the moment. If there was one thing a cop couldn't stand, it was to see one of their own literally fleeing from justice. Every cop on duty would be watching for any sign of Jackie, so it wasn't likely she could take any of the more common routes.
That being the case, she would certainly be driving a different vehicle than usual, something that wouldn't be noticed as readily as her own. With her skills, she would have no trouble hotwiring a vehicle, but that would limit her to older cars that didn't require a key to unlock the steering or transmission.
In today's modern automotive world, however, there are a lot of new cars that don't require a key at all. All you need is a key fob in your pocket, and you can simply push a button to start the car. That's a wonderful thing, but it’s also enabled high-tech car thieves to run off with your fancy new vehicle. A simple device, designed to allow a dealership or locksmith to create a new key fob if your original is lost, can be plugged into a slot in your car to override that system. You simply plug it in, push the button and the car starts, allowing you to drive away without anyone knowing the car is stolen.
As a crime scene technician, Jackie would know about such devices and even have access to them. She could literally be in any of several dozen brand-new vehicles that were cruising around him at that moment, and he would never know.
But that didn't mean she couldn't be found. Sam yanked his phone out of his pocket again and called his wife.
“Hey, baby,” Indie said as she answered.
“Indie, is there any possibility you're close to your computer?”
“Oh, yeah,” she said. “We've been out having fun, but now were back at the hotel to rest up before dinner. What do you need?”
Sam grinned. “I need you to find a cell phone for me.” He gave her Jackie's number, and could hear her typing it into Herman's search fields. “How long do you think it will take to get a GPS location on her?”
“If that's all you need, I should be able to get it within a few minutes. Hang on, let me turn Herman loose.”
While Herman started searching for Jackie's phone, Indie filled Sam in on the day she and Kenzie had had, running wild through parts of Disney World that she hadn't even known existed until that day. They chatted for a few minutes, and then Herman went ding!
“Okay, I've got it,” Indie said. “That phone is heading south on 85, just about to cross Oxford. That help anything?”
Sam tapped the speaker button on his phone and dropped it into his shirt pocket, then looked around for a split second. Realizing where he was, he grabbed the shifter and downshifted to second gear as he yanked the wheel to the left and spun the car around. “It sure does,” he yelled. “Now just stay with me and help me zero in on the car it's riding in.”
Sam was on Broadway just north of Oxford, so he floored the car and took the right turn onto Oxford at almost 60 miles an hour. Cars were honking and drivers were making hand gestures, but Sam didn't take his eyes off the road. Just over two minutes later, he swung left onto 85.
“Okay,” he said to Indie, “I just turned onto 85 from Oxford, going south. How far ahead of me?”
“Um, it's just about to pass Belleview. Still going south, probably doing about fifty, fifty-five miles an hour.”
Sam shifted back into high gear and floored the accelerator again, watching his speedometer read higher and higher. He was doing a hundred and twenty, and still climbing. The big four twenty-seven under the hood was roaring, and Sam actually thought he could hear a note of relief in the loud exhaust. The car had been built to run like this, but it wasn't something he could do often.
Sam held the throttle steady when he made it to a hundred and forty. There weren't a lot of intersections on that stretch, so he wasn't running a great risk of someone pulling out in front of him. “How far ahead now?”
“It's halfway between Belleview and Bowles,” Indie said. “Where are you?”
“Sign says Belleview is a two miles ahead,” Sam said.
“Then you're about a three miles behind the car with that phone. Sam, who are you chasing?”
“Remember I told you about Jackie, my old friend in the CSI lab? Guess who turned out to be the killer in this case.”
“Are you serious? Sam, that's horrible.”
“No, what's horrible is that it took that damned ghost to give me the tips that let me figure it out. I've got to tell you that I'm getting kind of worried about your mother, she slipped into the Beauregard personality twice today and called me. I'm beginning to think it might be time for her to see a psychiatrist.”
19
“You want to think that through,” Indie said. “I mean, assuming she's crazy and Beauregard is just her own ability to predict the future, do you really want her to be cured? How many times has Beauregard saved your life now?”
“Shut up, I don't want to think about that right now. I just passed Belleview, how far ahead?”
“Um, it looks like about three quarters of a mile, and she's slowing down. The next major intersection is Bowles Avenue, or Littleton if she turns left. I'm watching, I'll let you know.”
This section of 85 had more side streets, so Sam stood on his brakes and downshifted in order to slow down. He dropped down to just over eighty miles an hour, weaving through traffic and dodging emerging drivers. The Corvette handled it all like it was on a Sunday drive on an oval track.
“Sam, she's turning right onto Bowles Avenue. She's stopped at the moment, and I know that light, it's a long one. Be careful, but you might come up on her before she gets away from the intersection.”
“I'll be careful,” Sam said. “Once I get there, all I have to do is figure out which car she's in. Anything you can do to help me with that?”
“Yes, I can! There's another major intersection when she gets to Federal Boulevard, and it's got traffic cams. I can be hacked into them in a matter of seconds.”
Sam could hear her tapping on the keyboard as he continued racing down the street. He could just see the intersection with Bowles Avenue up ahead of him when she spoke again. “Okay, I've got the cameras. She's coming up to the intersection in just a minute, and I should be able to tell which car she's in. Hang on, I'm watching.”
“I'm hangin', babe,” Sam said. He had downshifted in order to slow the car from its terrific speed, pumping the brakes to keep from overheating them. He was coming up fast on the intersection, and got the car under control in time to move into the right turn lane.
“Sam, it's one of two cars, but I can't get a look at the driver of either one to see if it's a woman. Ther
e's a big white car, almost looks like a police car without the lights, and right behind that is a black sports car, I think it's one of the new Corvettes.”
The light was red for Sam, but he was still moving at nearly 50 miles an hour as he came around the intersection. A couple of cars squealed their brakes as he slid in front of them, but then the Corvette straightened out and he floored it again. “Okay, babe, I'm about thirty seconds behind them. Let me take it from here, I've got to concentrate on driving.”
“Okay, Sam, but you better call me as soon as you can. I'm gonna be worried sick, you know.”
“I will, I will,” Sam said. “Call Karen, let her know what's going on.” A second later he heard the beep that said Indie had hung up.
The Federal Boulevard intersection loomed ahead, its light green, and Sam held the throttle to the floor. He was back up to a hundred and twenty and had no intention of losing speed, so he said a silent prayer and barreled ahead. The light turned yellow while he was still two hundred yards away, and he knew there was no hope of stopping.
Two cars started to enter the intersection of Federal, but Sam laid on his horn and both screeched to a stop as he shot through in front of them. There was another flurry of car horns and hand gestures, but Sam didn't even notice. He could see the two cars Indie described up ahead, and he was gaining on them rapidly.
Suddenly, the black Corvette whipped out and passed the car ahead of it, gaining speed like a rocket. “There you are!” Sam yelled. He had been about to slow down, but he pushed the throttle back to the floor and gave the old hot rod all it had.