Fatal Chaos

by Marie Force

  “Terror.”

  Sitting at a red light, Sam looked over at him. “That’s an angle we haven’t fully explored and probably should.” She called Avery Hill. “Talk to me about your deeper look at homegrown terrorists.”

  “I’ve got my people combing the databases looking for any connections, and I’m talking to the intelligence agencies about chatter in recent weeks.”

  “Excellent. Keep me posted?”

  “I will.”

  “Appreciate your help on this one, Avery.”

  “Whatever we can do.”

  Sam slapped her phone closed. “They’re on it.”

  “I know it goes against everything we believe in, but you did the right thing bringing in the Feds.”

  “This isn’t the kind of case where pride matters. Who cares who breaks it as long as someone does.”

  “Well, it would be nice if it was us.”

  “Duh.”

  Freddie laughed. “Just so you know, boss of my life, I talked to Elin about the kid thing over dinner, and she sorta sees your point.”

  “I knew I liked her.”

  “You couldn’t stand her for the longest time,” he said scornfully.

  “That is not true. I never disliked her. I wasn’t sure she was right for you.”

  “She is so right for me,” he said with a salacious smile that had Sam scowling at him.

  “Spare me the gory details, Romeo.”

  “The details are so, so gory.”

  “Stop it!”

  Freddie was still laughing when they pulled up to the Ninth Street checkpoint where they were waved through by the Secret Service.

  Sam parked in her usual spot and headed for her dad’s house with Freddie right behind her. They went up the ramp, and Sam knocked on the front door before going in.

  “How many times do I have to tell you not to knock on that door?” Celia asked from her perch on the sofa.

  “After you two crazy kids were caught making out, I’m always going to knock.”

  Celia’s heart-shaped face turned bright red.

  “She does that stuff to me too,” Freddie said.

  “I’m a good time had by all,” Sam said with a cheeky grin.

  “She should’ve been spanked more as a child,” Celia said, teasing.

  Sam laughed. “They couldn’t catch me to spank me. Mind if we pop back to see Dad?”

  “He’s waiting for you.”

  Sam led the way through the kitchen to her father’s bedroom in what used to be the dining room. A hospital bed sat where the dining room table had once been. She leaned over the bed rail to kiss his forehead. “How you doing, Skippy?”

  “Better than you from what I saw on the news. A six-year-old? So awful.”

  It was no surprise that he’d take this case hard, having lost his first partner to a drive-by shooting that remained unsolved.

  “Yeah,” Sam said, sitting in the chair next to his bed, “it was awful. The dad was a single parent. He’s inconsolable.”

  “Terrible. Tell me you have something.”

  “We’ve got dick, and we’re chasing our tails. We’ve even called in the Feds, voluntarily.” He would know how desperate they were if they’d taken that measure.

  “What can I do?”

  “Talk to me about Kenneth Wallack.”

  The side of his face that still had expressive ability registered shock. “What about him?”

  “He’s a trained sharpshooter.”

  “Sam, come on. He’s one of us. You can’t seriously think he’s involved.”

  “We’re investigating every person in the local area who has the ability to do what this shooter is capable of—hitting targets with deadly accuracy while traveling at a high rate of speed. His name came up, and I’m looking for some perspective.”

  “Does Joe know you’re looking at him?” he asked of the chief.

  “He does, and he’s not happy about it.”

  “He wouldn’t be. They were great friends coming up through the ranks. Wallack was even closer to Conklin. I think they were in each other’s weddings.”

  “If he was close to Uncle Joe, why don’t I remember him?”

  “I don’t know. We’ve worked with so many people over the years. It’s hard to keep track of them all sometimes. But Kenny, he’s a good guy. He’d never be caught up in something like this.”

  “Who were his other friends in the department?”

  “Conklin was his partner for a couple of years,” he said of the deputy chief. “And for a brief time, he hung out with Stahl, but that didn’t last.”

  “How come?”

  “Stahl has always been the Stahl you know. He became more so over time, and people kept their distance, even people who’d once been his friend.”

  “Interesting,” Sam said.

  “Did Wallack have any issues during his career?” Freddie asked.

  “A contentious divorce from his first wife that spilled onto the job for a time. He was sent to rehab and came out having found the Lord. That put people off for a while, but he eventually settled down and refocused on the job.”

  “So they let a guy with substance abuse problems be a sharpshooter?” Sam asked.

  “As far as I know, he never touched a drop of booze again after he left rehab. He was a changed man, and that was obvious to everyone. And no one, and I do mean no one, could shoot like he could. The guy was one hundred percent on the mark. It would’ve been a tragic waste of talent not to use him in that role.”

  A tingle of sensation traveled down Sam’s backbone. In fourteen years on the job, she’d learned to trust the feeling that told her she was onto something. “What’ve you heard of him in recent years?”

  “Not much. He doesn’t come to the reunions, but I did hear somewhere along the line that he got married again, and it’s a real love match.”

  “This is all very helpful. Thank you.”

  “Whatever I can do, baby girl. You know that, but I think you’re barking up the wrong tree here. He was a decorated officer.”

  “I’m just dotting the Is and crossing the Ts the way my dad taught me.”

  Half his face lifted in a smile. “Keep me posted?”

  “Always. And call me if you think of anything else about him that I ought to know.”

  “I will. Have you looked at your current roster of sharpshooters?”

  The question struck Sam like a hammer to the head. “Um, no?”

  Skip’s eyebrow lifted. He got a lot done with that one brow.

  “Freddie,” she said, “take a memo. Look into existing MPD sharpshooters.”

  “Got it.”

  “Get some sleep, Skippy,” Sam said, kissing him.

  “You too, baby girl.”

  “Not happening tonight.”

  They said goodnight to Celia and went back outside, Sam glancing longingly at her home as they walked to her car. Exhaustion tugged at her, but she didn’t have time to be tired.

  “Where’re we heading now?”

  “Back to the house to do some digging on sharpshooters, past and present.”

  They spent the rest of the night investigating everyone they could find who had the skills to perpetrate an accurate, high-speed shooting. By four in the morning, they’d ruled out two current MPD officers, Fitzgivens and Sellers, by verifying they’d been on vacation together and out of town at the time of the first round of shootings, leaving one other current officer who had the skills—Sergeant Dylan Offenbach.

  With Freddie standing in the doorway, Sam placed a call to SWAT Captain Nicholson at two a.m. “Sorry to wake you, Captain. You’re on speaker with myself and Detective Cruz.”

  “What can I do for you?”

  “Sergeant Offenbach,” Sam said.

  “What
about him?”

  “We’re unable to determine his whereabouts this week and were hoping you might be able to help us as his commander.”

  After a pause, he said, “Why’re you trying to verify his whereabouts?”

  “It’s part of our investigation into the drive-by shootings.”

  “You gotta be fucking kidding me. You’re looking inside the department?”

  “We’re looking for people who have the skills necessary to perpetrate this crime. Your sergeant is someone who has the skills.”

  “Well, it wasn’t him. He’s at a conference in Philadelphia. He’s been there since Saturday, so that rules him out.”

  “We’ll need the information about the conference and the hotel where he’s been staying.”

  “He’s one of your brothers in blue, Lieutenant.”

  “I understand that, Captain, and I regret the need to follow up in this way, but I can either get the information I need from you, or I can ask someone over both our heads to get it for me. Either way, I’m going to confirm the sergeant has been in Philadelphia since Saturday.”

  After a long, long pause, Nicholson rattled off the name of the hotel where Offenbach was staying.

  “Let me ask you one more thing,” Sam said. “Fitzgivens and Sellers were both on vacation and Offenbach was at a conference. What were we supposed to do if we needed a sharpshooter and all three of our current officers with that skill were out of town?”

  She could hear the snarl in his tone. “We had a scheduling mix-up, and we were only without someone for twenty-four hours. Fitzgivens and Sellers returned from vacation late on Sunday night and were back on duty Monday morning.”

  “I see,” Sam said. “Good thing we didn’t need a sharpshooter on Saturday night or Sunday morning, huh?”

  “Is there anything else you need?”

  “That’ll do it for now. Appreciate your cooperation.” Sam pressed the button to disconnect the call.

  “That was intense.”

  “I’d feel the same way if someone came to me asking those kinds of questions about one of you.”

  “You’re only doing the job.”

  “Still, it would piss me off as a commander that someone would infer one of my people could’ve been responsible for a crime.”

  “You didn’t infer that. You asked for information.”

  “The request alone was enough to infer a lot of things. Verify he was in Philly on Sunday night and is still there, and we can check that box. Then we’ll track down Wallack.”

  “Will do.”

  * * *

  SAM WENT INTO her office, closed the door and turned off the lights, determined to catch ten minutes of shut-eye while she could. Feet on the desk, head back and eyes closed, she could see only the heartbroken face of Trey Marchand. That poor guy. He was doing everything right, raising a child on his own and to have something like this happen… The word unfair didn’t begin to do the situation justice.

  Her cell phone dinged with a text from Nick.

  Call me if you have a minute.

  She immediately placed the call. “What’re you doing up?” she asked when he answered.

  “I wanted to check on you. I saw the reports about the shooting, and I know how hard it is for you guys when kids are involved.”

  “It was horrible. The poor dad is a single parent and buckled to her pleas to take her to the park, even though he knew they should stay in. All I can see are the braids in her hair and her adorable sunflower dress covered in blood.”

  “I’m sorry, babe. I honestly don’t know how you guys can see the stuff you do every day and continue to function normally.”

  “There are many who would argue that my functioning is far from normal.”

  “I’m not one of them. Your normal works for me.”

  “That’s good to know,” she said with a sigh. “Most guys wouldn’t want anything to do with a mess like me.”

  “This guy wants everything to do with your messy self.”

  Sam smiled, which would have been impossible before he called. “Hearing your voice makes it all better.”

  “Are you getting anywhere with the investigation?”

  “Not really, but we’re doing what we do, pulling threads. We’re working the sharpshooter angle hard. Whoever is doing this has some kind of formal training to be able to strike repeatedly with such deadly accuracy while traveling in a speeding car.”

  “That’s a good theory. I hope it pans out.”

  “Of course, that angle is fraught with peril as it includes people associated with the department.”

  “Does that mean you’re making more friends at HQ?”

  “Something like that.”

  “You going to be at it all night?”

  “Looks that way. I don’t feel right going home until we catch these SOBs.”

  “You need to sleep at some point. You won’t be any good to anyone if you run yourself into the ground.”

  “I know. I’ll work until I can’t anymore, and then I’ll be home.”

  “Keep me posted?”

  “Will do. Do you think you can get some sleep?”

  “I’ll try. I don’t sleep as well without my wife to snuggle with.”

  “Sorry.”

  “It’s okay. Love you, babe. Be careful out there.”

  “Always am, and I love you too.”

  She closed her phone and put her head back against the chair, grateful for him and the support he always provided when her cases got to be too much for her. And this one had been too much since the first bullet hit Jamal Jackson.

  Letting her mind wander while she had a moment of quiet, she worked through the details of the case so far. From Jamal to Melody to Sridhar to Caroline and now Vanessa. Nothing obvious connected the five victims except for how they were killed. The shootings had happened in different parts of the city, four of them after dark. Only Jamal had been killed during daylight hours.

  She thought about Joe Kramer and the investment he’d risked everything to make and still couldn’t find a motive that led to his wife being killed in a drive-by shooting. How did that make any sense? If they killed Joe, that would add up because eliminating him meant they’d have one less investor to share profits with if their gamble paid off. But killing his wife would’ve gotten them nowhere. Except to maybe send a message to Joe.

  Sam sat up in her chair. “Cruz!”

  He opened her door a minute later. “You bellowed, Lieutenant?”

  “Joe Kramer.”

  “What about him?”

  “The guys he invested with checked out, right?”

  “They did. No criminal records.”

  “Were we able to get anything on what this mysterious project they’re working on is about?”

  “We didn’t dig into that.”

  “Maybe we should. What if they were trying to send a message to Joe by taking out his wife?”

  “It’s a thread, but tell me this… What do the other four victims have to do with sending a message to Joe?”

  “Maybe nothing. Maybe they were collateral damage.”

  Freddie thought about that for a minute. “It’s a stretch. If they were going to surround Melody with collateral damage, they did that the first night. Why start it up again tonight?”

  His good point had her sagging with discouragement again.

  “I was able to confirm that Sergeant Offenbach checked into the hotel in Philadelphia on Saturday and hasn’t checked out,” Freddie said.

  “That tells us he was in Philly on Saturday. It doesn’t tell us he’s still there.”

  “What do you want to do?”

  “Ask Archie to track his phone.”

  “Sam… The guy’s a decorated police officer.”

  “I know he is, but I’ve got a
six-year-old dead in the morgue because she went to a freaking park with her father. Track the phone, Freddie.”

  “On it.” He turned and left the room.

  Sam immediately regretted her sharp tone and would have to apologize for taking her frustrations out on him. Apologizing never came naturally to her, but she’d learned to do it when she had to. Being an adult sucked sometimes. But other times it really didn’t, especially the time she got to spend with her sexy husband. That was the best kind of adulting.

  Their beach vacation already seemed like it’d happened months ago. With exhaustion creeping in around her rough edges, Sam scrubbed at her face and got up to find some coffee. At the coffee station in the pit, she was surprised to find Cameron Green filling a cup. “What’re you doing here?”

  “I heard about the dead kid and came in to see what I could do to help.”

  “That earns you big points, Detective,” Sam said, accepting the cup of coffee he poured for her.

  “That’s not why I came.”

  “That earns you even more.” She stirred cream and a half a teaspoon of sugar into her coffee. “Is there a Mrs. Green at home?”

  “Nope. Just me and my pug named Jeffrey. My neighbor takes care of him for me when I get stuck working crazy hours.”

  “I love that you have a pug named Jeffrey.”

  “He’s my son. Sometime when we don’t have dead kids to deal with, I’ll show you pictures. He’s so ugly he’s cute.”

  “I’ll look forward to seeing those pictures.”

  “Tell me about the dead kid.”

  Sam went over what’d happened and what they knew so far, which was next to nothing. “We’ve got people looking for the car, the Feds are working the homegrown angle and we’re digging into the sharpshooters in the area. Cruz and I are heading out shortly if you’d like to join us.”

  “Don’t mind if I do.”

  “I really do appreciate you coming in early.”

  “No problem.”

  Dominguez and Carlucci came into the pit, and Sam waved them over. “Detective Dani Carlucci and Detective Gigi Dominguez, meet Detective Cameron Green.”

  The three detectives shook hands.

  “Nice to meet you,” Dominguez said.