The Third to Die

by Allison Brennan

  “What?”

  “That we found the gloves. My diver found the gloves in a bag weighted down by a rock in a different location from the other evidence. My forensics guy thinks that’s the greatest possibility of getting viable DNA from the killer—hair or blood if he nicked himself.”

  “Very well. I’ll lead. This is still my city.”

  Matt nodded, and hoped he wasn’t making a huge mistake. “My profiler suggests that we hold the conference outside, that the killer might show up and stay if the venue is outdoors and he see us.”

  “Front steps. Give me five minutes and I’ll meet you in the lobby.”

  A dismissal? Matt wondered what Packard planned on doing in those five minutes.

  He strode toward the lobby and found Michael chatting with the desk sergeant. When Michael spotted him, he pulled Matt to the corner, where there was some privacy.

  “What’d you learn?” Matt asked.

  “The PIO is hot,” Michael said.

  Matt wasn’t in the mood. “And that’s relevant how?”

  “Just a comment. She wouldn’t tell me squat, only that she didn’t talk to the press at all yesterday, which is odd in and of itself because she’s the PIO. She gave them the brush off, trying to get a statement from the chief, so when she saw the paper she was stunned. Doesn’t know who leaked the information, but implied the chief is buddies with the crime beat reporter.”

  “Did you see who was out there?” Matt gestured toward the front steps.

  “About forty people, not all press. Two television crews. A couple radios. A group wearing some American flag insignia—looks like an anticrime group.”

  “Neighborhood watch or something, per Packard. We need a unified message, and more important, I need to control what gets out there. The killer is going to be watching the news, reading the papers, checking the internet. Hell, he might have a Google Alert set up so he gets informed of every damn tidbit as it happens. Did you know there’s already a Twitter hashtag? Ryder told me about it. Hashtag Spokane Triple Killer.”

  “Welcome to the new era of policing.”

  “It sucks.”

  “It has its advantages. Maybe the killer is monitoring Twitter. Maybe he’ll interact with someone.”

  “He’s been smart—would a smart killer do something that could get him so easily caught?”

  “To gloat? Because he knows he’s smart so he creates false accounts? To correct the record?” Michael shrugged. “I don’t know.”

  “Hmm. Maybe.” He sent an email to Catherine about social media. She’d already confirmed that the killer would be tracking the investigation. How might they be able to use that to their advantage? Then he forwarded the message to Ryder. The kid probably had already thought about tracking social media, he seemed to be up-to-date on modern policing.

  Ryder called as he hit Send. He had the public transportation tapes they’d asked for and would be reviewing them while Matt was at the press conference. No dice on the taxis—nothing fitting their profile. Private rides were harder, and Tony was working on that angle from DC. Would the killer be so bold as to take a private taxi all the way to the hospital? Or would he jump around? Walk? Take a combination of public and private transportation? Where was he all day after hiding the ATV at the vacant house?

  Matt wrapped up the conversation, confident that if there was anything to find with transportation, Ryder would find it.

  He glanced at his watch. It had been more than fifteen minutes since he left Packard, and they were ten minutes late for the scheduled press conference. Where the hell was he?

  Matt glanced through his messages. He had a response from the ASAC in LA, Bryce Thornton.

  I would like to discuss Detective Quinn with you at your earliest convenience. If she’s assisting on one of your cases, you need to know who you’re working with.

  Matt ignored the message. He couldn’t be bothered with interagency bullshit right now, and he’d promised Kara he wouldn’t pursue it. It wasn’t relevant to his case, and she was helping, and that’s all that mattered: finding this killer before someone else died.

  A female cop approached with a warm smile for Michael. He reciprocated and touched her arm as she passed by. Great. Matt didn’t need a sexual harassment lawsuit when his team was barely out of the gate.

  “Agent Costa?” the cop said. “I’m Sergeant Diana Jackson, the PIO. Chief Packard is ready. Please follow me.”

  They followed Jackson around the side of the building to the front steps. As soon as they arrived, Packard stepped to the podium and spoke briefly about the murder of Victoria Manners and detailed that SPD was working closely with Liberty Lake and the Sheriff’s department gathering and processing evidence from the crime scene. He wasn’t doing bad, and he didn’t give away any key details—which was a plus.

  While the chief was talking, Matt got a text from Jim that they had confirmed that Manners had been drugged with an opioid.

  Fentanyl is an opioid and we’re testing now for that and a broad range of narcotics. It’s likely a compound. Once I get the results, we can ask Portland and Missoula to test their victims—if they properly collected samples of blood, tissue, etc. I also asked the ME to go over the body again looking for an injection site. If small, it may not be obvious.

  Fantastic, Matt thought. One more piece to the puzzle, and one he could use in this briefing.

  Matt looked out at the crowd. Forty plus people congregated, some tight together near the front, others loosely in the back. He couldn’t see Kara. Had she bailed on them? In hiding? What was her game?

  Packard then introduced Matt.

  Matt presented the timeline of the Triple Killer succinctly, outlining the three murders in Portland then the three murders in Missoula.

  “Victoria Manners is the seventh victim of this killer. We believe she was targeted because she was a trauma nurse. We also believe it’s not a coincidence that the first victim—Anne Banks—had been a trauma nurse also at Spokane General before leaving to raise her family in Portland, and that the fourth victim, Sophia Kwan, was also a trauma nurse.

  “At this point, we have a working theory that I’m ready to share with the public in order to promote public safety and vigilance. This killer kills in threes in three different cities. Three victims in Portland. Three victims in Missoula. But we want to stop him here, in Spokane. We believe he chooses his victims at random, though with a clear methodology. The first victim in his chosen city is a nurse. The second victim is an educator. The third victim is in law enforcement.”

  He let that sink in. He looked out into the crowd and still didn’t spot Kara.

  Matt continued. “If you are a teacher, an administrator, a college professor, be diligent over the next few days. Do not leave work alone. If possible don’t go out alone, and if you have friends or out-of-town family you can stay with for the weekend, all the better. Change your routine. If you jog every morning at 6:00 a.m., jog at eight. And change your route.

  “To date, this killer has chosen victims who were alone and isolated. Driving on a quiet road late at night. Living alone in a remote home. Leaving work by themselves after dark. I do not want to cause alarm or panic. I do, however, want everyone to be aware of their surroundings.”

  He focused on what Catherine believed would set the killer off. Matt was always nervous about taunting a killer, but this time he agreed with Catherine—it would likely cause him to make a mistake. Catherine had told him privately, “The killer believes he’s in charge, that he is smarter than the police. Talk about how weak he is. How inferior. Make him seem like a brute, a bully, but powerless. The more we can get under his skin, the greater chance he’ll slip up.”

  “The killer targets victims who are alone because he is a coward,” Matt said. “He drugs his innocent victims—telling us that he’s physically weak and unable to overpower most of his
victims.”

  True, they only had confirmation on Manners, but it reasoned that if he drugged Manners, he drugged the other victims—outside of Anne Banks, whom they knew he had killed quickly. The press didn’t need to know all the details.

  “He kills his victims when they’re unconscious and unable to fight back,” Matt said, “again confirming that he is weak and believes that he is powerless.

  “We also believe that his first victim knew him—that she may have recognized him, or would have if given the opportunity. He killed her in front of her infant son, leaving the child in a stroller only feet from his dead mother. He’s cruel, without concern for others, and he will not stop until we stop him.

  “My team will stop him. The FBI has devoted people and resources to ensure this cowardly killer is caught and prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. We have hit the ground running because Ms. Manners’ body was found quickly, only hours after she was so brutally murdered. We’ve found more evidence at this crime scene than at all the other crime scenes combined. We’ve found the knife used to stab her, the clothes the killer wore when he killed her, and the vehicle used to transport the victim to Liberty Lake. My top forensic criminalist is working closely with experts at the Spokane crime lab, and together, we’ll process the evidence quickly and efficiently, with the goal of apprehending this killer before he strikes again.”

  19

  Spokane

  4:20 p.m.

  Kara only half listened to the cops as they did their talk. She was watching the crowd. She’d done this dozens of times in a variety of circumstances, looking for small signs that someone was off. That someone was just a bit too interested or a bit too angry.

  She started by analyzing the press. If she were a bad guy who wanted to check on the progress of a criminal investigation, she’d take on the role of someone expected to be in attendance. Press was logical. But each person had the reporter vibe. Some had a cameraman or another person carrying equipment. The dress, the mannerisms—she dismissed everyone in the press pool within minutes.

  She looked at the larger group of anticrime activists, who stood on the grassy area outside the police department, or next to the narrow road. She sidled up to a young woman carrying a toddler on her back in one of those kid backpack things. No chance she was the killer, so Kara asked her about their group. There were seven, all wearing the same American Flag shirt. The mom knew all of them, and would have chattered on the entire conference if Kara didn’t get away from her.

  Several too old. A lone teenager holding a skateboard—much like the skateboard Kara had tucked under her arm—looking more amused than anything. That kid was up to something, but he wasn’t the killer, so Kara put him in the back of her mind. Two lone men. She photographed them discreetly. They were the right age—thirties—and looked normal in every way. One of them approached the woman with the baby and kissed her—okay, husband, anticrime group, dressed like a businessman. The other walked away to the side. She approached, stood three feet behind him, and half listened to the speech while watching him.

  He was a possible. Yet he wasn’t trying to hide his identity. He was dressed in business casual, didn’t strike her as off. But some killers were crafty, and just because her instincts were better than most didn’t mean that they were foolproof.

  Then he turned and looked right at her. His eyes were moist. “Excuse me,” he mumbled.

  “Are you okay?” she asked.

  He shook his head. “I don’t know why I came here. I’d hoped for something—I don’t know.”

  “You knew Victoria Manners.”

  He nodded. “I run the staffing agency she worked at. I was hoping this press conference was going to tell us who killed her—but it’s nothing that wasn’t in the paper. I need to go.”

  She let him leave. Verifying his story would be easy enough, and she had a picture of him, but she didn’t doubt him.

  No one else fit the profile. She dropped her skateboard and rolled down the sidewalk, looked at parked cars. No one sitting in a vehicle and watching. No one on the periphery or trying to hide. Still, she took photos of every license plate within visual distance of the press briefing. She looked at the buildings—a government office building on one side of the main street, a mix of houses and small businesses on the other side. No one looking out windows. She returned to the conference. Two cops were in the crowd. Had Costa sent them in? Or Maddox? Didn’t matter, she had them both pegged quickly. One was obvious—his gun was partly visible under his blazer—the other was trying to blend. Jeans, loose T-shirt, windbreaker. But he had that cop vibe.

  Her eye fell back on the teenager with the skateboard. He was certainly up to no good. She kept an eye on him. Discreetly, but the kid didn’t even notice because of how she was dressed.

  Just one of the boys, aren’t I?

  She almost laughed out loud as she watched the kid pick the pocket of the baby daddy. So smooth, so clean she was almost impressed. But what really impressed her was when the kid slipped the wallet out of the pocket of the undercover cop in jeans and the cop didn’t even notice. Well, shit. She couldn’t let a badge get burned like that. And the killer wasn’t here. Of that she was certain.

  She caught up with the kid not even a half block later. Helped that she, too, had a skateboard and could keep up. Most of the time, no one paid attention to teenagers, which was why it was her favorite undercover disguise.

  Kara stuck out her foot and tripped him. He fell on his ass with a foulmouthed complaint. His skateboard slid under a parked car.

  “Bitch, watch it!”

  “You’re good, but I’m better,” she said.

  He jumped up and retrieved his skateboard. She didn’t give him time to get back on.

  “You’re under arrest,” she said.

  He laughed. “No fucking way you’re a cop.”

  She pulled handcuffs from her pocket—always a risk to carry when undercover, but she felt they might come in handy—and cuffed him. The conference was breaking up. She dragged the kid in through the side door and found a uniformed officer.

  “Hey, buddy, can you take this kid off my hands? He picked a couple pockets at the press conference.” She’d only seen him pick two, but when she cuffed him she felt at least three wallets in the deep pockets of his cargo pants. “Including this.” She slipped the cop’s wallet—with his badge—out of the punk’s back pocket.

  The officer looked suspicious. He opened the wallet. “Detective Theodore Coleman. I’ll be damned.”

  “She planted that wallet! I didn’t steal nothing,” the kid said.

  Kara rolled her eyes.

  “I need you to write out a report,” the officer said.

  “No problem, but I have to talk to someone first.”

  “I haven’t seen you around. New?”

  “Detective Kara Quinn. LA, not Spokane. I’ll be right back—” she glanced at his name badge “—Officer Sherman.”

  Sherman took the kid from her, a perplexed look on his face, and she walked down the hall to where Matt was walking in with Maddox.

  She’d missed most of the Q&A, but figured she wouldn’t learn anything new, and she was certain the killer didn’t show up.

  Matt spotted her and did a double take. He said something to Maddox, then walked over to her.

  “Where have you been?”

  “Watching the crowd.”

  “From in here?”

  “No.”

  “Why don’t you ever give me a straight answer?”

  She raised her eyebrows and kept her voice calm. “Do not yell at me.”

  Matt motioned for her to follow him. She did. Happily, because he was obviously irritated, and Costa was fun to mess with. He was so damn serious but she saw something more in him than most cops. Maybe it was brains. Maybe it was drive. Whatever it was, she knew he was pissed, and she
was going to enjoy the confrontation.

  He found an empty conference room and closed the door behind them. It was just them, a table, and two chairs, though neither of them sat down.

  “What happened?” he demanded.

  “I mixed and mingled. The killer didn’t show.”

  “How do you know? You were in here.”

  “No—I came in when I caught a teenage pickpocket. By that time, I’d already assessed everyone in the audience—you’d just started Q&A. The killer wasn’t there. Manners’ boss showed up, from the staffing agency. The anticrime group had met with Packard first—they know a lot more than he said to the crowd. I ID’d everyone in the group that was in attendance—they were known to the chapter secretary. Every male who fit the profile in age didn’t fit in other ways. I took pictures of every license plate in the area, which I’ll send to you.”

  “I didn’t see you.”

  “You were looking for me, not a teenager on a skateboard.”

  He opened his mouth, closed it. Mumbled, “Voy a ser condenado. I did see you.”

  She smiled. “Told you I could blend in.”

  “Catherine is certain he’s tracking the news—and a public, outdoor press conference would be ideal for him.” Matt was frustrated, but Kara tried not to take it personally.

  “She’s a smart shrink,” Kara said, “but there are other ways to track news. He wasn’t in the audience.”

  “You can’t know that.”

  She raised an eyebrow. “I caught a pickpocket who was so good he slipped a wallet out of an armed cop’s pocket, complete with his badge. I assessed everyone in the audience, and I’m telling you, he wasn’t here.”

  “You caught a pickpocket.”

  “You doubt me?” Costa was going to be so much fun to play with. Kara hadn’t had so much fun in a long, long time.