by Blake Pierce
It was too late for Ha Eun, but there were others still out there. She thought, briefly, of the boy who’d gone missing searching yesterday. There was still hope he had simply gone home, or was with a friend. But now, Adele could feel the urgency of it. For three years Ha Eun had been tortured and then killed. Who else was on the list? Sixteen names they’d found in the last three years that fit the MO. College age, missing. Three years. Of those sixteen, there were chances that many had gone missing for reasons unconnected to this case. But there was someone out there. Someone hunting the vulnerable. The same person who had taken Amanda Johnson five months ago. Taken Ha Eun three years ago. And what if they’d been active for longer? How much longer?
How many other names would they find? How many other victims?
CHAPTER TWENTY ONE
John and Adele fell silent, waiting for the loud rumbling engines to pass overhead. They were once again at their airport motel.
John was no longer at the table, but preferred to lie back on the couch, his long frame stretched out. His laptop was on his stomach, his neck tilted, so he could read the files scrolling across the screen. Adele, for her part, had a compiler running on her own computer. She’d already issued the parameters. Extending the search not just within a three-year window, but five, and then ten.
She watched the list compile, various documents spinning through, their titles flashing across the gray bar.
Eleven percent, the bar read. Soon, they would have a broader list. Sixteen names in the last three years that fit the MO. Sixteen possible victims of this psychopath. Ha Eun was off the list now. Amanda in a hospital. Fourteen names, then, unaccounted for. Still missing. Some of them, Adele had no doubt, had nothing to do with the case. Gone, perhaps never to be heard from again. But others, she could feel it in her bones, were still out there, alive. There was still hope for them.
Another jet engine flew overhead. At least, there was hope as long as Adele could get herself in gear. She’d been swinging and missing the last couple of days. No longer. She had to find something. Had to.
John grunted from the couch, and Adele looked over. “Find something?” she said.
“Running the compiler,” John replied. “But I just got an email. From BKA. Our lovely Ms. Beatrice Marshall.”
“Yeah? What about?”
Instead of answering, though, John tilted his head. “Where is Agent Marshall? I’m starting to miss her.”
“Yeah,” said Adele. “I’m sure it’s for her vivid personality.”
John smirked, a crocodile grin flashing past the length of his body from where he lay on the couch. “You know me,” he said. “I’m all about personality.”
Adele snorted in disgust. “Ms. Personality is probably following orders to distance herself from us. It’s not like the Germans have been keeping us in the loop on everything. Couldn’t help but notice we showed up at that crime scene a couple hours after BKA had already been through. Remember those threads from their uniforms contaminating the scene? They’d already stomped all over the place.”
John frowned. “Well, then that might explain this too.”
“The email?” she said, following his gaze.
“Yeah. That doctor’s report; the full, official file on Amanda Johnson. I just got it. But when I look at the date it was filed, and the forwarding information, it looks like it was sent out nearly thirteen hours ago.”
Adele actually rotated in her chair now, the wooden legs creaking against the floor. “Thirteen hours?” she snapped, her temper surging. “That’s half a day. They could’ve sent it to us yesterday. Are you sure you’re not reading the email late?”
John shook his head. “No, it was sent to me five minutes ago. Did you get it?”
Adele checked her phone, scrolling to her email. She slammed her phone against her leg, looking up again. “I didn’t even get it at all. Are you sure?”
“Yeah, five minutes ago. They didn’t even send it to you?”
Adele huffed a breath, her back to her laptop now. She could feel the blood pumping in her ears, her own frustrations mounting. She gritted her teeth and resisted the urge to throw her phone across the room. She paused for a moment, breathing, but then, exhaling through her nose, she looked at John from beneath hooded eyes. “They’re cutting us out of the loop is what they’re doing. The Germans are getting priority. BKA is protecting their own at this point. I think they can smell a storm coming.”
“Everyone’s going to get involved soon,” said John. “Sixteen names, eight different countries. Bunch of international students. Imagine eight agencies trying to coordinate. BKA can’t even coordinate with us, they’re already leaving us out of the loop.”
Adele gripped the armrests of her chair, feeling her knuckle strain.
For a moment, she felt like snapping the chair. Then she felt like kicking over the table. A sudden flash of anger surged through her, bright and hot. People were making it more difficult than it had to be. She had a job to do, but how could she do it if the team wouldn’t even play ball?
She breathed, inhaling, then exhaling longer than she’d inhaled. She tried to calm herself, focusing. She blinked a few times, and then, easing out a sigh, trying to relax, she said, “What does the medical report say?”
John shrugged a shoulder, the motion causing his laptop to tilt off his belly. “Pretty much what the doctor told us in person. Only thing I’m noticing is that you’re right about the MO. That blow that he saw on the back of her head was hard enough to knock her unconscious. So, yeah, our killer is a sneaky bastard.”
Adele leaned back, staring at the ceiling. “Tortures, knocks out kids, strips them half naked, and keeps them locked up somewhere where he can prey on them. Sneaky doesn’t do it justice.”
John sighed and glanced back at his laptop. “Thirty-two percent,” he said. “Let me get this straight. We’re looking for college-age kids, mostly international, visiting the Black Forest area, who went and stayed missing.”
“Yeah, same parameters as the three-year search.”
John shook his head. “You really think a ten-year search is going to help?”
“Can’t hurt. Ha Eun had been missing for three years. If he’s gone back that far, it’s possible he’s been working for longer.”
John narrowed his eyes. “Executive Foucault was right. This one’s bad. I’m half worried to see what we find.”
Adele glanced back at her own laptop screen. The compiler had reached forty-five percent.
“Look,” she said, “we’re going to have to tackle this from another direction. The missing people are our only witnesses. Individuals, backpackers, usually on their own out in the forests and woods. No one else is going to have seen what happened.”
“What about that kid that went missing with the search party? Has he come up yet?”
Adele shook her head. “Hasn’t technically been forty-eight hours yet. Can’t call it official. But let’s consider him a missing person as well.”
John grunted. “You don’t think the guy was unlucky enough to stumble on our killer, do you?”
“At this point, the only victims have been female,” said Adele. “So hopefully, he’s just lost somewhere, or went home without telling anyone. Though,” she said, bitter, “if it turns out he hasn’t, we’ll be the last ones notified.”
“Think we should talk with his friends? The ones who reported him missing to the search parties?”
“Definitely worth a shot,” Adele said. “But, by the sound of things, they didn’t see anything or hear anything. He went out to take a leak, and then vanished.”
“I don’t like the sound of that,” said John.
“What’s your compiler at?”
“Seventy-six percent. “Yours?”
“Eighty,” said Adele, with a slight clearing of her throat. For a brief moment, her frustration faded to a mild flash of enjoyment at the look of frustration on John’s face.
“Interpol gets all the new toys,” he mut
tered. “Your computer is just better.”
Adele winked at him and turned back in her chair, facing the screen, watching the progress bar extend.
Now that her back was to John, she heard the sound of another plane going by. “Is it really true,” she said, “Executive Foucault puts people up in bad motels if they annoy him?”
John snorted. “Best I can tell. Or else he just doesn’t really like me.”
“I don’t think he likes anyone.”
She heard a smack, like John clicking his tongue. “Not true. Sophie Paige. Executive Foucault has a soft spot for her.”
Adele shook her head but didn’t look back, her eyes glued to her screen, glazed over, waiting for the progress bar to move. It was stuck at ninety-five percent.
“Why do you think that is?” she said. “They’re not lovers, I’m almost sure of that.”
“I think it has something to do with Sophie’s kids.”
At this, Adele frowned. “She adopted all five of them, from what I remember,” said Adele. “There was some trouble with her husband. He was a suspect, it all turned out okay in the end. But Paige tried to cover it up. And I, well, I wasn’t aware at the time. I thought I was doing the right thing. Evidence was missing.”
John didn’t say anything. Adele wasn’t sure how she felt about turning in fellow agents. She knew it was important they stick together and have each other’s backs. But she also knew it was important they didn’t allow each other to get away with breaking the law.
Partnering with John was a constant area of growth for this very reason.
“Well,” said John, “Foucault went light on her. I remember that; it was all the talk a few years ago. I remember Sophie had it out for you for a while.”
Adele tapped the screen, willing the progress bar to move. Distractedly, she said, “So you think Foucault has a soft spot for her because of her kids? You don’t think one of them is his, do you?”
John grunted. “You mean like Sophie and Foucault had a one-night stand, and she never told her husband?
Adele shook her head again, her shoulders slumped over her computer, her eyes still glazed. “I’m telling you, I don’t think they were ever lovers. It’s not like that.”
“Well, then, your guess is as good as mine. Hey—one hundred!”
A second later, Adele’s computer also dinged. Both of them went deathly quiet, reading the results, their eyes scanning down the page. Adele’s mouse hovered at the bottom, and she clicked to the next page.
She frowned. There was a third page. A fourth. A fifth…
“John, how many names did you get?” she said, her voice urgent.
John didn’t reply. She turned back, looking at him. His eyes were wide. He was no longer leaning back, but was sitting up in the couch. The laptop was on his lap now, and he was staring, his eyes flicking from left to right as he read the results.
“John, how many names?
He looked at her, swallowed. “College age, mostly international, haven’t turned up, and missing in the last ten years,” he said, trailing off. He swallowed. “Adele, I’ve got two hundred names.”
She stared at him, stunned. “Two hundred?”
He shook his head. “I can run it again, but what did you get?”
She glanced over at her own screen, her eyes flicking to the top number—small red numerals. She blinked. “Two hundred and twenty-six,” she murmured.
John frowned at her, then shook his head again and reread his own results.
Adele felt a cold shiver creeping up her spine. She thought of Executive Foucault’s near premonition about the case.
“Obviously, not all of these can be our killer,” said John.
“No,” said Adele, quickly. “That’s unlikely.”
John glanced. “How come you have more names than me?”
“Because,” said Adele, “I also added another feature to the search.” Her voice was low, soft, probing in the cold gray room.
“What parameter?”
“When we first looked, in the three-year period, we were looking for a kidnapper.”
“All right, so what did you change?”
She looked at him, square in the eyes, and he finally looked up from his own screen, meeting her gaze.
“He’s a killer. He murdered Ha Eun. I went back, for the three years, the five years, and the ten, looking for the same parameters, but also missing persons that had been found. Specifically, found dead. Murdered.”
John swallowed. “Do I want to know how many?”
Adele’s eyes flipped through the files, clicking from one to the next. Reading the brief report, scanning the items and the circumstances.
“No shoes,” she murmured. “Half naked,” she muttered. “Bruises, cuts.” She continued to move through the files, clicking through and muttering, “Throat cut. Throat slit. Cut across the throat. Cut ear to ear. Throat wound. No shoes. Rope marks. Rope burns. Rope abrasions.” She clicked from one file to the next to the next to the next.
She looked over at John, and in a grim, somber tone, said, “Over the last ten years, there have been twenty-six bodies found in the areas surrounding the Black Forest. Some further out, many of them buried. Most of them picked clean by animals before they were discovered. Some of them matching our MO, others with gunshots. Others barely any remains dredged from rivers. You’d have to be looking close—but… but there are connections. Not all of them. But similarities enough. Three with rope marks. Another two with broken bones. Others without shoes. None are the same in all circumstances—but the killer is clever, we already knew that.”
“Twenty-six bodies?” John gaped.
Adele shook her head. “Twenty-six bodies found.” She emphasized the last word like a clanging gong.
“There are two hundred other names on this list, John,” she said, her voice urgent. She felt prickles across the backs of her arms. “Twenty-six dead. Found. Of those two hundred other names, how many more do you think weren’t found, but are in a shallow grave somewhere out in the forest? Animal food. Bugs, maggots feasting on them. Throats cut, bruises, half naked, no shoes… It’s all there. Scattered throughout the victims—only snapshots of his real MO. Some with burns, but clothed. Others with shoes, but no shirts. Others with broken bones, but gunshots instead of stab wounds. He’s been practicing a bit at a time for a decade, John. Enough to not have a full connection. The first victim I can find is nine years ago. It’s possible he’s killed at least twenty-six people. And that’s probably only half of it.”
John bristled. “You think he’s killed as many as fifty?”
“It’s possible. In fact, I think it’s likely.”
“You think the bastard has still got others? Still alive?”
Adele was still clicking through the files, nodding now. She could feel herself leaning forward, the blood rushing to her face. She could feel herself on the verge of something. But she couldn’t place exactly what. She said, “Look, here’s one, went missing six months before he was found. Back eight years ago. Another, missing a year after that. She was found two years later. Here’s another, found three weeks later. Another, found two months later. Another, half a year later.”
“So he keeps them, tortures them, and then kills them and just dumps their bodies? What’s he doing? Why is he keeping so many at the same time? It doesn’t make any sense.”
Adele leaned back in her chair, feeling the rigid wood of the cheap motel furniture against her back. She could feel the cold dread stretching across her. Twenty-six bodies. Two hundred missing. Perhaps only a fraction attributed to this killer. She didn’t know. No one knew. But he’d been operating for nearly a decade. Right under their noses, not a single person raising the alarm.
“If Amanda Johnson hadn’t escaped,” Adele said, “if she hadn’t gotten away, none of this would’ve been found. He would’ve kept going. Maybe for another decade. Another twenty-six bodies.”
John gave a low whistle. He was still watching her, but th
en his eyes flipped back to the email. He frowned, and Adele saw his finger slip, scrolling down. Then, his tone sharp, he said, “Adele.”
“What?” she responded to his tone.
John had shut his laptop hard, tossed it on the couch, and was already on his feet, moving toward the door.
“John, what?”
He looked back at her, already pulling on his second sweater. “The bottom of that medical report. The one sent thirteen hours ago that we just got?”
Adele’s eyes flicked to the closed laptop and then back to him. “Yeah?”
“Amanda Johnson is awake, she’s been for nearly half a day.”
John and Adele stared at each other across the small motel room space. Above, a jet engine rumbled in the sky, echoing some of the fury now rising in Adele’s stomach.
“Are you fucking kidding me?” she demanded, kicking out of her chair and surging to her feet.
John had an equally frustrated look, his eyebrows low over his face, his teeth set in a growl. “Hurry,” he said. “I’ll drive.”
CHAPTER TWENTY TWO
Their vehicle screeched half onto the curb in the emergency space outside the hospital. John and Adele exited, hurrying toward the front doors. A nurse, standing by the doors, drinking from a mug wafting with steam called out, “You can’t park there!”
John grabbed his keys and tossed them to the man. “Park it yourself!” he snapped.
Adele frowned, and half turned back to retrieve the keys and park the car, but then she pushed aside her frustration and moved with purposeful steps toward the hospital doors. John’s tactics might not be traditional, but they were often effective. She marched to the doors, heading for the beaming yellow light emanating out into the late afternoon. She and John hurried into the lobby, ignored the nurse at the counter, and moved to the elevator. Adele punched in the up arrow which would take them to the floor where Amanda had been the last time they visited.
As the doors closed, she glimpsed the nurse through the front window, holding John’s keys up and staring at them like they were a severed limb. And then the elevator dinged and began to rise.