by Ty Patterson
A paper plane landed on his feet. Beth and Meghan.
‘Any pearls of wisdom, hotshot?’ Beth queried.
‘There must be hundreds of thousands of blonde, professional women in the city.’
‘Yeah.’
‘So why would he pick on these four?’
They thought about it, light flashed first in Meghan’s eyes. ‘Distance? These four were within his radius of comfort?’
‘Good. You have read the profiles. Why did they disappear near their homes?’
They frowned, papers rustled as they skimmed through the sheets. Fingers snapped. Beth’s this time. ‘Those were the few times they were alone and in the open. Most of the time they were at work, or at home or in social places.’
‘Yeah, so how do you think he took them?’
More frowning, their eyes turned distant. Zeb knew their train of thought. The twins themselves had been stalked by a serial killer who had subdued them with a knife to a throat.
‘Gun? Knife?’ Meghan thought out aloud. Beth nodded.
Zeb shook his head. ‘You’re both drawing from your own experience. Your captor was counting on the bond between the two of you. He threatened one of you knowing the other wouldn’t do anything to risk the situation.’
He pointed to Mary McCallum’s profile.
‘She was a Krav Maga expert. She once chased down a mugger who threatened her with a gun. Rachel Saunders faced down a knife wielding mugger herself. She practiced judo. They both got press coverage. Our man would have known about their abilities.’
Meghan typed on her keyboard and brought the news articles up. ‘The perp would have known about them. A gun or knife holdup could go south for him.’
The sisters looked at each other and then at Zeb, a dawning light in their eyes. ‘They knew the perp?’
Zeb smiled. ‘It’s a very good possibility.’
‘But if he knew them, why grab them on the street; why not at their homes, where the risk of someone seeing them would be lower?’
Zeb crossed his arms across his chest and leaned back. The twins would work it out.
Beth snapped her fingers. ‘Maybe he knew them only casually! If he went to their home, they would be immediately suspicious.’
He gave her thumbs up and got an elaborate bow in return.
Meghan whirled back to her computer. ‘Of course! That’s why you want to dig through their credit cards.’
‘You’ve lost me, sis.’
The words tripped over Meghan’s tongue in impatience. ‘They all had very packed lives; work, home, kids, families, yadda, yadda, yadda. The only opportunity for them to interact with strangers, other people, was in social situations, such as parties, theaters, bars, and salons.’
‘Gotcha. We check out credit card details for commonalities.’
‘Wait,’ she said and stilled Meghan’s fingers on the keyboard. ‘Didn’t the cops check this angle out? I remember Chang saying there was nothing in common in their social circle.’
Two pair of green eyes swung in Zeb’s direction, he swung his feet off the table and stood up and stretched the kinks out of his body. ‘They checked for common friends, nannies, and part time help. They didn’t dig deep enough.’
The keyboard clicked as Meghan replied, ‘I’ll put Werner onto it.’
Werner was an artificial intelligence program that lay at the heart of their intelligence gathering and sifting. A couple of Stanford graduates had written the initial software using highly sophisticated algorithms and machine learning programs. Zeb and Broker had bought the rights to the software before the Department of Defense or any Pentagon contractor had a sniff at it, and Broker had improved it.
Now the DoD and the NSA frequently made offers to buy the software, approaches that Broker turned down with great relish.
Werner scanned global news reports in real time, analyzed seemingly disparate events such as weather patterns in the Pacific, oil output in the Middle East, and linked the various incidents. An additional layer of humint went into Werner, the reports from all of Broker’s agents across the globe.
Werner took these human intelligence inputs, added real time news, social and geopolitical events and created ‘weather maps’ that Broker distributed to his clients. The program was also well purposed for finding relationships between various entities and throwing up probabilities.
Zeb walked to the murder board lost in thought. Next to it was a map of the country and he idly removed the murder board and placed it on the larger map.
Of course.
‘Beth, Meghan.’
They swiveled at the urgency in his voice.
‘Check out if any other bodies were found or body parts got mailed to the cops or to the press in any other part of the country.’
They absorbed his words; Meghan was the first to respond. ‘Didn’t Chang say no one was missing?’
‘Nope. He said no other women of a similar profile were missing.’
They were quick to see the connection. They spoke almost simultaneously, quoting the letter.
‘I have become better.’
‘Yeah. I wonder if he was bettering himself on vulnerable women or people who didn’t register on the cops’ radar, in different parts of the country. Maybe that’s why he went quiet here, in New York for four years.’
Meghan turned back to Werner and programmed a search while Beth dialed Chang again.
‘He said he has no work other than to answer our calls.’
‘Funny.’ Meghan said drolly. ‘He’s compensating for Zak. Zeb, I have asked Werner to search for such instances in Europe, Canada and South America too.’
‘Good thinking. And talk to the FBI too. Interstate cases go to them.’
Smart girl. I should have thought of that.
Because of their agency clearances, Werner was able to ‘talk to’ several international policing systems and databases. But not all of them. Zeb fished out his phone and fired a text to Clare.
Need to talk to Interpol, Scotland Yard and Royal Canadian Mounted Police.
A reply came back in less than five minutes.
Why?
Zeb explained in bursts of messages and while he was waiting for a reply, turned on a news channel on a wall-mounted TV.
The usual talking heads were spouting the usual commentary, politics, sports, economics, and weather. He flicked through several channels until he came to one that had masked men in the background. He turned the volume up.
The masked men claimed to be representatives of the Hand of Fire, the latest and most violent of the terrorist groups in the Middle East.
The HOF had cut through a couple of failing nation states, occupied territory and their clever use of social media had seduced many young men and women in the Western world into joining them and fighting for them.
‘We have never faced a threat such as them. Al Qaeda? They are nothing compared to the HOF.’ Clare had addressed the National Security Advisor in a secretive meeting a few months back, which Zeb had attended. But divisions had sprung up between the Middle East terrorist groups.
An Al Qaeda killer had taken out a very senior commander of the HOF and had claimed the kill. In a very brief internet message, the killer, yet another masked man, had held a board up with the words.
HOF Commander was not a true follower. He fornicated. He drank.
He signed off saying he was The Butcher, an Al Qaeda assassin.
Al Qaeda said the killer was not one of theirs; they had no part in the assassination. The HOF didn’t believe them, and the conflict between the two groups heated. The masked men on the screen made threats against the Butcher, against Al Qaeda. They disappeared and a commentator came on making irrelevant noises.
Zeb felt a presence beside him. Beth. He felt the excitement radiating off her as she grabbed the remote from his hand and turned the TV off.
‘We might have something.’
‘All four women liked fine dining. Two of them, Mary McCallum and Rachel Sa
unders went to the same restaurants. I have asked Chang to look into the staff lists at those establishments.’
‘They looked into such connections didn’t they?’
‘They did, but Chang asked us to look again.’
Meghan wore a broad grin as she turned the screen toward Zeb. ‘But look at this.’
Zeb squinted as he read out a charge on Mary McCallum’s credit card.
‘Okay. What’s that for?’
‘Hold fire, hotshot. Now look at these three statements.’
The same charge was listed on the other women’s statements.
‘What’s all this about?’
Meghan’s eyes were shining. ‘All four of them went as VIP audience members of the most popular TV chef contest in the country.’
She rattled off a name and laughed at Zeb’s blank face.
‘Wise One, you eat to live, but food programs and TV chef contests are humongous. They have a huge viewership and the most popular ones have dedicated followers. The one that the women went to has been going for years.’
Zeb was bemused. ‘These shows have audiences? Aren’t they shot for TV?’
‘Yeah, they are, but this show also has a few episodes in every series that are shot in front of a live audience. Thousands of people sign up to be part of the audience. Very few of them are selected. Some, like our victims, pay an astronomical sum and go as VIP guests.’
Meghan read out four dates that covered two years to the year the first three victims disappeared.
‘All four of them? Together?’
‘We don’t know that yet.’ Beth replied. ‘We’ll follow up on that. We found credit card charges for all these women that tracked back to the production company.’
‘Great work.’
Meghan nodded in thanks, her eyes shining.
‘How do these live shows work?’
She brought up the show’s website. ‘This show, in its tenth series now, is a competition to identify the best chefs. The chefs take up a cooking challenge in each episode; some of them don’t make the grade and leave, and the rest progress. A series winner is judged in the final episode.’
Beth took over the narration. ‘This program moves to different cities and our women went to the one shot here, in New York, and then to three others, in Philadelphia, Boston and in Atlanta.’
Zeb massaged his chest. A killer had knifed him, tried to kill him, and while the wound hadn’t left any lasting damage, the muscle twinged occasionally.
‘It’s only the staff and producers that remain the constant in these shows, don’t they?’
If anything, Meghan’s smile grew wider. ‘I know where you’re coming from. But this show works differently. Whenever they are shot in front of an audience, the competing chefs serve the VIP guests who rate their preparation. The judges take those ratings into account when deciding on each episode’s winners and losers.’
‘But get this,’ Beth interrupted her. ‘The four episodes these women went to had seven chefs each and three of those chefs were the same.’
Zeb shook his head. ‘I don’t get it.’
Beth tossed her hair back in impatience. ‘Some of the losing chefs come back to the show again in a new series. It’s quite common to see the same participants in all these TV contests.’
‘Got it. It’s not just the production staff or organizers but also these chefs who might have struck an acquaintance with the victims.’
He turned back to the TV but paused when he felt their eyes boring into him.
‘What?’
‘We’ve saved the best for the last, Wise One.’ Beth started.
‘All three of those repeat contestants come from New York.’ Meghan completed.
Zeb whistled softly. ‘That’s a helluva coincidence. But let’s – ’
She put a hand up. ‘Yeah, yeah, no jumping to conclusions. We get it, Zeb. We’ll dig into this further.’
She started to say something, looked past his shoulder and fell silent. Beth sensed her silence, looked up and blushed furiously. Zeb turned round to see a young man, as tall as him, standing just inside the door. He frowned and then his brow cleared.
‘Mark Feinberg?’
‘Yes sir.’ Feinberg stepped forward and shook his hand.
‘What brings you here?’
‘I left Jackson P.D., sir, a few months back and moved to New York. I got a good recommendation from them and am now with the NYPD, two months along now with New York’s finest.’ His even teeth flashed in a smile.
Mark Feinberg had helped Zeb in Jackson, Wyoming, when Zeb had gone to the rescue of the twins who were being hunted by a gang.
‘Congratulations. I am sure you’ll do well here. But that’s a big move. What brought it on?’
Mark’s eyes fell away from Zeb’s gaze, he looked downward and fidgeted.
Something struck Zeb’s back and he turned. A paper ball. He looked up to see Meghan scowling furiously at him.
Way to go Zeb. How about putting the other foot too in your mouth?
Beth mumbled something, her face scarlet as she brushed past him and led Feinberg out.
Zeb looked at their departing backs and then at a furious Meghan.
‘What brought it on?’ She mimicked angrily.
‘For Christ’s sake, you couldn’t guess he moved to the city for her? You didn’t sense their attraction when we were all in Jackson?’
Zeb gave an embarrassed shrug. ‘I’m not good at reading this kind of stuff.’
Meghan’s fury drained away as quickly as it had come. Zeb had lost his wife and son several years back. He never spoke about it, never spoke about them; neither Broker nor the others ever uttered a word despite the twins’ attempts to know the story. He had never dated since that loss.
She came across and hugged him lightly.
‘I guess not, you dumbass. They kept in touch all this time and it became more serious. He applied to the NYPD on the back of that glowing recommendation and got through.’
Zeb tried to take it in. ‘Neither of you said anything.’
She chuckled. ‘You’re not the only one who can keep secrets, Zeb. Besides, she wanted to see where this went. I think she knows now.’ Her eyes had a warm, satisfied look.
‘Who else knows?’
‘Everyone, Clare, Broker, Bwana, Roger, Bear, and Chloe; all of them know. Heck, even Commissioner Rolando, Chang, and Zak know about them.’
‘Why am I the last to know?’ Zeb asked incredulously.
‘We didn’t know how you would react. We have been working so well, we didn’t know how you’d feel. Mark turned up unexpectedly today or else you would have still been in the dark.’
Zeb looked out of the picture window at Chrysler Tower that caught a few rays of sunshine and turned gold.
‘Zeb. Zeb?’
He turned to her.
‘We’re good?’
He looked at her, at the uncertainty in her green eyes and replied from deep within.
‘Yes. I am glad, really glad that her life is full again.’
He broke a rare grin.
‘Nothing’s changed, Meg. Nothing will.’
Chapter 6
October 22nd – 28th
The four men met in the desert in Iraq, in broad daylight, a scorching sun and a harsh wind the only ones in earshot.
Ten men were spread out in a loose protective cordon around the tent where they met and another thirty men formed a wider circle.
The four men were the most senior commanders of the HOF.
They took their security protocol so seriously that they rarely referred to one another by full name even when in person. They sometimes used first names, but most usually went by their order in the leadership hierarchy.
They lowered their kuffiyehs only when the other was within a ten-meter radius and that only when their most trusted lieutenants were about. The West knew who they were, but it never knew where they were or what they were doing.
The Great Satan deplo
yed drones to hunt them and satellites aimed their ears and lenses at the earth but not a word about their whereabouts leaked.
The four men didn’t use phones, computers, or laptops. They relayed instructions to their men who in turn ordered their underlings verbally. Any electronic communication was limited to junior cadres.
The tallest commander, Omar, who went by One, stood and greeted the three visitors with a silent hug. It was his tent, he was the host. Omar was the closest to the Supreme Leader and as such was the second most senior in the HOF.
There was a secondary and tertiary layer of leadership, but these four strategized and made the major decisions. Omar and the Supreme Leader had discussed a cell system similar to Al Qaeda, but had discarded it. The HOF’s initial objective was to conquer and hold territory, for which a pyramid structure was more appropriate.
Omar made a gesture which brought his lieutenant forward with a jug of water. They waited silently when the man finished serving them and disappeared.
A bowl of dates stood on a center table, cushions lay around it but the commanders ignored it. They had gathered to discuss just one agenda.
The Butcher.
‘Any news?’ One asked his guests in Arabic.
Razaq, Two, shook his head and looked at Hamdaan, Three. Three was the one responsible for security and counter-intelligence.
‘I spoke to a few Al Qaeda commanders and they all say this man is not theirs.’
Tayyib, Four, spat on the ground. ‘That’s what the whores would say, wouldn’t they?’
The three of them raged at Al Qaeda at length, as One silently looked on. He finally clapped his hands together.
‘Enough. Arguing like women will get us nowhere. We have to find him and finish him. He has killed three of our best men now. He spreads lies about them not being true believers. It is affecting our men’s morale. The West is laughing at us.’
Three frowned. ‘It’s possible he is America’s man. It would be just like them to spread division among our followers. He uses a Barrett.’
‘That’s not proof. We have those guns too. Al Qaeda has them. We need to know who he is. If he is American, we need to know. Find him. Capture him. Then give him to The Ghul.’