Vail pulled her BlackBerry. Using the light given off by the LCD screen, she scanned Agbayani’s throat area. Palpated the cartilage. And concluded—to be confirmed later under more optimal conditions—that the detective was the latest victim of John Mayfield, of the Crush Killer.
His left wrist had been sliced, the blood moist around the wound. He was killed moments ago—which meant Mayfield was likely still nearby.
Agbayani’s boots were on his feet—but at this point, it didn’t matter. Mayfield didn’t need to leave his calling card. They would know who was responsible.
As she glanced back up—she’d taken her eyes off the room too long—a text came through. Brix:covered east upper level and turrets. zip.
Then Dixon:courtyard and surrounding rooms, banquet room clear. on second floor. no way of knowing if he’s still here
Vail replied to all:still here big room. found a db. still warm.
She sent it without saying it was Agbayani—the revelation would no doubt upset Dixon—but then realized she had no choice. They needed to know one of their boots on the ground was now, literally, on the ground.
She took a deep breath, looked over at Agbayani, and typed a new message:sorry, rox. vic is eddie
Tears filled her eyes. She knew Dixon would take it hard. And though she didn’t know him well, he seemed to be a good guy.
If Vail were to follow standard crime scene procedure, as was her duty, she needed to secure the area and remain with the body. But that was a low priority. Her greater duty was to find the killer. Besides, they knew who did the murder. And Agbayani was dead. No sense in remaining. No one was going to walk up to a dead body.
Vail rose and moved back into the larger room. That’s where she stood while she figured out what to do, where to go.
That’s where she stood when the lights went out.
FIFTY-SEVEN
Dixon was on the second level, her neck aching and swollen from Mayfield’s attack in the steam room.
The adrenaline had masked the pain, but now, as time passed and the inflammation increased, she could no longer shrug it off. Her throat was narrowed and she was having difficulty swallowing and breathing.
And her neck’s range of motion was diminished. She had to twist her torso—which was also sore—because the cervical muscles were bruised and in spasm.
Dixon left the room she had just cleared and moved back into the corridor when her phone vibrated. She pulled it from her belt. A text from Vail:in some kind of large room filled with oak barrels. past gift shop. somewhere in tunnels. no sign of mayfld. ur 20?
Dixon shifted her weapon to her left hand and texted back.
courtyard and surrounding rooms, banquet room clear. on second floor. no way of knowing if he’s still here
Flipped the phone closed, proceeded carefully. One run-in with John Mayfield was enough. She felt fortunate to have escaped; trying to pull off a second miracle in the same night might be asking too much of her Creator. Another buzz. Pulled her cell, flipped it open. Text from Vail: still here big room. found a db. still warm.
Goddamn it. She took a deep breath. They had to find this monster. Fast. Phone in hand, Dixon steadied her weapon with both hands and moved forward a few feet, toward a doorway that led to a balcony overlooking the square below. Black iron lights hung at various intervals from the brick walls, under alcoves and from rusted brackets, throwing romantic—but minimal—light on the courtyard.
Her phone buzzed again. She twisted her right wrist and read the display.
sorry, rox. vic is eddie
Dixon stood there staring at the message. What? How can that be? Read it again: vic is Eddie. Eddie?
She started walking, unsure where she was headed, moving toward a staircase that would take her down. Dixon wasn’t paying attention to where she was going or what was in front of her. She kept moving, through corridors, across the square, down a staircase. Someone bumped her. Brix. She looked at him.
“Roxxi, I’m so sorry—”
She blinked away tears. Looked off ahead of her. “Where. Where is he?”
Brix took her by the arm and led her around the gift shop, through tunnels and small rooms lined with barrels and wine bottles. He pulled his Maglite and turned it on, twisted the beam to a wide spread.
Eddie. Dead?
I’ll kill that bastard. I’ll break every bone in his body—
“Roxxi, calm down,” Brix said in a low voice. “Relax.”
He must’ve felt me tensing. “I’m gonna kill him, Redd—”
“Shh,” he said, placing a hand over her mouth. “Hold that thought,” he whispered. “Let’s catch him first.”
They were moving down a long, narrow corridor when suddenly the lights went out. They both stopped. Brought their handguns up, adrenaline flooding their system.
Ready for a fight.
FIFTY-EIGHT
Vail backed up against the nearest wall and crouched down low, into as small a target as possible. Unless
Mayfield had night vision goggles, she would be nearly impossible for him to find. But she could not rule out him having NVGs—because, thus far, he seemed to be prepared. And because his ending up at the castle might’ve been by design.
But it couldn’t be. He did not have NVGs. He was as much in the dark as she was.
Then why would he cut the lights?
Unless he knew where I was when he took them out. Move—I have to move. Vail clambered to her left, attempting to be quiet, but the scrape of her shoes against the cement flooring, the fine gravel and detritus from the people who’d walked through here today made stealth difficult. But that worked both ways.
She continued left, bumped into a wall—brought up her right hand and felt around—barrels. Took a step forward to move around them—and stopped. Someone was coming. Noise in the distance.
Vail rose, backed up behind the barrels and brought her Glock in close to her body, holding it low, so it couldn’t be easily knocked from her hands.
Waited. Footsteps.
BRIX HELD HIS SIG-SAUER out in front of him, the Maglite alongside the barrel, illuminating the area in front of him. In such narrow quarters, Dixon had to follow single file behind him. She was a good five feet back, giving adequate spacing.
Up ahead, she saw the mouth to another, larger room. Brix stopped. Dixon stopped.
VAIL LISTENED. Moved forward slightly, peeked around the edge of the barrel. Saw the flicker of a light. Then it went out.
Her heartbeat accelerated. She felt it pounding, an aching in her head, a pulsing in her ears. She backed up a step away from the edge and listened.
“WHAT?” DIXON WHISPERED.
Brix shut his light. “A room up ahead.”
“Could be the one Karen’s in.”
“If so, Mayfield could be in there, too.”
“Split up?”
Brix nodded, leaned in close to her ear. “I’ll take the light. If he goes after someone, it’ll be me because he’ll know where I am.”
Dixon gave a thumbs up. Brix lit up his Maglite and pressed forward. The room ahead appeared to be large, with curvilinear brick ceilings, like multiple gazebos launching from thick square columns.
As Brix disappeared into the room, Dixon started ahead herself, wanting to shout into the dark, “Karen, you in here?” But she knew that was the absolute wrong thing to do. She didn’t even dare open her phone in the darkness, as that would surely give away her position.
But just as she’d gone about fifteen paces into the large room, she saw Brix’s flashlight go flying from his hand. He let out a sickening thump and, in the twirling and carnival-like swirl of his light as it spun on the ground, he appeared to drop to the floor with an even louder thud.
Dixon started to rush forward, then stopped. Mayfield was here. She had to get to him before he killed Brix—if he hadn’t already. She had to risk it. “Karen!”
VAIL SAW THE LIGHT advancing into the room, footsteps approaching. She backed up furthe
r, Glock out in front of her, taking an angle on the imminent arrival of her guest. The light was moving, bouncing the way it would with someone’s gait. Or if it were held out in front of you against your gun.
But she didn’t dare call out.
A noise—skin on bone—and the light went flying to the ground. A bump. Something hit the cement. A body?
“Karen!”
Vail looked out into the near darkness. Dixon. “Over here!”
And then she saw something dark spring toward her, a mass like a football player plowing into her, a crushing blow that knocked her back into a wall of barrels. Her air left her lungs.
And the Glock flew from her hands.
FIFTY-NINE
In the distant light that was off somewhere in the background, Vail saw John Mayfield in silhouette, his massive hand over her mouth. He had her shoved against the barrels. And she knew what was coming.
Vail swung, struck his meaty shoulder, then
kicked him in his groin—hit something hard,
kneed him again, and
again,
writhing her head from side to side, trying to open her mouth to bite—
reached up and grabbed for his face, got hold of his nose but
he yanked his head back and
she threw her left hand up in time to block a massive thrust into her
neck.
It struck her hand and forced it against her throat and she coughed.
Spasmodic. Coughing—
And then she heard a nauseatingly sick bone-breaking crunch.
“OVER HERE!”
Dixon tried to locate Vail’s voice—but in the chamber, with its uneven and gazebo-rounded ceilings, she couldn’t triangulate on her position. She moved quickly into the large room, using whatever light was being given off by the fallen Maglite, hoping she wouldn’t run into Mayfield. Because right now, she was sure he was here. That’s what had taken down Brix.
She saw barrels to her left and moved toward them, her right hand aiming her SIG and her left feeling the metal rims surrounding the flat oak faces, forward, forward, a few feet at a time.
And then scuffling, struggling, muted yells—off to her right. Karen!
Dixon ran in the direction of the noise. Around the bend, she saw, in the relative darkness, John Mayfield, legs spread, straddling something. She couldn’t see Vail, but Mayfield was easily twice her width.
Given Mayfield’s well-documented MO—which she’d experienced firsthand—she didn’t have to see Vail to know where she was, or what Mayfield was doing to her.
There wasn’t a good angle to take him out with a clean shot—especially in the poor lighting, she couldn’t be sure what she would hit. And a man like this wouldn’t respond to her plea for him to put his hands above his head. Based on what Vail had told her about narcissists, “surrender” is not in their ego-driven vocabulary.
So with Agbayani’s demise in the forefront of her thoughts, Dixon went for the more personal approach. She came up beside him, lifted her right leg, and brought her foot down, with all the force she could muster, against the side of Mayfield’s locked left knee, driving it to the right.
He recoiled in pain, the bone-crushing blow tearing ligament, cartilage—and probably fracturing his tibia and fibula.
As Mayfield’s knee buckled, he yelled out in pain, crumpled backwards. Dixon grabbed his thick wrist and brought her right forearm across her body and forward, through Mayfield’s elbow joint. It hyper-extended and snapped. She yanked down on his fractured arm, then backhanded him across the face with her SIG-fisted hand.
Mayfield, dazed by the blow, stumbled awkwardly on his broken leg, then collapsed and hit the ground hard.
Dixon stepped forward and brought her leg back like a place kicker and planted it in his jaw. It was a cheap shot, she knew, because the man was already unconscious.
Then she brought up her SIG and aimed.
SIXTY
After hearing the first crunch, Vail felt Mayfield release his grip on her mouth. She saw and heard movement—and Mayfield was suddenly yanked to the side, followed by another bone-snapping sound. A blow to the face. And then he was stumbling backward.
Standing there was Dixon. She stepped forward and kicked him. Just to make sure the Crush Killer would not be doing any more damage.
Vail rushed over to the fallen flashlight and picked it up. And that’s when she saw Dixon aiming her pistol at Mayfield’s head.
“Roxxann!”
Dixon, her blonde hair matted and mussed and half-covering her face, brushed it aside. Her chest was heaving, her left hand still balled into a fist.
Vail stepped forward. “It’s okay, Roxx. It’s okay.” She brought Dixon against her body, gave her a hug and a reassuring squeeze, and felt her tense body relax.
But Dixon suddenly pushed back. “Brix—” She scrambled to her left. “Light!”
Vail swung the Maglite around and, twenty-five feet away, found Brix on the floor, facedown and alongside a stack of barrels. Vail knelt down and pressed her fingers against his neck. “Strong pulse. Call it in.”
As Dixon opened her phone, Vail reached for her handcuffs. But they weren’t there. Of all the things she’d replaced, she had forgotten to get a new set. She went back to Brix, felt around his belt and found his cuffs, then brought them over to the unconscious Mayfield and clamped them down, extra tight. When he awoke, there was no way he was getting out of those. Especially with a fractured arm.
Vail pulled her BlackBerry and checked for messages from Robby. Nothing. “Call Ray and the others,” she said to Dixon. “Let ’em know we have the suspect in custody and he needs transport to county.” She looked over at Mayfield, who was stirring, regaining consciousness. “He’ll need medical attention on arrival.”
AS DIXON POCKETED HER CELL, Brix slowly sat up. Dixon extended her arm, locked hands with Brix, and pulled him up. He swayed a bit, then steadied himself against the barrels and looked over at Mayfield. “Bastard clocked me from behind.”
“You okay?” Dixon asked.
He stretched his neck and rolled his shoulders back. “I’m fine.”
“You missed all the fun,” Vail said. She brought a hand to her throat and rubbed it.
“Where’s Eddie?” Dixon asked.
Vail locked eyes with Brix. He frowned, then said, “Take her. I’ll stay and keep watch over the douche bag.”
Vail led Dixon to the next room, created by walls of barrels, and stood there while Dixon approached the body. She knelt down, her back to Vail, started to place a hand on his chest—and stopped. No doubt, her “cop instincts” trumped her emotions and she knew not to contaminate the crime scene. But did it really matter?
“It’s okay, Roxx,” Vail said. “You can touch him. Pay your respects.”
She reached out again, placed the back of her hand against his cheek, then his forehead. Gently closed his eyes. Said something to him, and her back heaved in sorrow.
Vail remained where she was, giving her friend some space.
A moment later, Dixon stood up and, wiping away tears, squared her shoulders, brought up a hand and moved her hair off her face.
“Let’s go,” she said, walking past Vail.
SIXTY-ONE
Brix called one of the officers who was watching the castle’s periphery and had him secure Eddie Agbayani’s crime scene. The paramedics, clad in light gray tops, darker pants and ball caps, transported Mayfield, under heavy guard, to the Napa Valley Medical Center ER, not far from the Napa Police Department. Brix refused treatment, saying he was “Just fine now, thank you very much.”
Vail chucked it off to male ego, embarrassment to having been taken out, but then she realized she’d probably behave the same way. She chided herself for looking for male-female gender issues in every situation. It was something she would have to work on, because she knew, invariably, it would sneak into her thoughts, despite her best efforts to keep those attitudes in check.
On the
way to the hospital, Dixon and Vail stopped at the Heartland bed-and-breakfast in Yountville. Robby was not there. Nor was his car. In fact, he had not been there the entire day—other than the maid service straightening the bed and cleaning the bathroom, the room was as she had left it when she locked up this morning.
“I take it it’s not like Robby to ignore your calls,” Dixon said.
Vail stood at the foot of the bed, hands on her hips. “No, it’s not.” She turned and faced the new suitcases Robby had purchased at the outlets a couple of days ago. Flipped his open, moved aside his dirty underwear and socks. Hit something hard and flat. Dug it out and held it up.
Dixon joined Vail at her side. “His cell phone?”
Vail did not reply. She flicked it open. It was powered off. She turned it on, waiting for it to boot and then find service. When it had finished, she scrolled to the incoming log. All the messages she had left him stared back at her.
She turned to Dixon. “The only messages in his log are from me. No one else called him?”
“Did he get other calls while you were with him—at any time during your trip?”
Vail thought. “No.” She thumbed the mouse button. “But at some point he would’ve received a call, and there’s nothing. Nothing here before today.”
“Maybe he deletes his logs regularly. I have a friend who does that. What about outgoing calls?”
Vail played her thumb across the buttons again. “Nothing there either. That’s not right.” She held up the phone. “There’s nothing.”
“Either he regularly deletes his logs, or—”
“Or someone deleted them for him.” Vail stood there staring at the phone, as if doing so would magically restore the log entries. “I can send the phone to the Bureau lab, see if they can grab data off the chip. There’s gotta be a computer chip inside, right?”
Crush Page 37