by Judy Candis
As she pulled herself from the squad car, her Rock look-alike was already approaching her witness.
Chapter
17
Jael approached the two men quickly. Her sight landed on Peoples, who was dressed much the same, if not exactly, as he’d been the day of the killing at the crack house, in loose-fitting jeans and a dirty flowered T-shirt. As she closed the distance between them, the sour smell emitting from his unwashed body began to hit her.
Grant had moved up on the bum so fast that Peoples wasn’t even aware of his presence until Grant was almost in his face. The derelict looked up startled, but regained his composure by brushing off the crumbs on his stained T-shirt and spreading his lips into a careless grin.
The grin faded just as fast when Grant flashed his badge and got right to the point.
“Eric Grant, FBI. What are your connections to these recent murders?”
Befuddled, Peoples stood up a little straighter. “What?” Grant now had his full attention.
“I don’t have time to fool around, Peoples. Who was this other guy you saw at the crack house?”
“I . . . well . . .” Peoples looked back and forth between her and Grant, then around him as if seeking help from some unknown source. “Uh . . . well, uh . . . just some crack-head.”
“You’ve seen him before?”
“Well, not really.” The grin was back. “He ain’t usually the kind to be seen around places like that.” Peoples giggled into his hand, but not before Jael caught a glimpse of stained teeth with food crumbs between them.
“Where’d you get that newsletter sticking out the back of your pocket?” Grant demanded.
“What newsletter? I don’t waste money on no newspapers.”
Grant reached behind the man and snatched the paper rolled-up from his back pocket. Jael caught the name, Aryan Report as Grant unrolled the small newsletter.
“Who gave you this paper?”
“I just found it somewhere, can’t remember.”
“I think you know how this paper is connected to the recent homicides. It would be to your advantage to tell me what you know.”
“Hey, mister, you got the wrong guy. So leave me alone.”
“Let me put it this way: One little point in the right direction from you and nobody knows, but if you want to continue with this line of ‘I don’t know nothing’ then we’ll have to drop a few hints around that whatever we come up with came from you.”
“You can’t do that!” If it were possible, his smell seemed to have gotten worse. His face had certainly changed, from a nonchalant expression to one of total distress.
“Who shot TeeTee and Zap Man?”
Jael was shocked. Where did that question come from?
“I ain’t talkin’ and you can’t make me!”
Grant suddenly backed off. He glanced at Jael, then back at Peoples.
“Okay. Just point me to whoever gave you the newsletter or you go downtown for aiding and abetting a murder suspect.”
“Hey! You must be crazy! You don’t know what you’re asking. Are you nuts?” He began backing up.
Grant didn’t give up an inch. “No, but you certainly are if you don’t start telling me what I want to know.”
Jael was about to interrupt when movement to her distant right drew her attention away. Turning her head toward the store entrance, she saw a slim white male with long blond hair exiting the building. His eyes were cast downward, glued to a paper similar in size to the one Grant had just taken from Peoples.
Grant must have threatened Peoples physically in some way, because the derelict suddenly yelped like a wounded puppy, and the sound caused the man at the store entrance to look up in their direction. His eyes locked with Jael’s, and she experienced a frozen moment of recognition. Immediately the man broke their gaze as he spun on his heels and took off in a speedy sprint. Jael was in instant pursuit, drawing her weapon and holding it closely in front of her with both hands.
“Halt, police!”
The man ducked to his left at the side of the building and vanished from view. Only a few yards behind, Jael quickly covered the distance to the corner. She threw herself against the rough cement wall, holding her gun before her as she peeked around the building. It was a narrow alley, with little or no light from overhead. She could barely make out the shadow dashing down the distance.
“Stop! This is the police!” Jael shouted into the alley.
Her words had no effect as the man ran the short length of the alleyway, which abruptly came to a dead end at a tall chained fence. Her runner was trapped. Easing herself around the wall in case the man had a weapon on him, Jael dropped to a crouch. “Put both hands in the air.”
Realizing he had nowhere to escape, the man slowly turned while raising his hands skyward, giving Jael a better view of his face. Full recognition hit her. He was the man she’d seen that day at the crack house standing amid the crowd of observers. What were the odds of both men having been at the crime scene and now at the same desolate area of town?
Cautiously rising from her crouched position, Jael never dropped the point of her gun from its direct aim at the man’s chest.
“Keep both hands high and don’t even breathe.” She was holding her own breath, aware she could quite possibly be looking into the eyes of a killer.
The man slowly raised his hands higher as terror redesigned his features; she felt waves of it hit her from twenty feet away. She didn’t turn when she heard a commotion behind her, and was not surprised to see Grant move past her line of vision and rush up to the man. Jael lowered her weapon only when Grant began to handcuff the man and read him his Miranda rights.
“I’m not the guy,” he softly mumbled, offering no resistance. His clean-cut look, crisply pressed striped shirt and dark pants gave him the appearance of an average Joe.
“Yeah, yeah, they all say that. So why did you run?” Grant asked.
“I swear, I’m not the one you’re looking for.”
“You can explain why not down at the station,” Jael said as she reholstered her 9mm.
“No, please believe me. If I were the one you were looking for, would I slip you a note telling you there would be more executions?”
“Executions?” Grant said.
“That’s what they are.”
Jael took a step back. “You’re the one who gave me the note at Brenda’s house?”
“What are you guys talking about?” Grant asked, pushing the man ahead of him toward the front of the alley.
“Wait a minute.” Jael stopped the movement by placing a hand at the center of the guy’s chest. She looked into a face marred with acne scars, and watery blue eyes that told her he was telling the truth. “You’re trying to help?”
He nodded. “Yes, but I can’t get involved.”
“Mister, you’re involved up to your teeth,” Grant snarled.
“Please believe me, if I’m seen talking to you guys, it’s over for me.”
Jael stepped farther back. “Then how would you suggest we handle this?”
The man thought for a moment, his eyes roaming frantically back and forth between his two captors. He gritted his teeth and with a sigh of resignation said, “Follow me to my house, but don’t let anyone see you.”
“Wait a minute . . .” Jael began.
“Especially Peoples—he’ll say anything for drug money. Let me leave, and let him see you let me go. Then follow me home.”
“You must be crazy.”
“Listen, my address is in my wallet. I don’t live far from here, just a couple of blocks away. I have no car, so it’ll be easy to keep up with me.” His voice was laced with desperation, and something else. Fear? It seemed there was a lot of that going around. What was everybody so afraid of? Who was this unknown assailant to cause such a reaction in people?
“Just follow me after you’re sure Peoples isn’t watching. At the end of this corner, pull up into the next alley. My house is the third one with a fence around
it. I’ll be waiting, and I’ll let you in the back door. Then I’ll tell you what I know and what I suspect.”
Jael looked over at Grant, not sure what to do.
“It’s your call,” he said.
“Okay, walk casually back up the alley. If one muscle looks like it’s attempting to take off, I’m shooting.” Jael withdrew her weapon once more for emphasis.
The man nodded. Grant looked at her again and then unhandcuffed the man. Jael held her breath, waiting for him to dash for it.
“Let me see your ID,” Grant demanded.
The man reached into his back pants pocket and pulled out his wallet, then handed Grant the Florida driver’s license. Grant compared the picture with the man in front of him, then handed the card to Jael. She also compared the photo with the man, then memorized the information. William David Jasper; birth date 7/21/72.
“Come quickly,” Jasper pleaded. “I’m not sure how much time we have before someone else is struck down.”
Though the statement was alarming, it held an undeniable sense of certainty.
“You can count on it,” Jael said, her own voice filled with conviction.
The man moved awkwardly toward the main street, then lifted his shoulders and moved out into the open shopping center, the sun glinting off his blond hair. Jael gave him five seconds, then she and Grant followed.
At the end of the alley, they turned in the opposite direction and headed back to the squad car. She felt stupid letting the man walk away like that but couldn’t think of anything else to do. Was she making a grave mistake?
Peoples was nowhere in sight, as she expected, but might be hiding somewhere, watching their every move. She was a ball of nerves and could barely keep from running to her car and burning rubber in pursuit of Mr. Blondie, aka William Jasper. As if reading her mind, Grant did a slight spin on his heels to make it appear as if he were walking backward in order to speak directly to her, while he in fact looked over her shoulder. “He hasn’t taken off yet. He may be on the up-and-up.”
“It’ll be my butt if he’s not.”
“I held Peoples for as long as I could, but I was worried about you. You were right—the guy can be very slippery.”
“I just hope he hung around long enough to see our boy leave on his own.”
When she reached the car, she nearly dived in to get a look in the direction William Jasper had taken. He was just turning the corner, but he could take off at any second and lose her. Though she was good, she’d never stepped into a car, sat in her seat, started the engine and pulled off all in the same motion. She did this time, and Grant almost lost a foot in the process.
Chapter
18
So what do you think?” Grant asked as she pulled away from the curb.
“I think I’m taking a foolish risk here, but I need whatever I can get. All my earlier leads are raveling away like loose threads.”
“You got a feel about this guy?”
“I’m not sure—only that he’s scared. But there seems to be a lot of that going around lately.” She kept her eyes focused on the road ahead. “When we get to his house—if he’s even there—you start the questioning. That will give me some time to look around and get a better feel of what he’s all about.”
This was a process she and Sills often used, one that offered a chance to let one of the officers scrutinize a suspect’s mannerisms and unobserved habits. Although she’d only known Grant a few hours, right now she felt comfortable enough with him to let him play the role. She could always take over if she needed to.
“What do you think happened to Peoples?” she added.
“It was a lucky break for that guy. I was just about to handcuff him when I heard you shout. I had two choices—waste precious moments handcuffing my man or come see about you.”
Jael looked over at him and flushed.
“Not standard procedure by a long shot, but I felt Peoples was much less of a danger than the guy you were pursuing. We can always pick up Peoples later.”
“Yeah. We’ll find him in one of his favorite holes. He’s not going far.”
Jael restrained the urge to ram the accelerator to the floor, and drove as slowly as possible to give the impression they were simply cruising around the area. Passing the first corner, she stayed on the trail, traveling to the end of the block. Grant didn’t question the action, but followed her gaze down the street as their man strolled along as if he were in no hurry.
Together they watched him stop at a house with a huge oak tree and a green metal awning over the front porch. A brown and black mutt of undeterminable lineage was tied to the tree. The animal rose to its feet, wagging it tail when Jasper reached down and patted him. Then the man moved on to the next house, where he waved at someone sitting on the porch. Jael was too far away to get a good view of the person.
Jasper resumed his stroll in an unhurried walk, and Jael suspected he was emotionally wired, like an escapee on the lam. If he knew they were at the corner watching him, he didn’t let on. When he reached a house with a bleached-wood privacy fence, he stopped to check his mailbox, shook his head as if disappointed, then casually walked up the front steps. Jasper fumbled in his pants pocket for a moment, obviously searching for his key. Finding it, he unlocked the door and stepped inside.
Jael did a quick U-turn, headed to the alley they’d been told to enter and drove slowly down the back toward the house.
“So far, so good. He’s playing his role like Bruce Willis,” she said.
“He must be afraid his house is being watched.”
“Or he’s pulling our leg.”
“For now you can only play it the way he suggests.” Grant took in his surroundings to make sure no one was lurking in the bushes or coming out a back door to meet them. The guy could be calling for his own kind of backup right now and his buddies might creep up on the two of them unnoticed. Grant kept his hand on the 9mm Glock at his waist, his senses alert.
When they reached the third house with a fence, Jael drove through the open gate up onto the weedy area a few yards from the back porch. Jasper was standing in the doorway looking anxiously around behind them as she and Grant climbed from the car and moved up his back steps. He waved them in hurriedly, then shut the door and locked it.
“I hope no one was watching you guys hanging around at the corner. I asked you to come straight back to the alley.”
“Just making sure you entered the same house you told us to meet you at in back,” Jael said, moving past him into the old-fashioned but relatively clean kitchen.
“Let’s go to the front so I can keep a watch out in case my old man returns.”
They followed him into a cluttered living room where the air was stuffy and stale.
Jael moved away to begin her personal observation of the house. Grant suggested Jasper have a seat on the couch and began questioning him.
“So who’s behind these murders?”
“Not the MAD DADS—though unknowingly, they played an important role. I was hoping not to have to go this far, hoping by leaving a note of warning at that Mr. Foster’s house, he’d come forward with what he knew. I guess it didn’t work.”
“I guess not, since you put the warning at Watson’s home instead. How are they playing an unknowing role?”
Jasper didn’t answer immediately. “Have you ever heard of the Aryan Knights?”
“What about them?”
Jael picked up a hint of excitement in Grant’s voice and glanced over at the two men. Grant had taken a seat in an overstuffed chair at the left of the couch and coffee table. Jasper sat on the couch, rubbing his hands across the top of his pants legs.
“There’s a branch here in Dadesville.”
“Are you a member?”
Jasper reached for a crumbled pack of cigarettes on the top of the coffee table and shook one out. “I went to a few meetings, but it was really too much for me.” Digging inside his front pants pocket for a pack of matches, his hand visibly shook
as he tried several times to strike a light. “My old man is an active member. I picked up a little about what’s going on from his phone conversations.”
“And what’s going on?”
Still listening, Jael casually moved toward an old scarred wooden desk with a pegboard on the wall directly above it. Attached to the board was a huge rebel flag, newsletters and clippings of the recent murders.
She approached the cluttered desk and picked up a flier lying on the printer tray of a fax machine. Her stomach muscles instantly clinched. It was an old grainy photo of a black male hanging from a tree. Underneath the picture were the words: THEY KNEW HOW TO DO IT IN THE GOOD OLE DAYS.
She dropped the paper as if it had burned her. Heat rushed to her ears and fingers of flame flashed in her eyes as she tossed a cold glare at Jasper. Absorbed as they were in conversation, both men missed the heated look. Controlling herself against her rising anger, Jael moved over to a homemade bookcase standing at the left side of the wall. Silently she prayed as she read the book spines. The Militias. Adolf Hitler and the Third Reich. The American Nazi Party. Mein Kampf. The Clansman.
In her many years of duty she’d come across more racism and bigotry than she could stomach, but this was the first time she’d ever been inside the home of someone who advocated pure hate.
She scanned other shelves cluttered with Nazi paraphernalia, a photo of Timothy McVeigh and more revolting messages of violence against Jews, homosexuals and blacks. There were even stacks of clippings from the bombing of the Trade Towers, which made no sense. Wouldn’t a terrorist assault be a direct attack on the very symbol of American power? Or was this group simply looking for new ideas? Another flier caught her eye, with the words “Red Dog” written on it. The name sent a funny chill down her spine.
The atmosphere around her grew heavy with a malignant rot, weighing her down with its vile worship of hate. Disgusted, Jael turned away from the wall and its abominable declarations and moved toward the men. She’d heard everything the two had said about the group’s next meeting and jumped in with her own questions, trying to hold back her contempt.