“How did you get here?”
“I borrowed Todd’s car.” She stood up from her chair. “Thanks for talking with me.”
“I wish I could be of more help.”
“Oh no, you helped me out a lot. I feel better already.”
Jennifer looked at the girl. She felt jangled and restless, full of unresolved feelings. But one thing was clear: Susan Locke was a good kid and a kindred spirit. Life, with all its random twists and turns, with all its unforeseen zeniths and nadirs, had dealt them both the same unenviable hand. And right now, Jennifer found herself wanting, more than anything else, to help Susan through her crisis.
She reached out and touched Susan’s hand again. “I’m here for you, anytime,” she said softly.
CHAPTER 61
JUST BEFORE NOON, Patton got a call from Taylor requesting his presence in the bullpen. He grabbed his iPad, scurried down the hallway, and stepped into the crowded room, which overnight had turned into a frenzied command-and-control center. Added to the existing high-tech gadgetry were five 36-inch color monitors, a stack of supercomputer towers, and an array of sophisticated equipment for video enhancement and color printing. A technician sat in front of each screen and there was a new face talking to Taylor. Patton realized, belatedly, that he must be the specialist from the CIA Directorate for Science and Technology, Office of Technical Service, Sharp had requested. All of the new equipment must have arrived with him last night from Langley.
Taylor gave a professional smile as Patton came up. “This is Charlie Fial from OTS.”
Patton shook the man’s hand. “Welcome to the Wild Wild West. Bet you’re glad to get a break from the backstabbing bureaucracy of Langley and get a little taste of ours, huh?”
The pale young techie nodded bashfully and pushed up his half-frame glasses. He looked like he had spent every day of the last ten years gazing at a video monitor, and every night solving partial differential equations in his sleep. Which meant he was perfect for the job at hand.
“With Charlie’s help we’ve identified John Doe at three different campaign rallies,” Taylor said, sweeping his hand across the color monitors in front of them. He pointed to the screen in front of Weiss, the one furthest to the right. “This footage is from last Friday—Kieger’s speech in Sacramento. You can see John Doe five rows back from the stage.”
The senior Secret Service agent then handed off to Fial, who pointed out the differences in John Doe’s physical appearance compared to the Union Plaza Building footage shown on the far left monitor. The guy had the same sharp jawline, mustache, and dark sunglasses as before, but this time he was dressed like a businessman. He wore a light-blue button-down shirt, a conservative red-and-blue-striped tie, and a ROLLINS FOR PRESIDENT cap, pulled down low over his forehead just like the UPS cap at Union Plaza. The ponytail was gone, or at least hidden from view, and the mustache and hair were darker in color. His face was also more closely shaven, but it was still the same guy.
“Where’d you get this?” Patton asked Taylor.
“Media pool.” He pointed to the next screen, to the left. “Okay, here we’ve got him at the Oakland rally the day before. This is one of ours, from a security camera to stage left. A little different disguise, but still our man.”
Again Fial stepped up and pointed out the differences in the man’s disguises, his physical presence, the way he interacted with those around him. This time John Doe had a blue-collar look and stood further from the podium, perhaps ten rows back. A factory worker’s uniform encased his slender but strong frame, and his face was smudged with oil or dirt. He had black hair this time, and Patton could see a forest of chest hair in the V in the man’s uniform. The same ROLLINS FOR PRESIDENT cap was pulled low over his brow, and he peered out impassively from behind his impenetrable sunglasses. As in the Sacramento footage, his air of focused concentration and lack of emotion separated him from the rest of the crowd.
They went through the remaining two tapes from a rally in Bakersfield. When they were finished, Taylor said, “We haven’t found him yet in the footage from San Diego, San Bernadino, or any of the other venues. But hopefully we’ll track him down. We could even get a better shot of him. We’ve been getting a good response over the Net.”
Fial picked up a copy of the wanted poster from the table and began looking it over.
“Every law enforcement agency in the country has that by now,” Patton said to him. “Plus we’ve issued an alert to Interpol and our friendlies overseas.”
Without responding, Fial continued to look over the grainy photograph and artist’s sketch on the poster, comparing them to the images frozen on the screens. Studying his expression, Patton sensed there was a problem.
“Something wrong?” he asked.
“I’m not sure.”
Everyone looked at him with puzzlement.
“What is it?” Patton persisted.
“Okay, let me see if I can explain this. What we see, in each frame, is a person who looks like a man, right?” Fial pointed to the five images on the screen, from right to left. “We’ve got a mustache, chest hair, two day beard growth, et cetera. We’ve got male clothing—the business suit and worker’s uniform. And finally, we’ve got the male physical presence, the posture, the gestures, the way he moves. Did you see in the Bakersfield tape where he scratched his crotch? Or the Union Plaza tape when he rubbed his hand across his beard? Now the images are somewhat grainy, but in every case the picture we see says, Man! Except there’s a problem with this picture.”
“I’m not sure I follow,” Patton said, brows knitting together.
“There’s too many woman-like discrepancies. The smooth shape of the nose, the curved hips, the slender wrists, the soft lips and jaw line. Now these features are, for the most part, swamped out by the masculine features, but they’re not completely lost. There’s something feminine there. You can see it in some of the body movements and gestures too.”
“Wait a second. Are you saying John Doe’s a goddamned woman?”
“I’m not sure. Could be a transsexual. All I can say is something’s not right. I’ve observed thousands of criminals, male and female, from surveillance tapes over the years. So I know what I’m talking about. Something about this character doesn’t gel.”
“Am I supposed to go to my boss and tell him the assassin’s some kind of cross-dresser or cold-blooded La Femme Nikita? He’ll demote me to GS-5 on the spot.”
Fial laughed nervously. “I was hoping we could keep this between ourselves until I’ve had a chance to test my theory further. You know, go over the tapes in detail, try and find this guy at other rallies. Maybe somewhere along the line he—or quite possibly she—slipped up.”
Patton’s head swam with vexation. Is this asshole wasting my time or does he know what the fuck he’s talking about? “Can’t you give us something more concrete?”
Fial scratched his chin thoughtfully. “I can tell you one thing.”
“What’s that?”
“Things are not what they seem.”
CHAPTER 62
LOOKING FOR ANSWERS, Patton went down to the seventeenth floor to see Dr. Hamilton. The door was open, so he walked right in. “Howdy, Doc. I’m baaack!”
The freckle-faced criminal profiler was putting away a book in the shelf and he nearly jumped out of his skin at the sound of Ken’s voice. “Jesus, you scared the shit out of me!”
“Sorry, Doc, but I need to know about female assassins.”
“I don’t recall mentioning that particular breed of criminal in my profile.”
“I realize that. But Charlie Fial—”
“Who the hell is Charlie Fial?”
“He’s the audiovisual nerd from Langley. He thinks John Doe could be a woman disguised as a man. He’s looking into it further, but in the meantime I’d like to hear what you think.”
“Sounds interesting, but I think he’s got a fanciful imagination. I saw the video.”
“Just suppose for a momen
t we are dealing with a woman. In your expert opinion what kind of background would she have?”
“Women generally become assassins or terrorists for two reasons: one, the equality of opportunity available; and two, because they’re convinced violence can bring a better life to their oppressed people. Unlike the men in the male-dominated American terrorist groups you’re used to dealing with, women rarely do it in the name of religion, to destroy the opposition, or for the sheer thrill of violence. They are driven by deeper passions and a desire for the egalitarian. Men are driven by this too, but not as intensely as women.”
Patton turned on his iPad. “So it would be unlikely for a woman to be a freelancer. She would be attached to some sort of group.”
“The female terrorist is motivated by a desire to help people in need or to change societal and governmental policies. It would be difficult to accomplish such lofty goals on her own, so she would probably be part of a larger terrorist cell.”
“Like the Green Freedom Brigade?”
“You’re the one knowledgeable in terrorist cell dynamics. You tell me.”
“Its members have limited paramilitary experience—basic infiltration tactics and explosives. They don’t kill people, at least not intentionally. And their motive’s questionable. I just don’t see them taking out Kieger because of his lackluster environmental record in California.”
“What about a right-wing group?”
“We’re looking into a dozen of them, including fairly innocuous Christian organizations like American Patriots and Families First. But we haven’t turned up anything definite yet linking any of these groups to the assassination. All the evidence we have is circumstantial.”
“You’ll get a breakthrough soon. But let’s return, for the moment, to our female assassin or terrorist. The interesting thing is she usually performs a dual role. On one hand, she sees herself as a soldier for her cause. On the other, she fulfills the role as nurturer to the other group members, who are like extended family to her.”
“That’s what I’ve seen in some of the militias,” Patton said, typing on his iPad. “But the men still dominate and the women are invariably in secondary roles.”
“In America, that may be true, but not in other parts of the world, especially Europe and the Middle East. For years now, criminologists have been pushing the ridiculous notion that female terrorists are followers, not leaders. These women have supposedly fallen into bad ways because of misguided loyalty to their lovers, who are attached to terrorist cells. But this is hogwash. Today, around seventy percent of the leaders in the German, French, Spanish, and Italian cells are women. So we know women are capable of both killing and giving orders to do so without any qualms. But they must feel as though they are fighting for a noble cause. They need to see themselves as freedom fighters.”
“So the problem you have with a woman in the Kieger case is that you envision the assassin as a loner, a professional sniper whose sole motivation is money?”
“I think the physical evidence supports my contention. But there’s another reason: statistical probability.”
“I’m not sure I follow.”
“Let me explain. Suppose this Charlie Fial fellow is correct, and we are dealing with a woman. How does that gibe with the fact that the world’s leading snipers, the known ones at least, are men? I did some checking with a friend of mine at Interpol after we talked last. There is not a single woman among them, and most are either ex-military or ex-intelligence, male-dominated fields.”
“So that’s where it becomes a question of statistical probability?”
“There are plenty of female terrorists, but no known long-distance snipers. It’s like astrophysics. Where are the women? For the most part, they’re simply not there. They’re doing other things.”
Patton was typing furiously. The good doctor gave him a moment to catch up before continuing.
“When I consider the three most distinctive aspects of the case—the sophisticated penetration, the military-style weaponry, and the world-class marksmanship—I call to mind a specific type of criminal. An ex-military, alpha-male loner who considers what he does an exciting job with great benefits. A soldier of fortune who can rationalize away his guilt rather easily. A woman would never be satisfied with such a mundane existence. She would need a passionate reason to kill.”
“But you still believe this lone assassin is backed by a group,” Patton said.
“A very well-financed and well-connected group.”
Patton stopped typing, closed his iPad, and rose to his feet. “Thanks, Doc. I’ll keep my mind open on this one.”
“That’s why they put you in charge of the case, you know,” Hamilton said, like a teacher to a star pupil. “Because of your open mind. Quite different than most of the agents around here.”
“Thanks, Doc. I just hope I can live up to everybody’s expectations—including my own.”
CHAPTER 63
WHEN SKYLER RETURNED to her apartment, she found Anthony waiting outside. He wore casual shorts, a polo shirt, and Birkenstocks and greeted her with a soft kiss. They stepped inside and sipped some wine, a robust Chianti Anthony had brought with him. Then they went out.
They strolled happily through the streets of Venice Beach. The city’s crown and glory had once been its Venetian-style canals, with wonderful vaulted arches and rococo-style hotels. Such was the vision of tobacco magnate Abbot Kinney, whose goal was to bring the romance and refinement of Venice, Italy, to sunny Southern California shores by dredging the wetlands along Santa Monica Bay and creating a vast network of interconnected waterways. In 1905, his dream was complete, but within a generation the canals became dirty and oily. The renaissance town began to change in other ways too, no longer attracting society’s upper crust, rather gamblers, prostitutes, bootleggers, and other assorted rogues. By the time local hero Jim Morrison and the Doors were ripping out Break On Through in the mid-sixties, Kinney’s once grand vision was long forgotten. Most of the canals were completely filled in and buried, and those that weren’t were nothing more than cryptic vestiges of their former glory.
After walking past a few abandoned canals on their right, Skyler and Anthony headed in the direction of the beach. Funky wooden houses sprouted up next to them as they made their way through the narrow, Venetian-style streets and alleyways. At one point, they slipped into an art gallery to browse. While Anthony looked over the modern art, Skyler examined prints of famous paintings by Fra Angelico, Botticelli, Ghirlandajo, and Raphael of winged angels and sweet-faced Madonnas. Her favorite art would always be that of her native Italy, and her favorite artists would always be the Renaissance Old Masters.
From the gallery, they headed to the pavilion on Windward Avenue. The street circus artists were out in full force and she and Anthony took a moment to watch a talented juggler on a unicycle. With ridiculous ease, he tossed five burning torches in the air and peddled about with a young girl from the audience on his shoulders. Skyler confessed to Anthony that, as a little girl, she had wanted to run off and join the circus as her favorite film director, Federico Fellini, had done as a child. Life in a circus had always seemed so full of risk and freedom to her.
They walked on unhurriedly, browsing through several shops along the way. There was a Mediterranean feel, with the sidewalk cafés and small shops lining the avenues. This was one of the things that had attracted Skyler to the region originally. It was like a home away from home. Occasionally, they held hands as they took in the ocean views in the distance, the warm breeze blowing on their faces. There wasn’t much need for conversation, but when they talked, it was about art and films, mostly.
After the pavilion, they walked to the beach. The late afternoon sunlight sparkled off the water. Foamy white rollers slammed into the sand. Squadrons of seagulls soared overhead. In the distance, sailboats slid across the ocean, airbrushed with sporadic splashes of white.
They walked the beach for more than an hour then took a late lunch in a cozy resta
urant a short distance from the pavilion. A full bottle of Chianti rounded out the meal of California-style thin crust pizza nicely. Then they were off to the beach again, walking and talking. To Skyler’s relief, Anthony didn’t ask her any questions about the CIA or her past, nor did he broach the subject of the assassination. They talked about light and pleasant subjects.
While she wasn’t sure if she loved him, she did know that she had never felt this way before. It made her feel a sense of loss for all the years she had missed out on emotions like these. She had known almost no intimacy in her adult life. She loved her parents and siblings, but she rarely saw them. When she was young, there was Alberto, but that was so long ago it was nothing more than a distant memory of tainted intimacy. He had only wanted a beautiful young lover in his bed and a loyal freedom fighter at his side. When she had posed the slightest risk, he had ordered her execution.
But this—whatever was going on between her and Anthony—meant something. This was different. She felt a throbbing pulse of excitement whenever she was with him and her confidence, her sense of self-worth, ran high. Her heart brimmed over with emotions—deep emotions, connected emotions, visceral emotions she hadn’t felt in eons. She could almost slap herself, she felt so lucky, and she hoped it would never end.
That was what she wanted most of all: to feel like she did now forever.
CHAPTER 64
“SO WHAT HAPPENED TODAY?”
She and Ken were sitting in a booth at the Castle Café, beneath a huge painting of an 1870’s wrangler knocking back a bottle of Taos Lightning, while the trusty stead beneath him gulped greedily from a clear mountain creek.
“I’ll tell you what happened,” Patton growled, his irascible tone taking Jennifer by surprise. “Nothing good—not a single damned thing.”
“Did you interrogate Locke?”
“No, my boss wouldn’t let me. He said there wasn’t enough evidence.”
The Coalition: A Novel of Suspense Page 23