by Dan Ames
Three women missing. All tied to Reacher.
Idly, Pauling wondered if there would be a fourth.
And if that fourth would be her.
30
You decide it’s time.
Not quite the final phase, but you’re turning the corner and can at least see the home stretch and the finish line beyond. But you don’t look at it.
That would mean taking your eye off the prize.
Besides, there’s nothing to see up there anyway. You have the final piece of the puzzle safely stashed aside, just waiting for the coup de grace.
No need to obsess over that any more than you already have. In fact, you’ve spent years thinking of nothing else. The biggest mistake you could make at this point in time would be to spend even more time preoccupied with it, and make a misstep in the lead-up.
No. That’s not your style.
The site you’ve chosen for the next step, for example. Lots and lots of thought and planning went into that one. It had to be a place where you can get the things done you need to do with a certain degree of privacy. No casual passersby. No hidden witness somewhere. No hidden doors that will suddenly open and a group of people will pour out.
At the same time, it had to be a location where the items you leave behind will be found in a reasonable amount of time.
Say twenty-four hours.
There were quite a few options. Places of business closed for the evening. Empty homes for sale the night before an open house. A suburban park at three in the morning.
They were all fine options for what you have in mind. But they all lack one crucial element.
Symbolism.
There is more to your actions than the simple execution of said plans. Like anything in life, context is essential.
With what you are doing, even more so.
Therefore, your decision is bold, strategic and innovative. But you make no bones about its drawback: risk.
After weeks of back-and-forth weighing pros and cons, you ultimately decide the risk was the reward.
So now, you pull the vehicle and trailer, with its highly prized contents, into the chosen building’s parking garage. It’s late. You’ve studied the traffic patterns. The layouts. The cameras.
Yes, there are cameras.
But only one in the spot you’ve chosen. The others are trained on more important access points that the architects decided were pockets of vulnerability.
No, the only one near you is the camera by the elevator.
Which leaves plenty of blind spots.
One big one just past the entrance before the concrete maze indicates where to turn.
It’s there you park your vehicle.
From the glove box, you retrieve a gun and a knife.
The gun is a Glock, a .40 S&W, standard issue for FBI agents. The knife is nothing special, but incredibly sharp.
There are a couple of other items, very special, that you retrieve as well. They are just as important as the gun and knife.
You walk to the back of the trailer, unlock the lift, and roll the door up.
Three sets of eyes look back at you.
None of them are scared. They are bound. The trailer is well-ventilated.
You smile at them before speaking.
“Which one of you wants to be first?”
31
Pauling wrenched her eyes away from her laptop screen. She’d been staring at it for the better part of three hours.
After the failure to learn anything new in Hope, she and Tallon had driven to a hotel near the airport for the flight back to New York. The earliest flight had been five hours away so Pauling used the hotel’s Wi-Fi and downloaded everything she could find on the Julia Lamarr case.
They had been hungry, so they ordered sandwiches and coffee, ate hurriedly, and Tallon had gone off on his own, leaving Pauling alone to do her research.
The Julia Lamarr case was interesting. Of the three missing women, it was the only case that had a direct tie to the FBI. One of their own, a profiler, had been the guilty party. The fact that Lisa Harper, who had been involved in the case, was the first one taken may or may not have had any bearing on Pauling’s intuition. But the more she thought about it, the more she was drawn to the Lamarr angle.
Even though she had read about the case in the news – it had been front-page news for several days, the gruesome details had softened over time. The whole thing was still unbelievable to Pauling.
Julia Lamarr had been an FBI profiler at Quantico. Amy Callan, a woman who had been in the Army and had suffered sexual harassment while serving, had been found dead. She’d been discovered in a bathtub full of green paint, the kind the Army uses to the tune of millions of gallons per year.
No obvious sign of death.
And then another woman, Caroline Cook, had been found under the same circumstances. That woman, too, had been involved in a sexual harassment case while being in the Army.
At that point, the FBI team investigating the murders had somehow gotten Reacher to work with them. Pauling thought he’d mentioned something about a gangster he’d interfered with and the Feds had used it against him, essentially blackmailing him into working for them.
He’d studied the pattern and only realized too late who the killer had been.
Julia Lamarr. A member of the very Quantico team who’d been investigating the murders and that had brought in Reacher.
The final would-be victim had been Lamarr’s very own sister, who’d also endured sexual harassment. But, she had a huge life insurance policy and Lamarr had killed her for it. She’d simply used the sexual harassment as a ruse to cover up the real motive: killing her sister for the cash.
But it was the extent to which Lamarr had tried to throw off the investigators that Pauling realized had drawn her to the case.
The green paint.
The sexual harassment angle.
Even the timing of the initial murders; three weeks apart to imply some sort of military schedule.
The mysterious causes of death had been fascinating, too. Initially, no one had any clue as to how the women actually died. No ligature marks. No wounds. Just dead in the bathtub covered in paint.
Lamarr had been an expert at hypnosis.
She’d hypnotized the women and had them fill up their own tubs with green paint and then Lamarr had talked them through swallowing their own tongues and choking to death.
After they were dead, Lamarr would pull their tongue back out.
A mystery.
Until Reacher figured it out.
He’d clobbered Lamarr at the last crime scene and broke her neck. In fact, she’d been pronounced dead at the scene, but paramedics had detected the faintest of heartbeats and they’d managed to save her life, even though her spine in the neck area would never be the same.
“You look intense,” Michael Tallon said as he slid into the booth across from her. He’d gotten them each a cup of espresso from somewhere.
“I’m reading up on the Julia Lamarr case.”
She filled Tallon in on the whole story, including all of the nitty gritty details.
“Those military psychologists are freaky,” he said. “They know how to turn people into killers. Sometimes maybe it gets turned back on themselves.”
“You know what I find fascinating, though?”
“What’s that?”
“The way Lamarr went to such extraordinary lengths to steer investigators away from herself.”
Tallon nodded. “That’s what the smart criminals do. It’s not so much about getting away with it. It’s making someone else take the rap, which then means you get away with it. They’ll never find you if they’re not looking for you.”
“That’s right.”
Pauling was looking off toward a bank of windows.
“I wonder if that’s what’s happening here.”
“It can’t be. She’s in prison, right?”
“Doesn’t have to be her. Could be someone who’s doing the s
ame thing. Maybe someone at the Bureau.”
“But they’re focused on Reacher,” Tallon said. “Which I guess could prove your point.”
“Exactly. Or, the Lamarr case was everywhere. Newspapers, television, true crime shows. Hell, I think they’re teaching a course on it at Quantico.”
“So a copycat killer, maybe?” Tallon said. “But they’re not doing the mysterious deaths or anything.”
“We don’t know that yet, no bodies have been found.”
“Could be.”
“We just need to figure out who would have felt inspired by Julia Lamarr’s case enough to copy the strategy.”
Pauling let the words roll around in her head. One of them didn’t sound right until she changed it.
“Inspired. Or motivated?”
32
The two cops looked at Julia Lamarr.
She noted their badges. They were local police, nothing special. Maybe there was a forest fire somewhere and they were evacuating the neighborhood. But she didn’t smell smoke.
“Ma’am, we’re looking for Dr. Barnes. Is he home?”
“No, I’m afraid not,” Lamarr said. “It’s just me here.”
So much for the forest fire theory. They were looking for Dr. Barnes, who was dead upstairs. Lamarr tried not to think about it. She was worried she would give something away and then her instructions would be broken.
“Do you know where he is?”
From their squad parked at the curb, some radio chatter erupted, giving Lamarr a brief respite in which to come up with an answer.
“He’s in Denver at a medical conference. I dropped him at the airport yesterday.” As she said it, she remembered to straighten her head as best she could, so she was giving them a straight-on direct line of sight. It would make them feel like she was telling the truth. She remembered that vaguely from her past life.
One of the cops was pale with bright orange freckles splotched across his face. The other was taller and darker.
They both nodded in unison.
“Why? Is someone looking for him?” Lamarr prompted them.
“Someone from his office called, looking for him,” Freckles said. “I guess he didn’t show up at work today. Are you his wife?”
“Oh, no. We’re not married. Just dating. We met on Christian Singles.”
Lamarr had no idea why she’d thrown in that last part. It had been sheer improvisation but she thought maybe adding a detail like that would add some authenticity.
But now she was frightened she had gone too far.
Lamarr felt the weight of the knife she’d grabbed from the butcher’s block. It was in the back of her pants, and she was tempted to reach back, put her fingers around the handle, for comfort. But something told her they would notice.
Like it was a tell.
Especially to the red-haired one. He was looking at her with an expression that fringed on skeptical.
The dark-haired one seemed bored and ready to go, he even turned his body slightly away from Lamarr, toward the squad car in back. It was a subtle suggestion to his partner that they move along. But the other cop hesitated.
“What are you cooking? Smells good.”
“Spaghetti,” Lamarr said.
“Lots of garlic, that’s the way to make it,” the cop said.
He looked over Lamarr’s head, into the kitchen, then back down at her.
“Okay then, we’ll get out of your hair,” he said, his tone begrudging. “Enjoy.”
“Thank you,” she answered and shut the door. She threw the deadbolt, and raced upstairs to the security cameras. She saw the cops get into their squad car, the red-haired guy looked back at the house one last time before getting into the car.
He knows something is wrong, she thought to herself.
Finally, the squad car pulled away and Lamarr let herself breathe a sigh of relief.
She smelled something burning, went down to the kitchen, and scraped the burned garlic into the sink. Lamarr poured some dish soap into the pan, cleaned it, and set it on a drying rack next to the sink.
She untied the apron and took her place back on the couch in the living room.
All she could do now was wait, she thought.
And then she closed her eyes and whispered one urgent word.
Hurry.
33
You were just kidding.
They were all going to go first, at the same time.
Despite the time in the trailer, they look pretty good. You had put carpet in to prevent them from bouncing around too much and it looked like they’d somehow worked together. No one was bleeding.
Lisa Harper was the tallest of the three and the first one he’d grabbed. She’d been bound now for nearly two days and the trailer smells sort of ripe. They’re probably thirsty, too. Maybe even a little delirious.
You feel a twinge of compassion for Chang and Vaughan, not so much for Harper.
It’s enough with the deliberation, you need to get this done and get gone.
You grab the first one, Chang, by her feet and drag her from the trailer onto the concrete. She kicks at you but you easily avoid the blows. Underneath the duct tape that’s covering her mouth, you can hear her screaming at you.
Vaughan tries to resist, but it’s impossible. She digs her feet in but you overpower her and toss her to the ground like she’s a bag of flour.
Harper is last. You gave some serious thought to butchering Harper because of what she’d done. Scratch that, because of what she hadn’t done.
It’s now or never if you want to do it. Once again, you think back to what she would want and in your gut you know the answer.
So, in the end, you stick with your original plan.
Harper is in even worse shape than you initially thought. Practically unconscious and she doesn’t resist as you pull her from the trailer. Which is good because she’s much taller than the other two and probably could have put up a good fight.
But not now.
Now, it looks like she’s barely holding on.
Hey, that’s the price you pay for lethal incompetence.
Once they are all laid out on the concrete you start with the knife. A stab here, a slash there. Nothing major. The wounds are somewhat superficial. You go a little deeper here and there on Harper and get the sense of some satisfaction.
Stabbing the other ones doesn’t bring you anything, other than the feeling of checking off items on a to-do list.
They squirm, and you hear them scream underneath their duct-taped mouths. Blood starts flowing onto the concrete. Soon, there are multiple pools of red.
You step back and study the amount of blood.
That’s when you drop the knife.
And pull out the gun.
You start firing. Not really aiming.
Just a few shots here and there. You see a puff of clothes when a bullet strikes. One time, on Chang’s leg, you can actually hear the bullet smack into bone.
The women are crabbing, trying to get away, but they can’t really move. Not with their arms and legs bound.
The only one who isn’t moving is Harper.
You shoot Vaughan again, this time aiming at her upper arm and you can tell you barely graze her, but she jumps in pain. She has her own pool of blood and it’s growing fast.
Time to move, you tell yourself.
You drop the gun next to the knife.
And then you take care of a few other things while one of the women moans. You aren’t sure which one it is and don’t really care.
You leave them there, and hurry back to your vehicle. You get behind the wheel and take off, carefully avoiding any cameras, just like you did before.
Soon, you’re back out on the road.
You feel elated, as if a weight has been lifted from your shoulders. It was your least favorite part of the plan, and the one with the most complications, the most risks.
It’s over.
All you have left now is the grand finale.
On
ce you’re free of the city, you put the accelerator to the floor and risk going over the speed limit.
You can’t wait for what’s up ahead.
You’re headed for the finish line.
This time, you have no problem looking directly at it.
34
Pauling saw the man enter the hotel lobby and she immediately knew something was wrong. It was the way he walked.
Favoring one side slightly. He had on blue jeans, black sneakers and a dress shirt. On his head was a baseball cap and his glasses were tinted.
Several thoughts went through her mind. An off-duty police officer. A thief who was about to hold up the place. A lone shooter about to execute some deranged plan.
Or an on-duty Federal agent.
Maybe from the Bureau.
Looking for her.
He had entered the hotel from the opposite end of the restaurant, threaded his way through a family on vacation, and avoided a businessman hurrying to catch a flight, probably.
All the while he moved with ease and practiced efficiency. Not in a hurry, but he was making a direct approach toward Pauling, without really appearing to do so.
She could tell he had something on his right hip he wanted to get to fast.
A weapon, naturally.
Tallon, still sitting across from her, instantly recognized the change in her body posture and glanced above her head. There was a mirror behind her, she knew, and Tallon was looking at the man, too.
“You said motivation. Something about motivation and Julia Lamarr. What did you mean?” Tallon asked her.
“I was talking about the possibility of a copycat killer. Perhaps someone she inspired. But then I wonder if it was less about inspiration, and more about motivation.”
“How do you mean?” he asked, his eyes still on the mirror above Pauling’s head. The man was still getting closer to them, yet had avoided looking directly at them.
Pauling shook her head. “Doesn’t matter now.”
Tallon started to slide from the booth, but she stopped him.