by Mary Burton
“Out here, alone, with a broken-down car, what choice does she have?” She held up a plastic bag that contained a cell phone. “I did find this in her lap. I’ve dusted the phone and pulled a few prints. Husband gave me the pass code.”
The phone’s screen saver displayed a grinning Gloria Sanchez, standing beside the Texas governor. Her thick hair draped her shoulders and a blue dress hugged her curves. “Jericho said she called her husband but the phone went dead. What’s the charge on her phone?”
She checked. “Fully charged. But it’s not uncommon for calls to drop out here.”
Calhoun nodded toward the passenger side of the car. “There was a second phone on the passenger seat floor. Less expensive. No pictures or screen savers. Fully charged.”
“A burner?” Burners were prepaid phones that could be bought at any box store for cash. They could be used and tossed, leaving no trail back to the user.
She shrugged. “That would be my guess.”
He studied it. “What would Mrs. Sanchez be doing with a second phone?”
“Maybe it wasn’t her phone. The car is a loaner from the dealership. Maybe it was left in the car by the last person who drove it.”
Mazur grinned as he nodded. “You sound like a detective.”
“Making detective is just one rung on my way up the ladder to chief.”
Mazur smiled. “Don’t forget the little people.”
A begrudging grin followed. “I won’t forget you.”
“Thanks, Chief.” He studied the phone. “Have you checked it for incoming calls?”
“It has received eight calls from one phone.”
One number.
“Maybe she was having an affair?” he asked.
“I’d say definitely hiding something.”
Again he puzzled over the car. It was five or six years old. No scrapes or dents or signs of any kind of accident. But not the flashy kind of car Gloria Sanchez sold. She could have pulled any car from the lot, and she chose this one.
Mazur held out his index finger and thumb, mimicking a gun. “The shooter wasn’t more than two feet away when he fired. Judging by the blood spatter, he was standing right here.”
“One shot. The medical examiner will make the final call, but I’d say the bullet shredded her heart.”
“He didn’t try to take her jewelry or money.”
“Something may be missing. Her husband might know.”
There was an open bag of peanut-chocolate clusters on the seat and beside it a bloodstained, rumpled receipt. In the cup holder was a to-go cup. “Is the receipt from a local store?”
“It’s going to take me a little time to figure that one out. Soaked in blood.”
He leaned in and tested the weight of the coffee cup. It was full, and there was none of the victim’s red lipstick on the cup lid.
“Any signs of sexual assault?” he asked.
“Not that I can see, but again, the autopsy will tell you more.”
He popped the trunk, moved to the back of the car, and found the tire and jack in place. Nothing else.
He knelt by the back right tire, now resting on its rim, and ran his hand over the tread. No screw or nail. Likely the puncture was small enough to get her onto the interstate before the tire deflated. “Punctured just enough so that it didn’t flatten right away?”
“Best guess.”
“Once you’ve finished up here, we’ll talk.”
“You know where to find me.”
Mazur crossed to the patrol car that contained a sturdy man with a thick mustache and tussled gray hair. He wore a gray T-shirt stained with blood, sweats, and expensive loafers with no socks. His head was tipped back against the seat, eyes closed, and his hands were balled into tight fists.
Mazur knocked on the window, and the man opened his eyes and sat taller. Briefly his gaze was lost as if he didn’t know where he was, and then realization chased off the wild-eyed expression and replaced it with a scowl. Mazur opened the door and motioned for the man to get out.
“I’m Detective Theo Mazur,” he said.
The man straightened and was almost as tall as Mazur’s six-foot-four frame. “I’m Martin Sanchez.”
“Gloria Sanchez was your wife?”
“Yes.”
“I’m sorry for all this.” He always started off nice. He wanted witnesses and suspects to like him because people, even murderers, opened up to those who felt like a friend.
“It’s been a nightmare,” he said in a thick Texas drawl.
Mazur angled his head down, and dropped his voice a notch. “Mind telling me what happened?”
Martin touched a thick cross that dangled around his neck. “She called me at one a.m. Woke me up out of a sound sleep. She told me she was having car trouble and asked me to come get her. She told me the exit before the line went dead.”
“What was your wife doing out here in the middle of the night?”
“She was driving down to Laredo to see her mother, who’s in a nursing home. Gloria drives to Laredo at least three times a month. Yesterday was very busy at the dealership, and she couldn’t get away from the showroom until after eleven.”
“Is that her regular car?”
“No. She drives a silver Mercedes. She texted me yesterday and said her Mercedes was being serviced and that she’d find a loaner for the trip.”
“No disrespect, but this car is kind of plain and ordinary.” With a chagrined smile he leaned in a bit as though they were friends. “It’s the kind of car that I would drive, but not the Queen of Cars.”
Martin looked back toward the vehicle but quickly shuddered and glanced away. “I don’t know why she took that car. She usually goes for the luxury models. I guess she was in a rush, and it was available. She’s always in a rush. Always so busy.” He rubbed the back of his neck with his hand.
“How far is the dealership from here?”
“Thirty miles.”
Mazur scanned the horizon before looking back at Sanchez. “So she takes a loaner, stops for chocolate and coffee, and ends up here with a sabotaged tire.”
Sanchez looked the part of a grieving husband, but a lot of murderers were talented actors.
“I can’t . . . I can’t think about it.” The anguish and disbelief that threaded around the words sounded genuine.
“And then she’s shot point-blank in the chest. Hell of a bullet hole.” The comment was intentionally blunt. He wanted to shock Sanchez, who as the victim’s husband was top on the suspect list right now.
Tears glistened in Sanchez’s eyes. “I’ll never forget what she looked like when I came up to the car. So much blood. It doesn’t make any sense.”
“Anyone have a beef with your wife?”
“She was a tough businesswoman. There were people who didn’t like her, but I can’t think of anyone who would have gunned her down like this. This killing had to be random. Someone who happened upon her.”
“Her window was open. Whoever shot her won her confidence.” She definitely would have lowered the window for her husband.
“That’s not like her. She’s not a trusting sort.”
“The flat tire wasn’t by chance. It was intentional. And the longer I’m a cop, the less I buy into coincidence. Most people know their killers. It’s rarely random.”
Dark eyes narrowed as Sanchez ran his hand over the gray stubble on his chin. No wedding band. “What are you saying?”
“Were you and your wife having marital problems?”
“No.”
He nodded toward Sanchez’s rough, calloused hands. “You don’t wear a wedding band?”
The man didn’t look down. “I’m a mechanic. I often take it off. It’s a hazard. I just forgot to put it back on.”
“How much older are you than your wife?”
“Fifteen years.”
“That’s one heck of an age gap.”
Sanchez lifted his chin. “The years didn’t matter to us.”
“You two have an
y financial problems? I mean, she’s dressed real nice, but all that glitters is not gold.”
“I run the garage. She took care of the sales and numbers. We always had highs and lows. That’s the nature of business. But in the last year, she said it was all going well, so I didn’t question her.”
“How many phones does she carry?”
His brow wrinkled. “One.”
“There was a second phone in the car. Know about that?” Mazur understood something about having a spouse with a wandering eye. The sad-sack husband was the last to know.
“I’ve never seen a second phone.”
“Maybe it belonged to someone else.”
Heavy brows knotted. “My wife loved me. And I loved her.”
“You mind giving a DNA sample to Officer Calhoun over there?” His tone was always casual and keeping it friendly until the situation required a different approach.
“I let Officer Calhoun fingerprint me.”
“Good. I appreciate that. We’re going to be collecting a lot of forensic data from that car, and it would be nice to have your DNA and exclude you quickly.”
“What kind of DNA?”
“A cheek swab. Takes just a second, and then we’re done. Will save you time later. You won’t have to come down to the station.” Again the no-big-deal, let-me-be-your-pal tone.
Sanchez jutted his chin out as he looked at Mazur. “I didn’t hurt my wife. I came out here to help her.”
Insistence reverberated from the man’s words, but Mazur didn’t have a good enough read on him to determine if he was telling the truth or just a damn good liar. “Once you are eliminated as a suspect, we can get to the business of solving the case.”
“I should call my lawyer.”
“You can do that. Will just give the killer more time to get away.” When Sanchez hesitated, he added, “This is all very routine. I do it in every homicide case.”
The man shook his head. “Sure. Take my DNA. Do whatever you need to do.”
Mazur motioned Officer Calhoun over, who set aside her camera on a temporary worktable. When he explained what he needed, she pulled a DNA kit from her forensic van and carefully swabbed the inside of Sanchez’s cheek.
“I didn’t kill her,” he said. “I came to help her.”
At least a third of murdered women died at the hands of a husband, boyfriend, or lover. “I’m going to do everything I can to catch her killer.”
A sigh shuddered from Sanchez. “What will happen to her? Who will come for my wife? Where will they take her?”
“We’ll send her to the medical examiner,” Calhoun said. “Once medical professionals have examined her body, they’ll call you and you can make arrangements with a funeral home.” The technician secured the cotton swab in a glass vial, labeled it, and stored it in her van.
“Funeral home. Jesus. I was talking to her just a few hours ago.”
Mazur studied the man’s body language closely. Sanchez was wringing his hands and making eye contact with him, both signs of grief and truth telling. “When she called you, did she give you any idea that she was in trouble or that she was being followed?”
“No. She sounded annoyed. Pissed off. Gloria has been short tempered lately, and the flat tire made her furious.”
“Why was she short tempered?”
“I asked her several times, but she said it was nothing. She’s lost some weight, so I figured it was one of her crazy diets.” He ran a hand through his hair. “This is a bad dream.”
The sound of a cell phone dinging had Mazur checking his own and realizing quickly it wasn’t his, but the victim’s burner that Calhoun had bagged in plastic. She held up the bag. The display read BLOCKED.
Calhoun carefully opened the bag and then the phone. “It’s a text with a video attachment.”
Mazur turned to Sanchez. “I’m going to have an officer escort you home. We are also going to need your shirt for testing.”
“My shirt?” Sanchez glanced down and saw the blood. More tears filled his eyes. “Yes, of course.” The older man’s shoulders slumped forward as the weight of his wife’s death sank in. “You’ll take care of my wife?”
“Yes, sir.”
Again, Sanchez looked pale, upset, devastated. He was hitting all the right emotional high notes. But killers also felt regret. In the aftermath of a murder, especially of a loved one, many sincerely mourned the loss of the very person they had just killed.
When a uniformed officer escorted Sanchez to a different patrol car, the detective turned back to Calhoun and read the text. Dr. Kate Hayden, you did not catch me.
“Kate Hayden,” Mazur said, trying to recall the person.
When he couldn’t make a connection, he hit the icon for the video attachment. In this remote area, cellular service was spotty and slow, and it took nearly thirty seconds for the attachment to load. When it did, he saw the freeze-frame of Sanchez’s car. He pressed “Play.”
The camera images showed someone moving from the back of Gloria Sanchez’s disabled car to the driver’s side window. Gloria Sanchez startled as she looked up from her phone into the camera.
“Are you all right?” a man asked. “Looks like a flat.”
Her gaze warmed and she smiled. “I’m safe in my car and can wait until help arrives.” The closed window muffled her response as she gripped her phone.
“Want me to change the tire?”
“What? No.” She looked up, blinked. “You shouldn’t have to do that.” She glowered at her cell phone and punched the numbers. “I always have bars on this stretch of road.”
“I can check mine and call the cops or a tow truck.”
Her smile widened. “That would be great.”
A gloved hand grazed the edge of the camera as he raised a cell. Seconds passed. “I’ve got nothing either.”
“You don’t have to stay,” she said. “Really, I’m fine.”
“You have no cell service and your tire is flat. Leaving you like this would be wrong. I can drive you ahead to the next gas station and ask them to send a tow truck.”
“Really?” She cracked her window a fraction.
“Sure. It’s going to take about half an hour to get there and send someone back. Do you have a flare? Easy to get sideswiped when you’re on the shoulder.”
She glanced toward the darkness. “I hate this stretch of I-35.”
“I’m not crazy about it either,” he said.
“I should have been in Laredo by now. Work ran late.”
“I’m in the same boat. Extra shift at the hospital. I’m buzzing on an extra-large coffee and a bag of vending machine cookies.”
“Jesus, this is the last thing I needed.” She reached for her phone, punched in more numbers, and cursed.
“Pop the trunk. Let me have a look at the spare.”
“You know cars?”
“Enough.”
Some of her tension visibly eased. “If by some miracle you can fix that flat, I’d be in your debt.”
“Not necessary. Let me see what I can do.”
As he moved toward the trunk, the camera caught the image of a blue van. The plates were blurred by the darkness.
The trunk popped open, and he ran a gloved hand over a full spare tire. His breathing was steady as he returned to her. “Spare’s flat.”
“What? That’s bull.”
“Have a look for yourself.”
This time she rolled down her window. “I don’t mean to be rude. I’m just really stressed.”
“Just trying to be a Good Samaritan.”
“Oh, you are.”
And then the barrel of a gun appeared.
She braced. “What the hell?”
The muzzle flashed, and the bullet struck her square in the chest. She recoiled back as crimson droplets splashed her face, the steering wheel, and the dash. Blood soaked her shirt, skirt, and the seat.
“You’re not alone. I’m here for you.”
“Shit,” Calhoun said. “He filmed the
killing.”
“Why the hell does he want us to see this?” Mazur asked, more to himself.
“Maybe he’s bragging. Maybe he’s proud.”
He watched the video again, studying it closely. The killer gently wiped the hair from Gloria Sanchez’s face.
“Seems pretty damn personal to me,” Calhoun said.
“Or it’s part of his ritual.”
“The killer left the phone so he could communicate with us.”
“Yes, he did,” Mazur said.
“I can try and trace the incoming phone call.”
“Go ahead and do it now. If this guy has any brains, he’s using a burner and will have deactivated it right away. But sometimes we get lucky.”
“I’ll move fast.” She reached for her cell. “Hoping for stupid killers right now.”
A smile tweaked the edge of his lips. “I bet you’ve seen your share.”
“And no doubt you saw a few in Chicago.” She raised her phone to her ear.
“Something tells me this one is smart.” Mazur looked up and down the stretch of highway. A memory sparked. “There were other killings on I-35. Women traveling alone, disabled car, and then shot point-blank. Serial killer or copycat?”
“It’s been six months since that killer struck. The last shooting was farther north. And the FBI made an arrest in that case.”
“All the killings moved progressively south on I-35.”
Calhoun’s call dropped. She cursed and redialed. When the second call went through, she turned from him and discussed a phone trace. Traffic on the northbound side was heavy and noisy, forcing her to cup her hand over her ear as she listened.
Mazur searched the Internet on his phone. The articles were slow to load but finally appeared on the I-35 killer, also known as the Samaritan. His memory had been correct. The five victims had been random, all were shot once in the chest, and each victim’s car had suffered some kind of malfunction. One ran out of gas. One had a punctured tire. Another had a rag stuffed in the tailpipe of her car. The lead FBI investigators on the case were Agent Mike Nevada and Dr. Kate Hayden, profilers based at Quantico.
The killer was reaching out to Agent Kate Hayden.
Calhoun tucked her phone back in her holster. “The phone is being traced as we speak.” She glanced at his display. “FBI? You really want to pull the FBI into this case?”