“Come on,” Mac directed. When they got to the conference room, he turned to Ridge. “Not a word to anyone outside this room. Not a fucking word, do you understand?”
“Maybe you’re unclear on how a reporter operates.”
“You have been offered a ticket inside,” Mac replied. “It has conditions. Accept them or hit the bricks.”
“Not a word without you saying so,” Ridge acquiesced.
“Okay,” Mac replied. “Does the name Maynard Munger mean anything to you?”
“Why have I heard that name?” April Greene asked.
“He was a medical examiner from up in Boston,” Ridge supplied quickly. “He was the one BPD thought was the killer of the first two Rubens victims for like ten minutes.”
“That’s the one,” Mac answered. “He’s Rubens.”
“But Mac, I remember this guy now—I was up in Boston. Munger was in custody when victims three and four were killed,” April Greene argued. “How can he possibly be your killer?”
“He has a partner,” Wire replied.
“A partner!” Greene and Ridge exclaimed together.
“Yes,” Wire confirmed. “We figured it out, or more really, Mac figured it out yesterday.” Mac and Wire explained their working theory.
“Wow,” Greene replied, amazed.
“Holy shit,” Ridge breathed and then went into storyteller mode. “This just keeps getting better.”
“Speak for yourself, asshole,” Greene growled disapprovingly. “This guy is out killing women.” She looked to Mac and Wire. “Are you going to put Munger out there?”
“With his face, we can really make some progress,” Coolidge added. “That definitely gives us something to work with. Maybe we could age that picture by ten years and that could help, too.”
“We’re right there with you, Detective Coolidge,” Galloway answered. “We’ve been working his picture from ten years ago against our sketches and the good pictures from the Metro cameras that day he was chased, and the ones you found on the Waxe case. You can see the similarities between Munger and the man on the surveillance pictures, particularly the nose. That bulbous end of it is somewhat distinctive. You look at the two pictures and there are definite similarities.”
“It’s the same man,” Greene replied and handed a picture to Coolidge. “Don’t you agree?”
“Yup.”
“Mac,” Galloway stated, “we’re starting to get some hits. Names from the list in Boston that also appeared in Chicago and Los Angeles.”
“Names?” Greene asked. “How?”
“He was a medical examiner,” Mac explained. “We think he may have been using identities he stole while working in the Office of the Medical Examiner for Massachusetts. We’re running every autopsy for the ten years before he resigned for names, social security numbers and dates of birth against DMV and other records for Illinois, California, DC, Maryland and Virginia.”
“And we just got one for here in DC,” Galloway reported. “Mac, we’ve got a hit on a Howard Gilley who Munger conducted the autopsy on up in Boston. That name correlates with an office address over in southeast.”
“An office?” Wire asked.
“He has to operate out of somewhere,” Mac replied. “Linc, you’re with Wire and me.” Then, to Galloway, he stated, “Time is running out. Let’s get Munger out there. The whole smash, everything.”
“It’s done.”
• • •
The date wasn’t supposed to start until 5:00.
One rule he had for dates like this was to never be first, to never be the one waiting. He always wanted his lady waiting. So he spent two hours walking the area around the National Art Gallery to see if there was any kind of an unusual police presence. Given what happened at Eleanor’s apartment, he was particularly on guard. He had confidence in the disguise and his backstory with Glenda but still, he was taking extra precautions. After two hours, he felt confident that there was no ambush awaiting him.
At 4:57, he watched as Glenda walked up the front steps to the Gallery of National Art. About halfway up the steps, she stopped and rested against the railing, scanning the area for him. It wasn’t a nervous or anxious form of scanning but rather an excited one.
That was what he wanted, her in the right frame of mind.
At promptly 5:00 P.M., he crossed the street and walked up the north steps of the National Gallery of Art.
“Gabriel, Gabriel,” Glenda waved eagerly.
“Glenda,” he replied as she jumped into his arms and hugged him. “I am so happy to see you.”
“Yes, me too,” she replied.
“You look wonderful,” he stated, pulling back and admiring her in a flowery spring dress with which she’d matched a light white sweater.
“And you look very scruffy, in a good way,” Glenda said as she stroked his long beard lightly. “I like a scruffy, woolly man.”
“Well, this scruffy and woolly man is very much looking forward to walking through the gallery. Are you ready?”
“Yes.”
Inside he led Glenda over to the check-in booth and the attendant to get their tickets.
“Here you go, Mr. Ripley. Please enjoy the exhibit,” the attendant said pleasantly as she handed the tickets across the counter.
“Let’s go see if we can find that Cezanne you were so excited to see.”
“Let’s,” Glenda answered excitedly, squeezing his hand tightly.
• • •
“Clear!”
“Clear!”
A few seconds later the SWAT team leader emerged from the office. “Agent McRyan, we have something inside I think you should see.”
“What do you have, Sarge?” Mac asked, following the team leader.
“This, sir.”
The sergeant pointed to a metal cabinet with the doors opened. Inside were numerous fake beards, mustaches and hairpieces of varying lengths. On the hangers were clothes, his wardrobe. Above the hanger rod was another shelf with hats: three tam hats, four baseball caps and two stocking caps as well as a box of rubber gloves. On the bottom floor of the cabinet, there were also shoes: two pair of tennis, two loafers and a pair of hiking boots.
“This is his place,” Mac stated. “No question.”
Coolidge burst into the office, dragging another man with him. “Mac, this is the building manager. He says Gilley drives an older model black Honda Civic.”
Mac called Galloway. “Don, we’re looking for a black Honda Civic registered to anyone on that list of names.” Mac hung up and then to the group ordered, “Everyone out, don’t touch anything else. Put everything back the way it was. Lock the door to the office. Linc, it’s 6:30. We’re running out of time. I want your men all over this place. I want men on the front door, the back door and all over this building. When and if he comes back, we take him down.”
“Mac! I got Grace on the line,” Wire bellowed, holding out her phone.
Mac took it from his partner. “Yeah, Gracie, what do you have?”
“Mac, Galloway says we just got a hit at the National Gallery of Art.”
• • •
“I can’t get over how amazing some of those pieces in there were,” Glenda exclaimed happily. “That was so great, thank you for getting the tickets.”
“I enjoyed it, too,” Maynard answered, “especially the Cezanne ones. Those paintings were spectacular.”
Glenda appraised him. “I guess you are proof that we should never stereotype.”
“What do you mean?”
“The beard, the longer hair, the flannel shirt, the sport fishing—none of those say art lover. Yet you know it and you do love it.”
“Art is a chance to do and experience something different,” he answered. “You know what I would love to do next?”
“What?”
“Go back to your place and open a bottle of wine. I’d be happy to pick up one along the way.”
Glenda smiled. “Oh, that is not necessary, Gabriel, I have a c
ouple of bottles. I’ll just open one.”
“Then let’s go,” he said, leading her down the steps and across the street. “I’m parked in the ramp just down the street here on the left.”
At the car, he opened the door for his Civic and let her slip down inside. As he walked around the back of the car, he made a mental note to wipe it down. Glenda would leave prints inside.
As he dropped himself down into the driver’s seat he looked to his right, and Glenda was smiling and shaking her head.
“What?”
“You are a walking contradiction.”
“How so?”
“You fish, you hunt and you work in the lumber industry. So I figured I’d be getting into a big pickup truck.”
Maynard laughed to cover the inconsistency. “I travel quite a bit and if I need to rent a vehicle I rent a truck to get my fix, but here in Washington with the traffic, the Civic is better for mileage and better for the environment.”
He started the car and classical music played over the radio. It caused Glenda to smile and shake her head again.
“And the contradictions continue.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
“I know you had help.”
The name that got a hit was Gabriel Ripley.
“Mac, we’re scanning every government computer system and we hit that name as having bought tickets and checked in at the Gallery,” Galloway reported over the speaker in Wire’s phone. “Munger did the autopsy on a Gabriel Ripley three months before he disappeared. Ripley was a homeless Desert Storm veteran who died from a heroin overdose. No next of kin came forward and he was identified via his military dog tags.”
“What time was this show he was seeing?” Wire asked Galloway as Mac swerved through traffic, following two patrol units who were parting the traffic ahead of them on 4th Street Southwest.
“It’s been running since 2:00 P.M. and goes until 8:00 tonight so there’s a big window for the showing.”
“Mac, Munger’s picture is appearing on all news outlets, cable and network plus it is all over the Internet. It’s not a matter of if we catch him,” Delmonico suggested. “It’s only a matter of when.”
“But do we catch him in time?” Mac replied as he pulled the X5 to a stop on the south side of Constitution Avenue. “It’s 7:10. It’s getting late early.”
“It’s not 8:00 yet though,” Wire replied. “We’ve still got time.”
Coolidge arrived right behind him. It was all hands on deck now. Three Bureau sedans arrived plus even Greene and Ridge, pulling up in Greene’s white Mercedes SUV.
The group quickly ran up the steps and moved inside. Mac showed his identification to the receptionist at the front desk. The security director was on the scene a moment later.
“I need you to lock the museum down,” Mac explained. “Nobody leaves unless I say so. And we need to find a man named Gabriel Ripley, if he is still here.”
The receptionist checked in her system. “Ripley picked up his tickets from us at 5:02 P.M.”
“Where did he pick up them up?” Mac asked.
“There was a reception table set up for the West Building. This was a special exhibit and you had to have advance tickets for the exhibit today so they were checking people in there.”
“Come with me,” the security director gestured. “Down the hall to where my security system is housed.” The director sat down at his desk, made some mouse clicks and pulled up the security camera monitoring the reception table. He started the footage at 5:00 P.M. and ran it through fast forward. He stopped it at 5:02 and let it run normal speed. A man with long blond hair and a long beard walked up to the table with a woman dressed in a floral dress and light sweater. The man moved with just a slight shuffle to his step. He was perhaps two inches taller than the woman, who was in a short pair of heels.
“He’s changed up again,” Mac noted. “He’s got long blond hair now and the big bushy beard.”
“Is it him?” Greene asks. “How can you be sure?”
“It is,” Mac and Wire answer in unison.
“It’s the way he walks,” Wire answered. “A little like he has a stick up his ass—we saw it on the Metro video just as he got on the train.”
“Is he still here—that’s the question,” Mac pressed.
The group quickly fanned out into the exhibit, hunting around. Mac approached a security guard walking around the exhibit and described the man.
“I think I know the guy you’re talking about,” the guard reported after a moment of thought. “I was standing over by the exit out onto Constitution Avenue and saw him.”
“He left the building?”
“Yes.”
“Where were they going?”
“Out the front door is all I remember,” the guard replied. “He and the lady, they left together. They were all friendly-like.”
“Where did they exit?”
“The main exit on the north side that leads out onto Constitution Avenue.”
• • •
“I have a few different bottles in the kitchen,” Glenda said as they entered her second-floor apartment. She grabbed two bottles. “Red or white?”
“What would you like?”
“I’m in kind of a white mood,” Glenda said.
Maynard took the bottle of white and examined the label. “A Pinot Grigio looks good. Why don’t you go into the living room and make yourself comfortable,” he suggested. “You can turn on some music if you’d like.”
“Sounds terrific.”
As he worked the corkscrew, she called from the living room, “How about the Chicago Symphony Orchestra?”
“Sounds good to me,” he replied as the cork popped out of the bottle.
“Glasses are right above you in the cupboard.”
“Thanks,” he answered as he reached inside his pocket. A moment later, he strolled into the living room with the two glasses. Glenda stepped in to accept it. It was an invitation to be close and he took it, leaning in, cupping her face in his right hand and kissing her lightly, a quick soft peck.
“Should we sit down?” she suggested.
“I’d like that,” he answered as he quickly glanced down at this watch and his heart skipped a beat. It was twenty to eight. He was behind schedule.
• • •
“Agent McRyan, I have him here,” the security director reported, pointing at his computer monitor.
“Show me.”
The director rolled the video. The camera angle showed the steps down to the sidewalk and then Constitution Avenue to the west. The man and woman walked across the avenue and then continued walking north and out of view.
“And there is no other camera? No other angle out there?”
“Sorry, Agent McRyan, there isn’t.”
“What street is it that they kept walking north on?”
“That’s 6th Street Northwest.”
Mac spoke into his phone to Galloway. “I’m sending you some video footage. We have a new emergency project for the tech guys. I need them scrubbing every possible street camera for 6th Street Northwest north of the Gallery for our guy and his date.” He hung up and looked to Wire and the others. “Let’s get up that direction and see if there are any other surveillance cameras we can access.”
Mac and Wire crossed Constitution Avenue and took the west side of 6th Street Northwest with Greene and Ridge in tow. Coolidge and two of his men worked the east side. Mac and Wire ducked inside a flower shop and presented their identification.
“I need your help. Have you seen these two people?” Wire asked, showing the screen on her phone to the woman behind the cash register.
“Let me take a look,” the cashier replied, sliding glasses on.
Mac’s cell phone rang. It was Galloway.
“Mac, there is a traffic camera pointing south on 6th. It’s a little hard to tell but it looks like the man and woman turned into the Colonial Parking Ramp, a block and a half north of the Gallery.”
“What
time?”
“6:37.”
Mac and Wire pushed by Greene and Ridge, rushed out the flower shop front door, turned left and sprinted north to the parking ramp, turned to their left and ran up the exit ramp to the attendant booth. “Where is your office? Where do I find the surveillance system?”
The parking attendant pointed to a set of double doors. “Go through the doors up the steps to the second floor.”
Mac took off before the attendant could finish, Wire right behind him. They found the office and barged in, both with their identification out. “I need to see your security cameras. Is there one focused on the exit to the ramp?”
“Yes,” the clerk answered, obviously startled. “I’m not sure how to work the system, though.”
“Let me,” Wire said as she sat down to the computer and started maneuvering the mouse. She found the camera that focused on the ramp exit. At 6:41 P.M., surveillance footage time, they saw it.
“Black Honda Civic,” Coolidge pointed out.
“And it turns left onto 6th Street Northwest,” Mac added and then barked to Galloway, who was on speaker. “Don, Rubens is driving a black Honda Civic north on 6th Street Northwest. License plate is Maryland, 1-7-3 AET—that’s Alex Edward Tango. You got that?”
“Copy.”
“Then one more thing: we have surveillance footage and pictures of the woman from the gallery. We need to get that out there. We need to find out who she is.”
“We’re on it.”
Mac and Wire ran back to his X5. Coolidge, Greene, Ridge and the rest were right behind and they all raced north on 6th Street Northwest with lights flashing.
“It’s 7:46 P.M.” Dara observed. “We have fourteen minutes, give or take.”
“There’s time. There’s still time,” Mac muttered as he weaved through traffic, driving north on 6th Street Northwest, scanning for black Honda Civics.
Galloway was back on the line. “Mac, we got sight of the Civic. It stayed north on 6th until it hit Florida Avenue. At Florida, the car turned left and then took an immediate right on Georgia Avenue and continued north.”
“Where did it go from there?”
“We tracked it ten blocks north and then we lost it. Georgia Avenue goes residential farther to the north once you get past Howard University.”
Next Girl On The List - A serial killer thriller (McRyan Mystery Series Book) Page 28