Cold Moon (The Huntress/FBI Thrillers Book 3)

by Alexandra Sokoloff

  Fun is not what this is, Roarke thought. Not by a long shot.

  Snyder paused. “But your killer differs substantially from the Dennehy case in that—whoever she is—she’s very clearly taking a page from Cara Lindstrom: using the exact weapon and MO and victim pool. She may have a list of her own, however, and subsequent killings could be men who are personally known to her. Which would reduce the pool of potential victims.”

  A pimp and a john. A pattern? Roarke wondered again. He said it aloud. “Or she could be making a point. Deliberately targeting abusers from both ends.”

  Which also sounded more like the blogger than Jade.

  The team all sat, thinking. Epps spoke first.

  “Okay, thing is, is she on a rampage here, in the city? Whoever this is, she knows these streets. Are there going to be others?”

  “We are of course monitoring all killings of adult males in California,” Singh said. They had been since Cara came on their radar.

  Snyder answered. “If it’s Jade, the likelihood is that if she kills again it’ll be here, simply because teenagers are less mobile than adults.”

  “So we get out on the street,” Epps said flatly. He turned to Roarke. “You can’t. Jade knows you. But she never met me. Me, Jones.” He looked at the younger agent. “We get in civilian cars and go out cruisin’. We don’t know for sure who we’re hunting. But we damn well know where she’s hunting.”

  Roarke felt a tremor of apprehension. And it was not for Jade. It was for his agents. He hated the idea. But it was proactive, it was protective, it was a clear strategy.

  “Yeah,” he agreed reluctantly. “Okay.”

  “We start tonight,” Epps said. “Go out cruising the Tenderloin and the Haight.”

  Jones was frowning, thinking. “Hold up. If it was me, I’d be figuring the TL is too hot now. I’d want to mix it up.”

  Roarke knew he had a point. Jade wasn’t stupid.

  “So what about Inty?” Jones continued. “There’s more street action there, anyway.”

  He was talking about International Boulevard in Oakland, otherwise known as “the Track”—a major prostitute stroll. These days a lot of the street action had moved across the Bay to Oakland. And the Track was infamous for its large selection of underage girls.

  But Epps was already shaking his head. “Uh-uh. White girl on the Track? She’d stand out too much.”

  Roarke knew Epps was not simply speaking professionally. The agent had grown up on the streets of Oakland.

  “I agree,” Singh said. “She has not been seen on the Track.” The men turned to her. “I have been monitoring the online sex forums: Backpage, Yelp, Redlight. Inspector Mills and I thought there might be talk from the men who post on those forums, the tricks—things they have seen that could be useful to our investigation.”

  She stepped to the podium to connect her laptop to the overhead projection. An online web forum came up on the screen.

  “There are several quite active forums dedicated only to Street Action. The men who frequent those forums act somewhat as reporters for the other men: they routinely post what they call ‘intel’ or ‘recon’—camera phone shots they take of the streetwalkers while they are cruising, and descriptions of the women they see out working. The posters are very explicit,” she said, and neither her tone nor her face changed, but Roarke could feel her cold disgust. She scrolled through the threads so the other agents could see.

  Users with screen names like Justanotherdick, MrDiscreet, and Beaverstretcher had posted camera phone photos of girls walking particular streets, often with links to classified ads that listed a sex worker’s prices, dimensions, and specialties. Some threads were individual reviews or queries asking details from anyone in the forum who had “done” a particular sex worker.

  Roarke caught glimpses of some of the comments. Some dick-sucking lips on that one. Love to get a girl like that to gobble my load . . .

  Singh continued clicking through the threads. “I have been thinking that a girl of Jade’s looks would draw comment, if she had been seen. Inspector Mills and I have created several online accounts of our own so that we can interact with other posters. Under these aliases we can post as sex workers as well as ‘mongers.’ For the last two days we have been establishing a presence so that our queries will not come out of thin air. The men who post in these forums tend to be suspicious of newcomers.” She clicked on a thread to open it. “Here Inspector Mills has posted directly asking if anyone has seen a sex worker of Jade’s description, under the pretext of wanting a second ‘date.’ We have received no useful answers. But this afternoon I found this separate query, from a poster who uses a photo of his infant son as an avatar.”

  Roarke was startled at the loathing in her voice. Not that it wasn’t entirely justified, but he had never seen her react so strongly in a professional setting. Or anyplace else.

  “There is no overt description of her, but see here.” She clicked on a thread. “This was posted last night.”

  The agents looked up at the screen.

  HUNGMAN: Need intel on young wsw spotted near bakery on Polk. Smoking little body, tight hot ass, black short hair, silver tube top, black mini, freaky all-over tats.

  “Hungman,” Epps said, his voice dripping contempt. “I just bet.”

  “Doesn’t sound like Jade to me. He says ‘black short hair,’” Jones pointed out.

  “Hair is the easiest and most dramatic identifying characteristic to change,” Singh answered. “It is likely the first thing Jade would do to disguise herself. The post specifies ‘wsw’: a white sex worker, which are more prevalent in the Tenderloin than on the Track, but still in the minority. And this is what particularly caught my attention.” She used the mouse to highlight a phrase: freaky all-over tats.

  “Admittedly a long shot, but there is a chance this Hungman was a witness to Jade’s presence and activities in the Tenderloin last night. Perhaps he even got the ‘intel’ he was asking for and actually found her.”

  “Which means he might already be dead,” Jones said. There was a sudden chill in the room as the rest of the team realized he was right.

  “Shit,” Epps said softly.

  Roarke turned to Singh. “How do we find him?”

  She frowned. “Unfortunately, there is not enough in the posting for us to get a warrant to compel the website to give up names and addresses. Also the site makes it quite easy for users to register by money order, so there is no paper trail to most of the accounts. But—I have searched all posts by Hungman. I found this photo he took from inside his car as he was cruising.”

  Roarke tensed and stared up at the projected image of a girl in high heels and miniskirt, walking along a neon-lit sidewalk. The photo was shot through the windshield; the figure was grainy, barely visible, but he was almost certain the girl was Latina.

  “That’s not Jade,” he said.

  “No,” Singh answered. “But look there, at the dashboard of the car. Hungman drives a MINI Cooper. Black, or perhaps dark blue.”

  The dashboard instrumentation was visible in the photo, and Roarke realized she was right.

  Epps leaned forward with a surge of excitement. “So we’re on the lookout for a dark MINI during the stakeout tonight.”

  “Just so,” Singh answered. “And as we monitor the boards for real-time street activity, we will have a bigger picture of the action going on and can respond to any potential sightings.”

  Snyder spoke from the conference screen. “I think you have your plan. And I’m being paged, so this is where I wish you luck and sign off. Be safe.” His screen went dark.

  Roarke sat back. He wasn’t happy with the plan for his own reasons, but he couldn’t deny it was solid.

  “Finally, there is this.” Singh clicked on a thread and scrolled down through camera phone photos of various sex workers. She stopped on on
e photo of three girls in short skirts and tube tops walking on the sidewalk, and moved the cursor to highlight a shape in the background. “There,” she said.

  “Whoa,” said Jones.

  There was a blob of white where the face should be. Roarke was startled to make out the fuzzy shape of a human skull.

  “A Santa Muerte mask,” he said.

  “Yes,” said Singh. “That is how I saw it, too.”

  Roarke finally brought himself to say it. “I think this person was at the crime scene this morning. There was someone standing at the barrier. Wearing a skull mask.”

  Epps and Jones turned to him in disbelief. Singh did not look surprised. “So. There is someone else we must be on the lookout for. What that means, I do not know.”

  Roarke couldn’t believe it was Cara. It wasn’t her style at all. She wore disguises, but her purpose was not to be noticed. And Jade’s particular advantage over these men would be to approach them as herself.

  So who’s out there in the mask? Erin? The blogger? Or— He didn’t even want to think it.

  “It means this killer may not be anyone we’re looking at,” he said. “It could be someone else entirely.”

  Chapter 36

  Singh was very quiet in her chair as Roarke filled the team in on the mystery woman who had used Andrea Janovy’s identification to visit Cara in jail.

  “I don’t know who this visitor was. But the blogger who writes under the name Bitch is one possibility.” He distributed the composite sketch of the blogger to the team, and they all looked down at the young, intent face as Roarke continued.

  “When I saw that onlooker in the skull mask at the crime scene, that was my first thought. That it was her.”

  Epps was shaking his head. Roarke held up a hand.

  “We focus on Jade. But tonight we need to be on alert for Bitch, too.”

  The team spent the next hour laying the groundwork for the stakeout. Roarke agreed with Epps and Singh that Jade would most likely avoid International Boulevard and stick to San Francisco. The Tenderloin wasn’t huge, which would make patrolling it manageable. And it was the most likely place to find Jade if she was out there hunting.

  Hunting. It was a surreal thought.

  But action in the Tenderloin didn’t start until late at night, so Roarke dismissed Epps and Jones to get some sleep before zero hour.

  “I want you sharp, and rested.”

  As he left the room, he stopped beside Singh. “That was interesting thinking, about female vigilantes.”

  She nodded without smiling. He paused, then added, “We need to find that blogger.”

  Singh was immediately focused. “I have begun to search for her through the IP numbers and accounts—Redlight, the blog. Of course she is using encryption, proxies, and rerouting methods to conceal herself. It is standard operating procedure for these cyberorganizations. They are very expert at it. But I have just begun.”

  As usual Singh was a step ahead of him.

  “Good. I’d also like you to monitor any online activity by Bitch—not just the blogger but the whole organization. Any calls to action. Any chatter between Twitter accounts.”

  “I see,” Singh said.

  “Now that they’re involved they may attempt to reach out to Lindstrom somehow. Or Jade. Both. They may have already.”

  “Yes,” she said. “You are right.”

  “And Singh . . .”

  She looked at him.

  “I know it’s a lot right now, but we’re going to need to look into Kaz Spinoza’s suggestion that there was or is prisoner abuse going on at County #8.”

  “Of course,” she said softly. “I will begin that process.”

  Back in his office, Roarke sat down behind his desk and fished out his cell phone, punched up a contact. When Snyder answered, Roarke started in.

  “I wanted to thank you for your input today—”

  “You’re welcome. And?” Snyder’s tone was amused.

  “And we really could use your help down here,” Roarke admitted.

  There was a pause on the phone. When the profiler spoke, his voice was grave. “You know I would be there if I could. But this case takes priority.”

  “I understand. Just know that I can requisition your full fee at any time—”

  “That has nothing to do with anything,” Snyder said sharply. “The man we’re looking for up here is hunting children. If I’m correct about previous victims, his cooling-off period has become shorter and shorter. We’re running out of time.”

  “I’m sorry,” Roarke said.

  When Snyder spoke again, his voice had softened slightly. “Your killer, whoever she is, will almost certainly kill first, I fully understand that. But in the grand scheme of things, I can’t say I consider her victims a priority.”

  “Right,” Roarke said. It was a feeling he knew too well, and the stark truth of it. Who could?

  He wished Snyder luck and disconnected, then sat back in his chair and let his mind go to the one thing he’d been wondering about all day.

  Cara.

  Where was she?

  Chapter 37

  Fire is all around her.

  She stands in the middle of the burning street, the heart of the Haight lit up in the bright glow of flames. Inside the fiery circle, the street is alive with music and hilarity, guitar riffs and the thump of bass. The music overlaps, reggae, nouveau punk . . . the sidewalks pulse with it, while people dance in the street between the food carts and craft tables of jewelry and art and batik T-shirts and blown-glass drug paraphernalia.

  All of them completely oblivious to the flames around them, even though those on the periphery catch fire and flare up like paper.

  The walls of the shops are covered in a mural, a sprawling painted street scene that mirrors the live scene in front of it. A skeletal figure crowned in roses grins down from the mural, larger than life.

  As she looks up toward it, the painted figure raises a bony arm and points.

  Cara turns slowly to look.

  In the midst of the revelers is the girl with the flaming, flowering tattoos, dancing by herself in the crowded street, the tattoos on her back coming alive, a tree dropping blossoms of flame that fall from the girl’s skin and explode in sparks on the street.

  She watches as the girl twirls in a circle, laughing, shrieking. Suddenly the girl catches sight of her and stops her spinning. She smiles, a strange, high smile in the midst of that pounding street music . . .

  Then the street is gone, the fair is gone. There is just them, her and the girl and the flames, dancing higher and higher. They are in a cave . . . no, a tunnel . . . with the pimp’s body lying between them, facedown in his own blood, and flames crawling up the wall.

  Her heart is pounding in her chest, echoing in her ears. She stands in the darkness above the body, feet planted to hold herself up. The girl watches her with cat’s eyes.

  Behind her falls the towering shadow of a robed figure. Robed, with a crown of roses and a grinning skull of a face . . .

  She jerks awake, her heart still hammering.

  As she lies still, breathing shallowly, the smell of blood and death and fire fades.

  The bedclothes are drenched underneath her, but her cheeks are cool. The fever has broken. She remembers the jail cell, Kaz’s hacking cough—and understands she has been ill.

  She sits up slowly. The walls around her are gleaming oak panel and there is a fireplace, and heavy drapes at a recessed window with a window seat. Outside, the wind pushes at the panes of glass; she can hear it slipping like silk through trees.

  She cannot remember getting here, but it is too well appointed to be a motel. The pillows and mattress are high-quality, and the air has a subtle ginger and orange fragrance.

  Now she stands. Every inch of her body is aching, as if she ha
s been beaten, and she has to be still for a long moment, bracing her legs to stop the room from spinning.

  Fever. No food for . . . how long?

  There is no stench, though. She is not reeking of smoke or burned flesh. She is wearing only a T-shirt, and her hair smells of the ginger-orange fragrance. There has been a bath, a shower . . .

  She does not remember washing. But she remembers the street fair, and the girl dancing, and the cave and the ominous shadow of a robed figure. A dream . . . but that does not make it any less significant.

  She crosses shakily to the window, pulls open the drapes, and looks out on daylight. The hotel is perched high on a cliff. There are trees above, Monterey pine, and below, a crescent of ocean bay. North of San Francisco, she thinks. But not a place she immediately recognizes.

  She turns from the window, fighting a wave of nausea. She crosses to the writing desk and finds stationery from the hotel. Bodega Bay Inn.

  She does not know the inn, but she knows the place. She has gone north, then. She has no idea of the time frame. Last night? Days ago?

  The clothes she finds on the armchair are not the ones she wore to take care of the guard. There are jeans, a sweater, some low-heeled boots from the Berkeley thrift store where she found the lethal pillow. Obviously she changed sometime during the day and night she cannot remember.