by Blake Pierce
Riley was shocked. “What happened to her?”
“Well, Trip eventually got busted, and Angie wound up in a drug rehab center. That was just this summer while we were in Upstate New York. I don’t know what happened to her after that. All I know is that she’s just sixteen now and her life is ruined.”
“I’m so sorry to hear that,” Riley said.
April groaned with impatience.
“You really don’t get it, do you, Mom? You’ve got nothing to be sorry for. You’ve spent your whole life stopping this kind of thing. And you’ve put away all kinds of guys like Trip—some of them forever. But if you stop doing what you do best, who’s going to take over for you? Somebody as good at it as you? I doubt it, Mom. I really doubt it.”
Riley fell silent for a moment. Then with a smile, she squeezed April’s hand tightly.
“I think I’ve got a phone call to make,” she said.
Chapter Seven
As the FBI jet lifted off from Quantico, Riley felt sure that she was on her way to face yet another monster. She was deeply uneasy at the thought. She had been hoping to stay away from killers for a while, but taking this job had finally seemed like the right thing to do. Meredith had been clearly relieved when she’d said she would go.
That morning, April had left on her field trip, and now Riley and Bill were on their way to Phoenix. Outside the airplane window the afternoon had turned dark, and rain streaked across the glass. Riley stayed strapped into her seat until the plane had made its way through rough-and-tumble gray clouds and into clearer air above. Then a cushiony surface spread out beneath them, hiding the earth where people were probably scurrying about to stay dry. And, Riley thought, going about their everyday pleasures or horrors or whatever lay in between.
As soon as the ride smoothed out, Riley turned to Bill and asked, “What have you got to show me?”
Bill flipped open his laptop on the table in front of them. He brought up a photo of a large black garbage bag barely submerged in shallow water. A dead white hand could be seen poking out of the bag’s opening.
Bill explained, “The body of Nancy Holbrook was found in an artificial lake in the reservoir system outside of Phoenix. She was a thirty-year-old escort with an expensive service. In other words, a pricey prostitute.”
“Did she drown?” Riley asked.
“No. Asphyxiation seems to have been the cause of death. Then she was stuffed into a heavy-duty garbage bag and dumped into the lake. The garbage bag was weighted with large rocks.”
Riley studied the photo closely. A lot of questions were already forming in her mind.
“Did the killer leave any physical evidence?” she asked. “Prints, fibers, DNA?”
“Not a thing.”
Riley shook her head. “I don’t get it. The disposal of the body, I mean. Why didn’t the killer go to just a little more trouble? A freshwater lake is perfect for getting rid of a body. Corpses sink and decompose fast in fresh water. Sure, they might resurface later on because of bloating and gases. But enough rocks in the bag would solve that problem. Why leave her in shallow water?”
“I guess it’s up to us to figure that out,” Bill said.
Bill brought up several other photos of the crime scene, but they didn’t tell Riley much.
“So what do you think?” she said. “Are we dealing with a serial or aren’t we?”
Bill’s knitted his brow in thought.
“I don’t know,” he said. “Really, we’re just looking at a single murdered prostitute. Sure, other prostitutes have disappeared in Phoenix. But that’s nothing new. That happens routinely in every major city in the country.”
The word “routinely” struck an uncomfortable chord with Riley. How could the ongoing disappearance of a certain class of women be considered “routine”? Still, she knew that what Bill was saying was true.
“When Meredith phoned, he made it sound urgent,” she said. “And now he’s even giving us the VIP treatment, flying us directly there on a BAU jet.” She thought back for a moment. “His exact words were that his friend wanted us to look into it as the work of a serial killer. But you sound like nobody’s sure it is a serial.”
Bill shrugged. “It might not be. But Meredith seems to be really close to Nancy Holbrook’s brother, Garrett Holbrook.”
“Yeah,” Riley said. “He told me they went to the academy together. But this whole thing is unusual.”
Bill didn’t argue. Riley leaned back in her seat and considered the situation. It seemed pretty obvious that Meredith was bending FBI rules as a favor to a friend. That wasn’t typical of Meredith at all.
But this didn’t make her think any less of her boss. Actually, she really admired his devotion to his friend. She wondered …
Is there anybody I’d bend the rules for? Bill, maybe?
He’d been more than a partner over the years, and more than even a friend. Even so, Riley wasn’t sure. And that made her wonder—just how close did she feel to any of her coworkers these days, including Bill?
But there didn’t seem much point in thinking about it now. Riley closed her eyes and went to sleep.
*
It was a bright sunny day when they landed in Phoenix.
As they got off the jet, Bill nudged her and said, “Wow, great weather. Maybe at least we’ll get a little vacation out of this trip.”
Somehow, Riley doubted that it was going to be a lot of fun. It had been a long time since she’d taken a real vacation. Her last attempt at an outing in New York with April had been cut short by the usual murder and mayhem that was such a big part of her life.
One of these days, I need to get some real rest, she thought.
A young local agent met them at the plane and drove them to the Phoenix FBI field office, a striking new modern building. As he pulled the car into the Bureau parking lot, he commented, “Cool design, isn’t it? Even won some kind of award. Can you guess what it’s supposed to look like?”
Riley looked over the facade. It was all straight, long rectangles and narrow vertical windows. Everything was carefully placed and the pattern seemed familiar. She stopped and stared at it for a moment.
“DNA sequencing?” she asked.
“Yep,” the agent said. “But I’ll bet you can’t guess what the rock maze over there looks like from above.”
But they walked into the building before Riley or Bill could hazard a guess. Inside, Riley saw the DNA motif repeated in the sharply patterned floor tiles. The agent led them among severe-looking horizontal walls and partitions until they reached the office of Special Agent in Charge Elgin Morley, then left them there.
Riley and Bill introduced themselves to Morley, a small, bookish man in his fifties with a thick black mustache and round glasses. Another man was awaiting them in the office. He was in his forties, tall, gaunt, and slightly hunched. Riley thought he looked tired and depressed.
Morley said, “Agents Paige and Jeffreys, I’d like you to meet Agent Garrett Holbrook. His sister was the victim who was found in Nimbo Lake.”
Hands were shaken all around, and the four agents sat down to talk.
“Thank you for coming,” Holbrook said. “This whole thing has been pretty overwhelming.”
“Tell us about your sister,” Riley said.
“I can’t tell you much,” Holbrook said. “I can’t say I knew her very well. She was my half-sister. My dad was a philandering jerk, left my mom and had children with three different women. Nancy was fifteen years younger than me. We barely had contact over the years.”
He stared blankly at the floor for a moment, his fingers picking absent-mindedly at the arm of his chair. Then without looking up he said, “The last I heard from her, she was doing office work and taking classes at a community college. That was a few years ago. I was shocked to find out what had become of her. I had no idea.”
Then he fell silent. Riley thought he looked like he was leaving something unsaid, but she told herself that maybe that was really all th
e man knew. After all, what could Riley say about her own older sister if anyone asked her? She and Wendy had been out of contact for so long that they might as well not be sisters at all.
Even so, she sensed something more than grief in Holbrook’s demeanor. It struck her as odd.
Morley suggested that Riley and Bill go with him to Forensic Pathology, where they could take a look at the body. Holbrook nodded and said that he’d be in his office.
As they followed the Agent in Charge down the hall, Bill asked, “Agent Morley, what reason is there for thinking we’re dealing with a serial killer?”
Morley shook his head. “I’m not sure we’ve got much of a reason,” he said. “But when Garrett found out about Nancy’s death, he refused to leave it alone. He’s one of our best agents, and I’ve tried to accommodate him. He tried to get his own investigation underway, but didn’t get anywhere. The truth is, he hasn’t been himself this whole while.”
Riley had certainly noticed that Garrett seemed to be terribly unsettled. Perhaps a little more so than a seasoned agent would usually be, even over a relative’s death. He’d made it clear that they weren’t close.
Morley led Riley and Bill into the building’s Forensic Pathology area, where he introduced them to its team chief, Dr. Rachel Fowler. The pathologist pulled open the refrigerated unit where Nancy Holbrook’s body was being kept.
Riley winced a little at the familiar odor of decomposition, even though the smell hadn’t gotten very strong yet. She saw that the woman had been short of stature and very thin.
“She hadn’t been in the water long,” Fowler said. “The skin was just beginning to wrinkle when she was found.”
Dr. Fowler pointed to her wrists.
“You can see rope burns. It looks like she was bound when she was killed.”
Riley noticed raised marks on the crook of the corpse’s arm.
“These look like track marks,” Riley said.
“Right. She was using heroin. My guess was that she was slipping into serious addiction.”
It looked to Riley like the woman had been anorexic, and that seemed consistent with Fowler’s addiction theory.
“That kind of addiction seems out of place for a high-class escort,” Bill said. “How do we know that’s what she was?”
Fowler produced a laminated business card in a plastic evidence bag. It had a provocative photo of the dead woman on it. The name on the card was simply “Nanette,” and the business was called “Ishtar Escorts.”
“This card was on her when she was found,” Fowler explained. “The police got in touch with Ishtar Escorts and found out her real name, and that soon led to identifying her as Agent Holbrook’s half-sister.”
“Any idea how she was asphyxiated?” Riley asked.
“There’s some bruising around her neck,” Fowler said. “The killer might have held a plastic bag over her head.”
Riley looked closely at the marks. Was this some kind of a sex game gone wrong, or a deliberate act of murder? She couldn’t yet tell.
“What did she have on when she was found?” Riley asked.
Fowler opened up a box that contained the victim’s clothing. She had been wearing a pink dress with a low neckline—barely respectable, Riley observed, but definitely a notch above a streetwalker’s typical trashy attire. It was the dress of a woman who wanted to look both very sexy and suitably attired for nightclubs.
Nestled on top of the dress was a clear plastic bag of jewelry.
“May I have a look?” Riley asked Fowler.
“Go right ahead.”
Riley took out the bag and looked at the contents. Most of it was fairly tasteful costume jewelry—a beaded necklace and bracelets and simple earrings. But one item stood out among the rest. It was a slender gold ring with a diamond setting. She picked it up and showed it to Bill.
“Real?” Bill asked.
“Yes,” Fowler replied. “Real gold and a real diamond.”
“The killer didn’t bother to steal it,” Bill commented. “So this wasn’t about money.”
Riley turned to Morley. “I’d like to see where the body was found,” she said. “Right now, while it’s still light.”
Morley looked a bit puzzled.
“We can get you there by helicopter,” he said. “But I don’t know what you expect to find. Cops and agents have been all over the site.”
“Trust her,” Bill said knowingly. “She’ll find out something.”
Chapter Eight
The broad surface of Nimbo Lake looked still and tranquil as the helicopter approached it.
But looks can fool you, Riley reminded herself. She knew well that calm surfaces could guard dark secrets.
The helicopter descended, then wobbled as it hovered in search of a place to land. Riley felt a little queasy from the unsteady movement. She didn’t much like helicopters. She looked at Bill, who was sitting next to her. She thought he looked equally uneasy.
But when she glanced over at Agent Holbrook, his face seemed blank to her. He had barely said a word during the half-hour flight from Phoenix. Riley didn’t yet know what to make of him. She was used to reading people easily—sometimes too easily for her own comfort. But Holbrook still struck her as an enigma.
The helicopter finally touched down, and all three FBI agents stepped out onto solid ground, ducking through the churning air under the still-spinning blades. The road where the chopper had landed was nothing more than parallel tire tracks through the desert weeds.
Riley observed that the road didn’t look heavily used. Even so, it appeared that enough vehicles had passed over it during the past week to conceal any tracks left by whatever the killer had been driving.
The noisy helicopter engine died down, making it easier to talk as Riley and Bill followed Holbrook on foot.
“Tell us what you can about this lake,” Riley said to Holbrook.
“It’s one of a series of reservoirs created by dams along the Acacia River,” Holbrook said. “This is the smallest of the artificial lakes. It’s stocked with fish, and it’s a popular recreation spot, but the public areas are on the other side of the lake. The body was discovered by a couple of teenagers stoned on pot. I’ll show you where.”
Holbrook led them off the road to a stone ridge overlooking the lake.
“The kids were right where we’re standing,” he said. He pointed down to the edge of the lake. “They looked down there and saw it. They said that it just looked like a dark shape in the water.”
“What time of day were the kids here?” Riley asked.
“A little earlier than it is right now,” Holbrook said. “They had cut school and gotten stoned.”
Riley took in the whole scene. The sun was low, and the tops of the red rock cliffs across the lake were ablaze with light. There were a couple of boats out on the water. The sheer drop from the ridge down to the water wasn’t far—a mere ten feet, maybe.
Holbrook pointed to a place nearby where the slope wasn’t as steep.
“The kids climbed down over there to get a closer look,” he said. “That’s when they found out what it really was.”
Poor kids, Riley thought. It had been some two decades since she’d tried marijuana back in college. Even so, she could well imagine the heightened horror of making such a discovery while under the influence.
“Do you want to climb down there for a closer look?” Bill asked Riley.
“No, it’s a good view from here,” Riley said.
Her gut told her that she was right where she needed to be. After all, the killer surely hadn’t lugged the body down the same slope where the kids had gone down.
No, she thought. He stood right here.
It even looked like the sparse vegetation was still broken down a little where she was standing.
She took a few breaths, trying to slip into his point of view. He’d undoubtedly come here at night. But was it a clear night or a cloudy one? Well, in Arizona at this time of year, the chances were that the
night was clear. And she recalled that the moon would have been bright about a week ago. In the starlight and moonlight, he could have seen what he was doing pretty well—possibly even without a flashlight.
She imagined him putting the body down right here. But then what had he done next? Obviously he had rolled the body off the ledge. It had fallen straight down into the shallow water.
But something about this scenario struck Riley as wrong. She wondered again, as she had on the plane, how he could have been so careless.
True, from up here on the ledge, he probably couldn’t have seen that the body hadn’t sunk very far. The kids had described the bag as “a dark shape in the water.” From this height, the submerged bag had likely been invisible even on a bright night. He’d assumed that the body had sunk, as newly dead bodies do in fresh water, especially when weighted down with stones.
But why did he suppose that the water was deep right here?
She peered down into the clear water. In the late afternoon light, she could easily see the submerged ledge where the body had landed. It was a small horizontal area, nothing more than the top of a boulder. Around it, the water was black and deep.
She looked around the lake. Sheer cliffs jutted up everywhere out of the water. She could see that Nimbo Lake had been a deep canyon before the dam had filled it with water. She saw only a few places where one could walk along the shoreline. The cliff sides dropped straight down into the depths.
To her right and left, Riley saw ridges that were similar to the one where they were standing, rising to about the same height. The water beneath those cliffs was dark, showing no signs of the kind of ledge that lay below right here.
She felt a tingle of comprehension.
“He’s done this before,” she told Bill and Holbrook. “There’s another body in this lake.”
*
On the helicopter ride back to the FBI Phoenix Division headquarters, Holbrook said, “So you think this is a serial case after all?”