by C. J. Lyons
Jennifer closed her eyes, her grip slipping away from Lucy’s hands, her chin sinking low onto her chest, her new reality too heavy to bear.
“I’ll stay as long as you like, answer any questions I can,” Lucy told her. Jennifer nodded, her eyes still shut. “Once they’ve finished processing all the evidence, getting a better picture of things, the state police and pathologist will also be happy to help. Whatever you need.”
The mother’s eyes snapped open, and Lucy wished she hadn’t added that last. Because no one on the face of the earth could give Jennifer Randall what she truly needed.
“What I need is my son. Home safe and sound,” she said. “Living the life he was meant to live. What I’ll settle for is finally seeing him buried, back home where he belongs. With us.”
Chapter Eleven
TK debated calling Lucy for help but decided not to. Just because her single cold case had now turned into four extremely cold probable-homicides, there was no reason she couldn’t handle things.
Instead, she asked Wash, their tech analyst back in their offices at Beacon Falls, to make sure Tommy, their medical expert, freed up time tomorrow to go over all the medical findings with Madsen. By then, she hoped the forensic anthropologist would be able to give them a better idea of what they were dealing with. If she knew how their four victims had died, not to mention basic info like sex, estimated age, and ethnicity, it would help her find out who they were.
“Three people dead in a trunk and another handcuffed up front?” Wash asked breathlessly.
TK secretly suspected Wash of using their cases as fodder for retro-noir pulp graphic novels or maybe as the storyline of a video game. He got so excited and caught up in each one, despite the fact that he had the most boring job imaginable: cranking info through the computer. He never went into the field. Although she’d heard Valencia and Lucy both offer to accommodate his wheelchair, he always declined. TK wasn’t sure she’d ever understand him; she’d die if she were trapped behind a computer day in and out, but she couldn’t do her job without him.
“Is this another serial killer, you think?”
“I don’t think anything yet,” she said, mimicking Lucy’s prim and proper tone. After fifteen years with the FBI, Lucy was a stickler for procedure—at least in her underlings. TK noticed that Lucy somehow seemed to ignore all the rules whenever she liked.
“I’m running with everything I have. Detective Karlan sent me all the identification numbers he could find on the car, and I’ve been going through all the uploaded photos and videos, looking for anything to ID our victims.”
“There was a badge in the front seat.”
“Like a police badge?”
“Maybe. Who knows, could be a food inspector found too many rats. Or it could be fake. As soon as we get it cleaned up, I’ll send you pictures.”
“Yeah, but, if it was someone official and they went missing, then there has to be a trail I can find. That kind of story is going to make it to newspapers, police bulletins, church newsletters, police fundraisers for family left behind… It’s the kind of thing an entire community would get involved with. Even after so many years, there’s bound to be some kind of digital footprint left behind.” His keys chattered happily, excited by a new direction to pursue. “I’ll call if I find anything.” He hung up.
Wash was on the case. Which meant there was nothing more for her to do until Madsen was done and TK could start to examine what little evidence the car had given them. Corroded bits and pieces of the lives that had been lost. That was all she had to forge a trail into the past and discover what had happened sixty-three years ago.
She pulled her phone free. No, she was not going to admit defeat and call Lucy just because her case had grown tangled and complicated. But there was someone else used to putting together timeworn puzzles who might help. She dialed David Ruiz.
“Hey, Ms. Lead Investigator,” he answered. His voice was a tinny monotone, the cell phone stripping it of what little affect it strived for. From the way the sound echoed, she thought he was probably in his car, heading out to a new story for the national crime blog he worked for now that his career as a TV investigative reporter had ended. “Tell me about this big case that cut our weekend short.”
“I left early to give you time to recuperate. Figured you’d need it after Friday and Saturday night.”
“Not to mention Sunday morning.” A traumatic brain injury while embedded with troops in Afghanistan had left David without the ability to express or understand verbal emotions, but despite the fact that his voice never changed inflection, she knew he was grinning.
“Actually, it worked out okay,” he continued. “I’m on my way to Pennsylvania to cover another officer-involved shooting protest. This time the Klan, neo-Nazis, and Tea-Partyers are organizing a counter-protest to the Black Lives Matter folks. Poor little town, middle of nowhere. It’s never gonna know what hit it.”
She frowned. “You’re coming to Greer?”
“Yeah. How’d you know? The story just hit our radar after the FBI announced it was performing its own independent investigation no matter what the local grand jury’s verdict is. And my sources say there might be public corruption involved. Maybe the DA, maybe the cops, I’m not sure.” His words practically boomeranged against each other in his excitement.
“Greer is where my case is. But,” she warned him, “you can’t report on it or tell anyone I’m here.” Damn, she really wanted to ask him for advice, but how could she do that without breaking confidentiality?
“Tiffany, don’t be a tease.” David was the only person other than Valencia Frazier, owner of the Beacon Group, who ever called her by her given name. And he only got away with it when it was over the phone and she wasn’t close enough to punch him in the arm. “What’s the story—I mean case? You said it was really old, a body that was unidentified. Who’d you find?”
“I never should have said anything. Sorry.”
“Is it a criminal case?” he persisted. “Not just some old family bones folks forgot where they were buried? Was it murder? If so, I could help—write a story, get the word out, maybe help you get an ID. Who knows, maybe there’s something to this corruption charge and our stories are linked.” David didn’t believe in coincidences—neither did she, usually. But how the hell could a car filled with bodies from the 1950s be linked to a grand jury hearing now?
“I doubt that. My case is from sixty-some years ago. Besides, we’re not that far along yet. I’ve only been here a few hours.”
“More than enough time. I’ve seen what you can do in a few hours. Didn’t take you much longer than that to find the evidence we needed to free my father from prison.”
She had to smile at his faith in her crime-solving abilities. “Not this time. In fact, that’s why I called. Off the record,” she stressed, “how would you go about identifying someone from sixty-three years ago?”
“Sixty-three years? Like,” he paused to calculate, “1954?”
“We think. Maybe late 1953. I don’t have anything paper, so no ID or business cards. What I do have is a car. Registered in Washington DC in 1953. Wash is running a search on the serial numbers and license plate, looking for an owner.”
“DC? And the car was found in Greer? It’s pretty much the middle of nowhere now, couldn’t have been a popular destination back then. Maybe they got lost?”
Wouldn’t explain the handcuffs or three bodies in the trunk, but she couldn’t tell him that—it would be like offering a tiger catnip. She’d seen David on the prowl for a story; he could follow the slightest scent to uncover all sorts of treasure caches of buried truths. If it wasn’t for the need to keep the investigation quiet, his help could be invaluable. Maybe if she hit a dead end, she could convince the mayor that a little publicity, done with discretion by the right reporter, could be helpful.
“You’re not going to find any computer DMV records from that long ago,” he continued. “But maybe Wash can work with classic car coll
ectors? They have all sorts of online communities that might help him trace the car’s origins. Narrow your geographic search?”
“He’s already on it. What we have so far doesn’t match any missing persons cases in our database, any ideas on where to find paper records?” That had been one of Valencia’s greatest accomplishments at Beacon Falls: consolidating the myriad of government and NGO data collections into an easily searchable information clearinghouse.
“Sure. Old newspaper archives. Look for stories of missing persons and don’t forget to check the personal ads—loved ones would often place ads hoping to get information. What else…if they were local I’d suggest old police blotter files. Some departments keep them for historical value. You might get lucky with DC; if the person was ever reported missing there, they might still have records archived, but with a tiny town like Greer, I doubt it. Especially if the missing person was from out of town; none of the locals might even have known them at all.”
“Which means if they were reported missing in DC, that fact might have never made it to Pennsylvania, much less a tiny police department like Greer. So, if they weren’t local, just passing through, no one local would have known to look.” TK thought about that. Still didn’t explain their police officer victim—no way would a DC cop drive to a place like Greer in his private vehicle while still in uniform.
“Was it a homicide? Maybe Greer was just a convenient, quiet dumping ground.”
TK thought about that. Maybe the police officer—or whatever kind of law enforcement officer he ended up being—was local, maybe the car belonged to one of the victims in the trunk, and the cop was just in the wrong place, wrong time, saw something he shouldn’t have? But then why wasn’t he reported missing?
“That’s your Venn diagram,” he said. “Greer crossed with DC. Find who fits that intersection and you can narrow your search.”
“Thanks, David.”
She started to hang up, but he said, “Hey, if we’re both in the same town, what about getting together later? I promise I won’t ask about your top secret case—at least not on the record.”
“Call me.” She hung up, slid her phone into her pocket and began the laborious process of struggling back into her sweat-soaked protective clothing. She glanced toward the tent where she’d left the badge with one of Madsen’s students. Madsen had warned her it was a slow process, removing the decayed debris without destroying the brittle metal underlying it, but surely they had to have something she could use to track down her handcuffed front seat passenger.
Her cop turned prisoner. He was the key, she was certain.
Chapter Twelve
“I changed my mind,” Karlan told TK as she returned to the heat and humidity trapped beneath the canopy. “I’m going back to my original theory of suicide. Three bodies in the trunk makes the sonofabitch a serial killer. I think he was only impersonating a cop, using a fake badge to lure his victims, but after he killed them, he felt enough remorse to kill himself.”
“Maybe they were all victims; our actor just ran out of room in the trunk.”
“Then why the handcuffs?”
“Maybe they weren’t dead before the car went into the quarry,” TK suggested. Hard to tell in the glare of the work lights and with his dark skin, but she swore his lips went pale at the suggestion.
“Can you imagine? Watching, seeing the water rush up at you, not able to do a damn thing about it? Or worse, being trapped in a trunk, no light, no one to hear your screams…” He shook his head, a muffled curse escaping. “I want to get this SOB. I don’t care if he’s been dead fifty years, I still want to nail his ass, let people know what he did.”
“What who did?” a voice came from behind them. TK turned, surprised to see Grayson Greer standing there, his white shirt still buttoned up to the top button, not a trace of sweat blemishing its pristine cloth. Unlike her own most decidedly wrinkled and sweaty appearance. “What did you find?”
“What are you doing here, Grayson?” Karlan said. TK detected a hint of disdain in his tone for the mayor’s son. “This is a crime scene.”
He used the bulk of his body to back the younger man up beyond the canopy. TK followed them outside, grateful for the chance to unzip her Tyvek suit and shuck the constraining hood.
Grayson didn’t seem to take offense at Karlan’s tone. “Dad sent me to get you. Didn’t want to say anything over the radio or phone, but the grand jury is coming back with their verdict on Jefferson. He’s thinking of announcing it this afternoon. He wants every available officer there.”
“I can’t leave. This is an active investigation.”
“It’s a sixty-year-old cold case. Dad said your boss said you and the patrol officer need to get back now. The officer driving the tow truck can maintain the chain of custody for the car, and Dr. Madsen will take care of the rest of the evidence. Dad said it’s just a matter of paperwork anyway.”
“Paperwork that can get a case thrown out before you even go to court,” TK protested.
“Dad doubts a case this old will ever make it to court.”
TK wondered if Grayson had a thought in his head that wasn’t put there by his father. Seemed like the mayor didn’t trust her to do her job without someone holding her leash. The thought rankled, but she kept her expression bland. Leashes could pull in both directions—and they were apt to tangle and trip the ones who thought they were in control.
“Anyway,” Grayson continued in an officious tone, “I’m here now to escort Miss O’Connor.”
Karlan frowned. “Go,” TK told him. “I’ll let you know when we find anything.”
“I’ll catch you up later.” With a curt nod to Grayson, he stripped free of his Tyvek and trudged back to his squad car.
“So, what did you find?” Grayson asked eagerly. “The Lindbergh baby? Jimmy Hoffa?”
“Worse. A possible serial killer.” Let him run to daddy with that little tidbit of a shocker. Only thing worse for a town’s image than a collection of unidentified bodies was a serial killer stalking the town, getting away with murder.
“A serial killer? Here? No way.” He shook his head in disbelief. “Nothing that exciting ever happens in Greer. What makes you think we had a serial killer?”
“We found four bodies in that car.”
“Really? Can I see?”
“Can’t risk contaminating the evidence.” She looked past him as Madsen emerged from the canopy, sipping at a bottle of water. “How’s it going?”
“Definitely four sets of remains. We’ve gathered all of the major bones—in cases like this, there are often smaller bones missing. Sometimes dissolved by the elements, or just lost in the debris. But I think we’ve gotten all we can.”
TK nodded—she’d seen how painstakingly careful Madsen’s students had been as they sieved the water and combed through the car. “You okay to release the car, then?”
“Yes. I’ll transport the human remains and the other evidence back to my lab. Should have some preliminary results later today or tonight—at the very least, sex, size, ethnicity, maybe even approximate age.”
“It’ll be a start.” TK’s job had just gotten that much more difficult, now with four victims to identify rather than one. But having four times the data might help as well. “What about the badge I found?”
“We cleaned it as best we could. Looks like it’s from Greer.” Madsen handed TK a clear plastic evidence bag. Grayson peered over TK’s shoulder, staring at the decades-old badge.
“No name or number on it,” TK said. Of course not. That’d be too much to ask for. But, knowing the police officer was local at least gave her a starting place.
“That’s not how our badges look,” Grayson protested. “Maybe it’s a fake.”
“It’s from the 1950s,” Madsen told him, annoyance in her voice. TK had a feeling that the coroner had been forced to tolerate Grayson’s babysitting before and liked it even less than she did. “Good chance the city has changed its design at least once since then.�
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TK handed the evidence bag back to Madsen then peeled the rest of her Tyvek overalls off, rolling the sticky, sweaty mess into a ball. “Let me grab my gear, and I’ll head out with the tow truck.”
“I can drive you,” Grayson volunteered. “Sounds like you’ll need another pair of hands anyway. My summer internship is with my dad’s office, and he assigned me to liaison between his office and the police. Another reason why my dad sent me to help out.”
That and to make sure TK kept quiet about the case, she thought. She wasn’t sure how much longer it would be before someone leaked info, despite the mayor’s wishes. A vehicle with an occupant who’d driven into the quarry sixty years ago was one thing…four victims of what had to be foul play was entirely another.
In the meantime, she was stuck with Grayson. It was damned irritating that he always seemed to be rescuing her—in his mind, at least. She hadn’t asked for his help, yet they were now somehow partners in all this.
“Let’s go,” TK said to Grayson.
Madsen finished her water. “We’re heading back to the lab. Hopefully more will come to light once we’ve finished drying the organic material.” The stuff that used to be cloth, paper, and cardboard, TK translated. “Our best bet will be the bones, but tell the mayor, it will take time.”
One of the students called to Madsen from where they were packing up the van. She nodded to TK, then left.
The tow truck drove out, stopping in front of TK and Grayson. The car had been secured beneath a tarp, protecting it from the elements as much as possible during the trip to the police garage.
“You riding with me?” the driver asked. The coroner’s ambulance pulled up behind him, leaving only the students in charge of removing the canopy and TK and Grayson left to leave.
“No, I’m taking her,” Grayson answered for TK. “We’ll meet you there.”
The truck and ambulance drove off, a cloud of dust billowing behind them. TK gathered her belongings and Grayson led her to his car, an anonymous silver Ford Taurus. Inside, the center console was crowded with a police scanner and radio. Grayson took his duties as an intern seriously.