The Omega Team: In the Eyes of the Dead (Kindle Worlds Novella) (Ryker Townsend Book 3)

by Jordan Dane

  He fixed his eyes on me and said, “What are you investigating? Is she in trouble?”

  I gave serious thought to ignoring his questions. Interviews were generally one-way affairs, but something in his eyes made me hesitate.

  “She’s a material witness in one of our cases,” I said. “Did you know Allison Barstow?”

  He shook his head.

  “Should I?”

  I shrugged.

  “Allison died. We’re investigating her death.”

  Guzman hesitated.

  “She’s the girl killed at that bonfire,” he said. “I heard about it on TV. I thought it was an accident.”

  I’d answered enough of his questions. Time for a pivot.

  “Tell me about the project Selina Madero is doing for your shelter—the video project.”

  The change in subject stopped him cold.

  “That’s Selina’s question to answer. I won’t betray her by speaking of it without her blessing.”

  “You’re not a priest anymore.” Crowley interrupted. “Whatever she told you, I’m sure it wasn’t done in the confessional.”

  Guzman gritted his teeth and glared at her. In that moment, it was easier picturing the man as a gangbanger than a priest.

  “You haven’t given me any reason to betray her confidence,” he said. “I’ll take her side over yours any day.”

  His loyalty either spoke volumes of good for Selina or they both were hiding something. I couldn’t be sure if I trusted a defrocked priest booted out of the church for reasons I didn’t know.

  “I get that you trust her with a key and she does good work here. You’re loyal and you want to protect her, but she’s a suspect in a girl’s murder,” I said. “You could help her by telling us the truth. If we can rule her out, that’ll be good for her.”

  The man did not budge. His eyes shifted between Crowley and me, unflappable. I needed to reach him before he shut us down completely.

  “I think Selina Madero is caught in the middle of something,” I said, softening my voice. “She’s hiding a secret that, to her, is worth holding back, but her behavior and yours makes her look guilty. If you know something that could help her, now would be the time to say it.”

  He clenched his jaw.

  “Sorry. I think we’re done here.”

  “I hoped we could take a tour of the facility,” Crowley said.

  “Not if you’re going to hassle my kids.”

  “We’re not here for that,” she said. “We want a sense of what Selina does, that’s all.”

  “No. You’ll need a warrant.” He waved a hand toward the door. “If you’ll excuse me, I have things to do.”

  The man escorted us to the parking lot, glowering as we got into the SUV. The young men hanging outside the shelter came to him and after he said something, they watched us leave. I had a feeling we would not be welcomed back, not without a warrant.

  “We got the bum’s rush. He sure slammed us down hard on Selina. He’s covering for her, but why?” Crowley asked.

  “I don’t know but we’ll find out,” I said. “Have Hutch look into Care House to see if they use Toluene to tan their hides. I have a hunch.”

  Pieces were falling together, but what we’d learned raised more questions about Selina. I glanced down at the time on the dash. We’d done all the damage we could do today, but I had a long evening ahead. I had the case files for the other murders. If I found a common link between those investigations and Allison Barstow’s death, I wondered if I would have more questions for Selina.

  Something unsettling burrowed under my skin as I drove to our motel. I didn’t like the feeling.

  ***

  Minutes later

  Athena Madero kept her distance as she followed the two FBI agents. She’d been a cop and with the training she had under the Omega Team, she knew how to keep a low profile and do a proper surveillance. She slowed the truck she’d borrowed from a cop she knew—a vehicle with local plates—and kept several cars between them.

  She’d expected the FBI to question Allison Barstow’s girlfriends and a guy she’d dated, but when they came to Care House—a teen shelter tied to Selina—Athena had a bad feeling.

  She’d used her connections inside the local PD and the Medical Examiner’s office. Instinct told her the Barstow girl’s death would not be ruled accidental. Townsend and Crowley were still looking at her niece for what appeared to be a murder.

  Athena gripped the steering wheel tighter as she made another turn, following the Feds back to a familiar residential neighborhood. When they rolled up to a guard station, Athena knew she couldn’t follow without drawing attention. She drove down the block and pulled out her phone to make a call to her sister.

  “Hello?”

  “Elisa, it’s me,” she said. “What can you tell me about the Care House Teen Shelter? That’s the place Selina volunteers, right?”

  “Yeah. What’s this about?”

  “Tell me everything you know. I need to stay ahead of this thing.”

  Athena saw no point in sharing her suspicions with Elisa. Her sister was worried enough over her only daughter, but something had changed between them. Athena had a gut wrenching feeling Elisa carried a dark secret—about Selina.

  ***

  Rancho Viejo Resort and Country Club

  8:30 pm

  Ryker Townsend

  ‘She has an altar in her basement. It’s hidden, but she showed me once.’

  Mia’s words had stayed with me ever since I’d heard her admit Allison Barstow had a Santería altar hidden in her basement. From what I knew of the Barstow girl’s life, I expected her to have an old bicycle in the garage, an obsession with pink hearts and a profuse supply of glittered tees in the attic. In her bedroom, I imagined I’d see every nail polish color invented and hair products I never knew existed.

  I have a sister. I know these things.

  What I wouldn’t have expected her to have was an Afro-Caribbean religious altar—something grown out of the slave trade in Cuba. That didn’t add up and I had to find out why.

  I pulled up to the guard station at the entrance to the gated community. Crowley had contacted the Brownsville PD and made an appointment for us to visit the Barstow home. Detective Ramirez had promised to meet us. The family had given the detective a house key after they decided to visit close friends who lived an hour away in McAllen. Hutch and Cam were on their way. We would have the house to ourselves.

  Crowley followed me upstairs to look at Allison’s bedroom. The room had been cleaned. Nothing appeared out of order or unusual. I imagined Allison’s mother and father found it hard to clean a room, knowing their only girl would not be coming home. The sharp edge of their sadness gripped me. My gift had made me more sensitive to the lingering emotions adrift where human beings existed.

  “Pretty normal girl’s bedroom,” Crowley said. “You ready for the basement?”

  “Yeah.” I turned out the lights and closed the door behind me, leaving the room as we’d found it.

  The basement in the Barstow house wasn’t what I’d expected. It had been fully renovated with very upscale finishes. I didn’t see where Allison could easily hide a worship altar, knowing she wouldn’t want her parents to find it. I let my mind work the puzzle and ignored the obvious things in front of my eyes.

  I gravitated toward the dark—the home theatre.

  When we stepped into the sound proof room, the silence closed in. I fumbled for the lights and found floor LEDs that looked like an airport runway. I glanced over my shoulder and caught Crowley’s eye. I would need her female perspective.

  “Think like a teenage girl.”

  “Oh you don’t want me to do that.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because I’d leave right now and hit the mall before it closes.”

  I pursed my lips and nodded.

  “Good point.”

  Crowley ran her hand along the wall and tapped with her knuckles, hoping to find a hidd
en compartment. I took a different approach. I headed for the darkest location in the room and searched it thoroughly.

  Near the home theatre, behind the movie screen, I found a door I hadn’t expected. I thought it might’ve been a storage unit for the theatre, but when I opened it, I discovered wooden stairs. A cold chill swept up from the lower level. It smelled musty and humid.

  “I have something,” I called out to Crowley.

  After I flipped a light switch, only a dim bulb cast enough glow to see to the base of the stairs.

  “Real cozy…” Crowley peered over my shoulder and grimaced. “…if you’re Dracula.”

  “Watch your step going down.” I grabbed her hand and led the way.

  I found another exposed light bulb and turned it on. Only meager light stretched eerie shadows across the room. A rank stench made it hard to breathe. Crowley reached for her Kel-light and a beam swept the room.

  In the darkest, most cramped place in the basement, we found a likely hiding spot for a teen girl—under the staircase. A parent had no reason to crawl into such a tight space.

  “Give me your flashlight.”

  When she handed over her Kel-light, I crawled into the cramped space and the rank smell of old death hit my nostrils. I discovered a small wooden chest with religious symbols marring the walls. On the stone floor at the base was a white chalk drawing. I’d never seen it before.

  “Take a picture of these markings. They could be Santería symbols, but nothing I’ve seen before.”

  “Yeah. You got it.” She took photos with her cell phone. “Doesn’t look Feng Shui approved.”

  I sighed. Crowley told me her understanding of Feng Shui once. She said, ‘It’s when you move your furniture the wrong way and your grandmother dies.’

  “Keen observation, but this has to be her altar.”

  I opened the cabinet and the flashlight flooded the compartment. Tiny skulls of mice or rats were piled in a corner. Candles melted from use, had dripped across the wood shelves inside. The odor of death came from shriveled chicken feet and blood had dried into a rust-colored stain near a makeshift altar.

  What I found on that wooden pedestal shocked me.

  A printed photo of Selina Madero held a prominent spot on Allison’s altar. From the pins in Selina’s eyes—and what appeared to be blood draining from the punctures—I sensed an acute malevolence, a similar darkness that had invaded my sleep before the case began. The Barstow girl had targeted Selina Madero with what looked like a malicious curse.

  “See if Hutch and Cam are here. Have them dust for prints and test these spots for dried blood.”

  Allison Barstow had been into the darker side of Santería—Palo Mayombe—but did Selina know she’d been cursed? The Madero girl had witnessed the religious rituals at Allison’s party in the woods. Had she gone there to record it on video, to expose her? Or had she struck back at the bonfire because she believed Allison could do her harm?

  I didn’t believe in curses, but a young vulnerable girl—overwrought from excessive bullying and in poor health from a nervous stomach—might’ve been very susceptible to such a terrifying mind game. Even Allison’s closest friends believed in her curses. Is that how she controlled other kids, to insure their loyalty and secrecy?

  In my line of work, I’d seen horrific cruelty when human beings preyed on their own kind. But was Selina Madero capable of murder? I had no idea.

  ***

  Courtyard Brownsville

  Hours later

  Ryker Townsend

  After we returned to our motel, I made excuses to be alone. Lucinda understood. Before she left my room, she kissed me long and hard with her hands finding the skin under my shirt. Her body nuzzled into mine and I held her until my brain almost switched to auto-pilot.

  Not even onion rings distracted me, until she finally pulled from my arms and let me go.

  “Goodnight. See you tomorrow,” she said. Her lips were plump and pink from our kiss and my eyes lingered on the blush to the skin at her neck.

  “Yeah. Tomorrow.” I touched her cheek and couldn’t take my eyes off her.

  I regretted my decision to work the instant I closed the door behind her, but I had no choice. If my gift gave me an advantage, I didn’t want to lose it because I had someone with me to divert my attention—and Lucinda wasn’t just anyone.

  I had to find something in the murder books to either tie the cases together or make a decision on whether or not we had a serial killer at work. With Dia de los Muertos coming tomorrow, if these deaths were related, the day of the dead would be too much temptation for a killer to resist.

  A clock ticked down in my head—a clock only I could hear.

  I grabbed a long hot shower, pulled on my jeans, and got to work. I collapsed onto the bed, with the murder books in my hands, and opened the first one. Taking in every detail, I couldn’t find where the detectives found a link between the earlier victims and the Barstow girl. The murders appeared random, yet my instinct told me otherwise.

  I reached for my cell phone and pulled it off its charger to make a call.

  “Sorry to bother you so late, Detective Ramirez, but I’m going over the murder books you gave me. Did your detectives find any links between the other victims and Allison Barstow? They’re similar in age and it’s a small town, but only one went to the same high school as the Barstow girl.

  “The Gillespie boy.”

  “Yes. He was shot with a .22 caliber weapon, in the heart,” I said. “He died at the scene when he bled out.”

  “Other than he went to the same school, we didn’t find a connection, no.”

  I pulled two folders out from the stack.

  “That leaves Jeremy Butler and Candace Peters. They went to the same church, it says in their files.” I flipped a page to look for the handwritten notation in the folder. “Sacred Heart Church of Brownsville.”

  “Allison and her family go to First Baptist. No connection.”

  The disappointment of finding no links between the prior victims and Allison Barstow weighed heavily until a memory tugged at me. I pictured a flickering votive candle and a church pamphlet for Sacred Heart Church of Brownsville in my mind’s eye. I’d seen the name of the church before—at the Madero house.

  “Did the Gillespie boy know Selina Madero, Detective?”

  “Not that I know of, but I can check with my detectives.”

  “Yeah, please do. It could be important.”

  I ended the call, but I wasn’t sure I needed confirmation. Gillespie and Barstow went to the same high school. Butler and Peters went to the same church.

  Only one person connected all the dots—Selina Madero. I wanted to question Selina again, but not before I had more answers. I read through the murder books with a renewed interest, looking for a pattern that would explain why. After another hour, I stopped and pinched the bridge of my nose when I came up empty.

  I shut my eyes for only a moment. Exhaustion did the rest.

  ***

  Next day

  6:10 am

  Ryker Townsend

  A grating sound yanked me from a dead sleep. The racket blared at my ear. I jerked my head and raised a hand, ready to fend off an attacker. After I cracked open my eyes, I was blinded.

  “What the hell.”

  The light by my bed had been left on. When I jolted upright, case files fell off my bare chest and landed onto the carpet of my motel room. It took me a moment to realize what had awakened me.

  My cell phone vibrated, clamoring on the wooden nightstand next to me, and I grabbed it.

  “H-hello?” I croaked and dragged a hand through my hair as another file slid off the bed. Photos of crime scenes and dead bodies were splayed across the bed. Opaque eyes stared back at me, with haunting facial expressions frozen in death—a harsh reality of my work.

  I glanced at the clock near my bed. Just after six. The sun wouldn’t be up for another hour.

  “It’s me.” Lucinda’s voice cut thro
ugh the fog in my brain. “We have another body. Detective Ramirez called. He’s on the scene and gave me the location. Hutch and Cam will meet us there.”

  I sat on the edge of the mattress, numbed by her news. Something made me ask, “Who’s dead? Do we have a name?”

  “Yeah, Justin Lutrell,” she said.

  The chess kid at the mall—Allison’s former boyfriend. I shut my eyes when the image of his face eased out of the shadows of my memory.

  “I’ll be ready in five.”

  Chapter 7

  Brownsville Memorial High School

  November 2

  6:45 am

  Ryker Townsend

  “Hutch sent me a text. He and Cam are already with the body. They’ve secured the scene.” Crowley said as we trekked across the parking lot.

  “Good. We’ll get this one fresh.”

  The spiraling lights of police cruisers lit the front of the high school and reflected off glass windows. The fire department had dispatched a unit and a yellow and white ambulance had its engine running. Men and women in uniform operated in controlled chaos, doing their jobs in the murky darkness before dawn.

  I showed my credentials to a young cop in uniform standing at a barrier of yellow crime-scene tape. Crowley did the same. After he let us pass, I spotted Detective Ramirez talking to Athena Madero as he stood near the emergency vehicle. Ramirez cut the distance between us with Madero in tow.

  I didn’t like Athena Madero at the crime scene, not while I still had her niece on my suspect list, but since Detective Ramirez must’ve asked her to come, he wasn’t making my job any easier.

  “Your consultant has a distinct conflict of interest, Detective. Her sister’s only daughter is a person of interest in the Barstow investigation.”

  “I realize that,” the detective said. “I’m sorry for how this looks, but I trust Athena. I take full responsibility for her.”

  I forced a smile and shifted my gaze toward the Madero woman.