Split Second f-15

by Catherine Coulter

  Savich said to the group, “Mr. Maitland wants us to handle the case now that this guy’s crossed state lines several times and is killing every few days.

  “Look through the packets and familiarize yourselves with the cases in San Francisco and Chicago. All major police departments across the country have been alerted about this guy and are already on the lookout.

  “Cleveland Police Chief Aaron Handler has moved fast. He compared the sketch their own police artist made from the bartender’s description to the other police sketches made in San Francisco and Chicago.” He held up the sketch. “This is a composite sketch, based on the descriptions provided by the three bartenders. Chief Handler had the sketches posted prominently in every neighborhood bar in Cleveland, and they’re running the sketch on local television channels. You can see the guy has a distinct look—dressed all in black, with his black beret and black jeans, boots, T-shirt, and leather jacket—and he’s kept to his initial pattern—always a neighborhood bar, always choosing a young woman who’s alone. He drugs her, and garrotes her in her own home or apartment, which means all of the women let him take them home.”

  Ruth Warnecki-Noble said, “Well, if they were all feeling ill from the drug he fed them, I guess it makes some sense they would accept some help. Plus, if they think the guy is gay, they probably wouldn’t see him as a sexual threat.”

  Lacey Sherlock said, “I guess he drugs the women so they won’t be able to fight him, either.”

  Lucy nodded. “The bartenders all said the guy looks like a stereotypical artist type, white as a vampire with the white face powder, and bone thin, which means he does indeed need the drugs to make sure he can handle his victims. He looks harmless as a puppy, softspoken, real polite, attentive, a good listener. Another thing—Alana Rafferty didn’t look dizzy or shaky on her feet when she left the bar, so he probably put the drug in her last—” Lucy looked down. “In her last Burning River Pale Ale.”

  There were a few more questions and comments, and then Savich brought things to a close. “Okay, Coop and Lucy are the leads on this case. Any of your specific input should go through them. I’d like each of you to think about this guy, about what makes him tick, and give all your ideas in writing to Lucy and Coop. Steve in Behavioral Analysis will get us a profile shortly.

  “This police sketch and the local TV coverage might make the guy cut his losses and head out of Cleveland, or maybe he’ll change his outfit and ditch the beret. We’ll see.

  “No matter what, this case is top priority. Whoever the guy is, we want to stop him before anyone else dies.”

  Lucy said, “This is really ugly, guys, and really sick. Dillon wonders if he’ll realize he’s a sitting duck and change his routine or his clothes—and that’s my biggest worry. If he does change his routine and ditch the black, we’ll lose any edge we have.”

  Sherlock said, “Whatever he decides to wear, I’ve got the weirdest feeling he’s not afraid of the cops and he’s not going to stop. He’s arrogant.”

  Lucy nodded slowly. She agreed with Sherlock.

  As Lucy and Coop walked back to their workstations, talking quietly, Sherlock said to Savich, “Why’d you put Lucy and Coop together? They don’t care much for each other. You can tell that by their body language. Look at the distance between them.”

  “That’s why I put them together,” Savich said matter-of-factly. “They need to learn to get along. They’re both excellent agents, and I wouldn’t want to lose either of them. They’ve got to learn to respect each other, protect each other, or else one of them will have to go.”

  “I’d hate to lose either of them. I wonder why they don’t get along well? They’re the new guys in the unit; you’d think they’d have bonded simply because they’re the rookies.”

  Savich said, “I asked Ruth what was going on between them, and she said she’d heard Lucy call Coop a dickhead—quote/unquote—because he dangles too many women on his string.”

  “Hmm, I hadn’t heard that. Do you think it’s true? You think he’s some sort of idiot playboy?”

  Savich shrugged, opened his office door, and ushered her in. “I’ve never seen anything in Coop’s behavior that’d make me think so. He’s got a good brain, he’s committed, a good team player, and I can usually kick his butt at the gym.” He grinned at her, flicked a finger over her cheek. “So, what’s not to like?”

  Sherlock laughed, hugged him a moment. She leaned back in his arms, studied his face. “It’s only been two days since the shooting at Mr. Patil’s Shop ’n Go. Are you all right, Dillon?”

  “Mr. Patil will make a full recovery, Dave Raditch and his kids are dealing okay with the shock, and yes, I’m fine as well. Look, Sherlock, I’m handling things, okay?”

  Mr. Hardnose. She looked at him for a long time, and finally she nodded slowly. “Yes. All right, then.” She kissed him fast, then left his office to discuss with Ollie Hamish his bizarre case in Biloxi, Mississippi, where some shrimp fishermen seemed to be on a rampage, killing off their competition.

  Lucy and Coop were studying the composite sketch of their murderer, tossing ideas back and forth, when Lucy’s cell phone rang. It was a Dr. Antonio Pellotti at Washington Memorial Hospital. Her father had suffered a massive heart attack and wasn’t expected to live.

  CHAPTER 4

  Washington Memorial Hospital

  Thursday night

  Lucy sat beside her father’s bed in the CCU and counted each breath. Dr. Pellotti had told her when they wheeled him out of the cath lab, honest grief in his voice, since he’d known her father for years, “They managed to open up his left coronary artery and found a large part of his heart was beating very poorly. We’re having to support his blood pressure with drugs. We’re not sure how much longer he’ll breathe on his own. We’ll discuss options when and if a respirator is necessary.” He’d taken her hands in his. “He may be in and out, Lucy, but I promise you he’s in no distress. He’s on morphine.”

  How did he know her father wasn’t in distress? Lucy wondered now. Her father couldn’t tell them anything one way or the other. And when someone wasn’t conscious and was barely alive, where were they? Looking down at themselves lying there, helpless, wondering what was next? Praying they’d come back? Or were they asleep in the nether reaches of their mind, really unaware of anything at all?

  Lucy stared at her father’s face through the oxygen mask, all lean lines and seams and so much thick, dark hair, only streaks of white at his temples. She’d had dinner with him on Tuesday night, her vibrant, handsome father, laughing over a federal regulator who’d overdrawn his own personal account and was raising hell about it. But now he looked old, his flesh slack, as if his life itself was leaching out of his body.

  But he wasn’t old, he was only sixty-two, at the top of his banking game, he’d tell her, and it was true. But now he was still, as if his beloved face was a facade, as if he’d already left and was simply waiting for the door to close.

  No, she couldn’t—wouldn’t—accept that. There was a chance he could come back; there was always a chance. If he was breathing, that meant his heart was pumping, and that meant—what?

  It meant hope, at least to her.

  “I told you to work out, Dad, or take a walk every evening; that would have done it.” But he hadn’t. He wasn’t at all fat, but he spent most of his time either reading his favorite newspapers and mysteries or working on his endless deals and strategic loan plans for the bank. He always had something going on, something he was excited about. He’d always been involved and excited about his life, and that was a blessing.

  Joshua Acker Carlyle was a very successful man and a loving father. Everyone she knew thought of him as smart and honest, a man to trust. He’d never dabbled in junk bonds or sub-prime mortgages or any of the other shenanigans so many banks had been involved with. His three banks were as solvent as most Canadian banks.

  She caught herself already hearing his eulogy, delivered by his uncle, Alan Silverman, only te
n years older than he was, a parental afterthought, he’d say, and laugh. He’d always banked his money with her dad and played golf with him most weekends. Uncle Alan and Aunt Jennifer, and their children, Court and Miranda, had been there all through the evening, but the doctors had asked them to leave. Only Lucy was allowed to stay with him. She’d turned off her cell phone because so many friends were calling and she simply couldn’t deal with their sympathy and their endless questions.

  “Can you hear me, Dad?” Lucy lightly squeezed his hand. The skin seemed slack, as if it were hanging off him. They said it was from the medicines, to help his lungs, but she hated it. He’d awakened earlier but hadn’t said anything, simply looked at her through a veil of drugs and closed his eyes again. But maybe he could hear her. If he was hovering up there, looking down, of course he could hear her. Dr. Pellotti said he couldn’t, but one of the nurses rolled her eyes behind the doctor’s back and nodded.

  And so Lucy talked. She told him about the case she was working on, the killer who targeted single women in neighborhood bars, and how he seemed to be coming this way, since he’d killed in San Francisco, Chicago, and now Cleveland. And why not Washington? There were so many single women here. She told him her partner on this case was Special Agent Cooper McKnight, a man she didn’t much like because he had the reputation of being a playboy. He always had a different woman on his arm, and he was too good-looking, and he knew it. She’d heard a couple of agents in the unit talking about all the women he dated, and they wondered, laughing in the way men did, about how he managed to keep them all straight. What did he think of her? She didn’t have a clue. So far he was polite and attentive, maybe checking her out to put her in his line to take to bed. He’d said a couple of funny things, and wouldn’t that make sense? Women tended to like guys who were funny. It fit with what she’d heard.

  She talked and talked, and her father lay there, moving his legs now and then; sometimes, she’d swear, squeezing her hand. Once he’d mumbled words she couldn’t understand before he lapsed again into that frozen silence. He was breathing, so she’d hang on to that. She told him about her boss’s wild-hair adventure Tuesday night at his neighborhood convenience store, how he’d brought down two armed robbers with two children in the store. Dillon had said the kids were both champs, and their dad was a champ, too. “I wonder how I would have done if I’d seen that guy with a stocking on his face and a gun in his hand, while two kids were standing six feet away eating ice-cream bars.”

  She told her father all the rest of it before she paused for a moment, then rubbed her fingers over his knuckles, wishing he would squeeze her hand again, show her he knew she was here and recognized her. “I saw Sherlock in Savich’s office this morning, and she smacked him real hard on the arm, not that she could do much damage, he’s hard as a brick outhouse, and then she kissed him. I know she must still be replaying what happened again and again in her mind. Can you imagine, Dad? Two innocent kids, and knowing all the way to your soul their lives were in the balance?

  “Sherlock called the father and gave him the name of a shrink for the kids. I’ll bet they’re going to have nightmares for a while.”

  She smoothed her palm over her father’s forehead, his cheeks. His skin felt clammy, and why was that? His leg jerked, then he was motionless again, and there was only the sound of his slow, difficult breathing. Lucy laid her cheek against his chest. “You’re too young to leave me, Dad, please, you know it’s always been just you and me, so you need to stay. You need to get better and tell Dr. Pellotti you’re going to outlive him and his kids. Will you do that for me, Dad?”

  She was crying silently when her father suddenly yelled, “Mom, what did you do? Why did you stab Dad? Oh my God, he’s not moving. There’s so much blood. Why, Mom?”

  Lucy reared back, her mouth open to shout for the nurses when she saw he was looking at her, recognized her. He squeezed her hand. “Lucy,” he whispered, and then he closed his eyes and took in a hitching breath, and then he lay still.

  She ran to the door to yell for the nurses, but she heard a nurse scream, “Code blue!” before she got there, and then the room filled up with men and women, and she stood by the lone window in the hospital room and watched them start to work frantically to save him, until she was ushered out.

  Her father, Joshua Acker Carlyle, was pronounced dead by a young physician she’d never seen before, at 3:06 a.m.

  Dawn was moments away when Lucy walked to the hospital parking lot. She realized she didn’t feel much of anything. Her brain, her heart, felt empty. But I’m really here, she thought. I’ve still got to put one foot in front of the other, walk to my car, get in, go home—and what?

  Lie in bed and plan Dad’s memorial service—not a funeral, no, Dad told me often enough he never wanted to have his carcass stuffed in one of those high-shine coffins sitting on wheels in the front of a church with a big stupid photo of himself beside it that everyone had to look at. No, burn him up in private and spread a nice long trail of ashes into the Chesapeake, where he loved to sail, swim, and eat every crab he pulled out of it.

  Lucy didn’t cry until after she’d called her great-uncle, Alan Silverman, at seven o’clock a.m. and told him his nephew was dead.

  Then the tears wouldn’t stop. When she called Dillon at eight o’clock a.m., she sounded like a scratchy old record.

  The worst of it was hearing her father’s words again, sharp, clear, and panicked. “Mom, what did you do? Why did you stab Dad? Oh my God, he’s not moving. . . .”

  Special Agent Luciana Claudine Carlyle knew her father had witnessed his own mother murdering her husband, Milton, Lucy’s grandfather, a man she’d been told had gone walkabout twenty-two years ago. Whenever she’d asked, that’s what she’d been told—Your grandfather left us, no word, no reason, just gone—until she’d simply set him away in the back of her mind, and eventually stopped thinking much about him at all. As far as she knew, no one had ever heard from him again; he’d simply left one day and never come back.

  Well, that was a lie. He hadn’t just disappeared. Her grandmother had murdered him, stabbed him to death twenty-two years ago, her own father a witness. That would have made her father forty years old when it happened, a grown man living with his parents, since his wife had died and he’d needed help with his small daughter, namely herself. Why hadn’t he stopped it? Because he’d been too late to stop it, that’s why. He’d never let on, never said a word to anyone, as far as she knew. Should she ask Uncle Alan? Would he know? She shook her head. She couldn’t ask him that question, not without knowing more. Surely he didn’t know, as she hadn’t known.

  Her father had seen his own father’s murder again in the moments before he died.

  Lucy couldn’t get her mind around it, couldn’t accept it. Her grandmother a murderer? Her grandmother, Helen Carlyle, had died peacefully in her bed at home three years ago. Both Lucy and her father were with her, and Lucy had kissed her good-bye on her forehead.

  No, she couldn’t believe it, not her grandmother.

  Her grandmother was always fiercely contained, with something ramrod-straight about her. Lucy had sometimes wondered, though, in the deepest part of her, if there was a reason for that.

  Lucy walked into her bathroom, sank to the floor, and leaned against the tub. She sat there for a very long time.

  CHAPTER 5

  Clayton Valley, Virginia

  Blue Ridge Society auditorium

  Sunday afternoon

  Lucy couldn’t seem to get warm. She was surrounded by her father’s friends and business associates, by Uncle Alan and his family—her only remaining family. On Uncle Alan’s face, she saw utter devastation. Beside him sat Aunt Jennifer, turned sixty-four the month before. Jennifer looked as stylish as she always did with her curve-brimmed black hat and Dior black suit. Lucy had always thought she was so like her sister-in-law, Lucy’s grandmother—always self-possessed, always calm, always kind to Lucy. Her own children, Miranda and Court, who were b
oth older than Lucy, sat stone-faced. Court was handsome and fit, a young aristocrat like his father, and Miranda looked like a bohemian wannabe, all dressed in drapey black, like a plump nun. Aunt Jennifer held Uncle Alan’s hand tightly.

  Out of the corner of her eye, Lucy saw the McGruders, her grandmother’s longtime housekeeper and groundskeeper. They were both looking like devout missionaries, stout and somber, dressed in stiff, formal black, Mrs. McGruder’s plain black hat pushing down her over-permed gray hair. Lucy nodded to them, tried to smile, but she was so cold she was afraid her teeth were going to start chattering, and that would be humiliating. Particularly since she had to walk about fifteen feet up to the small auditorium stage, look out over the hundred-plus people, and give her eulogy. Eulogy, she thought, from the Greek eulogia, which meant to speak well of, she remembered her father telling her before the memorial of one of his professors at Princeton.

  At least there hadn’t been a question about where to have his memorial service. Her father was an active member of the Blue Ridge Society for his entire adult life, a well-established group of like-minded people who wanted to preserve one of the nation’s natural wonders.

  Hold it together. She was surprised when Coop slid in beside her and closed his hand over hers. His flesh was wonderfully warm. He must have felt how cold she was, because he took both her hands in his and rubbed them until at last she got the signal from the minister. She rose and walked slowly to the lectern at the center of the stage. One of her father’s bank managers and close friends had finished speaking. Mr. Lambert was a short man, which meant she had to raise the mike, and the simple act of twisting the mike upward made her brain blank out. She could see some of her friends, mostly lawyers she’d met through her roommates in college, and wasn’t that strange? They were all here for her just as they’d all been at the hospital, and they’d called her constantly, as if they were on a schedule, until she’d asked them not to call so often, to give her some time on her own. She met the eyes of Mr. Bernard Claymore, the family’s lawyer, for many years, not all that much younger than her grandmother. He was bent low, his old face weathered from spending so much of his life out-of-doors. Her father had said Bernie had all his wits and he was hard not to like even though he was a lawyer. That was good enough for Lucy, and so Mr. Claymore was dealing with her father’s estate as well. She could see tears spilling out of his eyes and trailing down his seamed face from the lectern. It nearly broke her.