“How would you get them?”
“The power of the press—no police chief wants me going on the air and stating that he or she refused to give me access to files that could bring a killer to justice. I remind them of that. I play hardball when necessary. David isn’t me.”
“And you usually get what you want?”
“Always.” She backtracked a bit. “Say, nine times out of ten. Last case I worked I wasn’t allowed to take the files from the police station, but I had full access to everything the police had, and in the end, that made the difference in solving two murders.”
“Maybe we won’t need them,” Lucy said.
“You don’t believe that.”
Lucy started typing on the computer and ignored Max. She fumed. She didn’t like being ignored, and she didn’t like not knowing what was going on. Lucy was keeping something from her, what? Why wouldn’t she want to get the files from Santa Barbara when she’d made a point that comparing the interview list in all four cases could be the key difference in finding her nephew’s killer?
It took Lucy less than five minutes to bring in both Dillon Kincaid and Arthur Ullman to the video conference. She spent a moment adjusting sound and settings, then sat back. “Thank you, Dillon, Dr. Ullman,” Lucy said.
“No formalities,” Arthur said. “Call me Arthur, please.”
“Agreed,” Dillon said. “Your reputation precedes you, Arthur, and I’m pleased we’re able to consult together on this case. Hans Vigo speaks highly of you.”
“You know Hans? I haven’t seen him since I retired—well, about two years after I retired he came to a seminar I was teaching at Quantico. We never worked together on a case, but he’s consulted with me from time to time.”
“Hans is a good friend,” Dillon said.
“Please give him my best when you see him.”
Max watched the exchange. Probably good that they were building rapport with each other, a sense of trust. She would much have preferred dealing with one shrink instead of two, but it had been a compromise. Something she didn’t particularly like, but did when necessary.
“Dillon, I’m Maxine Revere. Lucy probably told you I’m an investigative reporter with NET and host the show Maximum Exposure.”
“Yes,” he replied rather icily. “I’m aware.”
“And, Arthur, this is FBI Agent Lucy Kincaid. She’s out of the San Antonio Field Office, but she’s assisting on her own time. She has a personal stake in the case—as well as Dr. Kincaid. The first victim was their nephew.”
“I familiarized myself with the case after you e-mailed me yesterday,” Arthur said. “And I also reviewed your notes. I’m happy to help, though I don’t know that two of us will be any better than one.”
“Lucy trusts her brother, I trust you. Hopefully by the end of this conversation, we have a clear direction.” Max hesitated, then added, “I’ll admit, though I didn’t like the idea of working with a federal agent, Lucy has provided some interesting insight and a compelling profile of the killer, but I still don’t see the big picture.”
“We have additional information from our research today,” Lucy said. “We’ve confirmed that the second known victim, Tommy Porter, was also buried with his favorite stuffed animal. That’s three of the potential four known victims.”
“Known?” Arthur asked.
“Lucy modified my timeline. She put Victim Zero before Justin Stanton.”
Dillon said, “What makes you say that?”
“I put a question mark next to it,” Lucy clarified. “I don’t see at this point how or why Justin was the trigger. I think the trigger came before Justin, but again, I can’t be certain without more information.”
Arthur said, “You mentioned in your message, Max, that the killer is most likely female. Did you come to that conclusion, Dr. Kincaid?”
“No, that was Lucy,” Dillon said. “She has a master’s degree in criminal psychology from Georgetown and is well-versed in profiling. Don’t let her rookie status deceive you.”
Max glanced at Lucy. Was she actually blushing? That would be hard to fake. Max said, “Lucy, tell Arthur why you think the killer is a woman.”
“First,” Lucy said, “we should backtrack a bit. Did you familiarize yourself with the commonalities of each case?”
“Yes,” Arthur said, “though there are a few holes because of the pending trial of Mrs. Caldwell, correct?”
“I can’t access any of those records,” Max said. But after David’s conversation with Carney, she wondered if Lucy might have a better chance. In fact, if the FBI wanted to take a peek, would the DA say no? It was worth a shot, if Lucy was willing. And why wouldn’t she be? She wanted to solve these murders as much as Max. And Max didn’t say that lightly—she rarely found anyone as invested in any of her investigations as she was. Yet Lucy wanted answers, maybe even more than Max, and that was saying something.
“I filled Dillon in last night,” Lucy said, “so we’re all on the same page. The manner of death—it was set up as a mercy killing. No sexual assault, no violence, a quiet death. I suspect the boys were all unconscious from the sedatives in their system before they were suffocated. She also couldn’t look at them while they died—she wrapped them completely in their blankets. The other details are all similar. But the trigger eluded me until this afternoon when we visited the park where Justin was buried.”
Max was watching Dillon Kincaid closely. He was much older than Lucy, almost old enough to be her father. His expression was more than a little protective and he had a tense jaw. It was clear he hadn’t known she’d gone to the park. Was he worried about her? Or angry? Why?
“Justin was buried in a park where he often played—in fact, it was a favorite spot of his. Max’s assistant followed up with the Porter family—Tommy was also buried in a park. But he was buried at the edge of the baseball field, and he loved the sport—he was on a Little League team. Max asked her assistant to find out if Chris Donovan spent time in the nature preserve where he was found—I suspect yes, he did. I suspect it was a favorite spot.”
“Excuse my interruption,” Arthur said, “but weren’t all these locations close to the victim’s home? Possibly chosen because of proximity?”
“That was part of it, she didn’t want to be with the dead child long. But there was a playground closer to the Donovan house than the nature preserve. It was only two miles away, but the park was much closer. Alone, this information may not seem important, but in context it is absolutely imperative that we understand she buried her victims in these locations on purpose.
“The context is this: the killer knew that the father was having an affair. The killer knew where the family lived. She knew where the children played. She knew when the parents were not home and what bedroom the child slept in. She stalked the families for weeks, if not months. She had intimate knowledge of their lives. How? That is the question we need to answer. How did she know that the fathers were having an affair? We know Nelia was privy to Andrew’s affair, but it wasn’t discussed between them. Andrew claimed that no one else knew, other than his mistress. But cheaters often think that they are being discreet when, in fact, those closest to them know the truth. Adam Donovan told Max’s assistant that he ‘almost wanted’ his wife to find out so that she would divorce him. That tells me he wasn’t being discreet. Porter was a repeat cheater. But still, while adultery doesn’t have the stigma that it once did, people don’t generally talk about their affairs openly.”
“You think that the killer followed the husbands,” Dillon said.
How the hell did he come to that conclusion? Max wondered if having a sibling made you somehow psychic.
“Yes, I do,” Lucy said. “Maybe she overheard something or saw something, I don’t know, but she followed the husband until she confirmed that he was having an affair. That was the trigger. That’s what told her that he didn’t deserve a family.”
Arthur said, “That’s a big leap. Why not kill the cheater? Or the mist
ress?”
“Because she doesn’t view death as punishment. She views suffering as punishment. And what better way to make someone suffer than to take away the one thing they love more than anything else?”
Max felt ill. She’d heard and seen a lot—mostly by choice in her profession—but she couldn’t begin to understand what would make a person kill a child to punish a parent. And Lucy … she was so matter-of-fact about it. As if she had conversations like this every day.
Maybe she did. What had Dillon said earlier? Don’t let her rookie status fool you.
There was far, far more to Lucy Kincaid Rogan than met the eye.
Lucy continued. “It’s clear she didn’t want the boys to suffer. That’s why they were drugged and suffocated. She also didn’t want them to suffer in the afterlife, which is why she buried them in a place they had been happy in while alive, it’s why she buried them with a stuffed animal.”
“And in their own bedding,” Dillon said.
“Perhaps not,” Arthur said. “Perhaps she couldn’t look at them, as Lucy said earlier.”
Lucy nodded. “Exactly, she couldn’t watch them die. She covered their faces—they were all suffocated with their own bedding, and I suspect she didn’t remove it when she buried them. She couldn’t watch them die, she couldn’t look at them after she killed them. My guess is that when she came into their bedroom, she injected them.”
“And they didn’t wake up?” Dillon said.
“We know there were no drugs found in any of the houses that matched the drugs found during autopsy. She must have brought them with her. The only autopsy that showed an injection site was on Chris Donovan—it was a huge problem with the prosecution of Chris’s father because no syringe or drugs were found at his house, his office, his car, his mistress. The prosecution claimed he threw everything away and the defense didn’t counter.”
Lucy must have spent all night reading the transcript Max had given her, because they hadn’t even discussed the case.
“It’s still odd that none of these children cried out after being stung by a needle,” Arthur said. “But it does sound more like a mercy killing.”
“It is,” Dillon agreed. “Each step of the killer’s process suggests mercy killing. Except that she’s not putting the child out of suffering from an illness, she’s creating misery.”
“She’s methodical,” Lucy said. “She has to know the families—maybe not well, but well enough that she can get all the information she needs. She’s either a neighbor or a colleague.”
“Colleague?” Dillon asked. “Wouldn’t that be easy to confirm?”
Max spoke up. “I’m going with colleague here. One or both parents are lawyers. While lawyers may be a dime a dozen, it seems too coincidental. That makes me think that the killer is a lawyer or works with lawyers—legal secretary, paralegal, something like that. My staff is doing the research on employees who worked with each parent, but it hasn’t been easy. First, Adam Donovan was convicted for his son’s murder and the police only interviewed his direct supervisor and his mistress. We have been trying to get an employee list out of the company and they cite privacy records. Donovan’s wife worked at a small law firm and they haven’t cooperated at all. The Porters, though initially opposed to helping, have been persuaded to assist us. My associate is in Santa Barbara working with them, and the police are cooperating as well, so I hope we’ll get a list of witnesses as well as colleagues. The Porters themselves may be able to give us names. Neighbors for both cases were easier because they are part of the official record—the neighborhoods were canvassed and everyone who was interviewed documented. So far, no name has been duplicated. I e-mailed Andrew Stanton and he’s creating a list of every female employee he worked with and I’d like to do the same with his ex-wife.”
“Absolutely not,” Dillon said.
“Dillon,” Lucy began, but Max interrupted.
“It’s the single best lead we have.”
“It’s not a lead. It’s fishing and I’m not putting my sister through that.”
“That’s not your call,” Max said.
Lucy said, “Dillon, we can talk about this later—”
“You told me last night that you would leave Nelia alone.”
“And you said,” Lucy added, “that if we needed it, you would talk to her.”
“You don’t need it.”
“What about my profile is off?”
“It’s not a profile,” Dillon said.
Lucy frowned. “I wasn’t finished.”
“Well?”
Lucy was flustered, maybe because her brother was being a jerk. What was it with these Kincaids? Did they really not care who killed Justin? Max said, “Lucy already concluded that the killer is a woman, and neither of you objected.”
“Identifying the gender of the killer isn’t a profile,” Dillon snapped.
Lucy raised her voice, “No, it’s not.” She cleared her throat. “The killer was a mother. She lost her only son to violence, and her husband was having an affair—not only having an affair, but he was with his mistress when their son was kidnapped or killed. I also think she wasn’t home, most likely working late. She never forgave him, she never forgave herself, and she cracked. She left her husband, moved as far away from him as possible because she hates him and blames him for her son’s death. He should have been there with his son, not with another woman. She also harbors intense guilt, because she also wasn’t there. Possibly she worked, or was at a book club, or somewhere other than in her house. She’d left her son with a babysitter to do something for herself or her family and when she got home, he was dead. And through the investigation into her son’s death, she learned about her husband’s affair.”
Little impressed Max, but Lucy impressed her. She’d talked loosely about the killer, the victims, the situation—but hearing it laid out as if Lucy had actually spoken to the killer was a little unnerving.
No one spoke, but Max had a hundred questions. “Why do you think she moved far from her husband?”
“Because she can’t fathom being near him or anywhere near where her son lived or played. It’s a guess, but they probably lived east of the Mississippi.”
“Lucy,” Arthur said, “I am very intrigued by your profile. Yet if you’re right and the killer lost her own son, how would she justify to herself to take another woman’s child?”
“They don’t deserve a child. They were all working mothers. All in professional jobs. They weren’t home when they should be, they don’t deserve him any more than their cheating husbands.”
Max shot Lucy a glance. She was tense, not a little bit angry, but she held it back far better than Max would have been able to. Yet part of the anger wasn’t directed at her brother—though honestly, Max felt he deserved it after that last exchange—but almost as if it was directed inward. Or as if Lucy was projecting the emotions of the killer herself.
Max understood the importance of understanding the motives of the killer, as well as victimology. It was crucial in any criminal investigation, but doubly important—and harder to understand—in a cold case, where time and distance created a layer of distorted memories.
Yet Lucy took profiling—which was exactly what she was doing, Max realized—to another level. She personalized it, which couldn’t be easy considering that one of the victims was her nephew. She compartmentalized as well as any cop Max had met. Maybe too well. Is that why she’d seemed so cool and distant? Even after they’d spent the day together, Lucy hadn’t warmed up. She was polite, professional, cordial, but Max knew the only way she’d ever understand Lucy was to observe her. She certainly wasn’t someone who shared much about herself. Max could get anyone to talk—either because they wanted to or became so irritated with Max that they talked just to make Max go away. Few people were as close-lipped as Lucy Kincaid. The closest she’d come to was her assistant, David, but even he wasn’t this complex.
Interesting.
Arthur said, “Agent Kincaid, it
sounds like you have a good foundation on a profile. You certainly don’t need my input. I would concur with your assessment, but I have one thing to add. Did you note that all of the mothers were in the legal profession? Two were lawyers—Nelia Stanton and the most recent, Blair Caldwell; Mrs. Porter was a court reporter and Mrs. Donovan was a paralegal.”
“I didn’t quite make that connection,” Lucy said. “We knew that one or both parents were lawyers.”
Dillon spoke. “Arthur, are you thinking that the killer is also in the legal profession?”
“I’m connecting the dots that Lucy already put on the map. I concur that the killer has some connection to each family, and probably the strongest connection to the first victim, Justin Stanton. I don’t know that he wasn’t the first victim, however—if there was another three to five years before him, you’re looking at a woman who could easily be in her sixties. Justin may have been the first after the loss of her own son, so it took her time to build up to it—and in taking that time, with her own professional background, she was able to come up with a plan that protected her. Victim Zero, for example, may simply be her own son, the trigger of her psychotic break.”
“I see what you mean,” Lucy said. “And if she has the intelligence coupled with the psychosis, she could plan out the entire murder, beginning to end.”
“Psychotic?” Max said. “What exactly do you mean, Arthur? How can someone this looney tunes function in a professional job for the last two decades and continue to commit such cold-blooded murder?”
“Psychology is not a hard science,” Arthur said. “It’s more complex because while we have certain standards and rules, we don’t have absolutes like in physics or chemistry. What we have is a wealth of information and experience from life, and an analysis of like crimes. When dealing with a female killer, we have a more finite set of data because females historically don’t become serial killers. Females are passion killers. A cheating spouse. A boyfriend who left them. Mercy killings. Poison is the primary method because it separates the killer from the murder.”
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