by Joseph Badal
Barbara turned one hand palm up. “And your point is . . . .”
“My point is that he might have left behind fingerprints or hair. Maybe we could track the guy down forensically.”
Barbara breathed out loudly. “I wonder if the Farmington P.D. found any trace evidence.”
“Maybe Sophia knows.”
Barbara handed Susan her cell phone and asked her to pull up Otero-Hansen’s number in her recently called list. Susan connected with Otero-Hansen, put the cell on speaker, and asked about the crime scene processing order in Farmington.
Otero-Hansen said, “That was Farmington P.D.’s crime scene. Maybe you should call up there.”
“That could be a problem,” Barbara said.
“Why’s that?”
“Well, Susan and I have been suspended for two weeks.”
“What?”
“Yeah, our boss is pissed about the little joy ride we took with you to Farmington.”
“Speaking of joy rides, Lucas was pissed off beyond all belief when he discovered you took off in a bureau vehicle.”
“Oh, boy,” Susan groaned.
Otero-Hansen laughed. “Darzi told Lucas to keep his mouth shut about the whole thing.”
As soon as Otero-Hansen hung up, Susan called OMI and asked to speak to Martin Wulfe. She put her cell on speaker while she waited for the Chief Field Investigator to answer.
“Wulfe.”
“Hey, Wulfie, it’s Susan Martinez.”
“I’m busy here. Unless you’re calling to invite me to lunch, I don’t have time to talk right now.”
“Okay, Wulfie, I’ll buy lunch. Just one question. How many coins were found in the wounds on that corpse transported from Farmington last night?”
“Why?”
“Come on, Wulfie. It’s a simple question that deserves a simple answer.”
“Well, since you’re buying lunch. There were three coins inserted in the guy’s abdominal wounds. One in each wound.”
“Anything else placed anywhere else in or on the body?”
“Nope. Just the three coins.”
“Thanks, Wulfie. Any other evidence from the crime scene?”
“Hard to believe, but we found nothing. The crime scene photographs showed blood on the carpet in the Franchini bedroom. We took samples, but, without a DNA match in the system, we have nothing to compare them to. By the time the OMI techs arrived there from Albuquerque, the whole house had been vacuumed and scrubbed clean. The carpet in the bedroom had been pulled up and disposed of. There wasn’t a fingerprint in the place.”
“How the hell did that happen? That’s dereliction of duty.”
“Farmington P.D. put an auxiliary officer on the Franchini house. Someone called him and told him he was being pulled off the site. Told him to drive out to the Navajo Irrigation Project to check on a fatal accident. The guy left the house and drove around for hours before calling in to the station to get the exact location of the accident.”
“The poor schlub,” Susan said.
“When are we having lunch?”
“I’ll get back to you on that.”
“That’s about thirty-five lunches you owe me, Martinez.”
“You know I’m good for them.”
“Yeah, yeah.”
“That was interesting,” Barbara said.
Susan said, “Yeah. You know there was only one time that we’re aware of when the Three Ghouls killed three people: the home invasion in Amarillo. Almost every incident involved two victims; usually elderly couples. The Flagstaff incident involved five victims. And there was one time when there were four people killed.”
“What are you thinking?”
“Three coins were placed in McCall’s shoulder wound. And there were three bullets in McCall’s abdomen.”
“Huh.”
“This case has got me tied up, twisted, and beyond frustrated,” Susan complained as Barbara pulled up in front of her house.
“Maybe our suspensions are a good thing. We need a break.”
“To do what? You gave up drinking a while ago. Neither of us skis. Besides, I despise being cold. And the weather’s not conducive to playing golf or tennis.”
Barbara sniffed. “Since when do you play golf or tennis?”
Susan hunched her shoulders and spread out her arms. “Just saying. I know I’d look good in those little short skirts the women wear.”
“I have something else in mind. Henry has a friend at the “U” who would like to meet you. Teaches in the Latin American Studies Department.”
Susan frowned, but quickly smiled. “Latin American Studies, huh?”
“That’s right.”
“When?”
“How about tonight? There’s a great band at Blacky’s. Dinner first. Good conversation. Some dancing. Who knows where it might lead?”
“What’s the guy’s name?”
“You know, I forgot to ask. He’ll tell you when he picks you up tonight.”
For maybe the thousandth time, Kathy Luneski swore she would never take another drink as long as she lived. Her eyelids felt as though they were glued to her eyeballs and her head felt as though a jack-hammer banged away at her brain. Eyes still closed, she moved her left hand around until it fell off the side of what she guessed was a bed.
“Where the hell am I?” she muttered. She dropped one leg over the side of the bed and rolled until her feet touched the floor. She covered her mouth as a wave of nausea overwhelmed her. She couldn’t decide what she needed more, to puke or to pee.
The jack-hammering began again. She covered her ears with her hands. Then she realized someone was banging at the door. She pried open her eyelids and looked around. It didn’t take long to realize she was in a motel room. “How the hell did I get here?” she asked herself.
The knocking began again. “Hold your horses,” she tried to shout, but her words came out through her dry throat as an unintelligible series of rasps.
She groaned like an old buffalo as she unsteadily stood and walked to the door. A peek through the peephole told her nothing. Her eyes weren’t working that well. She opened the door and looked down at a diminutive woman in jeans, a blouse, and a ratty sweater.
“You want your room made up?” the woman asked.
“Where am I?” Luneski asked.
“Where are you?”
“Yeah, where the hell am I?”
“You’re in room 121 at the Dew Drop Inn. Are you okay?”
Luneski pushed past the woman and looked left and right. No Audi. Then a wave of nausea hit her again and she pushed past the woman into the parking lot.
CHAPTER 48
Evan McCall felt as though he’d overdosed on speed. It wasn’t like his brother to not call him after completion of an assignment. Considering the amount of money that Reese would get from the Franchini job, it was incredible his brother hadn’t already contacted him. He checked online to see if there was any news about a home invasion in Farmington, but, as yet, there was nothing.
Then his jitters turned into a massive headache when his cell phone rang and he saw the caller ID: Vitaly Orlov. For a moment, he considered ignoring the call, but he knew that would only put off dealing with the problem, and the longer Orlov had to wait to talk with him the angrier the Russian would get.
“Hello.”
“You hear anything?” Orlov said in heavily-accented English. “Here” sounded like “heerre,” propelled on a blast of breath.
“Nothing yet. He may not . . . acquire the goods until tonight.”
“I thought you said he vould act quickly.”
“Yeah. But it’s a long way from where he was to where he had to go. I’ll let you know the second I hear something.”
“There vas news item about voman murdered near that area. Maybe your man did that.”
McCall’s breath caught in his chest; his lungs seemed to have stopped working. He hadn’t heard about the murder, but if his brother had murdered a woman . . . . What the h
ell had his psycho brother done now?
“He’s a professional, Mr. Orlov. He’ll get the job done just like always.”
“I don’t like vhat I hear in your voice, McCall. You’re not screwing vith me, are you?”
“Of course not. I—”
“I’ve paid you over million dollars in last five years. This job is biggest I’ve ever given you. Big bucks for you.”
McCall wanted to remind the man that for every dollar Orlov had paid him, the mobster had probably received at least ten. But he didn’t have the nerve.
“Give me a few hours, Mr. Orlov. I’ll hear from my guy by then.”
“It’s 9:30. I expect to hear from you by 6 tonight.” The man paused for a second, and then added, “Maybe I should come to your place? I can pick up goods from Flagstaff job and you can bring me up to date on Farmington.”
“Yes, sir.”
McCall heard Orlov mutter something in Russian just before he terminated the call. He stared at his cell and felt acid leak into his stomach. Orlov hadn’t said anything about the two men whose bodies were discovered in a van in New Mexico. The news media had already announced the connection between those two men and the Three Ghouls, so Orlov had to know that Reese’s two partners were no longer in the picture. He’d never told Orlov the names of the three men, or that his own brother headed up the crew. But the Russian did know about the horrific crimes the three had committed in conjunction with the coin robberies. He’d screamed when the news had picked up the story about the first home invasion five years ago, about how children had been assaulted and killed. But, in the end, all Orlov cared about were the rare coins and making a fortune when he, in turn, sold them to private collectors who couldn’t have cared less about the coins’ bloody provenance. Nor did Orlov or the collectors care that there was blood on the coins.
McCall had been horrified by what his brother had done. He’d always known there was something off about Reese. As a kid, his brother would pull wings off butterflies and torment cats and dogs in the neighborhood. But, until he tortured and murdered coin collectors and their families, he’d had no idea just how off he was. After his last conversation with Reese, he’d decided it was time to bail out of this arrangement with the Russian mobster and to sever his ties to his brother. What Reese had done tortured his mind; Orlov scared the crap out of him.
Race woke ten minutes before his alarm went off. He felt lightheaded and slightly feverish. He popped one of the pills Doctor Atcitty had given him and re-bandaged his wound. He left Cuba at 10:15 a.m. after he applied a disguise that matched his Arnold Webber identity on a New Mexico driver’s license. He ate a light breakfast in a diner. With a 1:00 p.m. departure time out of the private air terminal in Albuquerque, he figured he had time to stop at his Albuquerque bank on the way.
After an hour-and-twenty-minute drive, he arrived at the bank and parked in a lot across from the entrance. He removed his briefcase from the front seat and carried it into the bank.
The entrance included two sets of doors with a small foyer between them. Race walked to the far end of the lobby where he was greeted by a young woman who he didn’t recognize from his previous visits. That’s good, he thought.
“May I help you?” she asked.
Race smiled and handed her the key to his box and his Arnold Webber photo ID. “I need to access my safety deposit box.”
She barely glanced at the ID. “Of course. Please sign the log and I’ll take you right into the vault.” While Race signed the log, she said, “You know next month we’re converting to a handprint system for entry to the vault. You’ll need to come in after the first of the month so we can put your print into our system.”
Race didn’t like this news one bit. The last thing he wanted to do was put his hand print into a system that could be accessed by law enforcement agencies. He would have to check with the banks where he had other safety deposit boxes to see if they were about to convert their systems as well. “I’ll do that,” he told the woman.
It took all of three minutes after the woman used the bank’s and Race’s keys to open his box, place it on a table in an adjoining private booth, and leave Race on his own. He would not return to this bank again, so he removed all of the cash from the box: over five hundred thousand dollars, and stacked it in his briefcase, after he took a 9 millimeter from the case and stuck it behind his back—inside his waistband. He made certain his fleece coat covered the gun, then returned to the vault, replaced the box in its slot, and locked the safety deposit box door. He asked the woman to lock her side of the box door, thanked her, and moved toward the entrance. Outside, he moved to his pickup truck, unlocked the front passenger door, and tossed his briefcase on the front seat. He was about to step up behind the wheel when a jacked-up pickup truck pulled into the lane between the bank entrance and the parking lot. Two men leaped from the truck’s front and back seats on the passenger side. Race thought he saw a third man exit the truck from the back seat on the driver’s side. The two men on his side of the truck carried shotguns and wore masks.
Race shook his head. “Shit,” he muttered. Out of nowhere, he remembered the saying, Timing is everything. “This is pretty shitty timing,” he muttered.
He looked at the pickup truck driver whose head jerked around like a bobble head toy. Race slipped his cell phone from his jacket pocket and called 9-1-1.
“What’s your emergency?”
“I’m parked outside the People’s Thrift Bank on Jefferson, south of Paseo del Norte. Armed men just rushed inside the bank. There’s a black pickup truck out front with a driver inside.”
When the 9-1-1 operator asked for his name, Race disconnected the call. As he replaced the phone in his pocket, his heart seemed to stop. The driver had spotted him and now stared directly at him. The man suddenly pointed a huge pistol at him and fired a round through the open passenger side window of the black pickup.
As Race ducked behind his open truck door, he slammed his bandaged arm against the edge of the door. “Shit,” he cursed as pain ripped through him. He expected to hear the “clunk” of the bullet strike his pickup, but the round apparently sailed past him. He pulled his gun from the back of his waistband, propped it between the door and the truck frame, aimed, and fired three shots. The man jerked sideways, then slammed forward against the pickup truck’s steering wheel. The truck’s horn steadily blared and the man remained still.
Race climbed inside his truck and sped away from the parking lot as three men raced out of the bank. They carried nothing but their shotguns. Race guessed the blaring truck horn had caused them to abandon their plan to rob the bank.
It was a twenty-minute drive on southbound Interstate 25 to the Albuquerque Sunport’s private air terminal. It took Race almost the entire twenty minutes to calm down. He forced himself to stick to the speed limit as a caravan of police vehicles, emergency lights flashing, rushed north. He felt a flash of anguish hit his brain. So much death. Ever since Eric Matus had been killed, he’d questioned the mission they’d been on. But he segregated the sudden spasm of guilt into a corner of his brain. As much as he wanted to quit, there was still work to be done.
At the airport, he removed the Arnold Webber disguise and applied his Karl Simmons disguise to match the Texas ID. He checked the disguise in the truck’s rearview mirror—dark glasses, false mustache and beard, a Beatles hair piece, and a red baseball cap. Then he slipped his 9 millimeter under the front seat, left the truck in the parking lot, and entered the terminal. He apologized for being fifteen minutes late, went through a scanner, was escorted to the jet he’d chartered, was handed a drink by an attendant on board the plane, and was asked to fasten his seat belt. The charter had cost him twenty-two thousand dollars for a round-trip flight to and from Dallas.
After takeoff, he opened Google Map on his phone and familiarized himself with the location of Evan McCall’s address near Dallas and the best route to it from the airport. Then he located a pawn shop between the airport and Highland
Village.
The plane landed at 4:05 p.m., Dallas time. It was bright and sunny, although very cool. Race picked up the rental car he’d reserved with a black market credit card he’d bought on the Dark Net and took State Road 114 to State Road 121, where he stopped at the pawn shop he’d identified.
“Howdy,” Race said to the man behind the counter.
“How can I help you, sir?”
“You have any automatics for sale?”
“Pistols?”
“Yeah.”
“I got ‘em out the wazoo. Anything in particular you want?”
“A 9 millimeter with an extra magazine. I’d also like to buy a knife. Eight inch blade.”
“If you want to walk out with the pistol you’ll need a Texas ID.”
Race pulled his wallet from a pants pocket, took out a falsified Texas driver’s license from between his false California, New Mexico, and Nevada IDs, and handed it to the man.
“All right, Mr. Simmons,” the man said, “let’s see what we’ve got for you.”
Race was in and out of the shop in fifteen minutes. He drove on the 35 Interstate to the Highland Village community, near Lewisville Lake. He arrived at McCall’s address at 5:25 p.m.
McCall lived in a single-family, detached residence on a serpentine road packed with upper middle-class houses and plenty of expensive SUVs and luxury sedans. Spacious, immaculate lawns fronted the houses.
There were no children’s toys on the lawn in front of McCall’s place. Race muttered, “Damn,” when he thought that he should have asked Reese McCall if his brother had a family. A wife and kids at McCall’s home would seriously complicate things in ways he didn’t really want to think about. He parked on the street behind McCall’s block, put his weapon inside the back of his waistband, took the sheathed knife from his briefcase, and put it in his jacket pocket. Then he circled the block on foot.