Compulsion (Max Revere Novels Book 2)

by Brennan, Allison

  “Don’t push me on this right now, Max. We have deadlines and commitments and I’m setting up interviews with the parents of the missing boys in Oregon—or did you forget about that case?”

  She tensed. “Of course I didn’t.” Three young teenagers had disappeared without a trace two months ago. The police had no leads. She’d been contacted by the father of one of the boys who said he didn’t know who else to turn to.

  “We shift focus in two weeks to Oregon, and you already have the research team digging in there, how do they have time to run down this tenuous—at best—theory of yours?”

  “I’m only asking for this week.” And maybe next, but she wisely didn’t say anything.

  “Please.”

  “Sit.”

  He did, fidgeting. “I need the research staff.”

  “So do I.”

  “You can’t—”

  She raised an eyebrow.

  He corrected, “You should consult with me before you assign major projects.”

  “This was last minute. I’m serious, Ben, you need to see the potential in this story. Sally O’Hara is actively searching for the Palazzolos after months of inaction. Because of a lead I generated. She’s narrowed the search area, and I really believe she’ll learn what happened. If our team can pull down information that might give us a pattern…”

  “You can have one.”

  “I need—”

  “You have Riley, your own dedicated assistant. Why do you need six more?”

  “Two.”

  “One. You can pick.”

  Dammit. “C. J.,” she said without hesitation.

  “Fuck.”

  “You said I can pick.”

  “Fine, you get C. J. None of the others.”

  “Fair enough.”

  “More than fair.” He rose, went over to make himself a cup of coffee, and Riley burst in.

  She looked from Max to Ben. “Sorry.”

  “It’s fine, we’re done,” Ben said and left with his coffee.

  Max brewed herself a second cup. “What did you learn?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “You know something, spill it.”

  “I’m really excited.”

  “Don’t keep me in suspense,” Max said, glancing at her watch. “David will be here in ten minutes to take us to the courthouse.”

  “I, um, think I figured out where Adam Bachman spent his semester off.”

  Max smiled, leaned forward. “You did?”

  “One of three places.”

  “How did you narrow it down?”

  “My computer friend, Kyle, helped. I didn’t give him details, just asked how I could narrow down mental health facilities near Hartford.”

  Max wasn’t certain she believed that Riley hadn’t shared details with Kyle—but she let it slide for now. This inquiry wasn’t supersecret, but some of Max’s research angles were, and she hoped Riley understood the difference.

  “Since the previous research into Boston area facilities was a bust,” Riley continued, “and with your idea that he would keep it close to home because of his relationship with his mother, I focused on Bachman’s hometown and places nearby. That narrowed them down, but there were still too many. Kyle asked me what insurance he would have used. That reminded me that his mother worked for the City of Hartford, and as a college student he could have been covered under her insurance. There are only three facilities that accept that particular insurance.”

  “He could have paid out of pocket.”

  “Yes, but unlikely. He didn’t have a job at the time, and I don’t think he would have asked his mother for cash. I think it’s one of these.”

  She slipped over the list to Max. Max looked at it, nodded. It was a good lead.

  “We’ll go up to Hartford tomorrow, first thing in the morning.”

  “We? But I can go up right now—”

  “We. You’re still new at this, I want to train you, for lack of a better word.”

  “But—”

  “No buts. I need you in the courthouse this afternoon. You’ll take my credentials and take good notes on the trial. Then write up a report for me.”

  “Where are you going?”

  “I have a meeting.”

  “Can I—”

  Max stepped out of the elevator into the lobby, then turned and admonished Riley. “No. I’ve given you far too much leeway already. I think you’re forgetting that you’re my assistant.”

  “I haven’t.”

  “I’m not sending you to Hartford alone. We’ll go together. Or you can stay here.”

  She shook her head. “I’ll go with you.”

  “Good. Now prioritize this list. Checking into all three will be an overnight excursion. I want one. Your best, educated guess.”

  Riley looked concerned. “I already made assumptions—and what if I’m wrong?”

  “Talk to C. J. He’s good to brainstorm with. Go through your methodology. Between the two of you, I’m confident you’ll identify the right facility.”

  “I appreciate your faith in me.”

  “It has nothing to do with faith. I’ll see you at noon at the courthouse. Don’t be late.”

  * * *

  Max spotted David watching her five-minute interview with Ace Burley. He had on his sunglasses and she honestly couldn’t tell if he was looking at them, or watching the modest crowd that had gathered. Probably the crowd. When she was done and thanked Ace and the crew, he came over to her and led the way to where he’d parked a block away. He always seemed to have the best luck with parking places.

  When he pulled away from the curb, he asked, “What happened in court?”

  “The next logical step—how the D.A. got a warrant for Adam Bachman’s apartment and what they found in their search. Jewelry or other personal items from all five victims, things that were known to be missing. One of the victim’s driver’s license because he didn’t wear any jewelry.”

  “And you’re thinking about the Palazzolos.”

  “If the police don’t know what’s missing from their bodies, they might not know what to look for. The good news is that everything from his apartment is in evidence, so if we can find a way to get photos of the evidence to their kids, maybe they’ll see something familiar that the police may not realize is important.”

  “Good idea.”

  “The testimony was tedious, so I’m glad they did it in the morning. The big selling point from the prosecution’s standpoint is that the earrings that Ava Raines bought before she was abducted were found in Bachman’s pocket during the initial search.”

  David pulled into Max’s parking garage under her building, but they didn’t go upstairs. They walked a block and a half to the Tribeca Grill for lunch. It was crowded, per usual, but Max had made reservations and they were immediately seated. She ate here at least twice a week when she was in town; it was one of her favorite places.

  Max told David about her conversation with Sally O’Hara the night before.

  “She’s determined to find them. Maybe as determined as I am.”

  “How did you and O’Hara become so chummy?”

  “I wouldn’t say we’re chummy.”

  “She answered your call.”

  “It’s a long story.”

  “We have an hour and ten minutes.”

  Max didn’t know why she hesitated. Maybe because she never talked about it. She still had so many emotions about what had happened, and she’d been much younger, much less experienced. She’d often wondered if she had the case now rather than seven years ago if she would have solved it faster, or with less bloodshed.

  She said, “Seven years ago there was a missing child. Thirteen-year-old girl. Jane O’Hara.”

  “Sally’s…?”

  “Little sister. Most of the authorities believed she was a runaway. There was no evidence of an abduction, family or stranger. Sally had been in law school. Her family was torn apart, she dropped out of law school, helped with her ot
her siblings. Sally’s the oldest of four children, Jane the youngest. On the one-year anniversary of Jane’s disappearance, another girl went missing—the same age and same basic look. White, female, thirteen, blond. Sally had read my book about Karen’s disappearance, and contacted me. The police didn’t think there was a connection because the second girl was abducted from Virginia, hundreds of miles from here. Marco and I were still involved, and I convinced him to run like crimes in the FBI database.” Marco—why had he turned out to be such a macho control freak? There were times when they worked so well together she thought she’d found her soul mate—and then other times she couldn’t stand being in the same room with him.

  She said, “We found a pattern. Jane had been the first, but there were two other missing girls who fit the same description who’d disappeared in the Northeast before the girl from Virginia. That meant four girls within sixteen months. Marco helped get the New York FBI office involved, but there was no solid evidence, only that weak pattern. They did a little work on it, but it grew cold. So I convinced Marco to access the records so I could see what they knew, and I took it from there.”

  “Marco? That surprises me.”

  Max smiled slyly. “Marco wasn’t always an ass. He used to bend the rules a lot more.”

  “Before he got promoted?” David suggested.

  Max couldn’t disagree. Two years ago, right before she started Maximum Exposure, Marco had been promoted to Supervisory Special Agent in Miami and everything changed. Maybe that was truly the beginning of the end of them—though she could hardly say they’d ever had a smooth relationship. “It took Sally and me six more months, and the abduction of a fifth thirteen-year-old girl, before we found a witness who gave us a partial license plate taken off a security camera near where the last girl was abducted. We followed it through. A bunch of shit ensued, largely making it near impossible for me to drive through West Virginia without being arrested. But we found them.

  “The kidnappers were a couple—common-law marriage—building some sort of psycho cult of ‘pure bloods’—white, blond hair, blue eyes, whatever. Pseudo-Nazis, I suppose, though there was nothing overtly political about their cult. They had two teenage sons who were involved. I don’t need to go into the nasty details. Jane was pregnant when we found them. There was a standoff and hostage situation and one of the boys and one of the victims in the throes of Stockholm syndrome were killed in a suicide-by-cop ploy. The other three culprits, and those who helped them, are in prison. The four surviving girls, including Jane, were returned to their families.”

  David stared at her. “Why didn’t I hear about this?”

  “It was in West Virginia.”

  “You know what I mean.”

  She did. “I didn’t write a book.”

  “That’s not like you.”

  “Sally asked me to keep it quiet. Jane kept the baby. She’s twenty-one now. The child is seven. He’s being raised by Sally’s parents because Jane is a mess. Not to mention that the family had two other children between Sally and Jane.” She paused. “In my third book, the one about the abductions for ransom in Mexico, I wrote about the impact of missing persons on the people left behind. I wrote about their family and the cult, I just changed the names.”

  “And that’s why Sally listens to you.”

  “I don’t know that she listens, but she’s not going to shut me out. She trusts my instincts, usually. She was going to be a lawyer. She finished law school, passed the bar, but decided to enroll in the police academy. We can’t help but be changed by what happens to us. Sally would have made a great lawyer, but honestly? What difference would she have made? But she makes a big difference, a positive difference, as a cop.”

  Chapter Nine

  In Max’s job, she had dozens of contacts in law enforcement. One of her favorite people to consult was Dr. Arthur Ullman, a brilliant, retired forensic psychiatrist who had been one of the original FBI profilers way back when—before psychological profiling became a recognized tool in criminal investigation.

  The first time Max met Arthur was his last year working for the FBI. He’d been assigned to the disappearance of her best friend Karen Richardson. She’d butted heads with him—at twenty-two she butted heads with nearly everyone she met—but he was the only person who’d been honest with her from the beginning. He told her that yes, he believed Karen was dead, and that yes, he thought she knew her attacker. He also had insight into the type of killer who would befriend, kill, and disappear his victim. And if it wasn’t for Arthur, Max knew the FBI would never have been able to put a name on Karen’s killer.

  That he’d been right hadn’t settled the case. Karen’s body had never been found, and her killer—the playboy bastard Max knew was responsible—left the country, snubbing his nose at not only Max and the FBI, but the justice system as a whole. He’d gotten away with murder because no physical evidence and no witnesses tied him to the crime.

  Max learned a valuable lesson that year. Psychology and forensics could only get you so far.

  But if it weren’t for Arthur, she’d never have the pieces of Karen’s final day, never would have known who was responsible. And if Karen’s killer ever came back to the United States, Max would be there to make his life miserable.

  Arthur now had a teaching position at NYU and consulted with law enforcement. Max had consulted with him on any number of investigations, but she hadn’t spoken to him in nearly a year, when he was her expert consultant on Maximum Exposure. She’d offered to meet him at his office, but he said he’d prefer to meet at her apartment, where he knew she’d have set up a wall of information.

  “You took the best parts of my system and made it work for you,” he’d said. “I’d like to see your visual representation of the crimes.”

  Arthur was punctual, as usual. Max gave him a warm hug when she answered her door. “Arthur, it is so good to see you. You remember David Kane, my right hand?”

  “Of course. And it’s always good to see you, Max. You know you don’t have to call only when you need help.”

  “I have no excuse.”

  “There’s never a dull moment with you. I took the liberty of reading up about the Adam Bachman case.”

  “I’m surprised you haven’t before now.”

  “Oh, I have, but only what the average person might read about the case. I took a deeper look last night. Let’s go see the wall.”

  Arthur was in his sixties, gray, his hair thinning on top. He was still physically active, and teaching kept him intellectually engaged. He was a widower, losing his wife to cancer long before Max met him. He’d never remarried and once told Max that Beth was the love of his life and no one could replace her.

  Max wondered if she’d ever feel that way about anyone. Maybe she didn’t have it in her. Unconditional love didn’t come easy to her. If at all.

  They walked upstairs and Max turned on the lights. She and David stood to the side, to give Arthur time to read and absorb what was in front of him. He didn’t speak for fifteen minutes, putting Max on edge. She stopped herself—twice—from scraping the polish off her fingernails. A bad habit she couldn’t seem to break.

  “Can I listen to your interview?”

  “Of course,” she said. She walked over to her computer. “I think—”

  “I want to hear your theory, but let me listen to him without your bias.” He sat on the couch and closed his eyes in concentration.

  Bias? She was biased? What did he mean by that?

  She pressed play. They all listened to the twenty-minute interview again. His description of the fish still unnerved her, but she was more angry about the comment that she’d never find “them.” The Palazzolos.

  When the recording ended, Arthur said, “I had a friend send me the video of Bachman’s original interrogation, so I have some information that you don’t have, which I think will answer some of your questions.

  “First, Bachman didn’t kill the Palazzolos.”

  Her stomach fl
ipped. She wanted to argue with Arthur. He wasn’t psychic, how could he just know that?

  He said, with a touch of humor, “I know you want to tell me to go to hell, so I’ll quickly get to my point.”

  “I wouldn’t,” she said.

  David grunted and she ignored him.

  Arthur said, “He didn’t kill them because their bodies weren’t found.”

  He stood and walked over to her wall. He picked up her pointer as if he were the teacher and she the student.

  “Bachman is a nonsexual sadist sociopath. He is not a narcissist in how you and I would define a narcissist, both clinically or casually. He may be a malignant narcissist, which is a term rarely used and doesn’t quite fit here—they usually associate with a group or cause and kill as a means to a political or social end. However, without meeting with him I couldn’t commit to any responsible diagnosis.

  “He is definitely obsessive-compulsive, as you’ve noted in your research. He works in a bar, yet for the two years he’s worked there he’s always had Tuesdays and Wednesdays off. Why? Because changes in his schedule would rub him raw, like fingernails on a chalkboard. I wouldn’t be surprised, for example, that he gets up at the exact same time every day, eats at the same time, goes to bed at the same time.

  “His apartment was immaculate, but more than being neat, it was sanitized. He obsesses about germs, per your interview with his colleagues and even his lone childhood friend, but it’s clear also in how he lives. Yet he’s able to function in a social environment, to communicate and be perceived as being an articulate, friendly person. He’s managed to tame his obsessions, at least publicly.”

  Arthur walked to the beginning of the board. “There were no indications in his early childhood of classic sociopathy—meaning, no abusing animals, no fights, no antisocial behavior. His father left at an early age, and his mother’s second husband was abusive—so much so that his mother had to get a restraining order. If his mother lived in fear, Adam could have absorbed those feelings. That’s shown through his early childhood—you only found the one close friend, who enlisted in the army when they were eighteen. Essentially, abandoning him even though the friend was following his own dream of being a soldier.”