“What do you mean?” Joe asked. “You don’t think she had anything to do with it.”
“I’ll tell you after I’ve looked around a bit,” Horatio said. “Mister Delko, please wait here with the family.”
“I’ll be right here, H.”
Horatio didn’t really think Faustina would run, but it didn’t pay to take chances. With Eric hovering over her, she wouldn’t get far if she tried.
He went into her room and opened her closet, ignoring a twin bed, a dresser with a mirror half-obscured by photos of her and her friends, hip-hop band stickers, and tattoo designs, and white-painted walls covered with more of the same.
The closet was shallow, and mostly full of black. Black shirts and jeans hung from a rod. He supposed the dresser would be the same—lots of black, with a few splashes of color that were probably gifts rather than items she had purchased herself. On the floor were a couple of pairs of shoes, including a pair of black sneakers, heavy Doc Martens boots, and one pair of dressier flats. Beside them was a white plastic laundry hamper. Horatio flipped up the lid and glanced inside to find what looked like several days’ worth of dirty clothes.
Shutting it again, he left her room and crossed the hall to Silvio’s.
Faustina’s big brother had painted his walls midnight blue. Like the girl, he had some band posters tacked to the wall, but also a poster of the Miami Heat and a certificate showing that he had passed his high school equivalency test. His room, slightly larger, contained a desk (a glance showed that library books were overdue; Horatio decided to remind Joe Castaneda before he was hit with some annoying fines) and a dresser on which a wrestling trophy reared up over assorted bling and pocket change.
Silvio’s closet looked much like Faustina’s too, with more football jerseys and light-colored shirts than she had, but still a lot of black. He had a hamper that matched hers, probably bought at the same time at some discount store.
Something was missing, though. Horatio returned to the living room. “Faustina,” he said, “you had a different pair of shoes when I was here before. Yellow and black checks, I believe.”
Faustina didn’t respond, just glared at her father when he spoke. “Oh, those are out on the back step,” Joe said. “She got them muddy.”
“Thank you, Mister Castaneda,” Horatio said.
“I’ll take a look.”
He went out through the kitchen and found the sneakers just where the man had said they’d be. A dirty butter knife sat on the step beside them. When he turned them over, he saw that she, or someone, had begun to scrape mud from the tread of the right shoe, but had only made it about halfway, from the heel up. The left one hadn’t been touched yet. He wondered if she’d been working on them when he and Eric came to the door.
Horatio carried them back into the living room. Faustina still sat where he had left her, hands tucked under her arms, defiance written all over her face. Joe lazed in another chair, clearly wishing he had been allowed to sleep. Eric stood between Faustina and the door with his kit in his hand.
“Eric, would you get out an evidence envelope, please?”
“You find something?” Eric asked. He put the kit down on the floor, opened it up, and withdrew a paper envelope.
“And a pair of tweezers,” Horatio said.
Eric handed a pair over with the envelope. Horatio handed Eric the shoe, and Eric glanced at the sole.
“These are your shoes, aren’t they?”
“Might be,” Faustina said.
“Those are hers,” Joe Castaneda said. “I got them for her on her last birthday.”
“Papa!”
“Well, it’s true. What about it?”
Horatio pointed to a blob stuck in the treads. “This,” he said, “is a butterfly larva.” He plucked it out with the tweezers and held it up for the others to see. “I’ll have to confirm it at the lab, but I believe we’ll find that it’s the larval stage of a viceroy butterfly.”
“So I stepped on a damn butterfly,” Faustina said. “So?”
“Not a butterfly, but its larva,” Horatio corrected.
“Not very different, except that butterflies can travel a lot farther than their larvae do.”
“Still, it’s just a freakin’ bug, right? It against the law to kill one?”
“Not at all,” Horatio said. “But the only native larval host plant for the viceroy butterfly is the Coastal Plain Willow tree. And we know there were some of those at the scene where your brother was shot.”
“Are they rare trees?” Joe asked.
“Not terribly, no.”
“So that don’t prove nothing,” Faustina said. “I might have stepped on it anywhere.”
“Not anywhere,” Horatio said. “They’re not truly rare, but they’re not everywhere, either. But you’re right, by itself it doesn’t prove anything.”
“What you mean, by itself?”
“I notice you haven’t washed your clothes in a few days,” Horatio said. “I’m going to have to collect the clothes in your hamper, in addition to these shoes. My guess is that some of the clothes, and maybe the shoes, will test positive for gunshot residue. That, in addition to the larva in your tread, will put you at the scene of Silvio’s shooting.”
“I didn’t kill my brother!” Faustina shouted. Her eyes brimmed with tears, and her petulance turned to grief.
“I know you didn’t,” Horatio said. “We know that the nonfatal bullet was fired by someone very small in stature, or else crouching at a very awkward, unlikely height. Someone who is four feet, ten inches tall would have been shooting from a natural stance. You didn’t kill him, Faustina, but you did shoot him.”
The tears broke free, began to flow. Joe Castaneda stared at his daughter, eyes agape with disbelief. “Faustina—did you?”
“That bastard Little Willy from the Kuban Kings dissed me,” she said, fighting back sobs. “He tried to freakin’ hit on me and then he blamed me when I didn’t want to be with him. And Silvio didn’t do shit about it. He’s my big brother, he should have had my back, but he just stood there and let Little Willy talk that shit about me.”
“I understand he threatened Little Willy,” Horatio said.
“That was just talk. He didn’t do nothing.”
“That’s no excuse to shoot him,” Joe said.
“He got no excuse to stand there like an idiot while someone from another gang shows his sister disrespect! What kind of man does that? He don’t stand up for his family, he ain’t gonna stand up for anyone! I never meant to kill him, I just wanted to teach him a lesson. He can’t step up when it’s time, he’ll never be a real gangster, that’s all I wanted to show him.”
“By shooting at him,” Horatio said. “With what gun?”
“One of his nine-mils,” Faustina said. “I threw it in the bay.”
“That settles it,” Horatio said. “The fatal bullet was the forty-five, not a nine. You hit him, but you didn’t kill him.”
She spun around to face her father. “See? I didn’t kill Silvio!”
“But you were there when he died,” Horatio added.
“Yeah.” Her voice softened, and the sobs threatened to start up again. She swallowed one back.
“I was. I was just aiming at him when he heard or saw someone else. He drew down on the other person. I freaked and my finger accidentally squeezed on the trigger and I saw him, like, jump, and then he fired a shot and the other person fired at him all at the same time.”
“What did you do then, Faustina?”
“I ran like hell, what else?”
“And before you ran, did you see the other person? The one who did kill Silvio?”
“I got a glimpse of him when he fired, that’s all. He was standing in some trees.”
“What can you tell me about him?”
“He was a white guy. Older, like you.”
“Did you notice his hair color? What he was wearing?”
“Short hair, I think. Dark, like brown or black.”
“And his clothes?”
“Like a suit, I think. I can’t remember for sure. I don’t think a necktie, but maybe a white shirt and a dark jacket.”
“Anything else you remember about him?”
“Nothing really. Just a regular white guy, bigger than you, maybe your same age.”
“That’s good, Faustina. Thank you.”
“Will she go to jail?” Joe asked.
“That’s not up to me,” Horatio said. “But it’s possible that she’ll spend some time in a juvenile facility, yes.”
“But she—”
“She shot her brother, Mister Castaneda,” he said. “Not fatally, but it could have been fatal. The fact that someone else killed him, instead of her, was purely an accident. Then she tried to cover up the crime. I’m sorry, but a judge is going to have to decide what happens to Faustina.”
28
“TOO BAD ABOUT the girl,” Eric said when they were back in the Hummer. “And it’s too bad she didn’t get a better look at the other shooter.”
“I think she got a good enough look,” Horatio said. He pulled into the traffic lane and started back toward the lab.
“What do you mean?”
“Hang on.” Horatio took out his phone and called Ryan’s number. “Mister Wolfe,” he said when Ryan answered. “Have you got anything for me?”
“My trash-diving expedition?” Ryan asked. “I think so, yeah.”
“What?”
“Whoever used that tissue is suffering from allergies,” Ryan said. “To a specific type of pollen.”
“And that pollen is?”
“Peters says Coastal Plain Willow. It’s highly allergenic.”
“Indeed it is,” Horatio said. “Especially to people who don’t spend a lot of time around them. And it’s in bloom right now, isn’t it?”
“I think so.”
“You saw some yesterday.”
“I did?” Ryan paused. “Oh, at Bicentennial Park?”
“That’s right.”
“So this is related to that shooting?”
“I think it might be,” Horatio said.
“Who used the tissue?”
“I’ll fill you in when I know more. In the meantime, please get Valera started working up the DNA of the willow tree. I’d like to be able to match it to a specific individual plant. It wouldn’t hurt if she ran the DNA of the person, too—I know who it is, but we’ll need to be able to prove it in court.”
“I’m on it,” Ryan said. “By the way, Calleigh was looking for you a few minutes ago.”
Horatio thanked Ryan, hung up, and called Calleigh.
“That nine-mil round the bomber fired at you,” she said after greeting him, “that was recovered from the wall at the Ibanez house?”
“What about it?”
“I ran it through IBIS to see if the same weapon had been used in any other crimes.”
“And?” IBIS, the Integrated Ballistic Imaging System, converted images of fired bullets into mathematical algorithms, and compared those with others in its vast database at incredible speeds.
“And it has. A couple of nonfatal shooting incidents in and around Overtown, most likely gang-related. And…”
“And?” he said again.
“And it also matched the round Eric pried out of a tree at Bicentennial Park.”
“The bullet that the victim fired, presumably at his killer?”
“That’s the one. I think the bomber is using a gun he took from Silvio Castaneda after he killed him.”
“That’s what it sounds like to me,” Horatio said.
“There’s another ‘and,’” Calleigh said.
“What’s this one?”
“It’s also a match for a bullet that just came in the door. From the body of that gardener downtown.”
Which confirmed that the Baby Boomer had killed the gardener in order to steal his truck and equipment, thereby gaining access to the Ibanez home. “Thank you, Calleigh.”
He put the phone away and filled Eric in.
“So wait a minute,” Eric said when he was finished. “The bomber is the Baby Boomer, right?”
“Presumably.”
“And the Baby Boomer killed Silvio?”
“That’s what it looks like.”
“But why? And does this mean you know who it is?”
“It does,” Horatio said. The early evening traffic was thick, and he had to pay attention to it as well as to what he was saying. “I’ll take the questions in order, if that’s okay. As to the why, I think the Baby Boomer wants a fresh weapon when he hits a new town. He doesn’t want to keep providing a trail back to his old haunts and his previous crimes, does he?”
“Probably not.”
“So first he used the forty-five he brought to town, then probably ditched it once he had Silvio’s nine-mil. For the duration of his stay in Miami, the nine—which could be connected to a local gang member, but not to him—would be his firearm of choice. Whenever he hits a new town, he probably looks for drug dealers or gang members he can take a weapon from, figuring that no one is going to look too closely into their murders, and also that any shootings he does will point back to the gang.”
“Pretty smart,” Eric said, sounding impressed.
“Not quite smart enough, though, is he?”
“I guess not, since you figured it out. What about the other part?”
“The who? That’s easy, Eric. The Baby Boomer is Wendell Asher.”
“The FBI agent?” He had gone from impressed to amazed.
“The same.”
“But—”
“Asher has been sneezing and sniffling since I met him,” Horatio said. “He’s from Denver, which has an arid mountain climate. No Coastal Plain Willows there. But the night he landed—and remember, as an FBI agent, it wouldn’t have been hard for him to find out where drug dealing was a fairly common practice in Miami—he went to Bicentennial Park and hid among some blooming trees. The allergens went to work almost immediately. When he was in my office, I let him use a tissue, and he conveniently threw it away in my wastebasket. Maxine will use electrophoresis and DNA fingerprinting to match the trace in his mucus to the trees in the park.”
“But Asher has been chasing the Boomer for years.”
“He says he has. All we really know is that he’s been in the same cities the Boomer has struck in. He says he went there on the Boomer’s trail, but I think it’s the other way around. I’m sure his reports are detailed, precise, and almost entirely fictional. It’s no wonder the Boomer hasn’t been caught, if the lead investigator on the case is really the culprit.”
“Wow,” Eric said. “That’s—that’s incredible.”
“We’ll show Faustina a picture of Asher in a five-pack while she’s in holding,” Horatio said. They had waited at the house until a squad car showed up to take her in. “And once we have him in custody, she can pick him out of a lineup. I’m sure she’ll cooperate if she thinks it’ll help her get off more lightly.”
“Probably, yeah,” Eric said. “You know, it makes sense, now that I think about it. Asher is an explosives expert, right?”
“That’s why he was assigned to the case in the first place,” Horatio said. “Probably not a coincidence that he first struck close to Denver. Asher knew what he was doing, right from the start. He knew that he had the most expertise in the Denver field office, so he would be the likely choice to head the investigation.”
“That’s true,” Eric said. “It’s circumstantial, but—”
“A lot of it is circumstantial,” Horatio interrupted. “Like the cotton fibers found at the shooting scene.”
“From a pair of jeans, right?”
“Wrangler jeans,” Horatio corrected. “Much more commonly worn out West than in Miami. I’ll bet we’ll find some in Asher’s hotel room, though.”
“Which will change that from circumstantial evidence to physical evidence.”
“And physical evidence, Eric, is our
specialty.” Horatio took his phone out again and called Frank Tripp.
“Tripp,” the detective answered.
“Frank, it’s Horatio. I need you to bring in Wendell Asher.”
“The Fed? What do you mean, bring him in?”
“Arrest him, Frank.”
“You’re not a guy who makes jokes like this, Horatio, so why don’t you tell me what the hell’s going on?”
“Certainly, Frank.” Horatio ran down the evidence he had just sorted out in his own mind by discussing it with Eric.
“I don’t know, Horatio,” Frank said at the end of it. “It sounds compelling, but—”
“There could be someone else in danger right now, Frank. Just pick him up. We’ll put him in a lineup for Faustina Castaneda. If she can’t recognize him, then we can revisit it, but I’m convinced he’s our guy.”
“Okay, Horatio. I’ll have him picked up. If you’re wrong, there’ll be hell to pay.”
“I’ll take full responsibility, Frank.” Horatio knew he could ill afford to make more enemies at the Bureau, and he didn’t want to jeopardize any of the federal funding that helped Miami have one of the most state-of-the-art crime labs in the country. But he didn’t think he was wrong.
His phone rang a couple of minutes later. “Horatio Caine.”
“Horatio,” Frank’s voice said, clearly disturbed.
“I put out a be on the lookout for Asher, but I can’t locate him anywhere and he’s not answering his phone. He told me he was on his way to interview Emily Hurt, the judge who made the final determination on the Ibanez case, but I talked to a detective there who said Asher never showed up.”
“Of course he didn’t,” Horatio said. “Because he’s been playing us all along. The judge isn’t the next target, is she? And neither is Alexx.”
“I thought it made sense that Judge Hurt would be.”
“Of course it did, Francis. But Asher is trickier than that. He’s out there somewhere, planting his next device. And we’ve got to find him before he does.”
29
FRANK MET HORATIO at the crime lab, and the two hunkered in Horatio’s office with the Miami Herald and the records from the Ibanez court case. They combed through both, looking for any likely targets beyond the obvious ones. It was Frank who finally punched the newspaper with a thick finger. “I got it,” he said.
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