To Catch a Killer Page 15

  Kara and Dillon bolted for the door and headed straight for the car until Matthew stopped them. Kara looked at him sharply but he was already on the radio.

  “Oren, fire up the bird. We don’t have time to drive,” he said.

  “10-4,” Oren answered above the static. “She’ll be ready in five.”

  “You have a plane?” Kara asked.

  Matthew shook his head. “Better. A helicopter. More suited for this area. Now, come on. Time’s wasting.”

  They reached the makeshift helo-pad and after a quick exchange, Matthew climbed into the pilot seat.

  “You’re going to fly this thing?” Dillon asked, eyeing Matthew with clear mistrust. “Are you a licensed pilot?”

  “Get in, sweetheart, or get left behind,” Matthew bit out as he adjusted his headset. “This bird is leaving in ten seconds.”

  Kara didn’t have the same reservations and climbed in. Dillon, grumbling a bit, climbed in after her.

  They took to the sky and what would have taken nearly an hour by car only took minutes by air. Matthew radioed ahead to the Humboldt County Sheriff’s Department asking for a car to meet them at the station helo-pad.

  Within minutes they were driving to the Hot Spot.

  Chapter 19

  Kara leapt from the car the minute it pulled into the parking lot, feeling the pressure and the barely contained hope that this was the lead they were hoping for.

  She went straight to the counter where a teenaged girl of indeterminate age sat, playing a game of spider solitaire. Kara didn’t waste time and immediately flashed her badge, her demeanor hard and determined. The girl straightened and her eyes widened as more officers filed into the small Internet café. Some people, seeing who had entered, decided to make a hasty exit. Kara paid them no heed. She pinned the girl with an intensity that often made people squirm.

  “I need to speak to the manager,” Kara demanded. She glanced briefly at the girl’s name tag, then added with a short-lived smile that was aimed at being disarming but probably ended up looking feral, “Lisa.”

  “Uh, well, he’s not here,” Lisa stammered. Her gaze went from one cop to the next and she swallowed audibly. “Is this about those credit-card receipts that went missing?” Her voice was a mere squeak. “I looked everywhere and I swear, I didn’t take anything. I—”

  Kara cut her off with a wave of her hand. “We’re not here for that. I need to know if there are surveillance cameras installed here.”

  “Um, I don’t think so,” Lisa said, chewing her bottom lip. “I could call Big Bob. He’s the manager, and he might know.”

  “Please do. Quickly. And tell him to get down here ASAP.”

  Lisa scrambled from the stool she was perched upon and disappeared in the back. In the meantime, Kara surveyed the layout of the room while Matthew did the same.

  A row of terminals with big flat-screen monitors flanked each wall, with some offering privacy screens. Kara moved straight to the ones with a screen, of which there were only four.

  “Whoever this is would’ve wanted privacy,” Kara murmured, turning to Dillon. “Do we know which terminal the ISP belongs to?”

  Dillon, who’d had his phone to his ear only seconds ago, closed his phone and shook his head. “But D’Marcus said we can access the information from the terminal. He texted me the numbers.”

  “Good.”

  Kara saw Lisa return, a troubled expression on her young face.

  “I’m sorry but Big Bob said without a warrant, you can’t, uh, well, I guess it’s illegal or something to check out the property. I’m sorry,” she repeated, clearly uncomfortable with being the one to deliver bad news, especially when Kara was fairly certain her impatience was evident in her expression.

  Matthew stepped forward, saving Kara from what might’ve been a very bad judgment call. “Lisa, we’ve got a serious situation here. A child is missing. We can get a warrant if need be but time is of the essence.”

  “I want to help you out, but Big Bob doesn’t like people poking around the computers. And he might fire me if I let you do it without a warrant.”

  “It’s okay. I understand. Don’t worry, no one’s getting fired today.” Matthew smiled, then opened his cell and quickly dialed. Within moments, he was talking to a judge. Kara wanted to kiss him. She should have done that first but she was blinded by a mother’s single-minded focus. She mentally berated herself for dropping protocol. Without a warrant, any evidence they may have found wouldn’t have been admissible in court. Matthew looked to the girl. “Paperwork is on the way,” he said.

  “Yesterday a woman came in here to e-mail an attachment. Do you keep a logbook of some sort for users on the terminals?” Kara asked.

  Lisa nodded. “But only for the ones who want the privacy screen because most of the other users are gamers and they don’t usually care what’s going on around them.”

  “Can I see that logbook?” Kara asked, and the girl hurried to get it. Lisa returned and handed it to her. Kara murmured her thanks and flipped to yesterday’s date. She scanned the names, looking for Bernice Walz, but no such luck. No similar name had been put into the logbook. Of course she wouldn’t use her name, Kara thought to herself. Her mind moving quickly, she ran through possible pseudonyms the woman might use. She slowly went down the list again, this time looking for anything that popped out at her. Suddenly, something clicked. Pop. Goes the weasel. The song used for Jack in the Box toys. The same nursery rhyme that the killer had formed some kind of sick attachment to.

  She scanned the list again. Jack Weesle.

  “I’ve found her,” Kara breathed, showing Matthew and Dillon. “Terminal 3.”

  They dusted for prints and managed to pick one up from the mouse but it was only a partial one and smudged at that. Plus the chances that it belonged to Bernice were one in a million considering the kind of traffic a place like the Hot Spot got on an average day. But it was something and Kara was grateful for every lead, however tiny.

  They were just finishing up when Kara’s phone shrilled to life at her hip. It was Tana.

  “We’ve figured out the connection between Bernie Poff and the suspect…they’re related.”

  Kara frowned. “Related? How?”

  “Father and daughter. We missed it the first time around because Bernice used her mother’s name and nowhere in her college records is Bernie Poff listed as a relation.”

  Kara shook her head and whispered to Matthew, “Bernice Walz is Bernie Poff’s daughter.”

  His troubled stare mirrored her own. “We’ll be there in a few minutes. We’re done here,” Kara finished, snapping the phone shut and looking to Matthew. “Fire up that bird. We’ve got some more ground to cover.”

  Matthew spoke into the headset as they flew over Garberville. “I’ve known Bernie for nearly my whole life. I’ve never heard of him having a daughter,” he said.

  “Sometimes fathers don’t take active roles in their children’s lives.” The minute the words left Kara’s mouth she wished she could take them back. She shot him a quick look to gauge his reaction and nearly held her breath until he seemed willing to let the comment slide. Thank God. She hoped he hadn’t drawn parallels to their situation, for heaven knew Matthew would have been an attentive father if she’d given him half the chance. She gulped the lump down that bobbed in her throat and retrained her focus on the case. “Well, D’Marcus is cross-referencing now. This woman had to have had a mother. With some luck, she’s still alive.”

  Less than half an hour later they were back at the motel and yet, they soon hit a dead end. Literally.

  “Shit. Nelda Walz died years ago. Natural causes,” Zane announced with a sigh. “Address?”

  Zane rechecked the computer screen, then answered, “1917 Crebets Drive, Willits, California.”

  “That’s about two hours from here,” Matthew said, and Kara nodded. “Seems she didn’t go far for whatever reasons.”

  “Maybe she wanted to stay relatively close to Bern
ie for her daughter’s sake,” Tana suggested. Kara immediately disagreed.

  “Then why isn’t Bernie listed as the father?”

  “Maybe Bernice didn’t know who her father was, but that doesn’t mean that the mother didn’t want to stay close for personal reasons,” Tana countered. Kara saw her point. Tana added with a shrug, “People do a lot weirder things for less reason.”

  “I’m not going to argue with that,” Dillon murmured, then clapped his hands and rubbed them together. “I say we get out to this Crebets place and poke around a bit, shall we?”

  Kara smiled grimly. “I believe a house call is definitely in order. We’ll take two cars. D’Marcus and Zane, you stay here and see what you can scare up on this dead mother. Tana, you and Dillon go together while Matthew and I take the other car.” She checked her gun as she reminded them, her chest tight and her heart rate banging a mean drum, “Be careful. We’re dealing with a maniac and she has Briana. If you shoot…make it count.”

  Normally, Kara would never counsel her team in this manner but at that moment, she wasn’t Kara Thistle, Special Agent, CARD leader, she was simply a mom bent on getting her baby back—and if she took a pound of flesh with her in the doing, so be it.

  Chapter 20

  Kara and Matthew pulled up to the house first, with Dillon and Tana close behind.

  They exited the car, guns drawn, and started slowly toward the house. It looked like it hadn’t been lived in since the old woman croaked, which stood to reason since Bernice, as her next of kin, had been locked up until a few months ago.

  Kara gestured with her gun for Dillon and Tana to go right while she and Matthew went left around the house.

  Dead silence filled the air as Kara peered around the corner, Matthew at her back. Nothing. No cars, no sign of life inside or out. They did a perimeter check and then converged in the yard.

  “No one’s here,” Tana said in a low tone, disappointment as sharp as everyone else’s. “Shit,” she muttered, then gestured to Dillon. “Let’s go scope out the inside and see if there’s anything that will help.”

  Miraculously, the door was unlocked. The two stepped inside cautiously while Kara and Matthew did a more thorough search of the property.

  It was really a dismal place. Apparently, Nelda Walz hadn’t cared much for her surroundings. No sign of long-gone flowers in the ancient flowerbeds, just dirt and a few straggly weeds. It was as if even the lowliest of vegetation shunned this place.

  The house had a decided lean to it and it was hard to distinguish the storage shed from the main house, they were so similar.

  “Can you imagine growing up here?” Kara asked Matthew. “It’s sad.”

  Matthew nodded. “You’d be surprised at how some people allow themselves to live,” he said with a grimace, yet his gaze remained sharp. “I’m going to check out the shed.”

  Kara took in the lush and overgrown landscape that the shack was tucked into and imagined Bernice Walz as a kid, running barefoot like a wild child, dirty nose, and knotted hair with a shrew for a mother. She shook loose the thought. It was a bad idea to let her mind fill in the blanks in the absence of facts, but she couldn’t help but try to understand what could create a monster. She thought of the children that had been killed thus far, and as much as she found it distasteful, she placed Briana in the bunch for comparison. What had drawn this crazy woman to her own child? For that matter, what had drawn Bernice to any of the victims? She thought back to when she first met Bernice and remembered what the girl had been screaming when they’d taken her into custody. Kara hadn’t thought of that scene in years, but suddenly, it jumped to the forefront of her mind like a shotgun blast from the past.

  “Capitalist pigs stealing from the people! Fire is your only salvation! Let the treasures blow to the heavens!” The rant was muffled as she was stuffed into the back of an awaiting federal vehicle but Kara remembered being struck by the woman’s crazed rhetoric. Fire. She’d planned to blow up the Smithsonian. If it hadn’t been for her former professor who’d tipped off the feds when he’d been uneasy with her increasingly unstable behavior…Kara sucked in a sharp breath.

  She knew the connection!

  Kara turned to find Matthew when a hot blast knocked her off her feet, stunning her stupid for several long minutes until she got her bearings again. Climbing unsteadily to her feet, she wiped the dust from her face and eyes, and called out, her voice hoarse, for Matthew. She heard a moan and stumbled toward it.

  Matthew lay on the ground near the shack, slowly coming to.

  “Are you all right?” she cried, her heart pounding a terrified beat until he nodded that he was okay. She stared at the ruined house and her stomach pitched. Tana and Dillon!

  “What the hell happened?” he asked, getting to his feet with Kara’s help. He favored his left leg and winced as he rubbed his knee. Then he saw the damage. “Holy shit,” he breathed.

  They both took off running toward the mess, tears stinging her eyes as much from the acrid smoke and smoldering timbers as from the fear that two of her best friends were dead.

  “Be careful,” Matthew shouted, grabbing her arm as she tried to climb into what was left of the house. “It was obviously rigged to blow, booby-trapped. There might be others,” he warned.

  She nodded and carefully made her way to the house. She rounded the corner and saw both Tana and Dillon had been thrown by the force of the blast through a window. She rushed to their sides, screaming for Matthew.

  Blood covered their faces from deep gashes and lacerations. Both were still as the grave. “Noooo,” she wailed, going first to Tana to feel for a pulse, then with a sob moved to Dillon. “He’s still alive!”

  “Tana?” Matthew said after calling in for an ambulance and backup. Kara could only shake her head. Matthew’s mouth tightened to a thin line and he swore under his breath. Kara looked away, knowing tears sparkled in her eyes. Tana had been a trusted friend, ally, and co-worker. In some ways she’d been like a sister. A broken sound escaped from her lips before she could stop it and her shoulders shook from the anguish weighing her down. Matthew took her into his arms, heedless of his own injuries, and crooned softly into her ear, though in truth, later she couldn’t recall what he’d said. All that registered was that her friend was dead and Matthew was holding her tightly. That was all she could handle at that moment.

  Matthew raged silently at the loss of the federal agent. He hadn’t known her long or well but in the short time she’d been in his life, he’d gotten the sense that the quiet yet tough-as-nails federal agent had been a good person.

  The scene was processed by a different federal team along with the Humboldt County Sheriff Bomb Squad team looking for evidence of more bombs on the property. In the meantime, while the coroner had loaded up Tana’s body and an ambulance took Dillon’s battered one to the nearest hospital.

  “He’s going to be all right,” Matthew assured Kara when he noted her pale face and stark expression. She turned wide, red-rimmed eyes toward him and he nodded his belief. “That guy’s too much a smart-ass to let going through a window slow him down,” he said, trying for levity even though the situation was the furthest thing from resembling a comedy.

  Her lips trembled with a wan smile and when she pushed a strand of hair from her eyes, her hand shook.

  “Hey,” he said softly, drawing her away from the chaos around the blasted shell of the house. He looked deep into her eyes, needing her to hear him. “It’s not your fault. Don’t take this on yourself,” he cautioned her with concern. “Please don’t. You have enough on your plate. This was the work of a crazy person and everyone who works the job knows the risk. Tana wouldn’t want you to do this to yourself.”

  Kara sucked in a sharp breath and looked away, as if she couldn’t bear the truth of his statement, but deep in her heart, she knew he was right. Finally, with a shudder of grief, she looked back at him and just nodded. “I know,” she whispered, but her eyes strayed to the scene where Tana lost her
life. “But it’s hard to believe she’s gone.”

  He cradled her to him and pressed a kiss to her dusty head. “I know, baby,” he murmured, feeling her pain as sharply as if it were his own. He knew what she wasn’t saying because he was thinking it, as well.

  Had the killer set that trap knowing they’d come or had it been set that way for years after Nelda died? And the worst question of all, was Briana’s time up now that they were finally closing in?

  Matthew tried not to jerk at the thought but it was there. Heaven help his little girl…

  Briana felt weak from hunger but she did everything she could to make herself blend into the wall she was backed against. The woman hadn’t given her any water today. The cracks from her parched lips made her eyes smart with tears but she held them back. There was something about the woman that had changed. She talked to herself more and sometimes she yelled but as far as Briana could tell, they were alone in the house. But worse than the yelling was the singing. Over and over again, the same song, enough to make Briana want to scream.

  “All around the mulberry bush, the monkey chased the weasel…” The singsong voice scared her, and somehow she knew whatever was holding the crazy lady together was quickly unraveling, and that was a bad thing.

  Briana cocked her head to listen to the only thing that kept the fear from eating her alive. The soft chirp and whistle of the birds comforted her in some strange way. She didn’t know why they were here but their constant song helped her focus on anything but what was happening to her. And they gave her hope.

  Her mom would find her. The birds would help her.

  It took some doing but Kara locked away her sorrow and grief and regained a fierce and narrowed focus on the case.

  “Matthew, before the blast, I think I figured out the connection between Bernice and the victims. If I’m right, it means all this was very personal and not random at all.”