Cause to Kill (An Avery Black Mystery—Book 1) (19 page)

Sunday felt like a Monday for Avery.

She was up and energized at seven. Strangely enough, she slept
like a baby the moment she’d arrived home, probably the best night’s sleep
she’d had in months.

She threw on a black pantsuit and white button-down. As always,
she wore black Skechers sneakers on her feet. The days of high-heel Manolo
Blahniks were long gone. After breakfast and a cup of coffee, she stood in her
foyer and stared at herself.

Go get him, she said.

A twinge of doubt invaded her thoughts. There had been so many
close calls already, so many leads that had turned up dead. No, she thought.
This is the one. It
has
to be.

On the way to her car, she surveyed the landscape of her life as a
cop: traffic duty, petty crimes, domestic disputes, gang warfare, and now this,
her biggest case, a homicide detective on the trail of a serial killer. This is
what you’ve been working toward for the last three years, she told herself: a
chance to make amends for the past, to close the Howard Randall chapter for
good and to step out of the shadows of miserable regret, and live.

Weekend morning shifts at the A1 changed at eight. Most of the
office was empty from the transition, with a large majority of the force either
on the streets or on their way into work. Connelly was already there, along
with the chief and Thompson.

The chief was in jeans and a red BPD T-shirt, the most casual
Avery had ever seen him. On the phone, he waved her into his office with the
rest of the group.

“Hold on,” O’Malley said into the line, “I’ve got Black here. Let
me put you on speaker and we can get this handled right now.”

A gravelly voice emanated through the room.

“Hello? Can everyone hear me?”

O’Malley mouthed “The mayor.”

“We’re here,” he said.

“Detective Black,” the mayor said as if the words were distasteful
in his mouth, “I hear you’ve been relentless on this case, even after you were
dismissed. How sure are you about Devante? You know Miles Standish is a good
friend of mine.”

O’Malley mouthed “The owner.”

“I highly doubt that Mr. Standish has anything to do with this,”
Avery said. “We believe the killer is someone within his offices, most likely a
human resources manager or liaison that would have met with these girls, read
their resumes, and then passed them on to the proper departments.”

“I asked how
sure
you are about Devante, Ms. Black. Are you
positive
this is the best lead? I have a very difficult call to make.”

“Three girls are dead,” she said. “Each one of them is from
different schools, and yet they all had jobs lined up at Devante. It’s the only
connection that makes sense. I’m one hundred percent sure.”

“Good,” the mayor said. “Mike,” he added, “I’ll call Miles now.
Expect to hear from him soon. If he doesn’t cooperate, get your warrant and do
what you have to do. I want this case wrapped up by Monday.”

“Yes sir,” O’Malley said.

When the mayor hung-up, O’Malley addressed the group.

“OK,” he said, “here’s how we’ll do this. Avery, you’re lead. That
shit you pulled the other day was way out of line, but since you cracked this
thing, you should see it through. We’ll discuss your future later on. Connelly
is your supervisor. You’ll have Thompson and whomever else we can pull together
once we have all the information. Thompson.” he said and paused for a minute to
find the right words, “I used to think you were this freakish Irish giant that
would come into this office and make things happen. Sadly, none of that
happened In fact, I think you’re lazier than Finley. Scratch that,” he
instantly corrected, “I was wrong about Finley. He’s been working his ass off.
Everyone makes mistakes. You, however, had better amaze me today. Is that
understood?”

“Yes, sir,” Thompson swore.

Fifteen minutes later, the call they’d been waiting for arrived.
O’Malley instantly touched speakerphone.

“O’Malley here,” he said.

A perky young voice filled the room.

“Hi there!” she said. “This is Laura Hunt. I’m the personal
assistant to Mr. Miles Standish. I was told to call and provide whatever
information you might need about Devante.”

O’Malley waved at Black.

“You’re on,” he said.

“This is Avery Black,” she said. “I’m not sure if you’ve been
informed, but we have a serial killer on the loose with a possible connection
to the Devante Accounting Firm.”

“Yes, Ms. Black, I’ve been fully briefed.”

“What we need is a name, someone that would have met with each of
these college students and then either offered them jobs, or rerouted them to
another department within the company where they were hired.”

“OK,” she said. “Can I ask which Devante firm we’re talking
about?”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, we have offices in Boston, Chicago, and San Antonio.”

“The Boston office.”

“OK, hold on one second. Here it is. Timothy McGonagle is the
president of Human Resources for the Boston office. I don’t think he deals
directly with college recruiting, but you can either talk to him or someone on
his staff,” and she offered his cell phone number, home number, and home
address.

“How many people does McGonagle have under him?” Avery asked.

“There are twenty-eight other human resources workers.”

“If I have problems, can I call you directly?”

“Absolutely,” she said and gave Avery her number. “Mr. Standish
wants to help in any way possible. He simply asks that you try and keep the
Devante name out of the papers if possible. We wouldn’t want people to associate
any crimes with our accounting firm.”

“Understood,” Avery said.

The phone call ended shortly after and O’Malley surveyed the
group.

Avery wanted to see Timothy McGonagle for herself, up close and
personal. Even if he wasn’t the person directly responsible for the crimes, it
was becoming almost certain that he hired a killer, or he hired someone that
had hired a killer. A quick background check revealed nothing on McGonagle: not
even a parking ticket. 

“All right,” he said, “get to it. I have a sweet sixteen to
attend.”

* * *

McGonagle wasn’t far from the A1. He lived in the affluent
neighborhood of Beacon Hill just north of the offices, close to Lederman Park.
Connelly stayed behind to oversee two gang-related squads and to try and pull
together a team for Avery if needed.

Thompson was assigned as her partner for the day. He kept his
mouth shut for most of the ride and sat awkwardly in Avery’s passenger seat,
his body scrunched in tight.

“Where you from?” Avery casually asked.

“Boston,” he mumbled.

“Where in Boston?”

“All over.”

“What made you want to be a cop?”

A frown appeared on his albino-like face, and his fat lips curled
in a sneer.

“What is this? Twenty questions?” he barked.

Avery parked on Pinckney Street.

McGonagle lived in a large, brick-faced home with white shutters
and a red door sunken into an outdoor foyer space. Thompson remained on the
edge of the entrance and looked like he wanted to be anywhere but around Avery
Black. His size and strange appearance, however, were a magnet for people that
walked by; even if they were on the other side of the street, they crossed and
stared closely into his face as they passed.

The bell rang and was quickly answered.

“Hello?” someone called.

Tim McGonagle was younger than Avery had expected, maybe in his
mid-thirties, with black hair and bright green eyes that seemed to always be
calculating figures. He was dressed in gray slacks and a pink button-down shirt
and a green tie.

Five eight or five nine, she thought. Too tall. The height doesn’t
match up.

“Can I help you with something?” he asked.

“Avery Black,” she said, “Boston Homicide.”

“Yes, I see. A celebrity officer in person.” He smiled.

He noticed Thompson before he turned back to Avery.

“What can I do for you?”

“Have you been following the serial killer case?” Avery asked.

“I have,” he said.

“Are you aware that three of the victims were recently hired by
your firm?”

“No,” he said, “my god, that’s awful.”

‘What exactly do you do at Devante?”

He waved inside.

“Would you like to sit down?”

“No, thank you.”

A female voice called out from somewhere deep in the home.

“Timmy? Who is it?”

“Hold on one second, Peg,” he called. “I’m the president of the
Devante Human Resources Department for the Boston Division,” he said to Avery.
“My main responsibilities are to hire and manage the staff. I oversee problems
within the company, any major employee/employer disputes, things of that
nature. The only resumes I see are for high-level staff we may need, such as a
CEO position or a head auditor.”

“Who recruits for the colleges?”

“One of my employees. His name is Gentry Villasco, but honestly, I
can’t imagine him doing anything like this. He’s an administrative director. He
heads up a team of four. They oversee colleges, college resumes, and they do
scouting on campuses.”

“If a college student wanted a position at your firm, they’d have
to go through him?”

“That’s right. His team might sift through applicants and weed out
the best resumes, but eventually they’d go to him. If Gentry liked what he saw,
he would then pass them onto the appropriate department where a position had
opened.”

“Can you tell me anything about him? Is he single? Married? What
does he like to do on weekends? Does he have friends?”

Timothy laughed.

“Gentry is definitely not a killer,” he said. “He’s a loner,
that’s for sure, a little older than I am. Maybe in his fifties? Has a house
out in West Somerville. Commutes to work. He’s a people-person but he keeps to
himself, if you know what I mean? He’s worked at Devante longer than I have,
about fifteen years.”

Avery gave him the hard stare.

“Are you sure you have no knowledge of the three victims in
question? Let me tell you their names again, in case you forgot: Cindy Jenkins,
Tabitha Mitchell, and the last one hasn’t hit the papers yet. Molly Green.”

“I’ve never heard of any of them,” he said and then instantly
corrected himself. “Well, I’ve heard of the first two, but not within the
company. I read the papers. I’m familiar with the case,” and he stood taller
and held her gaze.

“Are you going to be home all day?” Avery asked.

“Well, my family and I are planning on going to church in a little
while. We’re just having breakfast with the kids.”

He seemed both honest and genuinely disturbed by the connection to
Devante. A family man, Avery thought. She stepped back and tried to imagine a
killer with a wife and family.

“Here’s my card,” she said. “Please call me if you can think of
anything else.”

“Of course,” he said. “I’m sorry to hear about all this.”

Thompson was leaning on the brick facade with his foot kicked up,
oblivious to everything except the sky.

Avery slapped him in the chest as she walked past.

“
Hey
!
” he complained.

“Next time you want to act like a doorstop,” she said, “go back to
the office.”

A quick conversation with Laura Hunt and Avery was in possession
of the cell phone number and address of Gentry Villasco, as well as the names,
addresses, and contact information for everyone on his team, just in case
Villasco turned out to be a dead end.

Of the four people who worked for Gentry, two were women and two
were men. The women lived in Chelsea and Boston, respectively, both well
outside of Avery’s general range of the killer’s home. The first man commuted
from South Boston, also outside the range. The last one lived in Watertown:
Edwin Pesh. Watertown was one of Avery’s hotspots. She circled his name and
hopped in the car. As she drove, Thompson plugged in all the names into the
database for a background check. One of the girls had ten outstanding parking
tickets. The man from South Boston had been arrested for drunk and disorderly
conduct a year earlier. No records were found on the other two.

Gentry Villasco lived on a wide-open street in Somerville. His
house was a very small, narrow, two-level Tudor home painted white with brown
trim and a brown roof. Multiple trees shaded his driveway. A white Honda Civic
was parked before a closed garage.

Avery and Thompson were in the middle of a heated debate.

“I’m just saying,
try
to look like you care,” Avery sighed.

“I
do
care,” he said.

“Look around,” she said. “If I’m talking to a suspect, observe the
premises, put on a smile, pretend to take notes. Whatever. Don’t just stare at
the sky.”

“I’ve been a cop a lot longer than you have.”

“Really? That’s hard to believe. When was the last time you were
promoted?”

Thompson pinched his lips in anger and tried to reposition himself
in the tiny space of the BMW passenger seat.

When they exited the car and walked up to the front door, Avery
was slightly ahead, with the hulking Thompson behind her like a bodyguard ready
to devour any opposition.

The doorbell rang.

A gracious, humble man appeared to greet them. He reminded Avery
of a monk, or of some saintly being. Tan and balding on the top with cropped
white hair on the sides, he had eyes that were small and squinted. Everything
about him was small—his chin, his hands and shoulders. He wore tan slacks and a
black sweater over a T-shirt, even though it was at least eighty-five degrees
outside.

He’s the right build, Avery thought. A little small, but if he was
wearing a disguise, he could have also been he wearing heights.

“Hello,” Villasco said in the sweetest, most gentle voice
imaginable. “Would you like to come in?”

Surprised, Avery said, “Do you know why we’re here?”

“Yes,’ he nodded with a sad frown, “I think I do.”

He turned and headed back inside

“Mr. Villasco, where are you going?” Avery called. “Mr. Villasco,
can you please just—excuse me, sir? I need to see.”

She and Thompson shared a look.

‘Call it in,” she said and pulled her gun.

Thompson drew his own gun.

“I’m with
you
.”

“Not a chance,” she snorted and pointed to the lawn. “You call it
in. Wait for the others. I work better on my own.”

The house was extremely cold, possibly through central heating as
Avery hadn’t noticed any air conditioners. She closed the door behind her and
stepped inside.

Beyond the gray-blue foyer was a staircase to a second level. A
gray cat with green eyes watched her from one of the steps. She turned right
and into a small living room. Lots of plants lined the windowsills and hung
from the ceiling.

Her heart was racing fast.

The gun was held low.

“Mr. Villasco?” she called. “Where are you?”

“In my office,” he replied.

Slowly, she headed toward a small doorway at the back of the
living room. After every step, she turned to make sure she wasn’t followed.
Only once in her life had she been shot. She took two bullets: one in the leg
and one in the shoulder.

Gentry Villasco sat behind a large mahogany desk on the right. A
green lamp was on one side of the desk, and paperwork was stacked on the other.
His hands were hidden in his lap. A small green couch was on Avery’s left,
under a window.

“Mr. Villasco,” she said, “please show me your hands.”

“You work so
hard
,” he sighed, “all your life.”

“Mr. Villasco. I really need to see those hands.”

“It’s all for
family
. You know that, right? I did it for
family.”

“Please—your hands.”

“It just seems
right
.” He nodded. “I’ve already lived. What
do I need to be here for anyway? My wife died of cancer two years ago. Did you
know that? Terrible disease.”

Avery inched closer toward the desk.

“Your hands!”

“Those girls,” he said. “I knew, I knew. A horrible tragedy. It
truly is. But who are we to judge? Everyone deserves to exist.”

He quickly lifted a gun from his lap and placed it under his chin.
The weapon had to be at least fifty years old, a six-shooter: silver with a
white handle, like something that could be bought at a garage sale, or from an
antique shop.

Avery raised a hand.

“Don’t do it,” she cried.

Villasco fired.