___________________________
“From here on in, I’m in the cremation business,” Snakeskin had told me by way of a DVD recording sent to my home, back in August. “Anyone who crosses my path will go the same way as your private dick. I'm coming to get you, Quinn. You and everyone close to you. I'm going to make you pay for what you did to me. You and The Undertaker. Make the both of you feel my pain. Then I’m going to kill him first and then you. So break out those marshmallows, Detective; your life is about to become a living hell.”
Snakeskin kept his promises.
It was as if someone had gotten hold of all my dried-up emotions, chopped them into little pieces and thrown them in the air.
“Cornsilk?” The ridges on Stone’s forehead were forming a question mark. “But Cornsilk wasn’t on that plane.”
“No,” I agreed, tightly, “and we neglected to put eyes on the following arrivals. As far as we were concerned, he was on the run. It didn’t seem reasonable to think he’d follow us to LA.”
Inconceivable to think he’d come after Rae. But he had. Snakeskin had gone to the last place we’d look, then done the unexpected.
“He killed her, Stone. He poured gasoline all over her house and torched her in her own bed.”
Stone looked like he’d just been told he had terminal cancer. He slammed big hands against the hood of the Suburban and cursed against the night.
I just stood there, lightheaded and heavy-hearted – otherwise empty, as if I were a hollow carbon copy of myself.
A breeze picked up and scattered my shredded emotions to the wind.
Morrissey gave us the grim thumbs-up and we were allowed into the crime scene as a professional courtesy. Officially, it wasn’t our case – not yet. But come morning, the police detectives would accede to the Bureau’s request to turn it over to Wilshire. They’d have no choice in the matter – not when one of our own had been killed, and by a serial killer we were already chasing.
Robotically, I followed Morrissey across the soaked front lawn, leaving smudged footprints in the fake snow.
“You sure the both of you are game for this?” Morrissey asked as we slipped plastic shoes over our own.
The hard line of my mouth was answer enough.
Truth was, I didn’t want to see Rae’s burned remains, but I didn’t have the strength not to.
Rae was dead!
Stone was equally silent. Jaw muscles twitching. The suggestion of a low growl rolling round in his throat. The closest to him losing it I’d ever seen.
“All right, then stay with me. I don’t need to tell you to be careful.” Morrissey handed us patrolman’s flashlights and we followed him into the razed ruins. The homicide detectives stayed outside, sucking lemons. I didn’t care.
The house stank of damp wood smoke and the toxic tang of melted plastic. Everything blackened. Everything sodden. Loose plaster raining from waterlogged ceilings. Timbers weeping. Charred debris all over the place. Whole sections of the upper floor and roof had burned away or caved in, exposing devastated rooms and the hazy night sky above. One or two inner walls had collapsed into splintered piles of rubble. Furniture had blazed or melted into unrecognizable slag heaps. Broken glass underfoot. It looked like hell and smelled like it too.
Our flashlights picked out pools of inky water, islands of soggy plaster.
We came to a flight of metal stairs. Shone our flashlights over the wrought iron framework. It was only half supported by the scorched brickwork behind what had been an impressive central fireplace. Grated treads piled with wet soot. I swept the beam over a broken ceiling. I could see night sky framed by charred rafters. Ashy snowflakes falling lazily.
“Keep to the wall as we go up and tread exactly where I do.”
Metal groaned as we climbed.
More loosened plaster crumbled and fell.
My heart was in my stomach and my stomach was in my mouth.
We entered a dark tunnel that had once been a hallway. Dagger shards in broken mirrors reflecting frightened faces. Our flashlights illuminated black stripes running up the walls and over the ceiling. Fiery tattoos forming a ribbed throat.
Welcome to the mouth of Hell.
We came to the master bedroom. It was a sizeable area facing the Pacific Ocean. Probably a lovely place in which to wake and savor the splendid views through the big bay window, or slumber in the perfect sunsets. No more. Part of the roof was missing and most of a walk-in closet had folded in on itself. Bits of ash swirled in the air and glass teeth snarled at us from the remnants of a picture window.
I halted, halfway into the room. Legs leaden. Bile bulldozing up my esophagus.
The crime scene investigators had rigged up a pair of portable lamps on the floor space, I saw. Their brilliant focus was on a black mound in the middle of the room. It resembled a burnt-out bonfire, but it was actually the remains of a King-sized bed, together with its linens and pillows.
Morrissey and Stone ventured a little deeper. But I was rooted to the spot. Nailed to the blackened floorboards by fear and disbelief.
There was a ghastly apparition within the exposed mesh of the mattress. A crisped corpse, seated cross-legged in the classic lotus position. Curled fists clenched in the crease of the knees. Head tilted slightly forward. The intense heat had burned off the clothing, most of the skin and all of the hair.
Bile pressed against my barred teeth, stung at the back of my nose.
“Don’t contaminate my crime scene,” Morrissey barked.
No hope.
I turned and puked in the doorway.
___________________________
When tragedy strikes, we have two options: give in or hit out.
I had no intention of going under.
I had every intention of killing Gary Cornsilk.
The realization should have startled me. It didn’t.
Snakeskin had killed my son and my lover.
Killing their killer was the only train hurtling down my one-track mind.
Everything else was on the backburner.
Once, I was a religious man.
Once, I was a police man.
Once, I was a family man.
Once I was on my own with Gary Cornsilk, I’d be none of them.
___________________________
My world had imploded – a collapsing star, moments before going supernova – and all I wanted to do was explode.
___________________________
Exactly two hours later, I was co-chairing an impromptu meeting at the Bureau’s field office on Wilshire Boulevard.
I didn’t want to be there. But I knew the best way to pick up Cornsilk’s trail was with the full scope of the FBI behind me.
Didn’t mean I’d need their help once I caught him.
“. . . as of now this is our number one priority,” Mason Stone was saying. “All vacation days are cancelled and all other non-emergency case work will be put on hold or farmed out. That includes our work on Operation Freebird. Until Gary Cornsilk is captured, this office will live, eat and breathe this case.”
A murmur of resolve passed through our audience.
All told, there were more than fifty of us filling up the airy room with the big glass windows overlooking the corrugated Santa Monica foothills. Emergent dawn light shortening shadows. The alarm had gone out and every available field agent had shown up for the emergency debrief. Men and women pulled away from their families the day after Christmas. Some seated, most standing. Early morning coffee warming cupped hands. Serious expressions fixing faces.
A special agent had been murdered and the fun was over.
Behind me, a trio of eight-by-ten photographs were taped to the wall, together with printouts of Cornsilk’s records – including the failed mission in Jackson, his psych evaluations and his discharge papers. It didn’t make for interesting reading. One of the photographs showed a thirtyish male of American Indian descent – a copy of Cornsilk’s original Bureau ID. He had a clean-looking face with coal-black eyes and no signs of disfigurement. The second eight-by-ten was the same picture only this time digitally-doctored to represent how Cornsilk looked today, based on my description. It showed in detail his scaly skin and his milky unseeing eye. Not quite Freddy Krueger, but close enough to give sensitive souls nightmares.
Over the preceding fifteen minutes, I’d brought our gathering up to speed on everything we knew about Gary Cornsilk. Voice monotonic. Jaw dystonic. In broad brushstrokes I’d painted out the bleak backdrop behind his disfigurement – the incendiary booby-trap bomb planted by
The Undertaker
in Jackson – as well as Cornsilk’s attempts to do the same to me in Florida. Everyone was in agreement that Cornsilk was a prized nut job. I went over the more recent events in Kodiak that had seen a police officer killed and Cornsilk giving us the slip. Snakeskin was a slippery son of a bitch and I impressed it on my listeners. We’d already requested flight manifests on all passenger aircraft arriving in the Los Angeles area between midnight and three in the morning. In that small window, Cornsilk had landed in LA and then proceeded to orchestrate an elaborate crime scene. It took some believing – so much so that I was leaning toward the theory that Snakeskin had planned it long before coming to California. Of course, there was one other explanation we hadn’t discussed yet: he had help.
“I’ve spoken with the Chief of Police,” Stone told our group. “The LAPD have our backs on this one. All patrol officers are being briefed on a rollout basis.”
“What about the surrounding areas?” someone asked.
“Again, the same applies. All the Sheriff’s Departments and police forces within a hundred mile radius are now on the lookout. We’ve reaffirmed the nationwide APB and alerted all our field offices.”
Gary Cornsilk had made the FBI’s Most Wanted – which was ironic, considering when he was FBI he’d been their least wanted.
We were all agreed that Cornsilk couldn’t have gone very far in the time between starting the fire and our discovery that he was behind it. State Police were now on high alert, looking for anyone remotely fitting Cornsilk’s description using the state highways or Interstates. While Stone and I had been shaking off shock, Rae’s neighbors had been questioned about suspicious vehicles on the street after midnight. So far, no one had reported seeing any. But Cornsilk had gotten there by some means other than walking. Already, we’d sent out summons to all the rental agencies at the airports and surrounding districts, requesting copies of their customer lists.
The kill map we’d found in Cornsilk’s Kodiak hotel room was being scrutinized by Bureau specialists. Phone numbers were being traced and dialed, and addresses were being checked out across the country.
Two hours into the hunt and the Bureau’s media wizards had already worked their magic on the Internet. Bulletin boards and news portals everywhere were showing Cornsilk’s pictures – and would continue to do so until further notice – with instructions to call their local FBI office or police department should anyone make a positive identification. A press release had been drafted and dispatched to the various media outlets, including local and national networks. This was a major assault. A federal agent had been murdered, burned to death in her own bed, and it was hot news.
I am a firm believer that many hands make light work. Our hope was that an informed and vigilant public would act as our eyes and ears on the streets. Millions of unofficially deputized public agents, all looking for the killer with the snakeskin face. As yet, the Bureau wasn’t offering a reward in exchange for information. But the more time passed without a result, the more a financial stimulus was an inevitability.
Rae was dead.
It still hadn’t sunk in properly through my thick skull.
I kept thinking I was stuck in a nightmare. I kept pinching myself. I didn’t wake up.
Rae was dead and part of me was dead too.
Sure, the temptation was to go to pieces. Rant at the injustice of the world. Scratch my eyes out with acid tears. But I’d already used up every curse and expletive known to man, and some not, following the discovery of my son’s death. I had to keep a lid on it – for Rae’s sake – otherwise I’d explode and be no use to anyone. And that would fit with Snakeskin’s plan perfectly.
No way I was giving him the satisfaction.
All the same, I was desperately conscious of every wasted second passing us by. I was itching to get out on the streets, run down leads and shake rotten apples from trees. The last place I wanted to be was in an air-conditioned office discussing strategies over breakfast muffins.
“What do we know about the keycard?” someone asked.
“We believe it ties up to a hotel room,” I answered. “As yet we do not know which one. Forensics are examining it as we speak. A small part of the magnetic stripe survived the heat. If they can access the information contained on that strip, it should give us a unique identifier.”
Stone cleared his throat. “Remember, Gary Cornsilk is ex-FBI. That’s his advantage. He knows how we operate. He knows where we’ll be at any given point in our investigation. It’s also his disadvantage. He won’t expect us to be unconventional. So let’s concentrate our efforts on doing the unexpected. Let’s think outside the box. Surprise him.
“Once we’re through here, I want all of you who haven’t been assigned specific tasks to liaise with the local law enforcement. Go out on the streets. Squeeze every criminal informant and rattle every cage. Call in any favors you have. Be unpredictable. If Cornsilk isn’t on the road he’ll need a safe place to hide. Somebody will know something, have seen something, heard something. Make some noises, people. Let everyone know we mean business and that we won’t rest until Cornsilk is caught.”
“This bastard killed one of our own,” somebody spoke up. “Are we going for a capture or a kill?”
A ripple of agreement passed over our gathering.
“Fair point,” someone said. “Burnett was a good kid. If I get into a tight spot with this guy, I’m not about to play nice.”
Stone glanced at me as the ripple of unrest grew into a wave. He knew what I was thinking, because it was advertised all over my face.
“Let me make this perfectly clear,” he said as he scanned the room, “I’m just as angry as you are. I’d love nothing more than to rip Cornsilk to pieces. We lost one of us today. Not by some accident or act of God, but by the hands of a cold-blooded coward. Agent Burnett was a great asset to this department and to the Bureau. More than that, she was a dear friend to me and to many of you gathered here.
“Believe me when I say no one is more determined than I am to make Cornsilk answer for his crimes. But this office will not tolerate mortal retribution, from anyone.” Another granite glance in my direction. “This department does not operate a shoot to kill policy. Not today or any other day. If you want to do Agent Burnett a service, you will do this by the book. We capture Cornsilk, alive. We make him answerable. We are the law, ladies and gentlemen. We must uphold it even if it kills us doing so.”
The wave of discontent turned into murmurs of unification.
Crowd mentality. Stone had the gift.
And I had to face it: Snakeskin was no longer my personal pet hate. By targeting a federal agent other than me, he’d elevated his status from simple lowlife to the FBI’s Most Wanted lowlife.
Privately, I had planned on chasing after Cornsilk my way, then metering out punishment, again my way. To hell with Stone’s
within reason
limiter. But now the whole of the FBI was on his case, nationally, and my own personal crusade was overrun. Ironically, the extra manpower left me feeling powerless.
I looked at the third photograph taped to the wall. It was a blow-up of Rae’s Bureau ID. Soft fiery hair falling in thick swags. A spattering of freckles under a bewitching gaze. Full lips pulling smiles from everyone who laid their eyes on them.
My heart ached.
Beneath the photograph were the words
Special Agent Liberty Rae Burnett
, but to me they read
this is all your fault
.