Broken (4 page)

"I know. I'll come back tomorrow. It's almost nightfall again." Agent Journey started to leave.

"Wait!" called Neely barely above a whisper.

"Yes?"

"Firsht one had an ugly double-headed sherpent tattoo on his chesht over hish heart. Shaw the headsh above the edge of hish tank top." She dozed and jumped again. "Oh," she groaned and pressed the pain medicine pump. "He shmelled like Dark Obshession."

He arched an eyebrow. "Thank you." He breathed a sigh of relief. "That's the first lead we've had. We're gonna do everything we can to find them."

"Thanksh." She was so groggy, her words continued to come out slurred. "They actually ushed condomsh. Can you believe they came prepared?"

"It's been the same in all the cases. There has been no physical evidence. Maybe when you're more coherent, you can describe them better."

"I'll try. I want them punished."

"I'm sure."

"He had pale blue eyesh—sho young. Shame color as their rubber glovesh."

"Blue eyes. Rubber gloves. Big leads." He patted her hand and turned to leave again.

"Didn't want to kill me, but the other one did. Shaid not firsht time."

"Excuse me?" He came back to the bed one more time.

"Young one told another he shtrangled me, but he knew I wash alive. Felt my neck after he took hish handsh off my throat."

"Remorse? Hesitation?" He grunted. "Maybe a different crew, but same leader. You say one was really young?"

"Mmm. Voice cracked."

"Maybe some kind of gang initiation. You really are giving me more than we've had."

"One more thing. Everything wash shaved, even pubesh and underarmsh."

"No semen, no hair—no DNA."
We found no trace of sweat or saliva. Too damned clean.
"At least you remember the gloves too. You rest now. I'll see you tomorrow."

Agent Journey would never return, but Neely did her best to describe her attackers, though she could only recall one with any certainty. She sketched the part of the tattoo she had seen, as well as a pair of eyes that haunted her. Neely might have been broken and left for dead, but she refused to curl up and die.

5

Fallen Angels

W
it
h
Chris Gautier's untimely death, Brian Baker assumed the role as lead detective. He had every detective and some patrol officers reviewing Chris's old cases for possible suspects. Officer Parker Reynolds volunteered his off time, and Police Chief Raiford Reynolds left the comfort of his office to lend a hand.

Chris had not even been on duty when she had been killed. She and Trista had been shopping at the strip mall. Since Trista was learning to drive, Chris had given her the car keys. Trista unlocked the driver's door, and Chris dropped on the other side of the car.

The milling shoppers near the Gautier car had fallen behind the nearest cover at the loud sound, not sure what they had heard. Only one shot had been fired. No one else had been hit. Chris had obviously been the sole target. Baker believed it had to be related to an old case.

The only thing her teenage daughter could recall was seeing her mother fall and the air being extremely cold for June in the Deep South. Baker read over the statements and shivered. "Shit." He called his boss.

Ray answered with trepidation. "What now?"

"Did you read this part about cold air?"

Rubbing his head as a migraine crept up, Ray said, "Are you suggesting some form of spiritual warfare?"

"Hey, it was freezing when we took Latrice down, and it was like ice in court with Mia."

"Yeah. I'm sort of tired of any demon Latrice might have unleashed."

"Me too, but it's weird again."

"Let's meet at the crime scene."

Ray and Brian met and went over everything again.

The investigation followed the trajectory of the bullet to an office building more than a hundred yards from the parking lot. The slug, which had passed through Chris's brain and had been recovered from the car in front of hers, was a .223 and had to have been fired from either a hunting rifle or a sniper rifle. The caliber was general use for hunters, military snipers and police sharpshooters in close quarters. Ray noted, "That old veteran you talked to, knows his stuff. A .308 could have penetrated glass, maybe hit someone else. Not likely with the .223. Makes me think even more the person is one of us or military. The guy's target was specific. Hunters probably wouldn't worry about a ricochet. A .308 would be their choice."

Baker groaned, "These days with the new strict laws promoted by the late great Robert LaFontaine, even hunters have to register their rifles. A .308 would be even harder to trace."

Ray agreed. "I'm loath to believe a fellow law enforcer or a military person could be responsible. Of course, the weapon could have been obtained illegally or have been in circulation before the strict laws were enacted."

"Let's not forget Latrice was retired military," Baker grunted. "Veteran status hardly negates culpability."

"I can never forget." Ray rubbed his middle where his reminding scars remained.

In Baton Rouge, FBI Agent Patrick Swift had a team investigating a string of high profile art thefts. Thirteen paintings in various state capitals had been stolen with the latest in Baton Rouge. Patrick waited for his team to convene. Looking at his watch, he realized he had about fifteen minutes to spare before everyone was expected back from a short break. He dialed his friend in Eau Boueuse.

"Raiford Gautier," came the answer.

"Hey, it's Patrick. I just wanted to check on you."

"Hanging in there. I've started a new project. And I have too much bullshit going on with the company not to stay focused."

"Keep busy. Chris would want you to move on with life. As soon as I put this case to rest in Baton Rouge, I'll run down. Maybe we can hit a few golf balls."

"Okay. I could use a friend."

"You have Ray."

"True, but he's not objective."

Patrick laughed. "I'm not either. Gotta go. My team's arriving."

"Okay, gang, settle down," Patrick Swift said to his special team. "We've been jetting all over the country: Phoenix, Little Rock, Sacramento, Denver, Jackson, Atlanta, Albany, Oklahoma City, Columbia, Salt Lake City, Richmond, Boston, now here—Baton Rouge. All state capitals, but this one feels off. What's different? What's the same?"

A young black woman raised her hand.

"It's not school, Beil," Patrick said with a smile.

"Yes, sir. Well, all the art pieces belonged to minorities."

"A racist connection?"

She shrugged.

Pursing his lips, Patrick nodded. "Could be. But what's odd?"

An older agent fidgeted. "I'm not superstitious, but number thirteen is the only state capital hit that
isn't
an FBI field office. All the others have been."

"Excellent," Patrick mumbled. "So—we have a thief or thieves, maybe being paid by a racist collector who for some reason wanted to lure us to Louisiana. Thirteen?" He scratched his curly coppery head. "You know, it's creepy because I worked the Latrice Descartes case here when her thirteenth victim was her undoing. I just got off the phone with her thirteenth intended male vic. He's a good friend. This just gives me the willies."

After concluding with his team the thief or thieves were being paid by a collector, the team left the local police precinct for dinner. Outside as they nonchalantly discussed where to eat, Swift dropped in his tracks, and a
crack.
The other agents quickly drew their weapons and found cover, but no other shot was fired. Swift was dead less than two months after Detective Christine Gautier.

The caliber of the slug matched the one used in the slaying of Christine Gautier. The trajectory of the bullet showed the shot came from the bank over one hundred yards away. There was no evidence of a shooter's existence except for a dead FBI agent.

The team related frigid air just before Swift was killed, but it dissipated within minutes.

Raiford Reynolds and Raiford Gautier received the news about their friend's death. Both were flabbergasted. They flew to Virginia for Patrick's funeral and had a momentary reunion with other FBI personnel who had become friends over the years. Steve Journey and Lawrence Dantzler greeted the men who had traveled a good distance to pay their respects to a fellow agent. At the interment, Raif cringed as he heard the guns being fired in honor of a fallen angel. He looked at his brother and said, "I told you Chris was only the beginning."

The New Orleans Police department had requested help from the FBI in a rash of violent robberies and vandalism involving female business owners who were beaten, raped, and murdered.

Agent Steve Journey brought a team into New Orleans to work with the local field agents. He thought it strange the state of Louisiana was having such a great need for FBI teams. Reviewing the twelve cases with dead women and one two nights before in which the victim was still alive, Journey's intuition as a profiler told him these were not random gang attacks. They were too well orchestrated. The animal, or he thought animals, who raped these women wore condoms and left no evidence. Thirteen attacks haunted him and made him hark back to another case in Louisiana that had involved the number thirteen. Journey called Lawrence Dantzler.

Dantzler agreed, "It
is
odd. Be careful. I just got off the phone with Swift's team in Baton Rouge. No more paintings have been stolen anywhere. Trista Gautier and Patrick's team talked about cold temperatures."

"Damn! Just like Latrice."

"One of his team mentioned the fact that all the other capitals had been field offices. You know, he was shot last month after the thirteenth painting. It keeps getting weirder. Did you realize it was three months to the day since Chris was shot that your thirteenth woman was attacked?"

"Not quite. Three months to the day that she talked to me. She was actually attacked the night before. I wish I could've gone to Chris's funeral, but I was in Albany on those child abductions. I called Raif. He still seemed broken at Patrick's funeral. You know, they were really good friends. Patrick landscaped the Gautier mansion."

"I went down. Yeah, Raif is a mess. He always said he would be lost without Chris. Oh, he goes about the motions, but he just seems robotic."

"Well, if I get the chance, I'll pay him a visit since I'm this close. I feel a little odd here. I mean, I got called in after several others came up with nothing."

Journey rubbed his neck after he hung up. He just could not shake his feeling that something otherworldly was at work. He had been in the old monastery when Latrice had attempted to sacrifice Larkin Sloan, Raiford Reynolds's wife now. He had profiled the case and suggested a woman was the killer. "Creepy as hell," he mumbled to himself. He remembered the frigid temperatures as the woman chanted an incantation and the sound that might have been angels flapping their wings. A shiver ran over him.

He decided to go back to his hotel and rest a short time before he went to the hospital to speak to Miss Rivers if she was awake. He left his notes on his desk and an outline of what he planned to do.

The day dispatcher was coming on duty at the same time. Journey greeted the woman and held the door open for her. He shivered as a gust of frosty air assailed him. He looked around trying to spot something. A bang preceded the woman turning to thank him; she saw blood spew from Journey's temple as he hit the ground, dead. The woman screamed.

The audacity of the murderer overwhelmed authorities. To shoot an FBI agent exiting the police station staggered the mind. He had done it not once, but twice. Again, the caliber of the bullet was the same as that in both the Gautier murder and the Swift murder. The trajectory led to a bank across the street, but there was no other evidence.