Monday Morning
Lucy had sent her boss a report over the weekend about the investigation, but wanted to follow up before the weekly staff meeting to make sure Rachel didn’t have any questions about the complex analysis of the three crime scenes. She found Rachel in her office.
Rachel immediately said, “I read your reports. Everything good with Walker?”
“Yes, for the most part.” She wasn’t going to share her concerns about Walker or how he viewed her and the FBI. “Do you know anything about the past cases he’s worked with the FBI?”
“No,” she said. “Did he say something?”
“Only that the two times he had to work with the FBI we screwed up.”
Rachel snorted. “He could be old-school. Our office has an outstanding relationship with the sheriff’s office, but there’s always a few who grumble about ‘damn feds.’”
“Maybe. I think there’s something specific.”
“Is it important? Because you don’t want to go stirring anything up with your colleagues.”
“I need him to trust me, and while I think we’re okay, I have this feeling that he’s waiting for me to mess up.”
“Then don’t mess up.”
Sometimes it didn’t take a mistake to cause friction. Lucy let the subject drop. She’d follow up with Leo later. She said to Rachel, “We’re going to re-interview the first two victims’ families, confirm that we have all the information about the night they died. Plus, we need to dig deeper into their pasts. I think these crimes are personal—the victims are either connected to each other, or they are connected to the killer. It just doesn’t…” Damn. She didn’t want to finish that sentence.
“What?”
It would be hard to backtrack, so she swallowed her pride and prepared for a tongue-lashing.
“It doesn’t feel random to me. There are random serial killers, but even those killers have a pattern—it’s just not always obvious.” She felt like she was contradicting herself, showing that these murders had no apparent rhyme or reason. Except, they were planned, cold, and calculated. The killer was smart. Methodical.
“And you don’t think this is a pattern?” Rachel furrowed her brows.
“There is, but it seems so basic. Married male under forty. Killed on a Friday night. Even if it’s random, the killer stalked his victims. He had to, to know when they were alone. He’s calculated, which seems the antithesis to the violence done to the bodies. Anyway, there’s a good chance that one of the wives saw or sensed something that will help us.”
Rachel nodded. “Let me know if Walker holds back information again.”
“Okay,” Lucy said, but realized she might not—she preferred to deal with any problems directly with Jerry. If she couldn’t resolve it, and the situation impacted the case, then she’d go to Rachel.
She hoped it didn’t come to that.
After the staff meeting, Lucy caught up on her emails, followed up on two outstanding cases where she was waiting for more information, then tried to talk to Leo about their conversation last night, but he was already out of the office. Lucy had been so out of the loop she hadn’t realized that a huge task force had been put together for the counter-terrorism case Leo mentioned to her.
She grabbed an early lunch and headed over to the sheriff’s office at noon. Several deputies gave her a high five for her demonstration yesterday. She smiled and continued on. She always felt nervous being recognized in an office environment. She did her job, though often wished she could stay in the background, unnoticed.
It hadn’t always been like that. She used to bite her tongue all the time, fearing she’d be ridiculed or dismissed. It had taken training at Quantico coupled with the cases she’d worked to give her the confidence to recognize that she had much to contribute.
And it sure didn’t hurt that she had someone at home who believed in her.
Lucy went up to Jerry’s small office. He wasn’t there. She walked down the hall to the conference room that they’d been using and it, too, was empty. She went in, sent Jerry a message that she was here, and looked through the files again to familiarize herself with the two women they were about to interview.
Susan Standish was twenty-six. She and Billy had been married for seven years and had known each other since high school. She was a kindergarten teacher at a local public school, and her family was local. Parents in San Antonio, two older sisters who moved to the suburbs with their families, a younger brother in medical school in Nebraska, and a brother still at home—a high school junior. She and Billy had bought several acres with a very small house outside of the city. Billy had an insurance policy that paid one hundred thousand dollars.
A lot of money to some people.
Lucy hated being cynical, but she’d too often seen people commit horrific crimes for money. She couldn’t see someone planning and executing three murders for a life insurance policy, but she wouldn’t discount it. She’d worked a case where the head of a drug cartel had killed the husband of his money launderer to keep his associate in line, and another case where a lobbyist ran a stable of call girls in order to blackmail members of Congress and judges in order to vote or rule her way.
Teri James was thirty-nine, the same age as her husband. This was not the first marriage for either of them. Steven James had been married for seven years to Bridget O’Connell, who was Abby’s mother. Bridget died over ten years ago—their daughter had been three—though there was nothing in here about the cause of death. No life insurance policy on Steven James, though there was a note that he had a policy through his work that paid his family his salary for one year after his death, plus he had a retirement account with right of survivorship. They had a healthy bank account and small mortgage on their house—no obvious signs of economic hardship.
Teri James had divorced her husband Roger Abbott in Colorado nine years ago, and moved back to San Antonio where she was originally from, though there was no note as to whether she still had family in the area. Steven James moved to San Antonio from Southern California eight years ago for work, and they recently celebrated their sixth wedding anniversary. No other details.
Based on how hesitant Jerry was in talking again to the widows, Lucy realized she was going to have to play bad cop. It sounded cliché, but when necessary, cops often took different roles with witnesses. The good cop, bad cop routine might sound like it came from Hollywood, but many partners used the tactic to gather information from witnesses and suspects because it worked more often than not. Especially now, male cops didn’t like being the aggressor when interviewing female suspects or witnesses, which left the job to Lucy.
She’d done both, but found that she had a knack for getting under the skin of people if she tried. She didn’t want to run either Susan or Teri over the coals, but she would if she could learn more about their husbands and who might have been a threat to them. The two men had no criminal records, but that didn’t mean they hadn’t pissed someone off. Families didn’t always want to reflect on the negatives in their loved ones’ lives, negatives that might set a killer on their trail.
All they needed was one common name. One person whom both men knew would be a starting ground. Because right now, they had no direction to go. No witnesses. No known motive. No physical evidence linking the three victims to a killer. The minor differences in the physical evidence could simply be the killer adjusting. And there might be no real motive, other than the thrill of the kill—which gave weight to the serial killer angle. But even a serial killer started somewhere, and the first victim was likely the most personal. That meant they should look more closely at Billy Standish’s life.
Maybe the killer was choosing victims purely at random. If that was the case, it wouldn’t matter if the victims were married or not—maybe it was the thrill of targeting healthy men. A display of dominance from a physically weaker man. Or a woman, Lucy thought. But other than the attack to the groin, there was nothing that suggested this was a female crime.
Jerry came in as Lucy was putting her final questions together, based on the background information on each of the victims.
“No lawsuits naming Garcia or Standish as defendants or plaintiffs,” he said. “Garcia, we have more work to do—your office was able to confirm federal records quickly, and we confirmed state because that’s centralized, but local jurisdictions we have to put requests in by county because many counties don’t have online archives. Nothing in Bexar, however.”
“Good to know. But? You didn’t mention James.”
“The Los Angeles FBI office is working on any lawsuits from California and that will take a day or three. Locally, he’s been named in two lawsuits jointly with his accountancy firm—one was an audit case where the individual they represented sued the firm for malfeasance and a bunch of other things—it was thrown out by the judge. The second was a bench trial, each side was said to be partly at fault for different things—I didn’t read it, didn’t seem relevant and it’s very technical. Accountant issues. You probably have someone in your office who can understand it.”
“We’ll take a look. What was the final outcome?”
“The firm ended up paying a quarter of the original million the plaintiff was asking for.”
Lucy made a note. “Do you have the name of the plaintiff in the first case?”
“Yes, but it was four years ago. And why kill the other two men?”
“If this plaintiff regularly files complaints or lawsuits, maybe he did the same with Standish and Garcia—maybe not them personally, but their employers. Standish is in construction, Garcia a chef. Food poisoning? A leaky roof?”
“That’s dang crazy.”
“Not all killers are sane, but this one is. Sane and methodical and patient. Remember I said the crime felt personal—the killer looked his victims in the face and shot them. Maybe losing a lawsuit was the final straw and he went back to take out everyone he lost to.” It was thin, and her tone reflected that, but they needed to follow up.
Jerry pulled out his cell phone and hit a button. A second later he said, “Keith? Remember that case file you pulled, George Andres versus Allied Accounting?… yeah, that’s it. Can you run all lawsuits where Andres was a plaintiff or defendant? Federal, state, and local courts. And get his current address and employer … I know it takes time, but send me what you find when you find it … Thanks, buddy.” He hung up. “Okay, it’s going, but it might take a while.”
“Time is one thing we don’t have on our side,” Lucy said.
“I want to find this guy, but he’s waiting a couple weeks between murders. We’re still processing evidence from Garcia.”
“Four weeks between the first two; three weeks between the second and third. He’s cocky. He knows he’s smart. He has someone else on his list, and I don’t know if he can wait to target him.”
Jerry stared at her and shook his head. At first she thought he was going to argue with her, then he said, “Damn, I really hope you’re wrong about this, but I’m getting that itch that tells me we’d better find something, and soon, or we’ll have another murder on our hands.”
They met Susan Standish at the school where she worked near downtown San Antonio at three thirty that afternoon. She was in her classroom with another woman; all the children had left for the day.
“Mr. Walker, I hope you don’t mind that I asked Gina to be here. She’s my closest friend.”
“Of course not,” Jerry said. “Whatever makes you comfortable. And please, call me Jerry. This is FBI Agent Lucy Kincaid, she’s assisting in our investigation into your husband’s murder.”
Lucy would much rather talk to Mrs. Standish alone. Friends and family meant well, but sometimes they didn’t help a situation. Still, she understood grief, and she couldn’t very well tell Susan not to have someone to support her.
“I’m Gina Clark,” the woman said and extended her hand first to Lucy, then to Jerry. “I’m the assistant principal and have known Susie since she started working here.” Gina towered over Lucy, who had never considered herself short. Compared with the petite Susan, she seemed even taller. “Let’s go outside—there are tables we can sit at a bit more comfortably than these.” She waved her hand toward the low tables and tiny chairs.
The tables were under an awning, and flies buzzed around the garbage cans, so they stayed far from the lunch remnants.
“You have news?” Susan asked. “When you called this morning, I didn’t know what to expect, because you didn’t tell me why you wanted to meet.”
Jerry said, “There was another victim who was killed in the same way as your husband. We believe they are connected.”
“Another victim? That makes three people? Dead?” Her voice increased in pitch with each question.
Gina squeezed Susan’s hand and urged Jerry to finish.
“Do you know a chef named Julio Garcia? He worked at one of the convention hotels on the Riverwalk—Sun Tower—and lives in Bulverde, north of the city.”
She was already shaking her head. “I don’t think so. Does he have a child at the school? There’s three families of Garcias here, no relation, and two years ago I had a Garcia girl in my kindergarten class.”
“His son goes to another school.”
“He had a son? That’s awful. Poor child. His wife … what she must be going through.” Her voice cracked.
Jerry said, “We have a few follow-up questions.”
“Do you have any suspects?” Gina asked. “Witnesses? Anything?”
“That’s why we’re here,” Jerry said. “We’re pursuing several lines of investigation because no witnesses have come forward.”
“What about evidence? Like, DNA or fingerprints?” Susan asked.
“We’re processing every shred of evidence we have, but so far nothing has matched in our databases,” Jerry said. “Can you think back, in the days and weeks before your husband was killed, did he say anything about being followed? Maybe having an encounter with a stranger? Could have been at the store, or a gas station, or even work.”
She shook her head. “Billy was working so many hours—he wasn’t even home during the week because of the job in Houston. That’s where the work is, even this long after Harvey, the good-paying jobs are there.”
“What about you?” Lucy asked. “Have you seen anyone in your neighborhood or where you shop that has paid you undue attention? Anyone who made you feel uncomfortable?”
“Like how? Like a jerk who whistles at me?”
“Like any way. Someone you noticed even if you don’t know why you noticed them.”
She sighed. “You’re asking me about vague maybe events from months ago. I really don’t know.”
Jerry said, “We’ve worked through several simulations that tell us the killer acted quickly. Your husband may have known the person who killed him. At a minimum, he didn’t feel initially threatened.”
“Are you saying that someone we know did this?” She shook her head. “No. I told you that when we first talked. Billy would give you the shirt off his back. He was big and had a gruff voice, but he was gentle as a puppy. Isn’t that right, Gina? When he wasn’t working, because in construction sometimes work was tough to find, it’s seasonal sometimes, he would come into the classroom and read to the kids. Everyone loved him.”
“Your husband had a couple altercations after he’d been drinking,” Jerry began, but Susan cut him off.
“Those were minor. They were misdemeanors and the other guys involved were just as guilty. We paid the fines, everything is fine!”
Lucy didn’t want the widow to become agitated. She said, “We understand that, Susan, and no one is placing any blame on Billy for what happened to him. We’re simply looking at everything in Billy’s past, even things that you might not think are important. If he was sued for any reason, even if there was no merit to the lawsuit. If he had a confrontation with a neighbor or co-worker. Think back, even back to high school. He played football, correct? Did he have a rivalry that maybe went from friendly to violent?”
“I can’t believe you think this is Billy’s fault!”
“We don’t think—”
But Susan was irate. “People make mistakes, and now it’s okay that he’s killed for it?”
Lucy’s mental antenna twitched. “What mistake are you thinking about, Susan?”
“I’m not thinking about anything!”
Jerry glanced at Lucy and gave her a nod. Good, he’d sensed the same thing she had.
Lucy said, “You said that he was killed for it.”
“That’s not what I meant. You’re putting words in my mouth.”
“Susan, three men are dead, three women are widows, and two children are orphans. Julio Garcia’s wife is pregnant; her daughter will be born without a father. We are asking everyone about anything odd, no matter how trivial you think it is. Maybe Billy didn’t even do anything, but someone took offense, or made a mountain out of a molehill. What mistake were you thinking of when you spoke?”
Susie bit her lip. “It was an accident, and it was so long ago no one could possibly hold a grudge.”
Lucy didn’t say anything. She stared at Susan until the woman looked down at her fidgeting hands.
Finally, she spoke. “Billy was a high school senior. We’d just started dating—I was two grades younger. Billy and his best friend Joey were doing donuts in the mud after a storm, out past Calaveras Lake. A few of us were there, and we were all cheering them on, it was wet and dirty and fun … but … Billy lost control of his truck and it collided with Joey. They weren’t even going that fast, but Joey’s truck flipped and he was pinned down. Broke his back and lost his football scholarship for college. Billy was sick over it, and Joey’s parents hated him after that. I don’t think Joey hated him, but they haven’t spoken since Billy tried to talk to him at the hospital. I heard Joey’s had some problems with drugs after that, painkillers, but my mom said she saw him at the mall a few months ago and he looked good. I just don’t really know what he’s doing or anything.”
“What’s Joey’s last name?” Jerry asked.
“Adkins,” she said.