I woke and felt somebody shaking my shoulder. I cracked open my eyes and saw a blurry shape of a person sitting on the edge of the couch. I squinted several times.
“Jade, it’s time to wake up. We’re going to order lunch and eat in the conference room, then we’ll get back to work.”
I remained in place and stared up at her. My mind hadn’t yet comprehended what that person was saying.
She chuckled. “Man, you’re still out of it.”
“What?” I sat up and rubbed my eyes then took in my surroundings.
“Yeah, this is the FBI lounge. Don’t you remember coming in here to take a nap?”
“I do now. Sorry, Val. I’m out to lunch, literally.”
“It sure seems that way. Why don’t you go splash some cold water on your face? That might help. After we eat, Cam gets his turn at a nap.”
“Okay, thanks.” I placed my feet on the floor and rubbed my temples. I needed a minute to regroup.
Val cocked her head. “You good?”
I nodded and stood up.
“Okay, we’ve got a dozen sub sandwiches in the conference room. Maria just made a fresh pot of coffee too. Looks like you’re going to need some.”
I turned left out of the lounge and passed through the door of the ladies’ room. At the sink, I cupped my hands under the stream of cool water and brought it up to my face. The water felt good against my skin and revived me. I finger tossed my messy hair and rinsed my dry mouth several times. With a deep sigh, I walked out of the lavatory and followed the corridor to the conference room. The room was abuzz with conversation, laptop computers, and people grabbing sandwiches.
Spelling looked at me as I entered the room. “Welcome back to the world, Monroe. Grab a sandwich and dig in. We’re calling all of the companies in a fifty-mile radius that do vehicle window tinting. Meanwhile, Joe is trying to locate every vacant building in the area that’s in a remote location or grouped with similar buildings without active neighbors. He should have that list complete soon.” He looked from person to person. “Everyone, put down your work for a half hour and eat your lunch. We’ll pick up after we finish our meal.”
I sat next to Cam as I chowed down my turkey sub. “Anything new since I’ve been napping?”
“Nothing has come in on the tip line about the dark-colored panel van. I’m sure it’s because there weren’t identifiable markings in the description.”
“Yeah.” I nodded as I bit into my sandwich and swallowed a quick bite. “What we put out there is pretty vague. Anything to check out as far as the window tint companies?”
“Not yet, but we’ve just started on Milwaukee County. We have a lot of places to call.”
“After lunch, I’ll take over where you left off. You need a power nap.”
Cam nodded and continued eating.
By one o’clock, Cam was napping, the sandwich wrappers had been cleaned off the table, and everyone was hard at work. I took Washburn County window tint businesses just because I was familiar with the area and knew how to get to most of those places quickly if needed. Most of my calls lasted a few short minutes. I asked whether anyone had installed limousine tint on a gold Mercedes sedan, possibly an E-Class, in the last year, but it hadn’t rung any bells so far in Washburn County.
Bill Lewis, Val, and Maria concentrated on Milwaukee County because the business side of that area was so much larger. Bill hung up and jotted some notes.
“Did you get something?” Maria asked.
“Maybe. The person who answered at”—he looked at the business name he had written down—“Tony’s Tint and Trim said according to their records, a gold Mercedes was brought in four months ago for a limousine tint. I asked if they had video surveillance and he said no, but he did remember a little about the man who brought in the car. He said he seemed like an odd duck.”
“In what way?” Spelling asked as he placed his reading glasses on the table.
“Like the customer was trying to camouflage his appearance just in case there were cameras in the area. Tony said the guy acted sketchy and paid in cash.”
I huffed. “Of course he did. No paper trail.”
Hopkins jerked his head toward the door. “Head out and get a full description of the customer to the best of the owner’s recollection. Have him make you a copy of the work order too.”
Lewis stood. “You got it, boss.”
I completed the list for Washburn County without a hit, but only fourteen places specialized in window tint in the entire county, anyway.
“Sir?”
Spelling looked up. “Yes, Jade.”
“Is it okay if I go back to working on the rants from the notecards?”
“Sure, go ahead.”
I studied the sheet of paper I had temporarily set aside and reread the messages. The first one mentioned a job they were about to do with J.T.’s help and a threat that if we interfered, Julie would pay the price. To me, that meant they were about to commit a crime. What I didn’t understand was why they needed J.T.’s help. Maybe they meant that they needed his resources. I scribbled notes to myself in the margins.
The FBI didn’t have a handbook on how to foil crimes before they happened—not to my knowledge, anyway. I thought back to the type of situations handled in the Violent Crimes Division. They included bank robberies, online child predators, gang threats, active shooters, gem and jewelry thefts, and Indian country crimes. I thought about the note cards and the eye-for-an-eye quote, revenge, and the mention of family. This kidnapper had a family member who was either incarcerated or killed. I was leaning toward the latter. The rants sounded too angry to be talking about someone in prison. The mention of payback being long overdue took me back to the three case files where somebody had died in gunfire.
I opened the folders for 2011, 2013, and 2014 where deaths had occurred during shoot-outs between the FBI and criminals. I glanced back at the categories that were considered violent crimes and eliminated the ones that didn’t fit our current situation. I crossed out Indian country crimes and the online predators. Why would they need help or information from J.T.? I looked again and crossed out gang activities and active shooters. Those were dealt with on a day-to-day basis. That left bank robberies and gem and jewelry thefts. With the folders open in front of me, I cross-referenced those three years with bank robberies or jewelry heists. One armored transport robbery occurred in 2014 after the final pickup of the day. The truck was full of money, and according to witness statements, a U-Haul cube van barreled through a stop sign and sideswiped the armored truck on the passenger side, caving in the wheel well and disabling the vehicle. Four men wearing masks jumped out of the U-Haul, commando style, and shot up the vehicle, killing the guard in the passenger seat and wounding two guards in the back as they got out to return fire. That bold stunt netted the thieves a cool nine hundred thousand dollars. It took two months of studying numerous videotapes from the neighborhood and the correct U-Haul agency before the FBI apprehended them. There were witness accounts of the attack on the armored truck, and several people stated they saw identifiable tattoos on the person who seemed to be in charge. With three matching witness descriptions of the tattoos on the back of the hand and wrist of that person, the FBI tracked down the artist who inked the man.
I took a five-minute break to stretch, wake up, and get a fresh cup of coffee from the lunchroom. Back in my chair, I turned the page and dug in again.
The tattoo artist, when finally located, was a young man who worked at a shop along the freeway north of Germantown. According to the report, he had just left a well-known tattoo parlor in Milwaukee and started working at that smaller, less-known establishment in Washburn County. The investigators missed him in Milwaukee by days. He admitted to being the artist and mentioned that the tattoo was a particular design requested by the customer. I flipped the page to the photograph and studied it. The tattoo was simple enough and had only two colors—black and red. The photograph showed two black ovals entwined with a large red V over the top of them. That was it—nothing intricate—and I didn’t understand the significance. I turned the page back to the report and continued reading.
Once the FBI connected the tattoo to a name and found where that man and the rest of the robbers were holed up, they conducted a surprise attack on the house just before sunrise that morning in 2014. J.T. and Curt were the agents in charge. Three of the four robbers were captured unharmed, and one was killed during a heated exchange of gunfire. J.T. happened to be the agent who fired the kill shot.
“You look like you’ve got something, Jade,” Spelling said. “You’ve had your nose in that file for almost an hour.”
“Maybe, but I’m not quite there yet. I still have to connect the dots.” I continued to read. The robber who had been killed—a Samuel Lee Dunbar—had been adopted as a youth by a Martin and Phyllis Dunbar. Mr. and Mrs. Dunbar were in their sixties at that time and lived in Oregon, according to the report written by J.T. and Curt. Our perp’s rants, especially about family, didn’t fit the profile for Sam Dunbar. I was still in the dark, and none of it was making sense. I closed my eyes for a few minutes to refocus.
“Dead end?” Spelling asked.
“I’m not sure. I thought I had something, but now I have my doubts. I have to dig deeper”—I glanced at the clock—“but for now I’m going to wake up Cam. I need his help.”
Spelling tipped his left wrist toward him and looked at his watch. “Yeah, he’s slept long enough. None of us need more than an hour of sleep a day.” He gave me a thoughtful smile. “You’re very dedicated, Jade, all of you are, and I appreciate the effort everyone is putting in to help find J.T. and Julie.”
I thanked him and headed to the lounge.