James Swain - The King Tides

He went to his study and shut the door. Sitting at his desk, he found a legal pad and a pencil in a drawer and wrote the words MISSED CLUES at the top of the page in bold letters. Before he could write any more, his cell phone vibrated and he removed it from his pocket. Karissa had texted him. She’d encountered a problem during her drive to Marathon and had just arrived at his friends’ motel and was getting settled in. He felt like a jerk for not reaching out to her to make sure she was okay, so he called her.

“Hey, there,” she said. “I didn’t know if you were still up.”

“Burning the midnight oil,” he said. “Tell me what happened.”

“I blew a tire on the Florida Turnpike just north of Miami and had to pull off on the shoulder. When I went to replace it, I found the spare was flat, so I called Triple A. Luckily, a highway patrolman came by and babysat me until a repair truck showed up.”

“I’m sorry. I hope you’re not too stressed out.”

“I’ll live. Look, Jon, I need to ask you a question. You told me that you have an FBI friend who could arrest Zack. What if your FBI friend doesn’t come through? What then? It wouldn’t be the first time the law has let me down.”

He leaned back in his chair and considered how best to respond. He knew from his years as a policeman that victims of sexual crimes rarely felt protected by the law and did not trust the police to follow through when it came to protecting them from their attackers. He’d promised Karissa that he’d have Zack put away so he couldn’t harm her, but until he actually did something, she was going to fear every shadow and strange noise.

“If that happens, then I’ll deal with Zack,” he said.

“Deal with him how?” she said.

“You don’t want to know.”

“Yes, I do. Deal with him how?”

“I’ll put a bullet in him if I have to. You have my word.”

The line went quiet. He’d never made a promise like that before. But the fact was, he’d screwed up when he’d confronted Zack and let Karissa’s name slip. He was responsible for the mess she was in, and he needed to fix it.

“I hope it doesn’t come to that,” she said.

“Neither do I. But if it does, I’ll deal with him. He won’t hurt you again.”

“Thank you. You have no idea how much that means to me. Good night.”

He said goodbye and ended the connection. He could only deal with one problem at a time, and he shoved Karissa out of his mind and went back to his legal pad.

Writing down all the clues they’d missed took twenty minutes. The reality of most criminal investigations was that the truth was hidden in the facts, and if the investigator looked hard enough, the truth would reveal itself. The truth was beginning to reveal itself with the Hanover killers, and he booted up his computer and continued his search.

Three hours later he was done. He’d found the bastards and now understood how they’d managed to evade Daniels for such a long time. He also felt certain that they were about to claim their next victim, and that he and Daniels needed to act quickly.

He found Daniels in the living room still talking in her sleep. Her words were anguished, and her body twisted uncomfortably on the couch. She led a tortured life. During the day she chased the men who’d tried to abduct and kill her, and at night, they chased her. Putting down his legal pad, he knelt next to the couch, wanting to wake her as gently as possible.

“Beth, wake up.”

She remained asleep, still talking to herself. He tried a different approach.

“Special Agent Daniels, wake up.”

That didn’t produce the desired result, so he gave her a gentle shake. Her eyes snapped open, and she grabbed his wrist. Within seconds he was lying on the floor.

“Hey, cut it out!” he said.

She released him and shot him an angry look. “God damn it, Jon. I have a hard enough time sleeping as it is. Please don’t ever do that again.”

“You got it.”

He pulled himself off the floor and collected himself. Then he sat down on the couch beside her. He picked up the legal pad and passed it to her. She spent a long moment staring at what he’d written. She shook her head, not understanding.

“I was wrong,” he explained. “Our killers aren’t nurses. It took me a while, but I figured out who they are, and why they’ve evaded you for so long.”

“I’m listening,” she said.

“We missed several important clues, which I’ve written down. Let’s start from the top.” He pointed at the top of the page where he’d written DRIVING IN REVERSE. “One of our killers is trained in tactical driving. I saw him drive a van in reverse on a street outside your sister’s house in order to get away from me. The street had cars parked on the curb, but he didn’t hit any of them.”

“He could have learned that anywhere,” she said skeptically.

“I disagree,” he said. “I was a SEAL and also a cop for fifteen years, and I took my share of driving courses. I don’t remember any time devoted to driving in reverse. The only other person I’ve ever seen do this was you.”

“You think there’s a connection,” she said.

“Yes, I do.”

“It’s flimsy. What else have you got?”

He pointed at the second line on the page where he’d written TIMING OF FIRST KILLING/APPEARANCE OF PHOTOS. “Two weeks after you were promoted to run the Violent Crimes Against Children/Online Predator unit, the first envelope of photographs was sent to the FBI and given to you. That’s when the investigation officially began. Correct?”

She nodded. “And I’ve been chasing them ever since.”

“You also told me that profilers at the FBI’s Behavioral Science Division believe the photographs are payback because you escaped from the killers at Dartmouth.”

“Right again. What’s the significance?”

“Think about the timing of the first photographs. They appeared two weeks after your promotion. During those two weeks, the killers abducted a victim, kept her in a house, killed her, photographed her body, then dropped the film off at Walgreens to be developed. An employee developed the film, saw it was a murder, and contacted the police, who in turn sent the photos to the FBI. Each one of these things took a few days. If you back them up, it appears the first victim was abducted right after you were promoted. Call it the first payback.”

She spent a moment processing what he was saying. Then it hit her.

“The killers knew I’d been promoted.”

“They did. Which leads to my next question. How did they know? The FBI doesn’t issue press releases, and the names of its agents and their job titles aren’t posted on its website. I know because I tried to look you up.”

“They must have found out through some other channel.”

“What channel? Let me show you something.”

He took out his cell phone and got on the internet. Opening the Google app, he typed in “Special Agent Elizabeth Daniels FBI” and hit “Enter.” A page of links appeared on the screen, and he clicked on the first one. It was the story from the Boston Globe of Daniels and her team busting a child-trafficking ring and included her photograph and job title. It was the same story that had led him to finding her.

“If you go on the internet and type in your name and the word ‘FBI,’ this is the oldest story that pops up,” he said. “This bust in Boston took place three years after you got promoted. The information about your promotion wasn’t available for public consumption. Yet our killers somehow knew. They knew the day you were promoted, which led them to abduct and kill their first victim.”

She took a deep breath. “I admit, it’s a strange coincidence, but it still doesn’t prove anything.”