Allison Brennan - Cutting Edge

Quin shrugged. “You asked me to. I don’t mind. But I have to get downtown by ten for a staff meeting, then Ulysses and I are meeting at Butcher-Payne to catalog everything, then turn it over to your ERT by tomorrow morning.”

As they walked together to the conference room, Nora’s phone vibrated. She glanced at the number. Dunn.

“English,” she answered. “Did you get in?”

Dunn’s voice was strained. “You were right. We have what appears to be a major crime scene.”

“Where in the house?”

“In the bedroom. The bed is saturated with blood. There’s also other biological matter-the place stinks to high heaven.”

“Don’t touch anything. I’m sending the ERT there. Secure the scene and start the canvass. Any neighbors who saw him arrive, when, if anyone spoke to him, saw him with anyone, whatever you can find out. Then send me a report.”

“This place is in the middle of nowhere. It doesn’t get much more private than this.”

“I’ll have research shoot you off his recent credit card transactions and phone records. See if you can follow up on any of them. I’m going into a briefing, but call me if you find anything.”

She hung up.

“Payne was killed in Tahoe,” she told Quin as she shot off an email to the ERT leader and ASAC Hooper about the crime scene and asking for a group to go to Tahoe to process the scene.

They entered the conference room. Within minutes, her entire team had gathered, as well as Megan Kincaid. Nora wondered where Duke was, but she didn’t have time to call him.

“I’m going fast because we have a lot to do. First, to bring everyone up to speed, Nathan Dunn called from our Tahoe office. There is substantial evidence of violence in Dr. Payne’s vacation home. We’ve secured the house and are sending the ERT. We’ll need to confirm that Dr. Payne was killed there, but all evidence points in that direction.”

She sipped water and continued. “Everyone should have gotten my notes from the coroner’s office and the crime scene. Dr. Coffey hasn’t made his report official, but we’re going off the preliminary until we hear something different. The victim was dead at least six hours before the fire started. He was killed off-site and transported in an enclosed pickup truck bed. Dr. Coffey is working on matching up the marks on his back with a make and model. It may give us our first real lead.”

From the minute Dr. Duncan said Jonah Payne was a creature of habit and went to his vacation house the last weekend of every month, Nora had known that he’d been killed there. Organized murderers plan their kills down to the last detail. They follow their prey, plan the best method of attack, and pounce.

Before she could share the additional information, ASAC Hooper opened the door and said, “Nora, when you have a minute I need to see you in my office. Go ahead and finish up here.”

He left, but Nora was distracted. She glanced at Megan, who just shook her head, not knowing what was going on.

Finish up here. Right.

She looked at the team. “I asked Megan to be part of this because she understands psychopaths. And whoever killed Jonah Payne is not a typical anarchist.”

Megan said, “I’ve been thinking about it, and I’d like to go through like crimes, see if there are any unsolved cases similar to Dr. Payne’s, but not connected to genetic research or arson. I’m looking at the manner of death. If you don’t mind, I’d like to talk to the M.E. myself.”

“Please do,” Nora said. “Pete, can you follow up with both Sheriff Sanger and Sheriff Donaldson on the canvasses at Butcher-Payne and Lake of the Pines yesterday? See if they’ve found anything new, have them walk you through it. They might need a fresh pair of eyes.”

“Will do. What about Cole?”

Nora was trying to avoid going there until she had a chance to reassess her previous analysis. “We need to talk to him again.”

Pete cleared his throat. “Without meaning to offend, Nora, but are you the best person to do it?”

Nora knew where he was going with this. Pete had always felt that she was too close to the investigation, that Nora tried too hard to think like the arsonists. He worried she was overly sympathetic, but nothing could be further from the truth.

“Yes,” she simply said, “I am.”

Nora turned to Ted. “Duke Rogan with Rogan-Caruso sent over the background reports on Butcher-Payne staff. Go through it with a fine-toothed comb. Anything odd, you know what to look for-flag it and follow up.” To Rachel she said, “Learn everything you can about Jonah Payne and Jim Butcher. We can’t rule out that Butcher-who has the most to lose because he isn’t a scientist-may be peripherally involved. Maybe someone wants to punish him by killing his meal ticket.”

“That doesn’t sound like anarchists,” Pete said.

“No, and anarchists don’t generally kill. But someone died yesterday.”

“Unless it isn’t connected.”

“A bit too coincidental to me,” Nora said. “There’s a reason why Dr. Payne’s body was brought back to the research lab. Maybe it was just to watch us run around trying to figure out the unexplainable, but that would have been thought out by the killer. I doubt it’s so immature a reason, but there’s got to be a reason. When we find it, we may just discover the killer.”

She glanced at her watch. Ten minutes had passed.

“Go,” Pete said. “Let me know what’s happening when you’re done.”

She thanked her team, said good-bye to Quin, and went directly to Dean Hooper’s office.

Duke Rogan shook Dean Hooper’s hand when he entered his office. “Good to see you again, Hooper.”

“Likewise. How’s Sean?”

“Good.” He refrained from saying anything about Sean at Rose College this week. Better that Hooper didn’t know. Plausible deniability, should Sean learn something important to the investigation.

“I appreciate you coming in,” Hooper said.

“I was coming in anyway. What’s going on?”

“I had a disturbing call from Quantico. Our key profiler went over the case and wanted to discuss it immediately.”

There was a knock on the door, and a moment later Nora entered. Duke wanted to talk to her alone-hell, he just wanted her alone-but she was all business as usual.

“You wanted to see me?” She caught Duke’s eye and for a second, Duke knew she was thinking about last night. Good. That would keep her on her toes. He winked at her and she diverted her eyes, a faint blush rising.

Damn, but that was sexy.

“Yes. Everything taken care of? I read your report,” Hooper said.

“ERT already left for Payne’s cabin.”

“I’m planning to talk to Leif Cole again today.” She put up her hand before Hooper could object. “I know he’s threatened us with lawsuits every time we say boo, but I honestly believe that he knows something. I don’t think he’s involved-” Her voice trailed off and Duke wondered what, exactly, she did think. “But he has to suspect someone. Though they operate independently, it’s not a huge group of people.”

“You’re not going to get someone like Cole to turn state’s evidence.”

“No, but I might be able to feel my way around the situation and see if I can prod him hard enough to give up something without realizing it. It’s worth a shot, because right now we have next to nothing-unless ERT picks up a fingerprint in Lake Tahoe that we can match,” she added with a hint of sarcasm, enough to make Duke think she didn’t believe it would happen.

“Good plan,” Hooper said. He hit the speakerphone button, then dialed. “Hans Vigo called this morning and wanted to talk to us about the last letter sent by the BLF arsonists. Since Rogan here has been consulting, I hope you don’t mind I asked him to join us.”