John Gilstrap - No mercy

“Where the signals began and ended,” Dom explained.

Venice nodded. “Exactly. And it got interesting. The other end of the call-the receiving end in every case-was from different locations, starting in Indiana, and moving in a rough line north and east. The originating end of the calls all came from the same tower combinations in southwestern Pennsylvania.”

“Pittsburgh?” Jonathan asked.

“Not Pittsburgh per se,” Venice said, “but from that general area. In the mountains.” She reached under the coffee table and found the atlas that Jonathan always kept there, and sear became even more animated. “That part of the state is in pretty tough shape economically. You don’t have neighborhoods like we know them. Up in the mining country there are lots and lots of old homesteads, but they tend to be on big tracts of land. Dozens of acres, if not hundreds.”

Jonathan found his patience waning, but he hung in there.

“I know, I know,” Venice said, reading his body language. “Get to the point. Well, I am, believe it or not. Because the land tracts are so large, there are only a few that could possibly be the source of Stephenson’s signal.”

“Unless he’s decided to bivouac,” Boxers said.

Venice waved a dismissive hand. “Trust me,” she said. “He didn’t. He decided instead to use an old family home up there in the woods.”

“ His family?” Boxers asked.

“Why haven’t the police found him?” Jonathan added.

She beamed. “Because it’s deeded to Alistair DuBois,” she said. “Not to Stephenson Hughes.”

Jonathan recoiled. “Who the hell is Alistair Dubois?”

“Stephenson Hughes’s mother’s father.”

“Holy shit,” Boxers barked.

Dom laughed. “Isn’t she amazing? Honest to goodness, it only took her about forty-five minutes to piece all of this together. I watched her do it.”

Jonathan’s mouth gaped. “What kind of twisted logic gets you to places like that?”

She shrugged. “I cheated. I started with the assumption that he had a plan that made sense.” She shot a look to Boxers. “One that made more sense than bivouacking, anyway, which meant that there was probably some property that they had access to. If that were the case, then I figured that it would be family property, else how would they know about it? Based on that assumption, I started with the tax records for the most likely tracts, and then I worked backward through a genealogy search. The answer came pretty fast.”

Jonathan gaped. “You never cease to amaze me.”

She beamed.

“You up for doing some more magic?”

Her face fell. “Like what?”

“Like finding me everything you can about a place in West Virginia known as Brigadeville.” It took less than a minute to share the spotty information he’d learned from Andrew Hawkins.

Venice scowled. “That’s not much to go on.”

“You saying you can’t?” Jonathan asked.

“I’m insulted,” she said.

“I thought you might be.” Jonathan looked at his watch. “It’s seven-fifteen now. Let’s meet again in three hours and see where we are.”

Now she looked shocked. “You know it’s seven fifteen in the evening, right?”

Jonathan stood. “Three hours and fifteen minutes, then. You, Box, and I will meet up in the office at ten thirty.” He looked to Boxers. “That work for you, big guy?”

He stood, too. “Doesn’t feel like there’s a lot of choice.”

“Then I’m communicating,” Jonathan said. “Now, if y’all don’t mind, I’d like some time alone.”

The mood in the room. Her eyes should have been closed-or nearly closed, with perhaps a half-moon of iris showing above or below her eyelid. The flaccid flesh of her face should have brought her thin nose and high cheekbones into sharp relief. In Jonathan’s mind the dead never looked at rest so he didn’t expect that, but he did expect a look of peace. With the frowning muscles as lifeless as their smiling counterparts, he expected a deathly smoothness to her face.

Yet he found none of that.

Ellen’s face was barely a face at all; it was a bloated purple eruption of battered tissue. On her left side, the one closest to Jonathan, the cheekbone, eye socket, and brow had merged into a blood-filled globe. In the middle of the mass, the slit that was once the opening between her lids appeared to be glued shut. The angle of her jaw told him that it had been badly broken and wired back, and the odd cast of her lips was a clear indication that her teeth had been broken.

Looking at her like this, Jonathan understood why no one wanted him to be here. No one should ever have to see a loved one in a condition like this. Emotion blossomed behind his eyes, but it wasn’t driven by sadness. There was some of that, sure, but the redness of his eyes was all anger, as was the tightly locked jaw and the fists that he didn’t realize he’d clenched. He inhaled deeply and noisily, suddenly aware that for a long while he hadn’t been breathing at all.

“Sir, are you all right?” Jimmy asked. He looked terrified that he might have to care for the living instead of the dead.

Jonathan glared at him, at the long thin neck. Inexplicably, he thought how easy it would be snap it. One blow was all it would take. Or one violent twist. In his mind he could see himself doing it.

He shook the thought away. This wasn’t a time for violence. Certainly not against this clean-cut kid who’d tried every way he’d known to keep Jonathan away from this very moment. No, the time for violence would come later.

“I’m fine,” Jonathan said, returning his gaze to Ellen.

“You don’t look fine,” Jimmy said.

Jonathan didn’t answer. Instead, he turned on his heel and left the only woman he’d ever loved behind him on the gurney. He didn’t want to watch as Jimmy pulled the zipper shut again.

On the other side of the heavy door, in the paper-and equipment-strewn office, he nearly collided with Detective Weatherby of the Fairfax County Police Department.

Gail had never met the woman who stepped out of the shadows on her porch, but she recognized her on sight. “My goodness,” Gail stammered. “Director Rivers.” She extended her hand to the highest ranking law enforcement officer in the country. “What an honor.”

FBI Director Irene Rivers returned the handshake warmly and smiled. “The honor is mine, Sheriff Bonneville.”

Gail flushed. She found herself oddly speechless in the presence of the woman whom she admired perhaps more than any other. “Madame Director. Why are you here?” she asked, and then winced at the seeming rudeness.

“Please dispense with the ‘Madam Directorre the other day. That must be very unsettling in a community this small.”

“I’d think it’s unsettling in any community,” Gail said.

Irene gestured up the steps toward the front door. “May I invite myself inside for a chat?”

Gail gave a little start and headed for the steps. “Where are my manners? Yes, please come inside.”

They settled at the kitchen table because that was the only room that was furnished. Irene Rivers told her that she loved the place. Gail smiled and offered a soft drink, which the director refused, and they settled in to the business at hand.

“I know how difficult your last few days have been,” Irene started. “I’ve run high-profile cases myself over the years, and the pressure to produce results can be overwhelming.”

Gail crossed her arms and leaned them on the table. As her head cleared from celebrity shock, she decided to resist small talk. This was not a social call, after all. “Does this meeting have something to do with the shootings?” she asked.