Andrea Kane - The Girl Who Disappeared Twice

As she walked in, an entire wall of floor-to-ceiling video screens began to glow. A long, green line formed across each panel, pulsating from left to right. Then, a soothing voice, that seemed to emanate from every cubic inch of the room, said, “Welcome back, Casey,” bending each line into the contour of the voice pattern. It continued, “Warning. Heart rate elevated.”

Casey started. She just couldn’t get used to being greeted by Yoda, the latest incarnation of Ryan McKay-Forensic Instincts’ brilliant techno-wizard-and his artificial intelligence system. Somehow the damned thing knew who was in the room. It even knew when something was out of the ordinary. Like now. No matter how many times Ryan tried to explain to her how Yoda worked, to Casey it still sounded like magic.

The conference room was pure class. Polished hardwood floors. A plush Oriental rug. An expansive mahogany conference table and matching credenza. And, most crucial of all, a technology infrastructure that was light-years ahead of its time in both design and operation, all hidden from view. Only the gigantic video wall was visible, covering the longest side of the room and allowing Ryan to assemble a dizzying array of information into a large single image or several smaller, simultaneous data feeds. Videoconferencing equipment, an elaborate phone system, and a personalized virtual workstation available to each member of the group completed the elaborate system.

And it was all controlled by Yoda, who unwaveringly responded to requests made by team members. Behind the “shock and awe” of Yoda was a server farm located in the office’s secure data center downstairs. Like a proud papa, Ryan had named their custom-built servers: Lumen, Equitas and Intueri, from the Latin words for light, justice and intuition. The names had become so much a part of Forensic Instincts that they’d incorporated them into the company logo.

Casey still found herself awed by the sophistication, power and pervasiveness of the technology. Truthfully, she didn’t understand the half of how it worked. But Ryan did. And that was all that mattered.

Heading across the hardwood floor, Casey paused at the edge of the rug, then pulled back a chair and sat down at the long, oval conference table.

Leaning back, she called out, “Yoda, please show me TV news.”

“Would you like world news, national news or local news?” Yoda inquired pleasantly. “Local.”

“CBS, NBC, Fox, ABC or all?” Yoda asked.

“All.”

Yoda carried out her command by simultaneously showing all four channels, each occupying one-fourth of the wall.

Casey pivoted her chair around so she had a direct view. Staring intently, she tugged off the hair band she’d worn tonight, shook out her long red mane and combed her fingers through the tangled strands. When Glen Fisher appeared on the Fox News screen, she instructed, “Yoda, Fox News full screen.”

Instantly, Glen Fisher filled the entire wall. He was sweating and agitated, and quickly bent forward to hide his face as the cameras zoomed in on him being hauled out of the alley and into the squad car.

It was a media feeding frenzy. The female newscaster on the scene was superanimated, as excited about delivering the story as she was upset by its occurrence. Casey read the signs on her face, heard them in her voice, saw them in her body language. Acute energy-but mixed reasons for it. Chin held high, back ramrod straight, eyes bright with pride, but flickering away every now and then-she was already executing the steps necessary for her next promotion. But she felt guilty with her methods. She was a woman. Capitalizing on the violations and murders of other women wasn’t sitting well with her.

She was talking way too quickly, rambling on about Fisher’s shocking crimes, being sure to exaggerate all the colorful details-like the fact that he had a twisted, obsessive mind despite having had a stable childhood and an equally stable adult life. A decent job in a difficult economy. A wife who was devoted to him, though oblivious to the monster she was married to. And a lovely apartment in Manhattan, with neighbors who had no idea of the danger and depravity living among them. Even worse, he’d somehow found a way to elude the NYPD for months, staying so invisible that he wasn’t even a blip on their radar, much less a suspect. Astonishing that it had taken the uncanny initiative of a young private organization like Forensic Instincts to zero in on Glen Fisher, and to set things in motion so this day of reckoning could come.

Irked by the melodramatic presentation and the digs at the NYPD, Casey cursed out loud and curled her hands into fists, making her nails bite into her palms. She was taking this whole case way too personally, which was unusual for her. But there were reasons for her lack of objectivity-what Fisher had done brought back memories that made her sick.

“Like the proverbial fly in the spider’s web,” said a masculine voice, interrupting her thoughts. “Clearly, you made the ideal bait.”

Glancing over her shoulder, Casey watched as her trusty backup and fellow team member Marc Deveraux strolled into the room, eyeing the newscast and making a quick mental assessment. Not a flicker of emotion crossed his face, just an icy satisfaction in his eyes. Marc was Special Ops to the core.

He was also Casey’s most heavily credentialed recruit-former FBI, former Behavioral Analysis Unit, former Navy SEAL. His heritage was diverse: Asian grandparents on his mother’s side, and an extensive French lineage on his father’s. As a result, he spoke three additional languages fluently: Mandarin, French and Spanish. With such a desirable, multifaceted background, Marc had been snatched up by the Bureau. At thirty-nine, he’d done it all and he’d done it fast. He was the sexy, brooding type-single and happy to stay that way. Most of all, when it came to the job, he was the real deal.

“I had an endless cosmetic makeover to become that ideal bait,” Casey informed him. “You have no idea.”

“A makeover?” Marc repeated with dry humor. “I’d sooner guess an acting coach. The thought of you as a socially inept wallflower…that’s a reach.”

“Very funny, smart-ass. But I haven’t been eighteen in a long time. I needed a professional makeup artist to wind back the clock.”

“Nope.” Marc was never one to mince words. “For authenticity, all you needed to do was put on some teenage face gunk, and pull your hair back with a rubber band. Trust me, the rest of you worked. Just ask the horny frat boys ogling you. I saw them. I know the drill. If you hadn’t been playing the scared virgin, they would have been on line to score.”

“Sounds like you had a front-row seat.”

“I did.”

Casey shook her head in amazement. “I never even saw you.”

“That’s the point, isn’t it? I’m good at making myself invisible. And at making sure no one’s invisible to me. Including horny frat boys who-”

“Okay, enough on that subject,” Case interrupted, bringing the topic to a quick close. She was in no mood to be razzed. Actually, she was more interested in giving Marc the praise he deserved. “Let’s get to you. However you pulled it off, your timing was perfect. The delivery was terrifying. Even I almost lost it when you charged into that alley with murder in your eyes. And I have to admit I enjoyed watching Fisher freak out and humiliate himself-wetting his pants while he spilled his guts. It doesn’t get any better than that, catching the psycho and extracting a full confession. Kudos.”

Marc pulled back the chair beside Casey and dropped into it, folding his hands behind his head. “Sorry things got so ugly before I got everything I needed.”

“No apology necessary. It’s what the cops ‘unofficially’ asked us to do.”