Jeffery Deaver - The Kill Room

Barry Shales was thirty-nine. Former military—retiring as a captain in the air force and decorated several times. The man was now working civilian as an “intelligence specialist” with NIOS. He and his wife—a teacher—had two children, boys in elementary school. Shales was active in his Presbyterian church and volunteered at the boys’ schools, a reading tutor.

Learning this bio, Sachs was troubled. Most of the perps she and Rhyme pursued were hardened criminals, serial offenders, organized crime bosses, psychotics, terrorists. But this case was different. Shales was probably a devoted civil servant, probably a decent husband and father. Just doing his duty, even if it happened to involve shooting terrorists in cold blood. Upon his arrest and conviction, a family would be destroyed. Metzger might have been using NIOS for his own delusional approach in safeguarding the country and using a specialist for clean-up. But Shales? He might have been just following orders.

Still, even if he hadn’t been the one who’d tortured and killed Lydia Foster, he was part of the organization that possibly had.

Sachs called Lon Sellitto and told him of their discovery. Then she placed a call to Information Services, requesting every fact they could dig up on Barry Shales—most important where he’d been and what he was doing on May 9, the day of the shooting.

The lab phone rang and Sachs, noting the caller ID, hit speaker. “Fred.”

She wasn’t worried that Unsub 516 was tapping this particular phone line; Rodney Szarnek had sent over a device he called a “tap-trap,” which could detect anyone’s listening in. The monitor showed that the conversation was private.

“Amelia. Is it true what I’m hearing? Your friend and mine is sunning himself in the Caribbean.”

His astonishment was so exaggerated that Sachs had to smile. Cooper did too. Nance Laurel did not.

“He sure is, Fred.”

“Why oh why do my assignments take me to the prime vacation spots of the South Bronx and Newark? While Mr. Lincoln Rhyme’s on a beach, courtesy of the city of New York? Where’s the fairness in that? Is he enjoying those sissy drinks with umbrellas and plastic sea horses?”

“I think he’s paying for it himself, Fred. And how do you know they serve drinks down there with plastic sea horses?”

“Busted,” the agent admitted. “The coconut ones, they’re my personal favorites. Now, how’s the case goin’? That homicide on Third Avenue, that was related? Lydia Foster. Saw it on the wire.”

“Afraid it was. We think it’s a clean-up op, probably that Metzger ordered.”

“Fuck,” Dellray spat out. “Man’s gone rogue big time.”

“He sure has.” Sachs told him too that they’d found there were two perps. “We still don’t know which of them set the bomb at the coffee shop.”

“Well, I gotcha a few things you might be interested in.”

“Go ahead. Anything.”

“First off, the mobile your sniper was using—the one registered to Mr. Code Name Don Bruns, with that fake Social Security number and a Delaware corporation? The company’s buried way deep but I traced it to some shell outfits that NIOS’s used in the past. Probably why the phone’s still active. Lotta time the government thinks they’re too smart to get found out. Or too big. But you didn’t hear that from me.”

“Good. Thanks, Fred.”

“And turns out your friend the late and great Mr. Moreno was not planning to detonate a big bang of mass destruction and move into a cave.”

He explained he was referring to Robert Moreno’s mysterious message about “vanishing into thin air, May twenty-fourth.”

“What was it about?” Sachs asked.

The FBI agent continued, “Was a play on words, seems. What it is: Some of our folk down in Venezuela found out that Moreno and his family were moving into a new house on the twenty-fourth.”

He gave them the details: Robert Moreno had bought a four-bedroom home in the Venezuelan city of San Cristóbal, one of the more upscale locales in the country. It was on a mountaintop.

Thin air…

Laurel nodded at his words, obviously pleased. So Moreno might not be the Western Hemisphere’s answer to Bin Laden.

Gotta keep the jury happy, Sachs thought cynically.

The agent continued, “Oh, and the IED attack in Mexico City on May thirteen? Now, this one’s almost funny. The only thing with a Moreno connection on that date in Mexico City was a big fund-raiser for a charity he was involved with. Classrooms for the Americas. Called Balloon Day. Everbody bought a balloon for ten dollars then you popped it and got a prize inside. They had over a thousand balloons. I gotta say, my lungs aren’t up to a task like that.”

Sachs slumped, closing her eyes. Jesus.

Can we find somebody to blow them up?…

“Thanks, Fred.” She disconnected.

Upon hearing these revelations, Laurel said, “Interesting how first impressions can be so completely wrong. Isn’t it?” She didn’t seem to be gloating but Sachs couldn’t tell.

If you don’t mind…

I’m just curious…

Sachs fished out her phone and called Lincoln Rhyme.

His answering words: “I’m thinking we should get a chameleon.”

Not “Hello” or “Sachs.”

“A…lizard?”

“They’re quite interesting. I haven’t seen one change color yet. Do you know how they do it, Sachs? Metachrosis is what it’s called, you know. They use hormonal cell signaling to trigger changes in the chromatophore cells in their skin. I find it truly fascinating. So how’s the case going up there ?”

She ran through the developments.

Rhyme considered this. “I suppose that makes sense, two different perps. Metzger isn’t going to use his star sniper in New York to clean up. I should have thought of that.”

I should have too, she reflected sadly. Picturing Lydia Foster’s body.

“Upload a picture of Shales, DMV or military.”

“Sure. I’ll do it when we hang up.” Then in a somber voice she told him in detail about the death of Moreno’s interpreter, Lydia.

“Torture?”

She described the knife work.

“Distinctive technique,” he assessed. “That might be helpful.”

He’d be referring to the fact that perps who use knives or other mechanical weapons, like clubs, tended to leave wounds that were consistent from one victim to another, which can often identify them. She noted too that this detached, clinical comment was his only reaction to the horrific attack.

But this was just Lincoln Rhyme. She knew it; she accepted it. And wondered in passing why the same attitude in Nance Laurel set her so on edge.

She asked, “How’s it going down in the balmy Caribbean?”

“Not making much headway, Sachs. We’re under house arrest.”

“ What? ”

“One way or the other, it’ll be resolved tomorrow.” He clearly wasn’t going to say any more, maybe concerned that his line was tapped. “I should go. Thom’s making something for dinner. I think it’s ready. And you really should try dark rum sometime. It’s quite good. Made from sugar, you know.”

“I may pass on the rum. There are some unpleasant memories. Though I guess they’re not memories if you can’t remember them.”

“What do you think of the case now, Sachs? You still in the policy and politics camp? Leaving it all to Congress?”

“Nope. Not anymore. One look at the crime scene at Lydia Foster’s convinced me. There’re some real bad sons of bitches involved in this. And they’re going down. Oh, and Rhyme, by the way: If you hear something about an IED blast up here, don’t worry, I’m fine.” She explained about the explosion that took out the computer at the coffee shop, without going into the details of the near miss.