Broken (38 page)

“Frank sure does let a lot of the job fall to you.”

“I can handle it,” she said, but then realized that didn’t matter anymore. From now on, the only early morning phone calls that came to her house were going to be wrong numbers.

“What’s the security setup on campus? The same as when you were there?”

“It changed a lot after Virginia Tech.”

Will was familiar with the college massacre, the deadliest in American history.

She explained, “You know how institutions are—they’re reactive, not preventative. The bulk of the murders at Virginia Tech took place in the engineering building, so all the other schools tightened down security around their classrooms and labs.”

“The first victims were killed in their dorm.”

“It’s hard to police that. Students have to have key cards to get in and out, but it’s not a foolproof system. Look at what they did at Jason’s dorm. How stupid is that to cut a fire alarm?” Her phone started ringing again. Frank. Lena sent it to voice mail.

“Someone’s trying to get in touch with you.”

“You’re right.” Lena realized she was starting to talk like Will Trent. Maybe that wasn’t a bad thing considering he was running circles around her. She slowed the car to fifteen miles per hour as the rain rocked the car. Water flooded across the road, making the asphalt look rippled. The windshield wipers couldn’t keep up. She slowed the car to a stop, saying, “I can’t see in front of me. Do you want to drive?”

“I can’t do any better than you. Let’s wait it out and talk about our murderer.”

Lena put the car in park. She stared at the whiteness ahead. “Do you think we’re looking at a serial killer?”

“You have to have at least three victims on three different occasions for it to qualify as a serial.”

Lena turned in her seat to face him. “So, we’ve got to wait for a third body?”

“I hope it doesn’t come to that.”

“What about your profile?”

“What about it?”

She tried to remember his earlier questions. “What took place? Two kids murdered, both with knives, both while they were alone. Why did it happen? The killer planned it out. He brought the knife. He knew the victims, probably knew Jason better than Allison because he was obviously furious when he killed him.”

Will continued, “He has a car. He knows the town, the topography of the lake and the placement of the cameras in the dorm. So, he’s someone who went to the school or goes to the school now.”

She shook her head, laughing at herself. “This is the problem with profiles. You could be talking about me.”

“It’s possible a woman committed these crimes.”

Lena gave him a tight smile. “I was with my boyfriend Jared last night and with you all day.”

“Thanks for the alibi,” Will told her. “But I’m being serious. Allison was small. A woman could have overpowered her. A woman could have floated her out into the lake, then chained her down with the cinder blocks.”

“You’re right,” she admitted. “Women like knives. It’s more personal.” Lena had carried a knife herself a few years ago.

Will asked, “Who are the women we’ve come up against on this case?”

She listed them out. “Julie Smith, whoever she is. Vanessa Livingston, the woman whose basement was flooded. Alexandra Coulter, one of Allison’s professors. Allison’s aunt Sheila, who hasn’t returned my calls yet. Mrs. Barnes from across the street. Darla the nurse with the long red nails.”

“Mrs. Barnes gives Darla a pretty tight alibi. She says she was up with her all night both nights.”

“Yeah, well, my uncle Hank says he never sleeps, but every time I stay over I hear him snoring like a freakin’ chainsaw.” Lena took out her notebook. Heat rushed through her body, but not from the infection in her hand. She kept her notebook angled away from Will as she thumbed past the 911 transcript, then quickly went to the page where she’d recorded Darla’s details. “The cell number of the 911 caller is a 912 area code. Darla’s is a 706.”

“Did her accent sound unusual to you?”

“Kind of trashy, but she’s obviously pulled herself up.”

“She didn’t sound Appalachian to you, did she?”

Lena stared at him openly. “She sounded like everyone I grew up with in south Georgia. Where are you getting Appalachia?”

“Do you know any women in town who moved down from the mountains in the last few years?”

She guessed this was another bit of information he was going to keep to himself. Two could play at that game. “Now that you
mention it, we had some hillbillies a while back but they loaded up their truck and moved to Los Angeles.”

“Beverly Hills?” He chuckled appreciatively before throwing out one of his sudden subject changes. “You should have your hand looked at.”

Lena looked down at her injured palm. Her skin was sweating so badly that the Band-Aids were peeling off. “I’ll be all right.”

He told her, “I talked to Dr. Linton about gunshot wounds today.”

“You two kids know how to have fun.”

“She says the probability of an untreated gunshot wound getting infected is very high.”

No shit
, she wanted to say. Instead, she told him, “Let’s go back to the profile.”

He hesitated long enough to let her know he wasn’t happy about letting someone else change the subject. “What’s the sequence of events?”

Lena tried to wrap her brain around the question. “We already went through what happened to Allison. With Jason, I guess the killer came into the dorm, moved the cameras, stabbed him, then left.”

“He covered Jason’s body with a blanket. He knew there would be a lot of blood.”

That was new. “Where was the blanket?”

“I found it in the bathroom at the end of the hallway.”

“You should check the drains, the—” She stopped herself. Will would know to do all of these things. He didn’t need her help. “There were four questions for the profile, right?”

“The last one is, you have to ask yourself who would have done these things in this order for these reasons.”

“Allison was killed before Jason. She could’ve been a warning that Jason didn’t heed.”

“Jason was holed up in his dorm room. We don’t even know if he heard about the murder.”

“So, the killer is antsy, worried that the message hasn’t gotten
through.” A thought occurred to her. “The suicide note. The killer left it as a warning. ‘I want it over.’”

“Right,” he agreed, and she assumed he’d figured this out a while ago without telling her.

Still, she said, “It would make sense that the killer would be angry with Jason for not taking Allison’s death as a warning. He was stabbed at least eight or nine times. That speaks to a lot of anger.”

Will looked up at the sky. “Rain’s let up.”

Lena sat up in the seat, sliding the gear into drive. She rolled the car slowly forward. The road was still flooding. Streams of water gushed back toward Main Street. “Both Allison and Jason were students. They could be mixed up in something to do with the school.”

“Like what?”

“I don’t know. A grant. There’s all kinds of government money going in and out of there. Defense spending. The engineering school works on medical devices, nanotechnology. The polymer labs are testing all kinds of adhesives. We’re talking hundreds of millions of dollars.”

“Would a grad student have access to the money?”

She thought about it. “No. The doctoral candidates might, but the grad students basically do shitwork around the labs and the undergrads can’t wipe their own asses without getting permission. I used to date a guy who was in one of the master’s programs. They’re not involved in anything remotely interesting.”

They had reached Jason Howell’s dorm. There were two black vans parked outside. They each had the GBI logo on their doors and
CRIME SCENE UNIT
emblazoned in white on the sides. Despite herself, Lena felt excited, like a bloodhound who’d caught a scent. The sensation quickly faded. She had spent countless hours at this school studying for a degree that she would probably never get to use. At best, her education would go toward being one of those annoying people who point out everything they get wrong on
CSI
.

Will looked at his cell phone. “I need to make a quick call to my partner, if you don’t mind.”

“Sure.” Lena parked the car. The rain was still pounding down, and she bolted from the car and ran up the steps, holding down the hood of her jacket with both hands.

Marty was sitting inside reading a magazine. She knocked on the door. He jerked up his head, his glasses tilting on his nose. He buzzed her in with his card.

He said, “You look bad.”

Lena was taken aback by the comment. She ran her fingers through her hair, feeling a damp that hadn’t come from the rain. “It’s been a long day.”

“For you and me both.” Marty sat back on the bench. “I’ll be glad when it’s over.”

“Anything happening?”

“They got three men upstairs. Two more went over to the parking decks. The guy in charge, he’s got a handlebar mustache like he’s outta the circus. He found some car keys up in the room and drove around clicking the alarm until it went off.”

Lena nodded her approval, thinking the guy was pretty smart for a circus freak.

Marty admitted, “I never checked the parking decks. He was parked on the third level by the ramp.”

Lena gave him a pass. “I never checked the decks when all the kids were gone, either.”

“Uh-oh. Here he comes.” Marty reached over and pressed his key card against the pad.

Will pushed open the door, stamping his feet on the floor. “Sorry,” he apologized. “Mr. Harris, thank you for giving us your time today. I’m sorry we’re taking you away from your family.”

“Demetrius told me to stay here as long as you need me.”

“Can you tell me who was on shift last night?”

“Demetrius. He’s my boss. We’ve been switching back and forth so we each get some time off for the holiday.” He put down the magazine. “He doesn’t remember anything, but he’ll be happy to talk to you whenever you want.”

Lena thought there were more important things for Will to work on right now. “Marty told me that one of your people found Jason’s car over in the deck. They’re looking at it now.”

Will smiled. She could almost feel his relief. “That’s good. Thank you, Mr. Harris.”

He offered, “Demetrius is at the office pulling all the security tapes for you. I can drive you over if you want.”

Will glanced at Lena. Staring at videotaped footage for hours on end hoping to find two seconds of a clue was the kind of mind-numbing work that could make you want to put a bullet in your head. Lena wanted to be at that car combing through the carpet fibers, looking for traces of blood or fingerprints, but there was no point.

She volunteered, “I’ll go look at the tapes if you want.”

“It’s not going to be fun.”

“I think I’ve had enough fun lately.”

LENA SAT IN
the interrogation room at the police station where she had talked to Tommy Braham two days before. She had rolled in the television cart with the old VCR and newer digital equipment that they sometimes used to record interviews. The film from the campus security cameras was a combination of both—digital for the outside cameras and regular VCR tape for inside. Demetrius, the chief of security, had given her everything he had.

As far as Lena knew, she was the only person in the station right now except for Marla Simms, who never left her desk, and Carl Phillips, who was back in the cells working as booking officer for the night. Carl was a big guy who didn’t take a lot of crap off anybody, which was why Frank had stuck him with booking duty. Carl was incredibly honest. Frank was doing everything he could to keep the man away from Will Trent.

Lena had already gotten the story from Larry Knox, who gossiped like a woman. She knew Carl had protested kicking out some of the more talkative prisoners in the cells after Tommy’s body was
found. Frank had told Carl to leave if he didn’t approve, and Carl had taken him up on the offer. The only prisoners Frank hadn’t let go were either comatose or stupid. Top among this last designation was Ronald Porter, a twat of a man who’d beaten his wife so many times that her face had caved in. Frank had found a way to bully Ronny into keeping quiet. He was trying to push Carl around. He was lying to Will Trent. He was hiding evidence, probably postponing the delivery of the audio from the 911 tape. He thought he was blackmailing Lena.

The old man had a lot on his plate.

Lena rubbed her eyes, trying to clear her vision. The room was stuffy and hot, but that wasn’t the problem. She was pretty sure she had a fever. Her hand was already sweating through the fresh Band-Aids she’d found in the first aid kit. The flesh underneath was raw and hot. She had heard from Delia Stephens that they were going to wake Brad in the morning. Lena would go over first thing and find a nurse to take a look at her injury. She’d probably need a shot and have to answer a lot of questions.

There would be worse questions tonight. She would have to tell Jared what was going on. At least part of what was going on. Lena didn’t want to burden him with the whole truth. And she hadn’t laid herself in front of an oncoming train for nothing. Losing Jared on top of giving up her badge was the kind of sacrifice she was not willing to make.

Lena turned back to work. The videotapes she’d been watching for the last two hours ranged from tedious to boring. She should’ve just gone home but Lena felt a weird sense of duty toward Will Trent. He’d made her into a reluctant Cinderella. Lena figured it would take until midnight to watch all these tapes, around the same time her badge turned into a pumpkin.

She had found the good stuff early on. According to the time code, last night at eleven-sixteen and twenty-two seconds, the fire door at the back of Jason’s building was opened. Lena was familiar with the
layout from her own days with campus security. The dorm, the cafeteria, and the back of the library formed an open U with loading docks in the middle. The school didn’t let students use the area as a shortcut because a kid had fallen off one of the docks several years ago and broken his leg in three places. The resulting lawsuit had been a hard blow, and they’d blown even more money putting in xenon lights that lit up the place like a Broadway stage.