Checkmate (4 page)

Jerome Cole's house was in a subdivision about a mile from the Potomac River.

By the time we arrived, the HRT had already cordoned off the neighborhood and they weren't even letting emergency personnel past the barricades they'd set up at the end of the street.

“Okay,” I told the driver when we reached the news crews who were stationing themselves as close as they could to the crime scene tape. “This is good.”

We parked.

With my torso bandaged and scraps of metal still visibly wedged into my side, I was a little conspicuous, but I wanted a status report and there wasn't time to swing by Walmart to refresh my wardrobe first. Todd had a Windbreaker with him, stored on a shelf there in the ambulance. “Let me borrow that, okay?”

“Sir, we really need to get you to—”

“I know, I know. So, the Windbreaker?”

“I'm—”

“Thanks.” I snagged it. “I'll get it back to you.”

Because of my wounded side, slipping the jacket on wasn't easy and I had to clench my teeth when I threaded my right arm into the sleeve, but I managed.

It reminded me of the first case I'd worked with Ralph, back when I was a detective in Milwaukee and he was with the Bureau, helping us with an investigation into a series of kidnappings and mutilations in the region.

I'd been shot in the left shoulder and had borrowed his FBI Windbreaker at a scene similar to this. Later, when he encouraged me to apply at the Bureau, he'd told me that the jacket looked good on me.

And now here I was again.

Injured.

Bloodied.

In a borrowed jacket.

Full circle.

I stepped out of the ambulance.

The rain hadn't let up. If anything, it'd gotten heavier, steadier, the day deepening around us, becoming as bleak as dusk.

The HRT had snipers stationed around the area and an incursion team had the house surrounded. There was a communication and command center nearby, just beyond the barricades.

I found Brandon Ingersoll, the leader of the unit. I've worked with him a few times over the years and we've practiced target shooting together at the firing range at Quantico. “What do we know?” I asked him.

“So far we're clear.” He spoke with brisk, truncated syllables, militaryesque, although from what I knew he'd never served in the Armed Forces. Thin, but with tight sinewy muscles, he was intimidating even though he was only about five-eight. He eyed the paramedic's Windbreaker I was wearing. “What's with the jacket, Pat?”

“I didn't have my raincoat with me. Managed to borrow this one. Time frame?”

“So far, so good. We're almost ready to send in a team.”

When I turned to face the house, pain flared through my side. It was really starting to hurt, especially when I moved.

Or breathed.

So that wasn't exactly ideal.

Cope. You'll be at the hospital soon enough.

When I asked Ingersoll if he'd heard from Ralph he told me he was still back at the NCAVC. I was glad. If there was anyone there who could take charge, secure the scene, notice what needed to be noticed, and manage the situation, it was Ralph.

“Any word on the semi?”

Ingersoll shook his head. “Not that I know of. No.”

A voice crackled through his radio. “Sir, we're in position. Do we have a green light? Over.”

Ingersoll checked in with a few of his men, verified that his snipers were in position, then replied to the incursion team, “Roger that. Full breach.”

I watched as the guys surrounding the house moved forward stealthily but without the slightest hint of hesitation or apprehension.

The HRT doesn't do anything halfway and when they went in, they went in heavy, but there were no booby traps, no explosives. I could hear the men on the other end of the radio announcing that one room after another was clear.

When they reached one of the bedrooms on the second floor, their voices became softer, until finally all that came through the radio was a stretch of uncomfortable silence.

Ingersoll asked his men what they saw, but the only response was the chatter of a couple of HRT members there in the room.

“Check him. See if he's still breathing.”

“There's no way anyone could still be—”

“Check him.”

“Yes, sir.”

More silence.

“He's gone.”

“And it's Cole?”

“Yeah.”

“How can you—?”

“It's him.”

A moment later, one of the HRT guys called through the radio, “We need to find Bowers.”

Ingersoll looked at me quizzically, then replied, “He's right here with me.”

“What? Well, send him in with the ERT.”

“What is it?”

“It'd be best if he saw this for himself.”

That was all I needed to hear. Ignoring the pain in my side and moving my right arm as little as possible so it wouldn't exacerbate the wounds, I crossed the street and headed for the house.

I joined Natasha Farraday, an ERT member who'd transferred in from St. Louis a few years ago, on the front porch. Late twenties, Caucasian, slight build, and a Tuesday-night yoga companion of Lien-hua, she was good at her job, and I couldn't have chosen a better agent to be here on this case.

I'd first met her while working on one of the most gruesome investigations of my career last year in DC, when two killers provoked some primates to chew off the face of one of their victims while the woman was still alive.

It's disconcerting to find yourself remembering your coworkers based on the dead bodies you first met them beside, but unfortunately it goes with the territory.

Two of Natasha's team members were there as well. She greeted me, then asked, “They want you to come in with us?”

“Yes.” It's common to have a detective or special agent accompany the ERT onto the scene. In fact, keeping us away could be counterintuitive to the investigation. Forensics teams are experts at gathering evidence, but interpreting it is another matter altogether, and the sooner you have someone on-site whose expertise is doing that, the better.

Not to mention the fact that today there was something at the scene that had led the HRT guys to ask for me by name.

“I heard you were at the NCAVC,” Natasha said.

“Yes.”

“I'm really glad you're okay, Pat. And Lien-hua too.”

I couldn't help but think about those who were not okay. “Yeah. Let's just figure out who did this.”

“I'm with you.”

With my injured side, bending over was difficult, but after tugging on booties over my shoes and snapping on latex gloves so I wouldn't contaminate the scene, I let Natasha lead me and the rest of her team into Jerome Cole's house.

Though I knew him through work, this was my first time in his home.

The living room: a white shag carpet, a charcoal leather couch and matching reclining chair. Two floor lamps, a glass-topped coffee table. A flat-screen television was mounted on the far wall. Two houseplants hung in the south-facing window. As a bachelor, Cole had chosen not to decorate the room with many pictures and it had an austere, almost spartan feel.

The words I'd heard on Ingersoll's radio just a few moments ago replayed in my head. I'm pretty good with remembering details and now I heard the conversation word for word:

“Check him. See if he's still breathing.”

“There's no way anyone could still be—”

“Check him.”

“Yes, sir.”

“He's gone.”

“And it's Cole?”

“Yeah.”

“How can you—?”

“It's him.”

I both wanted to know what had happened to Jerome and did not want to know. You can't erase the things you see at crime scenes from your mind. They get rooted in there in a place that's impossible to run from. Whatever I ended up seeing in that bedroom, I expected that the images would stay with me for a long time. Maybe forever.

We came to the stairs leading to the second level. One of the HRT members was at the bottom of the steps. He looked pale.

“Upstairs,” he said softly. “He's . . .” It sounded like he had more to say, but instead of going on, he hurried to the bathroom down the hall. As Natasha and I started up the steps I heard him vomiting.

I thought about Jerome, about seeing him at work. Early forties. Short-cropped blond hair. Left-handed. A jogger. Liked to tell the same jokes over and over.

I tried to prepare myself for what I was about to see.

Sometimes killers leave messages scrawled in blood on the floor or on the wall. In one case that I'd worked, the offender had left the word “Sow” shaped from the victim's intestines.

We reached the hallway at the top of the stairs.

Two HRT guys in full tactical gear were at the end of the hall near what I presumed to be the master bedroom. Neither spoke. Instead they both just stepped quietly aside as Natasha and I approached.

And entered the
room.

Jerome lay on the sheets, clothed, his hands outstretched and tied to the bedposts. His legs weren't bound, but both of his knees were broken and had been chopped into, apparently with the hatchet or axe of some sort that lay beside him on the bed.

It was the same with his ankles.

And elbows.

And wrists.

He'd been beaten severely and it looked like his jaw was broken, or at least profoundly dislocated. Two arrows had been driven into his eye sockets and the shafts rose stiff and rigid from his blood-covered face. The fletching appeared to be made out of real feathers and the shafts looked old, like antiques or replicas of Native American arrows.

A book lay open—pages down, spine up—on Jerome's chest.

But not just any book.

One of the two volumes I'd authored.

This one,
Understanding Crime and Space
, had grown out of my research for my Ph.D. in Environmental Criminology back when I was new at the Bureau.

Natasha's team began snapping photos and filming video of the scene.

I took it all in.

Some people seem to be able to ignore the dark side of human nature, to live their lives in denial of the evil
that our race is capable of doing to each other. I've never been able to do that, never been able to close one eye to the truth.

But, personally, I'd rather be disturbed by the world, as terrifying and unnerving as it can be, than comforted by putting my head in the sand. They say the truth will set you free, and that may be true, but it can also be devastating when you look at it unflinchingly.

They also say the truth hurts.

And they are right.

No one in the room spoke.

I mentally flipped through the five steps you take when processing a crime scene.

(1)
Orient
yourself to the location: the lighting, the exit and entrance routes, the geospatial orientation of the site in time and space. (2)
Observe
as carefully as you can what you have to work with. (3)
Examine
the forensic evidence. (4)
Analyze
the data by keeping the context in mind. (5)
Evaluate
all the material you've collected and form a working hypothesis that will lead you into the next investigative route.

I figured that the last three steps would grow out of our visit here: Natasha and her team would be collecting and examining any forensic evidence, the Lab would analyze whatever they collected. After that, everyone on the case would evaluate what we had and figure out where to go from here.

Right now I would focus on those first two steps: orientation and observation.

Unlike in the movies, killers in real life are not omniscient. They can plan, yes, they can prepare, but they cannot tell the future, and they can't always guess exactly how the authorities are going to react.

And so it's there, in that disconnect, that we catch them.

I studied the room.

The shade-drawn window faced west toward the road. The digital clock on the bedside stand glowed red with the correct time. Based on the blood spatter, it appeared that the wounds Jerome had sustained had all been inflicted while he was on the bed.

The closet door stood slightly ajar. “Was this open or closed when your team came in?” I asked the Hostage Rescue Team members.

“Closed. We checked it to clear the room,” one of the men said.

I peered inside.

The shoes were all lined up in pairs. The clothes hung neatly, organized by color. No blood. Nothing in disarray.

Once Natasha was done photographing the dresser, I went to it and opened the drawers one at a time. The clothes were stuffed in, unfolded.

The top of the dresser was empty. I checked for patterns in the thin layer of dust on it to see if anything had been removed, but didn't see any.

“Were the lights in the room on or off when you entered?” I asked the guy I'd just been speaking to.

“Off. Why?”

“With the orientation of the trees along the side of the house, the streetlamp outside wouldn't have cast light in this window.”

“How do you know that?”

“I saw it when I was approaching the house.”

“You took note of where the streetlights and trees were?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“Because light is part of a scene. Also, I heard your team over the radio, clearing the rooms. I knew we were looking at one from the second floor. The location of the windows told me we'd be in here.”

I turned to Natasha. “Listen, I don't think he did all this in the dark. If the time of death was last night and he wasn't simply using a flashlight, and no one else has been in here, then the offender may have turned the lights off before he left.”

“We'll make sure we look for prints on the light switch,” she said.

It was standard, but still, articulating it, reiterating it, didn't hurt.

“And the shoes,” I said.

“The shoes?”

“The clothes in Jerome's dresser drawers are just tossed in there, yet the closet is almost obsessively neat.”

“You think that the killer tidied up in there before he left?”

“I don't know. That or maybe he rummaged through the dresser. Let's do what we can to find out.”

In a few minutes Natasha and her team would be looking under Jerome's fingernails for DNA in case he scratched his attacker or attackers. Now she was taking the temperature of the body to try to narrow down the time of death.

I asked her, “Do you have the photos you need? Can I look at the book?”

“Yes.”

Carefully, I turned it over to see what section it had been opened to.

Pages 238 to 239, in a chapter about the critiques of my approach.

Nothing was highlighted or circled, but seven numbers were scrawled in the right-hand column:

6'3" 2.53 32

I didn't know what that meant, but I could evaluate it in a minute. For now, I noted that this section of the book was about how all the data for developing geographic profiling models and distance decay algorithms were based on solved cases.

Obviously we only had data from investigations we'd wrapped up. So it made sense, but it created a problem, since during each of the past forty-five years, the percentage of solved violent crimes has rarely tipped over the fifty-percent mark.

That doesn't even take into account all of the crimes that go unreported.

So the section was about unsolved and unsolvable cases.

Had this book randomly been left open to these pages?

Possibly.

But I doubted it.

“Has anything been moved?” I asked the Hostage Rescue Team guys who stood near the doorway.

“No, sir,” the shorter man replied.

Using my phone I photographed the pages.

Since the book hadn't been randomly discarded on the body, but carefully squared up and positioned there, it would make sense that it was turned to these specific pages for a reason as well.

Questions scampered through my mind:
Did the
offender follow Jerome home? Was he waiting for him when he arrived here? How did the killer—or killers—know that Jerome drove the truck for us, that the lawnmower business was a front? Why these pages? Is he taunting us? Mocking us? Saying his crime will remain unsolved?

“Have you ever seen anything like this?” Natasha asked, drawing me out of my thoughts. She was staring at the arrows driven though Jerome's eyeballs.

“No.”

“Who would be capable of . . . ?” Her voice trailed off into a grim silence.

I said nothing.

In truth, we are all capable of evil. That's the thing. We're all made of the same material. Though some people might be predisposed toward certain types of behavior, no one is predestined to act on his desires.

We choose.

And all of us have it within ourselves to choose evil.

Who's capable of something like this?

Well, the unsettling truth, the fact that no one really wants to admit: any one of us is capable of it, given the right circumstances.

Or the wrong ones, depending on how you look at it.

I didn't bring that up, but just said, “What can you tell me about time of death?”

“The ME will have to narrow things down, but based on lividity and body temp I'd say Jerome died early this morning—probably somewhere between two and four a.m. We can tell by the blood spatter and the amount of bleeding around the wounds that they—”

“Were not postmortem,” I said.

“That's correct.”

“Cause of death from the arrows?”

“Could be from shock—depends on if he was dead
when those arrows were driven in there. It appears that whoever did this knew what he was doing, how to make Jerome suffer but keep him alive.”

One of the ERT members bumped into me, causing my arm to brush against my wounded side.

Pain streaked through me and I had to stop and take a couple deep breaths to calm myself.

I rested my arm against the wall, trying to hide the pain from the other people in the room.

“You okay?” Natasha asked.

“Yeah.”

Just a few more minutes, then I really needed to be on my way.

To get my mind off the pain, I focused my attention on the numbers that had been written in the column. I showed the people in the room the book's page. “Do these mean anything to you?”

People shook their heads. Everyone was quiet.

I evaluated the number sequence:

6'3" 2.53 32

The first set of numbers was written as a height—my height, actually—but what about the others?

Weight? Age?

The volume of something?

A mathematic equation of some sort?

I tried to think of both the hidden and the obvious, playing with the numbers, adding, subtracting,
multiplying them, looking for a pattern, but nothing seemed to click. Nothing hidden came to mind.

So, what about the obvious?

It's seven numbers.

A phone number?

I tapped it into my phone. No one picked up and it went to a generic voicemail. I identified myself as a federal agent and left a message for the person to call me back, then I phoned Angela to have Lacey tackle the number pattern. “Online searches, street addresses, equations, phone numbers, anything.”

“Gotcha.” Angela was chronically overworked. Though she did her best to hide how stressed she was, I could hear exhaustion in her voice. And this week, with everything that was going down, it was only going to get worse.

“And,” she added, “I'll have her check different iterations of those numbers and Jerome's phone records, his credit card statements, birthdays, anniversaries of those close to him—see what we can pull up.”

“Great. Talk to you soon.”

After we ended the call I got right back on the line, this time with Ralph. “We need to find out when Jerome was last seen alive. And let's locate an expert on Native American weaponry. I want to know what the difference between a hatchet and a tomahawk is.”

“Why?”

I summarized the scene, then explained, “With the arrows, if that thing's a tomahawk we need to figure out—”

“What kind of message he was trying to give us.”

I would leave the specifics of that up to Lien-hua and the other profilers. “Right.”

End call.

Careful not to disturb any evidence, I spent a few more minutes looking around the room, but finally pain and common sense got the best of me and I left Natasha and her unit to process the scene.

Todd Foster, the paramedic who'd somewhat protestingly lent me his Windbreaker, was still outside the HRT's barricade, waiting by the ambulance with his partner.

I returned the jacket to him, and after texting my wife and daughter to let them know that I was on my way to Tanner Medical Center, I climbed in and we took
off.