If Angels Fall (50 page)

God was present.

Edward Keller felt the intoxicating heat of His love.
It was overpowering -- he was swirling in it, as he hurried through Berkeley
for San Francisco, delighting in the celestial trumpeting that melted into horn
honking, waking him to the fact that his rental van was drifting toward
oncoming traffic. Keller shrugged it off.

He had found Michael the Archangel. He had gazed upon
him.

Sanctus, sanctus, sanctus.

The transfiguration was near, brushing against his
fingers. All he had to do was obtain Michael, the last angel.

The Lord would illuminate the way.

For God will send His angels to watch over them.
And they shall embrace them and carry them to Heaven.

Waiting for the light to change at an intersection
west of the campus along Center, Keller feasted obsessively on a thumbnail. He
was planning his route to the Bay Bridge, when a miracle blazed like a
prophet’s comet before his eyes.

“Sweet Jesus!” He couldn’t believe it! It was Michael!

Heaven’s warrior!

Keller managed only a glimpse, a mind-searing glimpse
of nine-year-old Zachary Michael Reed, wearing a bulging backpack and crossing
Center. He was walking.

He was alone.

Alone!

Keller drove ahead for a block and tucked his van into
a parking space ahead of a larger cargo truck, out of sight. He adjusted his
passenger-side mirror, catching Michael’s distant reflection.

And behold the earth shook and God’s angel
descended from the skies. His eyes were like lightening, and any who opposed
him were struck dead.

The boy’s image grew with each step, quickening
Keller’s pulse. He was sweating. What should he do? What if Michael spotted him
and became suspicious? He had to remain calm. In control, as he was with the
others.

I am cleansed in the light of the Lord.

The final challenge.

Michael stopped at a store, less than three car
lengths away. Had he noticed the van? He couldn’t have. Keller adjusted the
mirror again. It looked like a hobby store. Michael peered into the window,
then went inside. Where were the adults? Was he allowed to go into the store
alone? Keller waited. No one else appeared. The boy was alone.

It was a sign.

He must act on it.

Dominus Deus sabaoth.

Keller scurried to the back of the van, watching the
storefront from its tinted rear windows. He quickly changed into a shirt, tie,
dress pants, and suit jacket. The same outfit he used for his insurance man. He
knotted the tie, combed his hair neatly, and slid on a pair of dark aviator
glasses.

The van’s side door rolled open.

Anyone watching with a modicum of interest would have
seen a very serious, professional-looking man of authority stepping from his
new van to attend to an important business matter. If they guessed he was a
cop, they would be right, Keller would tell them confidently if pressed. For in
his beast pocket he carried the leather-cased laminated photo ID and shield of
Randall Lamont, special investigator for the State of California, a personality
he had created after sending fifteen bucks to a mail-order house that
advertised in the back of a detective magazine.

But Keller knew no one was watching, or cared.

Except God.

And He was lighting the way.

“Inspector Turgeon?
Inspector Sydowski?”

“Yes,” Turgeon said.

Professor Kate Martin stepped from the door of her
condo, indicating two sofas facing each other over a glass-and-rattan coffee
table, the centerpieces of her living room overlooking the Golden Gate and
Pacific. A hint of hyacinths lingered.

Although she was barefoot in Levi’s and a
long-sleeved, ratty flannel shirt, Martin moved with the swanlike elegance of a
self-assured woman. But Sydowski’s deeper reading picked up the unease in her
eyes. Her hair, pulled back with a navy barrette, was loosening. She corralled
the wild strands slipping in front of her face, revealing bright white flecks on
her hands. She folded her arms across her chest. “I was painting a bookcase
when you called.”

Turgeon and Sydowski saw the file folders stacked on
the coffee table. Martin had obviously stopped painting to scour through them.

“Sit down, please. Be comfortable. I’ve made some
raspberry tea. Would you care for some? I have coffee, too, if you like?”

“Tea would be fine,” Turgeon said.

“And Inspector Sy-DOW-ski? I hope I’m pronouncing it
correctly?”

“You are. No tea for me, thanks.” Then he thought of
something as she started for the kitchen. “Dr. Martin?”

She stopped and smiled.

“By chance, would you have any Tums?”

“I’m sorry, no. I do have Alka-Seltzer.”

“That’ll do, thanks.”

The chicken sandwich Sydowski had inhaled during the
briefing was jitterbugging through his system. It nearly burned a hole in his
stomach during the drive over as Turgeon read aloud, for the second time, every
word of the article the
Star
had recently published on Martin’s
bereavement research study.

The Homicide Detail’s secretary had clipped the story,
“as per the lieutenant’s instructions”. Leo was a pain that way about the local
papers. Anything with the word “murder” in it activated her scissors. But what
with the Yellow Ribbon Task Force working a green light, Gonzales never got around
to reading this one. And Sydowski, a scrupulous reader of crime stories, missed
it. When he approached Gonzales immediately after the FBI’s profiler went on
about the bad guy suffering psychological pain involving children, Gonzales
ordered the secretary to get the story.

It was written by Tom Reed.

“First he fucks us up on the Donner file -- what the
hell is it with this guy? Flora, can you make some copies of this please?”

Leo’s eyes narrowed and his jaw tightened on his unlit
cigar as Sydowski told him how Reed had tiptoed up to him after the news
conference on the Nunn abduction, after seeing the fuzzy video and composite.
How he hinted about recognizing the bad guy.

“This is a huge goddamn lead, Walt! You and Linda find
the proof and see if anyone in her group fits the FBI’s profile.”

Sunlight probed the prismatic crystal glass of fizzing
antacid Martin set before him. When she offered imported Scottish shortbread
cookies, Sydowski had to restrain himself from unloading on her about the
gravity of their visit. Lady, this ain’t a fucking tea party.

Martin had priceless information and Sydowski wanted
it. With two children missing, and most likely dead, he and their parents had a
right to it. He was here to claim it. He swallowed some Alka-Seltzer, gritted
his teeth, and nodded to the files.

“Are you prepared to help us, Doctor?”

Turgeon left her tea untouched and produced her
notepad.

“Yes. After we talked on the phone, I reviewed the
files of my research subjects and I think, uhmmm, I think ... uhm, I think one
man may, uhm --- I’m sorry.”

Martin was coming apart. She stared mournfully at the
files, gripping her knees. Her eyes were glistening when she tried to speak
again. She was stunned with embarrassment. Fear.

“I’m concerned about patient-client confidentiality.”

“But you’re not their doctor?” Turgeon said.

“Yes, but I entered into an agreement with each
subject for the research. They all volunteered.”

“Doctor, does the profile suggested by the FBI fit one
of your subjects?” Sydowski tapped the files. ‘We can get a warrant.”

Martin looked at Turgeon and Sydowski, her eyes
drowning in the whirlpool that engulfs a person once they learn that a dark
force dwells under the skin of a person they thought they knew. Sydowski had
seen that look break on the faces of a killer’s family as they struggled with
shame, remorse.

It was heartbroken, pleading:

Please don’t judge us.

How could we have missed it?

What could we have done?

Their anguish consumed them as if they had helped
plunge the knife, squeeze the trigger, or tighten the ligature. They were yoked
with blame and pain, becoming the murderer and the victim, condemned to die a
piece at a time for the rest of their lives.

Eyes downcast, Martin cleared her throat, touched her
face with the back of her hand. She grasped the top file, retrospectively
flipping through the yellow pages of her handwritten notes.

“This is my file on Edward Keller. He participated in
my research. He was a walk-in. His is the most unusual case of prolonged grief
reaction I’ve ever experienced, evolving into stages of delusion.”

“Doctor, please,” Sydowski said. “Does the profile fit
him?”

Martin swallowed. “Like a tailor-made suit.”

It only took a few minutes for her to recount Keller’s
case history and everything she knew about him: his fantasies, his religious
delusions, how he reacted suspiciously to Tom Reed when he arrived to write on
the bereavement group, how Keller demanded not to be photographed or identified
before ultimately storming out.

Turgeon took notes. Sydowski steepled his fingers and
listened.

“You ever fear he would act out his delusions?”
Sydowski said.

Martin shook her head, burying her face in her hands.
“I’ve read the papers, watched the TV news on the abductions. I’ve seen the
grainy video of the suspect, the composite sketch. Once, for a second, I
thought there was a resemblance to Edward, but I dismissed it. I never thought
in those terms. I never thought, I -- ”

“Don’t beat yourself up.” Sydowski began reading
Keller’s file.”

“It’s subconscious denial. I counsel people who do
this.”

“Where do we find him?” Sydowski asked.

“I don’t know. The number and the address he gave me
are invalid.” Martin fished Keller’s personal information sheet from the file
for Sydowski. “I just never made the connection, never grew suspicious. The
signs were evident. I knew he needed extensive help. I suggested it him. How
did I miss ... how could I ... the people I am studying have lost children ... I
never -- ”

Turgeon clasped Martin’s shoulder. “No one could have
known. Stop thinking about yourself and start thinking about everything you can
tell us about Edward Keller. I’ll have Bob Hill, the FBI’s psychological
profiler, come here immediately to consult you.”

“Certainly.”

“May I use your phone?” Sydowski stood, grasping
Keller’s file.

Martin nodded toward the kitchen.

When he was alone dialing Leo’s direct line. Sydowski
belched. He felt much better. The line rang once.

“Homicide. Gonzales.”

“Leo, it’s Sydowski. I got a name.” He was browsing
through Keller’s file.

“So do I, Walt.”

“How’s that?”

“We just got a hit on the prints from the new bills in
the truck buy and the meat tray from the Nunn home. Belong to an Edward Keller.
Seems twenty-odd, nearly thirty years ago, he was bonded as a night security
guard for a warehouse in the city. Got his blood type, too. It matches the
trace we found on Nunn’s severed braids. We don’t have a good address for
Keller yet. We’ve put the entire task force on him. What name do you have?”

Same one: Edward Keller.”

“No shit! You got an address for him, Walt?”

“Not yet, but get this: he lost his three children in
a boating accident twenty years ago. Two boys and a girl. The ages of Danny
Becker and Gabrielle Nunn match the ages of two of them.”

“That’s two. That means he’s got to take a third kid.”

“Right. A boy, age nine.”

“And he was in that group Reed wrote about?”

“Yes, Leo.”

“Shit, Walt, get ahold of Tom Reed. See if the
Star
has pictures, an address on Keller, anything.”