Mindhunters 4 - Deadly Intent (28 page)

It was clear that Assistant Director Whitman wasn’t sure how to react to Jonesy. It was equally obvious that he was mad as hell the lab was here in the first place.

“Ms. Trimball, can you verify the accuracy of the test results run today?” he was barking as Kell and Macy slipped into the conference room.

Nellie Trimball was once again wrapped up in the winter wear Macy had seen her wearing earlier. Jonesy still wore the sweatshirt he’d arrived in, but at least he was wearing boots rather than the thongs from that afternoon.

“Yes, sir, I’m confident they’re accurate,” she said primly.

“I don’t need anyone verifying my test results,” Jonesy snapped. He slapped the file folder he held onto the polished mahogany table before him. “I would have had them done in half the time if she hadn’t been dogging my every step.”

The woman sniffed audibly. “It certainly wouldn’t hurt you to review established lab protocol and procedures. One can’t take the chance on shoddy workmanship when lives are at stake.”

The two of them squared off again, and Macy said a silent prayer of thanks that she’d been spared their bickering for the duration of the tests. “Shoddy?” Jonesy’s voice went lethal. “Just who do you think—”

“We’re grateful to both of you for your quick work,” Macy inserted smoothly. Moving toward the conference table, she looked at Whitman, who appeared as though he’d swallowed a particularly nasty-tasting lemon. “Assistant Director Whitman, I assume you’ve been introduced to Alfred Jones? He’s one of Raiker’s finest scientists, lured away from Quantico a couple years ago.”

Whitman’s eyes narrowed so much they nearly disappeared. “He was with the FBI?” He raked the man with his gaze. He was no doubt wondering how Jonesy’s Mohawk and piercings had gone over at the bureau’s crime labs. Macy had often questioned that herself.

“I’m certain Adam sent you Alfred’s credentials.” Certain, because her boss had cc’d the document to her that very afternoon.

“Alfred? Don’t call me . . .”

A firm sideways kick had the rest of Jonesy’s protest sliding down his throat.

“Yes.” The special agent glared at her. “Your boss is good about presenting information after the fact. Has friends in high places, doesn’t he?”

She smiled blandly. “Lucky for us. With the cooperation of scientists from our labs and the CBI’s”—she nodded toward Nellie—“we’re no longer at the mercy of backlogs in the state lab in Denver. You must be excited about that.”

Excited didn’t seem to be in the man’s vocabulary, but something eased a bit in his expression at the reminder that CBI still had a hand in the lab results, thanks to Trimball’s presence. He reached for the file folder, and Nellie picked it up and handed it across the table.

“We ran tests on the bloodstains found, both on the bedding and in the suspect’s house,” she began. “The results do indicate one positive elimination.”

Macy and Kell exchanged looks. “Elimination of who?” he asked impatiently.

“Of the victim.” The woman looked vaguely surprised by the interruption. She took the glasses off her nose and wiped them vigorously on the end of her scarf. “Neither result matched the DNA of Ellie Mulder.”

Macy felt her knees weaken in relief. So the bloodstains on her bed and those found in Hubbard’s bathroom didn’t belonged to the girl. It was little, much too little, to pin hope on, especially in light of the threat assessment she’d run. But it was something.

“Who do they belong to?” Kell asked.

“The sample from location B was tiny,” Jonesy put in, “which impacted the tests that could be used.”

Nellie shot him a look that could almost pass for approval. “Minuscule, really. Which of course meant PCR DNA analysis, which was once thought not to be as accurate. However in recent years . . .”

“Can either of you get to the point?” It was plain that Assistant Director Whitman was even lower on patience than usual.

“We were able to match the samples found at location B with the employee DNA profile of one Nicholas Hubbard,” Jonesy finished hurriedly.

Her earlier relief gave way to frustration. The tiny stains found in the man’s bathroom could be explained by any number of reasons. “Any way of determining how old they were?”

Nellie Trimball looked down her long nose at Macy. “We weren’t requested to make that determination.”

“The bloodstains weren’t degraded.” Jonesy shrugged. “Repeated cleaning of the area over time would have eliminated them or at least deteriorated them to some degree. More than that I can’t say. Also, the photographs show they were drops, not clotted, circular in shape.”

“Meaning they came from a ninety-degree angle,” finished Macy. But at this point, that determination meant exactly nothing.

“Let’s go back to the bloodstain on the sheets,” demanded Kell. “Were you able to match it to Hubbard?”

Jonesy shook his head. “We only compared it to two DNA profile samples, that of the suspect and the victim. It didn’t match either.”

Shock jolted through her. Hubbard’s prints had been found in the girl’s room. The CBI crime lab had determined that much. But if the stained bedding couldn’t be attributed to either the girl or Hubbard, where did that leave them?

“Maybe that’s an indication Hubbard wasn’t working alone,” she suggested slowly.

But Whitman’s thoughts were clearly channeling in another direction. “Tomorrow I want those bloodstains compared to the DNA profiles we have on file for every employee on the estate. But first start with the parents.” His glare dared either Kell or Macy to object, but both remained silent. It was hardly surprising that his suspicions would immediately return to the Mulders. Macy doubted they had strayed too far from his mind as suspects since the case had begun.

At any rate, the comparison samples had to be run, if only for elimination purposes. But she’d hoped the bloodstains would have yielded more telling information.

“You said the stains in the bathroom weren’t degraded. How about the one on the sheet? Could it have been there awhile?”

“If it was, the sheet likely hadn’t been washed since it was stained.” Nellie had her glasses back on her nose. “There was no evidence of deterioration.”

Which made Macy even more certain it had occurred the night in question. It didn’t seem likely that housekeeping would have put a stained sheet back on the girl’s bed. More than likely it would have been disposed of.

But that didn’t help explain how it had gotten there in the first place.

“Before they start the tests tomorrow, let’s run the DNA profile result through CODIS.” She saw Whitman’s answer on his face before he even opened his mouth, so she said more firmly, “We save time by doing them simultaneously. As a matter of fact, we’ll probably know whether or not there’s a hit on the Combined DNA Index System before Jonesy and Ms. Trimball even finish the tests.”

“I’ll have the sample submitted into the state and national system,” the assistant director surprised her by saying. His gaze traveled back to encompass the scientists once again. “Did you discover anything else?”

Jonesy looked a bit crestfallen. Clearly he’d expected more fanfare over the results he’d presented. “I only had time to run the two tests. If someone hadn’t been underfoot every time I turned around, always yammering on about her research, or proper technique—which, for the record, I don’t need to be reminded of—”

“It’s the height of arrogance to think we can’t all benefit from an occasional reminder—”

“Occasional.” Jonesy snorted.

Before the two came to blows, Macy inserted herself between them. “This has been a big help. We’re grateful to you both. Jonesy, I assume you want to stay in the lab.” The large mobile station was equipped with a bedroom and small bath in back, separated by a double partition from the lab itself. She’d never known the man to stray too far from it when on location.

“I’ve got my things in there. And someone told me that we could call the kitchen at any time for meals.”

“That’s right. Be sure to do so. As a matter of fact, you could head there now and grab something to eat. I can vouch for the chefs. They’re top-notch.” She included them both in a smile that felt strained at the edges. “And, Nellie, if you ask in the kitchen, I’m certain they can find a housekeeper to direct you to the room Mrs. Mulder had prepared for you this afternoon.”

Feeling a bit as though she were herding cats, she led them both toward the door. “Thank you again for all you accomplished today. We can talk about priorities for tests run tomorrow in the morning.”

“I could eat,” Jonesy said, stepping out of the room. “Is the kitchen to the left?”

“That’s right.” Gently she eased the door shut again, resisting the urge to lean against it. Instead, she turned to find the CBI assistant director agent wearing something suspiciously close to a smirk.

“Something tells me you’ve had practice at that.”

“My stepfather did a stint at a number of British embassies. I learned the skills of diplomacy at an early age, and those skills came in handy today.”

“Raiker will be back tomorrow. But it’s a good idea to start running elimination samples on the bloodstain.” Kell folded his arms across his chest, tapping his index finger against his biceps as he thought. “After that . . . what about the trap in Hubbard’s bathtub? Probably not a priority to check it for more blood. Maybe we should concentrate on having them test the fibers found in the girl’s room.”

Whitman flicked a look at Kell, and his expression settled into its familiar near scowl. “You have an annoying habit of forgetting who’s in charge of this investigation, Burke. I’ll make those decisions myself.”

Macy’s heart sank. For a moment there, the CBI assistant director had seemed almost approachable. Really, the controversies of the day were getting a bit ridiculous. She could see Kell’s response in his expression even before he opened his mouth.

“Can’t say that I care for some of the decisions you’ve made so far,” he said with a mildness that heightened her instincts. Like Raiker, the quieter Kell’s tone, the more dangerous his temper. “Like the one when you tried to remove me from the incident response.”

“You were a distraction.” Whitman’s face was reddening. “And you don’t take orders worth a damn.”

“Not from you, anyway.”

The assistant director set his balled fists on the tabletop and leaned his bulk on them. “You’d never work for me, Burke. You have no respect for the chain of command. No understanding of what’s required to be a team player. I know your type. Always the rogue, always wanting to go his own way.”

Kell’s smile was grim. He placed his hands on the table, leaning across toward the other man as if restraining himself from leaping across it. “You know nothing about me, but you’ve got one thing right. I’d never work for you.”

Dusk was slanting long shadows through the trees, and with every step, determination grew inside him.

He was going to kill the little bitch. Put a single shot right between her eyes.

No. Gut her like a rabbit and leave her body in the snow for the animals to feed off her intestines. Or slice her throat. One horizontal cut, matched with another splitting open her torso from throat to cunt. Different scenarios each time, all ending with an agonizing death.

And he wasn’t going to wait for the okay from the man who hired him either. Fuck him and his plans. What difference did a couple days make anyway? He could still collect the extra fee because no one had to know the little bitch was already dead.

It’d been a long time since the thirst to kill had been this strong. Not since he’d shot his crazy-ass father, the bullet going through the heavy Bible he held and into his heart. The daily beatings had always started with that Bible, before it was exchanged for the whip or belt. Men like that shouldn’t have kids. They should recognize what lived inside them and spare their offspring. Like he had.

He ducked his head against the fucking wind that blew up here all the time. The gusts made it hard to walk sometimes, even with the trees as a shield. But he had to be careful anyway, because a couple times he’d heard shots. In the distance but still in the area. And once he’d thought he’d seen the flash of hunter orange nearby. The bastard was screwing up his trail.

When he found the snowshoe prints, it was hard to tell whether it was the kid in his boots and snowshoes or the hunter. The damn blowing snow obliterated a lot of the tracks.

Maybe the kid had seen a hunter, too. The thought made the ball of rage in his chest burn hotter. Maybe she’d found some stranger and been whisked off to safety. Maybe the cops were on their way already.

He wasn’t worried. With the cover of trees and the stashed snowmobile, he didn’t doubt his ability to lose them. And he wasn’t going leave the job undone. Not after he’d invested so much time and effort into it.

There was his future reputation to consider.

Halting, he slid the pack off his back. Opening it, he pulled out the night vision goggles he’d used when he’d snatched the kid. Everything about that night had gone like clockwork. He could see now that it had been too easy. Almost charmed. Something had been bound to go wrong.

But he’d never expected the little bitch to get away.