Rise of The Iron Eagle (The Iron Eagle Series Book 1) (30 page)

He was able to pull Cruthers’ file and saw that he was ex-military. Marine Corps. Drafted in ‘73 and discharged honorably in ‘77. He was a Vietnam veteran, a chopper pilot, and the leader of an amphibious assault unit. He was the President and CEO of WEC Medical Industries, which owned and operated three dozen for-profit hospitals on the west coast. The report showed that Cruthers founded the company in 1980, and that it went public in 2000. The list of medical facilities WEC owned was huge, and John scanned the hospital and medical clinic names for familiar ones. He saw Northridge Hospital and the date it was acquired by WEC. They took over full control in 2001.

Cruthers had no criminal history, not even a parking ticket or traffic violation. John cross-referenced the hospitals with a public record search through Experian and used every state and federal database he could access. He also cross-referenced media outlets and news stories using keyword optimization, using rape, murder, kidnapping, missing persons, and assault in his search. The computer scanned the databases, and although he was getting a lot of hits, most were related to substance abuse and anger management services provided by WEC-owned facilities. He was getting ready to pack it in and head for Cruthers’ house when three unique hits caught his attention.

The first was about a missing girl last seen in the waiting room of the West Hills Medical Plaza. Her body was found in a dumpster in Whittier a week after her disappearance in November ‘99. The second article mentioned a missing nursing student from Canoga Park Regional Hospital. Her family reported her disappearance in February 2001, and her body was found seven months later in an abandoned house in South Central LA. Then, there was the story on the front page of the
Los Angeles Daily News
. ‘The body of Doctor Amber Lynn Swenson was discovered on Wednesday, March 21, 2003, after being reported missing by her husband, Officer John Swenson of Granada Hills the previous day. The article didn’t go into the details of her death; he knew what the murderer had done to her. He compared the three cases and saw the pattern that Jim had been talking about. All three victims were taken or worked at medical facilities, and all but one, Amber, had been missing for months. He pulled the case files and autopsy reports on the other two victims, and their injuries were consistent with Amber’s. But with one huge exception. The other victims had been abused and tortured over a period of months according to the coroner’s reports. Amber was only with her killer for twenty-four hours, and the coroner put her date and time of death between ten p.m. and one a.m.

“Why didn’t you keep Amber longer?” he mumbled to himself. He found an obituary describing her as a strong-willed and powerful physician and friend. ‘Amber was passionate about saving lives and would never take no for an answer. She refused to bow to pressure when it was applied.’“Oh my God,” he said out loud, “you killed her because she wouldn’t comply with your demands!” He closed the search engine and studied the blueprints long and hard then filled two gym bags with equipment and donned his black outfit, and headed for Malibu. He didn’t know what Cruthers’game was, but he was certain that Sara was with him, and he knew it was against her will.

Chapter Twenty-Seven

‘He laid in the bed, his imagination
running wild, with tears running down
his face, thankful for what he had and
afraid and sad about their future.’

W
alter had served Sara a wonderful meal and then took her back to the bedroom off the large red room in the wine cellar. He was a perfect gentleman, outside of ignoring her requests to go home. She heard the door lock behind him as he walked out of the room in the wee hours of the morning. Exhausted and light-headed, she realized that Walter may have drugged her; she had to find a way out. She went into the bathroom, but there were no windows or other signs of an exit. She walked the room pounding on the walls, only to learn they were concrete. She got to the locked door and tried with all her might but could not get it open. She didn’t know it, but Walter was sitting in his little room watching her every move. He smiled as he watched her moving around like a mouse in a cage. She finally gave up and collapsed onto the bed and fell asleep. Once Walter saw that she was asleep, he went to bed. The sun was just starting to rise when he closed his eyes.

John pulled his truck behind the same dune he had parked behind the day before. He put on his mask and ran across the street in the premorning light, aided by the shadows of palm trees and brush. He made his way to the driveway and turned on the unit sensor on his belt. He used an imaging and visualization technique he learned in the Corps, and he moved from zone to zone undetected. He moved down to the beach and then disarmed the system leading into the boat house and entered. He placed one of the gym bags under the tarp of a small vessel in a slip next to the entrance. He looked around and could see that the entire building was sensor sensitive, and the doors leading in were motion activated. He took a mental inventory of the building and where he had stowed his equipment before moving to the house.

The sensor unit on his hip beeped twice, letting him know that the area was active. If it sent off a soft, constant tone, he would know that he had tripped a sensor. He moved toward Walter’s bedroom. There was a large infinity pool built right up to the bedroom windows. There was only one small door leading out of the room to the pool, but he knew that wasn’t right and upon further examination he could see that the walls were on rollers, and they opened. He moved silently behind the bedroom where the greatest concentration of internal sensors were located and found an air intake shaft. While observing the house, he was impressed with the amount of cement that was used in its construction. He used a pen knife to remove the air intake screen and entered the shaft. It was large enough to allow his whole frame to fit with his gym bag in front of him. Based on the blueprints, these were intakes that fed four areas of the house. He guessed that at least two of the four were panic rooms, allowing Cruthers to take refuge in the event of a robbery or natural disaster.

He moved in the direction of the room with the largest amount of sensors. He took a small black box from his bag, turned it on, and put it back. “That will jam any signal that his sensors might be putting out,” he whispered as he moved down the shaft. When he reached the end he could see a bright light, and as he moved closer to the grill he could see a gray concrete floor and red walls. There were motion sensors on the grill that he knew were jammed, so he slid his pen knife into the grill and moved to loosen if from the wall. He was concerned that it might be anchored in with concrete bolts, but the grate was merely set with an epoxy resin. He worked feverishly to loosen the grate, and when it broke free it started to fall toward the floor. Before the whole thing came crashing down, he caught the top of it.

He lowered the gym bag to the floor and then slipped from the shaft. He pulled out a small torch from his bag and placed the grill back in place then heated the sides of the grill until the resin softened and the steel reattached to the wall. He looked around and knew that there were infrared cameras in all directions; he scanned the room and saw three doors. In the middle of the room he recognized the unit that took up the bulk of the space; it was a torture rack, and he moved in for a closer look. The rack was impressive, definitely medieval, and probably from the 15th or 16th century. It had been refurbished and modernized. Where there was once cloth webbing, it had been modified with steel. He could see that the unit had been adapted with electrical cables that, based on the size of the wiring, could deliver up to 220 volts to its victim. The table had a receiver, and he knew that this was Walter’s pride and joy. It definitely let him know that Walter, at minimum, was in the bondage and S&M lifestyle. He took out four small round canisters the size of golf balls and placed them on the steel rack where the restraints were fastened and placed them onto the steel that held them in place. They were conductors and would intensify or block the current that the table had been modified to supply. It would also allow him to block the current remotely if Sara ended up on the rack. He pulled out a remote sensor and was able to grab the controlling signal. With a few presses of a button, he had taken control of the table. The first unit made a sharp click when he placed it near the steel. The magnets on the units were strong, and he was careful when placing the other three.

He moved across the room and tried each door, but they were locked. He pulled out a small remote control and pressed two buttons. The red light on the top of the unit scanned back and forth until he heard a click releasing the lock on the first door. He opened it slowly. It was dark inside, and he was temporarily blinded by the white in the room when he switched on the light switch. It took a few seconds for his eyes to adjust, but he realized he was in a bathroom that looked more like a nuclear clean room. He looked around, but there was nothing of interest to him, so he exited the room, turning off the light behind him. He moved to the next door and did the same thing. The lock clicked, and he opened the door and turned on the light. He looked around and whispered, “Impressive.” Every type of bondage and torture device known to man was in the large room. “The guy is kinky…but that doesn’t make him a killer.” He moved amongst the instruments, and as he did he could smell the distinct odor of dried sweat and blood.

He moved on and found a small hook-like device that reeked of bodily fluids. “Okay…this guy is not just kinky; he’s a killer.” He took the device and slipped it into his bag. He moved out of the room, and as he shut the door he left the light on. He looked back to make sure the room was well lit. He took the remote out and set the two locking codes into its memory. There was a door on the other side of the room, and as he moved toward it the sensor on his belt beeped three times. The sensor to this door was live. He moved the remote into ‘program’ mode and there was a click, and the lock opened. He locked the signal into his unit, opened the door, slipped in quickly, and closed it behind him. The sensor on his belt let out a low sustained tone. He knew that the sensor had been tripped. What he didn’t know was if anyone was monitoring things on the other end.

Walter was fast asleep at eight a.m. when he heard the alarm. It woke him, but by the time he was fully alert the sound had stopped. The sun was shining, and he laid back down for a few seconds, then shot out of bed and went to his remote room closet. He looked at the monitors, but they showed nothing but static. “What the heck?” He walked out of the closet and called Gerald and told him what he was experiencing. “Let me log in remotely, Walter, so I can have a look.” He could hear Gerald humming and typing. When he came back on the line he said, “It looks like the wine cellar video has been knocked out. I warned you that this could happen. Do you want me to send someone over to troubleshoot it?” “What about the rest of the sensors and cameras, Gerald? Are they working properly?” “I’m running a scan now.” He was still humming, “Everything looks fine, Walter. It’s the two wireless units that are causing the problem.” “Well, shut them down!” He had anger in his voice that Gerald hadn’t heard before. “Are you okay, Walter? You don’t sound like yourself.” Walter regained his composure and apologized, saying he just wanted to be able to see his cellar. “I’m sorry, Walter, but I can’t shut the two wireless units off remotely. They are not integrated into the system that way. I told you yesterday I need to hardwire them. If you want, I can come over or send someone over. We can work on them right away, but I need access to the cellar to hardwire them, or we’ll need to remove them.”

“Oh, Gerald, I don’t want the bother over the weekend. Come on Monday first thing, okay?” “Yes, Walter. Don’t fret; your wine is safe. You just won’t be able to see or hear it for the weekend. I don’t know why you need to hear it, but, hey, that’s your thing.” “You’re right, Gerald. I’m overreacting. You told me there could be glitches. I know the unit is secure, and, since you say the house is fine, I trust your judgment. Enjoy the rest of your weekend.” He hung up the phone and walked back to the closet; the monitors still had snow, and he had no audio. “Well, I will just have to make conversation with Doctor Cook the old fashioned way.” He dressed for the day and asked Margarita to prepare breakfast for two and asked her to bring it to his bedroom sundeck. She nodded and continued with her preparation.

The Eagle carefully moved across the floor of the dark room on his hands and knees with his bag in his mouth. He heard rustling ahead of him and stopped. He had night vision goggles in his bag but didn’t want to make a move until the sound ceased. When it stopped, he gently unzipped his bag and felt for the goggles. He placed them on his head, clicked the switch, and the room was lit. He could see a bed directly in front of him. He stood up and looked around the rest of the room. There were two other doors besides the entrance. One of the doors was open, and he walked quietly over to look inside. It was a bathroom. He turned around and looked at the bed and saw Sara asleep on a pillow, curled up in a robe.

He pressed his hand against his throat to make sure that his voice altering disc was on the larynx and whispered, “Ms. Cook.” She rustled a bit but didn’t wake. When he took her hand, she didn’t react, so he checked her eyes and could see her pupils were dilated. Given the blackness of the room that would be normal; what wasn’t normal was the deep breaths she was taking. He had slept with her enough through the years to know she had been drugged. He looked around the room to the second door over from the bathroom. He moved over to it and placed the remote unit against it, and the red light started moving back and forth until it toned and the lock released. He set the remote for that door as well and now had all the doors in the room programmed, so he could access them. He turned the knob and pushed open the door when suddenly his goggles went white; he knew that a light had come on.