The Secret Friend (15 page)

44

‘If Fletcher calls you at home or at the lab, we can trace his location in about forty-five seconds,’ Bryson said. ‘The moment your phone rings, the trace starts. Let it ring three times before you pick up.’

‘What about my cell phone?’ Darby asked.

‘That’s where it gets dicey. Cell signals bounce through towers.’ Bryson reached into his pant pocket. ‘It could take anywhere from one to three minutes to pinpoint his location. If he calls you on your cell, the key is to keep him talking as long as possible. Once we get a lock on his signal, we can trace it even if he hangs up, as long as he keeps his phone turned on. I also want you to carry this.’

Pinched between his fingers was a small rectangular piece of black plastic, thin, with a grey button in the centre. The device reminded Darby of the medical alert units some elderly people carried in case they fell and couldn’t get up.

‘This is what we call a panic button,’ Bryson said. ‘If something happens, if you believe you’re in danger, you press the button – you have to do it hard enough to break the seal. Once that happens, we come running. There’s also a GPS transmitter in there, so we’ll know where you are at any given time. You’re to carry this with you, even when you go to bed.’

‘Do you think Fletcher’s going to attack me in my sleep?’

‘I don’t think you should take any chances. During the day, keep the device tucked inside your pant pocket. What time are you leaving work?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘Let me know when you do. We need to install privacy devices on your phones. If you get a private call and don’t want us listening in, you press the button on the privacy device and the trace stops, nobody hears a thing. When you’re ready to leave, call and I’ll meet you at your place.

‘One other thing,’ Bryson said. ‘When you leave work, don’t look around the streets to see if you can spot surveillance. If Fletcher is watching, he may suspect something and run. Keep up your normal routine and act natural. Do you have a boyfriend?’

‘No.’

‘Someone you’re seeing?’

‘I hope you’re not asking to fix me up on a blind date.’

‘I’m asking because I was hoping someone was staying with you.’

‘Coop is.’

Something flickered across his eyes. Was it disappointment?

‘He’s not my boyfriend, just a very close friend,’ Darby said. ‘He’s very protective.’

‘The surveillance team will be watching you when you leave work today, when you leave your condo – eyes will be on you at all times. Again, just act natural. Try to relax. If there’s a problem, we’ll call and give you instructions.’

Bryson handed her his business card. ‘My home phone number is on the back. Programme it into your cell phone. If you need anything, give me a call.’

‘What’s Hannah’s address?’

‘She never made it home, never got on the bus.’

‘I want to look through her things.’

Bryson wrote the address down on a sheet of paper, tore it off and handed it to her. ‘I’m going to head downtown and help Watts.’

‘I’ll call you if I find anything at Hannah’s place,’ Darby said. ‘After that, I need to collect makeup samples.’

She told him about the makeup stain on Chen’s sweatshirt.

‘Sounds pretty thin,’ Bryson said.

‘It’s the only evidence we have to work with at the moment.’

‘Before you go, I have a present for you.’

He opened his desk drawer and handed her a small box. Inside was a tactical light for her handgun.

Darby smiled. ‘You certainly know the way to a woman’s heart.’

45

On her way back to her office, Darby called Coop and gave him a quick rundown of her meeting with Tim Bryson.

Coop was already driving back into town with the fingerprints he’d collected from Tina Sanders’ mailbox. He agreed to meet her at Hannah Givens’ home in Brighton.

The events of the day crowded her thoughts. Darby wanted to hit the gym. A run on the treadmill would sweep her head clean but there wasn’t any time. She put on her coat, grabbed her forensics kit and headed out. Walking outside in the dark, frigid air, she wondered where the surveillance was. She also wondered if Malcolm Fletcher was watching.

Safe behind the wheel of her Mustang, her thoughts turned to the Virgin Mary statues. In her mind’s eye she saw the Blessed Mother’s sorrowful expression, arms held wide open, ready to embrace. The face vanished, replaced by Fletcher’s strange black eyes. Darby thought she heard him laughing.

She didn’t want to think about the former profiler. She focused her thoughts on the man who shot Hale and Chen. That man had placed a statue of the Virgin Mary in their pockets. He’d sewed them shut and tied the end off with a knot so the statues would stay with them. He’d placed a sign of the cross on Chen’s forehead and dumped her body into Boston Harbor. Why? What was the significance of the statue and why was it so important that it stay with the two women after they were dead?

You cared for them, I know you did. Why did you keep them alive for so long only to turn around and kill them?

Darby wondered if the killer was possibly schizophrenic. Most schizophrenia was based on a specific delusion – UFOs, secret government organizations implanting microchips in people’s brains to eavesdrop on their thoughts. A lot of schizophrenics believed God, Jesus or the devil spoke directly to them.

With Hale and Chen, there seemed to be an organizational element at work in the way both women were killed and dumped in water. And then there was the length of time between the abductions. Emma Hale had been held somewhere for roughly six months – half a year, Jesus – her body discovered in early November. Chen’s body was found two days ago. It was February. Her stay had lasted only a couple of months.

As a general rule, schizophrenics weren’t organized offenders. They were impulsive killers. The crime scenes were sloppy. With Hale and Chen, there was no crime scene.

Emma Hale, the first victim, had left a party at her friend’s Back Bay apartment. It wasn’t a long walk home but it had been snowing, so Emma had called a cab. She grabbed her coat and went outside to smoke. Twenty minutes later, the cab pulled up to the apartment building but Emma Hale wasn’t there.

Judith Chen had studied late into the evening. She left the library and somewhere on her way home had disappeared.

Both women had not made it home. Had they been abducted by force? If a strange man had tried to grab Hale or Chen, both women would have tried to fight. They would have kicked and screamed. No witnesses had come forward to indicate this had happened.

Darby felt certain the killer didn’t do this – he wouldn’t want to draw attention to himself. He was more cunning. He
needed
these women. Before approaching them, he would have a plan in place to get them quickly inside his car as quietly as possible. Had the killer driven up to them and offered a ride? Darby considered the possibility. If this had happened, the killer wouldn’t drive a clunker or a van – vans always sent a message of danger. Appearances would be important.

Both women were smart and well educated. Darby felt confident that neither of them would have accepted a ride from a stranger. Either they knew him or he had acted in such a manner as to make them feel comfortable about getting into his car. To do that, he would need to have known something about his victims. Had he followed them, observing their habits and routines, their friends and class schedules? Or were they randomly selected?

Random selections were desperate. If these women were randomly selected, they would be used and discarded. They wouldn’t be kept somewhere for months. Maybe they were victims of opportunity. Maybe the killer simply approached a variety of women to see which one would climb inside his car. Maybe he had posed as an undercover cop and used a fake badge to lure them. Or maybe everything she was thinking right now was a complete waste of time and energy.

Darby spotted a Starbucks and pulled over. She was walking back to her car when her cell phone rang. The caller ID window said unknown caller. She waited until the fourth ring to pick up, just to be sure.

‘Are you ready to discover the truth?’ Malcolm Fletcher asked.

46

‘I spoke to Tina Sanders,’ Darby said.

‘Did she tell you about her daughter?’

‘She did. For some reason, the woman is under the assumption that I know what happened to her. Is there something you’d like to tell me?’

‘If you want to know what happened to Jennifer Sanders and the others, drive to Sinclair,’ Fletcher said. ‘This time, I want you to come alone.’

‘Why?’

‘I’ve decided I want you all to myself.’

Click.

The phone call was short, less than thirty seconds. Did Fletcher know the call was being traced? This time he had asked her to come alone. Had he somehow already spotted the surveillance or was he merely anticipating it?

Darby pulled onto the highway and called Bryson. He promised to call her back and did, twenty minutes later.

‘I just got through talking with Bill Jordan, the man heading up your surveillance,’ Bryson said. ‘Fletcher wasn’t on long enough. They couldn’t lock on to his signal.’

‘Is there any way he could have found out about the trace?’

‘No. My guess is he’s playing it safe, trying to hedge his bets. I’ve got to run and coordinate with Jordan. He’s still scrambling to get his people together.’

‘What do you want me to do?’

‘It’s like you said – he left us the same Virgin Mary statue we found in Chen’s and Hale’s pockets. It’s hard to ignore that fact.’

‘He wants to meet me alone.’

‘Jordan’s using some undercover narcotics detectives. They’ll pose as Reed’s security people and escort you inside.’

‘Tim, if Fletcher does, in fact, know something, maybe I should go in there alone.’

‘I’m going to pretend I didn’t hear that.’

‘If the man wanted to hurt me, he’s had ample opportunity,’ Darby said. ‘What does Fletcher have to gain by killing me?’

‘If I let you go inside the hospital without any sort of protection, the commissioner will have my ass. If something happens to you – if you go in there and stub your toe, the city would be liable. You could sue me, the city.’

‘You want me to sign a waiver?’

‘I’m not going to debate this with you. You want to drive up to Sinclair, then go, but we’re going to be there.’

‘I’m driving there now.’

‘Okay. We’ll make sure all the exits are covered.’

‘How many are there?’

‘A lot,’ Bryson said. ‘This past weekend Reed showed me all the different places people can sneak inside. His security can only cover so much of the campus at any given time. When Fletcher calls, keep him on the phone and we’ll do the rest. Is your phone fully charged?’

Darby checked the battery level. ‘It’s still got some juice,’ she said. ‘I have a charger in my car.’

‘Good. Everyone will be in position by the time you arrive.’

‘What if he leads me into the basement? The cell won’t work down there.’ They had discovered that during their weekend search. The basement was too far underground, the walls too thick. The signals either dropped or cut out completely.

‘I’m hoping it doesn’t come to that,’ Bryson said.

47

Jonathan Hale sat on his office floor, elbows propped on his knees and hands buried in his unwashed hair as he stared at the pictures of Emma and Susan scattered across the rug.

All day Saturday he had scoured the house for the photo albums and removed each and every picture and arranged them on the floor. It was now Monday evening. He had spent the entire time holed up in here in his office drinking bourbon and reliving the memories buried in each of the pictures. Some were clear but most had either faded or dulled.

When he nodded off, sometimes he had flashes, clips of memory that didn’t make much sense or carry any significant weight – Susan kneeling on the boat dock, rubbing sunscreen on Emma’s pudgy little arms; Emma cutting off her doll’s hair then crying after Susan told her it wouldn’t grow back; Susan at a Rolling Stones concert sipping beer from a paper cup while Mick Jagger belted out ‘Sympathy for the Devil’.

A phone rang. He thought it was his office phone, and when he stood, he realized the ringing was coming from inside his suit jacket. He only carried one phone with him now; the one Malcolm Fletcher had given him.

‘Have you looked at today’s mail?’ Fletcher asked.

‘No.’

‘I placed an envelope inside your mailbox,’ Fletcher said. ‘Inside you’ll find a DVD containing the garage surveillance video of the man who killed Emma. Call me after you’ve seen it.’

Hale opened his office door. His assistant had placed the day’s mail inside the leather tray sitting on the small table, along with a new bottle of Maker’s Mark bourbon. A small padded brown envelope was tucked into the bottom. Malcolm Fletcher’s name was written as the return address. The envelope, Hale noticed, didn’t contain any postage.

Standing at his desk, Hale grabbed the envelope’s tab and ripped it open. A shiny silver DVD slid onto his blotter.

His office had a TV with a DVD player. He made sure the door was locked, then slid the disk inside the player and waited.

The garage surveillance tape is a grainy haze of colour without sound. On the TV screen, a man wearing jeans, a baseball cap and a windbreaker runs across the garage to the private elevator. He presses the button and then bows his head, his gloved hands making fists by his sides. His back is toward the camera.

The elevator doors open. The man steps inside. He doesn’t turn around, just stands there with his head bowed. He knows the cameras are watching and recording.

The doors start to slide shut. He whips his head around and the camera catches a brief glimpse of his face as he presses the number for Emma’s penthouse suite.

Jonathan Hale shifted his attention to the bottom right-hand corner of the TV screen, to the bold white lettering holding the date and time of the recording: July 20: 2:16 a.m. Emma had been missing for two months. The man who had abducted her had decided, for a reason known only to God, to come back to her home to retrieve a necklace.

Why? Why would this monster risk everything for a
necklace?
Why would he perform this seemingly kind act only to turn around and kill her?

The tape ended. The TV went dark.

Hale stared at the screen and imagined his daughter trapped in some rundown room with no windows or light, Emma alone, confused and scared, forced to do things only God could see. When she cried out in pain, when she asked God for comfort, did he listen or turn his back? Hale already knew the answer.

Fact: the man had entered in through the garage.

Fact: he had waited for the garage to open and then snuck inside.

Fact: Detective Bryson said he had people posted in front of the building. Why hadn’t his people seen this man? If Bryson’s men had done their goddamn job, they would have seen this man and caught him and Emma would be alive.

Fact.

Hale started the DVD again, pierced by a memory of Emma sitting in this same chair watching
The Sound of Music.
After Susan died, Emma watched the movie over and over again, insisted on watching it in here, in the office, so she could be close to him. Only now did he understand the connection – the mother died and the children found a new mother in the nanny.
Emma must have watched the movie for comfort because I was unavailable.

Now Hale watched a movie for comfort. Again he watched the man who killed his daughter, the man who was last to see Emma alive, to speak with her, the last man to touch her.

Hale gripped the armchair as a new memory came to him: Emma, a little over a year old, sitting on his lap while he is talking on the phone. He doesn’t remember what the call was about, although it was probably business related. What he remembers now, clearly, vividly, is the smell of his daughter’s clean hair, the curve of her plump and downy cheek pressed up against his neck. He remembers the way Emma’s mouth hangs open as she studies his pen. She holds it in her tiny hands, her eyes wide, amazed.

Hale knew he would spend the good part of whatever was left of his life wishing he could go back in time to that moment. If God would somehow grant him this impossible power to go back through time, he would hang up the phone and just stare at Emma playing with the pen. He knew he could stay wrapped up in that memory forever and be happy.