Thrill Kill (21 page)

At six o’clock, Sinclair and Braddock walked up the same concrete stairs they had ascended three hours earlier. Sinclair grimaced with each step and limped slightly from where the doctors at ACH ER had dug a piece of concrete out of his right hamstring and closed the wound with five sutures and surgical superglue. The rest of his body felt like it had just gone ten rounds with a heavyweight champ. His thick raincoat protected most of his body after he went airborne and landed on the asphalt, where he slid, tumbled, and rolled for another twenty feet. Still, he ended up with road rash on his left hip where the surface of the parking deck tore through his wool pants, as well as oozing abrasions on his left arm and chin.

A canvas canopy the size of a small circus tent covered the far end of the parking lot where the device had exploded. Maloney waved at Sinclair as soon as he stepped under a smaller canopy that had been set up as a break area for the scores of officers and agents from a variety of local, state, and federal agencies. “I thought I told you at the hospital to go home when they released you,” Maloney said.

“I figured it was a suggestion,” Sinclair replied.

Maloney shook his head and sighed. “I take it the MRI found your brain wasn’t too badly rattled.”

Sinclair turned his head to the left, since the ringing in his right ear drowned out all but the loudest sounds. “No more than normal.”

“What about you, Cathy?” Maloney asked Braddock.

“I was a lot farther away, so the blast didn’t even knock me down.” She was almost yelling even though Maloney was only a few feet away. “Other than a slight headache from the noise, I’m good, but the bomber got away.”

“You stayed with your partner,” Maloney said. “That’s the right decision.”

Sinclair poured himself a cup of coffee and pulled a cigar from his pocket, bit off the end, and pulled out his Zippo. Immediately, a man in an FBI windbreaker rushed from the other side of the tent, yelling, “You can’t smoke here! This is a crime scene.”

Maloney turned toward the man and held up his hand like a stop sign. “This is Matt Sinclair, the man who was nearly blown up. Correct me if I’m wrong, but the crime scene and all the evidence is under the other tent.”

Sinclair lit his cigar.

The man in the FBI windbreaker introduced himself as the San Francisco Field Office assistant special agent in charge for counterterrorism. ASAIC Lee said, “You’re a very lucky man, Sergeant. They tell me if you were much closer, you wouldn’t be standing here right now.”

“No luck involved, sir,” another man with a weightlifter’s build said. He was wearing an ATF windbreaker, for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives. “I just read the sergeant’s statement from the hospital. He recognized the backpack as an IED, saw the bomber preparing to trigger it with a cell phone, and hauled ass out of the blast radius. Only a fucking warrior knows to do that.”

Sinclair puffed on the cigar to get it started, drew a mouthful of smoke into his lungs, and exhaled. From the way the ATF agent talked, he had to be prior military, but Sinclair didn’t have
the energy to swap military service and unit assignments with him. “Are you guys doing the scene?” he asked.

“Us and the FBI’s evidence response team,” the ATF agent said.

“What was the device?” Sinclair asked.

The ATF agent looked to Lee, who nodded his approval. “A simple pressure cooker bomb filled with black powder and set off remotely with a cell phone triggering device that was attached to a blasting cap in the lid. The bomber didn’t fill it with shrapnel—you know, nails or ball bearings—like the Boston Marathon bomber and most other bombers do. Still, the concussion would kill anyone within twenty feet, lots more in an enclosed area. Some fragments of the pressure cooker became airborne projectiles, too. If one of those would’ve hit you or your partner, even from across the parking lot, you’d be in for a big hurt.”

“Does that mean the bomber was an amateur?” Braddock asked.

“Not necessarily,” the AFT agent replied. “He probably figured you would pick up the backpack, at which time he’d detonate it. No need for fragmentation projectiles at that distance. Amateur, professional, who knows. Anyone with an Internet connection can learn how to make a pressure cooker bomb.”

“Anything on the cell phone yet?” Sinclair asked.

“The lab will have to examine it, but it looks like a cheap flip phone, probably a prepay.”

Lee added, “We traced the number that the subject called you from. It’s a TracFone, part of a batch that was distributed to Bay Area convenience stores. It’ll take a while to trace it to a particular store. Eight minutes after the second call to you, precisely at the time of the explosion, the phone made an outgoing call to a number that’s part of that same batch of TracFones.”

“Which would be the phone used as the detonator,” Braddock said.

Sinclair drifted to the far end of the tent and looked through the rain to the large canopy on the other side of the parking lot. Thirty or forty people, most dressed in white coveralls and yellow booties, scurried about with cameras and evidence bags. The Ford sedan was a twisted carcass of metal and broken glass. Twenty feet of the parking structure’s concrete railing was missing, obviously blown apart by the blast. Sinclair felt a hand on his shoulder and turned.

“Glad you’re okay, partner.” Phil Roberts was dressed in an OPD baseball cap and a blue windbreaker with yellow OPD letters on the front and back.

Sinclair pulled a cigar from his pocket and handed it to Roberts. Roberts cut the end with a pocketknife and lit it with Sinclair’s Zippo.

“The FBI labeled this an act of terrorism and think it’s connected to the anarchists’ video of your murder,” Roberts said. “That’s freeing up all kind of resources. They’ll be able to track the movement of the cell phone the bomber used through its GPS, which might provide some leads to his identity. They’ll trace any cell phones nearby his and look for connections. That might give us associates. Your killer has to be among them.”

“Do the Feds have anything that directly links this to the anarchists?” Sinclair asked.

“Earlier today, the cell phone’s GPS put it at one of the cafes frequented by Occupy Oakland types. At the same time, three other cell phones they’ve linked to known occupiers were there.”

“Do these guys have names?”

“Matt, an investigation like this expands tenfold every eight hours as more and more data are linked. This is what the FBI excels at. They’ll work up files on everyone. When the time’s right, agents will interview them. Analysts, who combine it with phone, e-mail, and financial records, enter the details from every interview and surveillance into a computer program. That will show the relationships between hundreds of people and
thousands of pieces of information, more than we can possibly keep in our heads. Most of the time it’s best for us to just stay out of their way and not muddy the waters.”

Sinclair didn’t deny the FBI’s ability to amass enormous resources to collect and compile massive amounts of information in complex investigations. But he had worked with the Feds on drug cases before, where numerous people continued to die in the drug wars and tons of dope continued to flow onto the streets while he waited for them to act. “When are they going to reveal what they learned?” Sinclair asked.

“They’re talking about holding a briefing tomorrow, after which they’ll divvy up responsibilities for the investigation.”

“What about my murders?”

Roberts tapped the ash off his cigar. “Should be one and the same.”

“What if it isn’t?”

“We’ll have to see where the evidence points. They collected three cigarette butts outside the coffee shop. The manager said most people obey the law about no smoking within twenty-five feet of the doorway, so one of them might belong to our guy. This is a priority, so they could have DNA results within days. Can you remember anything else about the bomber?”

When Sinclair first saw him on the bench outside Peet’s, he didn’t give him a second glance. A fedora hid his face, and it was impossible to accurately gauge the size of someone sitting. Sinclair told the agents at the hospital he thought the man was in his twenties or thirties, probably between five-eight and six-two, thin to medium build, with dark-brown hair that hung over his ears. Besides a fedora-style brown hat, he wore a navy-blue parka similar to what you’d see in an REI or North Face store, dark jeans, and dark hiking boots. He was too far away for Sinclair to pick up any other details about him in the split second he saw him later across the parking deck, and Braddock only caught a glimpse of him before he disappeared into the stairwell a second before the explosion.

“What about the car that was blown up?” Sinclair asked.

“Belongs to an employee at Petco. She parks there every morning and walks down those steps and into the back door of the store. She’s clean.”

“When will I get a copy of the client list from the escort service?”

Roberts puffed on his cigar and blew a smoke ring that hung above him for a few seconds before dissipating. “You’re not giving up on that, are you?”

“What would it hurt to feed all those names into the big FBI computer in the sky with everything else your Fed friends are collecting and see what it spits out?”

“I’ll talk to them,” Roberts said. “We’ll probably be here the rest of the night. Why don’t you get some rest? Nothing for you to do unless you want to crawl around on your hands and knees looking for bomb fragments.”

More than a hundred people filled the briefing room at 450 Golden Gate Avenue in San Francisco when Sinclair, Braddock, and Maloney arrived a few minutes before nine. Sinclair was ushered to a long table at the front of the room. Standing at the back of the room were Linda Archard, Mark Cummings, and the two agents that were doing surveillance in the Waterfront hotel bar during the escort service undercover operation. The briefing began with an introduction by the San Francisco FBI special agent in charge, and was followed by a succession of ATF and FBI agents who flashed hundreds of photos on the monitors and discussed minute details of the bombing scene, an overview of the anarchist and Occupy movements and the local Bay Area groups associated with them, and a summary of Dawn’s and Pratt’s murders.

When the final slide appeared on the screen, Lee quickly took over the podium and said, “The joint terrorism task force and field intelligence group will be overseeing the investigation and handling fusion of all information out of this field office. For those outside the bureau who don’t know your assignment, see your team leader in the JTTF or your supervisory special agent. The Oakland RA will operate a twenty-four-seven op-center as well, and all local and federal agencies located in the East Bay will operate out of there. Areas of responsibility
and assignments have already been given out to team leaders and case agents.”

A short woman wearing a blue polo shirt with the FBI patch on her chest whispered something in Lee’s ear. “This just came in,” Lee said, glancing at the monitor behind him.

The monitor showed a computer screenshot of a blog that read,
Soon we’ll strike a blow to the 1%ers. More fun than blowing out windows on Wall Street. We will hit at the old white men of the privileged society. The 1%ers will realize their worst fears.

“We’ll send out updates through JTTF channels as we get them,” Lee said. “There’s a new sense of urgency. Let’s stop the next attack.”

People rose from their seats and gathered in small clusters or headed for the door. Sinclair stepped in front of Lee as he started for a back door. “Why was everything about the escort service’s clients cut from the briefing?” Sinclair asked.

Archard walked to Lee’s side, while the two agents who’d been sitting next to her remained a few feet away. “I don’t see how it’s pertinent,” Lee said.

“Yates, Whitt, and Kozlov,” Sinclair said. “You’re absolutely positive they have nothing to do with any of this? Nothing to do with the murders?”

Maloney and Braddock joined Sinclair, facing Lee and his entourage.

Lee crossed his arms across his chest. “It’s a separate area of investigation that most people in this room are not cleared for.”

“I’d like to talk to whoever’s running that
area of investigation
,” Sinclair said, making eye contact with Archard and then back to Lee.

“To what purpose?”

“Maybe I’m just a dumb local cop, but it seems to me they might know something that’ll help me solve my murders or tell me who the hell tried to blow me up.”

“Agent Archard is the case agent for the investigation into the escort service,” Lee said. “She’ll keep you abreast of any developments that relate to your murders.”

Archard stood there stone-faced.

“Funny thing,” Sinclair said. “I was told Ms. Archard worked in your organized crime unit, but I talked to buddies of mine at OPD and SFPD who know all the agents who work organized crime, and none of them have heard of her.”

*

The Oakland FBI office, officially called a resident agency, was housed in a high-rise office building at Twenty-First Street and Webster and fell under the control of the San Francisco field office. Sinclair had worked with many of the agents over the years on one kind of investigation or another, and most knew him. He and Braddock were escorted past the security doors to the home of the working agents, a large room filled with cubicles, each about four times as large as the space allotted to a homicide investigator in the PAB’s cramped quarters.

Upton Bellamy, known as “Uppy” to his fellow agents, was a former Detroit cop who had been hired by the FBI when he was thirty-three. He spent his first ten years in the New York field office before coming to Oakland two years ago. He worked in the bank robbery squad and had been assigned to work with Sinclair on the murder of a check-cashing teller six months ago when the MO fit that of a string of bank robberies the bureau was working.

“Sinclair, glad you didn’t get blown to smithereens,” Uppy yelled as he strode across the room. He grabbed Sinclair and gave him a half hug. He then took Braddock’s hand and kissed the back of it.

“I’m still married, Uppy,” Braddock said.

“I’m still the first one you’ll call when you leave that husband of yours, right?”

Braddock laughed.

Sinclair and Braddock spent the next two hours swapping information with the agents in the room. When Sinclair pulled the Best Buy employee list from his case packet and showed it, Uppy disappeared down a hallway. Moments later, he returned
with the word that the brass would detail a team of agents from another squad to conduct backgrounds and interviews on the rest of the eighty or so employees. What would’ve taken Sinclair and Braddock more than a week, the FBI would do in a day.

Sinclair swiveled his chair around in the FBI cubical to face Braddock. “The Feds have everything else covered. Other than tagging along with them when they talk to the third cousin of someone who once watched an Occupy Wall Street protest on TV, I don’t have any ideas other than going back after Yates and Whitt.”

“What the heck, let’s go for it.” Braddock flipped to a clean page of her legal pad.

“You’re not gonna talk me out of it?”

“The only reason I’m not arguing about it is because you almost got blown up yesterday.”

“Don’t get all sentimental on me now, partner,” Sinclair said.

Sinclair called Maloney and reminded him that Yates was to have come to the chief’s office last night. Since the bombing obviously changed everyone’s plans, Sinclair wanted to know if the chief could arrange for Yates to come in today. Maloney said he’d ask, but Sinclair shouldn’t expect it.

Sinclair called Bianca, who answered on the first ring. “I’ve been wondering how you were. The news said you were treated and released from the hospital, so I guess . . . How are you?”

“I’m fine,” he said, not mentioning that he could barely hear out of his right ear, had a steady, dull pounding in his head, and felt as if he’d been hit by a freight train when he crawled out of bed that morning.

“Glad to hear it. I imagine the escort service is no longer a priority after what happened.”

“Not exactly. You said Whitt and Yates were Dawn’s most frequent clients, right?”

“That’s right.”

“Did Preston Yates ever use the agency for other girls after he had the affair with Dawn?”

“After he settled with the agency for stealing her away, they never heard from him again.”

“What about Whitt? Did he continue with other girls after Dawn left the agency?”

She put him on hold and came back on the line a minute later. “William still orders an escort weekly. Usually different girls. His last time was Saturday.”

Sinclair thanked her and hung up.

It was a short drive to the City Center, and as the elevator took Sinclair and Braddock to the sixth floor, he wondered if it were a coincidence that Whitt’s office was in the same building as Kozlov’s and Fred Towers’s companies. The receptionist tried to fulfill her gatekeeper role, but when Sinclair told her it was about the bombing yesterday, which wasn’t a complete lie, she escorted them to Whitt’s office. It wasn’t a corner office and it was only a quarter the size of Fred Towers’s office, but it was still nicer than all but the one the police chief had in the PAB. Whitt sat in a leather executive chair behind a glossy black desk. A window that faced Broadway Street and other high-rises was behind him.

Whitt looked up from a desk strewn with papers. “I heard about the bomb. Was this the work of domestic terrorists as the news is saying?”

“We’re looking into it,” Sinclair said. “We spoke to the officer who investigated your wife’s death.”

“What’s that have to do with anything?”

“He thinks your wife committed suicide.”

“Why would he say that?”

“Why do you think?” Sinclair walked around the desk and stood over Whitt.

Whitt swiveled his chair to face him. “Would you like to take a seat?” Whitt motioned to a guest chair in front of his desk.

Sinclair wanted Whitt to feel uncomfortable. “I’m fine.”

Whitt leaned back in his chair and looked up at Sinclair. “I suspected the same thing. Susan knew the road, and I can’t imagine she’d just miss the turn.”

“The traffic officer actually shared his thoughts with you and asked if she left a note, didn’t he?”

“It’s been a long time. I don’t remember.”

“That’s not something a man would forget.”

Whitt was silent for a few counts, obviously weighing how much truth he’d have to reveal. “I believe he did. Susan didn’t leave a note. She was angry when I left, but not distraught. What difference does it make whether it was an accident or suicide?”

“Did you ever mention it to Travis?”

“Never,” Whitt shot back without hesitation. “Even if I believed it, I’d never breathe a word of it to my son.”

“Then why would he say that to Lisa Harper?”

The look of surprise on Whitt’s face couldn’t be faked. Sinclair asked, “Did you know he was in contact with Ms. Harper?”

“Why would they be talking?”

“Why would Travis think his mother’s death was a suicide if you didn’t mention it?”

“I have no idea,” Whitt said. “He has no business talking with that woman.”

“He doesn’t respond to that phone number you gave us, but we still need to talk to him.”

“For what purpose?”

“To ask him the same questions you probably want an answer to—why he thinks it was a suicide and why he’s in contact with Ms. Harper.”

“What’s this have to do with Dawn’s murder and the bombing?” Whitt asked.

Sinclair’s patience was worn thin by Whitt answering each of his questions with a question, so he shrugged, “Why don’t you leave the police work to us.”

Whitt picked up his desk phone, dialed, and then slammed it down. “He never answers when I call, either.” Whitt slid a cell phone from his pocket. Sinclair stood over his shoulder and
watched as Whitt tapped out a text:
Call me. It’s an emergency. The police are here with questions.

“Where is Travis?” Sinclair asked.

“I told you. He works in Mountain View with Google. He shares an apartment down there with someone from work.”

“Where’s the apartment?”

“I’ve never been there. It’s not like kids invite their old man to their apartments.”

“Stop lying to me,” Sinclair said. “Where’s he living?”

“The truth is he’s never forgiven me for his mother’s death, so I don’t pry into his life.”

“When did you last see him?”

“A few weeks ago, I guess.”

“Where?”

“At the house. He was visiting some old friends in the area and stopped by.”

“What did you talk about?”

“Nothing much. You know: ‘How are you? I’m fine. How’s work? It’s fine. How’s that girl you’re seeing? It’s not serious. She’s fine.’ Travis has a genius-level IQ, but socially he’s somewhat inept. He comes across as knowing he’s the smartest person in the room, which makes other people quite uncomfortable. Most young men think they’re smarter than their old man. Travis knows it for a fact.”

Sinclair backed up a step. “After Dawn stopped her escort work, did you hire other escorts?”

“Why’s that relevant?”

“It tells me more about you and whether you’ve been truthful with me.”

“Yes. I’m not ashamed of it, so yes.”

“How often?”

“Since you’re asking, you probably already know.”

Sinclair furrowed his eyebrows and locked eyes with Whitt.

“Three, maybe four times a month.”

“Do you know Preston Yates?”

“He’s the councilmember for my district. I’ve supported him. He’s a member of the Claremont Country Club, as am I, but it’s not like we’re friends or anything.”

“Sergio Kozlov?” Sinclair asked.

“Of course. He owns this building. He’s developing the Global Logistics Center, so we’re in negotiations with him to become the primary tenant.”

“You get along with him?”

“Sergio is a shrewd businessman. No one gets along with him, but if you want what he has, you must try to.”

“Do you know other men who saw Dawn when she was escorting?”

“That’s not something gentlemen talk about, so I don’t bandy it about, and neither would the men I associate with. If one of them was seeing her, I wouldn’t have known it.”

Sinclair glanced at Braddock. She shook her head to indicate she had no questions for Whitt.

“Anything back from your son?” Sinclair asked.

Whitt looked at his phone and shook his head.

“If he calls, I want to know about it immediately. I need to talk to him, and I’d rather not broadcast a ‘be on the lookout for him’ to all my brothers in blue to make that happen.” Sinclair wrote his cell number on the back of his card and handed it to Whitt. “If I need to talk to you later tonight, where will you be?”

“Here or home.”

Sinclair checked his notebook and verified he had Whitt’s office, home, and cell numbers. “Thank you for your time,” Sinclair said, and then he walked out the door.