When Shadows Fall (12 page)

Chapter
25

Bethesda, Maryland

FLETCHER AND HART
followed the FBI agents to the Stevens house out in Bethesda. On the drive over, Fletcher made a couple of calls, used his contacts to get a background on Rob Thurber. He didn’t want to go into the conversation about his relationship with Timothy Savage totally blind.

Thurber was, by all accounts, a straight shooter. Dedicated to the cause, he’d been an agent for twenty-five years, applied early, right out of school, and had served in several capacities within the organization. He was part of the Behavioral Analysis Unit tasked to the child endangerment team. He was their profiler, the one who looked at the victims and told you what sort of person would be interested in lifting them from their lives.

He’d asked a couple of quick questions about Jordan Blake, as well—she, too, was a lifer, though she was twenty years younger than Thurber and just getting her feet wet. But she had a track record of solves, a knack for finding missing kids, so she was running the show.

They seemed like solid people. So what was Thurber’s connection to Savage?

Nothing to do but ask the man face-to-face.

He debated calling Sam, telling her he’d found a possible heir, but decided to wait until he talked to Thurber himself, determine if it was a fluke or a coincidence, or if he was the real deal.

Fletcher didn’t believe in coincidence.

And the backdrop of this missing kid was sure to keep things interesting. Fletcher knew the odds weren’t good for Rachel Stevens, and he felt immediately guilty for thinking it. The longer she was missing, the bigger the chance she was gone forever. This was a noncustodial kidnapping, the worst possible scenarios at play. It would break his heart, if he let it. He couldn’t afford to. He had to stay detached, stay focused. If he let himself think about what might actually be happening to the little girl, he wouldn’t be worth a flip. He had to do his best to find her before the worst happened.

They took a final turn into a small, neat neighborhood. The Stevens home was a modest two-story brick house with a professionally landscaped and maintained yard on a cul-de-sac. There was a lot of activity on the street: neighbors taking cover in the shade of large, leafy trees, children at play signs at the intersections. This was a good area of town, perfect for young families, and normally untouched by a tragedy of this magnitude.

There was a chalk drawing on the asphalt in front of the house—a big pink heart with the words
We Love You, Rachel
underneath. A few teddy bears and batches of flowers were leaning against the black wrought-iron mailbox post, forlorn on the ground, and the neighbors who weren’t already gathering peeked out from behind their curtains every time they heard a car.

Fletcher saw a satellite truck make the turn behind them. The media were here, too. Great. Let the cacophony begin.

He put the Caprice in Park. “You ready for this?”

Hart nodded. “Better go in before the gauntlet arrives. The minute the 6:00 p.m. broadcast goes live, this place will be overrun with newsies and the tips are going to start flowing in.”

They followed the agents up the front walk. Before Thurber had a chance to knock, a dark-haired man with a long nose and thin, round silver wire glasses opened the door. His eyes and the tip of his nose were red, but he seemed to be holding it together. At the sight of the agents, his expression changed—hope and dread spilling across his face, etching so deeply into the lines of his skin he seemed like a detailed painting instead of a real person.

His voice shook. “Is there news?”

Agent Blake shook her head. “Not yet, sir. May we come in?”

Stevens’s expression fell. He sniffed once, then melted back away from the entrance, and the four cops trooped in. He shut the door behind them and gestured to the living room.

While the house looked tranquil on the outside, inside it was humming with activity and was packed with people: agents running wiretaps, a grandmotherly looking woman who was crying quietly—Fletcher recognized her as the nanny—a couple of teenagers. They all looked up expectantly, then realized these were simply interlopers—there was no news—and went back to their business.

Stevens brought them to a small den off the more formal living room, a library and office space. There were two comfortable sofas facing each other, and a desk at the head. He sat on the edge of the desk, and everyone else arranged themselves on the sofas.

“What’s happening?” Stevens asked.

Special Agent Blake took the lead. “Sir, this is Detective Darren Fletcher, and Detective Lonnie Hart, both with D.C. Metro. They’re going to be helping with the investigation. I’m sorry to say we don’t have anything new. The tip line should be out now, and I know you want to get the reward under way. Like I mentioned, we don’t want to go with that just yet. Let’s give it a day and see where we are.”

Stevens was wild-eyed, a man trying very hard not to tip over the edge. “Give it a day. A day? What you’re really saying is you think she’s gone. You think my little girl is gone.” He got up and started to pace. “What are you doing to find her? Why are you all here, in the house? Why aren’t you out on the street, looking? I need to get out there. I need to go look for her. I can’t wait around here anymore.”

He started out of the room and Jordan captured his arm. “Sir, Mr. Stevens, I know this is difficult. You’re doing great. We are doing everything possible to find your little girl. Please, don’t give up hope. The more we look into this, the more it looks like a professional kidnapping, not just a random event.”

He stopped cold. “Why do you say that? What in the world makes you think a pro took Rachel?”

“Both the cleanness of the snatch and the nature of your work, sir, and your wife’s. You’re both cleared for Top Secret classified materials. Your wife’s position at the State Department is quite sensitive. The kidnapper managed to disappear Rachel in the middle of a busy city street with no one the wiser. It’s not like she wandered off the beaten path, and vanished. She was taken. There one minute, gone the next, as your nanny stated. It’s risky to take a child in the middle of a crowd like that, so whoever did it knew what they were doing. They’d most likely been following the family’s routines for days, getting a sense of how things work.”

The cords in Stevens’s neck stood out; he was about to completely blow. “So you’re saying there are professional kidnappers out there, roaming the streets, just waiting for us to turn away so they can snatch our kids? I don’t buy that for a second.”

Fletcher’s phone rang, buzzing discreetly in his pocket, and he stood, moved away from the fight about to break out between the Feebs and the dad. He felt terrible for Stevens, totally got it. What parents would want to stand back and wait when their kid was missing? At least he didn’t get the sense Stevens was involved. His outraged demeanor, his fear and upset, was genuine.

Fletcher answered quietly when he noticed the number was Nocek’s personal line. “What’s up, Doc?”

“Detective, we have had a most unusual discovery in the samples Dr. Owens sent from Lynchburg. A DNA match in the missing persons database.”

Fletcher’s heart gave a double thump. Awesome. A hit, right off the bat. And fast, too. That meant it was a high-profile case, just waiting in the system for a match. “A match to whom? Are we looking at our killer?”

“It is possible, but I am not certain,” Nocek said. “The match is to a missing child from seventeen years ago. Do you remember the case of a young girl named Kaylie Rousch?”

“Kaylie Rousch? Kaylie Rousch.” But as he said the name, it clicked. “Wait a minute. I do remember the case. She’s the one who got off the bus after school and flat-out disappeared. No sign of her, nothing. No suspects, no sightings, no ransom demands. It was on the news for weeks. Man, I had just joined the force. I was still in training. And then they found her body a year later, just the skeleton. So there must be some mistake. Kaylie Rousch is dead.”

“I do not believe we have made a mistake. The child, she’s a woman now, is very much alive. I have taken the liberty of sending the file I have, meager though it is, to your email account. I would suggest you speak to the FBI agents who are working on the Stevens girl case. They may be able to flesh out more information.”

“Son of a bitch. Where was the DNA collected from?”

“According to Dr. Owens’s evidence log, it was collected from the victim’s neck and ear. The composition of the sample is from a tear duct. If I were to hazard a guess, I would say Kaylie Rousch was leaning over the victim, crying.”

Fletch was trying to wrap his head around the information. “Okay, you’ve got the DNA, and it’s a match to the Rousch cold case. Let me get this straight. You are one hundred percent convinced this is fresh DNA, as in the girl was there at the scene in Lynchburg?”

“This is exactly what I am saying.”

Fletcher took that in, tuned back in to the conversation with Stevens. They were getting nowhere, but he watched Thurber with a fresh eye. There was little doubt in his mind the FBI agent would be familiar with the Rousch case, and if he was, there was also a good chance he was the same Rob Thurber who was mentioned in Timothy Savage’s will. What were the odds? And was it possible the two cases—three now—were connected?

“This is interesting news, Doc. Just one question. If Kaylie Rousch is alive, whose body did they find and bury?”

Chapter
26

Lynchburg, Virginia

IT FELT LIKE
hours since Sam had watched the ambulance peel away from the Scarron house, Ellie Scarron inside, still unconscious but alive. The sun was threatening to set, plunging them all into darkness. Davidson had a crew of crime scene techs combing the premises, pushing hard to find anything they could before it got dark, looking for any clue to their attacker. Sam had her adrenal glands back under control, but they started pumping again when she thought about this faceless killer, big and brutal and merciless, and several steps ahead of her.

And steps behind. This man had been shadowing her for two days, murdering the peripheral contacts she made. It was starting to piss her off. And if she was being honest with herself, she was scared, too.

She sat on the steps, looked down on the bloody living room floor and tried to decide what to do. The professionals were on Scarron’s attempted murder, and now Savage’s murder, as well. Davidson had transformed from a sleepy, somewhat uncooperative Southern cop to a hard-as-nails detective, ordering everyone around and doing a good job of running the show. She was comfortable that he could handle things from here. She had another job to do.

Xander sat down beside her. He leaned in close and in his unerring way, said, “What do you want to do? Get out of here and go back to D.C., forget you were ever involved?”

Sam took his hand. “I wish I
could
forget. We’re in this now, in it deep. Our next step is to find the rest of the names in Savage’s will, and warn them. Let Davidson handle the criminal investigation. I’m going to honor Savage’s wishes and track down his people, especially his son, Henry Matcliff. He may be our killer, he may be an innocent, but either way, we need to find him.”

“I’m with you.”

“Good. First thing, my iPad’s out of juice, and we need to get to a computer.” She looked around at the scene, where there were two dozen people stomping around. “And I don’t want them on my back while I do it.”

“Leave it to me, my lady. Did you see the cameras?”

“No, where?”

He pointed up, to the corners of the room. She stared for a few moments, unseeing, then caught the very cleverly hidden cameras. There were false ceilings in the corner, angled to look like the exposed wooden beams of the rest of the room. The cameras were nestled inside their virtually invisible boxes, recording everything that happened in the house.

“They’re all over the place. The control room is downstairs, in the basement. We can use the computer there,” Xander said.

Sam whistled. “And maybe find a killer, too. Isn’t anyone from the Lynchburg Police looking at the tapes?”

“I showed the cameras to Davidson. They gathered the tapes up about twenty minutes ago. We should have the room to ourselves. Let’s go.”

They went quietly to the staircase. Xander led the way, spiraling down into the basement. It was beautifully finished, just like the rest of the house, the walls a golden stucco that reflected the setting sun through floor-to-ceiling retractable glass doors. It was a lovely indoor-outdoor space, and Sam couldn’t help stopping on the stairs and admiring the view. She’d been right. The sunsets up on this mountain were stunning. She hoped Ellie Scarron would have a chance to see one again.

The golden orb finally slipped below the horizon and the sky lit up, pinks and purples and blues spreading over the misty mountains.

“Red sky at night, sailor’s delight,” Xander said.

It was a private joke between them; they got to see some pretty spectacular sunsets from Xander’s cabin, too.

“Where’s Thor?”

“In the car, being a very patient young dog. We’ll have to spring him soon. It’s too hot for him to sit still much longer. He needs to drink and eat and run for a bit.”

“This won’t take long. I just want to do a Google search on these names, see if anything comes up.”

Her phone started to buzz. “It’s Fletcher. Finally.” She pressed the button.

“What’s happening there? Has the missing girl been found?”

“No, she hasn’t, but boy, do I have some news for you. You sitting down?”

She sat in the desk chair, put him on speaker. “I am now. What is it?”

“The DNA you collected off Savage’s body is a match to a cold case from seventeen years ago. Little girl named Kaylie Rousch. Do you remember the case?”

“Not off the top of my head.”

“Kaylie Rousch went missing from her bus stop, and they found a skeleton a year later, out in Ryder, Virginia. Kaylie Rousch is dead. Or so we’ve thought for the past sixteen years.”

“Jeez.”

“Yeah. The DNA was composed of tears. She was crying over him, according to Dr. Nocek.”

Sam leaned back in the chair, thinking about the specimen she’d taken from Savage’s neck. “He’s sure? The composition and trajectory certainly indicated tears, but I thought they were Savage’s. Wow. That’s rather amazing.”

“It’s pretty wild, I’ll give you that. This all gets more interesting. I just pulled Kaylie Rousch’s file. She bears a strong resemblance to this little girl we’re missing today—Rachel Stevens. And the FBI agent on both cases? His name is Rob Thurber. And I’m looking right at him.”

Sam felt a zing of recognition. “Thurber, that’s one of the names in Savage’s will. Have you told him?”

“No, not yet. I thought we should touch base before I did anything.”

“Well, I have some news for you, too.” She told him about Ellie Scarron’s very close call. She could hear his mind whirling.

“Son of a bitch. Get out of there, Sam. I want you back up in D.C. where I can keep an eye on you. This is clearly bigger than just Savage’s death. We’re going to sit down with the FBI and hash this out.”

“I want to look at the rest of the heirs first. If we can find them, we need to warn them. Someone is trying to silence them. The lawyer is dead, and the wife of an heir is clinging to life. Savage knew this was coming. He knew they were going to kill him, and the rest of these people. We need to find the others and talk to them right away. Find out who is behind this.”

“Sam, that’s my job. I’m the law enforcement officer here, and I say get your sweet little ass into Whitfield’s Jeep and back here, right away. You get me?”

“Fletch—”

He cut her off, his voice cold and hard. “Don’t. I’m dead serious, Samantha. I don’t want you prancing around down there with a killer on the loose. Whitfield, can you hear me?”

Xander grabbed Sam’s hand, pulled her to her feet. “We’re already gone, Fletcher. We’ll see you in D.C. in a few hours.”

“Good. You call me every half hour until you’re back here, and come directly to my office in Homicide. Do not pass go. Do not collect two hundred dollars. Am I clear?”

“Yes, you’re clear,” Sam said. “We’re on our way. Watch your back, all right?”

“It’s not my back I’m worried about, sunshine.”

No kidding. She ended the call.

Xander started towing her out the basement door. Sam said, “We need to let Davidson know we’re leaving.”

“No, we don’t. If he’s a part of this, we can’t take that chance.”

“Xander, come on. You saw how he worked the scene. He’s not part of this. I’m sure.”

“I’m not.” He clamped his lips together in a way she recognized. There was no more talking to be done; he’d made his decision. Arrogant caveman. She didn’t like being ordered around like this, but she wasn’t stupid. She wanted to get as far away from Lynchburg as possible.

The Jeep was parked on the side of the house. Thor let out a happy yip when he saw them. They bundled into the Jeep and Xander took off.

They didn’t see June Davidson standing on the steps to Ellie Scarron’s house, watching them drive off into the night. When the taillights disappeared down the mountain, he sent a text on his cell phone, let out a soft sigh and went back inside.