Whirlwind (21 page)

47

Dallas, Texas

T
he Dallas County Forensic Sciences building was a three-story complex located northwest of downtown on the Stemmons Freeway.

The state-of-the-art facility contained a spectrum of sections: a ballistics testing unit, DNA, forensic biology, toxicology and autopsy labs, along with a morgue—making it one of the busiest full-service crime labs in the country.

Angela Clark, a senior forensic analyst, was the acting chief of the trace evidence section. She was in charge of leading the processing of evidence from the Tumbleweed Dreams Motel.

The FBI’s Evidence Response Team had worked the scene. They’d seized hair and fibers from Unit 21’s carpet, bathroom floor, curtains, furniture, as well as drains for the sink and tub.

The techs also lifted latents from the TV remote, door handles, the TV, the sink, toilet, mirrors, counter, tabletops, the light switches, the coffeemaker, the phone, the Bible and the Do Not Disturb sign. They’d also collected trash and linen believed to have been from the room.

The evidence had all been collected in envelopes, bags, and packets, and paper and plastic containers. The biological material they’d gathered was saved in breathable containers and allowed to dry to reduce the risk of mold contamination. All the required chain-of-custody documents had been completed with signatures, case and inventory numbers.

The case was a top priority, for the FBI and the Dallas PD.

Work at the lab had been piling up.

Angela’s boss had been seconded to work with the FBI Quantico for a month, leaving her to take on more responsibility. It also meant that, as a mother of two boys, aged ten and eight, she’d missed a few soccer games.

Adjusting her glasses, she studied her monitor and her master inventory log. She’d assigned the evidence to appropriate team members: those who were expert in analyzing hair, fibers, biological evidence, DNA and liquids.

Angela was certified in several areas. She was an expert latent fingerprint examiner. She also had two degrees in forensic science and was a PhD from Caltech. The courts had qualified her to give expert testimony on forensic matters.

Everyone had been going flat out, putting in long days.

On a personal level, many were dealing with the aftermath of the tornadoes. Angela’s neighborhood had been spared, but nearly everyone in the lab knew someone who’d lost relatives, friends or property. And now with the apparent abduction of a baby from its mother during the storm, another layer of stress had fallen on her shoulders.

Producing hard evidence from a motel was challenging at the best of times. Motel rooms were high-traffic areas. Unless you had outside evidence for which you were seeking a match, or comparative analysis, anything could be challenged in court. Still, that was not to say that you couldn’t harvest strong physical evidence to point investigators in the right direction. However, Angela and her team realized that this case also came with other unfortunate aspects. First, the motel’s security camera failed to record surveillance footage. And then, the unbelievable topper: immediately after the subjects left the room, an intoxicated dismissed employee—in an effort to get her job back—had cleaned the room, presenting the FBI’s Evidence Response Team and Angela’s team with a whole new set of problems and circumstances to deal with.

As Angela continued her work analyzing latent fingerprints, some of her colleagues had already submitted their preliminary reports.

She checked her monitor, the latest one was for hair.

The presence of 4-amino-2-hydroxytoluene and m-Aminophenol on strands of hair found in the sink indicated hair dye was used. The blood found in a crumpled tissue under the bed matched the type found on the baby’s romper discovered at the shelter.

Some of the puzzle pieces were coming together, Angela thought, as she worked on the latent prints the FBI’s ERT people had collected. Because of all the circumstances, they all knew the quality of the latents would be weak, yielding only a few good clear partials.

Angela scanned the first two into her computer and submitted them to the automated fingerprint-identification systems, AFIS, for a rapid search through massive local, state and nationwide databanks for a match.

It wasn’t long before she got hits for two licensed drivers in Texas: Arb Winston, a sixty-nine-year-old man from San Antonio and Ella Winston, a sixty-eight-year-old woman from San Antonio. They shared the same address. No arrests, no convictions. Nothing came up for the Winstons in any other databases.

Angela reasoned that the Winstons were not likely involved, but still would pass the data to the FBI.

The third and last usable latent print was taking longer. Angela studied the arches, whorls and loops. It was from the right thumb, which in a standard ten-card is number one. She carefully coded its characteristics then scanned the print into her computer and submitted it to AFIS.

Within a minute, Angela started getting hits as her submission was searched through local and regional information sharing networks and the FBI’s mother of all databanks, the IAFIS, which stored nearly seven hundred million impressions from law enforcement agencies across the country.

As the process continued Angela left her desk to freshen her coffee.

When she returned she had her results: four files closely matched her unidentified submission.

Angela took a sip of coffee then set out to make a visual point-by-point comparison between the motel print and the four on the list. She zeroed in on the critical minutiae points, like the trail of ridges near the tip.

The dissimilarities eliminated the first two candidates right off. For the last two Angela enlarged the samples even more to count the number of ridges, and distinct differences emerged for one of them.

That left only one.

Angela concentrated on her submission with the computer’s remaining suggested match. All the minutiae points matched. The branching of the ridges matched. Her breathing quickened as she began counting up the clear points of comparison where the sample matched.

This is looking good
.

In some jurisdictions the courts required ten to fifteen clear point matches. She had fifteen and was still counting, knowing that one divergent point instantly eliminated a print.

We’ve got a match
.

Angela then took the identification number of her new subject, and submitted a query into a number of databanks.

She knew that the state’s parole division worked with other agencies to ensure that offenders on parole had their fingerprints on file so their cases could be tracked.

Angela watched as her submission verified parolee history, offender identification, arrest records, convictions, and checked for any holds and commitments for other law enforcement agencies.

Within minutes Angela was staring at the hardened face of a white male on her monitor.

She went to the offender’s central file summary and read quickly through his offences, then reached for her phone to call Special FBI Agent Phil Grogan.

This could be our break.

48

Dallas, Texas

A
fter eating a bowl of warmed-over chili in his trailer behind the garage, Lamont Harley Faulk settled into his sofa with his laptop on his chest.

The garage was closed. Everything was quiet.

He clicked onto his favorite sites, belched, savored another cold beer and the sweet deal he had. He operated Ray’s Right Fix Auto Repair for Ray, an old ex-con now confined to a wheelchair in an old folks’ home. Lamont got a salary and he got to live rent-free in the trailer. He was also making a tidy sum by allowing certain people in need of disappearing, like that idiot Mason Varno and his woman, to hide out at his dead uncle’s place.

The old house was getting crowded.

Lamont was happy here—working on cars, rarely dealing with people and being left alone with his secret pleasures. He clicked on a video from Thailand showing pretty little boys. He liked the young ones.

The younger, the better.

He belched, took a swig of beer and settled back to enjoy the number the two pretty things were doing to the old dude. Lamont was catching a nice buzz and getting aroused when the dog’s yelping killed the mood.

He slammed his laptop shut.

Stupid dipshit. Likely smelled the chili. He’s gonna pay.

Lamont left the trailer, hit the yard lights and seized his baseball bat. He walked to the kennel, opened the gate and let loose on the dog, hammering the bat into its back, its stomach and legs. Panting in agony the animal limped into its shed, casting an angry look back at Lamont.

“Stay in there and shut the hell up!”

Lamont slammed the gate and tossed the bat.

“You’re lucky I let you live, you useless piece of crap!”

He stomped to the garage, opened the bay doors, hit the lights and resumed work restoring the chassis of the Model T. He fired up the grinder to remove rust when he saw a shadow and heard knocking out front.

Now what?

He went to the locked office door and saw an older man and a younger woman standing outside.

“I’m closed!” Lamont shouted through the barred glass.

“You’re Mr. Faulk, Lamont Faulk?” the man shouted back.

Lamont hesitated.

“We just need a moment of your time, sir.”

Lamont looked beyond them for a car, or other people.
Who are they?
Becoming uneasy he weighed possibilities and options. Was this a surprise visit from the parole people? He hadn’t missed any meetings. But the guy had an accent. European?
What’s up with that?
Maybe they were religious nuts. But how would they know his name?

“We just need your help—it won’t take long.”

“What is it?”

“May we come in?”

If they were parole people, his reaction would be noted.

Lamont unlocked the door and let them into what passed as a reception area. It had two sofas, with holes patched with duct tape, and two battered chairs.

The man was in his sixties, wearing a polo shirt, jacket and jeans. He was about Lamont’s height and looked to be in good shape. The woman might’ve been in her late twenties. Kinda pretty but in a plain way.

“Who are you? Are you from TDCJ?” Lamont asked.

“No, no. We just need your help, only a moment of your time.”

“Help with what?”

The old man’s eyes scanned the office, the garage bays and work benches. “Are there others here? We’d like to keep this private.”

“We’re all closed up... There’s just me. State your business.”

“What about the trailer we saw in the back with the light on?”

“That’s me. What do you want?”

The man produced some folded pages from his jacket, and for the first time Lamont noticed he was wearing gloves. He unfolded pictures from Hightower prison.

“I understand you know this man, Mason Varno, who’s been known to use various aliases?”

Lamont shook his head. “No, I don’t believe I do.”

The older man’s eyes gleamed, and his skin crinkled around them as he smiled at Lamont.

“Mr. Faulk. Please think again. I understand you know this man and I need to locate him.”

Lamont’s face began to harden. “I answered your question.”

The man’s gaze never left Lamont. “Mr. Faulk, I’ve been polite and it’s unfortunate that you would choose to lie to me.”

“I don’t know you— I don’t need this shit. Get out!”

“Forgive me, but I can’t leave without your help to locate this man. I have business with him.”

“I don’t owe you squat. Where the hell’re you from anyway? You sound like those Russian Commies on TV. Are you a Commie? I hate Commies.”

The man stepped into Lamont’s personal space. “And as much as you hate communists, I detest liars.”

Who the hell did this prick think he was?

Lamont’s jaw twitched, his blood was pumping hard, releasing his hair-trigger temper. He drew his right arm back, closed his hand into a fist, driving it at the bastard’s face, but he hit air. The old guy moved like a snake as he ducked, lowered himself then with blinding speed shot up, smashing the top of his skull into Lamont’s face, breaking his nose and three of his rotting teeth in a brain-numbing explosion of blood and bone. In a heartbeat the man’s huge right hand had seized Lamont’s crotch, introducing him to a new degree of pain.

Still gripping Lamont’s groin, the old man used his other hand to grab Lamont’s mashed face and swiftly back-walk him to a bench, hoisting him so that Lamont was on the bench on his back writhing in pain. The old man drove his fist into Lamont’s groin, and he almost passed out.

With the rapid precision of an expert, the old man opened the jaws of a steel bench vise, seized Lamont’s shoulders and positioned Lamont’s head between the jaws of the vise.

Then he tightened it.

* * *

Before Pavel Gromov took the next step in extracting information from Lamont he turned to Yanna.

Her eyes were still wide at what she’d witnessed. Breathing as though he’d just finished working out, Gromov spoke to her in rapid Russian.

“Put your gloves on and search his trailer quickly for cell phones, small computers, anything that will help us. Move!”

As Yanna headed through the junkyard to the trailer, Gromov rattled in the parts and tools piled in a corner, finding a big steel clamp. He screwed it down on Lamont’s right wrist, locking his hand to the bench. Gromov then found a hammer and held it to Lamont’s face so he could see.

“Now, Mr. Faulk, are you listening to me?”

The bleeding compressed mess of scrunched skin, beard, hair, blood, snot, saliva and teeth that was Lamont’s face indicated a nod within the pressure of the bench vise’s jaws.

“Chyesssh,”
Lamont said.

“Good, this is how it will go. You will tell me what I want to know, and suffer no further pain. Or, I will very quickly ensure you will never have use of your right hand again. That will be step one. Understand?”

“Chyesssh.”

“You do know Mason Varno, correct?”

“Chyesssh.”

“Have you seen him recently?”

“Chyesssh.”

“Tell me where he is.”

Lamont’s words were incomprehensible, so Gromov loosened the vise slightly but not enough for him to get free.

“He’s at my uncle’s old house with his woman.” His words were slow, slurred and slobbery. “He came to me and said he needed to hide. I will give you the address.”

“Did the woman have a baby?”

Lamont took huge gurgling breaths. “I don’t know. I only saw Mason when he came to see me.” He groaned. “I need a doctor.”

“Did he say his woman’s name was Remy?”

“No, but it’s the woman who came to Hightower to see him— Please!”

“Why did they have to hide?”

“He didn’t say, but in Hightower we knew that Mason ripped off a drug guy named DOA. I need a doctor—please—I figured Mason was hiding because word was DOA was looking for Mason now that he was released.”

“Do you have an address for DOA?”

“No. Oh God, my head!”

“What else should I know about Mason?”

“I heard he was buying into a big deal with Garza, a big player.”

“Do you have an address for this Garza?”

“In my computer, ohhhh....”

* * *

The trailer smelled of body odor and held the appeal of a restroom in a bus terminal.

As Yanna searched the kitchen and living room she held a gloved hand to her mouth. Was this real? Was she dreaming? Would she wake up and be at her desk in Moscow reading a manuscript? It was as if she was Alice and had fallen down the rabbit hole into a violent underworld.

Unwashed dishes, take-out food bags and empty beer bottles covered the counters and tables. She found a cell phone amid scores of sickening pornography magazines.

Under one of them she found a laptop. The light indicated it was on. She hit Enter and a space bar and the screen lit, coming alive to a video that began to play. Bile erupted in the back of her throat and she steadied herself. The images—
My God, children
—were revolting. Yanna gagged several times, spit in the sink then closed the laptop, collected it with the phone and turned to leave.

She froze at the door.

A big dog, blood dripping from its snout and teeth, stood at the door, growling as if waiting to settle a score.

Yanna hurried to the fridge, found packaged cold cuts, went to the door, cracked it open so the dog could smell the meat. She tossed a slice over its head. The dog chased it. She tossed another toward the kennel, and the dog trotted to it and devoured it. She continued until she’d lured the hungry dog into his kennel.

She locked the gate.

* * *

Lamont was still lying on the bench with his head locked in the vise when Yanna returned with the computer and cell phone.

Gromov examined Lamont’s personal information; his email accounts, bank account and bills for his uncle’s property.

Unable to reach the vise with his free hand, Lamont moaned and begged for an ambulance.

Ignoring him, Gromov studied Lamont’s situation.

Before they left, Gromov came to the obscene images on Lamont’s laptop. Disgusted, the Russian tightened the vise until he heard Lamont’s skull crack.