Believe No One (16 page)

‘If it's the same guy, I don't see him showing visible scars,' Hicks said. ‘He blends right in.'

‘Okay.' Detmeyer paused, taking his time to think it through. ‘If he isn't covering their eyes to hide disfigurement, a blindfold would suggest that he
did
know the victims, and knew them well.'

‘What is that?' Ellis asked. ‘Guilt?'

Detmeyer shook his head. ‘Even sociopaths will cover the eyes, or even the whole face, if it's someone they know.'

Kate Simms introduced herself. ‘Laney went missing how long ago?'

‘Six months,' Hicks said.

‘And she and Billy were living with a man in Adair.' Hicks gave a brief nod, and Simms went on: ‘Did you get a description of the man?'

‘Their trailer was off the main grid,' Hicks said. ‘Added to that, the near neighbours said he was away a lot.'

‘Did you get a description or not?' Launer demanded.

Hicks fixed the Sheriff with her bright blue stare. ‘I did, sir, I'm just not sure how reliable it is. The only thing they'd agree on was he had a beard and wore his hair long.'

‘Well, that narrows it right down,' Launer said.

‘Is it possible she hooked up with the killer while her boyfriend was away?' Simms asked.

‘She got clean in prison, went to NA meetings after she got out,' Hicks said. ‘The ME says so far as she can tell, Laney was off drugs when she died. And in the two months she lived in Adair County, the only male caller was the guy she was living with.'

‘Come
on,
Deputy.' Launer smiled, glancing at the rest as though he was embarrassed for her. ‘You said it yourself – the neighbours couldn't even agree what he looked like. Did you think maybe that's because it was
different
guys they saw?'

‘No, sir.'

The smile seemed to slide around his face as Launer tried to come to terms with being told ‘no'. ‘Would you care to explain?'

‘They didn't agree on the boyfriend, but they were sure about his car – he drove a small European compact, grey or blue-grey,' Hicks told him. ‘That was the
only
car they ever saw. Laney lived quiet. Her brother went to school. Adair Sheriff's Office had twenty-two call-outs to the park in the time she was there, and not one of those was related to Laney.'

Fennimore saw nods of approval: for one person to have completed so much investigative work in such a short space of time was impressive.

‘Would now be a good time to go through what we have on the killings in Missouri?' This was Detective Dunlap, the African-American St Louis cop. They already knew some of it from ViCAP, and the similarities between Laney Dawalt and their three victims was striking. Dunlap pulled up a chart listing the similarities between the cases on the projector screen.

‘Tulsa PD's dive team recovered grey rope in the pond where Laney was found,' Hicks said. ‘I have a picture …' She riffled through the papers in front of her. Simultaneously, CSI Roper clicked through evidence photographs on the projector monitor. Hicks slid a glossy colour photo from mid-pile at the same moment he retrieved the image of the rope. She strode to the front and held the print photograph up for comparison.

The image on the screen showed a length of cord, greyish, with red and blue flecks woven into the braid. The rope in Hicks's photograph was stained with red mud, but it was still possible to make out the colours. There was a murmur of approval. The cord was distinctive. Every investigator valued the distinctive. Distinctive was what solved crimes. And the two samples were the same. Lifted from two dump sites of two different victims in two different states, they were the
same.

They turned to Trey Gaigan's disappearance next. The young detective and Detective Ellis, a big solid tank of a man, gave a detailed account of their visit to Trey's aunt, and the revelation that Trey had sent a postcard after he left.

‘You should look at the postcard,' Fennimore said.

‘Look at it for what?' Sheriff Launer said. ‘They already told you there was nothing on that card but three words and the boy's fingerprints.'

‘Did anyone check the stamp?' Fennimore said, doing his best to overlook the Sheriff's alpha-male posturing.

Roper, the St Louis CSI, sat forward. ‘Most US stamps are self-adhesive now. I'm sorry they ever replaced the gummed ones – those things were as good as a mouth swab for DNA.'

‘He still had to press the stamp in place,' Fennimore said. ‘I'm thinking low-template DNA.'

The CSI nodded. ‘What we call “Touch DNA”,' he explained for the rest. His foot was tapping compulsively under the table, as if he was controlling an urge to get up and sprint round the room. ‘It only needs a few cells from the outermost layer of skin to get enough DNA for a match. We've been a bit behind the curve on this in the States, but they used the technique in Boulder, Colorado to clear JonBenet Ramsey's parents of her murder.'

Launer scoffed. ‘That postcard must've been handled by a dozen people: postal workers, Trey's aunt, her kids, police, Team Adam.'

‘I can't speak for how you do things in these parts, Sheriff,' Fennimore said, not even trying to rein back on the sarcastic tone. ‘But I'm pretty sure Team Adam consultants and St Louis PD took care not to contaminate the evidence.'

‘What're you implying?'

Simms rolled her eyes and Fennimore realized he'd gone too far. ‘What I meant was—'

‘I know what you meant,' Launer said. ‘And I don't have to take that kind of shit from a chippy Brit who just blew in off the street. You think I'm some Billy-Bob from the Backwoods, scuffing up the crime scene in winkle-picker boots and spitting chewing tobacco on the evidence? Well, you should talk to Abigail Hicks about
that,
Professor.'

‘Gentlemen,' Dunlap said.

‘No, really – you guys should know what you're dealing with. The reason why you don't have enough evidence for a link to the Creek County murder is
she
screwed up.'

Hicks fixed the Sheriff with her bright blue stare.

‘Did you think I wouldn't know?' Launer said, grinning. ‘Why d'you think you never got past the six-month probation period?'

Hicks dropped her gaze and stared at the floor, her whole body rigid.

Surely, Fennimore thought, even Launer wouldn't humiliate one of his own team in front of six different agencies?

The two Team Adam consultants were seated near the back of the room, but one of them stood up, a tall man of fifty-plus years with a bald head and a grey goatee. He had the height and physical presence to draw every eye away from Deputy Hicks to him.

‘Kent Whitmore,' he said. ‘Team Adam.' He spoke in a Midwestern drawl, his voice deep, and it carried easily to the front of the room. ‘We really appreciate what you said, earlier, about the work we do, Sheriff.'

Launer was still puffed up, ready for a fight, but he couldn't tell the consultant to shut up and sit down, so he stuttered out a few incoherent words.

‘Well, that's very generous of you, Sheriff Launer, sir,' Whitmore said, as though he had been charmed by Launer's eloquence. ‘And we're truly honoured to be invited here. Whatever you need, we'll do all we can.' He nodded towards the projector screen. ‘If you guys could break down what's needed, we could get straight to work. For instance, if you need to hurry up Mr and Mrs Dawalt's DNA workups from the samples Deputy Hicks tracked down, we can pay for a private lab to get it done. And if you want to circulate information to law enforcement in a wider area, we can get word out to every state you want us to.'

He was telling them what they already knew, while giving Hicks credit for her good work on the case. His mild tone and his self-deprecating words were a reminder of what they were here for, and Fennimore felt ashamed to have allowed himself to be rattled by the Sheriff when Deputy Hicks had risen above his jibes.

Launer wasn't stupid, he knew he'd been outflanked; he could not return to Hicks's ‘screw-up' without making himself look petty and foolish, but the alpha male in him still felt the need to assert his authority.

‘Mr Fennimore, I'm sure Deputy Hicks appreciates your help, but we got it from here,' he said. ‘So, if you don't mind ‥?' He raised a hand inviting Fennimore to use the exit.

Hicks's head came up. ‘Sir, you can't just tell Professor Fennimore to leave. He—'

Launer drew a bead on her. ‘What did you say, Deputy?'

Fennimore stood. ‘It's okay. I'm leaving.'

Dunlap began to protest, but Fennimore insisted. ‘Seriously, better that I go. In a multi-agency investigation, you should remember to check your ego at the door. I'm afraid I left mine in my top pocket with the battery fully charged. If you want me, you know where to find me.'

Main Street, Westfield, Williams County, Oklahoma

Deputy Hicks found the Professor at Danley's, a bar halfway down an alley off of Main Street. A sign on the door read: ‘No firearms – concealed or open carry. No exceptions. That's The Law!' The shopfront window at Danley's was meant to let in light, but a flashing Budweiser sign blocked most of it. Inside, the place was just big enough for five tables and a fifteen-foot-long bar covered in hammered copper.

Abigail Hicks was in uniform, and when she walked in a couple of chairs scraped on the painted wood floor – a reflex reaction – nothing to be alarmed about, but something to keep in mind when she had to decide what part of the bar-room it was safe to turn her back on. She noted that the sound had come from a table in the far-right corner, next to the bar. Three men sat in the dark of a recess under the stairwell, staring out at her like coyotes under a deck. They had dark hair and two of them had full, dark beards, which only seemed to make their eyes gleam all the more bright and dangerous. A ceiling fan turned overhead, not doing much except to stir up the reek of beer, sweat and testosterone.

Fennimore was at the counter with his back to the door and, seeing those characters sitting in the shadows, she felt a shiver of anxiety on his behalf. He was drinking with Bob Ross, the fishing bait guy, which would offer him some protection, but only for as long as Bob-the-Bait stayed sober. Bob was a tough old countryman who believed in old-style hospitality to strangers, but it went without saying that hospitality involved alcohol, and while in his heart Bob was country gracious, in his cups he forgot his love of both friends and brethren and became a mean, moon-cussing, bloodlusting drunk.

The bar owner kept a baseball bat under the counter, Oklahoma State Law making it a felony to take a gun into a bar. He nodded to Hicks, but his eyes kept moving, watching every man in the room, not hurrying, showing no hint of worry, just letting them know he was awake and he was watching.

Hicks slid onto the stool next to Fennimore, side on to the bar so she could keep the three coyotes under the stairwell in her sights.

‘Get you anything, Deputy?' Danley asked.

‘I'm good, thanks, Dan,' she said.

Fennimore was in murmured conversation with his drinking buddy, but hearing her voice, he looked around.

‘Deputy Hicks!' He sounded affable, and only a little drunk, and she was hopeful the same was true of Bob-the-Bait.

‘You're a hard man to find,' she said, omitting his name – in Danley's bar, the less people knew about you, the safer you were likely to stay.

‘You should've called,' Fennimore said.

‘I did. And when you switch your cell back on, you'll see I left a message.'

He grunted, fishing in the side pocket of his pants for his phone. Once found, he switched it on and slipped it into his shirt pocket, missing the first time, and Hicks revised her estimate of Fennimore's level of drunkenness.

‘Deputy Hicks,' Fennimore said, ‘d'you know Bob Ross?'

Bob leaned forward and raised his glass in greeting.

‘We've met,' Hicks said.

‘The last time, she woke me up with coffee in the morning,' Bob said with a wicked grin.

‘Bob …' she warned.

‘At the town jail,' he admitted. ‘I was sleeping off a drunk.'

She dismissed him with a shake of the head and focused her attention on Fennimore. ‘You been here this whole time?'

Fennimore checked his watch. ‘About an hour. I mooched in every store in town. I almost bought an antique Shaker rocking chair – buggered if I know why – I sleep most nights in my office, back home.'

‘Man after my own heart,' Bob said. He was slurring, but had not yet reached the argumentative stage.

‘Bob, here, saved me from a desperate act,' Fennimore said.

There was a paper sack on the bar next to him, and Hicks said, ‘I see you did spend
something
– pick yourself up some nice lures at Bob's shop?'

‘Lures?' Fennimore said, resting a protective hand on the paper sack. ‘Lures! Damnable! They're flies, and dry flies at that.'

The bait man chuckled. ‘We already had that conversation, Deputy. This feller's got strong feelings on the subject.'

‘Damn right, I have,' Fennimore said. ‘Bloody great ugly whizzy things. You might as well dynamite a river for all the finesse in hooking a fish with a lure!'

‘You might want to keep it down, sir,' Hicks said, keeping her eye on the biggest of the bearded men. She thought she knew him, and he was trouble.

She stood up and reached for Fennimore's purchases, which put her between the bait guy and the professor. ‘You need to come with me.'

‘Am I under arrest?' Fennimore said.

‘Is that what it'll take to get you out of here?'

Hicks kept her hand on the copper counter, creating a barrier between Fennimore and Bob, knowing she was taking a risk turning her back on the coyotes. She could hear them muttering, and it didn't sound friendly. She lowered her voice and leaned in to the Professor. ‘Stay if you want, but there's three guys at a table under the stairwell looking at you like they have already counted the green in your billfold and are wondering how much trouble it would be to relieve you of it.' She was so close she could feel the heat coming off Fennimore's skin.