Killing Hope (Gabe Quinn Thriller) (44 page)

On the wall behind the bed, in big brown letters a foot tall, the killer had smeared the words:

If you could save a million lives by taking one … would you?

‘It’s body chocolate.’ Slack told us.

‘Otherwise known as love mud.’ Shakes said. He saw the look on my face and added: ‘I’m engaged, Detective. Her name’s Karen. She’s normal. I’m normal. We’re both normal. We’re the definition of normalcy. Now move on. There’s no story here.’

I shook my head. ‘So what’s
their
story?’

Slack read from his notes: ‘Their names are Mark Roe and Sarah Gillespie. They checked in yesterday. Three night stay. Mark’s Amex gold card paid for the room.’

‘What else do we know about them?’

He glanced at the notes, ‘Front Desk say they’re here for a seminar.’

‘Which one, Duane?’

Slack went over to an open carry-on lying on the floor beneath the window. Picked up a couple of brochures from off a pile. Handed one to each of us.

‘Microbiological Terrorism. Run by Harland Laboratories.’

I leafed through. It was a slick, glossy production filled with technical jargon and fabulous photographs of computer-generated molecules. I saw résumé pictures of Mark and Sarah, together with another guy with blonde locks and trendy eyewear. The front cover showed a computer-generated DNA double-helix floating against a nebulous background. The title above it read:

‘Homeopathic Security - Fighting Microbiological Terrorism, Cell by Cell.’

‘Your guy interested in saving the planet?’ Shakes asked.

‘Aren’t we all?’ I said.

I rolled up the brochure and stuffed it in a pocket. Moved along the side of the bed. The surface of the nightstand looked like a miniature cityscape dusted in snow. Strewn with sex toys and various kinds of lubricants. A pair of straws made out of fifty dollar bills.

‘Somebody was having a party.’ I said.

Shakes was busy leafing through the brochure, ‘It’s that kind of town.’

Mark and Sarah were good-looking kids, I saw. Mid-to-late twenties. The kind of well-toned bodies born through hours of daily exercise and strict diet. Both had unruly dark hair, cut shoulder-length. The same roundish face and general head shape. They might have passed as brother and sister if it wasn’t for the sex angle.

I looked up at Detective Duane Slack.

‘The only things here that match my killer’s MO are the syringes. But even that’s grossly out of character. There’s no ash. No petals. No pose of interment. These two are holding hands. What convinced you it’s the my guy?’

‘The toilet.’ He said.

‘The toilet?’

‘It’s in the bathroom.’

‘You don’t say, Duane.’

I went into the en suite.

On the big mirror above the cluttered sink top, in words formed by bright pink lipstick, the killer had written the same message. But here he’d signed it
‘The Undertaker’
.

I glanced into the lavatory. There was a hardback book. Jammed into the porcelain bowl. Tilted face-up. I bent at the waist. Peered closer. It was a book I’d seen before; I had one just like it on a bookshelf back home. A signed first. I recognized the cover. Recognized the author.

126

^{___________________________}

We bailed out when the CSU arrived. Left Duane Slack processing the crime scene on the thirteenth floor.

‘We need access to the surveillance system.’ I said as we made our way to the hotel lobby.

‘Easier said than done.’ Shakes said. ‘Ira doesn’t like anybody snooping around bar him.’

‘Who’s Ira?’

‘Ira Rosenthal. Head of Bellagio Security. The guy you saw being reined in.’

‘Daggers.’ I said with a nod.

‘You noticed.’

Shakes had the Front Desk page the Head of Hotel Security. Then we waited in the middle of the spacious lobby, with its rainbow-glass ceiling and its ball gown clientele. Thirty seconds later, Ira Rosenthal came storming towards us across the cream marble floor. Ira is in his sixties. Thick-set. With slicked silver hair and gnarled fingers. He didn’t look a bit happy.

‘This is my hotel.’ He growled through barred teeth as he came up to us. ‘You have no right keeping me out of that room, Detective. I’m filing a formal complaint.’

‘Cool those pipes, Ira.’ Shakes said. ‘For your own good. We’re not looking for a fight. This is Detective Quinn.’

‘I know who he is.’

Ira had venom in his eyes.

‘We’d like to check your surveillance tapes.’ I said.

‘No chance.’ Ira snapped without even considering the request.

‘We have reason to believe the killer could be on your system.’

‘You should have thought about that before you stepped on my toes, Detective. This is my hotel. Somebody dies, I want in on it. You made me look a fool back there.’

‘Oh, come on, Ira.’ Shakes said. ‘Play the damn game. We’re all on the same damn side.’

‘No, Detective. Not this time. Both of you overstepped the mark on this one. There’s no way I’m giving either of you access to any of our tapes. No chance.’

I stared at Ira Rosenthal hard enough to make eyes hurt. I was irritated by the impasse and it showed. Without a subpoena served by Nevada’s supreme judge, Ira wasn’t for budging.

‘No chance.’ He repeated in case we’d missed it the first two times. ‘And that’s final. Do I make myself clear, gentlemen?’

Three minutes later, a livid-faced Ira led us to one of the soundproofed vaults deep in the bowels of the
Bellagio
. While Shakes had continued to argue the toss with Ira, I’d phoned Bill. Who’d then phoned Director Fuller. Who in turn had phoned Ira’s bosses. No casino wanted to make an enemy of the FBI – and especially not of Norman Fuller.

I had a feeling Ira wouldn’t let us hear the last of it.

‘You got a fallout shelter down here too?’ Shakes commented as we walked along a wide corridor lined with big steel doors.

‘You’re not far off the mark.’ Ira said. Grudgingly, he was giving us the guided tour. ‘This place can take a direct hit from a bunker buster and come through unscathed.’

He swiped a key card into a slot next to one of the doors. Closed one eye and placed the other against a small funnel poking out of the swipe machine.

‘What’s that do?’ Shakes asked.

‘Checks my retina against the one on file.’

‘No shit? I thought they only had stuff like that in Hollywood.’

Behind the bombproof door, the small, dimly-lit vault was a hive of electronic activity. Three walls covered floor-to-ceiling with flat panel monitors. Most of the screens showed overhead views of blackjack tables, thoroughfares, slot machines. In the middle of the room stood a central semi-circular control desk. Manned by four eagle-eyed techies wearing pin microphones. It looked like we were in Mission Control, Houston.

‘We have six more surveillance pods like this one.’ Ira told us. ‘The best Japanese technology throughout. We can monitor every part of the complex from here. Over three hundred live feeds downloading directly into a Cray supercomputer.’

‘Recorded?’ I said.

‘And stored in an air-conditioned vault for three years.’

‘Your records department must be bigger than the National Archives.’ Shakes said with a whistle.

‘Digital data takes up very little physical space.’ Ira said. ‘These days, everything’s on hard drives.’

‘So why three years?’

‘Statute of limitations. It’s the maximum prosecution window in Nevada for fraud after the fact.’

‘Okay.’ I said to Ira. ‘We need to see all the elevator footage from midday.’

‘I can do better than that.’ He tapped one of the techies on the shoulder. ‘Snapshots of the thirteenth floor. South wing. Midday until three.’

The techie began hitting keys on a flat keypad.

‘The system takes photographs as well as video.’ Ira explained. We snap everyone entering and leaving the elevators.’

One of the big panels in front of us lit up in a colorful mosaic of tiny pictures. I put on my readers and peered closer. There must have been over a couple of hundred thumbnail images. Each viewpoint was from the upper rear of an elevator carriage. Doors open. Showing either guests entering or leaving. Sometimes both.

‘We’re looking for single white males.’ I said.

The techie touched a control and the mosaic shuffled itself. Most of the thumbnails dropped off the bottom of the screen like shards of broken glass. We were left with sixteen larger pictures.

‘That’s some crazy software you got there.’ Shakes said.

I scanned them. Two stood out straight away. Both showed the same man in a long dark coat and black baseball cap leaving the elevator. Slightly different shots.

I pointed, ‘That’s him.’

The techie discarded the other fourteen frames so that the pair in question filled half the screen each. The images were much crisper than the one on the Ramada tape. Hi-res. Full color. The suspect was wearing a nondescript black trench coat. Black jeans and sneakers. I could see wispy blonde hair sprouting from underneath his black cap, collar-length. His back was to us. Everything else was guesswork.

‘Why does it show him leaving twice?’

The techie pointed to the time stamp in the corner of each window. ‘There’s forty minutes between both these frames. The first shows him arriving on floor thirteen. The second must be him leaving.’

‘Rewind the tape.’ I said. ‘Second image.’

The techie fast-rewound from the time of the snapshot. We watched as the empty elevator ascended to the thirteenth floor. The doors parted. Our suspect was standing on the elevator landing. His back to the camera. He walked backwards into the carriage. Pressed for the Lobby level.

‘Son of a bitch.’ Shakes breathed. ‘He knew we’d be watching.’