Russian Hill (Abby Kane FBI Thriller - Chasing Chinatown Trilogy Book 1) (20 page)

“Come on, Abby; you didn’t think I would believe the story about you climbing a fence.”

Uh, yeah, actually, I did.
Okay, telling them that a fence caused the big gash on my thigh might not have been the best answer, but at the time, I thought mentioning anything close to being attacked with a razor would be too much.

Anyway, I had thought I had everything under control until Ryan called me out on my B.S. Don’t get me wrong; I love that he had become comfortable with speaking his mind but questioning me, even though I lied—not a fan of it.

“I have a job that can be dangerous at times—”

“Duh!”

“You want the real story?” I asked, raising my left eyebrow.

Ryan nodded.

I leaned back in my chair and rested my hands in my lap. “While apprehending a suspect, he attacked me with a sharp knife.”

“Why didn’t you shoot him, Abby? You have a weapon, too, right?”

“I do, and I did.”

“Did you kill him?”

That’s a first—talking to my kid about killing someone. How does one prepare for that? At that moment, I would have preferred the why-does-my-penis-get-hard question. But life doesn’t work that way.

Ryan was becoming wiser to what it was I did for a living. I figured I might as well be truthful. The truth is always good, right?

“Why do you ask that?”

He shrugged and looked down at the carpet.

“Well, to answer your question, the suspect received a fatal gunshot wound from me. So yes, he died.” I didn’t bother to add any more than necessary, figuring less was more.

“Oh…”

Ryan eventually looked up at me. “It was self-defense, right?”

“Yes, Ryan. That man intended to hurt me more than he already had. I had to protect myself.”

A smile formed on Ryan’s face. “You’re awesome.”

Secretly, it made me feel good to know my kid thought I was awesome, but I was a little worried that it was because I had killed someone. “You understand it’s not okay to go around shooting people, right? Even an FBI agent like me is not above the law.”

“Yeah, I know that. It’s just cool having a tough mom.”

My heart jumped.
He called me his mom.
I almost cried. Luckily, I held it together. I think if I hadn’t, he might have rolled his eyes and taken the compliment back.

He seemed satisfied with my explanation, because he headed back downstairs to his room. I closed the door to my office right as my eye let go a tear.
My son had finally called me Mom.

Chapter 47

Only three days had passed since the incident in the apartment, and I was already antsy at home. The kids were in school during the day, and Po Po and I had talked each other out. My only contact with work came through a small memorial service we had at the office for Agent Tucker. Reilly didn’t balk when I said I would show for that. Tucker’s family lived in Tallahassee, Florida, and that’s where the body would later be flown for funeral arrangements, but only after Green had completed an autopsy. Standard procedure.

Kang did his best to keep me clued in on things on his end with text messages and phone calls. I knew I could count on him for updates. Even though
we
were both certain we had our killers, the Prosecutor’s Office sought more proof. We had yet to identify the John and Jane Doe killers, and that proved problematic. Even their prints came up empty. We found no record of them. We still didn’t know if they were from out of town or locals. There were a lot of questions and not a lot of answers. Those pesky but required details kept blocking what should have been a slam-dunk ending.

When Kang finally stopped by to check on me in person, similar to his last visit, Po Po sent him upstairs to my office unannounced.
It’s a good thing I don’t work in the nude.

“We caught a break.”

I spun around in my chair in time to see Kang enter my office. Before I could react, he took a seat next to me and started talking. “A day after our investigation at the apartment, one of the uniforms on perimeter patrol mentioned to me that he’d spotted a cab driver parked in the alleyway next to the building.”

“I like it when people do their jobs, don’t you?”

“Yeah, I already gave him an earful. Anyway, he never got a name or plate, but he said it was a Yellow Cab. So I visited our friend at the cab company—”

“The one with the grungy nails and an office that resembled the city dump?”

“That’s the one. He did some digging and came up with two names for me. I questioned them both.”

“And?” I asked, my body tensing a bit.

“One of them was the driver in the alley that day.”

I smiled at Kang. “Good work, Detective.”

“Thanks. By the way, how’s the leg?” he asked, pointing.

“Meh. It’s slowly healing. What’s to say? Tell me more about this cab driver.”

“Immigrant from Pakistan.” Kang removed a small notebook from his jacket. “His name is Yousuf Ijaz. He confirmed that our guy was his fare and that he had promised him $100 to wait in the alley. The pick-up address was a home on Russian Hill.”

“Near you?”

“Nah, this was a nice house on the east side with views of North Beach and the bay. Above my pay grade.” Kang chuckled. “I got a search warrant and hit the place ASAP. We found plane ticket stubs, originating from Toronto, suggesting they’re Canadians.”

“Married?”

“Seems like it. We also found multiple passports and fake facial hair. Looks like the guy sported a disguise as well. They’re pros, and know how to cover their trail. Right now, we’re working with authorities in Toronto to ID them. Our findings don’t stop there, though.”

I gave Kang my best Oliver Twist impression. “More, please.”

“We found a laptop with pictures and videos that document their crimes.”

I threw myself back into my chair. “No way!”

“Yeah, pretty stupid, huh?”

“How incriminating is it?”

Kang leaned forward. “Devastating. One of the videos shows the woman striking your vic with a hand axe.” His hands emphasized his words. “Pretty gruesome stuff, and it nails the case shut. We’re pretty sure their real names are Jerry and Vicki Carlson. Once we confirm it, we can file the case away.”

“What you do mean ‘file it away’? What about the staging at the crime scene? Or our theory that it was done for someone else or a group of people?”

“We solved the murder. We found our victim’s killers.”

“Did we? I think we found two of the people involved. There’s more to it. I can feel it.”

“Why couldn’t the photos and videos be souvenirs, something to inflate their egos? Maybe they got off watching themselves in action. There are plenty of documented cases where a serial killer keeps photos or clothing or something from the crime scene.”

“I hear you, but this is different. If it were for their pleasure, why go through all that extra trouble of coming up with presentation that tied into an SF icon? It makes no sense. Something or someone else prompted them to act this way.”

Kang leaned back. His ego and mood deflated and swooshed out of his lips.

“Look, I know if we keep digging, it prevents you from closing the case on your end, which keeps your a-hole boss on your back. It also prevents me from closing my case. But we both know there’s more to this story.”

I knew that was the last thing Kang wanted to hear. To be inches away from putting this case to bed and then realize there might be more to it had to be irritating. The other part of the equation: if I was wrong, Kang got skewered. Not an easy decision. Cavanaugh didn’t care about the truth. He cared about stats. Kang said the department had a ninety-percent solve rate for their cases and staying there was what mattered. Cavanaugh made me appreciate Reilly.

“So what do you want to do?” he asked with a shrug.

“What else was on the laptop?”

“The photos and videos were the only incriminating thing we found. The rest were just personal files and programs.”

“That’s what we need to be paying attention to. It may give us a clue as to who else might be involved.”

“Well, we combed all their email and social media accounts, and nothing came up.”

“My guess is you were looking for the wrong thing.”

“What do you mean?” he asked, his brow crinkled.

“You were looking for evidence that ties them to our victims. We need evidence that ties them to their audience.”

Chapter 48

“No way. I can’t do that. If Cavanaugh finds out I’m intentionally derailing his closure rate, I’ll be relegated to foot patrol faster than you can spew a quick remark.”

Did he slam me or compliment me?
“Look, I know I’m asking a lot, but if we’re right, not only will we put away another degenerate, but this will put you in a better light with your captain. That has to earn you some extra donuts in the morning, right?”

Kang rubbed his chin and chewed his bottom lip. I had never seen a cop mull over a decision to chase a bad guy. Well, maybe I had, but this was Kang. This guy was straighter than a baton when it came to policing.

“Do you really need the laptop?”

“How else am I to find the information? Where is it now?”

Kang shifted in his seat and looked away. “It’s bagged and sitting in the evidence room under lock and key.”

“Will it be a problem to get it?”

“This evidence seals the case. If anything happens to it, or it gets damaged, or the contents get erased… we’re screwed.”

“Hulk be careful. Hulk no break laptop. Hulk promise,” I grunted.

Kang shook his head. “I don’t know, Abby. Can’t you come down to the precinct? I can probably get you access for a few hours.”

I looked at my injured leg and then back at him, triggering his eyes to roll upward.

“Come on, Kangster,” I pleaded. “Kangman,” I continued. “Kangis Khan. See? I can do the name thing too… Kangaroo.” I batted my eyelashes, threw in a pout and waited for him to cave. It took two seconds.
You still got it, Abby.

While I had enjoyed watching Kang succumb, I had a better solution than just snagging the computer. I really didn’t need the laptop. If I could copy the entire contents of the hard drive, I’d technically have the laptop without needing the actual laptop. And to be honest, I really didn’t need his permission for him to agree. As an FBI agent, I had the authority to confiscate the contents of that laptop for the purpose of my investigation if needed. I was being mindful of his situation with his supervisor—which was so unlike me. I sent an email to Reilly to keep him in the loop in case the SFPD found out and cried about my methods. He sent his usual reply. “Do what you need to do to get the job done.”

Later that evening, Kang returned with the laptop, and I copied the entire contents over to an external hard drive. He was eager to get it back into the evidence room and was out the door as soon as I had finished. I didn’t bother to wait for him to return before I checked out the contents.

“Anything yet?” Kang asked when he returned a half hour later with two plates of food. He noticed the look of confusion on my face. “Oh, your Po Po gave this to me on the way up.”

He handed me my plate and proceeded to shovel beef and broccoli into his mouth. “She’s a good cook,” he managed between bites. “This is the real deal.”

“Tell me about it. I overeat at every meal.”

“So what’s the latest?”

I swallowed before answering. “Nothing yet. I went through his email, his documents folder and the trash.”

“So did we. We also looked through his photo organizer and video folders.”

“What about his Internet history?”

“We looked at it, but nothing popped out.”

I opened the browser. A quick scan showed a lot of SF searches for information on sights and attractions. It didn’t take long before I found dirt. “Looks like they’ve visited the personals on a few adult directories. Escort services.”

“Yeah, we saw that. He’s got an active life back home.”

“The searches appear to be for escorts here, not Toronto.”

Kang stopped chewing. “Why would he want an escort in SF?”

“Maybe he and the woman were platonic.” I shrugged.

“No sex, just kills?”

“Yeah, it doesn’t make sense to me either.” I pulled up a few of the pages they had visited. “Well this is interesting. The searches are all for male escorts.”

“So the woman wanted action.”

“I wouldn’t judge too quickly. We don’t know that it wasn’t the guy.”

Kang’s head bobbed from left to right as he continued to eat.

I tapped a finger on my desk. “You know, they could have been trolling for another victim.”

“A male escort? What’s the connection to SF?”

I raised an eyebrow at Kang. “You ever get out of Chinatown?”

He still had a puzzled look on his face while he scooped food into his mouth.

“San Francisco is a hotbed for porn production specializing in the alternative scene,” I said. “Maybe they were planning something in the Castro. They’ve visited at least twenty different ads on this site alone. Let’s see if they reached out to any men of the night.”

I opened the mail program and checked the emails they had sent.

Kang must have noticed the smile on my face. “Did you find something?”

“They contacted a bunch of them. Let’s see who responded.” I checked the inbox on the days they were on the hunt for an escort. “I’ve found some replies.”

“Well?”

“Hang on.” I scanned a few emails. “Seems as though their interests with the escorts had to do with their size, and I’m not talking height. I see some back and forth with an escort who calls himself Sampson… Here we go. They had a meeting set up with him at the Parc 55 Wyndham.”

“We don’t have a victim named Sampson, so maybe he was a potential.”

“I doubt that’s his real name, but none of our victims fit Sampson’s profile. He’s a six-foot-three, muscular black man.” I shrugged. “He’s worth seeking out. Let’s set up a meeting.”

“You really think this escort was involved?” Kang asked.

I leaned back in my chair and patted my belly like a bongo drum. “I’m not sure. It could have been a legitimate hire for an adventurous threesome.”