The Big Bad Wolf Read online

  I hoped we could keep it up like this. Even the video games. I was on the right track now and I liked it. So did Nana and the kids.

  Around ten-thirty, to complete the day just right, I got hold of Jamilla on the phone. She was home at a decent hour for a change. “Hey,” she said at the sound of my voice.

  “Hey back at you. Can you talk? This a good time?”

  “Might be able to squeeze in a couple of minutes for you. I hope you’re calling from home. Are you?”

  “Been here since around six. We had a family night at the Kennedy Center. Big success.”

  “I’m jealous.”

  We talked about what she was up to, then my big night with the kids, and finally my life and times with the Bureau. But I had the sense that Jamilla needed to get off after about fifteen minutes. I didn’t ask if she had anything going for tonight. She’d tell me if she wanted to.

  “I miss you way out there in San Francisco,” I said, and left it at that. I hoped it didn’t come off as not caring. Because I did care about Jam. She was in my thoughts all the time.

  “I have to run, Alex. Bye,” she said.

  “Bye.”

  Jamilla had to run. And I was finally trying to stop.

  Chapter 19

  THE NEXT MORNING I was told to attend a key-person meeting about the Connolly kidnapping and the possibility that the abduction was connected to others in the past twelve months. The case had been upgraded to “major,” and it had the code name “White Girl.”

  An FBI Rapid Start Team had already been dispatched to Atlanta. Satellite photos of the Phipps Plaza shopping center had been ordered in the hope that we could identify the motor vehicle the UNSUBS had used to get there before driving away in the Connolly station wagon.

  There were about two dozen agents in a windowless “major case” room at the Bureau in Washington. When I arrived, I learned that Washington would be the “office of origin” for the case, which meant the case was important to Director Burns. The Criminal Investigative Division had already prepared a briefing book for him. The important entry point for the FBI was that a federal judge’s wife had disappeared.

  Ned Mahoney from HRT sat down next to me and seemed not just outgoing but friendly. He greeted me with a winking “Hey, star.” A tiny dark-haired woman in a black jumpsuit plopped down on the other side of me. She introduced herself as Monnie Donnelley and told me she was the Violent Crimes analyst attached to the case. She talked extraordinarily fast, lots of energy, almost too much.

  “Guess we’ll be working together,” she said, and shook my hand. “I’ve already heard good things about you. I know your résumé. I attended Hopkins for grad school too. How about that?”

  “Monnie’s our best and our brightest,” Mahoney interjected. “And that’s a gross understatement.”

  “He’s so right,” Monnie Donnelley agreed. “Spread the word. Please. I’m tired of being a secret weapon.”

  I noticed that my supervisor, Gordon Nooney, wasn’t in the room of at least fifty agents. Then the meeting began on White Girl.

  A senior agent named Walter Zelras stood in the front and started to show slides. He was professional but very dry. I almost felt as if I’d joined IBM or Chase Manhattan Bank instead of the FBI. Monnie whispered, “Don’t worry, it’ll get worse. He’s just warming up.”

  Zelras had a droning speaking voice that reminded me of a professor I’d had a long time ago at Hopkins. Both Zelras and my former professor gave everything equal weight, never seemed excited or disturbed about the material they were presenting. Zelras’s subject was the connection the Connolly abduction might have had to several others in the past months, so it ought to have been spellbinding.

  “Gerrold Gottlieb,” Monnie Donnelley whispered again. I smiled, almost laughed out loud. Gottlieb was the professor who used to drone on at Hopkins.

  “Upscale, attractive white women,” Zelras was saying, “have been disappearing at a rate a little over three times the statistical norm over the past year. This is true both here in the States and in Eastern Europe. I’m going to pass around an actual catalogue showing women who were up for sale about three months ago. Unfortunately, we were unable to trace the catalogue back to whoever manufactured it. There was a Miami link, but it never went anywhere.”

  When the catalogue got to me, I saw that it was black and white, the pages probably printed off the Internet. I quickly leafed through it. There were seventeen women shown, nude shots, along with details such as breast and waist size, “true” color of hair, and color of eyes. The women had unlikely nicknames like Candy, Sable, Foxy, Madonna, and Ripe. The prices ranged from $3,500 to $150,000. There was no further biographical information on any of the women and nothing at all about their personalities.

  “We’ve been working closely with Interpol on what we suspect could be ‘white slave’ trading. FYI, ‘white slave’ refers to women bought and sold specifically for the purpose of prostitution. These days, the women are usually Asian, Mexican, and South American, not white, except in Eastern Europe. You should also note that at this time slavery is more globalized and technologized than ever in history. Some countries in Asia look the other way as women, and children, are sold—especially into Japan and India.

  “In the past couple of years, a market has opened up for white women, particularly blondes. These women are sold for prices ranging from a few hundred up into the mid five figures and possibly higher. As I said, a significant market is Japan. Another is the Middle East, of course. The Saudis are the biggest buyers. Believe it or not, there’s even a market in Iraq and Iran. Questions at this point?”

  There were several, mostly good ones, which showed me this was a savvy group that had been brought together.

  I finally asked a question, though I was reluctant to as the FNG. “Why do we think Elizabeth Connolly is connected to the others?” I gestured around the room. “I mean, this connected?”

  Zelras answered quickly. “A team took her. Kidnapping gangs are very common in the slave trade, especially in Eastern Europe. They’re experienced and very efficient at the abductions, and they’re connected into a pipeline. There’s usually a buyer before they take a woman like Mrs. Connolly. She would be high risk but very high reward. What makes this kind of abduction attractive is that there’s no ransom exchange. The Connolly abduction fits our profile.”

  Someone asked, “Could a buyer request a specific woman? Is that a possibility?”

  Zelras nodded. “If the money is right, yes, absolutely. The price might go into the six figures. We’re working that angle.”

  Most of the remainder of the long meeting was taken up with discussion about Mrs. Connolly and whether we could find her quickly. The consensus was no. One detail was particularly perplexing: Why would the UNSUBS kidnap the victim in such a public place? Profit / ransom seemed the logical possibility, but there had been no ransom note. Had somebody specifically asked for Mrs. Elizabeth Connolly? If so—who? What was special about her? And why the mall? Surely there were easier abduction locations.

  As we talked about her, a photograph of Mrs. Connolly and her three daughters remained on the screen at the front of the conference room. The four of them looked so close-knit and happy. It was scary, sad. I found myself thinking about being with Jannie on our front porch the night before.

  Someone asked, “These women who’ve been abducted, have any of them been found?”

  “Not one,” said Agent Zelras. “Our fear is that they’re dead. That the kidnappers—or whoever the kidnappers deliver them to—consider them disposable.”

  Chapter 20

  I RETURNED TO my orientation classes that day after the lunch break, and just in time for another of SSA Horowitz’s awful jokes. He held up a clipboard for us to see his material. “The official list of David Koresh’s theme songs. ‘You Light Up My Life,’ ‘I’m Burning Up,’ ‘Great Balls of Fire.’ My personal favorite: ‘Burning Down the House.’ Love the Talking Heads.” Dr. Horowitz seemed
to know that his jokes were bad, but black humor works with police officers, and his deadpan delivery was decent. Plus, he knew who had recorded “Burning Down the House.”

  We had an hour session on “Management of Integrated Cases,” followed by “Law Enforcement Communication,” then “Dynamics of the Pattern Killer.” In the last course we were told that serial killers change, that they are “dynamic.” In other words, they get smarter and better at killing. Only the “ritual characteristics” remain the same. I didn’t bother to take notes.

  The next class took place outdoors. We were all dressed in sport jackets, but with padded throat and face protectors for a “practical” at Hogans Alley. The exercise involved three cars in hot pursuit of a fourth. Sirens blared and echoed. Loudspeakers barked commands: “Stop! Pull over! Come out of the car with your hands up.” Our ammo, Simunition, consisted of cartridges with pink-paint-infused tips.

  It was five o’clock by the time we finished the exercise. I showered and dressed, and as I was leaving the training building to go over to the dining hall building, where I had a cubicle, I saw SSA Nooney. He motioned for me to come over. What if I don’t want to?

  “You headed back to D.C.?” he asked.

  I nodded and bit down on my tongue. “In a while. I have some reports to read first. The abduction in Atlanta.”

  “Big stuff. I’m impressed. The rest of your classmates spend their nights here. Some of them think it helps build camaraderie. I think so too. Are you an agent of change?”

  I shook my head, then tried a smile on Nooney. Didn’t work.

  “I was told from the start that I could go home nights. That isn’t possible for most of the others.”

  Then Nooney began to push hard, trying to stir up old anger.

  “I heard you had some problems with your chief of detectives in D.C. too,” he said.

  “Everybody had problems with Chief of Detectives Pittman,” I said.

  Nooney’s eyes appeared glazed. It was obvious he didn’t see it that way. “Just about everybody has problems with me too. Doesn’t mean I’m wrong about the importance of building a team here. I’m not wrong, Cross.”

  I resisted saying anything more. Nooney was coming down on me again. Why? I had attended the classes I could make; I still had work to do on White Girl. Like it or not, I was part of the case. And this wasn’t another practical—it was real. It was important.

  “I have to get my work done,” I finally said. Then I walked away from Nooney. I was pretty sure I’d made my first enemy in the FBI. An important one too. No sense starting small.

  Chapter 21

  MAYBE IT WAS GUILT churned up by my confrontation with Gordon Nooney that made me work late in my cube on the lower level of the dining hall building where Behavioral Science had its offices. The low ceilings, bad fluorescent lighting, and cinder-block walls kind of made me feel as if I were back at my precinct. But the depth of the back files and research available to FBI agents was astonishing. The Bureau’s resources were better than anything I’d ever seen in the D.C. police department.

  It took me a couple of hours to go through less than a quarter of the white-slave-trade files, and those were just cases in the U.S. One abduction in particular caught my attention. It involved a female D.C. attorney named Ruth Morgenstern. She had last been seen at approximately 9:30 P.M. on August 20. A friend had dropped her off near her apartment in Foggy Bottom.

  Ms. Morgenstern was twenty-six years old, 111 pounds, with blue eyes and shoulder-length blond hair. On August 28, one of her identification cards was found near the north gate of the Anacostia Naval Station. Two days later, her government access card was found on a city street.

  But Ruth Morgenstern was still missing. Her file included the notation Most likely dead.

  I wondered: Was Ruth Morgenstern dead?

  How about Mrs. Elizabeth Connolly?

  Around ten, just as I was starting to do some serious yawning, I came across another case that snapped my mind to attention. I read the report once, then a second time.

  It involved the abduction eleven months earlier of a woman named Jilly Lopez in Houston. The kidnapping had occurred at the Houstonian Hotel. A team—two males—had been seen loitering near the victim’s SUV in the parking garage. Mrs. Lopez was described as “very attractive.”

  Minutes later, I was speaking to the officer in Houston who had handled the case. Detective Steve Bowen was curious about my interest in the abduction, but he was cooperative. He said that Mrs. Lopez hadn’t been found or heard from since she disappeared. No ransom was ever requested. “She was a real good lady. Just about everybody I talked to loved her.”

  I’d heard the same thing about Elizabeth Connolly when I was in Atlanta.

  I already hated this case, but I couldn’t get it out of my skull. White Girl. The women who’d been taken were all lovable, weren’t they? It was the thing they had in common. Maybe it was the kidnappers’ pattern.

  Lovable victims.

  How awful was that?

  Chapter 22

  WHEN I GOT HOME that night, it was quarter past eleven, but there was a surprise waiting for me. A good one. John Sampson was sitting on the front steps. All six-foot-nine, two hundred fifty pounds of him. He looked like the Grim Reaper at first—but then he grinned and looked like the Joyful Reaper.

  “Look who it is. Detective Sampson.” I smiled back.

  “How’s it going, man?” John asked as I walked across the lawn. “You’re working kind of late again. Same old, same old. You never change, man.”

  “This is the first late night I’ve had at Quantico,” I responded a little defensively. “Don’t start.”

  “Did I say anything bad? Did I even cut you with the ‘first of many’ line that’s right there on the tip of my tongue? No, I didn’t. I’m being good—for me. But since we’re talking, you can’t help yourself, can you?”

  “Want a cold beer?” I asked, and unlocked the front door of the house. “Where’s your bride tonight?”

  Sampson followed me inside and we got a couple of Heinekens each; we took them out to the sunporch. I sat on the piano bench and John plopped down in the rocker, which strained under his weight. John is my best friend in the world and has been since we were ten years old. We were homicide detectives, and partners, until I went over to the FBI. He’s still a little pissed at me for that.

  “Billie’s just fine. She’s working the late shift at St. Anthony’s tonight and tomorrow. We’re doing good.” He drained about half of his beer in a gulp. “No complaints, partner. Far from it. You’re looking at a happy camper.”

  I had to laugh. “You seem surprised.”

  Sampson laughed too. “Guess I didn’t think I was the marrying kind. Now all I want to do is hang with Billie most of the time. She makes me laugh, and she even gets my jokes. How about you and Jamilla? She good? And how is the new job? How’s it feel to be a Feebie down at Club Fed?”

  “I was just going to call Jam,” I told him. Sampson had met Jamilla, liked her, and knew our situation. Jam was a homicide detective too, so she understood what the life was like. I really enjoyed being with her. Unfortunately, she lived in San Francisco—and she loved it out there.

  “She’s on another murder case. They kill people in San Francisco too. Life in the Bureau is good so far.” I popped open the second of my beers. “I need to get used to the Bureau-crats, though.”

  “Uh-oh,” Sampson said. Then he grinned wickedly. “Crack in the walls already? The Bureau-crats. Authority problems? So why you working so late? Aren’t you still in orientation, whatever they call it?”

  I told Sampson about the kidnapping of Elizabeth Connolly—the condensed version—but then we moved back to more pleasant subjects. Billie and Jamilla, the allure of romance, the latest George Pelecanos novel, a detective friend of ours who was dating his partner and didn’t think anybody was onto them. But we all knew. It was like it always was when Sampson and I got together. I missed working with him. W
hich led to the next thought: I needed to figure out some way to get him into the FBI.

  The big man cleared his throat. “Something else I wanted to tell you, talk to you about. Real reason I came over tonight,” he said.

  I raised an eyebrow. “Oh. What’s that?”

  His eyes avoided mine. “Kind of difficult for me, Alex.”

  I leaned forward. He had me hooked.

  Then Sampson smiled, and I knew it was good, whatever he was about to share.

  “Billie’s got herself pregnant,” he said, and laughed his deepest, richest laugh. Then Sampson jumped up and bear hugged me half to death. “I’m going to be a father!”

  Chapter 23

  “HERE WE GO AGAIN, my darling Zoya,” said Slava in a conspiratorial whisper. “You look very prosperous, by the way. Just perfect for today.”

  The Couple looked like all the other suburban types wandering around the crowded King of Prussia Mall, the “second largest in America,” according to promotional signs at all the entrances. There was good reason for the mall’s popularity. Greedy shoppers traveled here from the surrounding states because Pennsylvania had no tax on clothing.

  “These people all look so wealthy. They have their shit together,” said Slava. “Don’t you think? You know the expression I’m using—‘having your shit together’? It’s American. Slang.”

  Zoya snorted out a nasty laugh. “We’ll see how together their shit is in an hour or so. After we’ve done our business here. Their fear lies about a quarter of an inch below the surface. Just like everybody else in this spoiled-rotten country, they’re afraid of their own shadows. But especially pain, or even a little discomfort. Can’t you see that on their faces, Slava? They’re afraid of us. They just don’t know it yet.”

  Slava looked around the main plaza, which was dominated by Nordstrom and Neiman Marcus. There were signs up everywhere for Teen People magazine’s “Rock and Shop Tour.” Meanwhile, their target had just bought a fifty-dollar box of cookies at Neimans. Amazing! Then she bought something equally absurd called a Red, White, and Blue Dog journal, which was prohibitively expensive as well.