Booth had studied a layout of the estate and knew a huge garage and workshop were out back, as well as a guesthouse and a small bungalow for guards and other employees.
A voice came over the radio. “Woods clear.”
A SWAT guy rang the bell and, when nothing happened immediately, a crash bar smashed into the knob and the door swung open and careened off the wall, then limply swung back, hanging loose like a broken tree limb.
The SWAT guys fanned out through the house.
More “clear” calls started coming almost immediately.
The house was empty.
Not even Gianelli’s dog seemed at home.
Booth led the way to the back. While SWAT checked the guesthouse and bungalow, Booth, Brennan, Woolfolk, and Greene took the garage.
Booth shot off the lock and they entered, Booth in the lead.
The room was dark and Booth hit the light switch by the door.
The cars and SUVs behind the four overhead doors were two deep, making eight that they had to search on their way through the big room to the single door at the far end: Bentley, Hummer, Porsche, Escalade, Jaguar, Aston Martin, Ferrari, and Vincent’s favorite, a ’63 Corvette.
Taking a deep breath and letting it out, Booth twisted the knob and swung through the door crouching, his gun leveled.
He found a large machine shop, tools, workbenches, and heavy machinery scattered around…
…but no Gianelli.
The “all clear’s” came in from the bungalow and guesthouse.
Booth frowned, the gun grip cold in his hand.
What, had aliens snatched them all?
From sarcasm he shifted to cold reality: had they been tipped off? Maybe by the same insider who had tipped the Gianellis about where to find Stewart Musetti?
If so, the tipster had to be FBI and, sooner or later, Booth would trap that rat.
Brennan found the next door, behind a large lathe in the corner. She stepped aside to let Booth take the lead.
The door opened onto a dark room, a spiral staircase going down into darkness. Using a mini-flash, Booth found a light switch and flipped it, bathing the room below in fluorescent light.
Instantly Booth recognized the workroom of a madman.
In the chamber below were worktables, not unlike the ones at the Field Museum. A headless skeleton lay on the one nearest the stairs, blood on the table and floor around it.
Brennan moved around him to survey the remains from up close. Booth descended the stairs, his eyes on the scientist, her eyes on the blood.
She followed it, looking at the floor beyond the table, and said, “Oh, no…. Sad. How sad….”
Booth sped up now, coming around the table and pointing his gun down…
… but what he saw made him holster his weapon.
On the floor in a pool of blackened blood lay Gianelli’s dog, its throat cut.
In a huge tub along one wall resided evidence of a hydrogen peroxide bath, a tag stuck between the toes of the headless skeleton.
Brennan picked it up and unfolded the printed-out note, which read:
POP THE TRUNK.
They trooped back upstairs, Booth making a beeline for Vincent’s Vette. The keys were in the lid and he indeed popped the trunk, and found exactly what he expected to find.
The head of Vincent Gianelli.
This had little impact on Brennan, who had seen more than her share of severed skulls, even if she had not long ago spoken to this one firsthand. This skull still had much of its flesh, muscle, and hair.
Vincent’s face possessed a strangely peaceful cast, belied by the hematomas on his cheeks and ragged neck, which told the anthropologist that the defleshing of the younger Gianelli’s bones had at least started while he was still alive.
Not a pleasant way to leave the planet.
The others all backed up when Brennan used her cell phone to snap a photo of the head, then with a latex-gloved hand promptly pulled it out of the trunk by its hair and tipped it so she was looking up Vincent’s neck from the bottom.
She wanted to see where it had been severed.
Replacing the head in the trunk, Brennan trudged back downstairs to count cervical vertebrae. She was sure that the number left with the skull and those on the skeleton would add up to seven.
She was right.
Though they would do more testing, this skeleton obviously belonged to one person: their deceased host.
She wheeled to find Booth standing behind her. “Who do you suppose did this?”
He shook his head.
“Will you investigate this one?”
“Yeah. But mob killings are rarely solved and prosecuted. These are pros.”
Her eyes went from the skeleton to the dog, and she asked, “Who could do a thing like this?”
“Whoever was ordered to,” Booth said coolly. “All about business with these people.”
“Horrible business,” she said with a small shudder.
Carefully, Booth put an arm around her. “That’s why we go after them so hard.” He gave her a little squeeze, then released her.
She could hardly believe he had done that. She had no idea what to say.
Booth’s expression was grave. “I need to tell his father. Raymond Gianelli. You can come with if you want.”
“…Should I?”
Shrugging, he said, “Your call. But you were the one to identify the body.”
He had a point.
11
To Temperance Brennan, Raymond Gianelli’s monstrous home made his son’s mansion look like a guesthouse.
Tucked away in a quiet Forest Park neighborhood, only the high wall around the property gave a hint at the nature of the man’s business. Within the grounds, however, armed guards patrolled with attack dogs and — unlike at Vincent’s place — everybody here was still on duty.
At the gate, two burly guys in black jumpsuits glared at Booth and Brennan, but inspected their IDs and let them pass.
Booth drove up a short drive to the front, where two more gunmen in black jumpsuits waited, looking like bad-guy SWAT team members.
The FBI agent and the anthropologist were escorted into a mahogany-paneled office off the entranceway. A desk bigger than three of hers dominated the room, a huge leather chair behind. Two chairs waited on this side of the desk, and Brennan had the same feeling she got in middle school when called to the principal’s office.
Raymond Gianelli strode in, his dark, well-tailored suit immaculate, his face a blank mask as he took his place in the big chair, without shaking hands. “What now, Special Agent Booth?”
Booth’s face was serious, no animosity in his eyes at all as he said, “I don’t relish this task, Mr. Gianelli, despite our adversarial relationship…. We’re here to inform you that your son Vincent has been murdered.”
Gianelli didn’t move, his expression didn’t change. “…How?”
Brennan opened her mouth, but before she could utter a sound, Booth put a hand on her arm.
She clammed up.
Booth said, “Does it matter?”
The gangster’s chin dropped to his chest and he rubbed his forehead. “You know it does. It’s not like you to pull punches, Agent Booth.”
Booth hesitated, and Gianelli, straightening up, demanded, “How did my son die?”
Brennan spoke, her voice low, professional. “He was tortured — we don’t know how long as yet — and his head was severed. He was alive at the time. I’m sorry.”
Booth was frowning, perhaps even irritated, but Gianelli only nodded and said, “Thank you.”
To Booth, the gang boss asked, “Who is she?”
“Dr. Brennan is an anthropologist who sometimes works with—”
“You could stand to learn from her,” Gianelli interrupted. His voice was strong but, if you listened carefully, a tremor could be detected. “She has a nice way with the truth.”