She recognized a number of national journalists, which was not surprising. Vaughn liked the attention and the media loved running stories on depraved minds who killed gobs of people. It was a match made in Internet eyeball click-bait heaven.
But then a name caught her gaze.
“Hang on a second. Bledsoe, look at this.”
He leaned over and snatched a look at her phone. “Lots of names there. Can you be more specific?”
“Here.” She zoomed the screen on Harrison Vaughn.
“So? It’s his son. Besides, you asked Vaughn about him. Didn’t get anything.”
Vail replayed that exchange.
“You ever talk to him when you were doing your victimology on Vaughn?”
“Of course. Family history’s important. Never married, no girlfriends. Menial labor. Not as sharp as dad and didn’t seem to exhibit psychopathic tendencies. But I eliminated him as an accomplice with the few facts we had. Tenicia was a big part of that. She said it was just Vaughn. Which made sense because if he had help, no way she would’ve escaped alive.”
“So he visited Vaughn in prison. How many times?”
Vail scanned the document. “Pretty regularly.”
She looked up. “We need Harrison’s address.”
“But you said Caruthers—”
“SWAT’s en route. Let them handle Caruthers. Could be our offender. But Harrison... I’ve got a feeling about him.”
“Christ,” he said as he pulled out his phone. “Another one of your intuition things?” He tapped out a quick text and hit send as the helicopter banked slightly to the right.
“What if I was right about the smile?” Vail said. “What if Vaughn was laughing at us because he knew his son was carrying on in his footsteps?”
“He didn’t smile.”
Vail shook her head. “I know what I saw.”
“Why can’t it be a regular old copycat? Excuse me, a guy patterning him—”
“Copycat’s fine. Just wanted to make sure you knew it’s more like inspiration, rather than duplication, of what the killer did.”
“So why can’t it be a copycat?”
“They can only emulate those things the killer’s done that are written in a book or news article. No one’s written a book about Vaughn yet. And we withheld certain things from the media — including the white 70s Chevy panel van. So the only way he’d be able to ‘copy’ such things is if he—”
“Knows the killer.”
“Right. And I’m betting it’s more than that. It’s personal. Vaughn coached him. Personally mentored him.”
“But Harrison was only eighteen when Vaughn was arrested. You’re saying he taught his son how to kill when the kid was young. A minor. So Harrison knew what his dad was doing and how he was doing it.” Bledsoe shuddered. “That’s friggin’ awful.”
“Let’s assume Harrison hasn’t offended until now. If Vaughn desensitized his son when he was young and impressionable, maybe he reinforced it when meeting with him in prison over the years. When he felt Harrison was ready he egged him on, pumped him up.”
Bledsoe stared out the window a long moment, then nodded. “If true, that’d mean he hasn’t done this before. Makes sense. But why hasn’t he acted until now?”
“Maybe he’s been afraid to. The visits with his father could’ve served as encouragement, like you said.” Vail turned her attention back to the phone and scrolled to the far right of Harrison’s name. “He visited Vaughn several times recently. Last time was—” She looked at Bledsoe. “A week ago.”
“When you visited Vaughn and asked for his help, he knew his son had finally done it.”
Vail clenched her jaw. “I inadvertently told him junior had pulled the trigger. Made his day, I’m sure. That’s what the smile was about.” She looked out the side window, peering into the darkness of the Virginia countryside. They were over Caruthers’ home. The top of the parked assault vehicle was barely visible in the moonlight, but she did not see the deployed officers. “Hover here a minute.”
“Copy that,” X-ray said.
“What do you think?” Bledsoe asked.
“I think we let SWAT do their thing and we go check out Harrison.”
Bledsoe thought a moment, then his phone buzzed. He looked at the display, then nodded. “Let’s do it. X-ray, change of plans. Got a new address for you.”
They approached the home of Harrison Vaughn twenty minutes later, located in a dark, sparsely populated area of Charlottesville, Virginia.
Vail adjusted the headset mic in front of her mouth. “X-ray, sitrep from SWAT?”
“Negative. Stand by, I’ll check.” A moment passed. “Suspect Caruthers wasn’t home. In process of clearing house. No sign of Debra Mead or indications she, or any other woman, has been held there. Over.”
“Copy that,” Vail said.
“Could be he has another place where he’s planning to off her,” Bledsoe said.
“Or he’s not our guy.”
They were now within view of the house — which was more like a home-built cabin in the middle of an evergreen thicket.
“I’ll approach slowly, give you a 360 sweep of the perimeter so you can get a lay of the land.”
“Copy that,” Bledsoe said.
Vail nudged Bledsoe. “If he’s not already awake, we’re gonna announce ourselves.”
“If he tries to leave, we should see him from up here. In fact, that might be the better call. We don’t know what structures are down there. We’re going in blind.”
“I’m trying to remedy that,” X-ray said. “Coming in from the north, then we’ll go clockwise in a circle. You want, there are IR monocles in that kit by your feet.”
“I want,” Vail said, leaning forward to rummage in the bag. “Got it.” She pulled it over her face, removing the headset first to seat it properly. Bledsoe did the same, and then they began scanning the countryside.
“Not seeing anything,” X-ray said as he completed the second sweep. “Taking you down. Any preference? North, south, e—”
“Hang on a second,” Bledsoe said. “Nine o’clock. That cloud of dust.”
X-ray craned his neck and nodded. “10-4.”
“Where?” Vail asked, looking past Bledsoe’s left shoulder.
“Someone heading away from the property. In a big hurry, kickin’ up a dirt storm.”
X-ray pushed the cyclic forward to give them a better look. “It’s a van, headed south.”
“Got it,” Vail said. “Can you head him off?”
“Working on it,” X-ray said, swinging the chopper starboard and swooping toward the treetops. “How aggressive you want me to be?”
“What do you think?” Bledsoe asked. “Is Harrison the kind of guy who’d be armed or unarmed?”
“If he’s our guy, we’re assuming he kills with the same MO as his father — choking them and then carving them up — but we don’t even know if he’s murdered anyone yet. We don’t even know if this is our guy.”
“He’s driving pretty damn fast from his shack after seeing a chopper doing a flyover.”
“You’re making some assumptions here, Bledsoe.”
Bledsoe kept his eyes on the fleeing van. “He’s running from the police. Looks guilty to me.”
“Guilty — of what? Maybe he’s got a warrant out on him for unpaid child support and he freaked out. Or it could be overdue parking tickets. Or he’s a survivalist who thinks jack-booted government agents are coming to get him. Who the hell knows?”
“He’s driving an old van.”
“So do a lot of people in Virginia. I’m not saying he isn’t our offender. But we could be wrong about this. Do we really want to go in hot and heavy without knowing for sure what we’re doing?”