“Thank you for that, Commander. Incidentally, what is your Navy’s stance on the search? By the time that information goes up the chain and back down to me, I’ll be toast.”
“Although we can’t supply all the underwater search vessels needed for this task, we’ll provide multiple support equipment, including UUVs, AUVs and their operators. They are a strong autonomous underwater search force, small and unmanned. We control them from the Trident Tine, while we support Cross and his Canyon Glider.”
“And visibility? We don’t want to start a panic with all the offshore activity. How will you handle that?”
“Simple. There won’t be any. One large unmarked white ship lumbering over the ocean, about five miles out. A few helicopters coming and going. A small submersible launching and landing from the deck. Nothing else. Its cover story will be for undersea fiber-optic cable repair. Happens all the time. They stay out there for weeks. The media is used to them.”
She sighed, realizing the story was believable. “Okay, I’ll pass that along to home office in my report tonight. It should make at least a few of them happy.”
“Hope that helps, Agent Gibbs. Gotta sign off. The Admiral is waiting. See you tomorrow.”
“Sure, Commander. Thank you for your help. This mare’s nest may just come together after all. Take care. Goodbye.”
Alone in her barren motel room, she sighed wistfully, holding the phone in her lap, thinking of home. Her son, Todd, was having his tenth birthday today, celebrating it without her: the first birthday she had missed, but Bryan had assured her that he would make it so much fun, Todd wouldn’t miss her. She doubted that. In her mind, she watched Todd blowing out the candles and wiped her eyes.
Bryan, her husband of fifteen years, had kissed her goodbye as she boarded the plane at BWI, not knowing where she was going or when she would return. Accustomed to her spontaneous mystery trips, he took the time to bond with the kids. Beginning to weep, she missed them dearly. On normal assignments, she knew she would return to her family once they ended. This one was different; it was not normal. There was a strong chance she would not return. She had to tell them. Aware of her restrictions, including contact with family and friends, she held up the phone and began to dial. On the ninth digit she stopped, cancelled the call and began sobbing into her hands.
Deputy Keller, seated in Sherriff Victor’s office, had planned to be enjoying the day off with his wife and three kids at Disneyland, but instead had been called in shortly after eight a.m. to explain and describe the SWAT strike on Ocean Drive. Victor, sitting back in his chair, his feet on his desk, thumbed through Keller’s report and grilled him, trying to clarify the scribbled writing.
“So the music was playing when you entered?
“No, not when I entered. They had already silenced it. It was playing when they entered.”
“Was the stereo warm? Did you check? Or had it just been turned on?”
“You know Sheriff, I did not check the amplifier, but the LP was over halfway done. I remember it was playing Vivaldi’s Summer. The thunderstorm part. Near the end. I remember when I looked at the tone arm, it was closing in on the lead-out groove.”
“Now refresh my memory. How long is an LP side? I haven’t seen one in ages. Can’t remember.”
“About twenty minutes.”
“So that means Fogner was in the house fifteen or twenty minutes before your team entered?”
“No, not necessarily. The turntable was on Repeat, so it would cycle back to the beginning of the record when it reached the end.”
Victor scanned further into the report, scrutinizing each page. “What about this pincushion wall, as you call it? Tell me about it.”
“It was a wall in the kitchen, by his worktable. Highly radioactive wall. It had close to fifty tiny holes in it, probably made by pushpins or thumbtacks. Some of the holes had small tears of paper and newspaper hanging from them as if the papers were rapidly torn from the wall. ”
Sitting up, eyebrows raised, boots off the desk, Victor said, “There’s our answers!” He read a few more lines into the report. “Did you find the papers?”
“No. Nor the pushpins. Stilson and a few deputies searched the trash and found nothing. All the cans and baskets were empty.”
On an impulse, Victor reached for the phone and called his command center.
“Orange County Sheriff’s Office, Garcia here.”
“Garcia, this is Sheriff Victor. I want two deputies to search the landfill for Dana Point, Ocean Drive pickup, specifically. I want a Geiger counter or two with them. They’ll be looking for a trash bag filled with paper scraps, probably newspapers, highly radioactive. That should simplify the search. Report back to me when they’re done. Thanks.”
Victor’s eyes were back on him expecting more. “Of course, the trash could have been taken to another dump or landfill, too. Let’s hope whoever threw it out just placed it on the curb for pickup.”
Victor was tiring of the elusive information. No Fogner, no real clues, nothing. “So after reading your report I see that our SWAT effort was basically a waste of time. Did you see anything that caught your eye?”
“Yes, I took some photos of the wall, the albums in the music room and a very strange small booklet in the same rack titled Shazam. We brought nothing back because of the radioactivity, but I have some photo printouts in the Adam SWAT file. You’re welcome to go through those, too.”
“Thanks. I will.” Victor flipped through the report searching for something, then stared out the window and back to him, waiting curiously. “One last question before you go. I remember that big Ocean Drive house on the hill. Used to drive by it during my deputy patrolling days. White Victorian, if I remember correctly, right?”
“Right.”
There was this widow’s walk high on its roof; a man with binoculars often stood up there watching the ocean. Occasionally he’d wave at me. Did you check up there?”
Keller flushed white as if he’d seen a ghost. He didn’t answer.
“You knew there was a widow’s walk, right?”
Looking at his feet, he muttered, “Um, no. We missed that, I guess. Sorry.”
Victor jumped up from his chair, threw the report across the room, and yelled, “What a bunch of incompetent asses. I knew I should have gone.”
He could almost see steam spewing from Victor’s ears. “I’m really sorry for the oversight, chief. I should have known, but we were so tied up worrying about the radioactivity, it slipped by us. Those things are common on the East Coast but rare as hen’s teeth in California. I just should have known.” He paused wondering how he could correct his error. “Want me to go back up there and check again? We taped it off, padlocked all the doors. It should be safe,”
“I sure as hell am not going to send another SWAT team up there.” He checked his watch. “You still have three hours of light available. Take Deputy Higgins with you and finish your job. Make sure he’s not there. I’ll expect you back in two hours. Thirty minutes down, a half-hour searching, and thirty minutes back, with thirty minutes to spare. Don’t forget your radiation suits.”
Turning to leave, he looked back. “Got it, Sheriff. Anything else?”
“Nope. Just do your job. And do it right this time.”
Quickly, he rounded up Higgins and told him the plan. Together they pulled on two blue Smurf suits, grabbed a couple M4s and a Geiger counter from the storage cage, loaded a cruiser, and headed down to Dana Point.
Thirty-five minutes later, he pulled into the driveway on Ocean Drive. The house was quiet, exactly as he left it. Yellow tape marked with big black letters stating CRIME SCENE — DO NOT CROSS stretched across the boarded-up front door, around the ground floor of the house then rejoined itself on the porch. He sat for minutes watching for movement. Nothing. It was still, except for a few trees moving gracefully in the onshore wind. Remembering Victor’s words, he opened his window and craned his neck, looking up to the widow’s walk. He could see only a corner, but it was empty.