CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Derek entered the FBI forensic lab, hoping for more good news. The fact that they had obtained a sample that yielded a limited genetic profile was a positive step, but he wanted more.
Part of that was due to his drive as an FBI agent.
Multiple young women had been killed over a period of twenty-two years.
That they knew of, it could have been longer than that.
The further back they went, the less there was to work with.
As an FBI agent, he needed to find the killer and bring them to justice, especially now that he was invested in the cases.
A larger reason for him to find some evidence that led somewhere was Alison Payne. He sometimes felt selfish about it, but he knew that he needed to find Emma Payne’s killer more than the other women’s. He hoped they all had the same killer, and if he found one, he would find them all.
"Tell me you have some good news for me," Derek said as he walked through the lab. He looked over at Dr. Somerset, the forensic scientist who had run the sample for him.
She looked up slowly, and that told him everything he wanted to know. She stopped what she was doing and waited for him to get to her desk.
"I’ve run it against every database we have, and there have been zero results," she said. "I’m sorry, I wish I had something more for you."
"It’s okay," Derek admitted. "I was half-expecting that. If we’re right about this guy, we know he’s as careful as they come. No arrests on record, no DNA ever collected, and if there are no matches, then no DNA left at any of the other crime scenes."
"I can liaise with foreign agencies if you think there might be a record of him elsewhere," Dr. Somerset said.
"Yeah, do it," Derek said. "I don't think he’s been active in another country. I think we’re looking for someone local. You never know though. We might get a hit through sheer luck. Goodness knows we could use it."
"I’ll see what I can do," Dr. Somerset said.
"Thanks again." Derek left the desk and walked back through the lab, out into the main offices.
They knew they were looking for a middle-aged Caucasian male. That was about all they knew. Likely someone local, someone who had been active in the area as a killer for many years. Someone careful. Perhaps someone who could move around the city without being noticed.
Does it have to be someone who can blend in?
It didn't need to be, but it would be helpful.
Derek was a product of his generation. They relied on modern technology and the techniques it brought. It would be wonderful to have a sample that matched. This guy was different. He was in the present now, but he wasn’t before. He was also active in the past.
What did that mean for Derek? Could he not rely on modern techniques? Did he have to rely on old-fashioned investigative work instead?
They had to use everything at their disposal to find their killer. He’d killed in the past, and the detectives back then had used the methods at their disposal. Those methods hadn’t worked. Derek had to apply what he knew now to reach back in time and grab their killer.
"Sullivan!" Agent Scott called.
Derek stopped in his tracks and diverted his course to the agent he had asked to look through any CCTV footage from around the scene of the most recent crime.
Perhaps there was some hope in that. If the killer was still rooted in the past, maybe they became less careful as technology advanced. Derek could only hope.
"What do you have for me?" Derek asked.
"It could be nothing," Agent Scott admitted. "You wanted anything from the footage, no matter how small, right?"
"Yes, anything," Derek said. "You have something?"
"Take a look at this."
The agent played a grainy CCTV clip from a camera near the park where Katrina Sands was found. They both watched together until Agent Scott paused the footage.
"Okay, do you see that van?" the agent asked.
"Yeah," Derek said, looking at a small, dark van with something written on the side.
The footage resumed.
"So, the van passed the camera, and then…sixty seconds later, it passed again, and…again, two minutes later, as if it’s looking for something.
Three minutes after that, it parks outside the park, and someone gets out and walks down the street.
I can't track where they go, so we don't know if they entered the park.
We do know"—he moved the footage forward—"that they get back into their van twenty minutes later and drive off.
The timing lines up with the Sands murder. "
"Okay," Derek said. "This could be something."
"That’s what I thought," the agent said.
"Now, we don't have any footage from the other murders that you believe might be connected. The next one goes back seven years, so there’s no chance of getting any footage from the area at that time.
However, I did take all the digitized information from all the previous cases and ran it through the pattern detection software, and it did kick out something. "
"Go on," Derek said.
"In the Walnut Creek murder from twelve years ago, one of the neighbors reported a van hanging around in the area before the murder, a contractor of some sort, but the old woman who reported it was a little…
well, out there, so there was never any notice taken, and it was before the murder and not at the murder scene.
However, she did say it was a smallish van, dark, with maybe a lock on the side? "
"Which matches with the van at the Sands scene?"
"I was able to enhance the image a little in the footage," Agent Scott said, bringing the image up on the screen. "It’s blurry, but that could be a lock on the side."
Derek stared at the blurry gray shape with lettering around it. "It could be. How about the letters around it? Are you able to make that any clearer?"
"That’s the best I can do," Agent Scott said. "I’ve run it through the AI software, but it doesn’t give anything. It does look like a company name, though."
"Maybe a locksmith, a security company, something like that?" Derek mused.
"I made some calls," Agent Scott said. "As many houses and businesses in the area at the Sands crime scene as I could, and no one reports using a contractor. I tried to go back seven years and checked with as many of the homeowners on the street where the woman saw the van, but again, nothing. If we could confirm that someone had a contractor at either scene, we might be able to discount it, but now, it’s worth looking into more. "
"This is very good," Derek said. "I’ll get onto looking for a company that has a lock."
"Way ahead of you," Agent Scott said. "I have compiled a list of companies for you to check out. If this is the guy you’re looking for, then he’ll have been at the company for at least seven years."
"You're the best," Derek said. "Please send me that list."
Seven years.
Derek thought about that as he walked away from the desk. Seven years was the starting point. If this was someone who could blend in, perhaps he had been working for the same company for the past twenty-two years and beyond. That would narrow down the list of suspects considerably.
***
"Thanks for coming down," Brian Dean said. "We’ve been analyzing all of the reports the killer has left for you, and the more we have, the more we can narrow down what we are looking for."
"And you found something?" Alison asked.
"Yeah, we did," Brian said. "There are some terms that appear across all four reports we’ve had time to look at. There are some common terms used, but it’s more about how things are termed and the evaluation frameworks.
We don't believe the author used them specifically, and they certainly had no knowledge they were doing so, but on a subconscious level, they likely have the same phrasing and formatting across all of their work. "
Alison was eager to interrupt and ask questions about what that all meant, but the tech put up his hand to stop her.
"You don't need me rambling on. You want to know how this helps us to get the killer."
Alison smiled and nodded.
"The first thing that is important is that this is the work of an academic, someone who has been in academia for a long time, and is classically educated.
They almost certainly hold a degree, likely a master's.
The way they write has been honed by time at university.
That's the starting point, but that’s not how we pinpoint them. "
Brian turned to his colleague, a younger woman.
"Yes," she said nervously, giving the impression that it was how she always spoke rather than being nervous to stand before Alison and Detective Moore.
"There are quite a few points were master able to match with a very specific set of documents within the California Department of Corrections, which I believe is where you worked, Dr. Payne. "
"It is," Alison confirmed.
"We’re looking at the internal training documents within the psychology department there," the young woman continued.
"I would say that we’re looking for either the writer or contributor of said document, someone who has used the documents extensively for training purposes, or someone who has been heavily influenced by the documents. "
Brian took over again. "We would recommend looking for someone who has been in the department for a long time."
"That tracks with what I thought," Alison said. "That was where I worked, or consulted with up until two years ago, and I’m sure we’re looking for someone who worked with me in a position of authority. There can't be that many people."
"I’m going to check in with the team," Moore said. "We’re almost there. They worked with you for a long time there, someone knowledgeable about the systems, and we have a description of them. We can get to them."
Hopefully, soon. We’re close, and if we can act, then we can put an end to the media outcry before it begins.
Alison considered the men she had worked with over the years, trying to think of any who had been there a long time and had a mustache. If they had to talk with everyone who might fit that description, they would do it, and Alison wouldn't sleep until they had found the right person.
Detective Moore appeared back in the small room.
"Do you have him?" Alison asked.
"No, but we should have a list of names in the next few minutes, and it won’t be extensive. We do this the old-fashioned way, going door to door if we need to. In the meantime, we play his game."
"What do you mean?" Alison asked.
"He’s left you another message," the detective said.