Chapter 6
Six
Turned out, there was an organization—of sorts—to Carter’s mess.
A couple figure eights stalked through the two tables, a rifling through printouts and photos, and Lincoln had it mostly sorted out.
Piles were organized around Dr. Fear’s four activity cycles.
For a three-year window before the first couple killed in each cycle, Carter had pulled county hospital and census records as well as university enrollment and employment records.
The pile of microfiche next to the reader was from thirty-two years ago and didn’t correspond to any of Dr. Fear’s cycles.
Lincoln assumed that was the thing Carter had been originally looking into here in Apex.
Lincoln moved on from that stack, even though a part of him desperately wanted to dig deeper into it, wanted to figure out what Carter had been doing here and what he was looking for.
Maybe Lincoln could help. Curiosity, cat, and all that.
But they were here on the clock, on a different case, and Lincoln needed to focus.
Glasses on, he pulled a legal pad and pen out of his bag, claimed a chair at the table with the pile that had Anthony’s hospital record flagged on top, and drew the mess of records toward him.
Two hours later, he’d confirmed Carter’s initial assessment.
No other trace of Anthony, and no trace of his wife or any of the other five people killed in that cycle of Dr. Fear’s activity twenty-five years ago.
Anthony had blown out a tire on the interstate and run into the guardrail.
He’d been brought into the ER to stitch up a few cuts and to confirm no concussion.
He hadn’t been in the county hospital more than twenty-four hours, his car in a garage in Apex only long enough to replace the tire.
Lincoln pushed the now neatly arranged stack of papers aside to make room for his pen and paper.
He scratched out a list of other archives and records to pull—all local.
Carter had done a good first cut by searching hospital, census, and university data.
He’d confirmed that Anthony wasn’t from Apex.
So now they needed to focus on the narrow time period when he was in Apex—DMV, police, and garage records.
Who was on the scene? Who towed the car?
Where was it towed to? Who worked at that garage?
The same for the hospital personnel that treated Anthony and, if they could identify them, any hotel or restaurants Anthony visited during his twenty-four hours in Apex.
Who had he crossed paths with? That was the list Lincoln ultimately needed.
He flipped the sheet of paper and made another list—all the characteristics of Anthony that he could recall off the top of his head.
Basic demographics—age, race, height, weight, hair color, eye color—then education, places of residence, any medical conditions, and last but not least, his fear: the dark.
For his wife, Rebecca, also murdered, it had been rats.
Dr. Fear had trapped them in a rat-infested basement with no lights.
Kept them there until they’d succumbed to their fears and begged for their deaths, then delivered a single kill shot to each of their heads.
A phantom tickle of flames licked the soles of Lincoln’s feet, the tips of his fingers, the ends of his hair, as it often did when he dove into this case.
He had to stand and walk around the tables to shake it off.
There was only one other thing that scared him worse than fire—performing in front of strangers—and he’d had to contemplate both today.
He made another lap around the tables before sitting at the one with the pile that had Zia’s hospital record flagged on top.
He didn’t expect to find Ruby or Chase but having fewer names to look for made fast work of the stack.
He didn’t find them, nor did he find Zia’s murdered girlfriend, Quinn.
Nor any other patients in common with Anthony’s stack; not surprising given the years apart, but still no commonalities.
And there was nothing else in the records, or the similar lists Lincoln made, that pinged any of his investigative senses.
No characteristics shared, no crossed paths—virtual strangers, and like Anthony, Zia was the only one with a fleeting connection to Apex.
Just two people passing through a college town off a major highway that led toward DC, where they had both lived at the time of their deaths.
Maybe that could be discounted as coincidence.
Except when Lincoln found Dr. Fear’s first victim from his second cycle twenty-two years ago in the stack Carter had pulled for that time window, coincidence seemed less likely.
And when he found the first victim in the stack from twelve years ago, coincidence would have flown right out the window if the archives dungeon had any.
Fucking hell, was this it? Was this the missing link they’d never discovered? The first victim in each of Dr. Fear’s cycles had passed through this tiny town? Had he identified them here? And if so, how had that one victim led to the others in each cycle?
He needed to call Ollie. And Carter.
He needed to get out of this room before the phantom flames licking his feet somehow morphed into reality and burned all these archives to the ground.
Fear and excitement powering his steps, he traded his glasses for his phone and impatiently took the elevator up to the main level, nearly running into Jeremiah on his way out the front door.
“You may want to grab a—”
Jeremiah’s suggestion could wait; Lincoln’s calls couldn’t. “I’ll be right back!”
He almost stumbled on his way down the library’s steps, not paying attention to his feet as he scrolled through his phone contacts.
He caught himself, one-handed, on the railing, drawing curious looks from the couple other passersby, but his mind was racing too fast to care.
Ditto caring about the snowflakes that were making his lashes stick and creating wet spots on the face of his phone.
He found the contact he was after, hit it, and hustled over to the nearest bench as he waited for the call to connect.
Oliver picked up on the second ring. “Have you found something?”
“Did Ruby or Chase ever mention coming through Apex or a county hospital out here in the past three years?”
“Not that I recall.”
“That’s fine. I didn’t expect they would, but I wanted to check.”
“L, I can tell from your voice that you weren’t calling to confirm a negative. What’ve you got?”
“The first victim in each of Dr. Fear’s cycles passed through the county hospital here in Apex, an exit up from the university. Including Zia.”
“Are you certain?”
“There’s a hospital record for each of them.
Short stays, no one longer than thirty-six hours.
We need to do some more digging as to how they got there—DMV and police records—but, Ollie, this is the first commonality we’ve found among the victims, aside from death by the thing they feared.
This is where each cycle starts.” Glancing up, he saw Carter striding across the quad toward him.
Lincoln flagged him to move faster, excited to share the news in person.
“Were any of the other victims through there?” Oliver asked.
“No, it’s just one half of the first set in each cycle.
” He scooted over, making room for Carter on the bench next to him.
He held the phone up between them, not on speaker but close enough so that they could both speak to and hear Oliver.
“Dr. Fear is following them,” Lincoln said.
“From Apex to DC, then proceeding from there.”
“That’s one question off the table,” Oliver said, “at least with respect to the start of each cycle. They’re identifying the first kill there, in Apex.”
“So,” Carter said, “stands to reason maybe Dr. Fear is here. They’ve had a connection to this town for at least the past twenty-five years.”
“Stands to reason,” Lincoln agreed. “Ollie, my partner, Agent Carter Warren. Carter, Senator Oliver Kirk.”
“Pleased to speak with you, sir,” Carter said.
“Same, Agent Warren. Thank you for your work on this case already, and for having L’s back in the field there.”
“I won’t tell you which of those tasks has been easier.”
“Oh, I’m aware,” Oliver said.
“Can we get back to the case, please?” Lincoln interrupted, even though he was grateful for the smile he heard in Oliver’s voice.
“We need to know why Dr. Fear shifts. Is it as random as we thought or is there a connection between the victims. A to B to C? Maybe this isn’t about you, Ollie.
Maybe it’s a connection from Zia or Quinn to Ruby or Chase, and the copycat figured out that connection too. ”
“Or maybe,” Carter said, “Dr. Fear started a cycle with Zia and the copycat hijacked it for attention. Copycats usually idolize, in some way, the criminal they are mimicking. What better way to grab his idol’s attention than to make a go at Senator Kirk, the person who last chased Dr. Fear?”
“Let me work on the first question with the team here, see if we can find a connection between A and B.”
“Ollie, you’re too close—”
“L, you called me, not Beverley—which protocol dictates, by the way—because other than you, I am the other best person to work this case. And fuck knows, I need something to do besides worry.”
He was right; it hadn’t even crossed Lincoln’s mind to call Beverley.
He’d face-palm if he could actually feel where his frozen forehead was; he’d rather not give himself a bloody nose, literally or metaphorically.
“Okay, you pick up the victims’ thread there, and we’ll home in on suspects here.
See who each of the first victims crossed paths with at the hospital and in Apex. ”
“I’ll update Bev,” Oliver said. “Good work, agents. Keep us posted.”
Call ended, Lincoln lowered the phone, then lifted his gaze to Carter’s. Credit was due. “You may have cracked this case.”
“I had a good teacher.” He smiled, the soft, genuine grin that made Lincoln’s skin heat for entirely different reasons. “Even if he can’t remember to wear a coat in winter.”
Fuck, Lincoln bet that’s what Jeremiah was going to say before he’d ducked out. Probably also why those passersby had looked at him like he’d lost his mind, on top of almost falling down the stairs.
“I didn’t think—” Lincoln’s words died as Carter settled his jacket over his shoulders, heat of a different sort enveloping him. Leather, coffee, and fresh biscuits tickled Lincoln’s nose. “Thank you.”
Carter’s hands lingered on the collar, pulling the flaps of the jacket tight around Lincoln, and damn if Lincoln didn’t wish for Carter to pull a different direction.
Closer, toward him. The slightest tug and Lincoln would go tumbling despite his better judgment.
But right then, high on the victory of the first lead on the Dr. Fear case in years, he felt like diving.
Deeper into those green eyes, into the dark curls the V-neck of his blue Henley teased at, into the heat everything about Carter Warren promised.
Carter pulled away instead, clearing his throat and standing.
“We should get inside where it’s warm and see what else we can find.
” He held his hand out to Lincoln, the silver band catching the afternoon sun.
A miniature flame where seconds ago there had been a raging fire, one Lincoln had both feared and considered walking into.
That was a first. As was Carter’s restraint.
It surprised Lincoln more than he expected. Impressed him too.
He slid his hand into Carter’s. It wasn’t the heat he’d wanted but he’d take it. “Let’s go.”