2:49 p.m.
5 hours 11 minutes until Cassandra’s deadline Ralph and I sat in silence after watching the video. Terry stared at me quietly from my computer screen. A long moment and then another passed. The stillness in the room seemed like sacred ground, and none of us wanted to be the first to trespass across it.
Ralph was clenching and then unclenching his fists. “Terry, make sure this isn’t posted anywhere on the web. You know Angela Knight in our cybercrime division?”
“Yeah. She’s good.”
“The best.” Ralph looked at his watch, no doubt factoring in Quantico’s three hour time difference. I knew Angela works nights, comes in at 5:00. “Give her a call,” he said to Terry, “and get her a copy of this. Have her sweep the web, look for any postings. If this is on the Internet we need it taken down. Now.”
“OK.” Terry began clicking his keyboard. “If it’s on there, we’ll get it off. We’ll also analyze the video, the digital resonance, the content. Everything.”
“Good,” I said. “When was the email sent?”
“At 8:51 a.m.”
“Can you tell where it’s from?”
I saw Terry referring to some handwritten notes beside his computer. “Whoever sent it knows how to hide his tracks. He positioned it as a piece of junk mail and sent it through a spam router in the Ukraine. Ever since I opened the file I’ve had my computer tracking it.” He glanced at his notes. “So far we’re up to seventeen transfers in four countries. It could take ten or twelve hours to find the original source.”
I shook my head. “We don’t have-”
“I know,” he said. “I know.”
“All right,” said Ralph. “Keep on it.”
“Terry,” I said, “I have some encrypted files for you from Cassandra’s computer. I’ll send them to you. See what you can decipher.”
“Done.”
After we’d ended the chat and I’d sent him the files, I asked Ralph,
“Can you tell what kind of building that tank is in?”
He shook his head. “Hard to say. Concrete floor… hardly any basements in California, so maybe a garage. Could be a deserted factory, a boiler room somewhere. Any of a hundred warehouses down by the shipyards.”
“OK,” I said. “So unless Austin Hunter sent this video to himself, he’s no longer our primary suspect in Cassandra’s disappearance.”
“Exactly,” he said.
“Let’s watch it again. But this time, look at everything except Cassandra. Whoever filmed this video was concentrating on her, distracted by her. You could hear it in the way his breathing changed.
He might have been careless, let something slip into the frame that can help us find her.” I clicked “play” again.
We were halfway through the second viewing when Lien-hua arrived. I saw her stand frozen beside the door. When the video ended, her lips parted as if she was about to say something, but it never came. She shook her head, her eyes intense. Frighteningly intense. I don’t think Ralph noticed. But I did.
“Is that Cassandra?” she asked.
I nodded.
She took a seat beside me. “Play it again.”
I did. And when it was finished, a moment of silence washed over the room once again.
Lien-hua pulled out her notepad. “All right. At least we’ve got time on our side.”
“How do you figure?” asked Ralph.
“After all the work of constructing that tank, abducting Cassandra, then chaining her inside, it’s unlikely he’ll move her.
If we can find where she was when he shot the video, we’ll find where she is now.”
Her words rang true to me. “OK.” I looked at my watch. “It’s 3:01. Assuming 8:00 p.m. is really our deadline, that gives us less than five hours to find Cassandra.” I set the timer on my watch to go off in four and a half.
“Lien-hua, what’s your take on this?” asked Ralph. “What struck you when you saw the video?”
“Everything is specific: the camera angles, the timing of the shots, the tank. It all plays into his fantasy. The camera doesn’t shake.
There’s no hesitation. He’s done this before. Cassandra isn’t his first.” This was her turf. Profiling. And even though I didn’t want to admit it, her observations seemed to be right on target.
“All right,” said Ralph. “Before we go any further, I’ll call the police department, see what kind of help they can give us. Maybe Lieutenant Graysmith’s attitude will change when he sees this video.
Also, I need to call FBI Director Rodale back and brief him. We meet back here in five minutes.” I was glad Ralph was here to take the reins, that way I could focus more on the case than coordinating a team.
While he made his calls, I stepped out of the room to grab a drink from the water fountain at the end of the hall, the words paralyzed prey ringing in my head once again.
Shade phoned Melice and had started to give him instructions when a woman’s voice said, “Who is this?”
End call.
It was Shade’s first mistake.
And Shade vowed it would be the last.
So Melice had given the phone away, or lost it. That did not make Shade happy. No, everything lay in too delicate a balance to be making foolish mistakes.
Perhaps track down and then eliminate the woman? Yes. That could be done easily enough.
But on the other hand, it would be better to stick to the plan for the time being. Only move on her if necessary.
No, Shade hadn’t said enough to her to cause suspicion. Not nearly enough.
Shade tapped a cell phone key, and a photo, sent from a friend, filled the screen. Shade stared at the twenty-two-year-old woman standing at a funeral, her grief captured in digital clarity.
Dark glasses. Black hair.
Lien-hua Jiang.
Long before she became a special agent. Even before she was a detective. The tears on her cheeks, frozen in time.
This was the key, the reason for everything that was about to happen.
Shade would find another way to be in touch with Melice. Until then, it was just a matter of watching and waiting and staying focused.
Without making any more careless mistakes.
After Ralph had made the calls and we were all back in the room he said, “All right. This has officially shifted from a missing person investigation to a kidnapping. It’s related to the arson investigation, though. I explained to Rodale that you two know more about what’s going on here than anyone, and that we need your help to find Ms.
Lillo. He gave you the green light to stay involved. So, let’s do this and let’s do it right.”
“Good,” I said, glad to be officially on the case.
“OK. Let’s watch it again,” said Lien-hua.
“This time,” I said, “let’s be specific. Ralph, watch for images on the glass. Earlier when we watched it, I saw a glint. Maybe you can see something in the foreground, a reflection of the cameraman.”
He nodded, his jaw set.
“Lien-hua, concentrate on Cassandra: the way she’s blinking; could it be Morse code? Is she mouthing anything? Her hands-is she signaling in some way? Look for any indication that she’s trying to get us a message.”
She nodded, positioned her legal pad in front of her, and slid a pen into her hand.
“I’ll focus on the chain and the pipe and the message on the wall,” I said.
Then, I began to play the video once again.
Inside the office of the warehouse, Creighton Melice checked his watch. Shade was supposed to have contacted him fifteen minutes ago, at 3:00 p.m., but he hadn’t heard from him at all since the call last night directing him to pick up Cassandra. Of course Creighton didn’t have his phone, but he did have email and Shade had often used that before. Creighton didn’t like it when things did not go according to schedule.
He glanced at the live video feed of the tank.
The water was up to Cassandra’s waist now. She couldn’t sit down to rest any longer. So it looked like it would be a long afternoon for her. He would have preferred filming all of this in real-time web streaming, but Shade had insisted that it would be too easy to track the location if they posted it on the web.
Possibly.
Probably.
As annoying as he was, Shade did tend to be right.
But still, it would have made for a satisfying day.
He watched her press her hands uselessly against the glass. Yes.
He would use the tank one last time with the woman Shade had promised him, and then everything would come to a glorious finish.
She took a breath, bent into the water, and tugged at the chain with both hands.
Let her tug.
The others had tried that as well. That chain was not going to break.