Her voice finally wavered a bit. No mother wants to find out that her son could be involved in a crime, especially one so heinous as an attack on a mass transit system.
“Mrs. Conlon. Please understand. Right now, no one is accusing Marc of planning the Metro attack. But the material we found in his computer makes it quite clear that he was on a bad path. He had contact with several less than savory people. He was exploring converting to Islam. He was talking to white supremacy groups. This is not the computer of some innocent who played Dungeons and Dragons in his spare time. This is the computer of a quiet revolutionary, gearing up for a serious change of routine.”
She shook her little mousy head and her wispy hair barely moved. “I’m telling you, he is innocent in all of this. He was a curious boy. He liked to see what made people tick. He wanted to live a hundred lives. Church, for example. He’s been to services at just about every single church in the metro area. It didn’t matter what the religion was, he was interested in how the people who attended responded to their environments. He wasn’t planning anything. He was just studying them. Studying the people and their actions. I know it in my heart.”
This was getting him nowhere fast. She would never admit her son could be involved in the attacks. He decided to try a different tack.
“Okay. Say I believe you, and Marc was doing research because he wanted to do a master’s thesis.”
She crossed her arms and gritted her teeth. “You’ll have to believe me, because that’s what he was doing. He had plans to finish college early and get his Ph.D. before he was twenty-five. He was a really smart kid.”
“Mrs. Conlon, please. In the course of his research, Marc came across some very nasty people. Did he ever mention being afraid of anyone in particular? Did he get calls late at night? Was he upset about anything?”
“My God, the boy was nineteen. He got calls at all hours, and was always upset. His hormones hadn’t settled yet.”
“Where is Marc’s father?”
She glanced at the floor. “Dead. When Marc was just a boy. I raised him myself. And that’s why I can assure you that he was not a bad kid. And he’s gone now. My baby is gone.”
She started to cry, and Fletcher stood. Nothing like browbeating a grieving mother to tears. There was nothing more to be learned here. He handed her his card.
“Mrs. Conlon, I may call on you again. I truly am sorry for your loss. I’ll show myself out.”
Driving back downtown, Fletcher couldn’t help but wonder if Marc Conlon had duped everyone in his life, or if his mother was telling the truth. If that was the case, it was entirely possible that his research had gotten him killed. Which meant Fletcher was back at square one. Again.
Chapter 37
Dillon, Colorado
Dr. Samantha Owens
Sam found Xander’s world more and more charming the longer she spent in it. And for someone who liked to keep to himself, he was practically a rock star around Dillon. Everyone knew him. Everyone welcomed him back with open arms. It was a good thing they weren’t trying to be subtle, because that would have been near on impossible. Sam understood why he’d chosen to hide out in the Maryland mountains instead of coming home. There, he could be alone. Here, that would never happen.
She got that. Entirely. It was one of the big reasons she’d chosen to move to D.C., just to get away from the constant noise of people caring.
After running into three more people who were happy to see him, they finally got settled at the restaurant with thick dark roast coffees, mouths watering at the smells emanating from the grill. Sam hooked into the free wireless and opened the website George had sent her to, Fotki. She pulled the Post-it note with the username and password from her wallet and logged into Loa Ledbetter’s account.
There were more than ten thousand pictures to sort through. Sam stifled an inward groan and remembered her plan—look to the events Ledbetter had immortalized on her walls first. Xander watched over her shoulder as she started sorting through the photos.
If the pictures were any indication, Ledbetter lived an amazing life. There were folders from every continent, every major city across the world. She did a search for Hawaii, and four separate folders popped up. She searched through them until she found the shot of Ledbetter on the plain below the volcano, the rosary pea plants next to her.
“I find it highly ironic that she’s the key to realizing the poison was abrin,” Xander said.
“No kidding. The simple fact that she’s been in contact with the plants makes me wonder what she might have had to do with this. And why a killer would go so far off the beaten path to discover how to weaponize the abrin, and use it to murder three people.”
“It’s looking more and more like a targeted assassination.”