Close to Home (Tracy Crosswhite #5)

“What is it?”

“Just look at it. I don’t want to color your perception. After you do, call me back.” Owens disconnected.

Tracy stopped the video playing on her computer and went into her e-mail account. She saw Owens’s e-mail, opened it, and clicked on the link. As she watched, she leaned forward, feeling a rush of heat much like when she’d been having hot flashes.

“I’ll be damned,” she said.



A little more than an hour later, Tracy dropped her briefcase on the floor beside her cubicle closet. Del and Faz, seated at their desks, both took notice. “You got to see this,” she said.

“Got a lot to tell you,” Del said, pushing away from his desk and approaching.

“Got a lot to show you,” Tracy said. She sat at her desk without taking off her jacket, entered her password, and pulled up her e-mail.

Del and Faz stood behind her. “What is it?” Faz asked.

“Just watch.”

They hovered over her as she pulled up the link in Owens’s e-mail and skipped the advertisement. As the video played, she rolled back her chair to give Del and Faz a better view of her screen monitor. In the video, a man and a woman stood arm’s-length apart. They each wore black T-shirts, the man in shorts, the woman in sweatpants. The man held a faux yellow-colored gun at the woman’s chest, while narrating in a thick British accent. In a split second, he no longer held the gun; the woman had disarmed him, and aimed the gun at his head.

“What is this?” Del said.

“YouTube,” Tracy said. “The Bremerton detective sent it to me. The woman in the video is Leah Battles.”

“The defense attorney?” Faz asked, sounding incredulous.

“Same one.”

They watched as the instructor went back through the disarming, this time step-by-step. Battles held the gun at his chest. Moving slow and deliberately, the instructor pivoted sideways, out of the line of fire, while simultaneously gripping the wrist holding the gun with his left hand and violently snapping the barrel in the opposite direction with his free hand.

“If her finger was on the trigger,” the instructor said, “it would be broken.”

He moved to the next technique. This time Battles held the gun at his abdomen. As with the prior example, the instructor moved too quickly for Tracy to fully assess his actions, but somehow he’d again disarmed Battles and aimed the gun at her.

“Damn,” Faz said.

The instructor went back through the four-step technique that resulted in his yanking the gun free.

As the third technique started, Tracy said, “This is the one I wanted you to see.”

The instructor pointed the barrel of the gun at Leah Battles’s forehead. “The key,” he said, “is once you make the decision to move, you cannot hesitate.”

Battles ducked while raising her arms. She gripped the weapon and shoved the barrel toward the ceiling as her right knee simulated a blow to the groin. Stepping away, she bent the barrel into her assailant and snapped his wrists down, yanking free the gun.

“What is this stuff?” Del asked again.

Tracy sat back, still staring at the video. “Krav Maga,” she said.

“Krav what?” Faz said.

“It’s the way Leah Battles could have taken Laszlo Trejo’s gun and shot him.”





CHAPTER 40


After a very long night working to put together a coordinated effort between the Seattle Narcotics Unit, SWAT, and the Violent Crimes Section, Del and Faz accompanied a SWAT team to the home of Eric Tseng at just before four in the morning.

Tseng’s rental in Rainier Beach was not far from the intersection in which Trejo ran down D’Andre Miller, as well as the easement where they’d located Trejo’s Subaru. The address likely explained who came to Trejo’s rescue the night of the hit and run. If Tseng was a seasoned drug dealer, he might also have had the forethought to wipe down the interior of the car, including the air bag, to eliminate prints. It didn’t, however, explain how the convenience store videotape had gone missing.

Earlier surveillance revealed the home to be a rambler—a rectangular structure with pea-green wood siding. Instead of just the one story, which was traditional for ramblers, the house had two stories, with the two-car garage located below the front walk and the three stairs leading up to the front door. The door and ground-floor windows were protected by black security grates. Most problematic, however, were the two dogs roaming a cyclone-fenced front yard. They looked to be a mixed breed and they weren’t small. They also barked when anyone walked near the fence. Sneaking up to the house would not be an option, even armed with a “no-knock” warrant from the King County court, which allowed SWAT to raid the home without announcing themselves.

As agreed, the tactical team used two armored vehicles and multiple officers to cordon off the street and the easement behind the home. Once the officers were in place, two animal control officers went through the gate, secured the dogs, and moved them out of the yard. At the same time, to distract anyone inside the house from the dogs’ barking, a SWAT team negotiator called the cell number Tseng had provided to Evans. She shook her head.

“No answer.”

The SWAT team leader, a burly man named Glenn Ekey, asked her to call the number again. She did, with the same result.

Not wanting to wait and potentially give Tseng time to arm himself or dispose of evidence, Ekey gave the order to proceed.

At just after 4:00 a.m., Del watched SWAT members, dressed in full tactical gear, move toward the front door carrying a battering ram. The metal security door opened with a loud clatter and the wood door gave way with what sounded like a pop. The SWAT officers entered quickly and with practiced precision. Del heard their voices broadcast over the radio as they searched room to room, clearing them. Lights in the adjacent houses and across the street snapped on. Dogs barked. A few of the neighbors stepped out onto their porches in pajamas, shorts, and T-shirts.

Del and Faz waited.

Within minutes of entering, two of the SWAT officers stepped back out the front door to speak to Ekey. Ekey listened, then turned and gestured for Faz and Del to approach.

“Do you know what this guy looks like?” Ekey asked.

“Just from DMV photos,” Del said, not getting a good feeling about what the SWAT team had found inside the house and what he was about to see.

Ekey led Del and Faz inside. The upper floor was sparsely furnished. Descending stairs, Del heard music and smelled a pungent odor. The music and smell became more prominent when they followed Ekey into a daylight basement with a 72-inch television, recliner chairs, and a fully stocked bar. Someone shut off the music. Eliminating the pungent smell would not be so simple. Eric Tseng sat slumped in one of the recliners, head flopped to the side, blood splattered on the leather and pooled on the floor. Del estimated the kill was at least a couple days old, very probably the same night as Laszlo Trejo.





CHAPTER 41