Overby nodded and looked at O’Neil, who was opening his briefcase and extracting a folder. ‘Crime-scene report from Orange County?’ Overby asked.
‘That’s it. Not much. Some trace elements. Footprints that probably are the Louis Vuitton. They have good security video at the Global Adventure theme park but all it shows is the crash, then our man jumping over the car through the gate. The teams down there canvassed a hundred people but nobody saw anybody who could’ve been him.’
He added, ‘And some OC detectives looked over Prescott, fine-tooth comb. Talked to most of his friends, bosses, co-workers. All his redneck buddies. No connection to our unsub. He just randomly pulled the picture of Solitude Creek off the web and posted it in his rant.’
Dance said, ‘So, he just had the bad luck to pick our boy’s attack to use in his post.’
O’Neil continued, ‘There were nearly four thousand texts and voice calls out of the park, once the rumors started to spread. Some of those would be his prepaid mobiles. But Orange County can’t devote manpower to go through every one and try to narrow it down.’
Overby said, ‘He caused all that chaos by a few phone
calls?’
‘Pretty much that’s it. But he was smart. He spread the rumors verbally in the park too. And the patrons helped him out, of course, when they texted and tweeted. Online media and TV picked up the story in seconds, and then those who weren’t at the park would text their family members and friends who were inside.’
Overby nodded. ‘Chain reaction.’
‘Flash mob,’ Dance said. ‘No prints on anything, not even shell casings – at either scene, Prescott’s apartment or the theme park. And the car he stole from the airport here?’ O’Neil explained it had been a sloppy theft, suggesting he wasn’t a pro at the art.
But, she reflected, it had worked.
Overby’s cheek twitched up. ‘So, nothing other than the phone.’
O’Neil said, ‘I’ve found something else, though. Not really a lead. But it’s something to throw into the mix about our unsub.’
‘What’s that?’ TJ asked.
‘Remember that Jane Doe?’ He spread out the photos that Dance had seen. ‘The asphyx?’ O’Neil explained about the homicide he was working, the attractive young woman found in a seedy motel, the bag rubber-banded over her head.
Never rains but it pours …
‘Could have been consensual sex gone wrong, could have been intentional. We don’t know for sure. Except for this.’ He opened the folder and extracted a photograph. It was a still from a security video. The picture was black-and-white but it clearly showed a light-colored Honda Accord.
‘No tag number,’ Dance noted, shaking her head.
Sometimes it was that easy. Not often. Not now.
‘Where was it?’
‘A block from the motel where our Jane Doe died. I had some MCSO officers canvassing all the businesses around the area and one came back with this.’ Tapping the picture.
‘The connection, though?’ Overby asked.
O’Neil pulled another crime-scene picture out of the back of the folder and set it beside the Jane Doe. It was of Stan Prescott’s body.
Looking from one to the other, Dance said, ‘It’s the same pose as Prescott, same cause of death. Asphyxiation. Both lying on their backs. Both images are stark: the victims are lying in pools of bright light from nearby lamps.’
‘Why would he kill her?’ Overby wondered aloud.
Dance offered, ‘The TOD on the Jane Doe was just after Foster leaked the info about what the unsub was wearing. Maybe she’d seen his outfit – the worker’s jacket with the logo he’d worn to Solitude Creek. And he realized she could ID him.’
O’Neil: ‘Could be why she didn’t have a phone or computer or notebook. That could lead to him. The scenario: she wasn’t from here. They met in a bar, had a oneor two-night thing. They were going their separate ways but he had to take her out.’
Dance asked, ‘But why the parallel means of death?’
‘Sadism,’ Overby suggested.
Maybe. That wasn’t, however, a question that interested Dance at this point. She had only one query in mind: was their unsub back in town, with another venue in his sights?
CHAPTER 56
Antioch March was thinking of Calista Sommers.
The police still didn’t have her name. In the media, she was referred to as Jane Doe. A picture had been released. Her death was either murder or some kind of weird sado-sexual thing.
He just happened to be driving near the bar where he’d picked her up earlier in the week.
A martini for her, a pineapple juice for him.
She’d still be alive if she hadn’t been brash enough to fling open his closet in search of a robe. Modesty. That was what’d killed her. She’d have seen the outfit that he’d worn at Solitude Creek, when he’d moved the truck to block the exit doors. At that point, the announcement had not been made that a witness had seen him – so he hadn’t thought anything of it. Shortly thereafter, at the movie theater, he’d learned that the public had gotten the word. Why on earth they’d released his description he still couldn’t fathom.
The police’s disclosure not only saved him at the theater incident it had got Calista dead. As soon as he’d left the McDonald’s near the theater, after learning of Ms Agent Dance, he’d taken a drive to Calista’s motel in Carmel. Hoping she hadn’t heard the description broadcast. But no. She’d been pleasantly surprised to see him. He asked if she wanted to take a drive. And once they were under way, how ’bout an adventure? Some little no-tell motel?
‘You naughty boy …’
You’re so fucking handsome …
And then …
Sorry, Calista.
‘No, no. …’
He pictured her on the floor of the cheap place, shivering as she died. The plastic bag over her head. Five, six minutes was all it had taken.
He now tucked away the happy memory and continued to one of the places he’d found a few days ago, perfect for another attack: a church reception hall.
It was astonishing to him, the number of people killed in stampedes related to religion.