The Bricklayer - Boyd Noah - Страница 31

“Meaning?”

“It takes a while for that to happen. Longer than the time between the shot and SWAT breaking in.”

“Are you saying he was already dead?”

“Yes.”

“Then who shot at you?”

“Whoever was at the Laundromat, and we saw coming in here.”

“So when we were driving by here, Bertok was already in here, dead.”

“Right.”

“Okay, this look-alike shoots at you, locks himself in this room, fires a shot to simulate the suicide shot.”

“Probably while holding the gun in Bertok’s hand in case of a residue test. Yes, that’s right.”

“That’s right?” Kate asked. “Then when SWAT broke in here, where was he? With the bars on the window, the only way out is the door where you and I and the L.A. cop were waiting to light him up.”

Without answering, Vail pulled on the evidence gloves. First he felt along the left edge casing, and after apparently not finding what he was looking for, he tried the right side. As he slid his hand along it, he found a gripping point and pulled the casing off. Inside was a metal plate into which were anchored the ends of the bars. He pushed the plate up and, reaching through the window, pushed the cage open. It swung out on the hinged edge of the other side. Vail put the casing back into place and pushed on it until it snapped into place. He climbed out through the window. Once on the ground, he swung the bars back into place, and a soft metal snap sounded when the bars reseated themselves in the hidden metal plate. He pulled on them to make sure they had locked into place.

“Those bars on the living room window were removed so anyone covering the back would have to also watch that side because escape was possible through that window. The Dumpster was probably put back there for cover so whoever went to the rear would be screened from this side of the house. This side would be ignored because the window was barred, which is exactly what we did.”

“But where did he go once he was outside?” Kate asked. “We were in the front and the cop with the shotgun was in the back.”

Vail walked over to the fence and tested several of the wooden boards until he found two next to each other that were not nailed at the bottom. He angled the lower ends away from each other and, half squatting, squeezed himself through the narrow opening. “I’ll be back in a few minutes.” He let go of the boards and they swung back into place.

Ten minutes later, he came back through the fence. “It’s just a short walk to the other side of the property. There’s a side street where he could have had another car parked.”

“How’d you know about the bars?”

“I didn’t, but when I felt the bars move back and forth and saw that pin-and-loop construction that could act as a hinge, it seemed like the only possibility. See, all those years in the construction trade weren’t wasted after all.”

Kate let all the implications run through her mind, trying to synthesize them into a logical explanation. “But Bertok’s gun was used in the homicides, three of them before he even disappeared. So how can it not be him?”

“The answer to that will require a call to the firearms unit at the lab.”

She had no idea what Vail meant but opened her cell phone and dialed FBI headquarters. Once she was put through to the lab, she asked for the examiner on the case and hit the speakerphone button. “Hi, this is Deputy Assistant Director Kate Bannon.”

“Mike Terry,” the examiner said.

“I’m calling on the Pentad case. I’m going to put on an agent named Steve Vail. Please answer any questions he might have.”

Vail took the phone. “Hi, Mike. You got a match on all the slugs with Bertok’s issue weapon, is that right?”

“And the casings. The one from the fourth murder and all those recovered at the house where he died.”

“Where is the gun now?”

“I’ve got it right here. I was just finishing my report.”

“Other than ballistics, did you do any examinations on it?”

“Not really. Assistant Director Kaulcrick called and said the comparisons were to be done immediately. At the time I was right in the middle of an examination for a customs agent who had been shot, so I went back to that once I had completed the Bertok tests.”

“I’d like you to take a look at the barrel of that Glock. It should have a serial number.” The examiner didn’t answer right away. “Mike?”

“Sorry. I was looking at the gun. It definitely has some wear. But the barrel, it looks much newer.”

“I thought it might.”

“But the casings matched. And they have nothing to do with the barrel. This has to be the gun used in the homicides.”

“Good enough. I’m just tying up some loose ends. Let me have the serial number on the barrel. For the office records.” After writing it down, Vail hung up and handed Kate the phone. “Call the armorer at Quantico and see if this is the barrel that was in Bertok’s gun when it was issued to him.” He handed her the slip of paper with the serial number on it.

Kate called Quantico and was put through to the armorer. She read him the serial number and, after five minutes, said thank you and hung up. “You were right. That is not the barrel that was originally in Bertok’s weapon. It all makes sense. Whoever did this committed the first three murders with a Glock 22 of their own, kidnapped Bertok, took his issue gun, and switched the barrel from the first three murders into his Glock. Then they committed the fourth murder with Bertok’s gun and left the casing because it would now match. Shot at you with the gun before escaping out the rigged window, and they had already placed Bertok’s body in here. Then they just had to leave the gun behind, which tied up all loose ends.” A look of revelation creased her features. “Which means that if all this was staged, the key in the moneybag can’t be anything more than another wild-goose chase.”

She looked at him to confirm her theory, but he was taking out fingerprint powder and a brush from the evidence kit. He dusted the white window frame with black powder. “Nothing there,” he said.

Then he took off the casing and dusted the metal release mechanism. “And nothing there. So much for a quick solution.”

Vail packed up the kit and took it out to the car. They got in and Kate asked, “What do we do now?”

“Do you have any contacts at ATF?”

“I could make a call to headquarters and find one.”

“We need a factory trace on the barrel.”

“Then what?”

“We’ll have to see where that leads us.”

“Is it me, or are we losing ground?”

“Well, let’s see. We now have five murders, we’re short four million nine hundred thousand plus, and we’re still being played like a whorehouse piano.” He smiled. “I’d say we’ve got them right where we want them.”

SEVENTEEN

THEY HAD BEEN DRIVING FOR ALMOST A HALF HOUR WHEN KATE cracked her window to let the warm sunny air stream across her face. It felt good against the cool artificial flow being pumped so uniformly throughout the car. She needed some sort of sensory feedback to separate the real from the staged. She, like everyone else, had been taken in by the Pentad’s plan to blame Stan Bertok for the murders. She let her mind find its way through the twists and turns of the case, looking for any inconsistency that the FBI would eventually have picked up on to lead them to the truth. She was not sure there were any. In the end, the money would not have been found, and the search for it would have become no more than a frustration eventually downgrading to a mild curiosity as everyone thankfully moved on to new priorities. She closed the window and looked back at Vail. He glanced at her with an absentminded smile. He didn’t seem to appreciate what he had done. Then a more immediate downside of the discovery hit her. “Do you want to tell Don about Bertok or should I do it?”