For kimmy4eytj. This chapter has been a long time coming.
"You're going to want to see this." Brody's voice broke through Young's reverie.
It was Sunday and it was still snowing lightly outside. There was no new news from Telford and now three crime scenes worth of evidence starting to come in. He had been turning over in his head the various people who had come up in the course of the investigation and the locations of the crime scenes. Sometimes he had found you had to take time to think, not just react.
"What is it?" Young said, not looking up from the map.
"I wasn't actually looking for it, but I've been going through the case files you've got from the gypsies. It just seemed too coincidental. I wanted to check them out before I put them aside. Now mostly they're nothing special but I've run all the names again and this time I've run them with some broader search parameters with variants on the names."
Young looked up
"So you've been through the aliases for Simeon McNiven, none of which had his original birth history attached to them."
"Yeah, doesn't surprise me." Young said, still staring at a map. "So what have you found?"
"I took your searches a bit further yesterday and on one of his aliases Simeon Gates, in known associates is a Kiva Masim."
Young's head shot up and he stared at Brody.
"Kiva?"
Brody nodded. "It only flagged up in my head when I looked over the files for the gypsies again as she wasn't taken into custody." He tapped at the laptop. "And it's not a common first name and the name of the de facto leader of your gypsies."
Young stood and walked over to look over Brody's shoulder.
"But what's more interesting," Brody continued, "is that doing a search on the databases for women named Kiva within a reasonable age bracket and excluding black and other ethnicities that can't be a potential match, it brings up just one. DoB is a couple of years different, but Kiva Luciani is wanted in three states for credit card fraud, and when you look into her history, that record not only has a birth history, she has an older half brother called Simeon Luciani with a full history until the age of twenty six."
"Any other points of correspondence between the two?" Young asked.
"Oh yeah." Brody looked over his shoulder at Young and grinned.
Two clicks of his mouse he brought a series of scanned surveillance photos. They were old, that was evident from the clothes, but what was most interesting was the people who were apparently accompanying the subject of the photos. They were younger, much much younger but still recognisable. Kiva could only have been at most in her late teens, and Simeon, hand on Kiva's shoulder in most of the photos appeared to be in his late twenties.
"That's a familiar pair of faces." Young said leaning over his shoulder.
Brody grinned an impish expression looking up at him sideways.
"Yep. And now those gypsies turning up on the Armstrong's land makes a whole lot more sense huh?"
"Yeah, yeah it does, a whole lot more sense."
"So where is this Kiva now?" Wray asked.
"She wasn't one of the ones who was taken into custody." Young said, with a sigh of frustration. "Her caravan and vehicles were completely clean and there was no reason to detain her." He sat back down. "Of course, the state police were convinced she was the ringleader, but they had no way to prove it."
"And we have nothing specific to detain her on now." Brody mused. "But we can seek her as a potential witness to Ginn McNiven being missing as she's the woman's sister in law."
Young nodded. "I'll put out a BOLO to state police for her vehicles, although I doubt she's in the state anymore."
"You never know." Brody said. "We may get lucky."
They spent the rest of the day working through the evidence from the fire at the Caine's and Doctor Rush's apartment. It was minimal, and all the available identifiable fingerprints on the door, throughout the apartment and in the communal areas of the apartments could all be identified. One by one they were attributed to residents, close family members who had stated they had been there and volunteered prints, and strangely, a large number of prints in the kitchen, living area and bedroom from Chloe Armstrong.
"I'll phone." Camile said picking up the handset.
Young looked relieved. She felt sorry for him, serial killers were rare and for a small town sheriff, that was a tough break.
"I'll put some more coffee on." He said. "Becky's mom dropped by earlier and left us a pot of chilli we can microwave."
"Yeah, that'll do me." Said Brody, pushing himself to his feet. "Camile?"
She nodded and tapped the phone number in. Stella, Miss Armstrong's secretary answered which seemed unusual on a Sunday. She asked if Miss Armstrong was in.
"Of course Miss Wray, sorry, Agent Wray, I'll put you through."
Camile waited for Stella to put her through to Chloe Armstrong. Icarus' Industries hold music was opera. Not Camile's favourite. Finally there was a quiet beep, a click and Chloe's voice cut in.
"Agent Wray, what can I do for you?"
"Miss Armstrong. Thank you for agreeing to talk to me. I'm sorry to disturb you but I was just wondering about something."
"It's no problem Agent Wray, please ask."
Camile leaned back in her chair. "We've been running all of the fingerprints from Doctor Rush's apartment…"
Chloe laughed quietly, interrupting Camile. "…and you've found my prints in his apartment. Doctor Rush has been a friend of the family for a long time, he was my father's oldest and closest friend. Being honest, though I am sure he won't thank me for this, he had taken my father's death hard. I've been there for him, there's been a couple of times I've taken him home and put him to bed. I've been over there and made him dinner a couple of times as well, last Saturday I was there, the previous Tuesday." There was a pause, Camile thought she heard Chloe swallowing, but maybe she imagined it. "He's like family Agent Wray." She said more quietly.
"Thank you Miss Armstrong." Camile said. "You've been very helpful."
She looked at Brody and Young, listening in silently on the other handsets and put the phone down. Young took a deep breath, held it and then let it out again.
"You believe her?" She asked them, tipping her head a little.
Brody pursed his lips. Young shrugged.
"It fits with what I saw the other night." Brody offered. "And possibly with what you saw at Icarus."
"It's a bit weird, but it doesn't fit with a motive for her to be the arsonist." Young added.
"I agree," Camile said. "I'm not sure what's going on there, but I don't think she's the arsonist. If Mr Armstrong was a murder victim, then maybe I'd think that he'd found out about their relationship and disapproved, but that was an accident."
"I can't find anything that suggests it wasn't." Brody said. He sat back from his laptop. "It's half past six and I'm going round in circles."
Camile sighed and nodded. "You're right." She closed the applications she was working on, tapped a few keys on her computer and it began to power down. "Time to shut down for the evening, look at it all with fresh eyes in the morning."
xxxoooxxx
Young was already at the Sheriff's office when Camile and Brody arrived the next morning. He was talking to an older woman at the counter. His face was the picture of tolerant interest. The woman looked annoyed and unhappy. Camile avoided looking like she was listening in, but Young caught her eye anyway as she went past with a look that suggested he was getting very bored with this. Becky lifted the hatch for them and they passed through quickly and turned on laptops. Young followed them through about five minutes later.
"Problem?" Camile asked.
"No. Routine." Young said. "She's had a couple of goats go missing."
Camile tipped her head curiously, and Brody snorted in amusement then ducked his head, embarrassed. Young chuckled.
"That's pretty typical round here. People tend to keep livestock if they don't live right in town. There's a good chance they escaped to be honest, but she claims they were secured. I'll get Scott to look into it. He's good with people."
"And animals." They all turned as Becky walked over to Brody. "You got that fax you wanted." She said.
The other two looked at him curiously as he scanned the sheets of paper in front of him. He looked up, suddenly uncomfortable at their scrutiny.
"I pulled a copy of Alan Armstrong's will from probate records." Brody said. "He left 75% of the company, the house and land and most everything else he owned to Chloe Armstrong his daughter," the other two nodded, "he left his wife a significant income for life, enough for her to live extremely comfortably, the capital reverting to Chloe on Patricia Armstrong's death." He paused, grinning.
"Adam!" Camile said warningly, gesturing her hand in a winding up gesture. "Get on with it."
Adam grinned again drawing out the moment. "The other 25% of the company was left to Doctor Rush."
Young stared at Brody in surprise. Camile raised her eyebrows.
"No-one's said anything to us." Young said.
"What, that Doctor Rush now owns twenty five percent of the company? Not a word to me either." Camile said.
Brody tapped the edge of the copy will on the table. At the front desk the phone rang, Becky picked it up.
"I don't think anyone knows." Young said, looking at Brody then Camile. "I certainly don't think the staff at Icarus know."
"Except maybe Telford." Brody said.
Camile nodded, crossing her arms and leaning on the table. "Not entirely surprising I suppose, being as they were old friends, and Chloe Armstrong seems to credit Doctor Rush with a good amount of credit for the company being in the position it is without him taking a lot of credit. It would possibly explain the conversation on the phone, and the bad atmosphere between Telford and Rush."
Young opened his mouth to agree and paused as Becky called over.
"Err Sheriff,"
"Becky?" Young turned to look at her.
"That was state police about your BOLO. They found one of the cars that Kiva Masim had with her on the Armstrong estate. A 1989 green station wagon. It's in the parking lot of a motel on the Interstate. Apparently it's there with a guest going by the name of Simon Lucas." All three were standing as she held out a phone message sheet. "This is the address. State police are watching the building."
The roads were bad to say the least and it took them almost an hour to drive out to the Interstate in Young's SUV. Young was on and off the radio, but it appeared that there was no movement at all at the motel and the State Police were keeping a low profile.
Camile was calm in the passenger seat as always, but Brody was restless and twitchy in the back of the car. He always felt like that turning up to a potentially violent scene. He guessed it wasn't a good trait in an FBI officer, but he always managed in the moment. Anyway, he was an engineer and consultant first, actually becoming an agent for the FBI had come much later in life.
The snow had stopped by the time they got to the interstate, but the sky was still overcast, with heavy clouds that threatened more. It wasn't far down the interstate to their destination and they pulled in not five minutes later.
The motel was run down and dilapidated looking. There was a smattering of cars and trucks in the parking lot and a couple of large haulage rigs. The state police were parked on the far side of one of these, largely invisible from the motel. Young pulled in next to them. They got out and walked over to the car. Young nodded in greeting and Wray and Brody waved ID.
"Sheriff." One of the officers greeted them.
"Mackie, Lougheed. What's happening?"
Mackie shrugged. "Nothing so far. The receptionist said that Lucas, or whatever his name is, arrived alone two days ago and he's been in his room since he went in there last night, he's not been out since. He hasn't ordered any food and hasn't used the phone. He's been very quiet."
Brody looked out over the motel again. There were few people moving around the motel at this time in the morning on a Monday. He guessed people either had already left if they had to travel for business or were not moving on yet due to the weather. The snow was as thick here as it was in Destiny, but in the parking lot it was a mixture of mud and grey slush. Closer to the motel buildings, someone had made a desultory attempt to clear the pathways, mounding it up in greying gritty heaps at the edges of the paths and against the bottom of walls. A small snowman was incongruously perched on one of the mounds, two feet high, whiter than the filthy grey heap it rested on with cigarette butts for mouth, nose and eyes.
"'Kay, I'm gonna go have a quick chat with the receptionist before we go and have a word with Simeon." Young said turning to look at Wray questioningly. "Coming?"
She nodded.
"I'm going to take a look at the car." Brody said.
Young patted Brody on the shoulder and he and Camile walked calmly across the car park. He watched as they walked over to the motel office, then casually walked along the edge of the parking lot, staring out at the vehicles still passing on the interstate and fishing in his pockets as if for a packet of cigarettes or a lighter. Simeon's car was the battered station wagon about ten feet away. It was a mess, the sills were rusted, it looked like the rubber seals round the windows were perishing, and the paintwork had dents and scrapes all the way down both sides of the car. He couldn't see the front of the car from here but from this close he could see the back fender was held on by a piece of wire wrapped round the drivers side end.
He walked a few more steps then leaning his hip on the back of the car, dug deeper in his pockets as if he was trying to find something buried deeply or missing. In the back of the station wagon he could see a heap of what looked like a large heap of blankets and clothes. He gave up on the pockets of his coat and rummaged under his coat to shove his hands into the pockets of his jacket.
The car bounced slightly, battered suspension creaking under his rummaging and as it did so, even in the icy cold winter air a faint but sickly sweet smell emerged. Glancing vaguely down as he delved into another pocket as if unfocussing his eyes to focus on tactile sensation, he noticed a dark mark at the edge of the heap, black-brown and tacky looking.
"Damn." Brody swore.
He took his hands out of his pockets, unzipped his coat and pulled out a pair of latex gloves. Pulling them on he tried the catch on the truck. It was locked, but seemed loose and on the off chance he gave it a good yank. The back of the car popped open and the nauseatingly sweet smell of decaying flesh hit him. Cautiously he lifted the edge of the blanket a little way to expose a foot in a training shoe, pink and green, stained with foulness.
Brody stepped away for a moment to calm his rebelling stomach then closed the trunk and walked back to the SUV, hoping he looked like he had left his cigarettes in the SUV. As he passed behind a large trailer rig he pulled out his phone.
"Answer, come on, answer." He muttered as Camile's mobile rang.
"What is it Brody?" She asked immediately she answered.
"I have a horrible feeling I've found her." He passed a truck driver, and dropped his voice. "I've just taken a look at his car and it smelled...well, it smelled like you'd hope it wouldn't. Probable cause so I took a look and there's a body in there, whether it's her I don't know, I didn't want to disturb the scene any more."
"Alright, suit up, we'll be there in a moment. We'll go in and get him." Camile's voice was firm and authoritative.
Quickly he walked back to the car, opening the trunk and unzipping the kit bag. Concealed by the back of the SUV he slipped out of his coat and shrugged into a bullet proof vest, zipping his coat up quickly over the FBI logo.
"Lougheed and Mackie is it?"
"Yup." Lougheed replied.
"There's a corpse in the station wagon. Call it in then make sure no one disturbs it. We're going to go in and get Simeon."
Brody stepped out around the cab of the truck, taking a few steps out into the parking lot. He could see Camile and Young walking out of the office. To his left, a further figure walked around the corner of the building, tallish, rough looking with a shaved head, bundled in a parka. Simeon. There was a moment where Young and Camile glanced sideways at the movement, and a second of recognition as they recognised Simeon. It was immediately evident that Simeon recognised Young.
There was a familiar feeling in Brody's chest and stomach as the adrenaline hit, vision clearing and focussing.
Brody watched as Simeon flinched back, looking to see how far he was from the corner of the building, but he was several steps past it. Simeon's mouth moved but Brody was too far from them to hear, as Simeon pulled a gun out from his pocket and fired at Young. The cry seemed faint and distant as blood bloomed on Young's shoulder and Brody's eyes slammed back to Simeon, not waiting to see what happened to Young, Camile was with him. Gun still in hand Simeon spun and took off at a run. Brody span back to the still open SUV, grabbed spare clips and a radio from the bag, slammed the trunk shut and sprinted after Simeon.