studied him suspiciously until the homicide detective flashed his badge, then he quickly moved the barrier aside.
Jack Stamm stared morosely out of the passenger window as the unmarked police car rolled slowly up the drive. The news of the explosion had stunned Stamm, who spent the ride to the crime scene blaming himself for not doing 'something' in the week following the attack on Abigail Griffen.
Paladino parked near a Fire Rescue Unit. The men from Fire Rescue were watching the bomb squad work. There was nothing else for them to do.
There was no fire, just the shattered remains of a new Mercedes-Benz.
There was definitely no one to rescue.
The driver of the Mercedes was unquestionably dead.
Paul Torino, the Team Leader of the Explosive Disposal Unit, intercepted the district attorney and the detective before they crossed the barriers the squad had erected around the blast site.
Torino was balding, five-eleven, thick through the neck and shoulders and bowlegged. He was wearing the unit's black combat fatigues under a Tyvex paper throwaway chemical suit, which protected against blood-borne pathogens.
'Put these on and I'll give you the grand tour,' Torino said, handing Stamm and Paladino Tyvex suits. Stamm slipped into his easily, but Paladino struggled to pull the paper suit over his beer gut.
'When did the bomb explode?' Stamm asked.
'The 911 came in at 10:35 P. M.,' Torino answered as he led them through the police barrier. Portable lighting had been set up to illuminate the front yard and someone had turned on all the lights in the house. The bomb squad members were searching the crime scene for parts of the bomb so they could discover how it had been made. One officer had been designated evidence custodian. Another sketched the area to show where each piece of evidence was found.
Stamm noticed a man photographing a jagged hole in the garage door. The ruined Mercedes was just outside the garage, facing the door. Stamm guessed that the car had been parked in the driveway and was backing out when the bomb exploded. He circled the Mercedes before looking inside.
An acrid smell that had not been dispersed by the evening breeze hung in the air. The safety glass in the windshield was shattered but intact, but the side and rear windows had been blown out by the blast. There were shards of glass and chunks of bent and twisted metal scattered across the driveway and the front lawn. The roof on the driver's side was puffed out from the inside as if a giant fist had struck upward with tremendous force. Torino pointed out two one-inch holes in the roof and explained that they'd been made by pipe fragments. Then he motioned the two men toward the driver's window.
'When we get the chance to examine the underside,' Torino said, 'we're gonna find a large hole in the floorboard under the driver's seat.
That's where the bomb was attached. Notice the seat belt.' It had been sheared in two. 'The victim was blown up into the roof, breaking the restraint. Then the body settled back in the bucket seat.'
Stamm took a deep breath and looked inside. Viewing a murder victim was never easy. It was infinitely harder if the victim was someone you knew. What helped here was the impression that the victim, slumped to the right, eyes closed, seemed merely asleep. The upper torso and head were intact, as was the body from the knees down, but there were massive injuries to the body between the knees and the torso. The pieces of flesh Stamm discerned were confined to the roof and the inside of the windshield on the driver's side and there was not as much blood as Stamm expected because death was the result of internal injuries. Stamm gathered himself and focused on the face once more, remembering it in life. He felt light-headed and turned away.
'Paul,' someone shouted from the garage. 'Look at this.'
The garage door was up now. Inside, a member of the bomb squad squatted in front of a white refrigerator that stood against the back wall.
Torino bent over him and Paladino and Stamm looked in from the side.
Embedded in the refrigerator door was a rounded piece of metal.
'Did it come through the hole in the garage door?' Torino asked the man who had summoned them into the garage.
'Yeah. We measured the trajectory. I'm glad I wasn't looking in here for a beer. I'd have me two assholes.'
'Have Peterson photograph this,' Torino said. 'Don't pry it out until he gets here.'
Stamm bent closer and noticed two short pieces of copper wire and something he could not identify embedded in the piece of metal.
'That's one of the end caps from the bomb,' Torino explained, 'and that's the remains of a lightbulb that was used as the bomb's initiator.
When the bomb exploded, the end caps flew off like bullets in the direction they were pointing. This one penetrated the garage door and wedged itself in the refrigerator door.'
The squad member returned with the sketch artist and the evidence custodian.
'It's getting crowded in here,' Torino said. He led Stamm and Paladino outside.
'Paul,' Stamm asked the captain, 'you worked the Hollins bombing, didn't you?'
'The Deems case?'
Stamm nodded.
'I'm not surprised you asked,' Torino said, 'because I started getting a dose of d(jh vu as soon as I saw that end cap. I just didn't want to say anything until the investigation was complete.
I'll know for sure when we get all the pieces of the bomb, but I'd bet a year's salary that this bomb is identical to the bomb that killed Hollins and his little girl.'
Shortly before midnight, Jack Stamm followed Harvest Lane through Meadowbrook, a development consisting of twenty small but attractive homes scattered over three winding streets on the outskirts of Portland, a twenty- minute drive from the site of the explosion. Stamm parked in the driveway of a modern, one-story gray house with an attached garage.
By the time a marked police car was parked at the curb, Stamm was ringing the bell and pounding on the front door. The small house was only a few years old. The development was so new that the trees provided no shade. The house was loaded with glass to catch the sun in the daytime. Stamm peered into the dark interior of the living room through the front window, then he turned to the uniformed officers whom he had ordered to follow him.
'Check the rear. See if there's any sign that someone's broken in.'
The officers separated and circled the house. Stamm was worried. Why was the house deserted? Just then headlights appeared at the end of the street. A car started to turn into the driveway, then braked. The driver's door opened and Abbie got out. She was dressed in jeans, a dark long-sleeved cotton shirt and a navy-blue windbreaker. Her hair was tied back in a ponytail.
Abbie looked at the marked patrol car just as the police officers came around the side of the house. Abbie looked from the officers to Stamm.
'What's wrong, Jack?' Abbie asked anxiously.
'Where were you?' Stamm said, avoiding her question.
'On a wild-goose chase. What's going on?'
Stamm hesitated. Abbie gripped his arm.
'Tell me,' she said.
Stamm put his hands firmly on Abbie's shoulders. 'I've got bad news,'
Stamm said. An array of emotions flashed across Abbie's face. 'It's Robert. He's dead.'
'How?' was all she managed.
'He was murdered.'
'Oh my God.'
'It was a car bomb, Abbie. Just like the one Charlie Deems used to kill Larry Hollins and his little girl.'
Abbie's legs gave way and Stamm helped her to the front stoop, where he eased her down.
'I want you to listen carefully,' Stamm told Abbie. 'There's no evidence Deems did this, but the bombs are very similar. So I'm not taking chances. These officers are going to stay with you tonight and I'm going to arrange twenty-four-hour police protection.'
