“She turned up dead, though.” Robbie asked. “I remember the stories about Divine Intervention.”
“Maybe not so divine,” Mort said. “Dahlia drowned when her fishing boat hit a reef and sank. At least seven people who saw Dahlia charter that fishing boat swear the captain was a woman.”
“Let me guess. The captain’s body’s never been found.”
“Bingo,” Mort said. “And they describe that captain as having a large scar across her face. Not something anyone would miss on a Jane Doe floating to shore.”
“You said you had two more?” Mort could hear his son clicking the keys of a computer.
“Nine months before Dahlia’s boat went down. You remember Jeremiah Valshon’s suicide?”
“The CEO of that chemical company with the plant down in Brazil? The one that exploded and killed, what was it, three thousand villagers?”
“That’s the guy. The government wanted to indict him on criminal charges, saying he deliberately placed the plant in Brazil to avoid safety measures that would cost his company a bundle if he built it in the U.S.”
“I also recall the Senate backpedalling. Saying U.S. investments would be hampered if they set the precedent of a CEO being held criminally responsible for activities outside the country. Valshon got a pass. But maybe his conscious got the better of him. Didn’t he hang himself?”
“He did. I remember thinking at the time a guy who’s got stones big enough to become top exec in a company that size doesn’t off himself. It turns out our guy Vashon went to dinner that night with a woman. Took her to his favorite restaurant in Boston. The staff described her as a “can’t miss”. A real good-looking redhead with a tattoo of an angel wrapping her right arm from wrist to shoulder.”
“Never found?” Robbie asked.
“Bingo again. The third was Ritchie Ortega.”
“The movie star? Drowned in his hot tub, right?” Robbie drew in a deep breath of recognition. “After he’d been acquitted of raping those two teenagers. I remember speculation that someone had paid off enough jurors to hang it. Judge declared a mistrial and the prosecutor decided not to re-file despite other young women swearing Richie’d pulled the same thing with them. What did you find?”
“The woman who ran an escort service Richie liked told police a new girl stopped by looking for work a couple of days before Richie called saying he wanted something exotic. The madam said she thought of the new girl right away. Thought the bright red Mohawk she sported would give him a thrill. Madam sent her and Richie turns up dead. No one could find the hooker. Case gets labeled an accident and mothers everywhere exhaled.”
“Three dead people. Three missing female witnesses.” Robbie sounded hopeful. “Sounds like something, Dad.”
“These aren’t just three dead people, Robbie. These are three very bad people. People who wiggled through the justice system. Got away with rape and murder on a horrific scale.” Mort’s voice was firm. “And these aren’t just female witnesses, either. Each had some physical feature that made people take notice.”
“Martin said his shooter, Graham, had a tattoo of a heart and dagger.” Mort could hear Robbie flipping paper. “And Halloway’s hooker was described as having a port wine stain across her neck.”
“Enough to send the cops looking for something specific. If they wanted to look at all.” Mort tapped his pen against the counter. “The shooter in Miami threw your guy…, what was his name?”
“Martin.”
“Yeah,” Mort said. “The shooter threw Martin straight to the cops when she learned he was a no-good husband looking to off his wife. His target wasn’t bad enough for her.”
“What’s your point, Dad?”
Mort blew out a long breath. “You’re looking at a vigilante, Robbie. This woman sees herself as a righter of wrongs.”
Robbie was quiet for a moment. “If you’re right, I can think of a lot of people who’d give her a parade for taking those people out.”
Mort remembered his conversation with Larry. “And that’s exactly why people like her are so dangerous.”
“Sounds like my Halloway story might have gotten a little bigger, huh?”
Mort flipped the file closed. “Can you handle it?”
Robbie laughed. “I always do, Dad. Now let me get to bed. You’ve given me a full agenda for tomorrow.”
“Will you do me a favor?” Mort asked.
“Name it.”
“Find out how Martin contacted the shooter. Let me know.” Mort hung up the phone, drank his milk, and climbed the stairs to his empty bed.
Micki Petty was sitting in his office when he got to work at 7:00 the next morning. Mort tossed his brief case on his desk and hung his soggy parka on the coat rack behind his door. “Jimmy see you yet?”
Micki laughed and the rain outside Mort’s window lost its dreary power. “I figured I’d beat him in. You got some time for me?”
“I got a pulse, I got time for you, Mack.” He nodded toward the expandable file she held in her lap. “What do you have there?”
“You know that sound equipment in Buchner’s living room?” she asked.
“The fancy tape recorders? Jimmy says the university wants them back as soon as we’re done.” He settled one hip on his desk. “So? Are we done?”
Micki held his gaze and slowly shook her head. “Not by a long shot.”
Mort knew Micki could sniff out a grain of sand in a blinding snowstorm. Before he could ask what she’d found his attention was pulled to the sight of Jim DeVilla walking down the corridor, Bruiser lumbering by his side. He rolled his eyes as Jimmy stopped and leaned into Mort’s office.
“Hey, Pardner, what’s up?” Jimmy feigned a double-take. “Why, Detective Petty. I didn’t expect to see you here.”
Mort waved him in and told him to shut the door. “Do you have some sort of radar?” Mort watched Bruiser sidle up to Micki for morning kisses. “Or have you trained Officer K-9 here to lead you to her?”
Jim feigned nonchalance. “I might have heard Daphne mention Micki was here to see you. Made me wonder if this has to do with the Buchner case. Maybe there’s some piece of evidence you might want the Chief of Forensics to know about.”
“Sit your love-sick ass down.” Mort watched Bruiser nuzzling Micki’s hair. “The both of you. Micki was about to tell me something about that fancy recording gear in Buchner’s place.”
Micki snapped the band on the thick file and pulled out a folder. “It’s one-of-a-kind, that’s for sure. It’s essentially an amalgam of several different pieces of audio equipment.”
“An amalgam?” Jim turned to Mort. “Do you need me to define the term?”
“Save it for happy hour, Jimmy.” Mort directed a raised eyebrow toward his friend. “Go on, Micki.”
“It’s a digitized voice synthesizer coupled to a powerful microprocessor and accented with a few more devices. What Buchner had in his home is the main unit. Think of it as the mother ship. I found slots for several hand-held remote devices.” She handed copies of the diagram she’d drawn to each man. “The quality’s fantastic. There’s nothing mechanical or artificial sounding in it at all.” She pulled several pages of notes from her folder. “The output is virtually limitless. You could assume the voice of someone famous. You could design a specific accent. Male, female, adult, child. You name it, this bad boy can produce it.”
“How does it know what you want to say?” Jim was using his professional tone now and Mort was glad to hear it.
“Any number of ways. You could type something on a keyboard and the machine will read it. Or, you could speak directly into a microphone and it will reproduce your words in whatever voice you choose. It’ll capture anything digital.” Micki’s excitement over her discovery was obvious. “There are also keys for commonly used words and phrases. A simple touch and the machine will speak. There’s even a scanner where you can insert something printed and have it read to you. This thing could be great. Blind people, folks with cerebral palsy, stroke victims, spinal cord injuries. I get why the university is so interested in this.”
Mort nodded. “You thinking that maybe this gizmo is our motive, Mack? Somebody gets wind of what Buchner’s working on and decides to make it their own?” He scowled. “But wouldn’t they just take it? Why kill the
