Full Tilt

59

Rampart, New York

Ashley Ostermelle is texting while walking from the Apple Store west through the Mall of America. She stops to check the directory before she exits. Now she enters the garage at P4 West Arizona, stops to text, then the picture goes fuzzy and she disappears from view.

Frustrated, Ed clicked and replayed the security camera footage, hoping to find something different.

How many times have I seen this?

The FBI had determined that Sorin Zurrn had breached the mall’s stand-alone system. He’d managed to obscure the security cameras recording in the areas where he’d been active. Brennan had examined the footage and the rest of the case over and over, searching for anything he may have missed.

Come on. There’s got to be something.

Time was hammering against them.

Zurrn had Vanessa Page and was likely preparing to kill her.

If he hasn’t done it already.

Every detective on the case was going flat out, but after Minneapolis they’d made little progress in picking up Zurrn’s trail.

I know I’m missing something that twigged with me earlier.

Whatever it was, it was gone.

Brennan left his desk to freshen his coffee. It had been four days since the Minneapolis break. He’d gotten home late last night and was up before dawn this morning to get back at it. The weight of the case was enormous. The task force was now having case status calls twice a day and had grown to include investigators from Chicago, Minnesota, Colorado and more from Canada. It had gained more profile-most network newscasts had led with it for the past few days and the press calls were nonstop.

Returning to his desk, Brennan reviewed the major points again. They’d found no trace of Ashley’s phone. Zurrn must’ve removed the battery and tossed it. The FBI worked with the family’s service provider and had gotten Ashley’s exchange of texts from the phone and her tablet, hoping to get a lead to Milwaukee, if that was in fact where Zurrn had been operating. But that line of investigation soon dead-ended.

He was good at covering his tracks, but we’ve got him on the run and as we get closer he makes mistakes.

Forensic teams were still processing Zurrn’s complex in Hennepin County, and everyone was optimistic it would yield something to tell them where he was headed. In the garage they’d found twelve vehicles, including the SUV used to abduct Ashley and the Chevy van linked to Rampart and the Lost River State Forest. They’d also found an array of commercial and service vehicles, like an ambulance, an armored car and a utility truck. Trouble was, they didn’t know which vehicle was missing or if he had others stashed elsewhere in the country.

Zurrn was a brilliant planner.

No one who knew the area and the auto-wrecking yard would have been suspicious if they saw a trailer hauling vehicles to the property.

Investigators got lucky when they managed to lift some latents at the property. They’d capitalized on Kate Page’s journalistic digging. Her work into Zurrn’s past had impressed most of the investigators. The FBI and Chicago PD made a full-court press executing warrants on Zurrn. They’d learned that he had done a stint with the Illinois National Guard, which enabled the FBI to confirm his fingerprints with those found at the property.

Here in Rampart, forensic teams were still working at the scene. Everyone was grateful that they hadn’t found more victims as they continued their efforts to identify those whose remains had been unearthed.

Brennan looked at the files on his desk, which obstructed the framed photographs of his wife and son. He looked at the case board at the end of the room. He knew what Zurrn had done. He knew where he’d been.

We need to know where he’s going to be.

There had to be something he’d missed. Something he’d overlooked. There had to be a pattern, a puzzle piece.

Brennan looked at the map with its pins flagging locations, events, victims and time lines before he sat at his computer and scrolled through the folders and databases.

Wait.

He glanced at the map, then the computer folders, concentrating on the one holding interviews with Zurrn/Nelson’s coworkers at the data center.

Who was that guy? Rupp. Mark Rupp.

Brennan clicked on the interview they’d conducted, reading fast, searching for the section where Rupp had recalled seeing Carl Nelson sitting at a coworker’s terminal.

What was it Rupp saw?

…Carl was looking at a real estate page and making notes. Looked like he was interested in some property…seriously interested…he thought that no one saw him, but I saw him and I saw what he was looking at.

Brennan kept reading while shooting glances at the map, feeling his heart beat faster.

It was a coworker’s terminal! That’s why we missed it! This could be it! I think I know where Zurrn’s going!