A False Dawn

FORTY-SIX

On the way back to the marina, I got Ron Hamilton on the phone and told him my theory about Bagman resurfacing. “I believe he could be responsible for the fifteen cold case murders of women. He never retired, Ron, he just stopped killing Miami prostitutes and went inland. Made the farm country his killing fields. Or if the perp is Richard Brennen, he stopped going to Miami for weekend killing sprees, and confined his evil closer to home.”

“Is he leaving plastic bags on their heads?”

“No. But there are similarities, duct tape instead of bags. Pinching the vic’s nostrils.”

“It’s a long shot. Sean. Why not let the folks in homicide up there take it from here?”

“Because I think one of the ‘folks,’ is part of this. I told you about Slater. He ight not be the perp, but if it’s Brennen, senior or junior, Slater is looking the other way. Detective Leslie Moore will be calling you. She’s going to overnight a DNA sample we got at one of the crime scenes. I need a favor. Pull out the profile in storage from those plastic bags, the best we have from the Bagman murders. There is a good sample from the last body, and a fairly good sample on the bag from the vic that lived. Have the lab start the process immediately. I’ll give you Leslie’s cell number. Probably a good idea only to reach her on that number. ”

“No problem. Oh, almost forgot. Clayton Susskind, the anthropologist MIA, the guy who likes to pilfer through Indian graves—”

“Did you find a body?” I pictured Joe Bille’s face as he pulled the arrow out of the rattlesnake’s head.

“Yeah, I found a body…alive. Suskind, who’s unmarried, left Florida abruptly ten months ago for a teaching job at Arizona State University.”

“Thanks. Ron, have you heard anything on the street as to whether the FBI is looking into these murders?”

“Haven’t heard anything more. Why?”

“Someone placed a sophisticated bug on my boat.”

“Why’d the feds do that?”

“Good question. Next question is who’s doing the killings?”

“If the perp’s from Miami, you’ll need help to pick him up, if we can find him.”

“If it is the same guy, I think he has a connection to the farm labor camps. I’m not sure how or why.”

“What do you mean by connection to the labor camps?”

“I know it sounds strange, but if it’s the same killer, the same perp we tracked, how’s he choosing his victims? Is he wandering the back roads, the farm country picking up women randomly? Don’t think so. The odds are he knows some of these people. Somehow, maybe, he’s linked at the high end. The growers. Or he could be associated at the bottom rung, the labor contractors, worker bees who want to please a queen somewhere, or there may be no connection at all, but something is going on.”

Ron snorted slightly. “For some Miami-based killer to leave his turf, sounds like it’s out of his comfort zone.”

“His comfort zone lies in the dark. Anywhere he can prey on those weaker. The killings are increasing, so there has to be a strong motive or urge. This kind of killer wants to possess his vics, if only for the time it takes to kill. We need to start with the organized prostitution rings.”

“Why?”

“I believe these women are being recruited, human trafficking, actually held as sex slaves and offered to Johns all over the state. If it’s happening, it seems too organized for a few labor contractors. Somebody is calling the shots, and I’m betting they’re not the assholes rousting farm workers at the crack of dawn. They’re probably right in Miami.”

“You got about two dozen sleazebags, from mob to gangbangers, running prostitution between Miami and Daytona Beach. Where do I start?”

“I don’t know. Maybe where we left off when we lost the perp’s trail.”

I heard Ron sigh and then heard him tap the keys on his computer. “If you don’t have anything more to go on, what’ll make this investigation any different? The perp dodged us four years ago. What’s to keep him from doing it again?”

“Because this time he made a costly mistake.”

“How so?”

“He left a young woman to die in my arms.”