I Am Death

Six

Captain Blake waited while both detectives checked the file in their hands. It opened with an 11x8-inch colored portrait of a woman.

‘Her name was Nicole Wilson,’ the captain began, leaning back and sitting against the edge of her desk. ‘Twenty years old. She was born and raised in Evansville, Indiana, where her parents still live. About a year ago, after being accepted into law school at CSULA on a full academic scholarship, she moved here to Los Angeles. Her records show that she was an outstanding student. For pocket money, and when her college schedule allowed her, she would sometimes babysit a few nights a week. This was supposed to be her first college summer break, but instead of going back to Indiana to see her folks, she decided to stay around because she managed to land a temp job, running errands for a small law firm in downtown LA. One of her professors helped her get the job.’

Hunter and Garcia studied the opening photograph for a moment. Nicole Wilson had a round face, with expressive olive-shaped eyes complemented by a petite nose and full lips. Her cheeks were dusted with a handful of freckles, and her hair was light brown in color, coming down to the top of her shoulders.

‘Seven days ago,’ Captain Blake continued, as Hunter and Garcia moved past the opening photograph and on to the second page of the file — Nicole Wilson’s fact sheet — ‘Nicole was babysitting for Audrey and James Bennett, a wealthy couple who live in Upper Laurel Canyon, when she was abducted.’

Hunter’s questioning gaze moved from the fact sheet to Captain Blake.

‘Yes,’ the captain confirmed, reading the unspoken question in her detective’s eyes. ‘She was abducted while she was babysitting, not on her way to work, or on her way back. The perpetrator took her from inside the house.’

Hunter’s attention returned to the file. He flipped to the next page and skimmed through it. ‘No struggle?’

‘Forensics found no sign of it,’ Captain Blake replied, then paused for a second, observing both detectives before nodding once. ‘I know what you two are thinking — that the perpetrator was probably known to Nicole, and that she willingly allowed him into the house, hence the lack of evidence of a struggle. The same thought came to me when I first read that file, but no, that doesn’t seem to be the case here.’

‘How come?’ Garcia asked.

Captain Blake shrugged and moved over to the espresso machine on the corner by the bookshelves. ‘Because the perpetrator tricked Nicole with a bogus story.’ She chose a coffee capsule and inserted it into the machine. This was her second cup since she’d arrived at her office less than half an hour ago.

‘A bogus story?’ Hunter frowned.

‘That’s correct. Coffee?’

Both detectives shook their heads.

The captain watched the last drops of coffee trickle into her cup while she clarified: ‘It looks like the perpetrator pretended to be Ms. Bennett’s cousin from Texas, who was supposedly staying over at their garage apartment.’ She took a moment, allowing Hunter and Garcia to absorb the information before moving on. ‘Audrey Bennett doesn’t have a cousin from Texas. They had no one staying over at their garage apartment.’ She dropped a single sweetener tablet into her cup. ‘And get this, the perpetrator was having a sandwich in the kitchen when Nicole walked in on him.’

Curiosity and intrigue flooded Garcia’s face.

‘He was having a sandwich?’

‘According to Ms. Bennett, yes.’

‘Wait a second.’ Hunter lifted a hand. ‘I’m guessing that if Nicole was babysitting for the Bennetts, they were out of the house at the time?’

‘That’s correct,’ Captain Blake confirmed. ‘They were attending a judge’s dinner. James Bennett is a high-flying lawyer.’

‘So if they were out of the house, how does Ms. Bennett know about the perpetrator posing as her cousin?’

‘Well, that’s where it starts to get creepy,’ Captain Blake said, sipping her coffee. ‘The perpetrator allowed Nicole to answer a call from Audrey Bennett and tell her about the man she had met in the kitchen, before taking her.’ She indicated the file in Hunter’s hands. ‘A very detailed transcript of the interview Missing Persons did with Audrey Bennett is in there, next page along. It also includes her entire account of the phone conversation she had with Nicole.’

Hunter and Garcia turned to it.

‘How did the perpetrator gain access to the house?’ Hunter asked.

‘As yet unknown,’ the captain replied. ‘There were no signs of forced entry but the back door was unlocked. The problem is, Ms. Bennett can’t remember if she had left it that way or not. But even if she hadn’t, Nicole could’ve unlocked it for some reason and forgot to relock it, there’s no way of confirming that. And there’s also the possibility that the perpetrator could’ve simply picked the lock. Forensics said that there was no damage to it, but we all know that with the right knowledge and tools, door locks aren’t that hard to breach.’

Hunter nodded and carried on reading.

‘Ms. Bennett called the police immediately after disconnecting with Nicole,’ Captain Blake added. ‘But by the time they got to the house — twenty-two minutes later — Nicole was gone.’

‘Any CCTV cameras around where the Bennetts live?’ Garcia asked.

Captain Blake shook her head. ‘None. You’d have to go all the way to the bottom of Hollywood Hills to find one.’

‘How about the boy she was babysitting?’ Hunter asked, reading from the file.

‘Joshua, three years old,’ the captain confirmed. ‘He wasn’t touched. They found him asleep upstairs, just the way his parents had left him. The boy heard and saw nothing.’

‘Are Nicole’s parents rich?’ Hunter asked.

‘Not by any stretch of the imagination. Father is a school-teacher. Mother works in a local supermarket.’

‘So the perpetrator broke into a wealthy family’s house to abduct the babysitter?’ Garcia this time. ‘Not the boy?’

‘As unnatural as it sounds, yes,’ Captain Blake answered, having one more sip of her coffee. ‘And that’s our first tricky question — why? Why complicate things for himself? He could’ve made his job a lot easier by taking Nicole either before she got to the Bennett’s house, or after she left. A simple approach and grab job. Why increase his risk by breaking into the house and taking her from inside?’

Both detectives understood their captain’s concern very well. They all knew a street abduction made collecting left-behind clues and evidence like fingerprints, fibers, hairs and so on infinitely harder, not to mention the fact that everything gets exposed to the elements. Clues could easily be blown away by a gust of wind, washed away by rain, or contaminated in many different ways. But if a perpetrator breaks into a confined space like a house, the risk of third-party contamination decreased exponentially, and he allowed the police an elements-free and much more focused area to work with.

‘One of two reasons,’ Garcia replied, first looking at Hunter, then back at Captain Blake. ‘He was either too stupid to figure out that he would increase his risk of being identified, or he was confident enough to know that he wouldn’t leave anything behind.’

Hunter nodded his agreement.

‘And if he was so bold as to be having a sandwich in the kitchen and to allow his victim to answer a phone call before making his move,’ Garcia carried on, ‘I don’t think that we’re looking at reason number one here, are we, Captain?’

Captain Blake finished her coffee, placing her cup on her desk.

‘No,’ she finally replied. ‘Forensics scrutinized the house for two whole days. Everything they found was matched either to the Bennetts or to Nicole Wilson herself. The unsub left absolutely nothing behind.’

‘Did the FBI get involved?’ Garcia asked.

The captain shook her head. ‘No. The Adult Missing Persons Unit didn’t request any help from the Bureau. As I’ve said, Nicole Wilson was twenty years old, not a minor, which means that the Lindbergh Law doesn’t apply to her.’

Hunter got to the end of the dossier. There was nothing else. ‘So when was her body found?’

Captain Blake walked back behind her desk, opened the top drawer on the left and retrieved two new files.

‘In the early hours of this morning. It was left on an empty field by Los Angeles International Airport. And if the house-break-in-sandwich-eating scenario wasn’t creepy enough — have a look at this shit.’