Redemption

Chapter 54

He drove over to the spot where he’d nearly lost his life tonight. But he didn’t go back into the abandoned building. He ventured inside Rachel Katz’s condo building and took the elevator up after flashing his creds at the officer guarding the crime scene’s perimeter.

The forensic team was still processing the area. Decker nodded at Kelly Fairweather, who was doing a bloodstain pattern analysis by the couch. In another corner of the apartment, Natty was talking with a second tech. He saw Decker and quickly headed over.

“Boy, close call for you tonight,” said Natty.

Decker nodded. “Mary really saved my butt.”

“And she nailed the bastard who killed Sally,” said Natty with a grim smile.

“Any word on Rachel Katz?”

“Still in surgery. Last I heard, she’s going to make it. Close, though, bullet nearly hit an artery. Your friend saved her life.”

“I know. Melvin’s over at the hospital now with her, probably adding another layer of protection.”

“Guy had a fancy sniper rifle with a sophisticated scope.”

“That laser scope gave me a bit of an advantage.”

“Yeah, well, the guy could have made that shot from triple the distance away and still nailed his target, easy. Or so my firearms guy tells me.”

“Any luck on identifying him?”

“We’re running his prints through the system.”

“He had pretty much the same tats as Karl Stevens had.”

“Yeah, Mary texted me and told me. You think there’s a connection, obviously.”

“We talk to Stevens and he’s dead. The shooter kills Sally and then tries to kill Katz. Yeah, I think we can definitely say there’s a connection. But the tats may help us narrow this down to a gang. They look to be some oddball collection of neo-Nazis and Klansmen.”

“Great combo,” said Natty sarcastically. “But the thing is, Decker, would that sort of gang have been operating here thirteen years ago? I mean, I don’t remember anything like that going on in Burlington then.”

“Neither do I. But keep in mind they could be muscle brought in now by the folks who were doing all this crap thirteen years ago.”

“Right.”

Decker eyed him. “How did your lunch go with your wife?” At first, Natty looked like he might erupt in anger, but when he focused on Decker’s sincere expression, he said, “It went okay.”

“Did she know... anything?”

“No. I don’t think so. She might have suspected. But look, Decker. Sally and me, we never, you know. We were just friends. Okay, maybe more than friends.” He let out an exasperated breath. “It’s this damn job. It gets to you. I’m not trying to make excuses.”

Decker thought of Lancaster and her marriage. “The job gets to a lot of people, Natty.”

“So, what are we supposed to do? How do we handle it?”

“If I knew the answer to that, I’d be a consultant to cops. A rich one. But spending time with your wife is a good first step. You mind if I look around?”

“Help yourself. Just don’t keep your ‘observations’ to yourself.” Decker nodded and went exploring.

He entered the bedroom and gazed around the space. He wasn’t exactly sure what he was looking for. He doubted Katz would have left a box with the word Secret engraved on it for him to find, revealing all.

But Katz was an accountant with a precise turn of mind. She was organized, paid attention to the details. You just had to look around her home to tell that. So there might be something she had that she felt she needed to keep. If only for protection from someone.

He went through all of her drawers and then did the same methodical examination of her closet. She had a lot of clothes and shoes, like Susan Richards, but even Decker could tell that the stuff Katz owned was far more expensive than the items in Richards’s closet.

He dug back in the very rear of the closet and went through boxes and bags, but came away a half hour later with nothing to show for his efforts.

He went into the bathroom and searched. When he got to the medicine cabinet, he found that Rachel Katz was on prescription anti-anxiety medication. That was not unusual. Lots of people were on meds like these. But still. He wondered what exactly she was so anxious about.

Well, the fact that someone tried to kill her demonstrated that she was certainly right to be anxious.

He picked up her purse, which was on the nightstand. Inside were her wallet, a set of keys, and a building security access card. He pocketed those items and walked back into the main area to find that Natty had left to go back to the police station. The forensic team was finishing up and Kelly Fairweather was packing up her kit.

“Find anything of interest?” asked Decker.

“Just blood. And the bullet. It went into the couch.” She held up a small plastic container with a lid on top.

Decker took it and looked at the bullet, which was in pristine condition.

“Seven point six two,” observed Decker of the round’s caliber.

She nodded. “Right. It’s called the NATO round. Lots of military forces use it, including ours. If that had hit her in the head instead of the shoulder, she’d be in the morgue, not the hospital.”

Decker looked at her strangely.

“You okay?” she asked.

“I’ll be okay once we solve this case.”

He left and hit the street. He had another place left to check where Katz might have kept something of value. Her office. It was only a few blocks from her apartment, so Decker was just going to walk.

When he got there, he found the door to the building locked. He took out the key card, held it over the card reader pad, and the door clicked open. He checked the lobby marquee for Katz’s office number and rode the elevator up. He strode quickly down the hall to her office door. All the other offices he’d passed had standard metal doors. Katz’s office had a far more expensive solid wood door with matching trim. Knowing how she liked things just so, he wasn’t surprised.

He tried several keys he had taken from her purse until one worked. He unlocked the door and went in. He decided to use his Maglite instead of turning on the office lights. There was a front reception desk, and a short hall off to the left. Two offices were off this hall and then a kitchen/workroom with a door that opened back into the reception area. The security pad was hung on the wall next to this door, its light glowing green.

He went back to the first office and opened the door. This was clearly Katz’s office. It was larger than the other one and outfitted with custom shelves, a seating area with plush chairs, and a handsome partners desk. The shelves were lined with business memorabilia, photos of Katz with various city officials and others he assumed were her business partners. There were also photos of what looked to be her various properties and commercial projects. In each photo, Katz was smiling broadly, looking triumphant and happy.

And yet as Decker peered more closely, it appeared to him that the looks were hollow, that an underlying melancholy was present in each image. Maybe that was just him imposing what he knew now onto the woman’s photos. Or maybe not.

Then he noticed the power cord lying on top of the desk. It was for a laptop, but there was no computer there. And there hadn’t been one at Katz’s home either. He opened some file drawers and his suspicions were heightened.

Someone had done a very good job of searching the office without seeming to have done so. He closed the drawer and looked at the shelving system built into the wall. He recognized it, since Katz had an exact duplicate in her condo.

But not exactly exact.

He stepped closer and noted a panel set between two open shelves. This same type of panel had been in her condo as well. But there was a difference. The one in her condo had a knob on it. Decker had presumed that was because the panel was actually a door and there was storage behind it. He had found this actually to be the case because he had looked inside it.

Yet there was no knob on this panel. He stepped back and looked at the unit again. He took the template from his memory of the one in Katz’s condo and laid it over what he was seeing now. The absence of the knob was the only difference.

He strode forward and felt around the perimeter of the panel, probing with his fingers. Then he pressed down on the lower left-hand side of the wood and the door popped open. Behind it was a space filled with documents and files.

He pulled them out and set them on the desk. He was about to go over them when he stopped, rose, left the office, and walked into the kitchen area. On the wall was the security pad.

Why had it been turned off?

Decker hadn’t done it. He didn’t have the code. He had known of the possibility that Katz would have her own independent security system for her office. The exterior of the building had security. The front door to her office had been locked. But the security system had not been engaged.

An oversight, or...?

The whooshing sound of something igniting and the resulting smell of smoke that reached him a few moments later definitively answered the question for Decker.