Not her kobo, p.14
Not Her -- Kobo, page 14
“The ATF is going to keep Nash busy for a while, I’d think,” she said. “It’ll be a few hours before we get a crack at him, especially if they turn up illegal firearms at the compound. So that gives us time to dig, I think.”
“Dig at what though?”
“We can get the names of the compound members. I’m pretty sure that’s something Wireman and his men would have readily available. We can look into their history, see if there’s anything there that might suggest that the compound is up to more than just collecting guns, hating the government, and not trusting anyone.”
“Yeah, that’s a good place to start.”
“So…you can handle that?”
“I mean, I can. Why? What are you going to do?”
“I’m not quite sure yet. I’m thinking of heading out, looking for anywhere there are small groups of people clustered together…somewhere near the water. Maybe ask around.”
“Ask what, exactly?”
She grinned nervously, still not quite sure how Palmer felt about her reliance on gut instincts. “Well, much like what happened with the truck and the plane,” she said, “I don’t think I’ll really even know until I get there.”
He seemed to think hard about this for a moment but finally nodded. “Can you be back in like two hours? I’d really like for us to both be here if the ATF brings Nash in.”
“Yes. And text me if they arrive before I do. And if you find anything on the compound members that points to Nash being our guy after all.”
He sighed yet again but didn’t look away from her. “Just…be careful,” he said. “And maybe try not to crash a stranger’s car.”
*
Camille started by sitting in the bureau car, scrolling through Facebook. She’d applied a few filters to a search, looking for anything that might draw in the interest of a murderer that seemed to be targeting women on the river. She deduced that the killer would want smaller groups because it would be easier to watch someone that was either alone or broken off from the larger group. He’d be following them to the river, so a smaller crowd would make it easier to locate and then stalk the victims. A larger crowd would be too much work and, probably, involve too much risk.
She understood that not all smaller events would be listed on Facebook, but she did get two possibilities. One was a craft bazaar that seemed to cater to painters and sculptors. A quick look through the comments and likes told her that it was going to attract an older audience—middle-aged and up. She ruled that event out and focused on the second. It was not an announcement from an organization, but from a jazz band called Daddy Long Legs. They’d be playing an outdoor concert at one in the afternoon, priming the way for a small festival “on the river” later that evening.
Her interested piqued, Camille put the address of the concert into her maps app and found that it was about half a mile away from the river. More than that, it was adjacent to a pair of boat rental businesses. She considered her options for a moment—but it was a brief one. She started the car and headed there right away.
On the drive over (the app said it would take sixteen minutes), Camille felt uncertainty washing over her. It was rare that she doubted herself and when it did happen, she started to feel anxious. She wondered what her sporadic little venture out to the concert would mean if they did find out later in the day that Vernon Nash was their killer? It would be wasted time and she’d always have this fool’s errand in the back of her head, nagging and eating at her.
But the alternative was worse, and she knew it. What if Nash wasn’t their guy and she did nothing but sit on her hands while they waited for the ATF to finish up with him while the real killer was still out there somewhere still hunting, likely with plans to keep killing. It wasn’t a gamble Camille was willing to make.
She arrived at the block where the concert was being held. When she got there, the band had just started. They were set up on a stage near the back of a lawn that looked like it was part of a public park. The crowd was relatively small—maybe sixty or seventy people. But she was sure that number would grow as the day went on.
She parked in a public lot across the street. When she stepped out of the car, Camille looked to the east, in the direction of the river. It wasn’t visible from where she stood, but she could see a small street that wound down in that direction. She supposed that would be where the boat rental shops were located.
She crossed the street and made her way toward the crowd. She was surprised that there was no booth where she had to pay, no band she had to wear around her wrist. She assumed that would come later in the day as the crowds got bigger and the beer started flowing a bit more liberally. As she started toward the crowd, she scanned it for women that matched the age of their three victims—on the young side, between twenty and thirty years old. There were several of them, most in groups of at least three, watching the band and starting to test their legs as they started to dance.
And now what? she wondered. Am I supposed to just go up to them and ask if they’ve been harassed or assaulted by a creep wielding a knife with a shark tooth on it?
As odd as it sounded, she thought that might be exactly what she was going to have to do. So, with the sound of jazz music wafting down over her, Camille entered the crowd and started looking for women that could be potential victims. And in doing so, she couldn’t help but wonder if the killer himself might be there, too.
CHAPTER TWENTY FIVE
“This is going to sound a little nuts,” Camille told the pretty blonde in the tight, ripped jeans. “I’m an FBI agent, looking into a man that I believe has been targeting women along the river. Have you had any trouble with strange men in the last day or so?”
The woman, maybe twenty-two or twenty-three if Camille had to guess, basically scowled at her. How dare you ruin my good time with this gloomy crap? her look seemed to say. “Nope. Any trouble I’ve had with men in the last day has been on purpose!”
The girl cackled at her own joke, high fiving the other young woman she was dancing with.
This is going to be harder than I thought, Camille told herself.
She approached another young woman and gave the same explanation. This woman was with a group of three others and though she was more willing to actually listen and help, she also stated that she had nothing to report. Her group had, she said, only gotten into the city that morning, for a three-day trip. Her two friends also commented that they hadn’t been accosted by a strange man in any way, so Camille moved on.
As Camille continued to move through the crowd she considered flashing her badge up at the stage and taking a mic from the band. For a split second, it did seem like a favorable idea. One announcement from the stage to communicate with every potential victim in the crowd—it made a quick and succinct sort of sense. On the other hand, if the killer was indeed somewhere nearby and heard such an announcement from the stage, it would be all the warning he needed. He’d not only make an exit from the concert but maybe even leave the city to ensure he wasn’t caught. And that would obviously make Camille’s job much harder.
The thought of the killer leaving made her rethink her approach. Maybe it wasn’t victims she needed to be questioning. Maybe she needed to stand along the outskirts of the crowd and start looking for a man that seemed shifty and out of place—a man that seemed to be studying the crowd rather than the band on the stage.
She moved toward the edge of the crowd to do that very thing when she felt a pluck at her heartstrings. Hearing the jazz music behind her and the lead vocalist harmonizing with a two-piece female backup reminded her of Nanette. Her sister had performed at these very same types of events, with this very same type of band. It made Camille feel as if she was missing out—not just on time with her sister, but on memories she’d never been able to form, of stories she and Nanette would never share between them, of—
“Sorry…excuse me…”
A woman’s voice spoke up from behind her, soft and hesitant. Camille turned to face her. She was quite pretty, her brown hair perfectly straightened, spilling over her shoulders. Camille guessed her to be twenty-five at most. She looked worried and uncertain as Camille met her eyes.
“Yes?”
“You’re the FBI agent, right? The one that was asking women if they’d had a run-in with someone weird? Someone with a knife, right?”
“That’s right.”
“Yeah…I overheard two girls talking about you just a second ago and I asked them where you’d gone They pointed you out and…sorry…anyway. I…I think I may have had a run-in with whoever it is you’re looking for.”
“When was this?”
“Two days ago. During the evening.”
Camille had lots of questions loaded and ready to go, but her attention was being pulled in far too many directions with the crowd of people and the blaring music. “Would you mind stepping over to the side with me?” she asked. “Just to get away from the noise?”
“Of course.”
As they exited the crowd, Camille could tell that the woman was a bit more confident now. She walked quickly, as if she wanted to get the information out as fast as possible. They found a small bench by a vendor that was starting to set up—a man selling leather bracelets and belts from the looks of it.
“What’s your name, first of all?” Camille asked.
“Courtney Galimore.”
“Are you a local?”
“Yes, but not for very long. I’ve been living in New Orleans for about a year now.”
“And what can you tell me about this man you ran into?”
‘Well, like I said, it was two days ago. Some friends and I had just gotten off of a small fishing boat—one of those chartered sort of deals, you know? None of us had ever fished so we thought it would be fun.”
“What time of day was this?”
“About this same time, actually. Maybe a little later. Anyway…the boat had docked and the driver had made his way up to the grass. I think we’d annoyed him. We really had no clue what we were doing. There were three of us and one of my friends had decided she hated everything about the experience. She didn’t even want to touch the bait.”
“And when did this other man show up?”
“Not too long after the driver left us. He’d docked the boat and left us with our rods and reels. I had banged my reel up and we were trying to make sure it was all set right so we would get our deposit back. I told my friends to go on up and make sure the driver wasn’t going to bad mouth us to his supervisor because that’s where we also rented the rods from. So I was down on the dock, struggling with the damned reel, trying to get the line to go back in right. And this guy just sort of shows up.
“He’s in this boat, an older fishing boat, sort of small, really. And he comes up to the side of the dock on the right—the one our docked boat wasn’t taking up. I didn’t even pay him any attention until he spoke to me. He asked if I needed help with the rod. I smiled and was polite, but told him no. He kept asking, but not in a way that I thought was pushy. But there near the end, he came to the edge of the boat and said something along the lines of ‘oh, just let me help you.’ But before I could say anything, the driver was coming back down. One of my friends was with him.”
“And did he retreat right away?”
“No. He hung around for a few seconds, shared some small talk with the driver. But I do remember that he had this knife holstered in one of those little pouch-things on his hip. The handle was sticking out and I thought it was weird because there was this tooth on the end of it, like on the handle.”
“Do you remember how big it was?”
“No, not really, but I do remember thinking it looked like shark’s tooth, and I thought that was weird because everything around here is all crocodile, crocodile, crocodile, you know?” She hesitated here and then, nervously twiddling her fingers, she asked: “Do you think I was almost killed?”
“I don’t know,” Camille said, only because she didn’t want to terrify the woman. “What can you tell me about him? Describe him as well as you can.”
“He was maybe fifty, I guess. Middle-aged, you know. Scruffy five o’ clock shadow on his face. He was wearing a really beat up trucker cap. His hair was dark…brown or black, I don’t know for sure.”
“Anything at all that stood out? That might make him easy to identify?”
“Sorry, no. I don’t…wait, yes! Yeah, there is! He has a lisp. When he talked, everything with an s in it sounded almost like a snake. And some of the s sounds came off like ts. I felt bad because I had to bite back a laugh at one point. Not cool of me I know.”
“And he never seemed aggressive to you?”
“No, not aggressive. But I do think after the second time I told him no thanks, he seemed to get this tone to his voice…sort of like he was talking to a stupid child. Condescending, you know? And maybe it was that tone that made me think I wasn’t in danger—that he thought I was just this helpless, stupid woman that was to stubborn to ask for help.”
Camille had another question on her lips but she stopped it short. What Courtney had just said slammed into place, like a nail right into her brain. It was a missing piece, a missing dot that had prevented them from connecting all the other dots straight to the killer.
…like he was talking to a stupid child. Condescending, you know?...I was just this helpless, stupid woman…
Each crime scene she’d seen flipped through her head like images on a Viewfinder, complete with details from the case notes.
Megan Keenan: struggling with tying a rope to anchor a houseboat down to a dock.
Debbie Herbert: getting an airboat stuck and stranded in a cluster of weeds and overgrowth along the bank.
And now there was this would-be victim, Courtney Galimore, that had been struggling with a rod and reel, and fishing line.
Not all tourists…but women that had been struggling with something on the river. Maybe making a little too much noise, maybe just coming off as a nuisance to the killer. Camille looked back at the band, the sax player currently ripping off an impressive solo.
“You okay?” Courtney asked.
Camille blinked, looking away from the band and nodding. “Yeah…just thinking. Thank you for your assistance, Ms. Galimore. It’s been a tremendous help. Enjoy the rest of the concert.”
Courtney nodded softly and then re-entered the crowd. Camille remained on the bench for a moment, stringing together a plan. She thought of Courtney, struggling with the fishing line on the dock and drawing the pity and attention of the man that may be the killer.
Getting to her feet, Camille thought she, too, might do well to do some fishing.
And she was going to use herself as bait.
CHAPTER TWENTY SIX
As the man at the desk of the boat rental shop processed her form, Camille considered calling Palmer. What she was about to do might take a bit longer than they had planned and, on top of that, there was no guarantee that it would work. On the other hand, she knew that he’d want to pull her out of there, to come up with a safer plan—especially after the incident with the truck and the boat. And since there was no time to waste, she decided to keep him in the dark. It was a harder decision than she expected, but she felt it was the right one.
The man behind the counter looked worried as he handed the keys to a basic fishing boat to her. “Please don’t take this the wrong way,” he said. “I understand you’re FBI and it’s an emergency and all, but do you know how to operate a boat?”
“Yes.”
“And you’ll have it back when?”
He hadn’t charged her because it was for FBI use, and he’d practically fawned over her ID when she’d showed it to him. Still, he obviously had his concerns.
“Sorry, but there’s just no way I can know that for sure.”
He nodded, clearly not a fan of what was going down. “Okay. Well…good luck. It’s the one with the red square sticker on the front, on Dock B. And please…just be careful with it, yeah?”
Camille left the shop and crossed a small parking lot to join up with a paved walkway that reminded her very much of the first one she and Palmer had walked down to view the crime scene where Megan Keenan had been killed. It turned out to be set up the exact same—several thinner walkways branching off, leading down to riverbanks and small, floating docks. She found the dock she needed, Dock B, and found the boat easily enough.
She hadn’t lied to the proprietor. She did indeed know how to drive a boat, though she was very far away from what she would call experienced. And she’d chosen a simple fishing boat because, while she thought she could handle an airboat, she wouldn’t be comfortable navigating one the way she intended.
Either way, at the end of the day, the poor guy back at the shop wasn’t going to be happy with her.
She took off her overcoat and stowed it beneath the seat. The white button-down and slacks she was wearing didn’t exactly scream “casual boat attire” but it was going to have to do. She untied form the dock, pushed off into the river, and started the engine.
She toyed with the controls a bit until she was comfortable with it and then started down the river. She headed away from the busier environs of the city because so far, all three murders had taken place in the thinner, narrower offshoots of the Mississippi. The ride was surprisingly cathartic—alone on the water, guiding the boat along with the warm wind pushing against her.
When she felt she had the controls well at hand, she started the next stage of her plan.
She put the small radio on, found a classic rock station, and blared the music. She then started to waver the boat back and forth, angling from one side of the river to the next. She attracted her fair share of evil glances from other boats she passed, but that was okay. It was sort of the point.
As a small stream appeared on the left, petering off the main stretch and deeper into the woods, she passed by a small pontoon boat occupied by five men. One of them whistled while another catcalled.
