Blood List(15)

"Shouldn't surprise us, Jerri. The only M.O. this guy's got is that there isn't any M.O. No serial in the books would have let you or Carl live."

Jerri looked at the floor and said, "There's no money in it."

"What?" Gene asked, confused.

She repeated herself with more certainty, looking him dead in the eyes. "'There's no money in it.' That's what D Street said just before he took me down. What's it mean?"

Gene grimaced. "I don't know, Jerri. But I think we ought to find out."



Over the next three days, two text messages were sent to the phone recovered in Sheila Jones' apartment. They were encrypted, and both a single line in length. Sam knew they were gibberish code-phrases. Phrases that, even if they hacked the encryption, wouldn't mean anything unless she knew what each word represented. "Blue moon sits on the hen's egg" or some crap like that. Even if they weren't gibberish, they were too short to bust open. She'd sent them to cryptanalysis anyway.





Chapter 6





November 14th, 5:18 PM EST; J. Edgar Hoover Building; Washington, D.C.



Gene sat at his desk, working on the Salt Lake City report. He'd been staring at a computer monitor for six hours straight and felt like it. His team, along with countless behind-the-scenes forensics experts, had been working sixteen-hour days for two weeks straight. His phone chirped, and he hit "speaker."

"Palomini."

"Hey," Sam said. "We have our LRJ."

"Fantastic. Who is it?"

"Lawrence Reginald Johnson, Jr., retired garbage man and grandfather."

Gene put his head in his hands and rubbed his temples. "Any pattern matches?"

"None so far. No correlation between Mr. Johnson and any of the other victims."

"No surprise there," Gene said. "Why do we think it's him?"

"We know it's him," Sam said, "because Larry has a blog that almost nobody reads. But he was logged six times in the past three months through municipal firewalls. Once from Los Angeles; once from Syracuse, New York; once from Rochester, Minnesota; again from Los Angeles; and twice from Des Moines. In that order. Do those locations sound familiar?"

Gene played dumb. "Gee, Sam, they almost sound like D Street's travel patterns. I assume the dates match what we have from the phone?"

"Yup. Sure do!" Sam's enthusiasm matched his own.

"Awesome work, Sam. Double-check the rest of our LRJs, and let PC know they'll be able to let them go soon."

"Will do. FYI, I'm still trying to crack the encryption on those text messages, but I'm not hopeful. Chad DelGatto from crypto has an idea about using area-code iterations and an Apex-Lucinda approach to break the—"

Gene cut her off. "Sounds good, Sam. Let me know how it goes." He'd never studied cryptography, and she'd never stop explaining once she got rolling.

"Right." She hung up.

Gene turned back to his paperwork. Another hour or two, and he'd be done for the week. But first, he had to figure out what to do with Larry Johnson, Jr. An idea came to him, and he picked up the phone.



* * *



November 16th, 8:20 AM CST; Home of Agent Robert Barnhoorn; St. Louis, Missouri.



Doug walked up the sidewalk, hand in hand with Maureen, to the yellow, two-story colonial. Maureen opened the door and called out, "Hi, Robbie!" A cute little projectile in the form of Evan Barnhoorn flew across the living room and leapt into the air with a gleeful cry. Doug intercepted the squirming child and flipped him upside-down. Holding him up so that they were face-to-inverted-face, Doug gave his best bad-cop face.

"Who are you?" Doug asked, digging his fingers in just enough to tickle with every word.

Evan squirmed and giggled. "Uncle Doug!" he said reproachfully. "I'm Evan!"

Doug gave him a thoughtful stare while Maureen suppressed a smile. "Can't be. Evan is a little tiny thing. You're all grown up!" Evan giggled again. "How old are you now?" Doug asked.

"Six!"

"Six? That's impossible. You can't be six yet."

"Can, too!" Evan said. "Someday I'll be as old as you! As old as Aunt Maureen!" Marcy Barnhoorn stepped into the living room, smiling. A plump woman in her mid-forties with disheveled strawberry blonde hair framing her face, she had a vitality about her that outshone her appearance, even through her flour-dusted hands and apron. She raised her eyebrows and mouthed the word coffee?

Doug flashed her a smile and a quick nod, then flipped Evan right-side up. Maureen stepped around him to greet her sister-in-law.

"And how old is your Aunt Maureen, little man?" Doug asked.

"Old!" Evan said.

Doug set him down and tousled his hair. "Brave little guy, aren't you? Now where's your dad?"