“Long night,” Peabody said. “I worked with McNab, and we’ve got everything there is to know on Macie Snyder and Jeni Curve, plus we have deep data on five of the abductees who settled in New York.”
She paused, scanned the new data on the board. “Wow. Long night for you, too.”
“Did you read the data I sent you on Guiseppi Menzini?”
“Twice. Bad guy, chemist, religious crazy—and the primary suspect in two attacks, using the agent we’ve identified was used in our attacks. Captured and erased.”
“Callaway’s linked to Menzini through his mother, an abductee.”
“Callaway.” Peabody’s eyes narrowed on the board. “I took him for a lightweight. I don’t remember any Audrey Hubbard on the list.”
“Because there wasn’t. She was born Karleen MacMillon to Gina MacMillon—Tessa Hubbard’s half-sister—and an unknown father. The MacMillons were reported killed during the home invasion. Hubbard recovered the kid, changed her name, got a fresh birth certificate, and moved with her husband to New York.”
Eve grabbed the coffee. “There’s more. I want the images programmed as I’ve outlined while I fill you in.”
She ran it through while Peabody set up the programming.
“I’ve got two men on him. Roarke dug into the mother—Gina MacMillon. There’s more there, but we’ll pass that to Feeney.”
“With all the angles, all the data to sort through, I never thought we’d zero in this fast.” As Eve had, Peabody turned to the victim board. “I went to bed last night thinking we’d have to go into another scene like the bar and the café. I didn’t get a lot of sleep thinking it.”
“We won’t give him a chance to add to this board.”
“I’ll sleep a hell of a lot better tonight then. Are we picking Callaway up this morning?”
“I want to see what he does this morning, where he goes. But yeah, we’ll be talking to him. I want to interview the Hubbards, and I’m damned if I’m going to Arkansas. I figure Teasdale has the pull to bring them here. Maybe enough pull to get a warrant to search their place while they’re out of it.”
“Do you think there’s something there, something with his parents? Jesus, Dallas, do you think they know?”
“I think there’s something there.” Eve stepped back from the board, drinking coffee as she scanned. “I can’t say what they know, but there’s a direct link from Red Horse, Menzini to Lewis Callaway. It’s biological, and there’s nothing here that comes close to proving he knew his own biology, or cared, or has any information on the substance used.”
“Maybe not, but we’ve got a lot of key pieces.”
“Now we need the whole picture. We need that to show means. There’s no clear motive. Was there a specific target—Cattery, Fisher—or were the attacks broad based? If target specific, why Cattery and Fisher? We’ve got opportunity. He was in the bar, and he lives and works within spitting distance of the café, and has admitted to frequenting same.”
She sat on the edge of the conference table, scanning, scanning. “We need more. We need to prove he had knowledge, had access to the formula. We need motive, specific or broad based. To sew him up tight, we need it all.”
“You’ve got enough to sweat him,” Peabody pointed out.
“Yeah, I can sweat him, and I will. I’d like more in my pocket before I do.”
She went back to her notes as cops trickled into the room. Then her head came up. She scented baked goods seconds before the wolf pack circled Feeney.
“Listen, the wife made this coffee cake thing from her cooking class deal. It’s probably not half bad.”
As if it mattered, Eve thought. She let them have the next couple minutes to tear in, devour while she finished off her coffee.
“Fall in,” she ordered. “And wipe the crumbs off your faces, for Christ’s sake. In case any of you have maintained some minor interest in the current investigation, we’ve connected Callaway to Red Horse.”
That shut them up. Attention zeroed in on the boards as cops grabbed chairs.
She waited one more beat, nodded to Peabody. “Gina MacMillon,” she began as the image came on screen. “This is Lewis Callaway’s biological grandmother. She is twenty-three in this ID, issued before, according to statements and documents, she abandoned her husband and joined an unnamed cult. During her association with the cult, she gave birth to a female. The certificate of birth lists her husband as father, and was issued when the infant was six months old. The infant was named Karleen MacMillon, listed as an abductee at the age of eighteen months, and never recovered. However—”
The next image slid on.
“This is Karleen MacMillon’s computer-aged image at the age of twenty-one. And this is Audrey Hubbard Callaway’s ID photo at the same age. Audrey Hubbard’s certificate of birth is fake, and issued to Gina MacMillon’s half-sister Tessa and her husband, Edward, who left England when the child was approximately four years of age, and settled in Johnstown, Ohio. Audrey Hubbard married Russell Callaway, and subsequently gave birth to a son, Lewis.”
“The dots connect,” Baxter commented.