Solitude Creek (Kathryn Dance 4)

Officers were checking out the bus lines too. And taxis.

No sign of a six-foot-plus man with a solid build, blond hair, holding a white gym bag (or Global Adventure World shopping bag holding a gym bag).

Finally the staff who'd been manning the security video reported that there was nothing on any of the many minutes of tape that might help them. The crowds had been too thick.

Dance looked over the masses and didn't even bother canvassing.

O'Neil said, "Back to Prescott's?"

"Sure."

In a half hour they were there--the traffic was, of course, thick as honey; even the lights and siren in Deputy Martinez's cruiser didn't speed them along very much. They arrived just as the crime scene crew was finishing up.

A tech said, "Your man knew what he was doing. Cloth gloves."

"I know."

"Didn't find much."

Looking down at Prescott's body, on his back, suffocated with duct tape. The image was stark and clear; he was under a bright floor lamp.

O'Neil asked, "Why was he killed?"

Dance speculated, "Something in that picture of Solitude Creek he included in the post? Clue to our unsub maybe. He had to kill Prescott and take down the site?"

The rant was gone, yes, but O'Neil had made a copy earlier. They looked it over again, carefully. The Vidster post was a video but the image from Solitude Creek was a still. It was a news photo, taken of the aftermath of the tragedy, after the bodies had been removed from the floor, which was covered with litter, purses, scraps of clothing, overturned furniture.

Neither of the officers could see anything revealing.

O'Neil offered, "Maybe our unsub had to take Prescott out, to prove there was no terrorist angle. He wouldn't want federal scrutiny."

And true, that's how it turned out; after Prescott's death, both the CBI and the MCSO had received calls from Homeland Security since the incident was linked to potential terrorism, though agents reviewed the matter and decided it wasn't terrorist related--wasn't even a federal crime.

"That could be." She examined the body again, seeing the face, clear under the bright lamp. The look of horror, eyes wide. She supposed it would have taken him four or five minutes to die. The unsub'd used this means for the quiet, she guessed.

An officer appeared in the doorway. He nodded to those inside and said, "Detective O'Neil?"

"Yes?"

"We did a canvass of the neighborhood, following the route your unsub escaped down. And found this." He held up a plastic evidence bag containing a Nokia phone. "Guy walking a dog said he saw it fall out of the perp's pocket when he was running to the Chevy, the getaway vehicle."

Dance and O'Neil shared a look. Guardedly optimistic. The phone was clearly a prepaid burner--they were invariably cheap, like this model. So it was unlikely they could trace it back to the man. But it might have helpful information inside.

"Can we get the prints from the man who found it?"

The uniform smiled. "He never touched it. He used a plastic bag. He watches all the crime scene shows, he said."

Dance took the phone and through the plastic tried the keys. "Pass-code protected. Well, one way or the other, we'll get inside." She said to the Orange County detective, "I'll want to take his computer and the phone into custody. You all right with that?"

"Sure."

O'Neil couldn't have done this, not without Orange County's okay, since the crime had occurred here and Monterey had no jurisdiction. The CBI, however, trumped county public safety departments and she could take the evidence. Her intention, however, was not to deliver the victim's computer and the perp's phone to the CBI's small forensics department--they actually farmed out physical evidence work to the Monterey lab most of the time--but to have Jon Boling analyze them. The former wonder boy in Silicon Valley occasionally consulted for the CBI, FBI and other law enforcement groups that needed IT or computer assistance. Computer forensic science is an art and he was good at it.

A woman officer with Crime Scene handed the computer over to her; Dance signed a chain-of-custody card for it and the phone. She stepped outside and slipped the plastic bags into her suitcase.

They arranged with the lead detective for the reports from here and the theme park to be sent to Monterey. In silence they walked to the rental car and headed for the airport. After a day like this, the idea of flying commercial, with the many hassles, had no appeal whatsoever; Dance reminded herself to do something nice for Charles Overby, thanking him for the pricey state jet.

Maybe she'd bake him a cake.