Levi watched the footage from the security camera on the twenty-fifth floor of Skyline’s building, groaned in disbelief, and rewound it to watch the same moment again. He fast-forwarded about fifteen minutes, then paused and pinched the bridge of his nose.
“Fuck,” he muttered under his breath.
“What’s wrong?” Martine asked. She set a Styrofoam coffee cup on his desk.
“The security camera is worthless.” He picked up the coffee and added a belated, “Thanks.”
She sat down at her own desk, which was directly across from his, and let out the sigh of someone who’d been on her feet all day. She sipped from her iced coffee before saying, “What happened? Perp corrupted the feeds? Looped the video?”
“Turned the camera,” said Levi.
“What?”
He rotated his computer monitor toward her and replayed the footage. “There’s a blind spot between the elevator in the far corner and where the camera’s sightline begins. The killer came up underneath the camera and turned it all the way to the side—with a broom handle or something, I guess—so it faces in the complete opposite direction of the path to Dreyer’s office. When they came back, they returned the camera to its original position. There isn’t a single second of the killer caught on video.”
She chewed thoughtfully on her straw. “So they staked the office building out in advance, obviously. They knew that was where they were going to kill Dreyer.”
“Yeah.” He pulled the monitor back into place, then tapped the pause button again. “I’m running the IDs of everyone who checked in with building security yesterday, and a couple of techs are going over the cameras from the lobby as well. We’ll see if anything pops.”
They both knew that was a long shot, though. Thanks to the camera feed, they at least knew when the killer had arrived on the twenty-fifth floor, how long it had taken them to kill Dreyer and arrange the crime scene, and when they had left. But in a forty-story building with over a thousand employees, on top of legions of daily visitors and delivery people, that wasn’t as helpful as it might seem.
The killer could have entered the building at any point during the day, whether on legitimate business or under some pretext, and hidden elsewhere for hours before killing Dreyer. They hadn’t necessarily exited the building right after leaving the floor, either. In fact, Levi would bet money that they’d still been on the premises when he and Martine had been assessing the crime scene. Until he had a list of specific suspects to work with, he was flying blind.
“How’d things go on your end?” he asked. While he’d been coordinating the technical side of things and leaning on the coroner’s office and forensics to speed their reports, Martine had been out interviewing Dreyer’s family and co-workers, and creating a timeline of his activities leading up to his death.
“Nothing out of the ordinary on Dreyer’s schedule yesterday. He didn’t have any meetings set up after 5 p.m., and he hadn’t ordered any food delivered. His wife did confirm that he frequently worked late, though. He called her yesterday around three to let her know he’d be staying after-hours.”
“Anyone with a reason to want him dead?”
Levi’s attention was split between Martine and his computer. When she didn’t answer right away, he looked away from his screen to find her grinning and waggling her eyebrows.
“What are you sitting on?” he said. “Spill.”
She set her cup down and leaned her forearms against her desk. “Well, everyone I spoke to denied that anyone would have a grudge against Dreyer. ‘Such a nice guy, can’t believe this happened to him.’ All the usual sanctification of the dead, you know what I mean. Like being murdered means he never did anything wrong his entire life.”
Levi nodded. The phenomenon was a common one, and frustrating when trying to discern motive.
“But when I got back to the substation, I had a very interesting conversation with Singh in Financial Crimes.”
She paused there, drawing out the reveal, but he could already see where this was going.
“You’re not telling me—”
“They’ve had him under investigation for eighteen months,” she said with great relish. “All on the DL, of course, but they’ve been building a case for embezzlement and defrauding investors. They’re furious that he’s dead. Hundreds of hours of manpower down the drain.”
Struck by this development, Levi rocked back in his chair. One of the first things he’d done was run Dreyer’s criminal history, and the man had been clean—officially, at least. This opened up a whole new realm of possibilities. “How many people knew about the investigation?”
“Not many. Dreyer didn’t himself, and neither did his wife or his superiors at Skyline. The DA’s office wanted an airtight case before they charged someone with Dreyer’s wealth and influence, so information was need-to-know—a few people over there, some guys in Financial Crimes.”
“And, realistically, everyone those people told about it.”
Martine snorted. “Got that right.”
Levi mulled it over. “Could be that one of his clients figured out what was going on themselves and decided on a little payback.”
“Sure. Or . . .” Shrugging, she reached for her coffee. “The only truly concrete connection Dreyer and Campbell have is that they were both criminals.”
“That could be a coincidence.”
Martine sipped her iced coffee, her expressive eyebrows saying more than words could.
“Did Singh give you anything else on the case?”
“Yeah. He’s sending over everything they’ve got, actually.”
“What does that mean?” Levi asked with a touch of foreboding.
She jerked her chin toward the far side of the room. He turned around and saw a uniformed officer wheeling a large cart stacked with file boxes into the bullpen, navigating carefully around the desks.
“The investigation was all hush-hush, so everything’s on paper, and paper only,” said Martine. “We’ll have to go through it the old-fashioned way.”
“Fantastic,” he said wearily, and began clearing a space on his desk.
“I’m looking for my little brother.” Dominic showed his phone to the cashier inside the gas station convenience store. “His girlfriend just dumped him, and he took off without telling anyone where he was going. I’m worried he might do something stupid.”
He had Goodwin’s Instagram feed open to a photo of him standing on campus with his arm around a young woman, a cocky grin on his face. Dominic wasn’t sure if his powerful aversion to the photo was due to his knowledge of Goodwin’s crime, or just because the kid was so obviously a smug, smirking little prick.
The cashier, whose nametag read SHAWN, studied the photo and then shook his head. “I haven’t seen anyone who looks like this today, and I’ve been here since nine. Although . . .” His brow furrowed. “Something about him does seem familiar. Can I?”
“Be my guest.” Dominic handed over the phone so Shawn could scroll through Goodwin’s Instagram at his own pace.
His pursuit had led him to a generic middle-class suburb in an almost entirely residential area, block after block of cookie-cutter houses and desert landscaping. This gas station was the only business he’d come across for several miles. It was crammed full of racks of over-processed junk food, and the whole place smelled like the hot dogs turning on rollers in a machine on the counter.
“Oh, hey!” Shawn exclaimed. “Yeah, I’ve seen this guy. I didn’t recognize him without these sunglasses.”
He handed Dominic the phone, now open to a picture of Goodwin on the beach, wearing a pair of dark-tinted aviators.
“So he has been here?” Dominic asked.
“Not today. Not since . . . uh, Tuesday, I think.”
Dominic raised a skeptical eyebrow. “You’re sure it was the same guy?” Four days was a long time for someone to remember a person they’d met only in passing, especially a person whose face had been partially obscured.
“Oh, yeah, I remember him,” Shawn said with a snort. He pointed to the self-serve coffee bar on the other side of the store. “Guy spilled coffee all over the floor and didn’t try to clean it up, didn’t even apologize. Just made himself another cup and walked away without a care in the world. Douchebag.” Shawn paused, seeming to remember belatedly that Goodwin was Dominic’s “brother.” “Uh, no offense.”
“Don’t worry about it.” Dominic waved a hand to set Shawn at ease. “He’s the baby of the family—Mom and Dad always spoiled him.”
“I got a sister like that. Drives me nuts.” Shawn heaved an exasperated sigh and said, “Anyway, your brother came in that day and bought a bunch of food, filled up a couple canisters of gasoline, and paid for everything in cash. He dropped it on the counter instead of handing it to me.”
At least Goodwin’s assholery was working to Dominic’s advantage. “Any chance you saw what kind of car he was driving?”
“He wasn’t. I didn’t notice him come in, obviously, but I sure as hell watched him leave. He went out the side door.”
Dominic looked at the door in question, but saw nothing remarkable. “And?”
“And there’s no parking out there. People who come here in cars walk in and out through the front, but we get a lot of foot traffic from the houses around here, and they use the side door. I saw your brother start walking down the sidewalk before I stopped paying attention. Never saw him get into a car.”
“Huh.” Dominic rocked back on his heels as he considered this new information. While it was gratifying to confirm that he was on the right track, what had directed him here in the first place was the information that Goodwin had used his credit card here today. The internal sense of not right that had gripped him earlier was back in full force. “You’re absolutely sure you didn’t see him this afternoon?”
Shawn shrugged. “I’m sure I didn’t see him. Doesn’t mean he wasn’t here, though.”
True. There were a couple of other employees working that Dominic could question, but in the end, it didn’t matter if anyone could remember seeing Goodwin here today. The important thing was that Goodwin had been here, and was probably staying in the area.
Dominic thanked Shawn for his time and bought a bottle of iced tea and a protein bar before going back out to his truck. He’d left Rebel behind for this one, since he didn’t know how long he’d be out, so he only had himself for company as he started the engine and left the gas station parking lot.
He would have to go through every single one of Goodwin’s family, friends, and acquaintances, looking for a connection to this town. Goodwin hadn’t ended up here by accident. If he’d decided to stick around here this long, it was because he’d known of a good hiding place—
A billboard on the side of the road caught Dominic’s attention, and he reflexively tapped the brakes. The car behind him blared its horn.
Sending an apologetic wave out his open window, he pulled onto the shoulder and let the car blow past him. He looked back up at the sign.
VILLA BRILLANTE ESTATES, read bold white type atop a photograph of an attractive Spanish Mission–style house. BROUGHT TO YOU BY THE SEAVER DEVELOPMENT CORPORATION. And below that, in smaller letters: If you lived here, you’d be home by now!
All perfectly normal, except that the sign was faded and weather-beaten, and there was no construction equipment that he could see beyond the brick walls that marked the entrance to the development—despite the fact that the majority of the houses were incomplete.
A quick search on his phone confirmed it. Seaver had gone belly-up three months ago, and the land for this development hadn’t been resold yet, leaving a graveyard of abandoned, half-finished houses rife with hidey-holes for cowardly little rapists who couldn’t face the consequences of their actions.
Dominic grinned and pulled back onto the road.
He parked on a street a few blocks over; the sound of an engine entering the deserted housing development would be a dead giveaway. Before he left the truck, he strapped on a ballistic vest and replaced his shoulder holster and jacket on top. Couldn’t be too careful.
He walked over to the Villa Brillante Estates and stopped just inside the low walls at the entrance, taking in the lay of the land. The houses were the same Spanish Mission–style as the one on the billboard, with low-pitched roofs, rounded windows and doors, and the beginnings of iron grillwork and decorated tiles in the houses closer to completion. He didn’t know how large the development was, which made searching it a daunting prospect, but many of the houses could be ruled out immediately—all those without a finished roof and walls, to start with.
Most likely, Goodwin would have chosen a house deeper inside the neighborhood, away from the main road. Dominic stuck close to the sides of the half-built houses while he walked, pulling his gun once he was out of sight of any cars that might pass by.
He was more concerned by the possibility of ambush than an escape attempt. Goodwin was smart enough to realize how stupid it would be to run—though the afternoon was winding into evening, there was plenty of daylight left, and there was no landscaping anywhere in the development, just flat, empty land interspersed with the skeletons of houses. Anyone running through here would draw immediate attention to themselves.
No, if Goodwin realized that Dominic was coming, he would stand his ground. With no idea of Goodwin’s exact position or whether or not he had a weapon, Dominic proceeded with great care, choosing the likeliest houses and clearing them one by one.
He hadn’t left the Army so long ago, and his Ranger training was bred into his bone and sinew anyway. True, working alone was different from working with a trusted team, but the methods and muscle memory were still there for him to rely on. He moved near silently in his soft-soled boots, slipping in and out of each house like a ghost, attentive to every small sound and slight movement in his surroundings.
He had cleared four houses when he saw it—a portable generator on the back patio of a house a block away, with extension cords snaking in through an empty space where a sliding glass door would have been installed if the house had been finished. That was what Goodwin had needed the gasoline for.
Dominic crept closer to the house, his eyes intent on the windows, but he detected no movement. When he reached the patio, he found the generator silent and cold to the touch. Had Goodwin already moved on?
Glock at the ready, he stepped into the house, moved a few paces into the living room—and gagged, pressing his face into the crook of his elbow.
God, he knew that smell. A few years wasn’t long enough to forget the stench of dead flesh left to bake in the desert, though the last time he’d smelled it, the desert in question had been half a world away.
He lowered his arm and forced himself to take several deep breaths, swallowing his bile until he’d acclimatized somewhat. Once he could trust himself to move without vomiting, he methodically cleared the house room by room, finishing the first floor before following the trailing extension cords up the stairs.
Though he kept his guard up, he sensed that any danger here had long since passed. Whatever had died in this house had done so days ago.
The extension cords led into the master bedroom, so he left that one for last, clearing the other rooms on the floor to ensure he was alone in the house. Then he pushed open the master’s half-ajar door.
“Ah, shit,” he said, lowering his gun.
Matthew Goodwin sure as hell wasn’t smirking anymore.
What had once been a handsome young man was now a darkened, bloated corpse buzzing with flies. He sat propped against the far wall, on a mattress set on the floor. His throat had been cut in one long slice, and his clothes and the bedsheets were black with dried blood.
Careful to keep his hands to himself, Dominic ventured further into the room. Goodwin was facing a small television—the final destination of the extension cords connected to the generator outside—though the screen was blank now with the loss of power. Most bizarrely, his left hand was wrapped around a beer bottle, resting at his side as if he’d just taken a sip.
How was that even possible? And was there something . . .
Dominic frowned and peered more closely at Goodwin’s hand. There was something tucked into it, right where his thumb and fingers met around the glass.
It was an ordinary playing card—the seven of spades.