“I’m confirming fire ants,” Stan Wenhoff said without an introduction. “The blisters contain a toxic alkaloid venom called solenopsin. It’s from the class of piperidines. The liquid is both insecticidal and antibiotic. Odd combination, I know.”
“So fire ants inject this when they bite?”
“Fire ants bite only to get a grip. They actually sting and inject from their abdomen.”
“Impressive little buggers. Can this stuff cause death?”
“This many stings could certainly have sent him into anaphylaxis. He’d have difficulty breathing, rapid heart rate. His throat would swell. Certainly may have contributed to his death. His lungs and heart tissue showed signs of congestion, consistent with undue pressure. Probable cause of death was suffocation. I need to wait for blood analysis results, but I suspect a high concentration of cocaine will have also contributed to his demise.”
“What about the ligature marks?”
“Definitely restrained. Both the wrists and ankles. I can’t estimate for how long, but there was a good amount of struggle.”
“I’m looking at similar images of the tattoo,” O’Dell told him.
Before she could go on, Stan interrupted. “And you’re discovering it might be linked to the drug trade.”
“So you recognize it?”
“No, can’t say that I do. But I’m guessing a man who puts a tattoo of a female skeleton that looks like the Grim Reaper on his back, a man who may have died of a drug overdose and who was most likely tortured by being tied down on top of a massive mound of fire ants… well, it wouldn’t take a stretch of the imagination to guess this is drug-related.”
“Dumping the body in the river could be a warning, but why in the Potomac? You said you believe he died somewhere down South. Do you still believe that?”
“You’re free to double-check, but my recollection is that fire ants don’t exist in areas that periodically have temperatures below freezing. Messes up their whole colonization thing. Besides, I’m guessing he probably died closer to his home.”
“And you know where that is?”
“Yes. I can even tell you his name.”
The offer surprised O’Dell enough that she hesitated before asking, “How are you magically able to do that?”
“Actually, no magic at all. I found a driver’s license shoved halfway down his throat. And despite the fact that he is currently a bit bloated, the resemblance is enough that I’m quite certain it’s his.”
14
O’Dell stopped in her office to collect copies from her printer. She used it as a detour to dilute her frustration before she confronted her boss. Everything about “the package in the Potomac”—from the tattoo to the driver’s license shoved down the victim’s throat to the dumping of the body in a public place — was adding up to be some kind of drug-related hit.
Why had she been sent? She specialized in profiling killers, tracking them, and stopping them before they killed again. But if this was a drug-cartel hit, it should be investigated by the DEA.
And that’s exactly what she intended to ask AD Kunze when she showed him a copy of Trevor Bagley’s driver’s license. She had obtained a printout from the Alabama Department of Motor Vehicles, but she included the copy Stan Wenhoff had e-mailed her of the crumpled, bloody original that he had removed from the man’s throat.
The creases in the laminated card made it difficult to identify Bagley. The bloodstains that had seeped behind the lamination suggested that the victim was still bleeding when his killer forced it down his throat. But Stan had confirmed the card alone would not have caused a suffocation that led to the man’s death. That, he still maintained, was due to the cocaine and the fire ants.
Still, O’Dell wanted AD Kunze to see the mess and had even used the color option on her printer to make a copy of the driver’s license, along with a photo of the bloated corpse and the shot she had of the tattoo.
She marched down the hallway, through the lobby, and headed for the assistant director’s closed door.
“He’s with someone,” his secretary told her. When she realized O’Dell wasn’t going to stop, she jumped out of her chair and shouted, “Someone is in there with him.”
O’Dell knocked, two short taps. Ignoring the secretary coming up quickly behind her, she pushed the door open before Kunze could respond. He looked up from behind his desk, surprise registering on his face before he scowled, first at O’Dell, then at his secretary, who had stayed back in the doorway. Across the desk from Kunze was, indeed, a visitor. And when the woman turned to look over her shoulder at the intruders, it was O’Dell’s turn to be surprised.
“Senator Delanor-Ramos?”
O’Dell saw the woman flinch and realized she should have left off the Ramos. The senator had been doing everything possible to disassociate herself from her ex-husband, and with good reason.
“Call me Ellie,” Senator Delanor said, standing and meeting O’Dell with an outstretched hand. “It’s good to see you again, Agent O’Dell.”
Less than a year ago the senator had used her political connections, including Assistant Director Kunze, when she was concerned about her then husband, George Ramos, and her two children. They had gone out in their houseboat on the Gulf of Mexico and gotten caught in a night of brutal thunderstorms.
But Ramos had fooled everyone: the authorities, his friends, his family, even his wife. He was using his kids and the storm as a cover to make a drug pickup in the middle of the Gulf. O’Dell and her partner, R. J. Tully, had been sent to rescue Ramos and his kids. Instead, they ended up arresting him.
“I didn’t mean to interrupt,” O’Dell said.
“Yes, you did.” AD Kunze glared at her. “Or you wouldn’t have barged into my office.”
“I’m so sorry, sir,” his secretary said. “I did tell her—”
“That’s fine, Ms. Holloway. I’m sure it must be something terribly important.” He continued to glare at O’Dell before he shifted his attention back to the senator. “I’m sorry for the interruption, Ellie.”
“No, not at all. I should let you all get to your work,” Senator Delanor said. “Raymond, perhaps you can call me later.”
He nodded, and O’Dell could swear she saw a look exchange between the two, one that seemed more intimate than professional. Nevertheless, Senator Delanor headed for the door, brisk, confident steps in three-inch heels. O’Dell couldn’t help thinking that the junior senator from Florida looked like a model, which probably caused some to underestimate her. The woman carried herself like a CEO for a Fortune 500 company, but she was still a politician, and O’Dell didn’t trust politicians.
Self-preservation seemed to trump everything else with them. O’Dell had stuck her neck out for this one’s family, and the senator’s presence here today only made O’Dell more suspicious of Kunze’s motives for sending her to oversee the retrieval of the package in the Potomac. Was he using her again to repay some political favor?
Raymond Kunze had been O’Dell’s boss for less than two years. He would never be able to fill the previous assistant director’s shoes. Kyle Cunningham had been an icon at Quantico. To O’Dell, he had been a mentor and, in some cases, even a father figure. His death had left the entire department feeling his absence. Perhaps Kunze came into the position with a chip on his shoulder, knowing he could never replace Cunningham.
Whatever the reason, he appeared to take it out on O’Dell over and over again, as if making her prove her worth. He had sent her into the eye of a hurricane to investigate a cooler full of body parts. Last fall he had her “stop off” in the Nebraska Sandhills to check on cow carcasses that had been mysteriously ravaged. And then there was the storm on the Gulf that he sent her into to retrieve Senator Delanor’s husband and children. Each and every time, O’Dell stumbled onto something murkier, uncovering secrets and even conspiracies — and in Senator Delanor’s husband’s case, illegal dealings. She no longer trusted her boss’s motives.