She fell silent. The pastry was a memory, so he got out of the car and went into the Starbucks and purchased an apple fritter the size of a softball. He brought it to her, and she immediately started picking at it. Sweets were definitely her weakness.
“We caught a break two years ago,” she said. “The photographs were dropped off at a Walgreens pharmacy in Plantation in South Broward. I flew down and interviewed the photo processor who’d been on duty that day. His last name was Daniels, so of course we hit it off. Daniels remembered the guy who’d dropped the film off, and told me that he’d seen the guy at a Fourth of July fireworks celebration on the beach.”
“So our killers live in Fort Lauderdale,” he said.
“At least part of the time. They may also have residences in Houston and Atlanta as well. You want some of this fritter? It’s really tasty.”
He tore off a small piece to be sociable. “Where are we in the rotation?”
“What do you mean?”
“You said that every six months there’s another victim. Are we due for another killing? If the way you ransacked my condo is an indication, I’m guessing we are.”
“Yes, we’re due. The last victim was killed five months and three weeks ago. I should be getting another packet on my desk any day now.”
“From Fort Lauderdale?”
“Correct. It’s next in line. We think the killers kidnap a girl and keep her doped up for a few days. They feed her a last meal, and then it’s lights out.”
“What’s the significance of the last meal?”
“We don’t know. Maybe it’s a way to calm her down.”
He chewed on the fritter and washed it down with his coffee. “If your math is right, these guys are going to kill another girl very soon. Do you have any other leads?”
“No. I’m running blind.” She gave him a weary look. “Can you help me save her?”
The question caught him off guard. Saving people had been his specialty as a SEAL. His pot belly and small stature had made it easy for him to blend in just about anywhere in the world. That had come in handy during hostage rescues.
“I’m happy to try. You want to take a break first? Go for a walk?”
“I’m okay, but thanks for offering,” she said.
“I have a theory about your killers,” he said. “Before I share it with you, I need to ask you a question. How many of the victims worked at malls or in retail centers?”
“All of them.”
“So the victims were around groups of people when they were abducted.”
“Yes. Except for me. I was walking home from a class.”
“You were different.”
“How so?”
“Our killers saw you walking by yourself and decided to be opportunistic and grab you. They put ski masks on, jumped out of their car, and abducted you. It was a rushed job, and they botched it. That’s why you managed to escape.”
“That makes sense. What’s your theory?”
He thought back to the elderly man in the tracksuit pushing the dying woman in the wheelchair, and how every person they’d encountered had avoided them. “Our killers have come up with a unique way to abduct their victims from public places,” he said. “They use a wheelchair. I first thought the wheelchair was for distraction, but there’s another reason. Let me show you how it works.”
He took out his cell phone and pulled up the surveillance video of Nicki’s near abduction at the Galleria mall. Daniels held the phone up to her face and stared at the screen. Her mouth grew taut with rage.
“My brother-in-law saved the day,” she said.
“Yes, he did,” he said. “Nicki was the killers’ next victim. They connected her to the Cassandra videos and decided to abduct her, knowing it would destroy you when the photos of her landed on your desk.”
“How can you know that for certain?”
“I know because of how hard they tried. The abduction at the Galleria mall failed, so they tried to grab her from home and escape in a boat. When that failed, they parked a van across the street and started watching the house. They were on a mission.”
“You may be right. So what’s your theory?”
“I’ll show you. Watch the video again. This time, focus on the people in the mall.”
Daniels watched the surveillance video a second time.
“None of them are paying attention,” she said. “Why do you think that is?”
“It’s the presence of the wheelchair,” he said. “From the time we’re little kids, our parents train us not to stare at people being pushed in wheelchairs, who are either handicapped or sick. It’s considered bad manners, so we avoid making eye contact when we see a person in a wheelchair. That’s our killers’ trick. They approach their victim from behind. One pushes a wheelchair, while the other holds a bottle of chloroform and a rag. They knock their victim out and strap her into the wheelchair, which they push through the crowd while people deliberately avoid looking at them. Outside in the parking lot, they put the victim in their vehicle, and load the wheelchair in the trunk.”
“You’re saying that there are witnesses, but they’re not paying attention.”
“Correct. There were plenty of people present when Nicki was nearly abducted at the Galleria mall, yet none of them helped your brother-in-law. That’s because they were looking the other way. Which leads me to my next theory.”
“Which is what?”
“You’ve been looking for a pair of cops. That makes sense, since the police from the nearby towns didn’t submit to DNA testing during the investigation of the Hanover killers. But what if this wasn’t a pair of cops? What if it was a pair of nurses or paramedics? They would have experience handling a wheelchair and also access to chloroform at the hospital where they worked.”
“Jesus. I never considered that,” Daniels said.
She fell silent. Her fist punched the dashboard.
“Don’t be hard on yourself,” he said. “People in the medical profession rarely commit crimes and hardly come up on law enforcement’s radar. But there are always exceptions. Did the employees at the hospitals in Hanover submit to DNA testing during the investigation?”
“I don’t know. There’s only one hospital near Hanover, and that’s the Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center in Lebanon, which is three miles from the college.”
“How hard would it be to find out?”
“Not hard at all. I stay in contact with the FBI agent that handled that case. He’s retired now and lives in a community in central Florida called The Villages. Every time I get new information, I share it with him, hoping it might spark a memory.”
“You should call him. I’m willing to bet that the employees at Dartmouth-Hitchcock didn’t submit to DNA testing either.”
“You think our killers are male nurses,” she said.
“Yes, I do,” he said.
Chapter 34
Keep Moving Forward
Daniels placed a call to the retired FBI agent who’d handled the Hanover killers case. His name was Mark Eberbach, and he confirmed to her that the male employees at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center had not submitted to DNA testing during the investigation. Daniels thanked Eberbach for his time and promised to stay in touch.
“I need to go to the FBI’s office in North Miami Beach and get on a computer and do some digging,” Daniels said. “Want to tag along?”
He’d finally gained her trust. He nodded, and she pulled out of the Starbucks parking lot and drove west toward I-95. The FBI had three facilities in South Florida: one in Miami, a newly opened office in Miramar, and an office in North Miami Beach. The NMB office was the closest, but that was a relative term when driving in South Florida, where a ten-mile journey could take between ten minutes and an hour.