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Amanda mulled over the options. If they ditched the Mercedes in the river, it suggested the shooter and his accomplice convened here and left in the van. If they disabled the GPS, that provided more uncertainty for the investigation, though they must realize the car could still be flagged from the active BOLO. She said, “It wouldn’t hurt to get divers out to take a look around.”
“We’ll stick a pin in that for a bit.” Malone walked over to the water’s edge and looked down.
Amanda stepped up next to him, and all she saw was black ink and her reflection.
“If they dumped it, we can kiss goodbye to forensic trace,” Malone said, scratching at his beard, his forehead wrinkled into deep furrows. “And divers take a beat or two to arrange.”
His hesitance to move on this told her he wanted more to support ordering a dive team. Amanda looked around, striving for some grand epiphany. Then she paced and thought.
Given the time of year, the marina was pretty much abandoned. That made it an excellent choice for a clandestine rendezvous point but for what purpose? It seemed they’d planned the abduction, so it stood to reason they had an endpoint in mind. Why not just drive straight there with him in the van and the woman in the Mercedes?
Her earlier thought returned. The boat slips are empty… She turned her attention to the large billboard on the side of a huge warehouse where boats were stored for the winter. She smiled and pointed at the sign. “They promise their customers twenty-four-hour surveillance.”
“Well that’s a good start.” Trent sounded pleased but didn’t look at her.
“Let me call the number.” Malone pulled his phone out and walked a few feet away.
Amanda turned to Trent. “We did discuss that we’re possibly dealing with professionals. It might better support them having the capability of disabling GPS. That’s assuming they did.”
“But why come here at all? Were they obtuse to the ad on the side of the warehouse, to the fact there are cameras? It would have made more sense for them to stop on a country road.”
She wasn’t close-minded to the possibility of the Mercedes being in the river either, but said, “I don’t have all the answers, but they’d know we’d be a while behind them. We need to watch the video, to start. Building on what you said, I’m not sure they are too intimidated by cameras. They did take her from Fill N Go. They’d have to know they’d have them there.”
“The duo isn’t exactly camera shy, though they hid their faces. They must have known there could have been other casualties, but that didn’t stop them from going ahead.”
“Whoever they are, they are highly organized, highly motivated. They even had foresight to put tinted plate covers on the van.”
“They seem willing to do whatever necessary. Thugs for hire?”
“That would be a nightmare and make tracking down whoever it is even harder. I don’t think we’d be far off the mark to assume these people have criminal records though. His prints could be in the system and be why he wore gloves. But did he think of that when loading his bullets?”
“If not, he might have left prints on the casings. That would be unprofessional, but so was leaving them at the scene. They’re not an elite kidnapping crew, whoever they are.”
She’d fire a quick message to Blair, but she had confidence the CSI would be processing the casings for prints.
“I think this guy possibly killed before too,” Trent said. “He didn’t seem to hesitate to pull that trigger.”
Amanda’s mind flashed to what she’d seen on that video, and Trent was on the mark with his comment. The shooter had raised the gun and fired without hesitation. He also had good aim.
Malone returned to them. “Good news. Two cameras cover the lot, and the manager’s coming in now. Should be here in less than ten.”
“Good news,” she said, half-distracted, trying to resurrect that glimpse of an epiphany. Just before his return, a thought was edging in. Now it was gone.
“Really? You sound like I ran over your dog.”
“Don’t mean to. Trent and I were just talking everything through. The shooter and his partner seemed to have planned everything out, starting with the tinted plate covers on the van.” Amanda told him their speculation about the shooting and the background of the perps, or perpetrators of a crime.
“And they aren’t shy taking her from a public place,” Malone said thoughtfully. “Brazen.”
Trent was nodding. “Or driven. That makes it more likely it’s someone Graves had a hand in putting away. If we pursue that angle, we can release the idea of a hired third party.”
“A gun for hire,” Malone said as if chewing on it. “I’d keep the theory in play. They did take Katherine alive. It could be to deliver her to someone.”
Amanda still didn’t want to give too much thought to that. “I have a message in with Katherine’s former lieutenant at the NYPD, and Trent left one for her best friend back in New York.” With that, the earlier slippery epiphany came into focus. “It doesn’t have to be someone Katherine wronged directly. It could be someone indirectly affected.”
“Jeez. Doesn’t that open a barrel of monkeys,” Malone said. “Where could we possibly start?”
This was yet another question she didn’t have an answer for. She leaned back on one fact. “There haven’t been any ransom demands yet.”
