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“It seems more solid than the gang thing,” Paige said. “A few splashes of paint aren’t necessarily gang signs. I mean, have youcheckedthem against the FBI’s databases?”
One of the things the FBI did was keep records on known gangs, including a database of every known gang marking, tattoo, and graffiti tag that it had come across. The idea was that in situations where agents found that kind of thing, they would quickly be able to work out which group they were dealing with and what its connections were.
“I’m working on it,” Christopher said, typing quickly on his laptop.
Paige was more focused on trying to think about the other potential lead they had. She pulled up the information she could find on the three victims, and now that Paige knew that Aiden Martlet had been trying to be an artist, she was able to look deeper on the internet, trying to find evidence of his work.
She found images from just one small local show that he’d been a part of that quickly showed her that Sebastian Dvornic had a point: Martlet simply wasn’t that good. His work consisted of a few watercolors that, while executed well enough, didn’t seem like anything that would grab attention or persuade people to buy them.
When it came to Allison Hartley, it was easy to find more. She was an art professor, after all, and the college at which she worked included a full bio for her on its website.
Allison Hartley teaches art and art history here at Arnville College, with particular expertise in Renaissance art. She has exhibited her own work at numerous shows, and her students have gone on to win prestigious art prizes around the world.
That took Paige a little by surprise, given that Hope Jackson and Aiden Martlet had been much less successful. She kept digging, though, and quickly found a list of the professor’s publications, along with a list that set out her shows. There were fewer of the latter than Paige might have expected, and a lot of them seemed to be community shows where anyone could exhibit.
Paige kept looking, searching for Professor Hartley’s books. There were only a few reviews of them and those caught Paige’s attention.
Prof. Hartley claims to write with the expertise of an artist on the great artworks of the past, but her own work is derivative at best.
I took her course last semester. I dropped it after I saw some of her work. I guess those who can’t do, teach.
Those were harsh, but in one way, it was reassuring because at least it fit in with the pattern of the other two victims.
“It looks like the killer is targeting people who are less successful in their artistic careers,” Paige said. “Even the professor doesn’t seem to have achieved much as an actual artist.”
“It’s still too general,” Christopher insisted. “There are so many people out there who try creative things and then don’t succeed with them that it would be impossible to work out where the killer was going to strike next.”
“And your gang theory gets us close to him?” Paige couldn’t help snapping back at Christopher then.
“It might. The database says that several of the marks are reminiscent of gang tags.”
“Meaning they don’t match exactly?” Paige said.
How had they gone from kissing on their last case to arguing like this? Paige wished that she could say that it made no sense, except that it made perfect sense. They were both afraid of getting close again, so they were looking to push one another away. Christopher, in particular, seemed to be determined to keep Paige at arm’s length.
Almost as soon as she thought that, clarity seemed to settle on her like a blanket. She couldn’t keep working like this, couldn’t keep working with someone where the situation was so complicated and who seemed so determined to push her away.
Paige needed a new partner. No, even that wasn’t enough, because if she still worked in the BAU, she would still see Christopher far too often. Not to mention just how much Agent Sauer seemed to think that Paige didn’t belong in his department. It would be better to transfer out of there completely, trying to move to somewhere where Paige could still do good work without all the complications that had arisen from working alongside someone she was so attracted to. She was sure that other departments would want her skills.
Almost as soon as Paige made the decision, it felt as though a weight had lifted off her shoulders. She could think properly again for the first time in days. It was enough to let her start to try to make inroads into this case.
“The artists angle potentially gives us one thing,” Paige said. She didn’t wait for Christopher to respond before she went on. “It means that we can start to look for other crimes that have targeted the same kind of people. Even if this is gang related as you say, then there’s bound to be some kind of build up to something like this. If it’s one person, again, I think that they’re likely to have worked up to killing, especially when they’ve left so little evidence behind at the scenes.”
This time, Christopher didn’t argue, perhaps because Paige had given him so little room to do so. Besides, she didn’t need his permission to keep going with this aspect of the investigation. She would get the answers to this that she knew were out there, whether he went along with her ideas or not.
“It’s worth looking into,” Christopher agreed.
Paige started to search through police files in the area, trying to find filters that would give her what she wanted. Ultimately, though, all she could think of was to simply type the word “artist” into a search and then try to wade through everything that came back to her in the hope of finding answers.
It was a lot. The search picked up every time the local PD had used the terms “con artist” or “scam artist” as well as every time an art major or would be performance artist had been moved on or cautioned for something they called art, but the cops called vandalism.
“We’ll need to split all of this if we’re going to get through it,” Christopher said, looking over her shoulder. He was so close that Paige could have made contact with him if she’d only leaned back slightly. A part of her desperately wanted to do it even now when things were anything but good between the two of them. It was just one more reason why Paige knew that she had to put in for that transfer as soon as she got back to DC.
“I’ll send over a stack of the files to your computer,” Paige said. Since the laptop in question was currently on the far side of the room, it potentially gave her space once again.
Paige started to look through the files, discarding any that obviously weren’t relevant. The hard part, though, was deciding whatwasrelevant. Did a case where someone had been stalking his artist ex-girlfriend potentially fit in with all of this? Did one where an artist had been violent towards a rival who had gotten a show ahead of her matter?
There was a sense in which all Paige could do was keep going, hoping that she would know something relevant when she saw it. She was looking for a pattern of crimes, she suspected, so that let her remove all the ones that were one offs. Obviously, the killer couldn’t be someone who was behind bars for another crime, so that let her remove a second tranche of them.
