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“We have enough people. No one is going to be home, so we’re not expecting trouble. Ten minutes, meet in the parking lot and we’ll give you the briefing.”
She walked away, skeptical.
Kara was naturally a suspicious person, and she used to fake fevers when she didn’t want to go to school. Easy enough to do. That didn’t mean that Marcy did it. And maybe she wasn’t sick but didn’t want to be around when her friend Damon Avila was brought in for questioning on multiple homicides. Guilt for helping turn him in? Maybe.
She texted Marcy.
Tom told me you’re sick. Let me know if I can bring you anything like chicken soup. I can’t cook, but I’m happy to get takeout.
A minute later, Marcy responded.
Thanks, but sleep is all I need. Talk to you tomorrow.
Matt came through and the AUSA sent over an electronic warrant. It was limited—they were looking for bomb-making material or C-4, any computers or disks, and any documentation that could be used to make bombs or maps, or evidence of confirmed or potential targets. As soon as they had it, Kara, Michael, Ryder, and Redfield headed over to Damon Avila’s house. The deputy stayed outside to make sure no one entered without authorization. Ryder was searching the detached garage and Michael started in the main bedroom of the small two-bedroom house, then would move to the second bedroom. Kara had Avila’s small home office, right off the living room. It might have been a formal dining room at one time.
She slipped on gloves and looked through every drawer and cabinet. Though it was a limited warrant, they were allowed to take his computer, which she had already handed off to Ryder to tag and log into evidence. They could access it to check for bomb-making instructions, but she didn’t want to do that here in case it was password protected. Ryder could handle that at headquarters.
There was nothing incriminating in his desk. He very well could have taken everything with him, dumping it in a weighted box in the ocean. Kara would have.
Well, no, she would have burned everything and then doused the ash with chemicals, in case something didn’t burn completely.
No sign of destruction in the office. No recent fire in the living room fireplace. No smoldering ashes in the barbecue pit. Waterlogged paper was just as good, she figured.
She looked around a second time. Maybe he thought he would get away with it. Maybe he still would. They had nothing to connect him to the five cold-case homicides, but they were specifically looking for something that linked him to the bombings: explosive material or any material that could have been used in the making of the two recovered bombs.
They could also look for journals, writings, or documents that might connect to how to make a bomb. Plans or maps or anything to connect him to the destruction.
If he was hiding evidence here, where would he hide it?
Remember, Ryder thinks that there are missing files from Neil’s house. What would he have done with them if he hadn’t destroyed them?
If, if, if...
Because she would have destroyed them.
Think like a psychopath.
That was Catherine Jones’s job. Kara didn’t think like psychopaths. She didn’t know why people did the shit they did. She didn’t know why her parents liked to con people. She didn’t know why criminals trafficked in people. (Greed? Profit? Control? Who the fuck caredwhy?) She didn’t know why Damon Avila killed those boys thirteen years ago—because icy roads caused Brian Stevens to swerve out of control? They hadn’t caused Avila’s accident on purpose! Revenge...yeah, she understood revenge, but this was twisted. It had not been their fault. And what about Avila’s girlfriend? Did he kill her because she fell in love with someone elseyearsafter they broke up? Shit, if every guy Kara walked away from had wanted to kill her, she’d be dead a dozen times over. But it didn’t even matter why Missy Douglas had left him. She did, she had every right to, and for years Damon didn’t do shit about it...until Missy found a guy she loved, and she was happy. A guy that Damon was jealous of because he had accomplished what had been stolen from Damon, at least in his twisted, petty little mind. He couldn’t stand to see his ex-girlfriend happy. That was it. And the fact that Missy was happy twisted him up so much inside that he went out of his way to kill hereight yearsafter she broke it off with him.
Perhaps he’d let these slights fester for years. They built up. He must have been watching Missy, following her on occasion. They may have had mutual friends, might have seen each other over the course of the years...and then he pounced when she was at the peak of happiness.
He justified it to himself, she was pretty sure. Most criminals did. Most killers could talk themselves into anything. So did he destroy the evidence? Or hide it?
Kara thought she understood him, at least on the surface, but she still couldn’t figure out what he would do with the evidence. At Neil’s house, someone had left the box with files related to Mott and Stevens: a cold case, the bodies were found. But Neil was investigating three other murders, and no information about those could be found in his house. Logically, the killer had taken them. Maybe becausethat’swhere the evidence was.Those caseswere the connection to Damon Avila.
She looked around. The place wasn’t large. They knew from their investigation—short as it was since they’d only ID’d him this morning—that his brother-in-law, Pete Dunlap, owned this house and Damon lived here rent-free every summer. Nice gig if you could get it...but they were family.
It was a clean, tidy place with functional, generic furniture. Everything had been updated, and the only room that Damon really seemed to use was one of the two bedrooms, and this small den off the living room. If he planned on keeping the evidence, he’d want to be able to grab it quickly, but it wouldn’t be accidentally found by his family.
She turned around in a slow circle, looking at the walls. A safe maybe? She checked behind the two landscape pictures hanging above the desk. Nope. The walls were panels...and then she saw it.
One panel had a slightly wider gap than the others. She had seen one of these doors before—her grandma Em had them in the basement. Push and they pop open.
She pushed.
It opened.
It was a narrow closet. Hanging were a couple of jackets; on the shelf above was an assortment of junk. On the floor was a lidless box.
