Travis Starnes
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Danger Close (John Taylor #7) - Chapter 13
🕑 Added 2021-08-23 18:46:05 +0000 UTCIt took time to get everyone together and on the phone. Lt. Colonel Simmons didn’t like being kept in the dark but quieted down when Taylor explained who else needed to be in on the conversation. It was one thing to be thrown into sudden command several steps above your pay grade and another thing altogether to hear you have to talk to a four-star general. Shortly before they had everyone on the line, Davis also showed up, but kept quiet, which was a surprise. His appearance however did keep Taylor from being surprised when the new secretary of defense also signed onto the call.
The only thing missing was the bevy of officers and functionaries that would normally be on a call like this. Taylor had made it clear in his message to Leland’s aide that the information he had was sensitive, and it would be best if they kept it to 'need to know' personnel only.
“Okay, Agent Taylor,” Secretary Yohe said nearly as soon as he showed up on the call. “We’re all here. What is this information you have to share with us? Have you found the people behind this black market ring?”
“We don’t have the people behind the thefts yet, but we do have the person who’s been murdering people both on the base and around town. We also have evidence that most of the murders in Silver Plains over the last three years were committed by this person.”
“I thought we made it clear we didn’t want this expanding more than it had, Agent Taylor,” General Leland said.
“I understand, but we followed things where they went.”
“Fine, who’s this murderer you’ve found.”
“General Lane, the base commander.”
Four people said ‘WHAT’ all at once, in varying degrees of shouting. Taylor waited patiently for the yelling to subside, at least to the point where he could make out one person’s questions and demands over the others.
“How can you be sure it was General Lane?” Secretary Yohe asked.
“We found trophies he’s taken from some of the victims in his home, while trying to find him. He went missing shortly after someone tried to kill my partner and me. We were already aware that trophies had been taken from most of the murders in town over the last three years, and have been operating under the theory that the murders were serial in nature. We aren’t yet sure if that makes them unconnected completely with the thefts or if there is a connection there we don’t understand, but we’re working on that.”
“Simmons,” General Leland said, surprising the lieutenant colonel out of his very focused not speaking.
“Yes, sir.”
“Whatever Agent Taylor needs, you are to provide it to him. Keep the base on lockdown until we find General Lane. That’s all. You and Mr. Davis need to leave the room.”
“Mr. Secretary, I think its best …”
“Lawrence, I need to keep what is said next just between the three of us for the moment. The president can decide if she wants it to go further than this.”
“Please leave the room, Mr. Davis,” The secretary said.
Davis wasn’t happy about it, but he wasn’t going to argue with his boss, only giving Taylor a look as he left.
“They’re gone,” Taylor said once the door shut behind Davis.
“What I’m about to tell you should not be repeated to anyone, but I think it has enough bearing on this case that you need to be brought into the loop. During Lane’s previous command while he was stationed in Iraq, we had an issue with the deaths of locals in the area. He was told to get his area under control and, when he couldn’t, we transferred him and most of the senior command out, both to try and get the problem handled, and as a sop to the locals, to show them we were doing something.”
“Wait, he ran a base where there were killings of locals and then it started happening here, and no one thought to mention it?” Taylor asked, incredulous.
“My thoughts exactly,” Secretary Yohe said.
“It wasn’t thought relevant. There are a few things to remember. One, killings of locals in Iraq wasn’t uncommon. Remember this is a combat zone where the insurgents are indistinguishable from the locals. You, of all people, should know that Sergeant Taylor. Sometimes the men get overzealous, especially when they’ve been receiving regular attacks. Two, it’s impossible to tell what killings are done by our men who get out of hand and what killings are done by locals in the name of sectarian reprisals. While we did hold General Lane responsible for maintaining order in his A.O., there was no way to connect him directly with the deaths. It wasn’t like the deaths around Fort Chilton started as soon as he transferred over, and there were plausible explanations for what was happening.”
“I still think someone should have told us what was going on. It’s pretty obvious he was the source of both, and all you did was sweep a serial killer under the rug so he could keep murdering people.”
“It’s easy to see that in hindsight, but you’ve been there for days, dealing with him, and it seems you didn’t see it either. Keep in mind, we asked for your help getting a potential public relations disaster under control. Airing more of our dirty laundry would really be counter-productive to that end.”
“While I think we need to reevaluate how we deal with situations like this in the future,” Yohe said. “I think right now we need to focus on the situation at hand. Is there any way we can get Lane in custody without this becoming publicly known?”
“I don’t see how,” Taylor said. “He killed a popular local sheriff. They’re going to be pressing you for what happened. Regional news is also sniffing around, and we’ve thrown up roadblocks. We didn’t tell them anyone specific, just gave them a very general description and asked them to stop any active duty military, regardless of rank.”
“And you don’t think they’re going to be able to work that out?” Leland asked incredulously. “They know what General Lane looks like.”
“Probably, but we’re running short on options. We don’t know where the general is, and there’s a good chance he made it off base. He’s the key to everything that’s happening here.”
“We’ll work out the public relations on this,” Yohe said. “What we need you to do is catch him, and do it quickly. We can’t spin anything until we have a resolution. Is there anything else on the black market ring?”
“Maybe, but I need to chase down a few more things before I’ll be ready to brief you on that. Whitaker’s called the JAG corps trying to get a warrant for a local bank where we believe Lane has a safety deposit box. We think there may be more information there that we will need to track down the thefts on base. While you’re getting us stuff, I’d like to see a copy of the general’s psych profile. I had to have several and I was just a grunt, so I’m assuming you make the people who get handed the keys to bases get them, too.”
The one benefit of this case being part of the military is there were a lot fewer protections against law enforcement accessing records than there were in civilian lives. Most civilians would probably never realize how much of the freedoms they took for granted a soldier signed away when they joined. Taylor wasn’t sure what he was going to find in the files, but after seeing the envelopes in the general’s closet he wanted to get a little more insight into the general first. He also wanted to look inside the safety deposit box, since the record they found gave Taylor an idea of how the murders and thefts fit together, although not one he was ready to share yet.
“I’ll get you what we have and see what I can do to smooth things over with that,” Leland said. “Just find Lane.”
“We’ll do our best, General,” Taylor said, disconnecting the phone.
Taylor found Whitaker back in the general’s house, still on the phone trying to sort out everything they needed. Several more MPs had shown up and they were now seriously tearing apart the house, which Taylor assumed had been Whitaker’s doing. He applauded the effort, but he guessed that the hide in the closet was the only thing they were going to find. The fact that Lane had a safety deposit box showed he understood the need to keep things tied to him to a minimum. Sure, he still had the most damning evidence, but things like that, it was probably a compulsion. Serial killers liked keeping trophies of their kills, and Lane definitely qualified as a serial killer by this point.
“Anything?” Taylor asked when Whitaker hung up.
“We should have a warrant in ten minutes. How’d the meeting go?”
“Turns out Lane got pulled from his last command because a bunch of Iraqi civilians were getting murdered and he couldn’t put a stop to it. So, they transferred him here.”
“You’re joking!”
“Nope. They thought it was either an overzealous soldier or local on local violence and wrote it off. The only reason Lane got transferred was because they needed to show the Iraqi’s that they were taking it seriously.”
“So, there’s a chance he’s been doing this for a while.”
“Which makes sense, right? You’ve done more of these kinds of cases, but I understood that trophy taking was in the later stages, as they figured out what got them off.”
“Not always. Sometimes it starts with taking trophies and then leads to murder as they learn there’s a better way to get them. I’m not a psychologist though and we don’t know enough about Lane’s background to know for sure.”
“They’re getting me his service psych evals. Knowing the army, he probably all but admitted he liked murdering people and they just considered it quirky.”
“This is got you really riled up.”
“I just can’t believe I missed it. Again. It’s pissed me off.”
“Don’t get to target locked. We still have the black market ring to deal with.”
“Maybe.”
“What do you mean, maybe?”
“I think we’re going to find some answers when we get to the safety deposit box. Lane being a serial killer makes all the murders fall into place, but the black market ring springing up at the same time still feels wrong. I take back what I said before. I think they are connected, but I think it may be the thefts connected to the murders, instead of the murders being connected to the thefts.”
“I don’t follow.”
“It’s 'cause I’m not making sense. I need more information to form an actual theory, but everything starting when Lane got here, and him previously murdering civilians in Iraq, makes me think he’s the center of all of this. The timing makes anything else impossible.”
“So, I guess we wait and see what we find at the bank,” she said as her phone dinged. “That was fast. We have our warrant. Let’s print it out so we have something to hand them and get to the bank.”
It took longer than Whitaker made it sound to get off the base. Chenier had taken the order to lock down the base seriously. Ultimately they had to get approval from Lt. Colonel Simmons before the gate guards would let them drive off towards town. Whitaker used her time well. Since it was still very early, just past dawn, she had to call ahead and have the bank manager waiting for her. The thing that surprised Taylor was that the man didn’t complain much about it. Maybe it was the fact they were in the middle of nowhere, the death of the sheriff, or people starting to notice all the commotion at the base and the roadblocks on the roads out of town, but every other time Taylor had joined in the execution of a search warrant, they’d received nothing but complaints and weak attempts to stop the search.
True to his word, though, the bank manager was standing on the front steps of the bank waiting for them when they pulled up. Whitaker handed over the search warrant as the man let them in and lead them to the box that matched Lane’s key. Whitaker had suggested they wait until the manager was out of the vault and left them alone to actually open the box. During her early days in the Bureau, she’d been a junior agent on a serial killer case where the killer kept his particularly gruesome trophies in a safety deposit box, and they’d opened it in front of bank employees.
Thankfully, Lane’s box held only documents. At first, the documents seemed almost random covering financial documents, internet records, and even some police records.
“That’s weird,” Whitaker said looking at one of the police records. “This is Corporal Evans, but the name on it is completely different.”
“What is it?”
“A report on grand theft auto. Looks like he did four years before getting out on good behavior.”
“We looked at his records, I don’t remember there being anything about a criminal record. Hell, the army isn’t the same it was in the seventies, they don’t normally take recruits with felony convictions anymore.”
“More importantly, why would Lane have this?”
“I don’t know, but this bank statement is for an account owned by our dead tech. That’s not a coincidence.”
“So, Lane is connected to the black market ring,” Whitaker said. “So I guess you’re right, your ‘its two unconnected things’ theory was wrong.”
“Maybe. There weren’t any thefts at his last postings though. Why would he suddenly start running this kind of organization, which is bound to get noticed, when his thing is clearly murdering people. It’d draw more attention, not less.”
“I don’t recognize all of these names, but all of the people picked up as part of the ring are in here,” Whitaker said.
“It’s a good bet the rest of the people in here are part of it too. Why would Lane be holding onto all of these records?”
“We originally thought the members of the ring were kept in line by the threats to their loved ones, but it seems pretty clear the murders were personal for Lane, part of his compulsion or whatever that made him take the rings. Maybe this is how he kept the people in the ring in line.”
“That makes sense, but it still doesn’t explain why Lane was involved with them at all.”
“Okay, but we have a way to find out. We need to pick up everyone connected to these as potential suspects and then find out what these all mean. I’m guessing we’ll find they all point us to something incriminating, which we can use to get them to flip on Lane. We’ve already got a BOLO out on him, but one of these guys might know where to find him.”
“Okay, let’s go talk to Chenier. I didn’t see his name in here, and I want to make sure none of his men are on this list before we start arresting people. I also want at least two people not in this pile to sit in the same room as the prisoners until we can interrogate them. I don’t want a repeat of Corporal Evans.”
“You don’t think Lane killed Evans?”
“Maybe, but the MO was different, so maybe he had someone else do it. I just want to play it safe. Just because we have a list of names doesn’t mean everyone we need is going to be in this stack.”
“True,” Whitaker said, gathering up all of the papers.
It took some time to get a full list of people they needed to pick up from the documents, since not all of them conveniently had someone’s name on it. As it was, there were three documents they couldn’t tie to a single person. Whitaker said she would send it to the Bureau and have people work on it, but it being a random document out of context, they might never know who the person it belongs to was. At least not without one of the other ring members rolling on them.
Taylor’s concerns about who might be on the list that could compromise the investigation were proven out when one of Chenier’s MPs was on the list. As with most of the documents, it wasn’t clear what exactly the document pertained to, but he had been one of the men assigned to guard Corporal Evans, which sent Chenier into an apoplectic fit. Taylor had been able to convince Chenier to hold it together until they could actually prove what had happened, but they did make sure to pick him up first. In all, they arrested nine soldiers, which was a smaller number than Taylor would have thought would be needed for a criminal operation like this, even with the three documents they couldn’t identify and the two dead men.
Things stalled for a few hours after that as they worked to identify the documents they had before they could interrogate any of the men. If this was leverage that Lane was using, they needed to know what it was before they talked to any of the men. Whitaker pointed out that you never went into an interaction without knowing the answers to most of the questions you were going to ask. Considering they were starting from zero, a handful of hours was pretty fast work and as they got the information back it started to paint a picture of what had really been happening.
The records led them to all kinds of crimes including hidden or criminal records skipped on enlistment forms, a variety of financial crimes, hacking and, in the case of the file they found in the envelope in Lane’s closet, a record of trading pictures of minors that would lead to some serious jail time. Several of the files also implicated others, including the clerk of a federal judge. Whitaker passed that information on to the Bureau to handle as they focused on the nine men they currently had in custody.
At first, even with the records, the men stayed silent. For the MP, who Taylor was pretty sure had done the actual killing of Corporal Evans, that made sense. The others were probably still worried about Lane, despite their crimes coming to light. It wasn’t hard to imagine their being intimidated by someone who'd already got two of their number killed.
They finally got a piece of luck on interrogation number four, a sergeant in the quartermaster's department.
“I don’t really understand this stuff,” Taylor said as the man looked at a photocopy of the records from the safety deposit box that pertained to him. “But I’m told this is pretty solid evidence that you helped your brother embezzle a pretty serious amount of money from his employer and a payment he made to you for your help. This is enough that he’s going to jail and with that payment, you are wrapped up as an equal participant in the scheme and not just some accomplice. Your army career is over and you’re looking at serious jail time but how much depends on you. You can do yourself a big favor right now by working with us. A lot of eyes are going to be on what happens here, and anyone who helps us will get a favorable deal when the dust settles. Tell us about your accomplices in the thefts.”
“There weren’t any thefts.”
“You don’t want to go this way, sergeant. Stonewalling us doesn’t do you any good.”
“I’m not stonewalling you. I meant, we weren’t stealing stuff, not really. It was all a sham.”
“You’re going to have to back up and explain.”
“Look, I don’t know what he was doing, I just know what he had me do, so I can’t explain all of it. I’ll tell you what I know, but I don’t want to go to Leavenworth.”
“We’ll recommend they go light on you, but only if you talk first. When you say he, you mean General Lane?”
“Yes. I got sent here two years ago and I was only here a week when General Lane cornered me in the quartermaster offices late one night. I was the only one there that night, finishing up an inventory and I guess he knew I’d be alone. I was surprised, 'cause it isn’t often a Brigadier comes to talk to a guy like me, more so 'cause he knew who I was. He described everything I’d done for my sack of shit brother-in-law and showed me evidence that I’d done it. I was sure he’d decided to bust me himself and had the MPs waiting outside, but he said no. He said he had stuff he needed me to do and if I did it, he promised I’d get promotions and good recommendations in my jacket and if I refused, he’d make sure I ended up in prison.”
“What did he ask you to do?”
“At first, it was small stuff. Leave a bay unlocked when I finished a check, scrub a name off a sign-in log, but then he started to ask for bigger shit. Like, go to prison for a long time shit. I told him no. I wasn’t going to have two felonies hanging over my head, but he pointed out he now had me on not just stuff with my brother-in-law, but on the stuff I’d done for him. I told him I’d rat on him if I got arrested and that’s when he showed me the picture of my sister. Someone had taken it at the gym, and it was recent cause she’d just cut her hair the week before. He told me … it was bad. She’s my kid sister and I love her, even if her husband is a shit-bird. He meant it too. I could see it in his eyes. The general’s a fucking psychopath. When he had Dillon’s girl killed, I knew I’d made the right choice. I just wanted to let my time run out and get out of the service and be done with all this shit.”
“Do you know others he had working for him?”
“A couple. It’s not like we met or anything. He told us what to do and we’d go do it. Normally it was just to change a record or dump something, but sometimes it’d take two or three of us. Like the thing with the money.”
“You were one of the guys in the warehouse?”
“Yes. He told us we needed to break in, make it clear we broke in, and then leave. I couldn’t figure it, because we knew someone had to be watching it. Even an idiot would figure out it was a trap, but he said jump so we jumped.”
“What did you mean when you said he had you dump something,” Whitaker asked.
Normally she took point on interrogations, since she both had more experience at it and was better at it than Taylor, but this time Taylor had done most of the talking. Partially it was because they had these guys cold with the evidence that Lane had compiled, but also because Taylor just understood the military so much better than Whitaker did, which helped him know what questions to ask. She was doing what he normally did instead, listening closely and keeping track of things that stood out.
“That’s what I meant about not stealing nothing. He’d tell us what to take and we’d dump it out in the desert. We didn’t actually keep anything.”
Both Taylor and Whitaker paused at the statement. For Taylor, it made the pieces suddenly fit. Ever since the beginning, he’d had issues with the entire breakdown of the black market ring. For one, the selection of stuff that was stolen seemed so random and it was taken from a wide variety of areas. Sometimes it was something left more or less unguarded and other times it was material that was under lock and key and heavily watched. It was both calculated and random and included high-value items and items of opportunity. Taylor was bothered by the lack of a pattern.
The other thing that had bothered him was none of the stolen equipment ever turned up. Usually, some of the materials would eventually reappear, usually in places they wouldn’t want to see it. Military hardware is thoroughly cataloged and tracked, so when stolen items showed back up in the wild, they would have been able to track it back to Fort Chilton. The fact that in more than two years none of the stolen items ever reappeared, especially the guns, didn’t make sense. No one bought stolen goods that they planned to just hold onto.
“We need you to make a list of everyone you’ve met while doing jobs for General Lane, and then we need you to take us out to where you’ve been dumping army material,” Taylor said.
This probably wouldn’t make the army happy, since the entire situation was now weird enough they couldn’t just say ‘we caught the thieves and put an end to the criminal enterprise’ when congress asked about the wasted tax dollars, but for once since they started this case, Taylor felt like everything was finally falling into place.
Of course, it wouldn't be finally over until they caught Lane.
