Velocity kv-3 Read online

  She turned and headed back to the car. “Nothing. We got a location on his house?”

  “I can get it.” Dixon pulled her phone, made a call, and was soon jotting down the address. Twenty-five minutes later, they were pulling into the Sonoma neighborhood where César Guevara lived.

  From what Vail could see in the complete darkness, it appeared to be an immaculately cared for community, with houses that almost looked out of place, possessing an eastern Victorian grandeur.

  “Nice neighborhood,” Vail said, straining to get a look at the passing homes.

  “Oh, yeah,” Dixon said. She held up her pad and caught the headlight of a trailing car. “Millions. Each one of these homes. Five mil, maybe more.” Dixon glanced one more time at the address, then looked left at the house. “This is it.”

  “You said ‘millions’ and ‘this is it.’ Almost in the same sentence. César Guevara lives here?”

  Dixon hiked her brow, then nodded. “Looks like mobile bottling is quite lucrative.”

  Vail grabbed the handle and pulled. “Quite.”

  Dixon and Vail walked down the cobblestone path, passed through a short white picket fence, and stepped up to the hand-carved hardwood door. Dixon stuck out her hand to knock, then pulled it back. “What are we doing?”

  “We’re about to see if this is Guevara’s current address. And if it is, if he’s home.”

  Dixon stepped back from the door, out of the porch light. “Let’s sit on the house. Watch for a bit. See who comes and goes.”

  Vail glanced behind Dixon at the house. “I don’t have a lot of time left, Roxx.”

  “We can’t run an investigation based on what your schedule is.”

  Vail turned away and rested her hands on her hips. “I know. Let’s at least talk to him, confront him with what we’ve got, see what gives.”

  “You’ve done that. Didn’t work.”

  “We’ve got something now,” Vail said. “We can bluff him.”

  “We don’t even have enough to get a warrant. You’ve gone toe to toe with Guevara. Is he the type of guy who can be bullied or tricked?”

  Vail sighed. What does she want me to do? I’m leaving in a few hours and I’m nowhere on finding Robby. No leads. Except—maybe—Guevara. “Probably not. But I need to try.”

  Dixon held up her hands. “Fine. I can’t see it putting us in a worse position than we are now.”

  Vail frowned. “No shit.” She quickly rapped on the door before Dixon could change her mind. Seconds passed, then the door swung open. Two men stood there, both wearing large-caliber pistols and making no effort to hide them. “Those legal?” Vail asked, nodding at their hardware.

  “Who the fuck are you?” one of the men asked.

  Vail held up her creds. “FBI. Who the fuck are you?”

  “I got it.” A voice in the background. César Guevara. The door swung farther open, revealing the man of the house. He was wearing a sport coat and a black silk shirt. Dressed to go out, perhaps. And in the distance, Vail could make out the tips of high heels. Smelled floral perfume. Wife—or girlfriend. Definitely going out on the town. This may work out better than I thought.

  “Sorry to bother you on your way out,” Vail said. “But we’ve got a couple questions.”

  “Come by my office. Tomorrow.” Guevara started to close the door, but Vail stuck out her foot and the heavy wood hit against her shoe. Guevara turned back and eyed her with a narrow gaze. “What do you think you’re doing?”

  “We won’t take much of your time—”

  “I guess I should cooperate. At least you’re not sticking your gun in my face this time. Very decent of you, Agent Vail. By the way, I’ve got that videotape all ready to go to your . . . what do you call it? Your behavioral analysis unit?”

  Vail felt Dixon’s gaze bearing down on her. Ignore it. Guevara’s trying to get under your skin. Block it out. Don’t let him make you do something you’ll regret. Vail grinned, which helped diffuse her anger. “We just need a couple of minutes of your time.” Plowing forward without pausing, she said, “Ray Lugo told us you two were more than just friends who worked the vineyards together as kids. He said he was helping you out. You and John Mayfield.” Vail stopped, watched the creases in his face. There was decent illumination from the porch light, and some ambient brightness pouring in from the entryway. His face twitched, the eyelid fluttered, much in the same way it had this morning when she had questioned him and shown him Robby’s photograph. “And that interests us, Mr. Guevara, because John Mayfield is a serial killer. He’s done some bad things. And that means you . . . ” She shrugged.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Guevara said. “And it’s probably all bullshit anyway, because if it wasn’t, we wouldn’t be standing here chatting. You’d be sweating me out in some hot interrogation room. Isn’t that what you people do? But then I’d call my lawyer, who charges seven hundred bills an hour, and, well . . . we both know how the game is played.” He turned away from the door and called to one of his men, “Vaya a la limusina. Ahorita llego.” Go to the limousine. I’ll be there in a minute.

  “A limo. Very nice.” Vail let her eyes demonstrably roam the interior of his home. “Guess the mobile bottling business pays well.”

  “Good evening, Agent Vail. We’re done here.” He moved back from the door. And it slammed closed in their faces.

  26

  Vail pushed her head back into her severely reclined seat. They were parked a block and a half away, across the street in a neighbor’s driveway. “That looks like a Hummer limo. What do you think?”

  Dixon lifted her head and took a peek. “Yeah.”

  “You think his bodyguards are going with them?”

  Dixon kept her eyes forward, watching the lights of the vehicle move away from them. “They wouldn’t be very effective bodyguards if they didn’t . . . guard him. Would they?”

  “Good point.” The lights faded and then disappeared. “Ready?”

  “You sure you want to do this?”

  Vail reached up and turned off the dome light. “Are you really asking me that question?” She opened the door and pulled herself off the reclined seat, then turned to Dixon. “Better move it onto the curb. In case the neighbor complains.”

  Dixon propped up her seat, started the car, and moved it. Then she joined Vail as they made their way toward César Guevara’s house.

  “Karen, I’m gonna say it again. Because you’re not hearing me.”

  “I heard you the last three times. Breaking and entering. Not like I’m a goddamn dimwit. I know what I’m doing. You wanna save your ass, stay back. Go take a drive. Pick me up in twenty.”

  “You know I’m not going to do that.”

  “Then stop reminding me what we’re doing is wrong. But I’m leaving, Roxx. And Robby could be in trouble. John Mayfield’s in a coma. Lugo’s dead. And the only person we know of who knows anything about anything is this asshole. And the goddamn judge won’t give us a warrant. Do you think we’ve got a choice?”

  “There are always choices, Karen.”

  Vail gave Dixon a hard look. But she kept moving, stepped over the low picket fence, and made her way to a dark side of the house, bordered by manzanita hedges. “If you’re with me, watch my back. And if you see any security cameras, let me know.”

  “I didn’t see any when we were talking to him.”

  “Me neither,” Vail said, keeping her back against the bushes and shuffling forward. “Doesn’t mean he hasn’t got any.”

  “What about dogs? I didn’t hear or see any, but—”

  “They’d be on us by now.” Am I insane? What the hell am I doing? Robby would do the same for me. There’s no choice.

  Vail moved to the back of the house and pointed at security lights mounted above the large ivy-covered arbor. “Motion sensors. Follow me.” She made her way in a circuitous route that took them beyond the reach of the infrared lenses. Seconds later, they stepped up to the door without havin
g tripped the sensors. “You don’t happen to have a lock picking kit with you.”

  Dixon glared at her—a look Vail could make out as hostile even in the moonlight. “I don’t even own one, Karen.”

  “Don’t look at me that way. I don’t own one, either.” Vail examined the glass panels that made up half the wood door. She did not want to enter forcefully, but she didn’t see a choice. She wrapped the bottom of her shirt around her right hand and tried the knob. Locked.

  “You didn’t think he’d leave his house unlocked, did you?”

  “I learned a long time ago to check.”

  Dixon leaned back. “How many times have you done this?”

  Vail looked over her shoulder to the left, then to the right. By landscape and architectural design, they were well blocked from any neighboring houses. With her hand still wrapped in her shirt, she thrust her fist forward, through the lowest glass square.

  “Oh, Jesus,” Dixon said. Her eyes canted up, then left, right, and back to the house. No movement inside. “Can’t believe we’re doing this,” she whispered.

  Vail stuck her left hand through the opening, unlocked the door, and pushed it open. Then she wiped the inside knob with her shirt. “Okay. We’re in.”

  “And now what?”

  “Now we look around. Fast. In case we tripped some kind of silent alarm.”

  Dixon closed her eyes. “Oh, that’d be fucking peachy.”

  “C’mon,” Vail said, then moved forward. “No fingerprints, okay?” It was an obvious comment, but when you’re working fast and stressing over the fact you’re breaking and entering, it’s easy to reach and touch without thinking first about every action you take.

  Had she known they were going to do this, she would have brought gloves. But crossing over the line was not something she planned on doing—ever. Yet in the here and now, it seemed like the best thing to do . . . certainly the desperate thing to do.

  Most of the house was dark. A light was on by the entryway, where they’d been standing—legally—about an hour ago. “Look for an office of some kind. A place he’d keep papers, business stuff.”

  “Wouldn’t that be at the warehouse?”

  “Not necessarily. Depends on the nature of the documents. Does it have anything to do with Superior Mobile Bottling?”

  “What exactly is ‘it’?”

  Vail moved through the darkness. “Anything related to Robby, Lugo, or Mayfield.” She pointed Dixon toward a room off to her left while she went right. They worked slowly in the dark, until Vail found a flashlight in a drawer in the kitchen. She used it judiciously, holding two fingers across its lens to restrict the beam in case a neighbor could see in through a second- or third-story window.

  She pulled her BlackBerry and glanced at the display. She figured they’d broken the seal to the backdoor two minutes ago. How long did that leave them before the police arrived? She had no idea—except that a typical response rate was around nine minutes. But there were so many variables in that figure it was nearly useless to her. Were cruisers nearby when the call came in? Were there private security guards employed by a neighborhood watch group? How far was the closest Police or Sheriff’s Department substation?

  Dixon joined her in the hallway. “Nothing. How long do you want to keep pushing our luck?”

  “Keep looking down here. I’m going up. You wanna get the hell out, I totally understand.”

  Vail took her flashlight up the curving staircase to the second floor. Unfortunately César Guevara lived quite well, and this home had three stories. She would have to move more quickly.

  Master bedroom. Bathroom. Checked beneath the four-poster, shone her light behind cabinets, through closets. Guevara was a dapper dresser when he wasn’t working in the warehouse, with dark double-breasted suits that looked like designer cuts. Allen Edmonds and Bruno Magli shoeboxes lined the middle shelf in the cavernous walk-in closet.

  This is where she would concentrate her efforts. She grabbed a new pair of black Gold Toe dress socks and slipped them on her hands. It made for awkward groping, but the trade-off was worth it.

  She brushed aside his suits, then his shirts, pants . . . looking for a concealed wall safe. Pulled open the drawers of the built-in ebony cabinetry, felt around for a false bottom. Got down on all fours and crawled along the floor, her Gold Toe-clad fingertips probing for a break in the carpet, a concealed seam that might be an invitation to buried treasure. Nothing.

  Checked the clock on her BlackBerry. They’d now been in the house nine minutes. At this point, with each passing second, the likelihood of a law enforcement response to their entry bordered on unacceptable risk.

  As she started down the stairs, Dixon came running at her. “I got something—but we gotta get outta here. Now. Sonoma PD’s on its way—”

  “How do you—”

  Dixon turned and led the way out. “Brix. When you went upstairs, I called him, told him to monitor the radio.”

  They hit the ground floor and were heading toward the backdoor. Vail wiped down the flashlight and placed it back in the drawer. “Did you touch anything?”

  “Don’t know—don’t think so. Maybe a few things—”

  Vail, hands still protected by the socks, grabbed for the doorknob. “Does he know? Brix?”

  They followed the same roundabout route toward the hedge line, avoiding the motion sensors. “Did I tell him? No. Does he know? Of course, he’s not an idiot.”

  As Dixon followed Vail back to the car, Vail pulled off the Gold Toes and shoved them deep into her pocket.

  “Neat trick with the socks,” Dixon said. “I get the feeling you’ve done this before.”

  “Nope. First time.” And hopefully the last.

  After they had climbed into the Ford and slammed their doors, two Sonoma Police Department cruisers pulled up to the Guevara estate, light bars flashing. Vail and Dixon laid their seats back. To any of the cops who cared to look, theirs was an empty vehicle parked at the curb a block and a half away. While their Ford was somewhat out of place in a tony neighborhood like this one, it was dark and empty. The police were more likely focused on the object of their concern: the compromised house, with a peripheral eye peeled for fleeing suspects.

  “How long do you want to hang out?” Vail asked.

  “Let’s wait for them to get inside, then I’ll fire her up and we’ll back away slowly. Hopefully they didn’t grab our plate.”

  “Too far away.”

  Dixon lifted her head and peered over the dash. Apparently satisfied the area was clear, she reached forward and started the engine, then backed away as planned, using the side view mirrors as a guide. When they had gotten another two blocks, Dixon angled around a corner and swung the car around, headed away from the scene of their crime.

  “You gonna show me what you found?”

  “It was dark and I didn’t have a whole lot of time, but I thought it might be important.”

  “Let me see it.”

  Dixon pulled to the curb, then flicked on the dome light. She stuck her hand inside her blouse, extracted a piece of folded paper, and handed it to Vail.

  Vail unfurled it.

  “It’s just an address,” Dixon said. “I think it’s Ian Wirth’s. His home.” Dixon thought a moment. “Wirth, Victoria Cameron, and Isaac Jenkins were the only three people who were against Superior getting that bottling contract. Cameron and Jenkins were killed. If I’m right, and this is Wirth’s home address . . . we may be on to something. There’d be no reason for Guevara to have it. Right?”

  Vail sat there staring at the page. Off somewhere in the distance she heard what Dixon was saying. But she was seeing—and thinking— something else. Because in front of her was an address, all right.

  But what caught her attention was that it was in Robby’s handwriting.

  27

  Are you sure?” Dixon asked. “Robby’s handwriting?”

  Vail wiped away the tears that had pooled in her lower lids. “No doubt wha
tsoever.”

  Dixon looked away, facing the windshield. The interior dome light made the glass into a mirror from which their distorted reflections stared back at them. Neither one looked pleased at this news.

  Vail glanced at the clock. “I leave for the airport in six hours. How the hell am I gonna solve this in six hours?”

  “I know this is hard for you, Karen. It’d be hard for me, too. But have faith in us. This case doesn’t have to be wrapped up before you get on that plane.”

  “The longer Robby is missing, the less chance we have of finding him. And if he is around here—in Napa, in California, on the West Coast—the thought of flying twenty-five hundred miles away is . . . ” She shook her head. “It’s like I’m abandoning him. I don’t know if that makes sense.”

  Dixon placed a hand on Vail’s forearm. “Of course it does. I’m sorry. But I promise you, I won’t give up. We won’t give up.”

  Vail looked down at the paper bearing Robby’s handwriting. “What does this mean?”

  “At its most basic level, Robby wrote someone’s address on a piece of paper and it ended up in César Guevara’s possession. At the moment, that’s all it means.”

  That’s not all it means. There’s something here. But as has been the case this past week, nothing adds up. Nothing makes sense. We catch the serial killer, who says, “There’s more to this than you know.” And he’s being truthful. So what’s wrong with me? Why can’t I figure it out?

  Dixon pulled her phone and started tapping away. She stopped, dropped it into her lap, and waited. A moment later, it buzzed and she lifted it to her ear. “Yeah.” She listened a second and then said, “Okay. Meet you there.” Dixon hung up, then yanked the gearshift into drive.

  Vail, however, was still staring at the paper.

  BRIX SUGGESTED THEY MEET at a restaurant, since none of the task force members had eaten anything for several hours. Dixon pulled into the parking lot, where a large landmark sign read “Brix - Restaurant Gardens Wine Shop.” Had this been another time, she would’ve thought Brix’s choice of eating at the Brix restaurant curious, but with the burden of the past few days weighing heavily, she was only concerned about getting some glucose into her brain and figuring out what the hell was going on.