To kill his sixth victim, she thought to herself.
Francesca stopped in her tracks at the realization.
Changing her direction, she ran back to where the criminal had discarded her personal belongings, and combed through the weeds to find her cell phone. As she did, Agent Martin caught up with her location, slightly winded.
“That way,” she cried as she frantically dialed the number for the field office. “He’s run off through there, but I think we may have a body on site.”
Her words filtered through the air as Agent Martin ran off to chase down the unknown suspect. Until now, without a name, a list of potentials or DNA findings, this case had proven frustrating.
Which was exactly why the Baton Rouge team had called in the expertise of Francesca Thorne.
They needed a profile, and that’s what she aimed to provide, but now she also had a knife with his blood on it. A personal identification he had failed to ever leave at the scene of a crime, but which could be added to the file in the hopes of matching it with other physical evidence compiled from the series of events and seal the deal of his conviction.
She quickly informed the field office of their estimated whereabouts, and added, “I’m heading into the vacant building on the south-east side of the lot,” to ensure they would know where to find her.
It was from this very direction the man had come, stepping up behind her as she walked through the gravel along the outside of the building. He must have heard her from inside.
Had she even remotely suspected his presence, she would have taken every precaution to avoid the rumbling sound of loose gravel, but hindsight was a waste of time right now. There could be a sixth victim within the vicinity, and if so Francesca swore to find her.
As she stepped lightly through discarded broken glass, rusted hardware, and rodent feces, Francesca’s attention was momentarily diverted by an incoming call from her cell phone.
She recognized the distinctive ring assigned to the caller and her breath caught, knowing Delphi was attempting to contact her. The mysterious communication leader from Oracle, a secret intel operation for which some Athena Academy grads had been recruited for their unique skills, would not expect Francesca to answer.
Instead, the simple act of hearing Delphi’s call would instruct Francesca to either check her secured e-mail account, or to return the call from a landline. Only in a pinch would the two ever communicate over the cell. Francesca simply wouldn’t trust its promise of privacy.
Though she was curious about the purpose of the call, Francesca maintained her focus on the case at hand. She would contact Delphi after this scene was declared clear, but for now her main purpose was to locate a possible victim—one she hoped was still breathing.
“Thorne?”
Francesca followed the direction of the voice. It was one belonging to Agent Sharland of the Baton Rouge team, which meant her call had been answered swiftly.
“In here. Watch your—” She grinned as Sharland nearly stepped a foot flat into something nasty as he rounded the corner, meeting her inside the decrepit building. “Step.”
His grimace replaced the opportunity to say thanks, as Francesca continued her search for a body.
Within the abandoned building, one formerly used for a textile business if she recalled correctly, there were a number of floors to clear, but within each only a select number of hallways to snake through.
“We got him. Martin’s fine, too,” Sharland said, settling Francesca’s unanswered question. “How about you? You okay?”
“Shhhh. Listen,” she said in a careful whisper. As they stepped along through the concrete landscape, there was something that caught her attention.
It could be the slight chatter of a sewer rat, the nesting of a bird, or it could be something else altogether and Francesca wanted complete silence from her fellow Fed in identifying its whereabouts.
Sharland nodded in acknowledgment of her request as they followed the sound, faintly coming from a shadowed room down the hall.
Through the doorway a small stream of natural evening light shone down against the damp concrete underfoot, and as she cautiously stepped into its illumination, Francesca noticed the small barred window facing the direction of where she had been attacked.
From inside this room, their suspect would have been able to watch her movements, gaining the upper hand in sneaking up on her as she collected intellectual data.
A muted shuffle to the left caused her attention to narrow in on a darkened corner, and as she moved closer to the sound, Francesca breathed a sigh of pained relief.
Agent Sharland expressed what she was thinking that very second. “He must have been distracted by you out there, before he took the time to—”
She cut him off by shaking her head. She knew it was likely true, but there was no need to fill in the details with the young woman lying before them, curled and hunched in a darkened corner, clinging to her beaten life.
Had Francesca Thorne not insisted on visiting the site to analyze the killer’s selection process, victim number six would have been dead.
At the Baton Rouge field office, Martin, Sharland, and several of the other FBI agents were combing through the newfound information, gathering a case against the man they hoped would be prosecuted for a series of murders, and one failed attempt.
The evidence always had the final say in making a charge stick, but with what they’d encountered and the crime that had been stopped in its progress, the killer hadn’t had time to cover his intentions. His DNA would certainly help, as well as the additional trace being collected off Francesca.
She stood still, careful not to disturb the process of collection, while a local team member combed through her hair, and removed all trace of the man’s presence on her body.
“My things?” she asked when the protocol was complete, determined to sign on to her laptop and check her awaiting e-mail.
Delphi had signaled for her attention and though the criminal case against this serial killer was far from over, Francesca’s role in it had come to an end. She could now offer full attention to the call from Oracle.
After her personal belongings were returned to her, Francesca took a moment to shake hands with the various agents she had come to know in this recent, but brief assignment.
“We asked for the best,” Sharland said, offering a firm shake and a rare smile. “I’m glad they went one step further.”
“I’m sure your work is just about to begin,” she said, signaling her departure with a casual salute to the brow. Never one for goodbyes, Francesca preferred to keep it simple.
Outside, she crossed the street to a cozy café that advertised a wireless high-speed Internet zone. While waiting for a taxi to take her to the airport where she would catch the earliest flight back to the familiar territory of Richmond, Virginia, Francesca settled into a booth, nursing a cup of black coffee, and then typed in the password to access her e-mail account, ready to view Delphi’s message.
It was a short one, at that. Knowing more information would be awaiting her arrival back home she couldn’t help the curiosity about what activity was calling her into action.
The message simply read assignment for you, which was enough to pique her interest.
To anyone else this would likely seem vague and cryptic.
But Francesca knew all too well what was being asked of her. An assignment from Oracle implied she would be working with highly sensitive information.
More important, Francesca knew, the request was one she would promise to execute and make top priority.
Chapter 2