Hollow Green Read online

  Vincent shook his head. “This is exactly what he wants…”

  Sandoval turned to him. “Who?”

  Vincent shrugged. “I don’t know, ace. I just don’t know.”

  He pulled the sedan alongside Stone’s vehicle, Stone near the trunk and donning her tactical vest as Vincent got out of the car. “What’s new?”

  Stone nodded toward the front of the house. “We’re going in. We’re trying to clear the resident out of the house. He claims he saw Michaels in the basement. One of our guys had him on the horn a second ago, but now he’s not picking up.”

  Sandoval ran his hands through his hair. “Shit…”

  Vincent looked toward the front of the lime-green home, an eerie stillness about it as a light wind lapped at the curtains through an open window. For a moment, the windows began to look like an eye and the curtains like its winking lid that tempted those foolish enough to come inside and take a look around.

  One of the muscle-bound FBI SWAT team members hustled up to Stone, his rifle slung over his shoulder. “Harper said you’re in charge. He said you have tactical command. What do you want to do?”

  Stone took a moment as she thought through her options and kept her eyes glued to the front of the house—the curtains still lapping, still winking.

  “Try him again,” Stone said.

  The SWAT commander removed a cell phone from a pocket on his vest and dialed.

  It rang.

  And rang.

  And rang.

  “Zip,” he said after twenty seconds of waiting.

  Stone asked, “Do any of your people have eyes on the inside the house?”

  “Negative. There are only five windows, and the curtains are closed on all of them.”

  “Access points?”

  “Front door, side door, and back door.”

  “What’s your assessment? How would you play this?”

  The commander hooked his fingers and pulled on the front of his vest. “Concussion grenade through the windows. Place two men at each of access points. We clear the first floor. Throw a flashbang down the stairs, and then we clear the basement. If we do this, though, we need to do it quickly.”

  Stone weighed her choices once again. “Try him one last time,” she said.

  The commander dialed the number for the house.

  It rang.

  And nothing happened.

  Stone said, “Make it happen.”

  The commander nodded, motioned to his men, and set about storming the house. Stone made a sputtering noise through her lips as she braced herself on the trunk of her car.

  “This could end poorly,” she said. “Very poorly.”

  As outlined, the six-member tactical team approached the house in three pairs of two, each man covering the other as they kept their rifles raised, their footwork fluid, and a finger carefully caressing the trigger guard on their submachine guns.

  “Team A, break left,” the commander said.

  Team A moved toward the side door leading into the house.

  “Team B, break right.”

  Team B moved around the right side of the house and came up to the rear.

  The commander, at the lead of Team C, approached the front of the house and kept his rifle trained on the center, ready to pop off a couple of shots if anyone decided to get salty.

  As the team leader began to remove the concussion grenade from his vest pocket, Chief Mason hustled onto the scene and stood alongside Vincent and Sandoval.

  “What’s going on?” he asked.

  Stone nodded to the house, her gaze still homed in on the front door. “What’s it look like?” she said. “We’re going in.”

  Vincent leaned in toward the chief. “Where have you been?”

  “Across town,” the chief said. “I was on Main helping some of our people get situated.”

  “Hmm… Interesting.”

  At the front of the house, the commander removed the pin from the grenade, the man next to him smashed a hole in the window above the keyhole, and the commander threw the grenade inside. Two seconds later, there was a loud bang followed by a flash of bright light.

  “Go! Go! Go!” the commander shouted over the radio.

  The team moved inside from every access point, the commander updating Stone on their status as they cleared the house corner by corner.

  “First floor. Moving inside. No signs of anybody. Moving toward the basement.”

  Shuffling over the airwaves. Directions and orders being shouted.

  “First floor clear,” one of the team members called in.

  “Converging on the basement door,” the commander said.

  Stone nervously tapped a finger on the hood of her vehicle as she waited for further updates, the chief, Sandoval, and Vincent right there with her.

  “FBI!” the commander shouted. “Come out with your hands above your head, or we will fire!”

  Nothing but static.

  “This is the FBI,” the commander repeated. “Come out now!”

  More static.

  “Okay,” the commander said. “We’re going to move in on the basement.”

  The tension outside the house reached a palpable level.

  “Oh, shit…” the commander said.

  Stone pressed the button on her radio and said, “What do you see?”

  “We have a body. Male. Forties. Looks like he took a round in the head.”

  “But the house is clear?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  Stone nodded to Vincent. He withdrew his pistol, and he, Stone, and Sandoval shuffled toward the front of the house.

  Trace amounts of smoke were still lingering in the air from the flashbangs, the SWAT team now slightly at ease with their rifles slung as Vincent, Stone, and Sandoval made a beeline toward the basement.

  The commander was waiting for them at the bottom of the stairs, two of his men standing on either side of the body lying face down on the floor in a dried—and quite old—puddle of blood.

  “Is that him?” Sandoval asked.

  Stone holstered her service weapon, got down on one knee, and took a look at the contused and ashy face of the body. She took account of the man’s features, shook her head, and looked up.

  “This isn’t Trevor Michaels,” she said.

  Vincent got down and took a look himself, knowing Michaels’ mug shot well.

  Indeed, it wasn’t Trevor Michaels.

  It was the owner of the house.

  Minutes later, Stone, Vincent, Sandoval, and the chief were at the funeral home that was temporarily being used by the FBI. On a metal slab was the homeowner they had removed from the basement after the raid. Standing over him was a technician, straining his eyes through his glasses as he examined the body.

  He pointed to the dime-sized entry wound by the temple. “See the scorching here around the wound? That means this was done at close range.”

  “Execution style,” Sandoval said.

  “Correct. I’ll have to do a thorough evaluation, but it’s clear this man has been dead for a couple of hours.”

  Sandoval shook his head. “No. No way. I got a call at the station from him. I was talking to him just over an hour ago!”

  The technician shrugged. “Again, I can’t say for certain, but I’m willing to put cold, hard cash on the fact that this man has been dead for more than a couple of hours.”

  Sandoval was reaching a frustrating level of intolerance that Vincent had experienced just a little while earlier. As he consulted and debated with the technician, Vincent pulled Stone aside.

  “I don’t know about you,” Vincent said quietly, “but I don’t think I need any more reason to think that someone is trying to get our attention right now.”

  Stone nodded. “You’re right. They’re trying to misdirect us, just like you said. It’s just a question of who and why.”

  “The who is the element of this that we need to be chasing. We can figure out the why once we’ve interrogated them.”
/>   “I don’t know about you, but we are short on leads.”

  Vincent glanced at the chief. “I’d like to talk to my boss,” he said. “Perhaps he can shed some light on this.”

  Stone lowered her head. “Are you serious?”

  “Deathly. He was unaccounted for the past hour or so. And he rolled in on the crime scene at the last second.”

  Stone exhaled, the thought of the chief of the Hollow Green Police Department being considered a suspect flooding her mind with all kinds of dire thoughts.

  “I know,” Vincent said, catching on to her reservations. “I don’t like it either, and I’m skeptical as hell that it’s him. But as far as I’m concerned, we need to treat everyone as a potential suspect until we can figure out who’s doing this. Whoever it is, they’re still in Hollow Green. They want our complete attention fixated on this manhunt.”

  Stone nodded. “You’re right. In the meantime, we still have to keep the search going. Whoever is doing this is still out there. We need to anticipate that more people might be killed before we reach the finish line.”

  “I’ll have someone back at the station pull up the call logs,” he said. “Sandoval said he took the call. I think maybe it was the killer giving us a fake tip.”

  “He was making sure to keep us all riled up with that raid,” Stone said.

  “We need to find the rest of Karen Mercer’s records. We also need to find out what’s going on with the photo we found in Michaels’ box.”

  “I’ll go to the facility. I’ll ask Davidson and Delores about the photo.”

  “Don’t you want to call them in?”

  She shook her head. “Like you said: we’re treating everyone as a suspect. If I show up unannounced, it’ll take the people at the facility off guard.”

  “Good idea. I’ll deal with the chief and the missing pages of Karen Mercer’s file.”

  “Got it. Stay in touch.”

  Vincent started to move toward the chief.

  Stone grabbed him by the elbow.

  “Hey,” she said. “Be careful.”

  Vincent smirked and nodded, a comforting feeling overcoming him when Stone’s skin touched his own.

  “You too,” he said before telling the chief he needed to speak to him in private.

  10

  Hollow Green Police officers still searched the town. FBI agents went about searching for their man. Edgar Vincent posted up in the chief’s office with Sandoval after clueing him in to the “misdirection” plot and his plan to subtly interrogate their boss as Stone made the drive up to Hollow Green Mental Health Facility to do her end of the digging.

  Everything was in a state of panic, the town, the officers, and the feds trying to maintain their composure and sanity as Hollow Green seemingly slipped into the seventh circle of hell.

  The chief was on the phone behind his desk. Sandoval was in the corner to his right, Vincent sitting in the chair facing the desk and waiting for the chief to wrap up his call.

  “I told you,” the chief said into the phone, “you need to tell the highway guys that they need to help you on the south side. Not the north. We’ve got an open pocket of road right now, and there’s no one posted on it. Get it done.”

  He slammed down his phone. Placed his hands on his hips. “Sons of bitches,” he said. “I have never, ever in my life dealt with a situation like this. What in the hot hell is going on?”

  Vincent cracked a smile. “I’ve always liked that expression.”

  He turned to Sandoval and snapped his fingers. Sandoval produced his cigarette pack and tossed it over.

  As planned.

  Good cop, bad cop.

  “Times like these,” Vincent said, “certain vices are forgivable.”

  He shook the pack of cigarettes.

  The chief eyeballed the cancer sticks like they were a stack of hundred-dollar bills, tempted and trying to fight the urge to indulge a habit he had quit not more than twenty years ago.

  The chief took a cigarette, and Sandoval tossed him the matchbook to light it with. “I was a Pall Mall guy myself,” the chief said, lighting the tip.

  As the chief took the first, beautiful puff of his cigarette, Vincent eased his way slowly into his interrogation. He’d have to play it subtle and cool and smart, because the chief was not always the chief.

  He’d been a detective himself once, keen at interrogation and still toting around that human lie detector set that all detectives earned at some point. Chief Mason was a tactful man, a veteran of Atlanta PD’s homicide division way back when before he settled in Hollow Green for something a little sounder and safer in his later years.

  He had figured wrong.

  Nonetheless, Chief Mason was someone who could sniff out a trail of bullshit when it came his way, so if Vincent attempted to prod at him like any other perp, he’d be shut down and shit-canned before the questions started flying.

  Vincent said, “Pall Malls always tasted like dirt to me.”

  The chief arched a brow. “Aw, you’re full of it. I suppose you like those American Spirit cigarettes, right? All natural. Better for you.”

  Vincent shook his head. “I’ve never had more than a handful in my life, but when I did, I went with Marlboro reds.”

  “Listen to us.” The chief chuckled. “We sound like walking ads for Phillip Morris right now.”

  Vincent forced a little laughter. “A little bit.”

  “Knew a guy that worked for them. Got free packs of cigarettes for twenty years. Smoked them all. Know what he died of?”

  Vincent waited for it.

  “Old age,” the chief said. “Bastard hung in to be ninety-eight goddam years old. Unbelievable, isn’t it?”

  He sucked on his cigarette.

  “I can’t believe Trevor Michaels is back,” Vincent said. “How often do serial killers break out of prison and repeat their crimes?”

  “Ted Bundy did,” the chief said. “Twice over, I think.”

  “Right. I heard that one too. I just… I don’t know. I don’t know how something like this could happen.”

  “It’s not something that can be explained, Eddie. It’s just a shit circumstance that we are all stuck dealing with.”

  The chief sat down in his chair, closing his eyes and puffed away.

  “Just makes me wonder,” he said. “About this whole thing.”

  “In what way?” the chief asked, eyes still closed.

  Vincent leaned forward, elbows on his thighs. “Why he’d come back to Hollow Green to kill again. Just a little odd, is all.”

  The chief opened his eyes. “In what way?”

  Vincent stood. Paced. “Think about it. If you’re a killer—why come back to the scene of the crime?”

  “Like I said before: Bundy.”

  “True. Very true. But Bundy was a one-off. Trying to pin one killer’s MO on another is like lightning striking twice in the same place. Sure, more than one serial killer in our lifetime has returned to the scene of their crimes. But just a few. Not all of them. Plus, Trevor Michaels never returned to a crime scene twice before, so…”

  The chief swiveled his chair. “What are you getting at?”

  Here we go…

  Vincent leaned back in his chair, and, with a casual gesture of his hand, like he was throwing away the thought, said, “What if Trevor Michaels isn’t our killer?”

  Time passed between them.

  For more than several minutes.

  The chief’s casual and tense expression turned to a suspicious sneer. He stabbed out his cigarette, interlaced his fingers, and leaned forward on his massive desk.

  “Well, Eddie boy, he said. “That is some theory. Got any ideas on who might be the ‘real’ killer, then?”

  Vincent smirked. “A few…”

  Agent Stone pulled up outside the mental health facility around eleven thirty in the evening, the engine idling as she put the car into park and Dr. Davidson hustled toward the driver’s side.

  “Special Agent St
one,” he said. “I just got word that you had arrived. I wish I would have known you were on your way.”

  Stone took a quick scan of Davidson and all his tics he was displaying: hectic, nervous, and uncertain. He was rubbing his hands together, trying to control his tension as he occasional dabbed at the sweat on his forehead with a handkerchief.

  “I wish I would have known sooner,” Davidson said.

  “I apologize.” Stone moved straight toward the entrance. “Things are in a state of chaos right now.”

  “We’ve gotten wind of the situation. We may have to lock the facility down until you’ve apprehended your suspect.”

  “I’d suggest you do so.”

  Stone’s cell phone rang. It was the ASAC, informing them that the local and nationwide news stations were flooding into Hollow Green and overwhelming the already overwhelmed agents and police officers trying their best to get a hold on the situation.

  “Keep them at a distance,” Stone said. “And tell them nothing.”

  She hung up, focusing her attention back on Davidson.

  “Is everything all right?” he asked.

  “Yes,” she said. “It’s fine. I just need to ask you a few more questions pertaining to Trevor Michaels.”

  “Of course. As I said, I’m happy to assist in any way that I can.”

  They moved back to his office, Davidson pulling aside one of his guards and telling him to inform the rest of the staff that they were on lockdown—no rec time, no meals, and no patients were allowed to leave their rooms until further notice.

  They settled back in his office, Stone remaining standing while Davidson sat in his desk chair.

  Davidson said, “I heard about the raid that occurred. Tragic. Absolutely tragic.”

  “Indeed. I’ve never encountered a situation like this before in my career. But it’s important to focus on the now, on catching our man, whoever he may be.”

  “You’re of the impression it’s not Trevor Michaels?” Davidson asked.

  Stone shrugged, making sure to give Davidson just enough of the facts to keep him talking, but making sure to not hint too hard at the notion that she was—as Vincent was currently doing—interrogating a possible suspect.

  “We’re keeping all options open, at the moment,” she said. “We’re finding a lot of… irregularities in the pattern of these murders, even though most are of the mind that Michaels is the culprit.”