Ruthless Game (A Captivating Suspense Novel) (20 page)

"Don't turn this around on me," James snapped back, raising his hand in her face.

"Why not?
You
do. It's all about your next promotion, your raise. Hell, if the deputy chief gave you a fucking shovel, you'd bury me yourself."

Furious, Alex turned her back and aimed for the door. James wasn't coming after her. Not his style, especially not when there was work to be done. Damn it all to hell. She needed information and she needed it fast.

"Whoa," Reesa called after her.

Alex turned to see Reesa holding a thick Airborne Express package.

"Want this?"

Alex glanced over her shoulder. "What is it?"

"The file from the PAPD."

Alex halted. "PAPD," she repeated.

"The Palo Alto Police Department."

Alex nodded. "No, I know." She saw the initials in her head and suddenly saw them again on Loeffler's calendar, on his list of places to call. She had requested this file after reading the article from 1971 about the kids in Palo Alto. She frowned. Had Loeffler been looking into this case when he died?

"You want it or should I send it back to Lombardi?"

"No, I want it." Leaning forward, she took the package and pulled it to her chest. "Thank you," she whispered. "I'm going to run to get some lunch. If anyone asks, I'll be back in an hour or so."

"Enjoy it."

Alex wasn't sure if Reesa meant lunch or the file, so she simply nodded and ran down the stairs and out of the station.

In her car, she made a U-turn in the middle of the street and drove ten blocks toward the bay, took a left, and drove another four blocks. Somewhere near the border of Emeryville and Berkeley, she stopped.

It was as safe a place as any. Opening her glove compartment, she pulled out the granola bar that would have to serve as lunch and tore open the Airborne package.

Wiping her sweaty palms on the passenger seat, she flipped through the Sesame Street Murder Case material, searching for something that would make things fall into place, that would give her an idea of why Loeffler was killed.

The report listed the names of the officers involved in the investigation. Lead officer was Peterson, then Kearny and Sansome. None of the names was familiar.

Her eyes skimming on, she searched the names of the eleven children who had been killed after being kidnapped on a class outing. None of those names was familiar either. The warehouse where Walter Androus had murdered the kids was called Richmond. That didn't seem to be the connection. Androus's only family was one sister, Maggie, who lived in West Virginia. Alex scribbled down the name and address of Maggie Androus as a starting place to tracking her down. She wondered where Walter Androus was now.

She glanced up to be sure no one was watching. Apart from the occasional traffic, the street was empty. The granola bar caught her eye and she ripped it open, sticking half in her mouth.

She read on. Maggie hadn't seen her brother in years. She characterized Walter as quiet and shy and not capable of such violence. Alex grunted. The family always said that.
Well, I remember he used to run over dogs for fun, but he wasn't a violent person.

Frustrated, she exhaled. Maggie had refused to comment on the household she and Walter had grown up in. Alex was sure there was a good reason for that.

Having made notes of the full names of the eleven murdered children and their parents to cross-reference later, with her notes from Loeffler's house, she continued to search the file. At the end of the twenty-page document, she flipped back, glancing up at the clock. Forty minutes had passed and she hadn't found a thing. Nothing seemed to indicate that she was even on the right track. She didn't see any connection to William Loeffler. Why had he even had the newspaper clipping on the murders?

She tried to remember the details from the article. She was sure it had said there were fourteen children. Maybe there were survivors. Loeffler had been about the right age. She searched for a list of the remaining three children and finally found it, buried at the back of the file.

A dog barked and she slammed the file shut and shot upright, looking for the source. The lack of sleep was starting to make her jumpy, which wasn't like her.

An older man walked his pit bull down the street. He waved an apology for the dog.

"Those things should be shot," she said out loud, remembering a recent incident where a pit bull had attacked and almost killed a toddler.

She opened the file again. "Survivors," she whispered to herself, running her finger down the page. She stopped when she got to the first name on the list.

William Douglas Loeffler.
Her pulse beat a quick drum on her ribs. So Loeffler
was
a survivor. She thought about the old class picture he had in his files, the one of the second-grade class with most of the faces crossed out. Now it made sense. Had Loeffler been planning to call the PAPD about this case? Why had he dredged it up again? Maybe Androus was still alive and he killed Loeffler. She flipped through the file until she found the article she'd seen at Loeffler's.

She skimmed the beginning again, making mental notes as she went. The children from Florence Hemingway School had been on a field trip to the Ghiradelli Chocolate Factory. Androus had intercepted the bus by pretending to be a chaperone arriving late. He'd shot and killed all the adults on the bus and then kidnapped the kids and forced them to ingest Valium. Alex found the spot where Loeffler's article had cut off and continued to read:

... Androus was found shot dead. Three children were still alive, all but one still blindfolded. The survivors' names will not be released, but they have been treated at Sequoia and are said to be in good physical health.

The city has made arrangements for counselors to assist the children and their families in overcoming this tragedy.

Meanwhile, police are still searching for evidence as to who shot and killed Walter Androus. They have not ruled out the possibility of one very brave child.

Alex frowned. The killer had been killed—shot dead, maybe by one of the kids. "Shit." Androus couldn't have killed Loeffler if he was already dead. She started to toss the file aside. What a waste. What now? Maybe someone else was involved back then, someone who was back now. An accomplice.

She could talk to the other survivors. The article had mentioned three. She found Loeffler's name again at the top of the list and then scanned down to read the other two aloud. "Marcus Andrew Nader, and—" She gasped. "Oh, my God."

Her hands shaking, she lifted the paper closer to her face and stared at the name, sure her eyesight had to be playing tricks on her.
Alexandra Michael Kincaid.

Chapter 16

Alex sat in the car for a long time, staring at her own name on the page, certain it would disappear just as shockingly as it had appeared. It didn't. Each time she blinked, the words seemed darker, their image burned into her retinas so that she saw them when her eyes were closed.

How many Alexandra Michaels could there be? If her middle name were anything else—Ann, Jane, Michelle—she would be convinced it was someone else. But Michael? It was her mother's maiden name.

This was ridiculous. It couldn't be her. Her eyes closed, she tried to recall anything about grade school—a teacher, a friend, an outfit, even what she used to eat at lunch. Not a single image popped into her mind. How could she not remember anything? She recalled playing with Brittany and James, but little else.

The photos that had lined the mantel in their home came to mind—James in a plaid oxford with a butterfly collar, the girls in matching striped sweaters. Brittany wore her hair long and feathered, Alex was in short pigtails. Where were all those pictures now?

The one thing she knew for certain was that she'd been born in Palo Alto, at Stanford Medical School. Her mother had moved the family across the bay the summer before Alex started third grade. Alex searched her brain for the reason they had moved. She was sure her mother had taken a new job in Berkeley, but had that been the only reason? Had they moved because of something so horrible?

If she had been there, she would remember it, wouldn't she? Why couldn't she remember anything? Cursing, she wished her mother were still alive—or her father. Someone who could answer her questions. Would Brittany and James know? But they had been only ten at the time.

Disbelief gnawed at Alex's stomach. How could her mother have kept something like this from her? How could she have died without telling Alex what she had gone through, without leaving her with any hint as to how to handle it?

Fists tight on the steering wheel, she tried to drain her anger. She wished she could cry and scream and let it all out. "I
wasn't
there."

But suddenly her entire body felt numb. Nothing surfaced—no rage, no tears, no well of endless emotion. Only a heavy, dark sense of dread that cloaked her in its cold fear. She looked down at her empty wrist. She needed a new watch. Glancing at the clock on the dash, she saw it was three o'clock. She had been sitting there for almost two hours.

She reached for her cell phone and remembered it was gone. The killer had it. "Don't you remember?" he had asked her. Was he trying to get her to remember the murders from all those years ago? Had Loeffler remembered? He must have.

Marcus Nader was the third survivor. She had to find him. Was it possible Androus had somehow survived and come back? If he were still alive, wouldn't he go after Nader, too? Or was Nader a killer? She wrote herself notes to search for Nader and Androus. She thought about the accomplice angle again and about Maggie Androus. Maybe Alex could find her.

Blinking hard, Alex focused her attention. She couldn't let James or Lombardi find out about this until she knew what was going on. She removed the list of victims and survivors from the report, folding it carefully and sticking it behind the bills in her wallet. Closing the folder, she prayed the page wouldn't be missed until she had figured out what to do about it.

Alex turned the key in the engine. At least now she had a path to follow. She started down the street, trying to digest the information she'd discovered in the past few hours. She had survived a mass murder. And she couldn't remember a damn thing about it.

When she arrived at the station, Reesa caught her as she stepped through the door. Alex jumped slightly, her own mind moving so fast she hadn't paid attention to anything else.

"You okay?"

Alex nodded, not trusting herself to speak. She handed the file back to Reesa.

Before she stepped away, Reesa took her arm and stopped her. "You look like you've seen a ghost."

Alex forced herself to shake her head. "I'm sorry. Just trying to figure this out. Thanks for the loan."

The woman's eyes remained pinned to her face. "So, it helped?"

Alex nodded. "A ton."

Reesa's expression lightened. "Glad to hear it."

Seeking refuge in the office she had used that morning, Alex hurried down the hall in hopes of avoiding speaking to anyone else. She was supposed to have gone home. Logging into the system, she went to search the state for a name. She typed in "Walter Androus" and came up with no current record. She tried "W Androus" and "Walt Androus" and again got no records. She searched just "Androus" and came up with a bunch of listings. Nothing looked quite right, but she printed the list to go through more carefully later.

Next, she tried "Marcus Nader." No current listing. She typed "Nader" and found several. Scanning them, she found a Marc Nader listed in Palo Alto. "Bingo." She printed the list and ran next door to retrieve it off the printer. Back in the office, she folded the pages and tucked them in her bag. Exiting the system, she stood from her chair and then turned toward the door. But James was standing in the center of the frame, blocking her way. She wondered how long he'd been watching her.

"Excuse me," she said, trying to move past him.

"Not so fast."

Alex tried to push past him again, but he didn't move. She considered knocking him down, but decided against it. "What the hell do you want?"

"Answers."

"Great. Go find some."