Angel Killer (13 page)

“Sounds good. Let me talk to Knoll.”

“Hold on . . . You seeing this?” ask Ailes.

I look over at the overhead screens. An image appears from inside the engine duct. The metal is dark green and rusty. But the thing we’re supposed to see stands out clear as day.

The Warlock’s clue.

A feather.

A solitary white feather.

T
HE INSTANT THE
feather appears on the screen, a group of forensic techs are on the phone with local zoos and universities tracking down an expert on plumage.

Since I don’t know much about birds, other than how to hide them in a sequined tuxedo, I clear things with Knoll so I can head back to Quantico.

Knoll’s standing over the shoulder of an agent who is flipping through online images of birds. “What can you tell us about birds, Blackwood?”

“I got bit by my grandfather’s macaw when I was ten.” I still have the scar on my arm. A nasty bird, he clamped onto my arm when I was changing the newspapers in his cage.

“Nice.” He turns away from the laptop. “What’s up?”

“I was thinking I might be of more use in Quantico, now that the bomber is in forensics’ hands.” I gaze up at the screens showing the feather and photos of the plane.

“You think Ailes and his group might make some headway?”

“I think an unconventional approach might be helpful. There are still some things about the Chloe murders that should be pursued.”

“The whole thing is nagging me,” replies Knoll.

“Yeah. I just think there’s some deeper part to this. We’ve got two victims that can’t be who we think they are. The pilot’s fingerprint is likely a record switch. Something about the two Chloes . . .”

“You don’t think the inferno was to destroy the evidence?”

I shake my head. “I think he wanted an apocalyptic pyre. I think he wants us to think we know what he did. That he just found some girl that looked like Chloe and tried his best to pass her off as Chloe.”

“Why?”

I’ve been going over and over this. “To pull the rug out from under our feet. To get us to build false confidence so he can destroy it.”

“Destroy it? How?”

“I’m not sure. The pilot we found is a dead ringer for the one that went missing in 1945. Our two Chloes are indistinguishable from what we can see. But there’s only one body to examine, a partial one at that. There’s something else . . .”

Knoll nods his head. “And you think Ailes and his geek pack might have a better chance at breaking this than we do in the field?”

“I think it’s just as important.”

“All right. I’ll call you if we need you back here.”

An hour later I’m sitting in the lounge at the Fort Lauderdale–Hollywood International Airport thinking about the fact that the men of the Flight 19 Avenger squadron were last seen just a few hundred yards from where I am. It’s a strange feeling.

I’m trying to ignore the news on the television hanging over my head. They don’t have anything new to add. They just keep repeating the images of the Avenger on the sandbar and the pillar of fire at the cemetery. Even without the image of Chloe climbing out of the ground, it’s biblical enough. By now the connection between the two events is obvious, due to their apparently supernatural nature, and “Warlock” keeps showing up on the closed captioning.

I imagine him laughing at us as he sits over his Dungeons & Dragons game board in his Batman underwear.

On my laptop screen is the image of the feather. It’s obviously a big, bright, neon clue. Forensics had already identified it as a dove feather by the time I made it to the airport. I’m sure everyone in the conference hall is trying to figure it out.

I’m afraid it’s a red herring. And if it’s not, it’s only going to make sense to us after we see what the Warlock has planned next. It’s a clue, but a distracting one. We can’t help but look at it and wonder. We’re trying to figure out what one hand is doing while the other has already palmed off the aces.

The Warlock’s code on the FBI website wasn’t meant to be cracked until he was ready. Knowing where the sand came from wouldn’t have stopped him. It could have come from twenty miles in either direction. If he’d seen a stakeout, he probably would have dropped the plane elsewhere.

But they’re not clues, are they?

They’re calling cards.

They’re his way of telling us that the next mystery is his creation. He thinks he’s too important to write us a note. He only wants to communicate through his miracles.

This is how gods talk to mortals.

Gods speak in symbols too. I’m sure there’s a pattern to what he’s doing. The airplane may have been a lucky break, but to him it symbolizes something.

Chloe’s double was found in the grave. The airplane and body was found on a sandbar in the ocean.

I try to think of how he wants us to see the illusion. The Chloe died crawling out of the ground. The dirt. The “pilot” died in the air.

Earth.

Air.

Classical elements.

I pull up the Wikipedia page on the classical elements. The Babylonians had five: earth, sky, fire, sea and wind. The Greeks were almost the same: air, fire, earth, water and aether.

Aether. The Avenger pilot died from a lack of air. As if he flew into the space beyond the earth. The aether. Or the sky. Either one fits.

I don’t know if this means anything, but I send an e-mail to the working group.

Where does the feather fit in?

If the Warlock’s using the Babylonian elements, then it’s the wind. The Greek, air. Either way, I suspect we can expect at least three more dark miracles from the Warlock. Trying to predict what they’ll be is pointless. Never in a million years would we have expected him to make it look as if he ripped a hole in time and pulled an airplane through it.

His imagination has already exceeded our comprehension.

As I think this over, CNN is showing footage from an old movie called
The Philadelphia Experiment
, another of my father’s favorites, in which a vortex opens up around a World War II naval ship, pulling it out of time. I shake my head in disbelief.

The media are even supplying movie special effects to help build up his mystery. He’s such a goddamn made-for-television-news villain. Everyone, from theologians to fantasy authors, is chiming in with an opinion.

The talking heads are quick to condemn the acts, but all of them have a sense of awe in their condemnations.

Man-on-the-street interviews indicate regular people seem more focused on the illusion than the murdered people. But that’s the Warlock’s design. If we look at it from his point of view, he’s not a murderer. He’s a necromancer who gave Chloe life that she used to crawl out of the ground. He brought back a pilot who was supposed to have perished in an aircraft nobody ever thought would be seen again.

The murders are ambiguous. Like a writer who doesn’t want to make a character good or evil, the Warlock is trying to have it both ways.

I even see a hint of smiles on people’s faces as they offer their opinions on camera. They don’t see him as a murderer. Some of them are buying his story. This infuriates me.

I’m about to write another e-mail, this one to Knoll, and demand that we call attention to what the Warlock really is. But I stop myself. Knoll knows. We all know. We can only report the facts. We can’t control how people think. Right now the Warlock is winning.

I’ve been staring at the television for so long I don’t realize I’m being stared at by a man in a pilot’s uniform. He’s sitting across from me, several seats away.

I look over at him and it takes a second for me to recognize him. He’s got brown eyes and his face looks rounder somehow.

But it’s him.

“Why the long face, Jessica?”

Damian.

Goddamn it.

D
AMIAN CAN READ
my reaction as I start to stand up.

“Please don’t get the TSA over here. I haven’t done anything wrong. At least nothing that warrants involuntary sexual abuse.” He holds up his hands and smiles.

“How about impersonating a pilot?” I think about calling an officer over so I can get a look at his ID.

“It’s only a criminal act if I try to fly the plane.”

“Well, isn’t stealing trains the gateway drug to that?”

“I don’t bring up all your youthful indiscretions,” he smirks.

“I didn’t have any.”

“And that explains quite a lot about you. Not having any is the biggest one of all. It makes little girls grow up into authority figures who want to carry guns around and punish men.”

I close the laptop on the image of the feather. “Why are you here?”

“Two reasons. One, I don’t think you took my warning very seriously about being careful about this Warlock character.” In a relaxed gesture, he takes his pilot hat off and sets it in the chair next to him. “I don’t need to point out to you that you have the habit of attracting the unstable types.” He reaches down into his flight bag and pulls out a
Sun-Sentinel
newspaper and tosses it to me. “And there’s this. It’s a prepress of tomorrow’s edition.”

I don’t even ask him how he got such a thing. The front page headline is the reappearance of the Avenger bomber and pilot alongside a photograph. There are several stories about the incident covering the history of Flight 19, our investigation and the Michigan murder.

“I’ve highlighted the item I think you should be most mindful of.”

I turn the page. It’s an article about the FBI’s pursuit of the Warlock. One sentence stands out.

I set the paper down and look at Damian. “This is stupid.”

“Very. But did you see the photograph?”

“What?” I open the paper again. The image shows several agents standing on the beach looking out at the airplane. I’m in the middle. My black hair flowing in the wind. I’m surrounded by several dozen lighter-haired and balding men.

Damian mocks me. “I wonder which one is the Witch?”

I throw the paper at him. “I don’t need this bullshit.”

“Well, the good news is you look amazing in that photograph. Seriously. The bad news is I’m sure the Warlock feels the same way.”

I want to dismiss his notion, but I know he’s perceptive about these things. He’s certifiable, but he’s brilliant.

Damian is probably the greatest magician I’ve ever met. And it’s for one simple reason; the best magicians are the ones who live or die by their skills. Pickpockets. Card cheats. Damian’s whole life is a deception. When he’s not harassing me or pretending to be someone else, I suspect you’ll probably find him at a card table somewhere, slowly milking the house. Making big losses amid small wins that add up over time.

He handles a deck of cards like nobody I’ve ever seen. And I’ve seen the best in the world. Since I know he’s not staying practiced to perform at children’s birthday parties, I have to imagine it’s for gambling.

I’ve always resisted the idea of asking him for help. I never want to be in debt to him. There’s really no bargaining with the devil. I know what he’s capable of doing. Still, if there’s anyone who can see through a deception, it has to be him.

I give up fighting the question. “So what do I look out for?”

Damian’s face changes to delight as he realizes I’m asking for his help. “He’s probably not walking around in a cape. Although I’m sure he’s dying for them to come back. He probably has one picked out with purple trim. No. He’s in love with this idea of the Warlock. It’s a character he created. He wants to be him. But he’s afraid to actually step into the role—to put himself in public as the Warlock. That’s why this is all about ideas. I bet he looks quite normal. Probably tries to use that as camouflage. Buys his clothes at Old Navy. Looks like a square. He’ll be hard to find. He blends right in.”

“I know the type.” I wonder how long Damian had been watching me. He had to go out of his way for me to see him sitting there.

“Ahem, I can’t tell you how much effort it takes for me not to stand out.”

“Well, just the same. Do it a little farther away. And your profile is about as useless as a fortune cookie.” I’m resisting the urge to call one of the airport police officers to detain him. Maybe not press charges, but at least have him held long enough to find out who he really is. Sadly, that would be one more complication I don’t need at the moment. I might regret not doing it, but it’s not going to help me catch the Warlock right now.

Damian reads my face. “I can tell you’re conflicted by my presence. I need to catch a flight anyway. I’ll leave you with a thought. And this doesn’t come from an amateur. As a person who takes making himself appear to be other people very seriously, it’s not hard to see when someone else has stumbled onto one of my secrets.”

“What would that be?” It’s rare that he ever acknowledges his penchant for deception, much less his technique.

Damian stands up and straightens the crease in his slacks. “I don’t choose the role. I let it choose me. At first I wondered if he chose the girl because she looked like Chloe McDonald or if Chloe was murdered because she looked like the second victim. When I saw our fake pilot it became obvious. He’s choosing his victims to fit the faces of the already deceased. Both the second girl and our fake pilot were chosen because they looked like somebody else.”

“I think we already know this, Damian. Sucks that you came all the way out here to tell me this.”

He raises an eyebrow. “Oh. Then you know how as well? It was an old family trick, wasn’t it?”

“What do you mean, how?”

“How would you find a girl that looked like Chloe, or a man like a missing pilot?”

I haven’t even thought about that question. I’ve been too focused on airplanes and feathers. “What do you mean?”

Damian’s lips form a cocky grin. “Maybe it wasn’t a wasted trip. It never is to see you. Maybe you should start by asking ‘Who do I look like?’ Literally. I’m sure it’s a question our nondescript, very bland Warlock once asked.” Damian gives me a wink and leaves to chase after what I hope is an imaginary flight.