Wendy nodded her agreement
and left to tell Jake her plan to go with Brad. Jake could have
cared less, but as he was the special agent in charge of this case,
she knew to report to him.
An hour later they were
flying back up the coast to Oregon and entrench themselves in the
most baffling case to date
Chapter
5
The ‘Batt Team’
euphemistically known by in certain circles of the government was
built on stamina and perseverance. This was evident by the plane
ride up the coast. Steve and Wendy were both sleeping and the team
was fully awake doing what they do best: working. Billy at his
laptop; Sujin at her laptop, doing what she did best: digging for
information that might lead to a clue where this madman might
strike next; Brad with his map studying each kill site looking for
a needle in a haystack. Math, the answer to all questions, lay
before him. The formula is all he needed. Mike did his best work
analyzing where he had been, what he saw, what he heard and Brad
had told him to try and understand why the house was empty save the
books and kitchen stuff. He’d also told him after the FBI had
looked for clues and fingerprints to have the books sent to
Oregon.
The plane landed in the dead
of night to the calm after the storm, but just a pause as another
one lurked just over the horizon. Mike took his car to Port Orford
to check in at home and Steve took his car and the rest of them
piled into a van for the trip to Bandon.
Sandy was happy they were
home and didn’t pay much attention to the newcomer in Wendy. Rocky
would have told her to be aware if there was any danger, but he
renewed his love with a standoff stance while she played the role
of female making sounds of love and happiness by dancing around.
Earie had the welcome mat out and hot bowls of noodles sat on the
low table for the hungry team and guests. The smell of onion and
garlic rising off the noodles made all mouths water with
hunger.
Wendy was totally impressed
by what she could see and what she imagined the house and grounds
looked like in the daylight. So sterile, but so homey she thought.
She couldn’t quite put her finger on it. But what felt like
independence of the team members, but yet a bond made it all feel
warm and comfortable. No evidence of touching or hugs upon
returning, but just an order of business and the comforts of home.
The look and aroma of the noodles made her want to sit down and
eat, as Sujin led her downstairs to her bedroom where she could
freshen up. Billy and Steve followed them down to their respective
rooms and a few minutes later all were sitting on the floor sucking
up a homemade U-dong, a Korean noodle soup. To Wendy it tasted
wonderful and she was impressed with the surroundings having peeked
into the computer room and wondered what the other rooms looked
like. Her room was austere but comfortable. She thought she would
enjoy staying here and maybe she would even learn
something.
Earlier she had received a
document on her laptop one paragraph long about her inquiry about
who Brad Pratt was and is. Sitting at the table eating this
wonderful food she gazed at him thinking about what the document
said. He was an Oxford scholar and after graduation entered the
Navy. After retiring six years ago it was vague about what he was
doing at the present time. In it was nothing about his personal
life or why he had retired early when she knew he was supposed to
be a career man following a long line of military men such as his
retired father who was a general up until a few years ago. Vague
was not the word she thought about, secrecy was more like it. Why I
need to know, she thought, it seems like he knows more than he is
letting on. How to crack that knowledge base was her intention.
Must be careful as if I come on too strong or too curious he will
clam up tight and like a fool I will have lost his confidence. No
doubt he was held in high esteem in some circles and Jake knew more
than she did about this strange and powerful team of seemingly
misfits.
Then there was his Korean
wife. Where did he meet her and how does she fit into this team.
She hadn’t heard her say ten words since she met her. But she
always noticed the two of them looking at each other like telepathy
was going on between them. She moved like a cat. No sound and
fluidity marked her movements. Watch and learn she heard her father
say. There is nothing worse than a person putting their nose where
it doesn’t belong. Gain their confidence and tread lightly. She
liked Mike, but he was gone and who knows when he will return. Then
there was Billy who had gobbled down the noodles and ran outside
with a pack of smokes to satisfy his habit. She didn’t see him so
strange once she got by his dress and habits. Kind of typical of a
computer nerd, she thought while she fought the spicy taste and
rank smell of kimchee.
Brad broke the silence by
saying that we should all retire for the night and get together at
six in the morning. Wendy thought that a good idea and thanked them
for a lovely dinner and went to her room. Looking at the wall clock
it said close to one am. After the bathroom and putting on her
nightdress, she peeked out the curtains and saw Brad sitting on a
small sofa reading some papers. Doesn’t ever sleep she wondered.
And his dog is always next to him as her eyes closed and the next
thing she realized it was six am. She never slept so well and she
remembered there wasn’t a sound after she went to bed: total
silence. A little scary, but when she dressed in casual clothes
climbing the stairs and looking out the tinted windows as daylight
was just breaking, she relaxed when Steve came up alongside her and
said, “Sleep well?”
“Never better and why would
anyone live in DC when you could live here,” she answered with an
obvious rhetorical question.
“Wendy, it wasn’t by chance
you were chosen for this job. Brad asked for you special. He thinks
you can be a real help with this difficult case we are
on.”
Wendy was shocked and still
looking out the window which now had streams of water from a
soundless rain running down the window said, “How did he know or
how does he know me?”
“Honestly speaking he was
given a list of profilers and liked what he read about you I
guess.”
At that moment Brad came
through the door with one of his dogs. Both stopped on the entry
way and Brad stripped down to his running shorts. He toweled off
his dog and walked to the stairs.
Wendy had a first look at
his body. When he walked it seemed he floated on air. Legs were
well muscled, but not overly so. It was the same with his arms and
shoulders, powerful but not bulging. His body seemed hairless, but
that was not unusual for blondes. Some of her friends would say he
had a wedge of a body. Wendy felt an electric current run through
her body and especially the sensitive areas. Her thoughts were
interrupted by Sujin coming through the door. She too stripped down
to shorts and a wet T-shirt, following her husband down the
stairs.
Wendy said to Steve with a
look of curiosity, “Don’t they ever sleep?”
Steve with a small grin
said, “Not much. I would guess a couple hours a night is all.
Something to do with Eastern religion, but as I’m a complete
neophyte about that discipline, your guess is as good as mine. I
will say that I’ve never seen him or her tired. And believe me,
I’ve had occasion to witness when he had operated in the field for
four days straight without any sleep or rest.”
Wendy looked back at the
view now that daylight gave her an outline of the coming day. She
saw what appeared as sand dunes running to south and the Pacific
Ocean is beating the beach with large waves of the storm in
progress. No way did she want to be out there in this weather. She
was a city girl and didn’t like the rain. The smell of breakfast
cooking with Earie working mostly soundless in the kitchen drew her
away from the view. She was starving and wanted a cup of coffee in
the worst way. Earie must have sensed the need for both Steve and
Wendy as she placed two mugs of steaming coffee on the old wood
table by the window. Steve took her by the arm and both sat at the
table sipping fresh coffee.
Billy came up looking like
he just crawled out of bed, but then he always looked that way. He
almost ran into the door while fumbling for his smokes. Rocky was
hot on his heels and wanted to play. The door faced east so the
weather was hardly noticed when the door opened or closed. Sujin
had turned off the security at the door, but the outside was always
on. Brad had informed Wendy about the ground security and to not go
outside without either Sujin or him with her. She took the warning
seriously and had no need to venture out in this
weather.
Breakfast was fish soup and
Korean pancakes. Wendy wasn’t much of a fish lover, but hungry was
the better part of valor and she dug in with relish. She found the
taste excellent and sheepishly wondered what was for
lunch.
After breakfast Brad
suggested they have a meeting in the basement to discuss the case.
Almost on cue the high sound of someone coming denoted the arrival
of Mike. Wendy was amazed how well it worked. Mike declined
breakfast and made for the stairs saying hi and good morning to
all. Billy was standing in the kitchen wolfing down an egg sandwich
and milk. He ran back to the door for a last minute smoke and once
all were in place around the glass top coffee table, the discussion
at first surrounded the contents of the kitchen from the house of
John.
Mike said, “We all know the
questions, but what are the answers. He cleaned out the house save
the kitchen and books.” He’d made an easy to read list of the
inventory and had passed around to all a copy. “Let’s go around the
room after a minute and see what pops out of the box.”
After a few minutes Billy
offered, “If it had been me I wouldn’t take condiments and pancake
mix with me either. That tells me he left it to confuse us and to
stall for time frustrating the investigators.”
Brad looked up and said with
his usual soft spoken voice, “Maybe that is the case Billy, but
let’s look a little deeper than what is on the surface. What do you
do with condiments and such things? You mix them to make something
is what you do. Now he is mixing up an alphabet soup. We need to
take a first letter of each item and see what we come up with.”
Billy was scrambling for his laptop and decided that was not what
he needed and left for the computer room.
Brad continued by pointing
out, “B for baking soda: Barstow; C for cookie: for Cantil; S for
salt: Santa Clarita; N for nuts: Needles; and so on.”
Wendy thought this was so
off the wall she almost laughed. Steve sensed her thoughts and gave
her a glare that would have devastated her in grad school. She was
smarter than that and gave herself a verbal warning to listen with
an open mind.
Brad went on to say, “If we
look at the size of the area he used for the two letters A and N,
then follow that with the next two sites further north to connect
the C, something tells me he didn’t follow his plan of making the
‘Catch me if you can logical or symmetrical. If you follow Sac and
add Bishop then connect the line to Baker a nice C is visible.
However, if you make a C out of Bakersfield to Bishop to Baker you
have again a C. In addition you have the three C’s.” A frown on his
face was felt by all at the meeting. Steve thought this was way
over his head and excused himself to make a phone call. Wendy had
to use the bathroom, but was afraid to leave.
Billy came back in with a
random list of words three pages long. Sujin took a look and left
to the computer room without a word. Mike changed the subject to
the books. Everyone looked at their copy of the list of books and
magazines found in the John house. Mike keyed in on one book he
found as an anomaly to the rest of the books. He said, “This book
about raising pigs is totally alien to the rest of them and to my
thinking why would a guy have a book about raising pigs when you
live in a city?”
Wendy was looking over the
list and was now starting to get in on the feel of things. Her
brain was starting to gear up and forget about the deeper thoughts
and think about what is staring you in the face. Pigs, why the hell
would he have a book about pigs? She blurted out, as all heads
turned towards her, “Maybe in his history, that is family history,
pigs were raised by a relative.”
Brad said, “I like it and
Mike run this guy’s genealogy through Utah and see what comes up”
Wendy looked pleased as punch and Brad gave her a small smile. Only
the two of them were left sitting around the table and she took the
opportunity to excuse herself for a bathroom run.
Steve, meanwhile, in his
bedroom was talking to Jake in Sacramento. Jake was telling him
they found his car and were dismantling it piece by piece. He told
Steve they were phoned by long term parking at the airport after a
description of it with the two letters was sent out to places where
he might park or hide the car. Steve asked, “Has he been identified
by anyone at the airport?”
“No, I doubt if we will get
an ID as he uses so many disguises.”
“Fine, Brad wants those
books up here soonest Jake, so please double your efforts on them
and send by first light tomorrow.” That was an order and not a
request as Jake took it.
“That will be done and is
there anything more,” he asked sarcastically.