Spider - Michael Morley [112]
Howie felt his mouth turn dry with excitement. ‘Still a friggin’ lot of homes to search, though.’
Jack stood up to stretch his legs. Blood pumped to his head and a burst of white-hot pain scorched through his temples.
‘You okay?’ said Howie, frowning up at him.
‘Sure. Just stood up too quickly,’ lied Jack. He looked down on the mess of maps and added, ‘We’ve got to go for the more isolated houses, the ones with big garages, doubles not singles. He’ll have picked a street that he can get away from quickly and that he can have good surveillance from, so he won’t be in the heart of the estates, he’ll be on an outer wing.’
‘We’ll pull together the sweep teams, right now. I’ll brief them right after we’re done.’
Jack was worried about that. Filling the area with squad cars or even Crown Vics could spook the perp. ‘They’re going to have to be careful. We know he’s got cameras in the house, so he sure as hell is going to have them outside too. If he’s in there, he’ll probably see us coming.’
Howie climbed to his feet, his knees cracking. ‘Do you think he owns the property or rents it?’
‘Good point. This guy has to be forty-plus so let’s do voting register and housing searches on people thirty-five or over. Get someone to sift mortgage and bank accounts too, focusing on that demographic. He’s certain to be using a false identity and showing himself younger or older than he actually is.’
‘And renting?’ asked Howie.
‘Unlikely,’ said Jack ‘He’d never want to risk a landlord coming in and finding all his toys.’
Howie wasn’t sure it was as simple as that. ‘I just don’t see him doing this kind of whacko stuff in his own crib. Like you always say, this guy is cautious. Surely he wants to make sure he’s able to leave at a moment’s notice and that, if the house gets busted, it cannot lead to him?’
Another explosion went off in Jack’s head, but this time he poker-faced the pain. Concentrate, he told himself, get your shit together, there’s time to rest up later, just get your head in gear.
Howie fiddled with some maps and it gave Jack the breather he needed. ‘You’re right. Of course you’re right,’ said Jack. ‘Get a team on to the letting agencies. I’m willing to bet that he does own this house, but what he has done is put it in the hands of a letting agent and leased it back to himself under a false identity. In other words, he’s both landlord and tenant.’
‘He probably used a false name even when he approached the agent, purporting to be the owner,’ said Howie.
‘Exactly,’ agreed Jack, feeling his eye twitch again. ‘Letting the house back to himself is a really clever trick. The first thing it does is generate false paperwork. From false tenancy agreements and household bills you can set up bank accounts, apply for credit cards and start to build up a series of false identities for yourself.’
‘I’m on to it,’ said Howie, heading off for a phone.
‘Another thing,’ called Jack. ‘You’ll also probably find the tenancy has changed names a few times. Those name changes will roughly coincide with the dates of our victims’ deaths. He’ll shed an old identity, and adopt an entirely new one, after each of our known murders.’
‘Back in a minute,’ said Howie, leaving the room to brief Fernandez.
Jack was glad to be alone.
He felt himself break into an oily sweat. The strength in his legs seemed to run into a puddle around his feet and his vision blurred.
Breathe slow, breathe deep, he told himself, and then grabbed for a chair just before a tide of blackness and nausea washed over him.
76
San Quirico D’Orcia, Tuscany
Nancy ran to the edge of the terrace where Zack’s trike lay abandoned and the garden fell away by more than twelve feet.
She could see nothing.
Panic set in.
Without even thinking about her own safety, she scrambled down the loose soil and into the deep crater. Surely to God he hadn’t come down here on his own? And then she remembered how she’d once found him dancing on top of her dressing table after