Chapter 45

I DID A QUICK ASSESSMENT of the cars nearest the bridge, looking for solo white males. Make no mistake about it, I believe in profiling during emergency situations like this one. The more a witness has in common with the criminal they’ve seen, the more reliable their testimony will be-at least statistically speaking. That had also been my experience at homicide scenes again and again. So I was looking for white males, preferably alone in their vehicles.

I settled on a black Honda Accord about five car lengths back from the overpass. The man inside was sitting sideways to avoid looking ahead, and he had a cell phone pressed to his ear. His car was running, with the windows rolled up.

I rapped hard on the glass. “Metro Police. Excuse me, sir? Sir? Excuse me!”

He finally held up his index finger without actually looking around at me. One minute?

At that point, I opened the car door for him and showed my creds. “Now, sir? Please hang up the phone.”

“I gotta go,” he said to whoever, and stepped outside, full of piss and vinegar, I could tell. “Officer, can you, or somebody, tell me how long we’ll be stuck here?”

“Not long,” I said, rather than lecture him about the two kids who had just died. “But I need you to tell me exactly what you saw happen on the overpass.”

He talked fast, with an irritating nonchalance, but his story corroborated what we’d gathered so far. The driver of the Honda had come to a halt seconds after the young male had been thrown down into traffic.

“At first, I didn’t realize what the accident, or whatever, was all about. I just saw cars suddenly stopping in front of me. But then I saw the dead kid.” He pointed to the bridge. “And the one up there. The girl who got her throat cut. Terrible shit. Tragic, right?” He asked the question as if he couldn’t figure it out for himself.

“Right. Can you describe the man who was on the overpass? The killer?”

“Not really. He had on one of those Halloween masks. The rubber kind you put over your whole head? I think it was supposed to be Richard Nixon. I’m pretty sure. Does that make any sense?”

“It does. Thank you for your help,” I told the man. “Another officer will come by to take down a few more particulars.”

The next eyewitness I spoke to was a limo driver, who told me the killer looked taller and much heavier than the female victim. Also that he wore a dark Windbreaker with no insignia that the driver could make out. And then a few vaguely recollected bits of what had been said over the bullhorn. “That sonofabitch bastard yelled, ‘I’m back!’ Those were his first words.”

“Did you notice if he had any kind of camera or recording device up there?” I asked.

The limo driver shook his head. “I’m sorry, I honestly don’t know. Not that I saw, anyway. There was a lot of confusion.”

“Still is,” I said, and patted the guy on the shoulder. “Anything else you remember?”

The limo driver shook his head. “I’m sorry.”

I managed to squeeze in four more witnesses before the G.W. was opened to traffic again. Any further accounting would have to come later; I’d gotten as much during the critical first hours as I could get. I hoped it would help, but I didn’t think so. For someone who was putting on live shows, the killer was covering his tracks very well.

A few minutes later, Bree, Sampson, and I reconvened at the west end of the pedestrian bridge, where the killer had apparently fled, at least according to several of the witnesses.

“The bushes over there are all trampled down,” Sampson said, pointing to a stand of high grass out of sight from the road. “For all we know, he had a motorcycle or something stashed away. So far, we’ve got nothing more on him.”

Bree added, “No calling card, by the way.”

“That’s a little weird,” I said. “He forgot about his signature this time? Since when does that happen?”

“Or he changed his pattern,” said Sampson. “Again, since when does that happen?”

“Or”-I finally said what had been bothering me for a while-“this wasn’t the same guy.”

Then Bree’s cell went off. She listened, and her face couldn’t have been any more grim.

Finally she looked at the two of us. “Well, he’s struck again. There’s been another murder.”

Chapter 46

THEY WEREN’T GOING TO KNOW what hit them this time. The killer had arrived at FedExField in Landover, Maryland, about two hours before kickoff for the first football game of the season. He grabbed a soda and a hot dog, then browsed the Hall of Fame Store, not really interested in buying-he wasn’t a Redskins fan, not his hometown-but he wanted to blend in with the rest of the sports crowd.

For a while, anyway.

And then-he wanted to stand out. Really stand out. Make his bones. Play his role in the fourth story.

Out of the corner of his eye, he could see some of the football players warming up-kickers booming high, long punts and making field-goal attempts. It was going to be another sellout crowd-there had never been a Redskins home game that wasn’t. There was about a thirty-year waiting list for season tickets.

And, man, did he love sellout crowds for his stories.

Some particularly high-spirited fans, the Hogettes, were singing “Hail to the Redskins” slightly off-key and with off-color lyrics liberally sprinkled in, which seemed weird since there were lots of kids in the crowd. The so-called superfans wore bright-colored wigs and polka-dot blouses and plastic hog snouts. Some of them were smoking extra-long cigars, which enhanced their piggy image.

He hadn’t gone quite that far with his outfit, but he was wearing a Redskins cap and jersey, and he had his face painted red and white, the home team’s colors. His persona was that of a disgruntled fan named Al Jablonski. A good, solid role to play.

Ninety-one thousand fans packed the stadium, all waiting for Al Jablonski. They just didn’t know it yet.

Close to game time, the First Ladies of football scampered onto the Technicolor-green field-masses of flying hair and pom-poms, skimpy red halter tops and white short shorts. Family entertainment at its most all-American, the killer couldn’t help thinking.

“Are you ready for some foot-ball?” he shouted from the stands. “Some foos-ball!” A few fans around him joined in or laughed at the familiar line from the Monday Night Football TV show. Al Jablonski knew his audience, and his game.

The control booth for the stadium scoreboard was located underneath the huge sign. He knew the way and arrived there in time for the national anthem to be sung by a soprano marine from the base down in Quantico.

Al Jablonski knocked on the metal door, said, “Couple of messages from Mr. Snyder’s office. Vanessa sent these down.” Vanessa was actually the name of one of the owner’s assistants. Easy enough to find out.

The door opened. There were two guys inside-stat geeks, from the looks of them, real antiques. “Hi, I’m Al Jablonski.” He shot them both, and the sound of the gun was completely lost under loud cheering from the crowd as the national anthem ended. Sort of took away his thunder.

So he sat at the geeks’ computer and put a message up on the big stadium screen for all to see.

I’M BACK! AND I JUST WANTED TO MAKE THIS SUNDAY A REAL KILLER FOR EVERYBODY.

THE GUYS WHO USUALLY SEND OUT THESE ANNOYING MESSAGES AND PLUGS ARE DEAD INSIDE THE CONTROL BOOTH. SO ENJOY THE GAME WITHOUT ANY FURTHER INTERRUPTIONS FROM MANAGEMENT OR CORPORATE SPONSORS. PLEASE WATCH YOUR BACKS, AND YOUR FRONTS TOO. I’M IN THE BUILDING, AND I COULD BE ANYWHERE, AND ANYONE.

THIS IS SO MUCH BETTER THAN FOOTBALL, DON’T YOU THINK? GO, SKINS!