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When she looked in the rearview mirror, he was still in the parking lot, watching her leave. She couldn’t think about him right now. There was too much at stake for Rachel Dean to think about how Charlie made her feel.
By the time she got home, all she wanted was to get out of her clothes and makeup and into something comfortable. She parked in the detached garage, then shouldered her bag and headed for the house, passing the greenhouse and the rose garden on the way.
The landscaping crew had obviously come and gone today, because the grass was newly mown and the hedges were clipped. It was getting late enough in the year that those services would no longer be needed until spring, but the scent of freshly cut grass was pleasant and homey, and today was also the day the twelve-person cleaning service came. She trusted them only because Merlin had trusted them, and they were well aware of the cameras everywhere inside and outside the property, so she had only to check the footage to assure herself they did nothing but clean. Plus, they’d known of her ever since she’d been living downstairs, so her presence upstairs had not changed the status quo of their job.
She was enjoying the scents in the garden, and anticipating the scents of lemon oil that came with the clean house as she hastened her steps, anxious to get inside and get back to the business of finding Rachel.
Charlie was in University Park with his GPS set on Allen Carson’s address. He couldn’t help but admire the size and the architecture of the homes he was passing, although they were never anything he had aspired to own. He’d learned the hard way that you can’t buy the things that matter most in life.
When he finally reached the Carson residence, he pulled up into the circular drive, got out and hurried up the walk to the front door.
The chimes were still echoing as a middle-aged woman in a gray dress opened the door.
He handed her his card. “I’m Charlie Dodge. I’m here to pick up some blueprints.”
“Oh, yes, sir. One moment, please,” she said and retraced her steps to a hall table a few feet away, picked up two large cardboard tubes and brought them back to him. “Here you are, Mr. Dodge. Have a good evening.”
“Tell Mr. Carson I said thank you. We’ll return them in a timely fashion,” Charlie said and headed back to his Jeep.
He laid them in the backseat and then got in. It was going to take a good forty-five minutes to get home to Wyrick, so he sent her a text to let her know he was on his way, and then left the residence.
The FBI had wasted no time sharing Wyrick’s info with the Louisiana division of the ATF, who already had Preston Davis in their sights for other crimes.
After going through the info, the FBI got an arrest warrant for Jeremiah Raver for money laundering, along with a search warrant for his home and for the church. And because the crime had crossed state lines, the FBI had also filed charges against him for ordering the hit on Jade Wyrick.
Special Agent Raines was nervous about the timing. The last time Wyrick gave them info, it was about the Fourth Dimension, and it had been destroyed before they could get to the main man. She had to destroy herself to take them down, and he regretted it.
But he knew there was an FBI team in Louisiana already en route to Jeremiah’s residence to serve the warrants, and he had a friend on the team who promised to let him know when Raver was in custody.
Four shiny black SUVs drove up into the yard at the residence of Jeremiah Lee Raver. The first thing they saw was a car with the trunk up, and the backseat full of items.
Agent Vance of the Louisiana FBI was in charge, and he was antsy.
All he wanted was to make a clean arrest and get in and out without a problem. They got out in haste, with weapons drawn as they headed for the house, and then stopped short as they saw the body, crawling with bugs, and the black pool of blood that had soaked into the earth beneath it, and the suitcases, one on either side of him.
“Son of a bitch. That looks like our man,” Vance said and immediately realized they could be targets, as well, and turned to his team. “You three, check the perimeter. You two, check the back of the house.” Then he glanced at the agent standing beside him. “Call it in. The rest of you follow me.”
The agents who’d gone into the tree line had already found where the shooter had been standing. There was a wrapper from a candy bar, and the crushed stub of a cigarette that they marked as evidence, then left it for the crime scene team to bag and tag. They trailed the shooter’s tracks back to the road, but there were too many tire tracks to discern what he might have been driving, so they headed back toward the house.
Once Vance and his team were satisfied that the house was empty, they moved through the rooms, careful not to disturb what might become evidence.
One of the first things they found were the computers in the office.
“We already know the website is down, and he likely deleted incriminating files, but the techs might get something from the hard drive.”
“I found an address book,” one of the agents said. “There are several people with the same last name.”
“Get the info,” Vance said. “We’ll have to call next of kin.”
The agent took pictures of the pages, and then left the address book where he’d found it. After that, they went back outside and stood around their vehicles, waiting for the medical examiner and their team from the crime lab to arrive.
Vance was walking around the exterior of the house when he glanced up at the underside of the eaves in front of the house, then stopped.
“Langdon! You and Evers go back into the house and see if you can find access to the attic. I think I see a security camera up here. It’s aimed straight toward the area where the shooter would have been standing. Maybe we’ll get lucky.”
Glad to have something to do, both agents headed back into the house, and minutes later Evers came running out.
“Security camera in the attic,” he said.