Page 43 of So Lethal

Also, doing a good job of staying hidden. That was one thing that Trammell, West, and this Messenger Killer had in common. Faith could ordinarily find a ritualistic serial killer within a few days, maybe a week or two at most. These ones eluded her for months. True, she wasn't allowed to work the cases officially, but even when she was working on them in spare moments without the FBI's knowledge, she couldn't make progress. She had been so excited by Michael's discovery of West's fan mail, but that had failed to produce any leads, and now they were back to square one.

That was it. That was why Faith was so off balance. In a way, Tabitha was right. Faith’s celebrity status was a problem. Not because the media paid undue attention to her but because she had somehow become the fixation of three separate serial killers.

Why? What was it about her that made her so “special?”

“We’re here,” Michael said.

That was another courtesy. Michael could tell that Faith was lost in her thoughts, so he told her where they were, knowing she wouldn't even look through the damned windshield to see. Her cheeks burned as she got out of her car. She looked at Michael and said, "You take lead this time."

Michael nodded, showing no sign of concern in front of Rebecca. Faith knew she’d get an earful of that concern later, but she’d deal with it when it came.

They stood on the porch, and Michael dialed Marcus’s phone number. “Marcus Wolfe, this is Special Agent Michael Prince. My partner and I were here earlier today. We’ve come back with an interpreter. We need to talk to you. Please come to the door.”

He hung up and asked Rebecca, “How long does it take for those TTY machines to work?”

“They should be instant. Older ones would need a second to catch up to the words, but newer ones use laser or inkjet printing. They should be just as fast as speech.”

Michael nodded. He put his ear to the door. “I don’t hear anything.”

“Could you really hear something that way?” Rebecca asked.

“We should,” Michael replied. “But I don’t hear anything. No movement, no television, no appliances running.”

“He could be asleep,” Rebecca suggested.

“At seven-thirty?” Faith asked.

“If he’s a chronic drinker, that’s not out of the question,” Michael pointed out.

Faith sighed. “Right. Call him again. We’ll give it a few minutes, and if he doesn’t answer, we’ll pick the lock and go in.”

“Can you do that?” Rebecca asked. “I thought that was illegal.”

Faith’s lips thinned. Technically, it was illegal, but sometimes, it was okay to bend the rules if it didn’t hurt anyone and got Faith the answers she needed.

And what were they supposed to do, anyway? They couldn’t let their suspect use the fact that he couldn’t hear as an excuse to impede their investigation.

Faith sighed. “Well, call him, and we’ll go from there. And Rebecca, I really need you to stay quiet and let us do our jobs.”

“Right. Sorry.”

Michael left another message. The group waited a few minutes with no more response. Faith sighed. “Okay, Michael, you stay with Rebecca. Turk and I are going to go around the house and see if we can find Marcus.”

“You got it.”

Faith and Turk moved to the side of the house, and Turk barked almost immediately. He rushed forward but only made it a few steps before yelping and dropping to the ground just as he had at the Amtrak station when Dr. Crane shot him with the sound pistol.

The whining noise came to Faith’s ears again, but she didn’t panic this time. She was almost certain that the killer’s sound weapon was causing this latest episode.

She rushed past Turk and rounded the corner. The whine faded, replaced by a deep rumbling sound.

That was telling, but more telling was the figure standing in the backyard holding a black object about the size of an old Walkman CD player. The two of them stared at each other for a moment before Faith drew her handgun.

The figure twisted a knob on the object and threw it at Faith. The rumbling became a deep basso roar in Faith’s ears. She winced and batted the object away. It hit the ground and split into two pieces. The rumbling stopped, and Faith breathed a sigh of relief.

And remembered that she had just drawn her weapon on a suspect. She swore and looked ahead, expecting the killer to be rushing her.

Instead, he was rushing away. She just caught sight of his silhouette in the darkness ahead.

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