Part 29 (1/2)

”Yes.”

”No. That's....” I paused to calculate the distance. ”That's got to be eight hundred meters away.”

”More like eleven,” she said.

”d.a.m.n,” Spinelli remarked. ”Eleven hundred meters? That is no ordinary sniper range. That's military snipping.”

I holstered my weapon. ”Then we're good.”

”What are you doing?”

”Dominic, he hit his mark. That sniper is long gone by now.”

”I don't understand.”

I gestured toward the hotel room. ”Call in a crime scene crew. Get them out here and over to that warehouse rooftop. Start collecting evidence. We have another homicide on our hands.”

After turning over our crime scene to the CSI crew, Carlos, Spinelli and I drove out to the warehouse where the shot that killed Howard Snow came from. There on the rooftop, as Corporal Olson predicted, we found evidence of a makes.h.i.+ft sniper's nest, consisting of a sandbag muzzle rest and camouflage netting designed to look like roof gravel. No sh.e.l.l casing. No weapon. Nothing else remained.

With Spinelli's binoculars, I could see clearly across the marsh to the motel parking lot, including the room where the CSI team was still busy collecting evidence. An expert shooter with the sun at his back, a calm wind and a serious sniping rifle would have had little trouble scoping in a kill shot from such a vantage point.

”This smacks of a government a.s.signation,” Carlos remarked. ”I don't know where we turn next.”

”We call in the Feds,” I said.

Spinelli scoffed at that. ”Sure, like they'll do something about it.”

”Doesn't matter,” I told him. ”We have to call them. This is no longer our case. It's theirs.”

”Why?”

”This warehouse is on Federal property. It sits along the marshlands extending to the Parker River National Wildlife Refuge. So, technically this is a Federal crime scene.”

”This warehouse is part of the preserve?”

”Yup.”

”But the Marsh flow doesn't even flow that far.”

”Oh, but it does. It gets skinny, but that's where it eventually ends up.”

”What about the rest of our case? What about Delaney's murder at the railroad tracks? The car bomb at Dwyer's? Isn't that still ours?”

I shook my head. ”What case? All we have is a morgue full of dead bodies. And with Dwyer, we don't even have that. No body. No blown up car. We cannot even prove a crime took place.” I shook my head. ”Without Howard Snow, we have nothing.”

”What about my Corvette?” Carlos asked. ”Who's going to get the b.a.s.t.a.r.ds that shot up my Vette?”

”The Feds.”

He hauled back and kicked the sandbag off the edge of the roof. ”d.a.m.nit. That sucks. You know they won't do anything about it, Tony. h.e.l.l, they're the ones who shot it up in the first place.”

I pointed over the edge. ”You just disturbed Federal evidence.”

”Sue me,” he snarled, and he walked away.

I looked at Spinelli. He seemed equally put out. ”You got a problem with this?” I asked.

He shook his head. ”No, but it does suck.”

I nodded my agreement as he, too, walked away. ”Yes,” I said under my breath. ”It definitely sucks.”

FIFTEEN.

The next morning, Carlos and I were at the office organizing the paperwork we needed to file with our report to the Feds. Carlos was still angry over the thought of turning the case over to the same people he believed shot up his car. I tried telling him that wasn't the FBI.

”I don't care,” he said. ”FBI, CIA, NSA, T&A. Feds are Feds.”

”T&A?”

”You know what I mean.”

”Just so you know, the FBI work under the jurisdiction of the Department of Justice, which has nothing to do with those other agencies.”

Across the room, several workstations down, someone called out, ”Detective Marcella?”

I looked out over the expanse of desktop monitors. ”Here,” I said, only then spotting the stranger who called for me.

He came over to us, an older man in a neatly pressed suit with starched white collar and cuffs peeking out in conspicuous flair. I pegged him at around fifty, so calling him older is not exactly fair, especially since beneath my twenty-something-year-old exterior lies a sixty-something-year-old man.

”Detective Marcella?”

I stood and offered my handshake. ”That's right. How can I help you?”

He flashed his badge and ID. ”Special Agent Bradley Driscoll, F.B.I. I'm here to a.s.sume the Biocrynetix Laboratories case you're working on.”

”I didn't call you guys yet.” I looked to Carlos. ”Did you call him?”

Carlos shook his head. ”I didn't call.”

”Did Spinelli?”

”No. He's not here yet.”

”No one from your office called me, Detective,” Driscoll said. ”I'm here because of what happened yesterday at the motel.”

”How do you know what happened at the motel?”