Unsolved

Book 2: Invisible

by James Patterson, David Ellis

Genres: Crime Fiction; Suspense

Synopsis

The perfect murder always looks like an accident.

FBI agent Emmy Dockery is absolutely relentless. She's young and driven, and her unique skill at seeing connections others miss has brought her an impressive string of arrests.

But a shocking new case-unfolding across the country-has left her utterly baffled.

The victims all appear to have died by accident, and have seemingly nothing in common. But this many deaths can't be coincidence. And the killer is somehow one step ahead of every move Dockery makes. How?

To FBI Internal Affairs special agent, Harrison "Books" Bookman, everyone in the FBI is a suspect-particularly Emmy Dockery (the fact that she's his ex-wife doesn't make it easier).

But someone else is watching Dockery. Studying, learning, waiting. Until it's the perfect time to strike.

Release date: June 3, 2019

Publisher: Little, Brown and Company

Print pages: 480

Sample

1

I AM neither evil nor deranged. I am not uneducated, I am not poor, and I am not the product of an abusive upbringing. I do what I do for one, and only one, reason.

The man in the beige jacket pulls his SUV into the strip-mall parking lot and kills the engine. He steps out of the car, straightens his jacket, and lightly brushes his hand against the bulge at his side, the concealed handgun.

The setting summer sun casts a dim glow over the strip mall, nearly empty. The laundromat at the end is dark; the catering service is shuttered, a metal grate across the window. The convenience store, displaying ads for cigarettes, beer, two-for-a-dollar hot dogs, Powerball tickets, is the only thing open.

There is one other vehicle in the lot, a Dodge Caravan the color of rust that’s parked nose in about eight spaces away.

A man in a wheelchair is in the middle of the lot. He bends over at the waist, reaches down to the pavement, and struggles to pick up several items that have spilled out of a plastic grocery bag. He also works the joystick on the arm of his wheelchair, but in vain—the motorized chair fails to respond to the command.

A disabled man in a broken wheelchair.

Only moralists or lemmings think that weakness requires compassion and mercy. Any student of history, of science, knows the opposite is true.

We are supposed to extinguish the weak. It always has been and always will be so.

The man in beige calls out, “How ’bout I give you a hand with that, mister?”

The wheelchair guy straightens up with some difficulty. His face is red and shiny with sweat from the effort of trying to retrieve the toiletries rolling around on the pavement. He is wearing a camouflage hat and an army fatigue jacket. Decent upper-body build, to be expected of someone who’s lost the use of his legs. His unshaven face is weathered and dull except for a small, shiny scar in the shape of a crescent moon near his right eye.

“I s’pose I could use a hand,” says the wheelchair guy. “I ’preciate that.”

“No trouble at all.”

Nothing like the gentle facade of manners, of charity, to reel in your prey. Far easier than lying in the weeds and waiting for the wounded animal in the pack to come limping by, unsuspecting.

“Not a problem at all,” the man in beige says again. He scoops up a tube of Crest toothpaste, a stick of deodorant, and a green bottle of Pert shampoo, puts all the items into the man’s plastic grocery bag, and hands the bag back to the wheelchair guy, who is struggling between gratitude and wounded pride, a feeling of helplessness. The guy pushes on the joystick again, but again the wheelchair fails to respond; the wheelchair guy curses under his breath.

“Having some trouble with your wheelchair?” asks the man in beige. “Need help getting in the van?”

Don’t talk to me about cruelty or pity. The thinking man has no affections, no prejudices, only a heart of stone.

I am as I was made. I am a product of the laws of nature, not of laws passed by some inane body of human beings.

The wheelchair guy lets out a sigh. “Well, actually…that would be great.”

“Sure, no problem.” The man in beige extends his hand. “I’m Joe,” he says.

“Charlie,” the wheelchair guy says, shaking his hand.

“Nice to meet you, Charlie. Where do you get in the van?”

“The back.”

The man in beige, Joe, takes the handles of the wheelchair and wheels Charlie to the back of the van. He reaches for the door, but Charlie hits a button on his key fob, and the door slides open automatically.

“Cool,” says Joe. “Never seen that on a back door.”

“You probably never been in no wheelchair neither.”

Charlie punches another button on his key fob to activate the hydraulic drop-down ramp.

Joe pushes Charlie up the ramp and into the bed of the van. The ramp rises up and folds back into place. The van’s interior is customized, of course; there is a front passenger seat and a rear one directly behind it, but the other side is a clear path to the steering wheel, which has manual controls to operate the van.

A nice, open space.

This is where I will kill him. But I will not be cruel—that word again. I have no desire to inflict more pain than is necessary to eliminate him.

But first, a little conversation, for distraction and to keep the victim at ease.

Joe looks down at the bed of the van and sees a hardcover book lying there, a tattered bookmark jutting out from the middle of it. The book is titled The Invisible Killer: The Hunt for Graham, the Most Prolific Serial Killer of Our Time.

Joe picks up the book and opens it to a random page. “Hey, I know this person,” he says. “The FBI analyst who caught Graham. Emmy Dockery.”

Charlie works his joystick and rotates in his wheelchair until he’s facing Joe. “You know Emmy Dockery?”

“Well, she e-mailed and called me. I’m a cop, see, and I had a case I thought was an accidental death, but Emmy, she asked me to reopen it as a homicide investigation.” Joe squats down and gently places the book back where he found it as darkness begins to creep over the van’s interior.

The rear door closes with an ominous thunk.

“Ah, so it was Emmy who made you reopen the Laura Berg case,” says Charlie. “I couldn’t be sure.”

In the process of straightening up, Detective Joseph Halsted registers all this in the time it takes his heart to beat once—Laura Berg. The controls on Charlie’s wheelchair suddenly working. The rear door closing—before he feels the electrode darts hit him in the stomach.

The detective jerks at the jolt of electricity seizing his body and immediately loses muscle control. He collapses onto the bed of the van hard, unable to break his fall.

“You immediately discounted me as a threat,” says Charlie. “Even you, an officer of the law.”

One hand still holding the trigger, continuing to deliver the powerful charge to his victim, Charlie reaches down to the bag by his side and removes three pairs of handcuffs, a large plastic bag, a rubber racquetball.

“You feel like a prisoner trapped in your own body,” he says. “You feel vulnerable and helpless.”

Detective Halsted lies on the floor of the van, his body convulsing, his eyes wide, his mouth hanging open like a dropped drawbridge.

“If it’s any consolation, Emmy was right,” says Charlie. “Laura Berg’s death was not an accident. Yours won’t be either.”

2

I PULL up the e-mail with the search results. There are 736 hits.

Talk about a needle in a haystack. The haystack has too much hay. The search is too broad.

You’ve known that for weeks, Emmy. But you’re so afraid of making the search too narrow and missing that one needle.

Okay. Exhale. Let’s do it.

A gas explosion in Gresham, Oregon, claiming the lives of two people, a mother and daughter…a man electrocuted in his backyard in Gering, Nebraska…a teenager found dead in a pool in Brookhaven, Mississippi…

I push up from the desk too fast, get a head rush.

The north wall of this room is papered with more than a hundred letters, all of them copies; the originals are still under forensic analysis.

One day our blood will mix, Miss Emmy. You and I will make a child together and think of the things he will do. But until that day I will not stop killing. I can’t. I will wait for you to catch me. Do you think you can?

Dear Ms Dockery can i call u Emmy? congradulations on catching graham but i hope u know theres others out there like me even worse than him

Emily where are you, you used to live in urbanna but not any more, well I hope all is well and I jus wanted to tell ya that I have killed 14 people!! and I don’t plan on stopping till you find me

The room’s east wall has the timeline, the articles cut from newspapers or printed out from websites.

Vienna, Virginia: Activist Dead of “Natural Causes”

Indianapolis: Family, Friends Stunned by Mom’s Suicide

Atlanta: Ad Exec Dead in Apparent Drowning

Charleston: Mother’s Death Ruled Overdose

Dallas: Faulty Wiring Blamed in Southlake Man’s Electrocution

Beneath each article are the photos, the autopsy reports, and, where they exist, the police investigators’ notes.

A buzzer sounds. My iPhone alarm. A reminder pops up on the screen: Get some sleep, dummy!

It’s 3:00 a.m., so this is probably good advice. Maybe later.

I walk into the kitchen, make a fresh pot of coffee, pace back and forth while the water passes through the cone of ground beans; the pungent aroma helps wake me up, but not enough. I walk into the living room, lie down on the carpet, and do fifty abdominal crunches. I still have the residual pain in my rib cage after all this time, but I use it, anything to keep me alert.

I pour a blazing-hot cup of coffee and head back to my desk, the computer screen.

A man drowns after falling off an embankment into Lake Michigan…a young couple missing after renting a kayak in Door County, Wisconsin…a father and son killed by a lightning strike…

No. I’m not looking for couples, only single victims. I need to figure out how to narrow this search to exclude multiple victims. But if I narrow it too much, I might miss the one I’m looking for, so I’m left hopelessly combing through tragedy after tragedy: a grandfather dead after striking a power line while digging in the backyard, a woman in New Orleans found dead in a bathtub, a father—

Wait. Back up.

A New Orleans woman found dead in a bathtub. Click on that one.

Nora Connolley, 58, a senior health-care specialist, was found dead in her bathtub Monday morning after an apparent fall in her shower in her home in the St. Roch neighborhood. New Orleans Police Department spokesman Nigel Flowers told the Times-Picayune that no foul play is suspected at this

Hmm. Maybe.

I do a quick background check on Nora Connolley. First I do a few things anyone can do, Facebook and Instagram and Google searches. Then I do something only law enforcement can do, searching vital records in Louisiana. Then I go back to things anyone can do, this time looking at Google Earth and residential real estate websites.

When I find what I’m looking for, I slap my hand on the desk, making the coffee spill and the computer monitor shake.

Nora Connolley is one of the victims.

I pull up another website, find the e-mail for the New Orleans PD’s public information bureau, and start typing to Nigel Flowers, the department spokesman, beginning with my customary preface:

My name is Emily Dockery. I am a senior analyst with the FBI. But I must stress that I am not contacting you in my official capacity with the FBI or at the direction of the FBI.

The lawyers came up with that last sentence. I’m not allowed to let my “wild-goose chases” bear the imprimatur of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, not unless the Bureau agrees to open the investigation.

I press the backspace key and hold my finger down, gobbling up word after word like I’m playing Pac-Man, completely erasing that last sentence.

I start typing again. There. That’s better.

My name is Emily Dockery. I am a senior analyst with the FBI. I would be interested in speaking with the detective in charge of investigating the death of Nora Connolley. I have reason to believe that her death was not an accident or due to natural causes. You can contact me at this e-mail or at the number below. Five minutes is all I need.

I hit Send, bounce out of my chair, and experience the vertigo again, as well as pain in my ankle. I really have to stop doing that.

I walk back over to the timeline and scan each article and its accompanying notes, photos, and autopsy findings, especially the various details highlighted: petechial hemorrhages, congestion in the lungs, bloody froth in the pharynx, unexplained puncture wounds…

And the first one, the death of Laura Berg in Vienna, Virginia. I’m still waiting for a return call from Detective Joseph Halsted. He was reluctant initially, but he seems to be coming around now.

“Call me, Joe,” I mumble. “Help me find this guy.”

Then I head back into the kitchen for more coffee.

3

THE MAN who calls himself Charlie when he’s in character finds the PBS video on YouTube. It has gotten over two million hits. He clicks on the red arrow and settles in.

Words appear on the black screen in white block letters—THE REAL EMMY DOCKERY—then dissolve.

Images of front pages of several newspapers fade in and out like whack-a-moles:

Feds Nab
“Invisible Killer”


Ford Field Bomber Dead


Manhunt For “Graham”
Ends in Cannon Beach


“It’s Over”—Graham
Captured and Killed

The screen goes black again, then opens to an aerial view of a house, orange flames sweeping out of its second-story windows, then the roof collapsing.

“Fires,” says the narrator in a soothing baritone voice. “Homes are engulfed in flames every day due to various accidents—an overturned candle, a cigarette, a frayed wire. Every year, three thousand people die in their homes from fires. A house goes up in flames every ninety seconds in the United States, in neighborhoods big and small, rural and urban. Atlantic Beach, Florida. Monroe, North Carolina. New Britain, Connecticut. Lisle, Illinois.”

The screen shifts to the aftermath of another fire, the structure battered and shrunken to gray ash.

“Peoria, Arizona.”

A screenshot of a newspaper, a headline from the Peoria Times:

“Marta Dockery was killed in that fire in Peoria. Officials said the fire was an accident. Everyone agreed. Everyone but Marta’s twin sister, Emmy.”

A photograph of two girls in their teens, tanned and squinting into the camera, one a bit shorter than the other, with darker hair and fuller cheeks. The twin thing, you could see it, but they were anything but identical, these two. The camera zooms in on the taller and ganglier girl.

“Emmy insisted that it wasn’t an accidental fire. That it was murder.”

The screen goes dark.

Then a shot of the J. Edgar Hoover Building in Washington, DC, headquarters of the FBI.

“Emily Jean Dockery was a data analyst for the Federal Bureau of Investigation,” says the narrator. “Her life was numbers and statistics. She wasn’t a field agent. She wasn’t a fire investigator. So when Emmy Dockery insisted that her sister’s death was murder, nobody believed her.”

Images of excerpts from another newspaper article, enlarged:

Eight months after her sister’s death in a house fire, Emmy Dockery is still on a crusade to convince the Peoria Police Department that Marta Dockery’s death was not an accident, but murder.

“All forensic evidence points to death by an accidental fire.” A middle-aged woman appears on the screen with the caption Nancy Parmaggiore, chief of staff to the director of the FBI. “Emmy was able to convince a very skeptical team of seasoned veteran investigators not only that her sister was murdered but that a serial killer was out there committing some of the most gruesome crimes imaginable.”

Now there’s an elderly man on the screen; the caption identifies him as Dennis Sasser, special agent, FBI (ret.). “Nobody believed Emmy. I didn’t. But we never would have caught Graham if it weren’t for Emmy. In fact, we never would have even known that crimes were being committed in the first—”

Charlie fast-forwards the video. He knows this part. Everyone does. The manhunt across the country. And then the final showdown, Graham dead and Emmy, well…alive, at least.

He stops about forty-five minutes into the documentary. The screen has faded to black again.

Then the narrator: “And what has become of the FBI analyst who caught and killed Graham?”

An image of paramedics hauling a woman on a gurney down a driveway toward an ambulance, the entire scene filled with police cars and flashing lights and armed law enforcement. This, Charlie knows, was after Emmy’s face-to-face encounter with Graham.

“According to reports, Emmy Dockery suffered extensive injuries that day: deep scalp lacerations, burns over a large portion of her body, a punctured lung, a broken ankle.”

Dennis Sasser again: “Emmy was horribly injured. She endured terror that is difficult to put into words.”

Then the narrator: “It took half a dozen surgeries and three months before Emmy Dockery was released from the hospital. And then…”

The screen goes dark. An ominous sound, a single beat of a soft drum.

And this newspaper headline:

The screen fades to black again. Then an older woman, her gray hair pulled back, wearing a defiant expression, appears. The caption reads Dorian Dockery. “My daughter wasn’t trying to kill herself,” she says.

Charlie pauses the video and takes a breath. He’s read many of the various reports that came out afterward—that Emmy Dockery had suffered a nervous breakdown, that she’d gone into hiding, that she was receiving both death threats and love letters from purported serial killers.

“You broke into pieces, Emmy,” he whispers. “But you put yourself back together. You survived. Just like me.”

Charlie closes his eyes and does what he always does when he remembers. First he beats back their garbled shrieks, the hot breath of their terror, the smells of scorched flesh and splattering blood and perspiration and pure human fear burning his nostrils even now.

And then he accepts them. Lets their contents settle inside him, mix together, and jell.

His body cools. His pulse slows.

“It is a thinking man’s war,” he reminds himself. A quiet war, Charles Darwin said, lurking just beneath the serene facade of nature.

His eyes open. On the screen, the video is still paused, having just transitioned from the words of Emmy’s mother to a photo of Emmy, her hair in a ponytail, a fierce look on her wounded face. Her eyes on his. His eyes on hers.

Lonely, determined eyes.

“We could do so much together,” Charlie says.

4

HARRISON BOOKMAN—known as “Books” to everyone—feels his phone buzz at his hip as he helps a customer choose the right nonfiction selection for her grandfather, a history buff. They decide on a book about LBJ’s struggle to get Congress to pass the Civil Rights Act of 1964. He feels a small flicker of satisfaction as he rings up the transaction. He loves everything about books, but this is his favorite part of the business, talking with a customer and finding just the right novel or nonfiction work, like a sommelier helping diners choose the perfect bottle of wine to pair with their meal.

Now if only there were more customers.

At least he has Petty, bald and clean-shaven, sitting in the corner in one of the comfy chairs reading The Sun Also Rises by Hemingway; next to him is a cup of the coffee Books always has brewing. It probably isn’t the greatest idea to let a homeless man hang out in your store, but Petty keeps to himself and keeps himself reasonably presentable, and, really, how could Books turn away a guy who served two tours in Desert Storm and gave up so much for his country, not least of which was his sanity?

Petty is a part-time resident of the inventory room in the back of the store. He’s slept there a few nights a week every week since Books first met him six months ago, last December, sitting on the sidewalk outside the store. He shaves and washes up in an old shower that Books revived after converting the space from an old apartment.

Books watches his customer leave. His eyes wander over to the front window, where the name of the store—THE BOOK MAN—is stenciled prominently; the newest releases and local favorites are arranged just so to lure in the shoppers and the passersby in downtown Alexandria.

Then he turns the belt pouch holding his phone upward so he can see who just called. He glances at it, then does a double take.

Moriarty.

William Moriarty, the director of the FBI.

Not a social call. Bill never makes social calls.

Books considers returning the call right away. No customers in the store now, after all. And he can’t deny that tiny surge of adrenaline. You can take the boy out of the FBI, but you can’t take the FBI out of the boy.

The door chimes behind him. A customer. That makes the decision for Books. The FBI will have to wait.

He turns and sees two people enter the store, men in dark suits, each of them removing sunglasses. Jesus, they really have to stop reinforcing that stereotype.

One of them he doesn’t know, but the other, the taller one, is familiar. Desmond, part of the director’s advance team.

“Hey, Books,” Desmond says, glancing around.

“Hey, Dez…” Books gives him a confused look.

“The director needs a moment. He called.”

Yeah, he called two minutes ago. It’s not like he made an appointment last week or anything.

“Somewhere private you could talk for a moment?”

Books lets out a breath. “Sure. The stockroom. There’s a service entrance out back where—”

“He’s already parked there.” Dez nods.

Of course he is. “Okay,” says Books. “Let’s do it.”

5

BOOKS LEADS the advance team into the back room. There are piles of inventory, books ready to be placed on shelves, books ready to be sent back to the publishers, a stand-up display for the children’s author who did an appearance last week. Dez arranges two chairs at a table while his partner pushes open the back door.

“There he is, the bookseller.” Director William Moriarty has aged, and not so gracefully, in this job. He has been a public servant all his life, first as a special agent, then as a federal prosecutor, later as a congressman, and after that as a federal judge. The stress of all of those, he said, paled in comparison to running the FBI. He has lost most of his hair, and his face and torso have widened, but he still has that same no-nonsense stare.

Bill had made no secret of his profound disappointment in Books when he resigned. He’d tried everything to keep Books in the fold. He offered him a promotion, a raise, a better office. He even threatened to take him into federal custody, though Books was reasonably sure that was a joke.

“Hi, Bill.”

“You married yet?”

They take seats across from each other at the table Books uses when he’s balancing his ledgers.

“No.” That answer, Books thinks to himself, is accurate but tells Bill nothing. Not yet would be more informative. So would No, the wedding’s this September. No could mean a lot of things, including No, we’re not married yet, and I’m not sure we ever will be.

It’s been nearly a year and a half since he proposed to Emmy (for the second time) and she said yes (for the first time). And yet no date has been set, no china patterns picked out.

“But you two are still…together?”

It’s not like Bill to make small talk. Not like him at all. What does he care about whether Books and Emmy are heading down the aisle or toward separate lives?

“Yeah,” Books says. Two loaded questions from the director, two single-word responses from Books. The director’s a smart guy. He’s read between closer lines than these.

“I need you, Books. An assignment. A special assignment.”

“The Bureau is filled with talented and dedicated agents.”

“I need someone from outside the Bureau.”

“From outside,” says Books. “A double-I?”

Internal investigations are typically handled in-house, just like all other investigations. The Bureau rarely wants to admit that it needs outside help. If the director is asking, this is not the typical double-I. This is not about a boss chasing a subordinate around a desk. This is not about an agent using a Bureau computer to sell beauty products or surf porn. It means something far bigger than that.

It means the director doesn’t know whom to trust within his own agency.

“You have a mole.”

The director nods, some color to his face. “We do. You’d run the investigation. You’d report directly to me. Nobody else.”

“I pick my team,” says Books, realizing how quickly he jumped so many hurdles in his mind, how easily and almost naturally he said yes. Like there was never a doubt. “Starting with Emmy,” Books says, “and not because she’s my fiancée. Because she’s the best analyst the Bureau’s ever had. I know she hasn’t been the same since—”

“She is the best.” The director makes a face. “No question. But I have to say no. You can pick anyone else, Books, but not Emmy. Not this time.”

Books stares at the director, reading him, noting the averted eyes, the discomfort. This is also not like him. Not like him to beat around the bush. Not like him to ask about Books’s personal life either, especially his relationship with Emmy.

Books feels something sink inside him. “No,” he says, as if he can will it away.

“Gives me no pleasure to say it.” The director shrugs. “But Emmy is the target of the investigation. We think your girlfriend is the mole.”

6

I PUT it all together, everything I’ve been able to collect on Nora Connolley, on a biography sheet, the same kind I’ve compiled for each of the victims on my wall. It’s missing some pieces, but it’s enough for the time being.

Now if only the New Orleans PD would call me back. I e-mailed them yesterday. I usually get a phone call, at least, even if the person’s voice is laced with skepticism.

Speaking of which, why hasn’t Detective Halsted called me back about Laura Berg?

The clock says 11:45. I should probably eat lunch. No, I should sleep. I did put my head down on a pillow last night for a few hours. I didn’t sleep, but I rested. My mother used to say that to me when I was kid, when I tossed and turned, that at least I was resting. I never really understood that. Either you sleep or you don’t.

I don’t.

My laptop—my main one—pings with an e-mail. An invitation from some prosecutors’ association to speak at their annual event. I type a quick no-thank-you.

Another e-mail. A Google search alert, not my normal one that produces hundreds of stories a day, my needle-in-a-haystack search. No, this one is more specific.

When I see the headline, I suck in my breath.

“No,” I whisper. “No!”

Vienna Police Department detective Joseph Halsted, 48, a nineteen-year veteran of the force, was found dead this morning in his condominium. He was unresponsive when paramedics arrived. A spokesman for the department said that the cause of death was a heart attack.

I drop my head into my hands. “Oh no. No, no, no!” My phone buzzes on my desk. “I did this…I did this…”

I told him to look into Laura Berg’s death. He never would have given a second thought to it if it weren’t for me. I led Joe Halsted to the slaughter.

It means something else, I realize, though it’s hard to focus on it right now. It means I was right about Laura Berg.

My phone is lighting up, grunting at me. I reach for it. The caller ID shows a New Orleans area code. Oh, right, New Orleans—

“Hello?” I manage.

“Agent Dockery?” A New York accent. “This is Sergeant Crescenzo with the New Orleans PD. You e-mailed us about Nora Connolley?”

“Yes…um…uh…thanks for getting back to me.”

“Bad time to talk?”

I have to get a grip. This is my chance. I clear my throat. “No, sorry—I’m fine. Thank you for the call.”

“Ms. Connolley fell in her shower, Agent Dockery.”

I’m not a special agent, but I don’t correct him. He’s assuming this is an official investigation of the FBI and that I’m a special agent, even though I never said either of those things. I haven’t lied to him.

“And you’ve been to the scene?”

“I was there, yes. . .