time. She was certain there would be a stream of messages from the
ADIC on down when she returned to her office, and none of them
complimentary, she imagined.
Reynolds and Connie were in a private area at Reagan National. They
had thoroughly questioned the airline employee who had sold Faith
Lockhart her tickets. They had reviewed all the surveillance tapes and
the agent had readily picked out Lockhart. Reynolds assumed the woman
was Faith Lockhart. The ticket agent had been shown a picture of
Lockhart and was reasonably sure she was the same woman.
If it was Lockhart, she had changed her appearance considerably: a
haircut and dye job, from what Reynolds had seen on the airport
surveillance tape. And now Lockhart had help. For also captured on
the video was a tall, well-built man leaving with Lockhart. Reynolds
had initiated the obvious inquiries including checking taxi pickups at
the airport during that time. They also had colleagues checking in
Norfolk in case the pair had made additional travel arrangements there.
So far nothing had turned up. They did, however, have one very
promising lead.
Reynolds opened the metal gun case and looked at the SIG-Sauer 9mm
while Connie leaned against the wall and scowled at nothing. The gun
had already been checked for prints, and they were running the results
through the Bureau’s databases, but they had something even better: The
gun was registered. They had quickly gotten the name and address of
the owner from the Virginia State Police.
Reynolds said, “Okay, so the gun’s registered to this Lee Adams. We’re
getting a photo of the guy from DMV. I’m assuming he’s the one with
Lockhart. What do we know about him so far?”
Connie took a mouthful of Coke from the cup he was holding and popped
two Advil. “PI. Been around awhile. Seems very legit. Some of the
guys at the Bureau know him in fact. Say he’s a good guy. We’ll get
his picture to the ticket agent. See if she can positive-ID him.
That’s all for right now. We’ll have more soon.” He glanced at the
gun. “We found shell casings in the woods behind the cottage. They’d
been fired from a pistol. Nine-millimeter. From the number we found,
the person emptied half his mag at something.”
“Think this is the pistol?”
“We haven’t found any slugs to match it to, but ballistics will tell us
if the pinprick on the shell casings we found match ones fired from
that gun,” Connie said, referring to the indentation a gun’s firing pin
makes on the bottom of the shell casing, a mark about as unique as a
fingerprint. “And since we’ve got his ammo, we can test-fire from the
source, which is ideal, you know. And were running a print check on
the casings. That won’t definitely confirm if Adams was there, since
he could’ve loaded the pistol earlier and someone else could have fired
it at the cottage, but it’s still something.”
They both knew that shell casings were much better surfaces for getting
usable prints than a pistol grip.
“It’d be nice if we could get his prints inside the cottage.”
“VCU found nothing. Adams obviously knows how to do this stuff. Had
to be wearing gloves.”
“If ballistics does match, then Adams looks to be the one who wounded
the shooter.”
“He didn’t fire all those times at Ken, that’s for sure, and a SIG is
for shit long-distance. If Adams was able to hit Ken with a pistol
shot from that distance in the dark, then we’ve got to get him a job at
Quantico on the firing range.”
Reynolds looked unconvinced.
Connie went on. “And the lab confirmed that the blood in the woods is
definitely human. We also found a slug near the spot where all the
pistol shell casings were. Struck a tree and stayed there. We also
turned up a number of shell casings near the blood. Rifle ordnance.
Full metal jacket, heavy-caliber stuff. And customized, no
manufacturer’s code or caliber stamp on the casings. But the lab did
say the ammo used a Berdan primer instead of an American Boxer.”
Reynolds looked at him sharply. “Berdan? So European manufacture?”