Touch & Go (Tessa Leoni, #2)(9)

Purse most likely belonged to the wife. Wallet, pocketknife, at least one of the phones would be the husband’s, while the two sets of keys translated to his car, her car. The rest she would guess belonged to Ashlyn. Electronics, smart phone, lip gloss, cash, gum. Pretty much everything required by the modern teenager on the go.

Tessa was looking at the contents of an entire family’s pockets/purses, single-mindedly extricated and piled like offerings on an altar in the middle of the kitchen island.

She glanced again at D.D., found the detective studying her.

“The two cell phones?” Tessa asked.

“Three. Third’s in the purse, belongs to Libby. We contacted the carrier, who’s in the process of faxing the past forty-eight hours of calls, texts and messages. Preliminary synopsis: no outgoing calls from any member of the family after ten P.M. last night. Ashlyn, the teenager, has a series of texts from various friends trying to contact her with growing degrees of urgency, but nothing the other way around. Last text message Ashlyn sent was at approximately nine forty-eight P.M. Last text message she received was shortly after midnight, the fourth from her BFF, Lindsay Edmiston, demanding her immediate reply.”

“Perpetrator catches the family by surprise,” Tessa said, testing out the scenario in her mind. “Hence no aborted calls or texts for help. Attacker uses a Taser to subdue them, hence the confetti in the foyer. Then he restrains them and divests them of their personal possessions.”

“Some robbery,” D.D. stated, voice challenging.

“Not a robbery,” Tessa immediately concurred. “You’re right. The smart phones, purse, wallet. Those would be the first items taken, not left behind.”

Tessa wondered if the family had been conscious during this phase. Most likely. Tasering was intensely painful, but only briefly incapacitating. The moment the shooter squeezed the trigger, an electric current screamed through the victim’s body, firing each nerve ending to intense, excruciating life. The second the trigger was released, however, the current ceased and the pain passed, leaving the subject shaken, but standing.

Most police officers preferred Tasering to pepper spray for just that reason. Pepper spray reduced the subject to a giant, blubbering, mucousy mess, which the officer then had to awkwardly heave into the back of the squad car. Tasering, on the other hand, generally involved two to three quick bursts of searing electrical charge, at which point most perpetrators tucked themselves obediently inside the squad car, anything not to be Tasered again.

So most likely the family was conscious. Restrained, subdued, while the perpetrator ransacked their pockets, rifled through their personal possessions, then placed everything neatly on the kitchen island. The parents, at the very least, must have realized the full implications.

That this was no robbery.

That by definition, therefore, the attack was something more personal. Something worse.

“Since you’re doing a nice job of looking, not touching,” D.D. said, “I’ll let you in on a little secret.”

Tessa waited. D.D. pointed to the pile.

“Beneath all those electronics, we found the family’s jewelry. Engagement ring, wedding bands, diamond studs, gold hoops, two necklaces, a Rolex. My highly conservative estimate: at least a hundred grand in easy-to-pawn items.”

“Shit.” Tessa couldn’t help herself.

“Yep. Some robbery.”

“All right. Talk to me about the security system.”

“Electronically operated. Denbe’s firm has built a number of prisons, and he incorporated a system into his own home similar to what they use for jail cells. Doors all have multiple steel bolts, which are controlled by a master panel. Punch in one code, the system automatically locks down all means of entry and exit. Punch in a second code, the system automatically disarms, unlocking all egresses. I guess there’s other codes, specifying unlocking just inner door A or outer door B, but given this system probably costs more than my entire house, I’m hardly an expert. Of course, the windows and doors are also hardwired to the security system, which would automatically contact the security company while blasting an alarm if someone tried to manually break down a door.”

“And the system was disarmed when the housekeeper showed up at five thirty?”

“Correct. Which is highly unusual. Justin Denbe required the house to be locked at all times, whether anyone was home or not.”

“City life one-oh-one,” Tessa commented dryly. She went with the logical assumption. “Who knows the codes?”

“Family, housekeeper and the security company.”

“How often are the codes changed?”

“Once a month.”

“Can it be manually overridden? Wires cut, that sort of thing?”

“According to the security company, any tampering with the wires would activate the alarm. And there’s redundancy…two sets of wires, both fiber optics and cable. Hell, I didn’t understand it all, but Justin Denbe knows his shit, and applied it to his personal living situation. The security company can be contacted by first responders for emergency override—say, in the case of fire—but reported no such requests. Whoever gained access, they did it right.”

Tessa turned to look at the detective. “You said the housekeeper enters through the garage. How about the family?”

“When on foot, they use the front door, just as we did. When Libby is driving, she enters from the lower-level garage where she keeps her car. But according to the housekeeper, Justin and Libby had dinner plans for the evening. And in a his-and-her situation, he always drove.”