Zero Day (John Puller, #1)(21)

Monroe suddenly looked uncertain and shook his head. “Uh, no.”

Puller glanced at Cole and found her still staring intently at him, hands on hips, lips pursed. For a moment he thought she might go for her Cobra again.

Puller said, “No problem. Just Army overkill. Look, I need an experienced hand to help me with that, Lan. And you obviously know your way around a camera.”

“No prob,” said Monroe, his good spirits restored. “Glad to do it.” He pointed at the tripod and other equipment Puller had taken from his rucksack. “Is that a flash extension?” he asked.

Puller nodded. “We’ll use it to photograph fingerprints, tire marks, and any tool marks. We’ll use the synch cord to engage the flash.”

“How far away do you Army guys hold it?” asked Monroe eagerly.

“Ideally three feet. And at a forty-five-degree angle. Two shots from all four directions.”

“What’s the big deal with the extension thing?” asked Cole.

Puller replied, “Prevents hot spots of light. Causes overexposure to the top of the photos.”

“Cool,” said Monroe.

Puller pointed to the four members of the Reynolds family. “Since they haven’t been moved, we need to photograph them properly. All four sides, including the rear. Five shots of the face, all wounds, and other marks. With and without rulers, livor mortis patterns, and all gunshot powder and stippling. You got a video camera?”

Monroe nodded.

Puller said, “You video everything but you don’t rely on that for fine detail. Defense attorney will blow you out of the water with that.”

Cole said, “And did that happen to you?”

“It happens to everybody,” said Puller.

Puller was about to set up his tripod to start taking pictures of the bodies when he looked down at the carpet and stopped. He knelt and took a closer look at the medium-pile carpeting.

“What do you see there?” he asked.

Monroe and Cole came over. The tech dropped to his knees and studied the spot. “Not sure,” he said. “An impression of something.”

“Impressions, actually. Three of them, circular, but in a triangular pattern.” Puller hefted the tripod and set it down a few feet from the others. Then he picked it back up. “What do you see?”

Monroe looked at the spot. So did Cole. They both started and looked back over at the original spot. The impressions were nearly identical.

Cole said, “Somebody already set up a tripod here. Why?”

Puller looked at the spot and then over at the bodies all lined up. “Bodies in a row, on a couch. Tripod in front, camera mounted on it.”

“They were filming the Reynoldses?” said Cole.

Puller took several shots of the impressions. “No, they were interrogating them.”

CHAPTER

14


HOURS LATER they had finished photographing the four bodies and processing other parts of the crime scene. Puller and Monroe had laid the bodies next to each other on white plastic sheeting spread on the floor. Larry Wellman’s body had been brought up and was lying in a zippered body bag in the dining room. There were no defensive wounds on Wellman or the Reynoldses. They had all apparently been taken by surprise.

Puller had recorded his observations and used the device he’d previously stuck in his belt to help him organize the investigation. Monroe had excitedly asked him what the tool was.

“Army calls it a CSED, or Crime Scene Exploitation Device. It’s a camera with a bar coder, digital screen, labeler, and printer all rolled into one. It’s got a flip-out USB so I can down-and upload from my laptop. My digital recorder has the same capability. And it has an electronic transcriber so it’ll automatically type out what I’ve recorded by voice. I’m not great on the keyboard.”

“That is beyond cool,” said Monroe.

“Don’t get too excited, Lan,” said Cole. “Doubt there’s money in the budget for us to get one of those.”

Puller glanced at Cole. “Tell me about the dog that was here.”

“Collie. Got a colleague taking care of it. Friendly thing.”

“Okay, but any of the neighbors report hearing any barking?”

“Dog can’t bark,” replied Cole. “Probably the only reason they let it live.”

“A dog that can’t bark?”

“Well, it hasn’t once barked for us. Might’ve had an operation done. That can sometimes screw up the bark. At least according to a vet friend of mine that I asked.”

Looking down at the lined-up bodies, Cole said, “You said they were interrogated but didn’t really explain what you meant. They obviously weren’t being interrogated after they were killed. So why line them up on the couch after they were dead?”

“I think the person wanted to see them being interrogated. And they also wanted to see on the video that they were dead.”

“So they were broadcasting the video out to someone else?”

“That’s how I read it.”

Cole slowly nodded. “So if we can get our hands on the video, there might be some clues. One of the killers might have stepped in front of the camera, for example. Or maybe it might have caught a reflection of one or more of them.”

“That’s true. But odds are if we find the video, we’ll find the killers too. That’s not something they’ll leave lying around.”