“Any indication that that work is involved here?” I asked.
“As motive?” Ned said. “None so far. Sounds like Family Man all the way.”
After donning blue booties, hairnets, and gloves, we went inside through the garage door, which Mrs. Kane’s mother had opened with her key. The alarm system had been disarmed.
The lower floor looked untouched. The second floor was all crime scene.
The double doors to the master suite were open, revealing the Kanes dead in their bed. Irwin Kane had been shot through the temple with a small-caliber bullet. Linda Kane took one through the palm of her left hand and into her left eye and brain.
“She heard the first shot,” Sampson said. “Held up her hand to protect herself.”
“At this range, she couldn’t have protected a thing,” I said, feeling disgusted at the callousness of the act. There was no passion here. Quite the opposite.
We went into the other rooms and found Nate, age eleven, and Melissa, nine, dead in their beds. From a few feet away, you would have sworn they were sleeping.
I could not help but think of Ali. Almost the same age as Nate. They could have been classmates. Friends.
“Makes me want to punch a wall,” I said. “It’s just so …”
“Ruthless?” Mahoney said.
“I was thinking more like cowardly.”
Sampson said, “In what way?”
“Shooting them as they sleep. Probably with a suppressor on the gun. He’s unwilling to acknowledge the humanity of the targets. If they’d been awake, begging, he’d have to see them as fellow human beings. Executing them like this is a way of avoidance, a way to rationalize what is not rational. He doesn’t have to think of them as a mom, a dad, and two children. They’re just objects.”
“Targets,” Sampson said.
“But why?” Mahoney said. “What does he get out of this?”
I said, “Some thrill, no doubt. Other needs being met. And maybe …”
“What?”
“A means to an end,” I said. “A more concrete end than what we’re seeing here.”
“You’re saying these killings are part of a bigger picture?” Mahoney asked.
Before I could reply, Meagan McShane, a medical examiner, came to the doorway. “I’ve got a time of death on the mom and dad. Shortly before three a.m.”
A sheriff’s deputy in protective gear appeared in the hallway behind the ME. “I’m sorry to bother you,” he said. “But there’s some guy out at the yellow tape asking for you.”
“Who’s that?” Mahoney asked.
“He says he’s Thomas Tull. You know, the writer?”
CHAPTER 61
THOMAS TULL HAD NERVE, I’d give him that.
Among fifteen lookie-loos and some camerapeople, the writer stood at the yellow tape, dressed to look dark and mysterious in black jeans, cowboy boots, shirt, and jacket. His sunglasses were black-framed wraparound reflectors. His hair was perfectly out of place. He smirked in reproach as Sampson, Mahoney, and I came near.
“I thought you might like to talk,” he said.
Sampson said, “What are you doing here, Mr. Tull?”
“I’m assuming something happened.”
The three of us ducked under the tape and surrounded him.
“I’m Edward Mahoney, FBI special agent in charge,” Ned said quietly. “Walk with us, please, sir.”
“What’s going on?” the writer demanded.
I said softly, “We can get away from here and talk quietly, or we can put you in cuffs, make you look bad for television, and take you downtown to talk.”
“I bet you make a lot of men shiver with that kind of chitchat.”
I shrugged. “Your call, Thomas.”
The writer took off his sunglasses and studied me. “Let’s talk quietly.”
“Good,” Mahoney said. “We’ll go up the street. My car.”
We skirted the crowd and walked up the leafy road past the first satellite truck arriving on the scene, past our vehicle, and then past a midnight-blue Audi coupe.
“That’s your car, right?” Sampson said.
Tull brightened. “All six-hundred-and-seventy-five horsepower.”
“Rare car, I hear. An RS Seven.”
“Especially that one,” Tull said. “Audi built it for the car shows the year after they bought Lamborghini. The chassis, suspension, and engine block are all Audi, but every component after that is Lambo-made, from the transmission to the quad turbos. It’s a true hybrid. A one-of-a-kind beast. But you wouldn’t know it from the design. Sleek, but not outrageous. It’s like a James Bond car in that respect.”
When we reached Mahoney’s gray squad car, I opened the back door. “After you.”
Tull hesitated but got in. I shut the door, came around the other side, and climbed in beside him. Mahoney slid behind the wheel. Sampson took the passenger seat and swiveled around to look over his shoulder.
If the writer was nervous, he wasn’t showing it in the least.
“Mind if I record this conversation?” Tull asked. “For posterity?”
“An excellent idea,” Sampson said, getting out his phone. “We’ll do the same.”
Tull fumbled with his iPhone a moment, then nodded and said the date and time before continuing: “This is Thomas Tull with Edward Mahoney of the FBI, Detective John Sampson of Metro PD, and Dr. Alex Cross, a consultant to both agencies,” he said, looking at each of us in turn. “Now, before we get into particulars, this is a Family Man crime scene, right? Yes or no?”
For a moment, I thought Mahoney was going to blow a fuse. “We’re asking the questions, Mr. Tull.”
I said, “Where were you earlier this morning? Like two thirty to three a.m.?”
Tull cocked his head. “Uh—sleeping?”
“You’re unsure?” Sampson said.
“I’m something of an insomniac,” Tull said. “Sometimes it’s hard for me to tell if I’m sleeping or just kind of simmering there, hoping for unconsciousness. Why?”
“You can prove you were in bed?” Sampson asked.
“I … what’s this about?”
“You were here in Potomac or in Chevy Chase last night, weren’t you?” I asked.
The writer looked at me dumbly. “Maybe. Technically.”
Sampson spun a bluff. “Not maybe or technically. We’ve got you on CCTV footage in that rare beast of a car you have there, racing a black Porsche Turbo Carrera up the Rock Creek Parkway at more than one hundred miles an hour.”
Tull gazed at Mahoney. “And for that I get FBI attention?”
“You admit you were traveling in excess of one hundred heading toward Chevy Chase at roughly nine last evening?” Ned demanded.
He didn’t seem to know how to reply. He sighed. “I read this interesting piece online about the culture of people in the DC area who have high-performance cars and do time trials up Rock Creek in the middle of the night. I found out on my own that there are also eager takers for a more adventurous kind of urban racing.”
“You’ve done it before?” I asked.
“A few times, yes. Look, I know it’s against the law, but it’s just a way I blow off steam now and then.”