The Silent Wife (Will Trent #10) - Karin Slaughter Page 0,132
general search for the cross-peen hammer and found it was readily available at Pep Boys, Home Depot, Costco, Walmart and Amazon. Subpoenaing the records of sales in the area would be a David vs. Goliath quest. Grant County’s district attorney worked on a part-time basis. Filing the subpoenas would take days. Jeffrey didn’t have days.
He closed the tabs and returned to the Brawleigh site. The Dead Blow kit was under the METALWORKS menu. He hovered the mouse over the sub-menus. Nothing stood out. He went to WOODWORKS and found exactly what he was looking for.
NAILSETS AND AWLS.
He studied the nailsets, which were used to sink finish nails into wood. The tool was tempered steel, round, about six inches in length, thick at the top so a hammer could strike it, narrow to a point at the bottom to countersink the head of a nail. Jeffrey fisted his hand. He had held his share of nailsets. The tool was too small to effectively use as a weapon, let alone as a device to puncture the spinal cord.
He clicked on AWLS.
Scratch awls. Stitching awls. Bradawls.
He zoomed in on the bradawl, which was similar in look to a screwdriver. Instead of a flat or Phillips head, the metal tip was honed to a sharp point. The tool was another one that was familiar to Jeffrey. It was used to make indentations in wood to help guide a nail or screw into the correct position.
It was also long enough, and precise enough, to puncture a woman’s spinal cord.
There was movement in the squad room. Matt was pouring himself a cup of coffee. Frank was taking off his suit jacket and hanging it on the back of his chair.
Jeffrey went out to meet them, asking Frank, “Autopsy?”
He shook his head. “Nothing but a sick fuck.”
Jeffrey had expected the news, but he was still frustrated. “How many autobody and mechanic shops do you think we’ve got in town?”
“Between Avondale and Madison?” Matt asked. “I can think of twelve off the top of my head.”
Since he was the first to volunteer the information, Jeffrey told him, “I need you to go to each shop and discreetly figure out if anyone is missing a Brawleigh cross-peen hammer.”
“Brawleigh,” Frank said. “That’s my brand.”
Matt volunteered, “I’m a Milwaukee man myself.”
They’d stumbled onto a good point. Men tended to stick with the same tool brand. Jeffrey’s own workbench was marked by a distinctive DeWalt yellow.
He told Matt, “Mechanics usually have their own tools. Pay attention to who buys Brawleigh.”
“Yessir.” Matt gave him a salute as he walked toward the door.
Jeffrey asked Frank, “Any luck tracking down the Daryl from Caterino’s phone?”
“I checked all of our incident reports, FIs, traffic stops. The only Daryl that came up was Farley Daryl Zowaski, age eighty-four.”
“Another sick fuck.” They all knew the notorious flasher. One of the first arrests Jeffrey had made in Grant County was scooping up Zowaski outside the elementary school.
He asked Frank, “What about the sex offender registry?”
“We got three official predators registered in the county.”
Jeffrey knew the number should be ten times that. “Let’s do a briefing at eight. I should have the full Truong autopsy report by then. We need to get a plan.”
“What kind of plan?” Frank seemed genuinely curious. “This killer is a hell of a lot smarter than we are.”
Jeffrey couldn’t counter the statement, but he asked, “What makes you say that?”
“He’s methodical, deliberate. He’s stalking these gals, right? He don’t just snatch ’em in broad daylight without a plan.” Frank shrugged. “Stranger abductions are the hardest to solve. And if we’re dealing with a serial component, well, hell, game over.”
He sounded glib, but Jeffrey knew Frank was at that point in his career where nothing a person did, no matter how horrendous, could shock him.
Jeffrey said, “Okay, he stalks them. Then what?”
“I’m thinking he don’t take ’em anywhere, right? Maybe he parked his van on that fire road, but that was for his getaway. What happened was, he saw Leslie in the woods. He managed to get her off the path. He did his thing, then he left her there.”
“You’re saying that he stayed in the woods after attacking Caterino. Then he saw Leslie Truong.”
“Or maybe she saw him?”
“Lena’s pretty high on my shitlist right now, but even she would’ve mentioned that Leslie Truong saw the man who attacked Beckey Caterino.”
“Yeah, but maybe Truong didn’t realize she saw the bad guy. Remember, for all she knew, it was an accident when she walked back to campus.