Page 28 of Desperate Creed

“Don’t take this the wrong way, O’Dell, but it’s a gorgeous spring day here. I hope you’re not about to screw that up and tell me the FBI is interested in another of my cases.”

“It’s good to talk to you again, too.” Maggie smiled.

“Sorry, I guess I should ask how you are. The last I heard you were in an isolation ward.”

“It was just a precaution.”

Ryder, Grace and Maggie had been exposed to the bird flu in the same case that Jacks referred to. It had gotten the FBI’s attention and also prompted the CDC into cordoning off an entire floor of a luxury hotel on Michigan Avenue. Jacks had not been happy that her team of detectives and officers had been reduced to security guards while the federal agency figured out if Chicago had been exposed to a deadly virus. Truthfully, Ryder, Grace and Maggie had been lucky. Very lucky.

“Actually,” she told Jacks, “I am calling about a couple of homicides that may have happened in Chicago this morning.”

“Really? A couple? You’re gonna need to narrow it down for me, because as I understand it we’ve had four and the sun hasn’t gone down yet.”

“These would have been early this morning,” Maggie said, not wasting the detective’s time. “Two young men. One looked like a home invasion.”

“Wicker Park.”

“Your department called it a home invasion, but I’m betting there’s something about it that isn’t that simple.”

“What’s the FBI’s interest?” Jacks wanted to know. She was making this more difficult than Maggie liked. Maybe they hadn’t bonded quite as much as she thought they had.

“The computer was stolen,” she told Jacks. “I’m guessing his cell phone and any other electronic devices are gone, too.”

“Okay, how do you know that? Or is it a lucky guess?”

“Lucky guess. What do you know about the victim?”

“Computer analyst for Park House Labs. Mid-level entry position, from what I can tell. Lived alone. His sister lives a few blocks away. She IDed him. Said he was mostly a computer geek. Not into drugs. Doesn’t even drink.”

“I need to know if you had a second homicide. On the street. Not far from the home invasion. Might have looked like an armed robbery gone bad.”

“Another lucky guess?”

Maggie could hear in Jacks’ voice that she was growing impatient, but the detective’s lack of denial meant Maggie was right, and Hannah’s friend wasn’t just paranoid.

“If you were able to ID him, his name is Tyler Gates.”

She heard a hiss of air. Jacks was clearly not happy.

“How the hell do you know this? We haven’t released anything about the second hit.”

“You already suspect the two are connected?”

“That neighborhood is not exactly known for random execution-style murders. But we haven’t been able to connect the dots yet. You care to fill me in?”

Execution-style.

Hannah had told Maggie that Frankie Russo was still hoping her friend and co-worker had been injured. That maybe he was unconscious and in an emergency room somewhere. Or in surgery.

“How did you ID Gates?”

“Wallet was still in his jacket pocket. Cell phone is missing. We’re still trying to see if any cameras in the area might have captured it or caught an image of the perpetrators.”

Maggie sat forward, elbows on her desk. Frankie Russo had told Hannah that she and Tyler were video-chatting when two men approached him. She got a look at one, but feared that he also got a good look at her. Maggie now realized it didn’t matter whether or not the man saw her. He had something even better to identify her than a quick peek over the device’s small screen. As long as he had Gate’s phone, he had access to much more, including her home address and possibly her texts and emails.

“So what gives, O’Dell?”

She’d almost forgotten about Jacks.