Run (6 page)

In order for me to continue
my research, I would need to make phone calls and do more Internet searches. I didn’t want to use the wireless in the motel due to the fear that I could be traced. I didn’t know if that was possible or not, but I wanted to err on the side of caution. I couldn’t do either of those things right now. It was frustrating, but I would have to wait until morning.

After walking Max
and packing up the few belongings I had, I checked the locks and windows before I went to bed. In the morning I would look for another motel. I was afraid to stay in one place too long. My head hit the pillow at 10:12 and I was out by 10:15. The next morning I woke up without an alarm at 7:00. By 8:00 I was on the road. I had work to do.

______

I debated for a little while on which direction to head. I didn’t want to do my research and stay in the same area. I figured right or wrong that I would be safest if I kept moving. I also didn’t want to fall into any kind of pattern. I finally decided to close my eyes, point and then go in that direction. After my (likely foolish) manner of choosing, I decided on north.

By 10
:00 I found unprotected wireless in a suburban neighborhood. Time for my research. I needed to get contact information for my suspects, and I needed a good story as to why I was asking for their location in the spring of 2000.

I took my eight remaining suspects and started researching each individual man. There were five FBI agents I still needed to rule out. Agents Bruce Clarke, William Davis, Emanuel Lewis, Frank James, and
Jack Moore were all possible suspects.  I started with a simple Google search. I looked for news articles, website biographies, and social media. It is amazing the information that can be found on the Internet.

After two hours of searching I had obtained three ages. Bruce Clarke was 55. Emanuel Lewis was 35. Frank James was 52. I was pretty pleased with my progress so far. Since it was about noon
, I decided to get a bite to eat and change locations. I didn’t want people to notice me sitting outside of one place too long and call the police.

After lunch
, I found a new spot to research a few developments away and I was back at work. By the end of the afternoon, I had the ages of all of the FBI agents and I was ready to work on the consultants. I had identified the rest of the agents as William Davis, 44, and Jack Moore, 37. There were three consultants I still needed to find ages for: Lawrence Pheares, Peter Lyons, and James Carson. It was 3:30 and I figured I could work for another hour before people began coming home from work. The consultants were easy to find basic information about. Lawrence Pheares and James Carson were both owners of their own consulting firm. Their website biography gave their ages and background (Pheares, 54 and Carson, 49). Peter Lyons proved to be slightly more challenging, but by 4:15 I had his age (50) and I was pulling away. As I pulled away from the corner where I had parked my car, I heard sirens in the distance and I saw the curtain in the front window of the house across the street twitch.

I immediately assumed that the police were after me.
Fight or flight, and flight took over. I didn’t stop to think. I didn’t reason. I ran. I headed away from the sirens. I kept turning randomly. I was terrified. For the last two days I had been calmer, my rational and problem-solving mind kept the fear at bay. In that moment, the fear took back over. It consumed me. Five miles away from the development with no sign of the police and I jumped at every noise from outside the car. My heart pounded. I drove and turned randomly. I didn’t have a plan. I just ran.

Finally
, after two hours, I calmed down enough to start to think. I thought of what I needed to do and where I was going. I needed to find a place to spend the night. I needed to think over what I had found out so far. I needed to regroup. I had made progress, but now that fear had just prompted me to run. I felt like a predator was stalking me. I felt like every move I made was only bringing me closer to his net.

Maybe it was time that I trusted someone.

_______

It was nine that night before I found som
eplace I felt safe staying. This time, Jane London checked into a room. I was able to park my car around back where it couldn’t be seen, and able to get a room right near where I parked my car. I settled Kitty and Max, and carried my stuff in from the car. I set up the whiteboard and pulled out the data I had gathered today. Looking at my suspects and at my criteria, I was able to eliminate two more of them, bringing my total to 6 suspects. Now I just needed to figure out who was in Phoenix in the spring of 2000.

I hadn’t the slightest
clue how to do that. I took out my wallet. Tucked behind my credit cards and with the illustrious cards of my hairdresser and gynecologist, was the card of Special Agent Jack Moore. Tomorrow I would ask for help. Tomorrow I would call Agent Jack Moore.

Chapter
9: April 1, 5:25am – 11:54pm

I woke
up early the next day. I struggled to sleep because my mind was racing, trying to strategize how I was going to contact Agent Moore. I was feeling fairly paranoid (nothing new for me at this point), so I wanted to call him and then change location. I had been staying in the northeastern part of Pennsylvania, but thought maybe I should head back to New Jersey. If I called him first thing that morning, then I could head southeast. Even if he tracked my location, I would no longer be there. I packed up my car, practiced what I was going to say, and planned my route back to New Jersey. I figured I would need to call after nine in order to have the best chance of actually getting in touch with him.

I left the
motel around 8:15. I drove toward the city center in order to find a payphone. I thought there might be one at a gas station or convenience store. It took me a while, but I finally found a payphone. It was 8:56. I decided to circle the block a few times before making my call.

At 9:12
, I pulled into the convenience store parking lot and with change in hand I headed to the pay phone. I was going to do this. I was. I was just terrified. What if I was wrong? What if he was a part of it? What if he couldn’t be trusted? I stood in front of the phone for a good five minutes before I finally picked up the handset and placed my call.

The phone rang and was almost immediately picked up
. The woman who answered had cool and composed professional down pat.

“Agent Jack Moore
, please.”

“One moment
…” hold music started playing.

“This is
Special Agent Jack Moore.”

I was
tongue-tied. I didn’t know what to say … I hadn’t expected to just be transferred to him.

“Hello?”

I finally found my voice

“Agent Jack Moore?”

“Yes, who is this?” He must have heard something in my voice that let him know this wasn’t an ordinary call.

“Hi
, this is Charlotte Marshall. We met the other week. I brought in some information about some murdered girls.” I was babbling.

“Charlotte Marshall!? Ms. Marshall
, is that you? We have been looking for you … there was a fire?”

“I know
; I saw it on the television. Agent Moore, he’s real, the killer, he found me.”

“He found you
. What do you mean?”

“I mean he found me
. The other night he almost killed me. He knows I figured it out.”

“Who is he?”

“I don’t know … I couldn’t see his face … he was wearing a mask.”

“Look
, I need you to come into the office …” I don’t know what he was going to say, but to be honest it didn’t matter.

“
No,” I interrupted him. “He knew I knew; no one knew. I hadn’t talked to anyone but you guys. He knows … he can get to me.”

“
You didn’t tell anyone else? Are you sure?”

“I’m
positive; he didn’t find out through me. Somehow he is connected to your office.”

“T
ell me where you are; I’ll come get you and we will figure this all out.” He was using his authoritative voice. It wasn’t working.

“
No. What you can do is find out if anyone at your office would have access to the information I brought in and was in Phoenix in the spring of 2000.”

“What
… why?”

“I have to go. I’ll call you again later.”

I hung up and stood there for a second feeling weirdly elated and terrified at the same time.

______

After my call I headed southeast. It was hours before I finally felt safe, before I felt like I had gone far enough. When I finally felt I was far enough away, I started looking for a home with unprotected wireless. I was in a more rural area than I had been previously, and it took me a while to find a home with unprotected wireless that I could use.

My day was mostly gone
, and other than speaking with Agent Moore, my investigation had made no progress. I wanted to get phone numbers and contact information for the rest of my suspects. Today, during all of my driving, I had come up with what I thought would be a reasonable story looking for information. When looking at the various websites for the consultants, I saw that they were often speakers at different conventions. I thought if I pretended to be a convention planner I could say I was looking for a speaker I had heard in Phoenix in 2000 for an upcoming convention. I could say that I had lost the speaker’s information and that I was attempting to track him down. I knew it was far-fetched, but in my previous life as a social worker I had called people with crazier stories (true ones) and had been able to get information, so I was hopeful. I had wanted to make calls today, but it was rapidly getting late and I was afraid offices would soon be closed.

I decided instead to get
together all of my information to contact them, and then in the morning I would find a payphone and make all of my calls at once. Getting the contact information was easy, and by 4:45 I had all of the information I needed to make contact. Of the three consultants, I had phone numbers for two and an e-mail for one.

As usual
, I am not always sure why my mind goes where it goes. But looking at that e-mail address made me want to check my own e-mail. I am not really sure what I expected to find, maybe I just wanted to make some sort of contact with my life. I was fairly sure that I could not be tracked by just checking my e-mail.

My e
-mail was full of all the usual -- some group e-vites, a few notices about comments from Facebook, and some pictures of my nieces and nephews. There was one e-mail from an address I did not recognize: [email protected]. Since I didn’t use this e-mail address for anything other than friends and family, I didn’t think it could be one of the many junk e-mails I get using my other address. I opened the e-mail. It was one line:  “You can’t hide forever.”

To be honest
, I can’t tell you exactly what I did next, or in what order. I honestly don’t know. I was in blind flight mode. I know that I drove. I know I cursed. Then … then I got angry. My fear faded and my anger grew. He was tormenting me. What I did next was likely a stupid thing to do; however, it felt immensely satisfying. He may have been just waiting for me to do this, but I wasn’t going to be scared any more. I was going to fight. I stopped my headlong run and again looked for wireless access. By the time I found access it was 7:30. I opened up my Gmail account, and opened up his e-mail. I typed one line in response. “Neither can you.” I hit the send button then turned my computer off.

______

As satisfying as my small act of defiance was, I wanted to get away from where I wrote the e-mail just in case it could be traced. I drove east and south toward the shore. After driving for two hours, I decided I had gone far enough for the night and I found a motel to stay in. I performed my nightly ritual, taking Kitty and Max out, checking the door and window, and putting a chair in front of the door. I had reached out. I had fought back. I was feeling like I could get through this, like I could beat him. That night I slept better than I had since this whole thing had started. I felt accomplished.

Chapter 10: April 2, 8:30am - 9:30pm

The sound of a car door slamming woke me up at 8:30. I had slept deeply and soundly. Dreams of Emily and my girls had not tortured me as they had so many of the past several nights
. I was energized. I had a plan. My sense of accomplishment was interrupted by Max’s low growl.

He was standing tense and ready
, staring at the door. I went from feeling calm and proud to feeling panic grab at my throat. I froze, afraid to move, afraid not to move. I finally mobilized myself enough to creep over to the window and pull the curtain aside a crack. What I saw outside froze my heart within my chest. Agent Moore and Agent Clarke stood next to a black sedan in the parking lot. How had they found me? How on earth could they have possibly found me? I stood at that window for a second watching the two talk, and then the sound of Max’s growls mobilized me.