There was a collective sigh. I pulled out of the crowd and ran to the bag. There was an ID tag on the strap, one of those plastic labels. I lifted the strap and read.
BOOM! FUCKERS.
I was right. It was a goddamn leave-behind. Inside the backpack, next to the standard clock radio, was a photo in a frame. A computer photo, printed on paper, from a digital camera. The face of a good-looking man, maybe forty.
One of the charred bodies inside, I was pretty sure.
MORTON LIGHTOWER, read the inscription, AN ENEMY OF THE PEOPLE.
“LET THE VOICE OF THE PEOPLE BE HEARD.”
A name was printed at the bottom. AUGUST SPIES.
Jesus, this was an execution!
My stomach turned.
Womans Murder Club 3 - 3rd Degree
Chapter 7
WE GOT THE TOWN HOUSE ID'd pretty quickly. It did belong to the guy in the picture, Morton Lightower, and his family. The name rang a bell with Jacobi. “Isn't that the guy who owned that X/L Systems?”
“No idea.” I shook my head.
“You know. The Internet honcho. Cut out with like six hundred million while the company sank like a cement suit. Stock used to sell for sixty bucks, now it's something like sixty cents.”
Suddenly I remembered seeing it on the news. “The Creed of Greed guy.” He was trying to buy ball teams, gobbling up lavish homes, installing a $50,000 security gate on his place in Aspen, at the same time he was dumping his own stock and laying off half his staff.
“I've heard of investor backlash,” Jacobi said, shaking his head, “but this is a little much.”
Behind me, I heard a woman yelling to let her through the crowd. Inspector Paul Chin ushered her forward, through the web of news vans and camera crews. She stood in front of the bombed-out home.
“Oh, my God,” she gasped, a hand clasped over her mouth.