Inhuman Nature: a Mystery Thriller Novel

By Larry McCann and Nathan McCann

"Veteran homicide detective Larry McCann's Inhuman Nature takes the reader on a thrilling ride through the latest techniques of serial murder profiling, intrusive cutting-edge technological innovations, and dangerous political intrigue that reaches into the halls of Congress. Great story! Great book!" Dr. Roger L.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Larry McCann
• Release date: Dec 14, 2022
• ISBN: 9781959911012

Book preview

Inhuman Nature

Larry McCann

&

Nathan McCann

ISBN Paperback: 978-1-959911-00-5

ISBN ebook: 978-1-959911-01-2

Copyright © 2022 by Larry McCann

All rights reserved.

No portion of this book may be reproduced in any form without written permission from the publisher or author, except as permitted by U.S. copyright law.

Inhuman Nature is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are the products of the authors' imaginations or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locations is entirely coincidental.

Dedication

To Barbara, the best wife ever! Always comforting, never complaining. Thank you for putting up with me all these years!

About the Authors

Larry McCann

Larry McCann spent 30 years in law enforcement and 17 as a violent crime consultant. He served with the Arlington County (VA) Police Department and the Virginia State Police as a Trooper with the Governors Executive Protective Unit and a Senior Special Agent in the Bureau of Criminal Investigation. As a crime scene technician, bloodstain pattern analyst, crisis negotiator and criminal investigator he responded to crimes of violence throughout central Virginia.

Selected to attend the FBI Police Fellowship at the National Center for the Analysis of Violent Crime, FBI Academy in Quantico, Virginia, he spent a year studying violent criminal behavior, psychology, pathology, and law, attending classes at the FBI Academy, the University of Virginia School of Law, Blue Ridge Hospital, and the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology. During this training regimen, he was also involved in consultations with police departments from around the nation.

Special Agent McCann was involved in the investigation of over 2,000 homicides both in the US and internationally, has lectured extensively and appeared often as an expert witness in US courts. He has also appeared on numerous nationally syndicated television and radio programs and in several internationally broadcast documentaries and co-authored Crime Scene Investigation - A Guide for Law Enforcement at the request of the US Attorney General.

Nathan McCann

Nathan McCann is a writer and filmmaker. He brings to this book a photographer’s eye for detail and a storyteller’s love for powerful characters. This is his first novel.

Lisa Antonelli Bacon

An award-winning journalist, she has written for numerous publications, including The New York Times, CNN Traveller (UK), and Interior Design, covering a variety of topics from the Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show to abuses at Abu Ghraib prison. Her broadcast news experience includes reporting for Dateline NBC and MSNBC Investigates. She is the author of Virginia: A Commonwealth Comes of Age.

Contents

1. Too Many Loops

2. Pebbles on the Roof

3. Ashland, Virginia

4. Currents

5. Occoquan Park

6. Undercurrents

7. Deeper than Dead Men

8. Pretty Signals

9. The Last Payphone in America

10. Katie O’Rourke’s

11. After Action Report

12. The Lion Tastes Human Blood

13. Business

14. Down to business

15. Chopawamsic

16. How Many?

17. Red Herrings and Haystacks

18. The Farm

19. Senator James

20. Dreadlocks and Cowries

21. Finding Annie

22. Interview of Cassidy’s Parents

23. Hackers Contact Glazer

24. Strange Ways

25. Glazer Meets Hackers

26. DHS Attempts to Recruit Glazer

27. DHS Steals Cassidy Case

28. Medro and Friends Secretly Work Cassidy Case

29. Annie Has Second Thoughts About Glazer

30. Glazer Turns up the Wick

31. MetroStat About to be Deployed

32. Valentine’s Present

33. Gone

34. Glazer is Banished

35. Tossing and Turning

36. Case Closed

37. MetroStat Unearthed

38. What’s This?

39. Bullets in the Boughs

40. Barrows Tale

41. Truth be Told

42. Truth be Hidden

43. The Whole Truth

44. Inhuman Nature

Acknowledgements

Chapter one

Too Many Loops

Twenty miles south of Washington, DC, there’s a perfect spot to watch the sunset over the Occoquan River. Sailboats docked at the Prince William Marina rock lazily on sparkling water. Tree-lined riverbanks hide the northern Virginia sprawl. Lazy geese paddle the water, and the occasional fish breaks the surface. Perfect… if you survive.

Trooper Marcus Dowling cursed his luck as he crouched in this spot overlooking the river. Cursing because it happens to be the southbound shoulder of the I-95 bridge over the Occoquan. Dowling was not admiring the sunset because he was trying not to get killed by traffic.

He had pulled in, blue lights flashing, behind a maroon minivan up on a jack. It was evening rush hour, and everyone in DC was headed out of the city for the weekend. It was the worst possible time to break down and on the bridge no less. Dowling had unclipped his radio to call a wrecker but then saw the guy had the spare out. A wrecker wouldn’t speed up anything. He put on his hat and stepped out onto the concrete. At least the guy knew what he was doing. He had the jack in securely and was tightening the lug nuts on the spare when Dowling walked over.

Thanks for stopping, the man yelled over the turbulent noise of the traffic.

Yeah, Dowling yelled back, a little more brusquely than he’d intended. Let’s get you off the bridge as quickly as we can.

It wasn’t the guy’s fault he’d gotten the flat, but Dowling wasn’t in the mood to chat in the middle of rush hour traffic. With the lug nuts on, Dowling rocked the tire to make sure it was tight, then lowered the van. The man picked up the hubcap and some spare rags. Sliding into the driver’s seat, he handed Dowling a plastic water bottle.

It’s to wash the crap off your hands, the man said smiling.

Thanks, said Dowling. Be careful getting back into traffic.

As the van pulled off, Dowling walked back to the cruiser. He looked down at his hands and realized just how dirty they were. It was the fine, black road grit that seemed to only be found on flat tires and would spread over everything if he got back in the car. Dowling wanted off the bridge, but it’d be easier to wash up now than clean out the car later.

Stepping to the Jersey barrier, he held the bottle over the river and unscrewed the cap. No reason to splash his uniform shoes. He poured water over one hand and watched black rivulets rain down into the river below. He was pouring the rest of the water over his other hand when something in the river caught his eye.

Three white patches floated in a loose triangle directly below him. From this height it was hard to see exactly what they were, but something about them held Dowling’s attention.

As he watched, there was a ripple in the water. A huge snapping turtle paddled lazily over and closed its massive jaws. Sinking back into the water, the turtle trailed one of the white patches. As the turtle disappeared, the thing it had been chewing on broke loose and floated back to the surface.

And then Dowling realized what was in the water; a barely discernible corpse, casually floating down the river. The only parts visible on the surface were the crown of the head and two pale hands, one of which had just lost a finger to the departing turtle.

Darkness had long since fallen when the evidence technicians were ready to raise the body from the water. Sharp shadows stretched out over the river from the floodlights mounted on a half-dozen evidence collection trucks. Virginia State Troopers, along with Fairfax County and Prince William County officers, covered the Woodbridge Aggregates work yard at the edge of the river. First on scene had been a Prince William County fire department boat that located the body just down-river of the I-95 bridge. At the Edgewater Marina on the southern edge of the river, Friday night crowds milled around the slips and the dockside restaurant. Rather than hauling the body out there, the boat captain had politely moved it downriver to the now unoccupied low concrete dock at the aggregates work yard.

It was during that short, slow trip when one of the PWC firefighters pulled up the concrete blocks. She had been the one to reach over the side and secure the body with bright orange nylon webbing. The body had been almost vertical in the water. She’d seen bodies in water do all sorts of things as they decomposed, and floating vertically wasn’t the strangest. But as the boat moved toward shore, the body began to twist in the wake. It dragged and rolled in the water until she shouted at the pilot to kill the engine.

With a boat hook, she’d probed around its legs until she felt something hard. Figuring it was a stump, she’d pulled it to the surface. Instead of rotting wood, it was an upside-down bouquet of concrete blocks knotted onto the corpse’s ankles by twists of rope. And suddenly things went from a routine body recovery to a major crime scene.

Now, cruiser lights painted blue flashes across Woodbridge Aggregates shipping barges and towering piles of sand and construction gravel. White-shirted supervisors from both sides of the river argued over jurisdiction. The evidence techs had locked together a Stokes litter of pipes and wire mesh, hoping to pull up all the evidence – body, ropes, and blocks – in one load. The dive team was still in the river, all carrying fire department pry bars. They’d had to knock five snapping turtles off the submerged flesh of the dead man, and the big reptiles kept swimming up out of the dark water looking for more.

After having the dispatcher call out the cavalry, Trooper Dowling pulled police tape across Marina Way, the road into the marina’s parking lot. He got a few curious looks from people headed to the restaurant, but all the action was out of sight behind the piles of stone and sand. Fine by him. He would be hours late heading home, but he’d already called his wife and told her she shouldn’t wait up. Now he was just sitting in the idling car, earning overtime and getting out now and then to raise the tape for whatever responders were passing through.

It wasn’t the best way to end the week. When he’d heard over the radio about the weights on the body, he knew it was going to be a long night. Both counties and the state would want to hear his story. The forensics guys would ask if he disturbed anything at the scene. It didn’t matter that he’d been on the bridge and the body had been in the water a hundred feet below, they would still want his statement.

A white Chevy pulled into the restaurant lot, parking in the first spot next to the street instead of in a space closer to the restaurant. As it pulled in, Dowling saw the rainbow-colored peacock logo of the Washington NBC television affiliate. Ah, the press; not Dowling’s favorite part of the job.

He got out of the car and walked over to the tape. The press was legally allowed to cross under the yellow line so long as they didn’t damage the crime scene. But only reporters who were idealistic and new or jaded and desperate actually tried it. Any cop had the authority to send them back across the line just by telling them the scene was closed to the press. Which was precisely why there was always a cop stationed at the tape.

Hey there, called the reporter as he walked toward Dowling. We heard on the scanner there was a body in the river.

We are working a scene at the river, said Dowling, but I’ll have to ask you guys to stay here for right now.

The press was more content if you implied there would be a time in the future when they might possibly be allowed closer to the scene. Usually, just as soon as every person, vehicle, and interesting sign of anything remotely newsworthy had left the scene. But it made things easier if you let them hope.

Not a lot to see here, said the reporter. Any chance my cameraman could get just a little way down the road there?

Not right now, replied Dowling evenly.

The reporter looked young to be working news in Washington, DC. It usually took a few years for reporters to work their way up through smaller markets, so young typically meant smart. The camera guy walked over and set his tripod up against the tape. You weren’t supposed to call them cameramen, Dowling had been told. They called themselves photogs in the business, or shooters if they were feeling macho. There was nothing but dark piles of stone for this guy to shoot, so Dowling knew the camera would soon end up pointed at him. And he didn’t need to see his face on the late news, so he headed back to the car.

Just a quick question, the reporter called.

Dowling turned.

Can you tell me if the body was a man?

You have to talk to…

Is it the body of Hunter Cassidy? the reporter interrupted.

That stopped Dowling for a moment.

You know how this works, he said slowly. You’ll have to talk to the PIO when she gets here.

Sure, but if it’s Cassidy, that’s a big deal. If I can just call it back into my newsroom, it would be a huge help.

Look, said Dowling, I’m just the guy at the yellow tape right now. When the Public Information Officer gets here…

Can you confirm it’s not Cassidy?

Dowling took a deep breath.

I can’t confirm anything.

He heard footsteps on the gravel behind him and turned, glad for an excuse to leave the reporter. It was another trooper, and when he reached Dowling, he turned his face away from the reporter before speaking quietly.

I’ll watch the line. The forensics team leader wants you down at the scene now to get your statement.

Dowling nodded and started walking. He thought about what the reporter had asked. In all the activity of pulling in the body, he hadn’t even stopped to think it might be Cassidy. It had been more than a week since the man had gone missing. He’d had some political job in DC, and the office of the senator he worked for had released a statement expressing concern. Other than that, the news had been nothing but speculation and basic background.

Rounding a pile of loose gravel, he stepped into the floodlights. It looked like every crime scene tech in both counties had shown up, and they’d all parked blindfolded. A semicircle of evidence vans made a loose perimeter around the middle area of the concrete dock. One of Woodbridge Aggregates loading cranes sat at the edge of the water, and its cable was just going taut as it prepared to lift the mesh litter out of the water with the body and the concrete blocks.

Dowling stood with his back to one of the vans and watched the scene. The forensics team leader wouldn’t have time for him until the body was on land so he would just wait. Overtime was overtime, after all. There were shouts from the water, and the litter lifted slowly into sight, shedding streams of water. It cleared the river, then swung slowly over the dock, dripping water gelling rock dust into slippery mud, finally hovering over a wide square of yellow plastic sheeting.

He didn’t want to give in to morbid curiosity, but the reporter’s question had made him wonder. Was this Cassidy? He took a few steps in. As the litter came to rest with a clank, he saw the body wasn’t giving up anything to a casual observer. Bloated muscle bulged turgid against the skin. Discolored from decomposition, he couldn’t even tell the corpse’s race. There were wounds widespread over the portion of the body he could see, but whether they were human-inflicted or the result of predation by turtles, crabs and fish, Dowling couldn’t say. They didn’t look like propeller cuts he had seen on Weekend Admirals, the injuries of those who fell overboard while drunkenly urinating and quickly drowned, then subsequently run over by their out-of-control boats. What he did know was this person would not be identified by a driver's license in his pants pocket, because there were no pockets, or pants, or any clothing at all.

The one thing he could tell was whoever had put the body in the river hadn’t wanted it floating back up. Concrete blocks were tied to both legs by several lengths of rope, leaving the feet barely visible through a tangle of knots.

Dowling was about to step back, away from the rapidly spreading pool of foul, decomposition-scented water, when something drew his eyes back to the knots. There were three knots at each ankle, each trailing a concrete block. The knots were long, thick twists of rope, each a cylinder of tightly coiled loops. Dowling had been a Boy Scout, and he’d memorized every knot in the manual. Most of them he’d forgotten, but he remembered what a good knot looked like. Good knots were clean, simple, and efficient. The knots on this corpse were far more complicated than they needed to be. They seemed well practiced and strangely ornate.

Too many loops, thought Dowling.

Later, when the task force asked him if anything from the night struck him as strange, he would say;The knots, there were too many loops.

Chapter two

Pebbles on the Roof

Antony Glazer had just killed a man. But sometimes that’s the way things went when you’re a Senior Special Agent with the Virginia State Police.

Glazer stood in the doorway of a rotting house trailer in the mountains above Galax, Virginia. In front of him, beyond the still-idling SWAT assault truck, the sun was just coming up over the trees. Low fog glowed orange in the morning light, and the paths of booted feet were clear in the dew-wet grass. Behind him, red blood and brain tissue painted the ceiling around a fist-sized hole in the chipboard. On the couch below was a blood-spattered body, head destroyed above the jawline, still clutching a warm shotgun. Glazer let out a breath and slowly walked down the steps and into the yard. He could feel the blood at his back, pressing against him like radiant heat from a fire, the faceless corpse watching him go. Blake Roper had been a bad, bad man, but Glazer hated to see a case end this way — messy in more ways than one. Pebbles on the roof, he thought to himself.

Walking past the SWAT truck, he was grateful for the rumbling of the diesel engine. Its noise gave him a few extra steps before he would have to start talking to the tense knot of officers gathered behind the perimeter of squad cars. The Oshkosh SandCat was cramped for a full entry team, but a good choice if you had to maneuver down the rutted dirt back roads of rural Virginia. Glazer had always thought the high rear compartment and strangely angled fenders of the SandCat made it look like a large carnivore poised to spring. Maybe that’s what made them popular, the stylistic edge telling the good guys they were predators and the bad guys they were prey. In this job, you didn’t underestimate the psychology of a thing like that.

Glazer cleared the truck’s noise buffer and stepped around the first police car. He took a deep breath and straightened his back. He wasn’t tall, but he was fit and his prematurely gray hair gave him a look of authority when he needed it, and right now, he needed it.

A tight trio of men broke off from the group of officers near the car and walked toward him. Two wore the wide-brimmed hats and blue uniforms of the Galax Police Department while the third wore a dark blue Virginia State Police windbreaker matching Glazer’s.

It’s him, Glazer said, his voice pitched low so it wouldn’t carry to the officers beyond. It’s Roper, jailhouse tattoos and all.

The taller of the local cops, Lieutenant Herns, cursed softly and shook his head. He was a big man, and had the serious air of someone who had been leading people for many years.

Not the way we’d wanted this, he said.

No, agreed Glazer.

Herns was a good cop. Small town police and rural county sheriffs could be petty, political bureaucrats in Glazer’s experience, but Herns was a professional. He’d welcomed Glazer onto the task force, ready to do what it took to get Roper off the streets and ready to cut off the grumbles of his men and the local deputies who thought Glazer was nothing more than a sideshow.

Herns… Glazer started.

Herns held up a big, callused hand.

"We’d have never gotten this far without you. If that boy wanted to