So you’d like to know what my typical day is like? There’s my work with ATLAS, a covert government organization, in which I do the occasional forensic art: identification sketch from a skull, sketch of a murder suspect, maybe even lending a hand in an investigation. Unfortunately I can’t go into details, because ATLAS takes that whole national security stuff seriously. What I can discuss are the more mundane cases I work as an FBI agent when I’m not teaching forensic art at the FBI Academy in Quantico: money laundering, white collar crimes, that sort of thing. For instance, that bank robber I helped to arrest last week after I sat down with the teller and sketched the suspect from her description. Not the brightest crook, since he had a cobra tattooed on his neck and didn’t bother covering it up during the robbery. His landlord saw my sketch on the news and called our tip line, saying it looked a lot like one of his less-than-stellar tenants, Thomas “Snake” Collins, who recently paid his overdue rent in cash that happened to be damp with some sort of red dye.
Mind you, we get a lot of tips, most of them bad, but considering we never mentioned the bank’s red dye pack in the details we released to the media, this tip moved to the top of our priority list. We drove out to Snake’s house, parked down the street with a view of his front door, then notified the local police that we were in the area. Since Snake’s criminal history was rather extensive, my partner, Tony Carillo, thought we should come up with a more creative method of making contact. “I’ve got a couple packets on voter registration,” he said. “How about we go up to his door and pretend to be doing our civic duty?”
I studied an old booking photo of Snake, thinking he wasn’t the open-the-door-and-politely-listen-to-our-pretend-spiel-on-politics type. He was more the open-the-door-and-shove-a-gun-in-our-face kind of guy. “I vote we skip the ruse, and—”
“Hold on. Someone’s coming out the side gate.”
I looked up, saw a reed-thin white male in blue jeans strolling across the lawn to the motorcycle parked in the driveway. He was digging in his jeans pocket, probably for the keys. Unfortunately he wore a long blue and black plaid Pendleton shirt, which covered his waistband and any obvious signs of a weapon he might be hiding. What it didn’t cover was the telltale cobra tattooed on the side of his neck. I picked up the radio, keying it. “Suspect’s about to leave on a motorcycle. We’re making contact.”
“Ten-four,” the police dispatcher said. Then to the responding police backup, she asked, “Five-eight, copy?”
“Five-eight copies. ETA about two blocks away.”
“FBI copies,” I radioed. “We’re approaching now.”
Carillo shifted to Drive, hit the switch to activate the emergency lights, then pulled out. He stopped at the edge of the driveway. The suspect looked up, his eyes going wide. We threw our doors open, jumped out, drew our guns.
“FBI!” I called.
Snake’s gaze flicked from me to Carillo. And then he ran.
He feinted left toward Carillo, then darted past me at the last second. I holstered my gun and chased after him. The patrol car rounded the corner, tires screeching as it skidded to a stop.
Snake faltered when he saw the black-and-white. He tried to cut across the neighbor’s yard, jumping over a low hedge. He stumbled but recovered. I caught up to him, grabbed at his flannel shirt. He twisted, swung his fist at me. The officer jumped on him from the other side and down we all went.
The moment Snake started struggling, Carillo walked up, put his foot on Snake’s back. “Try not to move. It’ll just piss me off.”
Snake’s face was pressed into the grass, the tattooed cobra hood on his neck seeming to widen with each pulse of his carotid. “I didn’t do anything.”
I reached for his hand, pulled it down into a wrist lock, then cuffed him. “How about evading?”
“Evading?” he said. “You two race up and pull guns on me? How am I supposed to know you’re cops?”
“Besides that I told you? If the badges on our belts weren’t a clue, maybe the flashing red light on the car?”
“You don’t look like no cops.”
Carillo laughed. “As many times as you’ve been arrested? You try and use that excuse for running, they’re gonna add five years to your sentence for being stupid.”
“Yeah, well, I didn’t do nothing.”
I double-locked the cuffs. “Then how’d your fingers turn red?” I asked, noticing his stained digits as I pulled him to his feet, then walked him to the patrol car. “Dyeing Easter eggs in December?”
“I like to get an early start.”
“Right,” Carillo said. “Hope you didn’t hide them yet, ‘cause they’re gonna stink by the time you get out of prison.”
I buckled him in, closed the door, then watched as the officer drove our suspect to the jail.
After that, Carillo and I returned to the office for the not so exciting part that always followed. Hours and hours of paperwork.
And that pretty much covers a typical day in my life.
Let me know if you have any questions—about the cases I can talk about. I’m always glad to answer!
You can read more about Syndey in The Dark Hour, the fourth book in the “Sydney Fitzpatrick” mystery series. The first book in the series is Face of a Killer.
** Robin is giving away one (1) copy of “THE DARK HOUR”. Contest open to US residents only and ends November 30. Leave a comment to be included in the giveaway. Book will be shipped directly from the author. **
Meet the author
Robin Burcell worked as a police officer, detective, hostage negotiator, and forensic artist. The Dark Hour is her latest international thriller about an FBI forensic artist. The Black List will debut in January 2013. Visit her at www.RobinBurcell.com, Twitter, and Facebook.
Books are available at retail and online booksellers.
I find forensic art to be fascinating and am looking forward to reading this series, which is new to me!
kpbarnett1941[at]aol.com
I love stories about cops and FBI. I have a SIL who is a beat cop in Queens, NY, and a niece who was a Sgt in I.A.D. also NYPD… the topper to my crazy family was a cousin who was an Oxymoron in the military for 30+ years… he worked out of Ft. Meade in Md.
I’d love to win this book.
NoraAdrienne(at)gmail(dot)com
I’d love to win!
How many cases have you solved with your forensic work?
Not sure if you saw the comment below. I did not see the reply buttons! Apparently the caffeine did not kick in until much later today!
This sounds like a good book. Iwould like to read this book.
Love this type of book!
I really enjoyed Face of a Killer and would love to win this one!!! Dee
Looking forward to reading this. I would love to win.
another good one
Very glad to see everyone here! Thanks for stopping by. As for how many cases I’ve solved, that’s hard to say. I’ve done hundreds of sketches over the years. My forensic sketches (dead bodies that needed to be identified) resulted in identifications, but not necessarily on who killed them (much to our regret). It does, however give them a starting point. I’ve had some drawings fail miserably. Didn’t look a thing like the suspect. I’ve had even more that weren’t ever solved. No one was ever caught, therefore no way to know how close they were. But the ones that were caught? There’s a mix on the order. I tend to remember best those that were caught as a result of the sketch (someone looked at it, and said, hey, that reminds me of…), only because you get a great feeling of satisfaction. For the large number who were caught afterward, then compared to the drawing, I don’t remember those as much, perhaps because the impact wasn’t as great. (Less satisfaction for me???) Not an easy question to answer!
Thanks for the opportunity to win a copy of this book. I definitely will be tracking down the first books in the series to add to my library!
I love the Easter egg comment. Very snarky!
And I loved your comment! Once I figured out what you meant! See below, as I didn’t realize there were reply buttons!!!
I’d love to win this book.
This sounds like a good book!
LOL! So I’m reading the comments, and I read Loopy Librarian’s: “I love the Easter egg comment. Very Snarky!”
And I’m thinking: someone left an Easter egg comment? So I go back to read them. And I don’t find it. I go back again. Then re-read Loopy Librarian’s comment. And it finally occurs to me: Oh. I wrote that! In the story!!! Duh. (The life of a writer, eh? We write ’em and forget ’em as soon as we move on to the next story. It’s the same when people talk about scenes they like in the books. I’m usually so many thousands of words beyond that scene, it takes me a while to remember what they’re talking about!!!)
And FYI, for anyone who is interested: The Bone Chamber is available for a few days in ebook format (all) for only .99 cents!
Good luck, and can’t wait for the book draw!
Please include me in this giveaway. I’d love to read this book. The Dark Hour — makes you wonder.
6186pep(at)msn(dot)com
Loved this excerpt. It’s got action and really established the characters.
I picked it up yesterday. It has joined my stack, but it may still sneak up a few places.
Hope it sneaks up fast!!!
FBI mysteries are always high octane—and this one looks really good. Thanks for the chance to win it.
I like the sound of this, I love mysteries and I would love to read this one. Thank you for the chance to win this book.
saba121167(at)usa(dot)net
I love the way you guys arrest people in this short story you don’t even have to read these dumb crooks there rights they need to go straight to jail. I do love reading the Sydney Fitzpatrick series looking forward.
I meant dumb crook and he not them needed to go straight to jail. Lol
Thanks for the morning laugh, Harold!!! Gotta love fiction, right?
I do love your writing the Sydney Fitzpatrick series is so full of intense suspense from covers to covers PLEASE KEEP THEM COMING
Love mysteries involving the Fbi.this sounds like a really exciting one.
Sounds so interesting. FBI is fascinating.
Thanks Robin for stopping by and giving us a glimpse into Sydney’s day.
Sounds good. It’s different from what I normally read.
catbooks(at)rocketmail(dot)com
Contest is closed.
I’m a huge fan of Robin and met her at Bouchercon when it came to Baltimore a few years ago. No need to enter me in the drawing, I always snap up her releases!