“Like I said, you’ll—”
“This is crazy,” Tim gasped, his eyes widened. “I thought… are you guys nuts? I had nothing to do with their deaths! There was someone in my house! He left those things. Shit, I think he was going to use them on me! I didn’t do anything! I didn’t—”
Chase tried to guide the man forward and into the interrogation room, but he dug his heels in.
“This can’t be happening! I—”
Drake shoved Tim from behind and he stumbled forward.
“Get moving. Don’t give her a hard time, Tim,” Drake said calmly. “You’ll have your chance.”
Chase started after the suspect, but turned back to Drake before she entered the interrogation room.
“Get those to Beckett, then hurry back.”
Drake nodded.
“Don’t start without me.”
***
Drake was surprised to discover that while he was looking for Beckett, Beckett was also looking for him. They ran into each other just outside the elevator.
“Jesus, you look like you’ve seen a ghost,” Drake said as the elevator doors opened.
“Must be the hair,” Beckett replied, then quickly added, “got a hit on the DNA from the vics’ backs.”
Drake gawked.
“What? Who?”
He hadn’t expected that they would ever find a match to the bloody butterfly.
Beckett shook his head, and grabbed Drake by the arm and led him toward the conference room that they held their daily updates in.
“More like when,” Beckett said. When the door clicked closed, he held a stack of paper out to Drake. “Trade.”
Beckett snatched the evidence bag and handed over the DNA report. Caterpillar and syringe in hand, his eyes drifted to the cork board with all of the new photographs with strings attaching.
“Jeez, you guys ever hear of an interactive board? This looks like it belongs in the seventies,” Beckett gave Drake a quick once-over. “Sorry. Forgot you were forty going on fucking ninety-five.”
Drake shook his head, trying to remain focused.
“What do you mean when? Who is the blood from?”
Beckett smiled.
“Oh, yeah. Sorry, battling a wicked hangover. Anyways, you have the case file in your hand. The blood on Thomas and Neil’s back is from a woman who died nearly thirty years ago,” he put on a British accent when he said the name, “A Martha Slasinsky.”
Drake raised an eyebrow.
“Who?”
“Exactly. Who? A woman who died in her apartment from an apparent suicide. But here’s the kicker, she was dead for nearly a month before anyone found her.”
Drake stared at Beckett, his mind whirring, trying to fit this new piece of evidence, this big pile of steaming evidence, into the appropriate slot in the pegboard.
A woman dies thirty years ago, and her blood resurfaces in the murders of three wealthy New York City businessmen? What’s the connection?
“But here’s the kicker—yeah, yeah, we already had a kicker, I know, but here’s the real kicker,” Beckett continued, his pale blue eyes glowing now. “Martha, who was a nurse by the way, had a son.”
Drake leaned in closer.
“Yep, a son. And he lived with her.”
Drake screwed up his face, failing to see the significance.
“He lived with her? So what? What does—”
Beckett shook his head.
“No, big fella, you don’t get it. The boy was only eight when his mother died, but he turned nine before she was found.”
Drake couldn’t believe what he was hearing.
“What?”
Beckett nodded.
“Martha’s son lived with her body for nearly an entire month after she died. Eventually, the neighbors complained of the horrible smell coming from the apartment, and New York’s finest came ‘aknocking. But it doesn’t end there. The boy managed to convince the two uniforms that there was nothing wrong, that they were just defrosting their freezer—can you believe that? A nine-year-old boy… anyways, two days later, the officers came back and this time they went inside the apartment. The boy was enraged, and struck the officers, telling them that the crying had finally stopped, that they were finally living in silence, in peace. He told them not to take her, that she was all he had.”
“Jesus,” Drake whispered, picturing the scene in his mind. A shudder ran through him.
“It gets worse, my good friend.”
How? How could it get worse?
“After the cops came the first time,” Beckett continued, “the boy opened the window to try and get rid of the smell. But as smart as he was, he didn’t anticipate the bugs.”
Drake swallowed hard, an image of the nightmare he had of Clay’s dead face, a giant caterpillar crawling out of his mouth flashing in his mind.
“Yep, you guessed it. The apartment was full of Monarchs.”
Drake suddenly had to sit down. He reached for a chair and collapsed into it.
“Drake, you okay?”
He winced and held his side.
“The fuck happened to your face, anyway? You say I look like I’ve seen a ghost, but you look as if you’ve been beaten up by one.”
Drake didn’t answer… he was too lost in his own world to offer anything. He was imagining how horrible it must have been for that boy, to have his mother first commit suicide, then be alone with her rotting body for a month.
“What happened to him?” he asked, his voice barely a whisper.
Beckett shrugged and pressed his lips together.
“He spent a number of months in a state psychiatric institution, and then was released. No record of him after that, except that he received a hefty life insurance policy from his mother, being a nurse ‘n all.”
“How can a nine-year-old boy just go missing?”
“As far as I can tell, he didn’t ‘go missing’, the police report just ends.”
Drake mulled this over for a moment, before standing and adding several more pieces of paper to what Detective Henry Yasiv had called Gotti’s family tree.
“It’s all in the report,” Beckett offered, but Drake was barely listening. “What’s this, by the way? Another butterfly slurry?”
“Yeah, I’m pretty sure it’s the same stuff, but let me know as soon as you can.”
“Well, it’s definitely a Monarch caterpillar that’s for sure.”
Drake ignored him and continued adding squares of paper to the board.
He wrote Martha Slasinsky on one piece of paper, then poised his pen over the other.
“What was the boy’s name?” he asked absently.
“Lemme check,” Beckett said, and Drake heard him flipping pages from the police report. “Marcus—Marcus Slasinsky.”
Drake dropped the pen.
He had seen that name before. He had seen it just that afternoon, in fact.
Chapter 51
Drake knocked once then barged into the interrogation room without waiting for a reply.
Tim startled and looked up at him as he entered, his eyes wide.
“I didn’t kill anyone. I don’t know what you guys—”
“What happened to your mother, Tim? Or should I call you Marcus?”
Tim visibly recoiled.
“My mother? What does this have to do with my mother? What does any of this have to do with my mother? And who the hell is Marcus?”
Drake pressed his hands against the table and leaned forward.
“Marcus Slasinsky—that’s your name, isn’t it?”
Tim recoiled again, but this time it was different from when Drake had mentioned the man’s mother. There was something else there, something that might have passed for recognition if under other circumstances.
Drake didn’t know for certain.
“What are you—” Tim started, but the door to the interrogation room was suddenly flung opened.
Drake turned to see Chase barge in.
“Detective D
rake, can I speak to you outside for a moment?” she asked, ice in her voice.
“Just a sec—”
“Now, Drake.”
Drake swore and pounded his fist against the table before straightening and heading toward the door. Chase held it for him as he stepped through.
“What the hell are you doing?” he asked when the door was finally closed. He tried not to let his frustration leak into his voice, but it was a losing battle.
“Me?” Chase shot back incredulously. “What the fuck are you doing? I was waiting for you, just like you asked!”
Drake shook his head.
“It’s not him,” he stated simply, shaking his head. “Tim’s not the butterfly killer.”
“What? What are you talking about?”
Drake quickly recounted what Beckett had told him. Chase listened with earnest, but by the time he finished, she was the one shaking her head.
“I don’t know what the connection is yet, or if it has anything at all to do with our case, but Tim’s our guy.”
Drake balked.
“You don’t know what this has to do with our case? Are you listening to me? The blood from Thomas and Neil and probably Chris’s back is from a woman who died thirty years ago! A woman who was infested with Monarchs! You don’t know what this has to do with our case?” he mocked. “What’s wrong with you?”
Drake realized that his blood pressure was rising, and with this, every one of the wounds suffered at the hands of the thugs outside Veronica’s lair started to throb and ache.
Chase tilted her head to one side and narrowed her eyes at him.
“What’s wrong with me? You’re not seeing the facts, Drake. Just calm down… I don’t want to have to remind you that I’m the lead here, that you’re on thin fucking ice as it is without these outbursts.”
Drake ground his teeth, wishing that he hadn’t opted out of the whiskey at Patty’s Diner.
He saw red.
Who the fuck does she think she is? She’s now a replacement for Clay? Well, I’ll tell you what, sister, Clay is fucking irreplaceable. You’re not him; you’re just a two-bit narc from Seattle.
“Who got to you? Rhodes? Was it Rhodes?” he hissed. “Yeah, I bet it was Rhodes. Well fuck him and fuck you too.”
Chase’s furious glare suddenly turned to mush and the pain on her face instantly made him regret his words. After all, Chase had been nice to him, the only person that had given a shit about him.
“I’m sorry,” he said, lowering his eyes. “I didn’t mean that.”
Chase took a deep breath before answering.
“No one got to me,” she said calmly. “And there’s nothing wrong with me—there’s something wrong with you. You’re losing it, unraveling at the seams. This is just like the Skeleton King. Did you see someone there, at Tim’s house? Huh? A black shadow, maybe?” Her words stung him like arrows.
The truth was, he remembered the rear fence shaking and someone—something—disappearing into the darkness.
Or did he?
Did I see someone?
“No,” he said softly. “Maybe… I don’t know.”
“Yeah, and that’s the problem: you don’t know. What happened to your gun, Drake? I know sure as hell it isn’t in your car. Did you get drunk and leave it somewhere? Hmm? Let me guess, you don’t know where it is.”
Drake sighed heavily.
“It was stolen from my car,” he replied, all conviction gone from his voice.
“Yeah, I’m sure it was. Go home, Drake. Go home and sleep it off. Get your shit together. I told you once, and I’ll tell you again: you can burn with your fucking sailboat, but I’m not going down with you.”
Drake swallowed dryly. After a moment, he raised his eyes and leveled them at Chase.
“Can I just ask him one question?” he said, desperation clinging to his tongue. “Please—just one? You can give me that much, can’t you?”
Chase grimaced.
“Fine. But I’m coming with you. And I swear to God if you try anything, I will arrest you for obstruction. Do you understand?”
Drake nodded and turned back to the interrogation room. He moved to the door, but Chase stepped in front of him at the last moment and pulled it open.
Inside, Tim looked up again, startled like a fish hoisted from water.
“I didn’t do it! I didn’t—”
“Shut up,” Drake spat. “I just want to know one thing: do you have a passport?”
“A passport?” the man repeated, his face contorting.
“Yes, a passport. Small book about yea big? Let’s you leave this country?”
Tim considered this for a moment, not so much racking his brain to determine if he indeed owned a passport, but more likely trying to figure out the hidden meaning behind the query.
“No,” he replied at last. “I’ve never left the Continental USA. Why?”
Drake said nothing, but couldn’t help the hint of a smile that formed on his lips. Without another word to Tim Jenkins, he turned toward Chase and the still open interrogation room door.
As he passed her, he whispered, “Hard to murder a man in Montreal with no passport, isn’t it?”
Chase scowled, but bit her tongue.
Chapter 52
Detective Damien Drake was furious as he stormed out of 62nd precinct.
Furious at Chase, at Sergeant Rhodes, at Tim Jenkins.
But most of all he was furious at Clay Cuthbert.
Why weren’t you wearing your vest, Clay? Why the fuck weren’t you wearing your vest that night?
Less than ten minutes later, he found himself pulling his Crown Vic into Patty’s 24-hour diner.
It wasn’t adding up; if Tim was their guy, if he was pissed at Thomas Smith and his family for shutting down the Butterfly Gardens, taking his job away from him, then why did he murder Chris and Neil? How did they fit into the picture? And while in some twisted way the butterflies in the victims’ mouths made sense, what Drake couldn’t understand was the blood. Martha Slasinsky’s blood. What the hell was that all about?
Drake shook his head. Tim Jenkins wasn’t the Butterfly Killer; he was sure of it. But he also knew that it would be next to impossible to convince Chase otherwise. After all, it was her case, and she knew all about the Skeleton King, about Drake’s reluctance to accept the fact that the man responsible for terrorizing New York City was Peter Kellington—a fucking perverted janitor.
In a daze, Drake entered the cafe and took his usual seat in the booth opposite the door.
Broomhilda came by, her patented sneer plastered on her lined face.
“Key lime?” she asked with something akin to disdain.
“Fuck the pie,” Drake spat. “Johnny Red, double, neat.”
The weathered woman nodded and then left to retrieve his drink. Drake was the diner’s only patron until the door chimed and a man in the k-way jacket stormed in. His hood was down, his long brown hair a mess. He strode over with purpose and tossed a piece of paper onto the table between them.
“You should answer your damn phone,” the man said, frowning.
Drake looked at him for a moment, before pulling his phone out of his pocket. He must have switched it off after speaking to Beckett. He turned it back on and set it on the table before picking up the paper.
“What’s this?” he asked absently.
“It’s what you asked for. And the Butterfly Killer exclusive better be good, Drake. I went to great lengths and pulled in a lot of favors for this.”
Drake ignored him and turned his attention to the note. It looked like a draft written on a typewriter, and the date confirmed that this was likely the case: SEPTEMBER 12, 1994.
The headline read: Boy, 14, bullied into a coma at the Butterfly Gardens.
“What the hell?” Drake muttered. He looked up at the man across from him, but he only shrugged.
Drake kept reading.
It started out as a routine class trip, one that the grade nine students of Dee
r Valley Academy take every year. A field trip to witness one of the most awe-inspiring and beautiful scenes that nature provides, one that videos simply cannot do justice: the start of the Monarch butterfly migration.
Except this time, when the tens of thousands of butterflies took flight, they left a grisly scene on the ground below. The circumstances that left a boy in a coma and four others—sons of prominent New York businessmen—under investigation are unclear, but teachers and fellow students report that the victim, whose name has not been released, was the constant target of bullies.
Drake looked up and he waved the paper.
“That’s it?”
The man across from him shrugged again.
“It was an incomplete article. As soon as the editor—Leeds, editor Gentry Leeds back then—saw the draft, he shut it down.”
“Fuck,” Drake swore.
“But I did manage to find out the affluent kids’ names.”
The man was smiling now, and in that moment, Drake knew who they were.
“Chris, Neil, Tim, and Thomas,” Drake said, no smile on his face.
“Hmph. I guess you heard this story already. But did you know this one? The name of the boy that was in the coma?”
Drake shook his head and the man with the long hair threw a second piece of paper on the table.
There were only two words on this one: Marcus Slasinsky.
The breath was suddenly sucked out of Drake’s lungs.
Marcus Slasinsky…
“Where’s Marcus now?” Drake asked, folding the piece of paper with the name on it and tucking it into his pocket.
“No idea. You’re the detective, I’m just a reporter.”
Drake went to grab the other piece of paper, the one with the opening paragraphs of a news story that was never published, when the other man grabbed it first.
“Naw, I’ll keep this one. Like I said, I pulled in a lot—and I mean a lot—of favors for this. For one tiny nothing article that so far as I can tell never led to anything, somebody spent a shit ton of loot keeping it sealed. The only reason I found it was because Gentry got sick and hasn’t gotten around to clean out his office yet, even though he retired more than six months ago. He’s not coming back anytime soon, and guess who has squatter’s rights?”
Detective Damien Drake series Box Set 1 Page 22