by Brad Hart
Logan pulled his phone from his pocket and showed him.
“Cute girl,” Chief Walker exhaled and dropped the cigarette. He stomped it out with the heel of his boot just like he’d done with the last one. Not even half smoked. Must have been trying to cut down. Maybe his wife didn’t like it. Maybe he was trying to quit altogether.
Hard to do when a man was under that much pressure about finding a killer and a set of missing girls.
“I hope you and your men can help me with this case. Before tonight, I didn’t have a lot to go on. Now I’m thinking it’s a whole lot worse than before. We’ve got a killer on our hands, Chief. And it looks like he’s got a thing for kidnapping girls.”
“And does he kill the girls, I wonder? Odds aren’t in their favor.”
“Do they usually?” Logan said, knowing the answer. He just wanted to hear the Chief say it.
“Yes. They do. And you know that,” he turned and walked off.
“Chief,” Logan said.
Chief Walker turned. “What?”
“Take my card. Call me for anything. I hope you’ll keep my informed. I’d like to do the same for you.”
“Just call the station if you need me,” Walker eyeballed him and took the card.
“Don’t lose it, Chief. I think you’ll be needing it soon.”
He stopped in his tracks. “Why is that?”
“Because I think this won’t be the last one. He’s going to take more, and he’s going to kill more. That body there on the ground? That might just be the beginning.”
Logan stood there. He looked down at the foot prints and took a set of photographs with a small digital camera. Then he put the camera back in his coat pocket and stared at the cops for a minute. He walked up close to them and got a good look at the body. It wasn’t pretty. He felt bad for the young guy. At that age, he had his whole life in front of him. He didn’t know him, but he knew that no one deserved to go out like that. Date with a girl, parked at a romantic lookout, he must have been feeling good right before that sick bastard ended his life.
Logan’s outlook on life was sometimes optimistic. He tried hard to be that way. Now he was having to try a whole lot harder to see things in a positive light. As far as he knew, the girls were already dead. He searched the dirt lot for tracks, but there were too many. The tire tracks blended together. The Pacific Coast Highway saw thousands of vehicles per day. Tourists from every corner of the earth rent cars and drive the stretch of it because it is one of the most scenic drives in the world.
To say that just a few of them had probably stopped at that particular outlook on that particular day would be putting it lightly.
Of course, some tracks were fresher than others, but to Logan, they all blended together. He left, pulling out onto the highway and driving back into town. He had his first trail.
Now he knew there was a murderer on the loose. Who it was, he had no idea.
He pulled off back at the gas station and bought another large cup of coffee to go. He sat in his car and drank it, letting it burn his tongue and mouth. He was angry. He kept thinking about the footprints. Kept imagining the entire scene as it played out in his head.
He finished the coffee fast and then got out and stretched after tossing it into the trashcan. The sun was starting to come up. The sky was pink. There were still no cars on the road, and the station was empty. He went back inside and stopped at the register. He handed the clerk a pack of gum and then pulled his phone out.
“Have you seen this girl?”
The clerk was a middle-aged guy, thin, scraggly beard and big glasses that made his eyes look about twice their actual size. He stared closely for a moment, adjusting the frame of his glasses. “No.” He said.
Logan believed him. It had been a thoughtful no, not an automatic one. The guy had to think about it before he’d replied. Logan bought the gum.
“Thanks,” he walked out.
He drove to a diner and ordered breakfast. Despite the recent state of affairs, he still had an appetite and he ended up cleaning his plate of the waffle, eggs, and toast the waiter had set before him.
The diner was getting busy by the time he finished. Locals were inside drinking coffee and having breakfast. Conversations were being held. Casual, business, the usual. It was probably like that day in and day out. The guy behind the counter looked bored. The television was playing softly in the background. Logan kept it all out of his mind. He didn’t listen in. He wasn’t interested. He had his own thoughts. He had his own puzzle to solve.
Then the television was turned up. It got loud while the people in the diner got quiet. Logan turned and looked. Everyone’s eyes were glued to the screen. He watched, uninterested at first, until he read the headline.
Two bodies discovered in two grisly crime scenes on the same night. A Pacific Coast nightmare.
Two bodies. They found the girl.
Logan stood up and almost forgot to pay. He kept his eyes on the screen as he fished out the wallet. The television wasn’t giving any names as it was probably much too soon for that. He paid his tab and left, driving back to the crime scene. His phone rang.
He pulled off and stopped in the shoulder lane. He was feeling antsy. “Yeah,” he said. “Two bodies. Tell me.”
The Chief’s stern voice sounded distressed. “It’s not the girl.”
“What?” Logan said.
“It’s not the one he dragged away at the lookout.”
“It’s the girl I showed you?”
“Not her either. This one’s been dead for at least four days. It’s another male.”
“What?” Logan said again.
“When you left the overlook, we went down to the beach. We thought maybe we’d find something down there. Well, we did, but it wasn’t what we had expected. There was a body that had washed up onto the shore. It wasn’t a nice thing to see, Stone.”
“Why are you working with me now, Chief? I thought you didn’t want me to be involved.”
“I didn’t, really, and my men sure as hell still don’t. But I spoke with Officer Walsh and for some reason she thinks you’re a straight shooter like me. She thinks an outsider might be able to put this nasty mess into some kind of perspective. Now I’m thinking we need someone who’s used to this sort of thing. This is a… Peaceful community, detective. We’re not used to this. We don’t like this. And we’d like to see it end as quickly as we can. I don’t want things to get ugly in my town, and I don’t want a big load of the press to show up and start badgering us about why dead bodies are popping up. I don’t want this to get out of control.”
“It’s already out of control, Chief, but if we’re lucky, and if we’re smart – then maybe we can put a stop to it,” Logan said and hung up.
Chapter Seven
He drove back to the lookout. The sky was a deep shade of red, as if blood was seeping out from the clouds. Under the circumstances, it wasn’t pleasant. The color didn’t give him happy thoughts, not right then and there. He put the car into park and hopped out. The police were still there, and there were even more of them than there had been when Logan had left the place.
“This is a police matter, pal,” A skinny one said and held his arms up.
“Private detective Logan Stone,” Logan flashed his card. “I’m working with Chief Walker and Officer Walsh. Where are they?”
The skinny guy shriveled up. It looked like he shrank three inches. “They’re down at the beach,” he said in a defeated voice. “We found another body.”
Logan ignored him and walked past. There wasn’t a smooth trail to the beach. Rather, there were big rocks and boulders and he wedged himself through them and jumped down between the cracks until he hit the sand. He smelled the salt, heard the birds cawing. Seaweed was covering the beach, along with some dead fish.
And a dead body.
Logan walked to it. It was surrounded by police. They had dragged it from the tide and placed it next to a big rock. The swelling of the corpse looked li
ke it had been in the sea for a while. It wasn’t pleasant, although dead bodies never are. This one was especially bad. They were taking photographs of it. The flash was blinding, and Logan could feel his stomach crawling. For a moment, he regretted having eaten a big breakfast. Logan saw Officer Walsh standing some feet away from the body. She wasn’t facing it. Instead, she was watching the rolling tide as it came in.
“Officer Walsh,” Logan said. “I’m sorry to see you again so soon, but thank you for putting in a good word for me with Chief Walker.”
“Don’t mention it,” she said and looked back at him without turning her body. From the profile of her face, her lips looked stern. She was angry. “Not good. This isn’t good at all.”
“Small town with a set of grisly murders. It’s never good, but the press will eat it up. They’re the only ones that feel some sick form of benefit from this.”
“Let’s hope there aren’t more.”
“Murders?”
“Yes.”
Logan paused, considering his words carefully. “I hate to say it, but I think that’s wishful thinking, Walsh. I think we can assume that this is the same person who killed the man in the parking lot up above. After all, as Walker said, this is a nice town.”
“Yes,” she said. “And that means he’s probably not finished. Or there could be more we haven’t even found.”
“Like the girlfriend of the dead fellow up in the parking lot, and like the girl I’m searching for.”
She paused. “What was her name?”
“Brianne Jones,” he said and pulled his phone. He showed Walsh the photograph of her.
Walsh looked at it for a minute. “I’ll remember the face.”
“I can send you a copy.”
“That would be good. Thanks,” she turned and looked out at the sea. “This really isn’t good.”
“Never is when bodies start to pile up. How long you been on the force?”
“A while, Stone. I’m not a rookie. But I haven’t seen stuff like this, and I seriously don’t like it. Not because I’m scared. Because I’m not.”
“I know you’re not scared, no more than I am. You’re angry, like me. I can feel the heat coming off you.”
“Can all private eyes read a person as well as you?”
Logan paused. “I certainly wouldn’t go that far, but thanks. I don’t know if I can read a person especially well. I’m just an average detective in my own eyes. I’m just a guy doing what I’m supposed to. Anyway, who was it?” He waved a hand back toward the corpse.
“We don’t know. He’s so bloated and on top of that, he’s all eaten up by fish with no ID on him. He’s pretty much unrecognizable. We’ll have to find out who is he later.”
“Okay,” Logan said and took a breath. He needed a drink then more than ever.
He walked down the beach a short distance, thinking to himself. He looked back at Walsh, and at the body. This isn’t good. He thought about Brianne Jones. Thought long and hard about her father sitting in his huge ranch house with his wife. Thought about them sitting on their couch, watching the news. Thought about how they must have been dreading something like this. He hoped they hadn’t turned on the TV.
His thoughts were interrupted by a loud ruckus up in the parking lot, followed by engines starting. He hurried up past the rocks and pulled himself up into the chaos. Logan could hear voices.
“Another one. He’s going on a damn spree.”
“Where?” Logan said, but no one heard him. It was too loud. Too many people were talking at once, and it all blended together. He heard the words car crash, Anna Lawson, body.
Then it all happened so fast. The cops jumped into their cruisers and Logan ran to his car. They had already peeled out of the lot and hauled ass onto the California 1 by the time Logan sat down in the driver’s seat. He wondered where Chief Walker was.
He flipped the ignition and the engine came to life, then he slammed it into reverse and spun out in a big wide turn. After shifting the Toyota into drive, he drove fast out of the lot and stayed in hot pursuit of the police cruisers. They turned off the California 1 Highway, and he followed. The road was long and winding, and the sun was rising over the mountains. It looked like a bad place to meet a murderer, and Logan started to feel ticked off just from thinking about the whole thing.
It all kept coming back to his job, though.
Brianne Jones. There was no denying it now. She’d gone missing as a result of this psychopath who was now terrorizing this little beach town. It all fit together and couldn’t be just coincidental. But where was she?
Logan swallowed hard. For a period of time earlier in the morning it had seemed as if the killer was only picking off the men and taking the women with him. What he did with them after, Logan don’t know, and he shuddered to think.
But if he kept them alive, at least for a while, then there was a chance. A small window where Logan could solve the case and rejoice in the outcome being a positive one. He wasn’t going to hold his breath, but he was going to use it as motivation to work overtime.
He had already gone past the deep end. He was head over heels involved in this case. He knew sleep was not going to come until he solved it, for better or for worse. That wasn’t good for his attention. Lack of sleep dulled his senses, but he couldn’t help it. He didn’t have a choice in the matter, and his racing, sleepless mind would always win in the end.
Insomnia was a horrible thing, but at least he knew he wouldn’t miss anything while he was asleep. Whether he would miss something while he was awake due to the exhaustion was another question. It was one he was willing to take a chance on. He couldn’t sleep during this. He couldn’t chance it. Time was of the essence, and it was running out fast.
Logan focused on the road. His mind was already getting fuzzy from the adrenaline and he needed another cup of coffee. He needed a hardcore boost like a defibrillator to the chest. That would do the trick, he thought, although it might be overkill.
The road seemed to go on forever, and Logan had to drive it carefully, so he didn’t veer off the cliff. He checked the clock and then looked back at the road. The cruisers ahead of him put their brake lights on and started inching to a stop. He pulled in close behind them and got out. There was an old guy in the kind of tights bicyclists wear standing there, looking all distraught. His face was rosy, and he looked like he’d been crying. His breathing was heavy, and it looked like he was right in the middle of a massive panic attack. His bicycle was lying on the ground beside him.
Logan got out of the car and walked toward the mess of people. The old cyclist stood there wiping his forehead repeatedly with a damp, yellowed handkerchief. The cops were questioning him, giving him the usual intimidation act Logan had seen so many times from different departments. They were all the same. Some good, some bad. Just like the rest of the population. Chief Walker was standing in front of the guy with his hands on his hips. Ready to listen. Ready to hear the guy’s statement.
The guy’s voice was shaking but he sounded honest. Honest, or a good actor. “I rode by on my bike and just saw it. I ride here every day and of course this is out of the ordinary. I mean, the car was smashed up against the guard rail. The door was open, so I thought someone had gotten out and tried to walk somewhere after having a bad accident. These roads can be so dangerous.”
“And then?”
“I didn’t have to walk far. I looked over the rail and saw…” The man’s voice croaked up and he started to weep.
Lots of people could cry on cue. Logan had seen plenty of it. In general, it wasn’t a sign of good acting. But if he was acting, then the way his forehead wrinkles bobbed up and down as his eyes bulged out of their sockets while his lip twitched like a man who’d gone to hell and back would have made him a contender for major Hollywood awards.
The poor old guy looked like he’d seen a ghost and lived to tell the tale. He wasn’t lying. He was telling the truth, and the cops seemed satisfied enough with his story. So w
as Logan, but he kept quiet because he didn’t want to draw much attention to his presence.
Walsh walked up behind him. He had beaten her to the crime scene. “He found her?” She asked.
“Yeah. He’s clean, or at least I’d bet my life on it.”
“Just a guy passing through on his bike sees a car and sees the body. Where is it?” She asked him.
Logan felt more confident now that Walsh was around. He didn’t have to try to blend in. He could make his presence known and not be given any crap from guys like Richards, the big oaf.
“She’s down in the ravine. I haven’t taken a look yet.”
“Let’s go look now,” she said.
The pair of them followed the rest of the police down to the body. The drop off from the guard rail was steep and everyone had to go down backward, crawling on their hands and knees. Go down forwards, and you’d be eating dirt.
The body was nestled up against a bush. The woman’s face was untouched, and if that was all one could see then maybe they would think she was asleep. If they saw the rest of her, then their minds would quickly change. One of the cops bent over and started to gag. Logan only looked for a moment, and then he turned and closed his eyes, putting his fingers to his forehead and rubbing it as if he had a cracking headache. He tried to forget what he just looked at.
“Why?” Someone asked. “Oh, god, why?”
Logan didn’t like that question when it came to killings like this. He knew there was no point in asking because there was no answer to such a question. There was no reason for this and no motive. That was becoming clear. In this sick string of murders, the only similarity was that they were all random.
And this left him with less hope that Brianne Jones was alive.
“What happens now?” Walsh asked.
Logan shrugged. “We’re sitting ducks. We’ve got a serious killer on our hands who needs to be stopped before more victims start popping up.”
“There are probably already more. We found the body on the beach, who says there aren’t others?”
“I’m inclined to agree with you. If there are, then we’ll find them. In the meantime, we need to worry about future victims. We need to worry about the murders that we can prevent.”