“I got you Alex! Stick em up!”
Alex was startled by Jon jumping out in front of him and fell backwards hitting his head on a rock. The impact of Alex’s noggin smashing into the small boulder let out a hard crack. Jon yelled out,
“Alex!”
Alex touched the back of his head and felt the warm red liquid oozing out of the small wound from the impact. He looked at his fingers dripping with the red crimson and immediately started crying. Jon holstered his cap gun scooping up Alex in his arms and started running back to the house. Their mother was outside hanging laundry when she saw her boys emerge from the woods. Jon screamed,
“Mom! Mom! Alex is hurt!”
She ran over scooping Alex up into her arms and kneeled down to the ground repeating,
“Hon are you okay? Are you okay can you hear me?”
Alex’s face was red hot from sobbing, there were still tears streaming down his face. He stopped crying and stammered,
“I, I, I, I’m fine mom.”
While she was cradling his head she looked at her fingers that were covered in blood and removed a small towel from her apron and put pressure on the wound. She said,
“You’re going to need stiches. For heaven’s sake what were you two doing in the woods? Jon I told you not to play in there!”
Alex looked down at the ground sorrowfully. He stood up on his own, still holding the bloody rag to his head. He looked up at his mother and said pitifully,
“We’re sorry mama. It was my idea.”
Jon looked at Alex and gave a sideways smile for his brother covering for him. With a snarky remark he lifted the cap gun out of the holster pointing the plastic gun at him pulling the trigger with a thunderous crack from the cap and said,
“I got you.”
Suddenly Jon had another flashback of that night outside of the old house in the basement on 2748 River side crossing. It was his gun going off in a thunderous crack. There was so much blood spilling out of Alex’s head. Alex was laying on the lawn, his eyes lifeless. The red liquid pouring out of his fatal exit wound seeping into the green grass. Jon looked down at his brother’s corpse as Alex looked up at him with blood trickling out of the corner of his mouth whispering,
“I got you.”
Jonathon Cratick felt a hand on his shoulder as he snapped back to his current state outside of the precinct. Startled he screamed out “ugh”, as he swiped away Cassandra’s hand off his shoulder and leaned against the wall. He started hyperventilating as he reached inside his coat for a pack of cigarettes. Cassandra said,
“What’s wrong Jon?! Just breathe!”
Jon started pacing back and forth muttering over and over again,
“Shit, shit, shit, shit.”
He wiped a tear from his eye as he reached back into the inside of his coat revealing a flask. He unscrewed the cap taking a large swill and then lit up one of his cigarettes. He slowly exhaled the smoke and looked back at Detective Parsons. She was staring at him mortified as she stammered,
“Are you okay? What was that?”
Jon shook his head as he began walking past her and said,
“Nothing. What are you driving?”
Parsons pointed at a Jeep Cherokee as she hit the unlock button on her key chain. The Jeep chirped as the headlights blinked. She replied,
“That sure didn’t look like nothing!”
Jon muttered,
“I told you I’m fine.”
Detective Parsons opened the vehicle door and got in. Jon climbed in the passenger side and started doing up his seat belt. Cassandra turned to Jon with a look of concern for a moment and then stared at his cigarette in disgust and said,
“Do you mind?”
Jon shrugged his shoulders and said,
“Sorry.”
He pressed the down button control for the window. As the window opened he took another haul of the cigarette and blew out the smoke from his nostrils. Detective Parsons started the engine rolling her eyes as she pulled out of the parking lot and said,
“Okay. Okay fine don’t tell me.”
Jon chuckled as he took another drag of the cigarette and said,
“What? Did you want me to put it out? I’ll put it out.”
Detective Parsons shook her head replying with a sideways smile,
“Unbelievable.”
Jon gestured to throw the cigarette out of the window, then took another puff. Parsons was now coldly staring at him. Jon caught the gaze and lifted his hands as he took another quick puff and threw it out the window. Looking back at her with a smirk he said,
“Don’t like smoking huh?”
Parsons continued driving as she placed her hand on the side of her head, resting her elbow on the window. She glanced at Jon and said,
“You know it’s none of my business, but you swilling out of a flask like that after displaying whatever the hell that was in the parking lot is a sign of alcoholism.”
Jon looked at Cassandra with a half assed smirk and said,
“You’re right. It’s none of your business.”
Jon stared out the window as they drove to the coroner’s office at the morgue. What did Steven do to Alex in that psych ward? How could things have become so messed up? Steven wanted him to talk about it. He knew that’s what he was getting at. He wants to know in detail what happened. Jon felt his rage forming in the pit of his stomach. Sweltering like a red hot fire of wanting to tear Steven limb from limb for what he did to his brother. The guilt started coming back inside, wrenching his stomach, tearing at his insides. Not what Steven did to Alex; what he did to Alex. Jon lowered his head rubbing his face with his hand. He then pulled back his hair and said,
“You know sometimes I wonder why I even became a Detective.”
Cassandra Parsons looked at Jon as she turned at another light. She shrugged her shoulders grinning as she replied,
“I became one because I knew I wanted to help people. Everyone always has their reasons for doing this job. Either way, you have to be somewhat of a mess in order to be in this profession.”
Jon gave a chuckle nodding his head replying,
“Yeah you got that right.”
Parsons the positioned her posture glancing over at Jon. She gripped the steering while a little tighter looking forward back at the road and asked,
“So why did you?”
Jon looked at Detective Parsons for a moment and then back out the window. He could feel her eyes on him and wanted an answer. He sighed still looking out the window and said,
“I told my brother I was going to be one when we were kids.”
Cassandra smiled and said,
“Look at that, moody, broody, Detective Profiler Jonathon Cratick had a soft spot. Hard to believe you were ever a kid.”
Jon let out a genuine laugh looking back at Cassandra and said,
“Of course I was a kid once.”
Parsons was smiling knowing she cheered him up a little bit. She continued,
“So where’d you grow up Jon. Let me guess you were a country boy?”
Jon nodded looking forward out of the jeep replying,
“Yup, born in Gananoque Ontario in Leeds. Graduated high school and never looked back. Got into the police force, became good at being a cop. Took some behavioural science courses at Carleton University and earned myself a Criminology degree. Lived all over this country working as a Detective. Eventually took some training down in Quantico with the F.B.I. and became a Profiler.”
Cassandra nodded her head and said,
“That’s great Jon. So what was Alexander like?”
Jon looked at Parsons shaking his head replying,
“He was my brother. I told you, he went crazy and got shot.”
Parsons shook her head as they pulled into the morgue parking lot. She looked at Jon and said,
“Why does Steven Willis want you to talk about him?”
Jon shook his head saying,
“I don’t know. Who knows what that ps
ycho is thinking in the first place?”
Jon opened the Jeep door and got out. Parson’s opened her door and got out as well as she muttered under her breath,
“Isn’t it your job to try to understand what that psycho is thinking?”
They both walked inside of the morgue and made their way down the white hallway. Jon thought to himself how morgues look all the same. In some weird basement of a building, with some mortician helping make the bodies look neat and presentable. A man was standing at the end of the hall in a white coat with a plastic apron on. He smiled as he outstretched his plastic gloved hand in extension and said,
“Hello, I’m Doctor Russel Henderson, the coroner slash medical practitioner. You must be Detective’s Parsons and Cratick. Chief Ponce said I would be expecting you.”
Cassandra shook Doctor Henderson’s hand replying,
“Yes of course. So I assume he told you we are here to examine the remains of Veronica Stanfield and get a report from you for our profile?”
Doctor Henderson turned around opening the side double doors leading into a bigger room from the hallway corridor as he replied,
“Yes, she was quite a mess when she arrived. As you can see I had to do some…how can I put this….rearranging.”
Jon and Cassandra followed Doctor Henderson into the large room. It was all painted white which always bothered Jon. He thought, why paint a room bright white when you know there is going to be blood and autopsy’s involved? It just seemed like such a ludicrous choice. There were shiny metal cabinets that were along one side of the walls. The ice box, each sliding containers for the bodies. There were several metal table gurneys in rows with corpses on top of them. Their yellow toe tags sticking out from underneath the bright white sheets. The Doctor motioned for them to follow him to the far end of the room. Under the bright florescent lights there was a steel table with tools laid out. Some of them were covered in blood. The doctor motioned his hand out in a swaying like gesture to the table gurney and said,
“Voila, there she is. Like I said some rearranging had to be done.”
Jon looked at Cassandra and rolled his eyes. Most medical practitioners in his experience all had black humor. He guessed it was one way to keep some sanity at this morbid job. They approached the table and saw the victim Veronica, all laid out perfectly with each part severed from her joints and torso. Doctor Henderson had her arranged back to normal form with each severed limb an inch apart from each other. Jon looked in closer at the clean cuts and said out loud as he was thinking,
“The cuts to the joints are clean. Like a hack saw blade had been used.”
Doctor Henderson picked up his clipboard replying,
“Yes that is the same conclusion I came to as well.”
Detective Parsons glanced over the clip board and then back at Jon covering her mouth in disgust. Doctor Henderson smiled at the detective and said,
“A bit squeamish are we?”
Parsons nodded her head replying,
“I can never quite get used to this part of the job.”
Jon picked up some rubber gloves and handed a pair to Cassandra as he snapped them over his hands and wrists. He then carefully started examining the cuts along each joint and said,
“So our killer Steven didn’t look like he was in a hurry cutting up the body. Detective Parsons you were on scene when you arrived to Ms. Stanfield’s house. Did you happen to take photographs?”
Parsons nodded her head as she pulled out her smartphone. She looked up the photos in her file gallery and swiped them open handing the phone over to Cratick. Jon took the phone and started swiping through each photo. The garage had a large pool of blood on the concrete floor. There was photos of the car with the trunk open. Inside of the trunk contained the hefty garbage bags of Veronica’s hacked up body. Jon kept swiping the photos until he saw an angle of a peg board filled with tools. He pinched his fingers onto the screen, swiping them away from each other to enlarge the image of the back drop of the peg board. He lifted the phone towards Detective Parsons and said,
“Does it look like any tools are missing out of place to you?”
Cassandra shook her head and said,
“No?”
Jon replied,
“I doubt Veronica had a hack saw in her garage, which tells me he brought his own disposing body kit. When you arrested Steven Willis on scene, was there a duffle bag in the car? Anything that contained a hacksaw, rope, shackles, knives, anything like that?”
Cassandra looked at Jon perplexed and then raised her eyebrows with a realization as she said,
“No, there wasn’t anything like that?!”
Jon nodded his head looking back down at the body and said,
“Interesting. The profile I created for Steven Willis A.K.A Shawn Campbell shows me he is meticulous, calculated, a planner. It tells me that he would have a murder killing kit. This doesn’t fit.”
Detective Parsons shrugged her shoulders and said,
“Well maybe because of his Disassociate Identity Disorder his other side of him Shawn Campbell isn’t as calculating? Maybe that side of him, Shawn was doing the clean up? Do you think that would perhaps fit the profile?”
Jon nodded his head in agreement for a moment and then shook his head side to side as he said,
“Perhaps? The problem is if he didn’t bring his own murder kill kit; then what did he use to kill Veronica Stanfield and hack her up with? This is obviously the second scene for the body disposal and clean up. He was clearly going to take her to a dump site, which is why he loaded her into the trunk of the car, which would be his third step in the disposal of the body. So where is the initial kill site? Parsons, do you have more photos of any blood that was in the house?”
Detective Parsons swiped through the photos of her phone and pulled up a picture she took of the kitchen. There was a large pool of blood on the floor. Jon studied the photo and used his index finger pointing at the phone saying,
“See the blood spatter on the fridge? See how it isn’t as thick and is almost in a diagonal horizontal spray. This shows me that the Veronica was sliced from behind hitting a major artery. Possibly the throat. The pool of blood on the kitchen floor suggest she was stabbed multiple times with a large knife. She suffered and took minutes to bleed out.”
Parsons nodded looking at the photo and said,
“Okay so Steven Willis killed her in the kitchen. We knew that.”
Jon nodded and continued,
“Most serial killers go into a frenzy like state when they start stabbing their victims multiple times in a rage. It may be possible however Steven Willis wasn’t just present here. He is diagnosed with Disassociate Identity Disorder. I think Steven Willis wanted to kill her as humanely as possible slicing her throat. The multiple stab wounds once she was on the kitchen floor could’ve come from his other side, Shawn Campbell.”
Detective Parsons looked at Jon wide eyed. She flipped through the photos back to the trunk of the vehicle in the garage. She pointed at the body and said,
“The victim’s torso has multiple stab wounds, but it’s hard to tell if her throat was slit due to her head being severed. I think your theory could be correct Jon.”
Jon replied,
“I think Shawn Campbell took over and moved the body to the garage to be disposed of. I think that part of Steven Willis has been taken over in his multiple murders over the years. It makes sense. I think Shawn Campbell is the murderous more dangerous side of Steven’s psyche. Shawn Campbell might have been created during Steven’s adolescence. Protecting him from the savage beatings from his father. The more impulsive, animalistic side of him that that is more sadistic. I noticed it during my interrogation with Steven. He would go back and forth when describing his murders from “I” to “we” when going into details of what he was thinking, feeling and doing. Perhaps Shawn Campbell took over that night during the murder of Veronica Stanfield. When that part of his brain was active and moving the body, chopping the victi
m up, maybe Steven took over again. Maybe Steven Willis subconsciously wanted to be caught?”
Detective Parsons examined the body on the steel gurney and looked back at the operation table with the tools laid out. They were covered in blood in a gruesome display. She shuddered at the sight of it. Doctor Henderson smiled and said,
“I find it fascinating about your Profile about this killer. Your theory seems to stand with my medical report. I concur that she bled out like you had suggested. Judging by the photos of the garage the amount of blood on the concrete floor is post mortem. Usually the human body can lose to about three pints of blood before going into shock. Looking at the photos in the kitchen she lost a substantial amount of about four to five pints. Which was the cause of death. You can see where she was moved to the garage to be hacked up into smaller pieces, there isn’t as much pooling on the floor.”
Jon nodded and said,
“Well now that I have the report we can sign this off and get out of your hair.”
Doctor Henderson handed Detective Parsons the clipboard with a pen and she signed. Jon took the clip board from her and signed the coroner report for cause of death as well. Doctor Henderson looked over the paper work one final time and said,
“Well I think I am done here for the night. I’ll email you a copy of the autopsy report and put her back in the ice box. You two have a great night.”
Jon smiled and said thank you with Cassandra and started heading back down the hallway to the exit. Parsons turned to Jon and said,
“So we didn’t find a kill kit at the crime scene at Veronica Stanfield’s house? What did Steven Willis use to kill her? More importantly where is the murder weapon and the hack saw?”
Profile of the Gemini Serial Killer Page 12