Death Notice

by Lolli Powell

  “Whew!” She collapsed into her chair and fanned herself with the cocktail napkin. “I must be getting old. Where’s the waitress? I need something cold.”

  Hank flagged the waitress down, and they ordered a couple of Cokes. While they waited for the drinks, Jen voiced her concerns to Hank.

  “You might be right,” he said. “Then again, he might just think we’re on a date. Or maybe he doesn’t know what you look like. Or he might be sitting in a car out in the lot waiting for her to come out or outside her house or—”

  “Okay, okay.” Jen held up her hand. “I get your point. Too many unknowns, and besides, it’s too late to worry about it now.”

  Hank stood.

  “I’m going to run out to the car and see what’s going on with the others. Don’t run off with some guy while I’m gone.”

  Terri was still at the bar, talking to the same man. He was about thirty with medium brown hair and a nice smile. He looked harmless enough, yet he fit the general description of Arthur Kelty. She looked around the room and realized that so did at least a third of the men in the place. If only age and build were considered—men could and did dye their hair and shave their heads, after all—that percentage went way up.

  Hank came back to the table. Vic and the deputy had tailed Carpenter to The Palomino; apparently she was a country fan. Al and Jamie were also on the move. They had followed their girl, Molly Setters, to a house in Jefferson. They reported a man had met her at the door, and the two appeared to be on very friendly terms. The others were still at home. Jen glanced at her watch. It was early. The night was young, and a lot could happen between now and dawn.

  ***

  He came awake with a start at the sound of a car horn blaring. Two young women in a car were leaning on the horn, flirting with two men who had just come out of the club. He sat up and shook his head, trying to clear the cobwebs from his brain. He couldn’t believe he’d dozed off. That was stupid and inexcusable. She could have come out while he was asleep and left to go somewhere else, but he had been lucky. Her car was still there.

  The horn sounded again, and he glared at the sluts. The young men were laughing now and arrangements to meet at a nearby diner were being shouted across the lot. Anger boiled inside him. The sluts had succeeded in tempting the men. They would make them feed their appetites, first at the restaurant where they would glut themselves on food and later in the bed where they would sate their carnal appetites with the young men’s bodies. Cannibals, he decided, cannibals and vampires, that’s what they are. No, he amended, succubi. They were like demons that used sex to drain men of their very souls. God, how he hated them!

  He looked at his hands. They were trembling. The noise waking him suddenly like that had left him shaken. He had to pull himself together. He had been so thorough and careful with all of them. He couldn’t afford to make a mistake now and ruin his chance for the biggest trophy of all, the trophy that would be his in just a few days.

  CHAPTER 41

  Jen checked her watch and yawned. It was fifteen minutes after midnight, and Terri was still chatting with the same man. Hank seemed to be having the time of his life even though Jen had informed him twenty minutes earlier that she was done dancing for the night. He sat across the table from her, his fingers and feet tapping in time to the music.

  “I wish she’d decide if she’s going to take him home with her or not,” Jen said. “I’m beat.”

  “Relax and enjoy yourself. Pretend it’s your night off, and you’re out having a good time with that fed of yours.”

  “It’s not my night off, you’re not my dream date—sorry to break it to you—and I’m not having a good time. How can I relax when I can’t take my eyes off that woman over there?” She sipped her third Coke and scrunched up her face. She was starting to feel bloated. “I wonder what’s going on with the others?”

  Hank sighed. “Okay, okay, I can take a hint. I’ll go check in.”

  He was back in a few minutes.

  “Nothing’s gone down yet. Some of the women are still out, like our girl. Some stayed home. Sue Carpenter’s still at The Palomino, and it looks like the Setters girl is shacked up with her boyfriend for the night.”

  Jen felt relief that Al’s target appeared to be protected for the night. At this point, she didn’t care which of them got the killer as long as it wasn’t Al. She cared too much for her partner to want to see him destroy his life by turning vigilante.

  “I need another Coke.” Hank swiveled in his seat to look for their server.

  “I’d hold up on that order, if I were you,” Jen said. “It doesn’t look like we’ll be here long enough for you to drink it.”

  Randall had apparently made up her mind. She and the young man were walking toward the door. Jen and Hank followed the couple to the door and into the lot. Terri and the man stood for a minute, talking quietly. She turned and headed for her car, while he got in a newer model white Outback. Jen thought maybe she’d turned him down after all until they saw the man pull out of his space, stop and wait for Terri to pull out of hers, then fall in behind her. Hank notified the others that she was leaving and taking a friend with her. The Focus pulled out of the lot, the Outback followed, and Jen swung in a discreet distance behind.

  CHAPTER 42

  The Focus pulled into the driveway of Randall’s house while the Outback pulled to the curb just past the driveway entrance. Jen pulled the unmarked to the curb a half block down and cut the headlights, leaving the motor running. The man got out of his car first, but by the time he’d made it to the Focus, Terri was opening her car door. She smiled at the man, closed her door, and then tugged on the handle to make sure it was locked. She turned back to the man and had just taken his outstretched hand when he was struck from behind by an assailant who jumped from the shadows at the corner of the house.

  “Move,” shouted Hank, as Jen threw the unmarked into DRIVE and screeched to a stop in the middle of the street. Jen radioed for assistance and jumped out only seconds behind Hank.

  The young man was on the ground, propping himself on his forearms, groaning and shaking his head. His assailant had Randall backed against her car, slapping and cursing her. He was short, but Jen saw muscles bulging through his clothing. His hair was disheveled and his eyes wild—the look of a mean drunk.

  “Don’t, Jimmy, please don’t.”

  Terri Randall was shielding her face as she begged. Jen realized that she and Hank had just gotten themselves in the middle of a domestic disturbance, not an attempted murder by a serial killer.

  “Police officer!” shouted Hank. “Knock it off, mister, or your butt is going downtown!”

  Jimmy faced them wild-eyed, his fists clenched, as Jen and Hank held their identification where he could see it.

  “Who the hell called you anyway?” he shouted. “Nosy neighbors can’t mind their own business!” He slammed his fist into the roof of the Focus.

  “I’m gonna tell you one more time.” Hank had turned quiet. Jen knew that signaled he was almost at his boiling point. He was standing less than two feet from Jimmy and staring calmly into the man’s face. “Knock it off and knock it off now. You got it?”

  Jimmy stared sullenly into Hank’s face, not answering. Drunk as he was, he apparently recognized that Hank meant business.

  “I’m gonna give you the benefit of the doubt,” Hank said, “and take your silence as a ‘yes.’ Now let’s see some identification.”

  “I ain’t got any.” Jimmy thrust his chin out in defiance.

  “You’re trying my patience.” Hank stepped closer.

  “He’s my ex-husband.” Terri Randall spoke up for the first time. She was still crying, and Jen could see a bruise beginning to form on her cheek. “His name is Jimmy Howard.”

  “You bitch!” Jimmy shouted, moving toward her. “I don’t need you to tell the cops my business.”

  As Jimmy started forward, Hank grabbed him by the right arm and swung him around, while Jen grabbed his left
arm. Together they pinned him against the side of the Focus.

  “You’re under arrest,” Hank said, and the fight was on.

  Jimmy tried to come off the car. He got halfway around when Jen kicked him in the back of his right knee, causing his leg to buckle. He lost his balance and staggered into the side of the car. Hank used the opportunity to slap his cuffs on the man’s right wrist. Jen forced his left arm farther back, and Hank slid the remaining cuff over that wrist, ratcheting both up tight. Jimmy continued to struggle, cursing nonstop, as Hank and Jen forced him over the hood of the car and began patting him down.

  “Don’t hurt him! Please don’t hurt him!”

  Terri had stopped crying and was now as wild-eyed as her ex-husband. She started toward them, and Jen stepped away from Hank and their prisoner to cut her off.

  “Stay out of it,” she warned. “Get back.”

  “Let him go!” she screamed, pushing at Jen. “Jimmy! Please don’t hurt him!”

  Lord deliver us from fools, Jen thought, as she grabbed the woman’s right arm, twisting it around behind her back, pushing her against the side of the car. She had seen it time and again in her years working the street. A man could be beating the daylights out of his wife, his kids, and anyone else within reach, but let the police get the best of him and his loving wife was ready to fight, die, and go to hell to save him. She’d seen it happen even when the couple no longer lived together, as in this case. The destructive relationship often went on for years after the courts had legally ended it.

  A marked unit squealed to a stop, and two uniformed officers from the midnight shift bailed out. Will’s unmarked was only seconds behind. Randall was cuffed, and she and her ex-husband were placed in the back of the cruiser, where they leaned against one another, Randall still sobbing. Jen saw Jimmy kiss his ex on the forehead before she turned away, shaking her head in disgust. She turned her attention to the young man who was sitting on the ground holding his head.

  “How do you feel?” she said. “Do you want us to call an ambulance?”

  “No, no ambulance.” He shook his head and winced. “I’m okay. What was that all about anyway?”

  He started to get to his feet. Will took his arm to steady him.

  “That ‘gentleman’ is the young lady’s ex-husband,” Jen said. “He apparently didn’t care for her choice of new friends. It looks like you picked the wrong woman to go home with tonight.”

  “Figures. That’s the kind of luck I have.” He rubbed the back of his head. “What did he hit me with?”

  “I think his fist,” Jen said. “You have the right to press charges. We have some of our own on him, but you can file assault.”

  The man shook his head.

  “I just want to go home. I don’t want anything more to do with those two.”

  “I can understand that, but if they fight the charges we have on them, you might still have to testify as to what occurred here tonight.”

  “Yeah, sure, okay.”

  Jen pulled out her notebook.

  “I’ll need your name and contact information, and I’ll need to see some ID.”

  As he handed his driver’s license to her, the cruiser pulled off with the prisoners. Hank came over to where they were standing. He was grinning.

  “Just like old times, wasn’t it, partner?”

  “Yeah,” Jen said. “Now I know what I’m missing over in detectives. Absolutely nothing.”

  Hank laughed and turned to the man.

  “I don’t believe I got your name.”

  “Sam Heinlein. I want to thank you two for showing up when you did.”

  “No problem. We’d been out ourselves and just happened to be driving by.”

  “I guess that should teach me,” Heinlein said. “Next time I meet a girl at a bar and she invites me home, I’ll get letters of recommendation first.”

  Jen handed back his license.

  “Can I go now?”

  “You can,” Jen said, “but I think you’ll have to come get your car in the morning. Not only have you been drinking, you were hit in the head. I still think you should get checked out at the hospital just to be sure, but whether you do or not, we can’t let you get behind the wheel. We’ll give you a ride home.”

  Heinlein grudgingly agreed, and Hank led him to the unmarked, then got behind the wheel. Jen turned to Will.

  “Thanks for showing up so quickly.”

  “I would have done it for anyone,” Will said, the corners of his mouth turning up in that sexy way of his.

  Jen laughed. They both knew he’d stayed in their area when he’d heard Randall was on her way home because he worried about Jen’s safety. It was a relief that his concern for her and her resistance to it had become a laughing matter to them.

  “I guess that takes care of our surveillance for the night,” she said after she and Hank had dropped Heinlein at his apartment building. “Unless Randall bonds out, she’s as safe as she can be. I suppose we should just roam for extra coverage.”

  “Beats sitting in one place,” Hank said. “Even if she does bond out, I doubt we have to worry about Randall. If the killer was following her, he’s bound to have been scared off by what happened.”

  Jen held her wristwatch up to the streetlight. It was a quarter till two.

  “Let’s head for the ranch, Tonto. We can fill out the arrest sheets and get a cup of coffee before we head back out.”

  Hank nodded and started to key the mike to report that they were on their way to the jail when Vic Hensley’s voice came over the radio, his tone low but urgent.

  “This is Zebra 5. Is there a unit in the area of the 800 block of Tenth? We’ve got a subject on foot who just came out of the bushes on the west side of the target’s house.”

  Jen remembered from the earlier briefing that Sue Carpenter lived in a one-family house at 812 Tenth Avenue. It was set back several feet from the sidewalk. A row of tall, thick bushes ran along the property line on the west side. They could easily conceal a person who didn’t want to be seen.

  “This is David 10,” Jen responded. “ETA, three to four minutes.”

  “Rover 2,” Will’s voice crackled over the mike. “We’re about a mile from you. Where do you want us?”

  “Both units, step on it and advise when you get in the area,” Vic said. “We’ll keep an eye on him.”

  Lonnie’s voice came over the radio calling control on the open channel. He advised the dispatcher to get four marked units moving that way to set up a quadrant in the four-block square area around Carpenter’s house. A code had been worked out with control and the midnight crew in advance so that anyone monitoring the police radio’s open channel would not realize what was going on.

  Will notified Hensley that he and Don were in the area. Vic directed them to a cross street west of Carpenter’s house, which was third from the corner. Vic wanted the agents to come in from the side, one nearer the front and one nearer the rear of the house, covering the area on the other side of the bush line in case the subject managed to slip through.

  “David 10, Zebra 5 to David 10,” Hensley called and Jen acknowledged. “You and your partner come in on foot from Eleventh and cover the rear. We’ll come in from the front, one on either side of the house and flush him toward you.”

  “We’re nearly there now. Do you have a description on the subject?”

  “Dark clothing, approximately six feet, medium build. Probably male. It’s too dark to tell much else. He’s standing in the shadow of the bushes and appears to be watching the target’s residence.”

  “What about Carpenter?” Hank cut through an alley that ran between Eleventh and Twelfth in the nine hundred block. “Find out what her status is.”

  “Zebra 5, is the target inside the house?”

  “That’s affirmative. She went inside approximately fifteen minutes ago, alone. Lights are still on downstairs.”

  “It’s him!” Hank said, his voice rising in excitement. “I’m betting on it. He’s h
iding in the bushes waiting for her to go to bed so he can break in.”

  Jen knew he was right. She felt it as surely as he did, and she tensed in readiness for what lay ahead. This was their chance, maybe their only chance, to put an end to the killings. They couldn’t afford to blow it.

  She wondered what Al was thinking as he listened to the radio traffic.

  ***

  The man who used to be Arthur Kelty stealthily stretched first one leg, then the other. He’d grown stiff standing in the blind he had chosen for himself in the bushes. The time was nearing. His prey was still awake and alert, but he knew it wouldn’t be long now. She was probably exhausted from her night on the town and would be settling in soon.

  He’d felt his pulse begin to race when he saw her come out of the club, her firm young behind wiggling provocatively as she crossed the lot. Then he’d realized there was a man walking beside her, talking to her. He’d gripped the steering wheel tightly, the blood rushing to his head making him feel dizzy, and prayed. Not now! Not after all this waiting! She couldn’t—she mustn’t—take that man home with her.

  His prayers had been answered. She and the man had exchanged a few words at her car, the man had kissed her, first lightly but then pressing closer, trying to take things to the next level. Tease that she was, she’d pushed him away. The man who used to be Arthur Kelty had been disgusted with the way she’d led the man on, dangling the pleasures of her flesh in front of him, but then denying him satisfaction. He’d been filled with hatred as he followed her home, his imagination running wild with the thoughts of what he would do to punish her. And now, finally, it was almost time.

  In the distance, he heard a dog bark. He took a few deep breaths in an attempt to steady his nerves and flexed his fingers, anticipating the feel of her warm flesh. Then he froze. There had been a sound that didn’t belong in the night. It had been ever so slight, but he knew it wasn’t his imagination. His finely honed senses were those of the hunter, and he knew he had heard something that signaled danger.