by B. B. Hamel
“Guy we’re looking for goes by CGK.” I glanced back at her. “Cam Girl Killer.”
“Clever,” she said.
“Didn’t choose that, either.” I kept walking, breaking the twig into pieces as I went. It crumbled under my fingers. “Delia Walters was his fourth victim. There’ve been nine total now.”
“Five more in a year?” She whistled low. “That’s a lot.”
“Then you probably can guess why we’re here.”
“You think that message is from him? The CGK or whatever you call him?”
I stopped walking and faced her. “I’ve been obsessing about this guy for the last year. I’ve read everything, been at every crime scene. I’ve been close enough to smell the guy’s fucking shampoo. I know he left that note up there. The real question is, why the hell would he bother?”
“Doesn’t fit the profile,” she said, echoing my comment.
“Doesn’t fit at all.” I watched as she glanced away toward the forest, and wondered how much I could trust her. I’d been involved in this investigation long enough to know that locals were locals—they cared about their community and generally meant well, but more often than not, they fucked things up. We’d had too many leaks over the last few months, and if it weren’t for some incompetent goddamn detective in Houston, I would’ve caught the bastard already.
Starch seemed okay so far. I hoped she stayed that way.
“What can I do here, Agent? That girl needs protection, I’m guessing.”
“That’d be a start.” I frowned and squinted up at the sky. “He’s here in town somewhere. CGK likes to live close to his victims for a while. I’ll give you a good sketch of him. Pass it around town, especially to any cheap motels.”
“Won’t that scare him off?”
I shook my head. “Not that easily, it won’t. No, he’ll make his move, whether we’re here or not.” I looked back at her and tossed the remaining bit of the twig down into the long grass. “Me and CGK, we’ve got a thing going.”
I walked back to the house before she could speak. I heard her follow, stomping hard in the dead leaves and grass. I shoved my hands into my pockets and frowned at the ground, thinking about that letter, sent straight to my office.
And part of me knew one thing without a doubt: I was the reason CGK wanted to kill Rose.
“I’m going to talk to the girl,” I said over my shoulder. “Send me over everything you have.”
“Where are you two staying?”
“Foylestown Inn.”
She laughed softly. “Right in town. It’s a nice spot.”
“Bureau isn’t cheap when it comes to lodgings.”
“Guess that’s my tax dollars at work.”
I stopped on the porch and turned back to her. She stood lower than me, still in the grass, and had to crane her neck slightly. I was a tall guy, over six feet, and she was average height at best. I practically loomed.
“Tell me something, Starch. Are we going to get along?”
She chewed on that. “I think we might.”
“I want to catch this motherfucker. He’s gotten away from me one too many times. If I’m going to do it here, I need your total cooperation.”
She spit to the side. “It’s my jurisdiction. It’s my town.”
“I don’t give a damn. You’re going to play this my way if you want a chance at keeping Rose alive.”
“From where I’m standing, it seems as though you’ve let this guy kill with abandon this last year.”
I balled my hands into fists and for one second imagined splitting her head open against the railing. I could picture the thick blood drip down the wood and onto the steps below, her gasping breaths, her ragged chokes.
“Play my game, Starch.”
“I’ll see about that.”
I turned away. I wasn’t getting any more from her, and I knew I was close to losing my temper. I walked to the back door, threw it open, and stepped inside.
The two uniformed cops looked up at me. I nodded to them and headed upstairs. Fuckers, let them wonder.
Cal stood in the hallway looking at the phone. “You good?” he asked, looking at my expression.
“Fine. That detective pushed back.”
“They always do.”
“Still. Pissed me off.”
“Easy.” He put his phone away. “Girl’s in there. Says she wants to talk to you.”
I relaxed a touch. “All right.”
He stared at me and wanted to say something, and I could only imagine what it was. I didn’t need to hear, and he didn’t need to speak. He nodded instead and left.
I lingered outside of Rose’s room, eyes closed. I pictured her sister in the last video I’d watched of her, gyrating her hips. Poor, dead fucking Delia.
She was gone, her throat cut, her wrists bound behind her back. Left like trash.
But Rose was still here, and I wasn’t going to lose another girl.
I opened the door and stepped inside.
2
Rose
The young FBI agent came back into the room and stood by the door staring like he wanted me to get up and strip. It was totally unnerving, but for some reason it was better than his partner had been. That guy talked just like all the other cops did, factual and stilted, like he wanted to hold the world at bay with logic.
This one looked like he was present, fully present, and hated every second.
“How’s it going out there, Agent?” I asked, desperately trying to break the silence. I ran my fingers over the quilt my grandmother stitched for my twentieth birthday, the last thing she’d ever made me.
“Getting the lay of the land.” He relaxed a touch and leaned his head against the doorframe. “Call me Nick.”
“Okay, Nick. Call me Rose.”
“How much do you know about what happened to your sister, Rose?”
I stared down at my feet. I didn’t know a lot, and that was on purpose. I’d read the stories in the media, saw the comments on the articles, dumb bitch had it coming and dirty whore, who cares, one less slut and bet she gave that guy one great night before he cut her up lol and a million other horrible things. I had to stop reading after a while, and so my knowledge of the case stopped growing.
But I got the basics. She was murdered, her throat cut, her clothes stripped, and left in the middle of a wooded area miles away from her home.
Sometimes, at night, I dreamed about what it must have been like, that final ride to nowhere. I imagined she was still alive, sick and stuck and alone.
I’d wake sweating and have to scream into my pillow to get the images out of my head.
“She was murdered. It was pretty ugly.” I spoke the words quietly.
“That’s right. She was murdered.” He stepped toward me and I looked up at him. Dark eyes flashed back at me, and for a second I felt a stab of fear—but I didn’t need to be afraid of an FBI agent. He was supposed to be here to help me. “Killed by a man we call the Cam Girl Killer. CGK.”
“What?” I blinked a few times. “Are you serious?”
“That detail stayed out of the press. I made sure of it.” He kept looking at me with that intense gaze and I almost wanted to tell him to get out of my room. “He’s a serial killer, been active for a few years. Your sister was his fourth victim, spread out over four years, but recently he’s been accelerating and changing his habits. I don’t know what’s going on with him, but whatever’s going on in there—” He gestured at my bathroom. “That’s not normal.”
“You think a serial killer murdered my sister and now he wants to murder me?”
He gave me a strange, lopsided smile. “That’s about it, yeah.”
“Why?” I shook my head and felt dizzy. “I mean, that’s insane.”
“I know.” He sat down next to me, his thigh touching mine. I should’ve told him to move, but the sudden warmth was strangely comforting. He was a big guy, very handsome, with a square jaw and stubble on his cheeks. He was muscular, but still
slim and athletic, and didn’t look like all the others, not at all. It wasn’t just his clothes, either, though he wasn’t dressed like a stereotypical fed. It was the way he held himself, the way he looked around, like he was painfully aware of absolutely everything.
“You said that handwriting on the mirror. That was really his?”
“He must’ve broken in here last night.”
A horrible chill ran down my spine. “Why didn’t he kill me?”
He looked away. “He likes to taunt his victims.” I got the feeling he was leaving something out. Before I could push, he said, “I think last night was a test. He wanted to send a message first. It’s part of his profile.”
“His profile? I think I’ve read about that sort of thing in, like, crime books. I didn’t know that was real.”
He smiled a little. “It’s very real. We have detailed profiles on all the serial killers that we’re aware of.”
“So I’m part of his profile, then?”
His smiled vanished. “No, Rose, not at all. Until now, the CGK has only ever killed cam girls, and in a very particular way.”
“How?” I asked, feeling my feet go numb as he stared at the floor and laced his fingers together.
“Cuts their throat,” he said. “Right across their voice box.”
I felt like throwing up. I already knew that, but hearing it from him made it worse somehow, like that sicko got some pleasure from murdering my sister in a highly specific way. I hated it, hated that guy, and wished I could do something, anything, to bring her back—or to stop him.
“I guess that’s what happened to Delia.”
“That’s right,” he said softly. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said that. I’m sure you’re tired of talking about this again.”
I shook my head. “You know, I barely remember it the first time. I know I spoke to police, but—it’s like gap in my brain.”
“Trauma does that,” he said. “It takes something from you. Sucks it out and sends it away, and never quite stops.”
I chewed my lip and stared at him. That description matched how I felt exactly—like a vacuum had sucked up a part of me and sent it spinning out into space, and I knew that part was still there, out there somewhere, but I’d never get it back again.
I stood up abruptly and walked across the room to the dresser. It had been my gramma’s along with most of the stuff in this house. I hadn’t been able to get new furniture, mostly because I couldn’t afford it, but also because the house would’ve felt like something else if I got rid of her stuff, and I wasn’t ready for that. Maybe I wanted to hold on to something while I still could, even if so many other parts of me were missing.
“What do I do now?” I asked. “He’s out there and he’s coming for me.” I turned to face him and tried not to let my fear show.
I was doing a real shitty job, I knew.
His eyes moved down my body briefly then met my gaze. “I actually wanted to talk to you about that.”
I tilted my head. “I should get out of town, right? I can find somewhere to go. Witness protection, right?”
“You could do that,” he said, nodding slowly. “And if that’s what you wanted, I’d make it happen. We could relocate you, change your name, all that good stuff. You’d be free, or as free as you’d ever be until we catch the guy.” He stood slowly and it felt like a shadow breaking free from a mountain. “But you’ll always look over your shoulder. You’ll always wonder if maybe, maybe, he’s still coming for you—maybe he found you, and he’s going to finish what he started.”
“Why would you say that?” I asked, stepping back and bumping against the dresser. It rattled and an old porcelain angel fell over, rolled to the edge, and dropped to the carpet. It didn’t break.
“Because I want you to help me catch him.”
I blinked then barked a horrified laugh. “What the hell can I do?”
“Stay in this house and let me stay with you.”
My laughter died on my lips. “Bait,” I said, understanding right away.
He nodded. I respected that he didn’t try to hide it. “It’s our best bet,” he said. “Even with me here, he’ll still come. Hell, I think he’ll be twice as likely to come if I’m around.”
“Can you stop him?”
“You’re damn right I can. Help me, Rose.”
I turned and walked to the window, heart racing. This was insane. I wanted to get the hell away from here, and the idea of starting a new life was almost appealing—I could choose my name, dye my hair, make new friends, try to be someone other than the girl with the murdered sister. Everywhere I went, Delia’s ghost followed me, but I knew I couldn’t outrun it.
I could cut my bangs and wear new clothes but Del would always be dead.
“That doesn’t sound like regulation FBI,” I said, staring at the windowsill. Dirt and dust gathered at the edges.
“It’s not. My partner will be pissed and that detective will push back. But if you’re on board and you agree to it, I’ll stay here in the house with you. We’ll get some extra protection too, just to be safe.”
“And then what?” I turned back to him, trying to keep my breathing under control.
“And then we wait for him to show himself, and take him down forever.”
His eyes were dark and he ran a hand through his thick hair and I wanted to yell at him, scream at him, run away, jump from the window—and knew I wouldn’t do any of those things, because no matter how horrible he was for asking, I knew Del would’ve said yes in a heartbeat.
I squeezed my eyes shut and thought about roaming the woods out there in the summer, sticker bushes scratching long lines down my skinny legs, and Del laughing as she picked wild flowers and mashed them into a bouquets before throwing the whole mass at my face. We used to play tag between the trees, and when I fell one morning when I was nine and broke my wrist, she kept me calm and got me home.
We weren’t always close and there were fights. We were sisters, after all, and she was a few years older. But I loved her, loved her so much it hurt. She was the spirited one, like Gramma always said. She was the wild one. It drove mom and dad crazy, but they always favored her, the wayward Del.
“I’ll do it,” I said.
He didn’t look happy. If anything, he seemed pained. “Are you sure?”
“I’m sure.”
“All right then.” He turned to the door. “This part’s going to fucking suck.”
I smiled a little as he left and followed him downstairs. Nick’s partner, Cal, sat at the table with the two cops, all three of them drinking tea in silence.
“Gotta talk,” Nick said. “On the porch. Where’s Starch?”
“On the phone out front,” Cal said and stood. He barely glanced at me. The other two acted like I didn’t exist. I felt naked and invisible all at once.
“Come on.” Nick headed to the front door and I trailed after him with Cal bringing up the rear. The two cops stayed where they were. They knew they weren’t needed.
Detective Starch stood out among the cars with her cell to her ear. She was listening more than talking, and the three of us watched her until she glanced over, frowned, said something, and hung up. She walked over, arms crossed, looking annoyed. She was a tough-looking woman, but she’d been nice to me all day, and I had a strange amount of trust for her.
Maybe because she was the first person to be kind to me all afternoon. Human emotion and a little bit of warmth went a long way.
“What’s up?” she asked.
“Rose and I have a request,” Nick said, glancing at his partner. “And you’re not going to like it.”
Cal’s eyes narrowed. “What’d you do?” he asked, then looked at me. “What’d he do?”
“I want to stay here with Rose,” Nick said.
Cal and Detective Starch spoke at the exact same time. “No, absolutely not,” Cal said, and Detective Starch said, “Over my dead fucking body you are.”
Nick held up his hands. “I kn
ow this is a little out there, but—”
“Out there is putting it mildly,” Detective Starch said. “This is a single, young, traumatized girl, and you’re the goddamn fed assigned to her case. You’re not staying in her house.”
“Detective’s right,” Cal said, glaring like he wanted to rip off Nick’s skull. “This is inappropriate, even for you.”
“He’ll come,” Nick said, staring at his partner. “You know it. You read that letter.”
“Nick,” Cal growled.
“What letter?” Detective Starch asked.
“Let me stay here,” Nick pressed. “If I’m here, and she’s here, he’ll come. And when he comes, we’ll take him down. Come on, Cal. You have to know this is our best bet. He’s been getting wild for a while, and soon he’s going to break completely. Once that happens, he’ll go to ground, and it might be years before he resurfaces, if ever. Come on. You know that happens.”
Cal grunted then turned and stalked down to the other end of the porch. He stomped his foot like a toddler and turned back, hands in fists. “Fuck, Nick,” he said.
“Are you seriously considering this?” Detective Starch stormed up onto the porch. “Absolutely not. No way. This isn’t happening.” She faced down Nick and although he was like a foot taller, she seemed like she was a giant. “This is my goddamn town.”
I put a hand on her shoulder. I didn’t know what came over me, but as soon as I touched her, she turned around toward me and I saw the rage, the anger, the confusion in her eyes—and it seemed to melt away when she met my expression.
“I want to do it,” I said. “For my sister.”
“Sweetie, you can’t. You don’t know what you’re signing up for. These guys want to dangle you out there like bait.”
“I won’t let her—” Nick started, but I interrupted him.
“It’s worth it,” I said. “I know I’m bait. He told me so upstairs. I understand that this might go all wrong, and I might end up dead, but you know what? If it means catching the man that killed Delia and all those other girls, I’ll do it.”
Detective Starch looked distraught. She stared at me with pure sadness and pity in her eyes, and that only made me angry. I didn’t need her pity, I didn’t need her sadness—I didn’t give a damn what she thought of me. Maybe I was naive and stupid for making this call, but it was my call to make, and I was going to do it for Del. For my dead sister.