THE PERFECT HOUSE

by Blake Pierce

  “What’s that?” Beatty asked.

  “I don’t know how much the captain read you guys in. But my father—you know, the notorious serial killer…”

  “We’re aware,” Nettles said drily.

  “Well, he told another serial killer he’s been in contact with that he wants our family to be reunited again.”

  “How did that calm you down?” Beatty asked. “That would freak me out.”

  “He didn’t say he wanted to butcher me,” she noted, careful to only share the bare minimum necessary to make her point. “He said he wanted to reunite. That distinction was enough to help me relax a bit. And that’s all it took for me to crash hard.”

  “Whatever works, I guess,” Nettles said, clearly not convinced. “So what do we have on the agenda for today? Because I was thinking it couldn’t hurt to get this building a few additional exterior cameras; maybe place them across the street.”

  “Actually I had a different plan,” Jessie told him. “I was thinking of going in to work today.”

  Though she knew she shouldn’t have, Jessie got enormous pleasure from watching both officers’ jaws drop wide open.

  *

  She got the same endorphin rush an hour later.

  That was when she repeated her request to Captain Decker in his office and got a similar slack-jawed reaction.

  “You want to do what?” he demanded as Ryan shifted uncomfortably on the couch beside her.

  “Look,” she said calmly. “I can’t just hole up in my apartment for days on end. I’ll go stir-crazy. Besides, I’m a sitting duck there, just waiting for him to show up.”

  “I thought you said you’d safety-proofed the place—nothing listed in your name, no unit number, mail sent to a P.O. box, circuitous route to get there, cameras everywhere, multiple security systems.”

  “All that’s true,” she acknowledged. “But I’m still just sitting in a two-room box, stewing in my own anxiety. Why not let me be productive and work on the Penelope Wooten case? Then I’m not going crazy and I’m doing some good. Besides, like I said, I’m not sure Thurman even wants me dead. I think he may just want to reenter my life.”

  “Yeah, “Ryan interjected, “but it’s not like he’s some absentee father who just wants to take you to a ballgame. His version of ‘reentering your life’ might consist of abducting and torturing you.”

  “I didn’t get that vibe from my conversation with Bolton Crutchfield,” Jessie said.

  “You didn’t get that vibe?” Captain Decker repeated, borderline apoplectic. “You want me to release you back to work based on a vibe?”

  “You weren’t there, Captain,” Jessie insisted, cautious not to share the true source of her confidence in her temporary safety. “Crutchfield made it pretty clear that he thought my father was looking for some kind of heartfelt reunion.”

  It was a fib, to be sure, but one she doubted the captain would follow up on. Ryan, however, was a different story.

  “He’s a serial killer, Jessie,” he said, a perplexed look on his face. “He killed your adoptive parents. The idea that he just wants to reconnect in some genial, unthreatening way is…hard to accept.”

  “Look,” Jessie conceded, “I’m not saying he wants to take me to Disneyland. I’m just saying that the combination of his intent being unclear and me climbing the walls if I can’t do something constructive with my time justifies putting me back on the case.”

  Both men still looked unconvinced. But she sensed an opening and pressed.

  “I would be surrounded by cops, Captain. Ryan would be there. So would Brady Bowen from West L.A. Station. Officer Beatty could tag along as my shadow. And we’d be in the Palisades, far from my usual jurisdiction. I’d probably be safer out there for the day than here. Come on; let me help solve this thing. There are two kids without a mother today. If I can help bring the person who did it to justice, you’ve got to let me try.”

  Decker scowled at her but she could see in his eyes that he was softening. After a moment, he spoke.

  “Update her on the case, Hernandez,” he muttered reluctantly.

  “Sir,” Ryan said,” I just want to go on the record as saying I think this is a terrible idea.”

  “Noted. We’re full up with terrible ideas today. Proceed with the update.”

  “Yes sir. First thing, we had to release Gray Longworth last night. He made bail and we couldn’t keep him locked up unless we formally charged him with something substantial and we don’t have enough to do that yet. But he’s being watched to see where he goes now that he’s out.”

  “Where are you thinking he might go?” Jessie asked.

  “I’m not sure,” he admitted. “But I can tell you one place he won’t go—to dump the murder weapon. We found it yesterday.”

  Jessie couldn’t hide her surprise.

  “Where was it?”

  “Funny you should ask. It was just off the running trail, not far from the edge of the Wooten property. An officer found it when he was asking other runners if they’d seen him the previous morning. No one had. Longworth claims he went the other way, up the Los Liones trail, rather than the more heavily trafficked East Topanga Fire Road, where the knife was found. We have no way of verifying or disproving that as of yet.”

  “Any luck with the knife?” Jessie asked. “Maybe a nice print or two?”

  “Nope. It had been wiped clean. It was also doused in some bleach-like substance. So there wasn’t even any blood residue on it. The only way we could verify it was the knife used was because the puncture wounds matched.”

  “Maybe the CSU folks can ID the brand of bleach,” Jessie suggested. “That might help.”

  “They already did. It’s a fairly obscure brand called Green Clean. It’s supposed to be more eco-friendly. We thought that could narrow down our list of suspects. Even in a place like Pacific Palisades, it’s hard to come by.”

  “Did the Wootens have it?” Jessie asked.

  “No,” Ryan said. “We looked everywhere.”

  “That’s interesting,” Jessie mused. “It suggests that even if this was a crime of passion, the cover-up wasn’t. The killer had to take the weapon to another location to clean it, then dump it on the trail. Has anyone checked the Longworth house to see if they use it?” Jessie asked. “It was found on the trail, right? It follows that if Gray is our killer, he could have wiped it down and taken it on his run so he could dump it.”

  “It’s definitely a possibility,” Ryan agreed. “That’s part of why we have someone on him; in case he tries to dump a bottle he hid somewhere. The house search turned up nothing.”

  “So where do we go from here?” Jessie asked.

  “I was thinking we go back and talk to the wronged wife, Eliza Longworth.”

  “So now you’re starting to share in my doubts about her?” Jessie asked, unable to keep the triumphant tone out of her voice.

  “I didn’t say that,” Ryan argued. “I just figured we should talk to her when she isn’t drugged up in a hospital. Maybe she won’t seem so sympathetic when she’s not in bed in a gown.”

  “I didn’t find her all that sympathetic when she was in the gown,” Jessie said.

  “Wow, you really have it in for her, don’t you?” Ryan marveled.

  “I just think that a woman wronged by both her husband and her best friend might have an ax to grind. I know I was pretty pissed when I found out my husband was cheating. I’d cut her a little more slack if she just admitted to it and didn’t play the martyr.”

  “Well,” Ryan said, “maybe she’ll own that a bit more when we talk to her today. I’m also hoping she can give us a little more insight into her husband. Somehow I don’t think she’ll be all that eager to protect his secrets after what he’s done.”

  “There’s that too,” Jessie agreed.

  “All right, you two,” Captain Decker said, wrapping things up. “You can discuss strategy more on the way out there. God knows you’ll have enough time. And you don’t have to
take Beatty with you. Hernandez, you and the detective from West L.A. should suffice. Now get out of here. I have other meetings.”

  He stood up and ushered them out of the office, his concerns about Jessie’s well-being now taking a backseat to staying on schedule. They walked out into the bullpen as the door slammed behind them.

  “Bathroom break and head out in five?” Ryan suggested brusquely.

  “Sounds good,” Jessie said. “I’ll meet you in the main lobby.”

  As he walked off, she couldn’t help but notice the chill between them, something she’d never felt before.

  CHAPTER TWENTY SIX

  For the first half of the trip to Pacific Palisades, they drove mostly in silence.

  Jessie was happy for it, as she was navigating a complicated confluence of emotions. Part of her felt surprisingly light and cheery under the circumstances. She realized that was almost entirely due to the knowledge that her father wasn’t an active threat to her safety, at least not for another ten hours.

  With that in mind, she was able to keep her positive attitude. That is, as long as she didn’t allow her thoughts to drift to the murder of her parents or to Xander’s accusation: that she only became a profiler to rein in her own thirst for blood.

  The truth was that this wasn’t the first time that notion had entered her head. On more than one occasion she’d asked herself why she felt the need to work in a field where she interacted regularly with vicious, amoral murderers.

  Her answer had always been that she had seen one up close, suffered at his hands, and didn’t want others to go through the same thing. But somewhere, deep down, she’d always wondered if that was an excuse to loiter in this dark world.

  There were, after all, other ways to help those who had survived brutal crimes. She could have become a victims’ advocate or a mental health counselor or a criminal prosecutor. They all fought the good fight on behalf of victims. And yet she had chosen a career that required her to get into the minds of the most deviant killers around.

  She had always believed it was because she had some special insight into how to stop them. But was it really because she felt a special kinship to them; because she understood them in a way most people didn’t?

  Jessie shook the thought from her head, deciding it was preferable to direct her thoughts elsewhere, even if that meant her attention drifted to the iciness that had developed between her and Ryan. She knew he was annoyed with her take on Eliza Longworth. But she sensed that wasn’t the main reason he was troubled.

  Even if Captain Decker hadn’t picked up on it, he clearly knew that she wasn’t being fully forthcoming about why she wanted to be working this case at all. Finally, unable to contain the roiling thoughts in her head, she spoke.

  “Just spit it out,” she demanded, louder than she’d intended.

  “What?” he asked, startled by the sudden break in the stillness between them.

  “You don’t think I should be working the case.”

  “I thought I stated that pretty clearly back at the station,” he pointed out.

  “Yeah, but not for the same reason Decker didn’t. You don’t buy my explanation.”

  He looked over at her, sizing her up quickly before returning his eyes to the road.

  “Are we being real here, Jessie?” he asked. “Are we at the point in our working relationship where we can be straight with each other without worrying about bruised feelings?”

  “We are,” she told him with certitude.

  “Okay, then. You’re right. I don’t buy your story for one second. I believe you might be going stir-crazy in that apartment. That definitely tracks with what I know about you. But there is no way in hell you believe your father is only after a family reunion and means you no harm. There is a big, honking piece of information that you have—that you’re not sharing—which makes you sure he’s not coming after you. Otherwise, you’d be sitting on your couch with a gun pointed at your front door.”

  “I still don’t have a gun,” she noted petulantly, “thanks to the bureaucratic stylings of the Los Angeles Police Department.”

  “Don’t deflect,” Ryan countered. “You wanted to be real. This is me being real. You don’t have to tell Decker. But don’t you think I deserve to know what changed? Your parents were murdered less than two days ago. And yet, you look as untroubled as I’ve seen you since that day I lectured in your grad school class. Something has changed.”

  Jessie sat quietly for several seconds, turning over his words in her head. Finally, she came to a decision.

  He’s right. I owe him the truth. I just have to trust that he won’t burn me.

  “He left me a tape,” she said softly.

  “What?”

  “Xander Thurman. I found a videocassette addressed to me in my parents’ condo. I stashed it and brought it back here. I finally got to watch it last night.”

  Ryan looked like he had a million questions for her but finally settled on just one.

  “What was on it?”

  “I’ll give you the short version because I’m still having issues processing the long version. Basically, he wants me to join him and become some kind family-style, super-serial-killing squad. He thinks the world needs a little unnatural selection and he’s decided the Thurman brood should take up the task. I guess he thinks that I’m genetically predisposed to be like him. In fact, he basically said the only reason I became a profiler was so I could get up close to death and still be seen as normal.”

  “Okay,” Ryan said slowly. “First—that is full-on psycho talk. Second—I don’t see why you’re more relaxed after having heard it.”

  “Because he gave me a deadline. I’m supposed to e-mail him to let him know if I’m in by tonight at eight p.m., which means that until then, I’m reasonably confident he won’t try to murder me. So I’ve got that going for me, which is nice.”

  “Any chance of tracing the e-mail?” Ryan asked, notably not even addressing the idea that she might say yes.

  “Unlikely. It’s a generic Gmail account. He could look at my response from any library or internet café and be gone in two minutes. He could use an internet-enabled burner phone. He wouldn’t have come up with this method without having thought it through.”

  “So we’ll think of another way to catch him,” Ryan said optimistically. “After all, we’ve got a full ten hours to figure this out.”

  Jessie felt an enormous, unexpected sense of relief at his words. She was glad to no longer carry the burden of this knowledge alone. And Ryan’s seeming dismissal of even the notion that she might take Xander up on his offer reassured her in a way that made her feel guilty for ever doubting him.

  “Yeah,” she agreed. “We’ve got all the time in the world.”

  *

  Twenty minutes later, they pulled up at Eliza Longworth’s house. Brady Bowen was already waiting out front.

  They were just about to get out when she got a text.

  “Everything okay?” Ryan asked.

  “Yeah. It’s just a message from the funeral director in Las Cruces. Everything is set for Sunday. All I have to do is show up.”

  Ryan sat in the driver’s seat, not saying anything. After a moment, he reached over and gave her hand a little squeeze. She looked over and saw that he was smiling at her.

  They were interrupted by Brady rapping on Ryan’s window.

  “We doing this or what?” he asked.

  Jessie couldn’t help but chuckle at the guy’s bull in a china shop style. Ryan nodded and opened the door as Jessie wiped away the tear that had appeared at the corner of her eye.

  “What have we got here, buddy?” Ryan asked.

  “Eliza Longworth is inside waiting.”

  “She have a lawyer with her?” Jessie asked.

  “No,” Brady said. “I wanted this to be more of a casual conversation. Did you have something else in mind, Jessie?”

  “I wouldn’t count on this being casual,” Ryan muttered to him loud enough for her t
o hear.

  Jessie didn’t respond. Instead, she focused on taking in the Longworth house as they walked toward the front door. It was the first time she had seen the place. And while it wasn’t as opulent as the Wooten home, it wasn’t anything to sneeze at.

  It was also built into the side of the hill and three stories tall, though the lower level looked smaller and squatter than the Wootens’. And while it wasn’t a full-on mansion, it still had enough extravagance to make most folks jealous, including plantation-style pillars and a marble-slabbed porch. As they approached, she could see a pool in the backyard with a water feature that looked like a mini Niagara Falls.

  Brady knocked on the door. While they waited for it to open, Ryan leaned over to quietly whisper to Jessie.

  “Remember, we’re here to get information, not throw bombs.”

  Jessie smiled back at him, but said nothing.

  I’ll get what I need, thank you very much.

  CHAPTER TWENTY SEVEN

  As soon as she opened the door, Eliza knew she was in for a rough time.

  She vaguely remembered all three faces from their visit to the hospital the other day, though everything from that time, including their names, existed in something of a drug-induced haze.

  But now, more aware and more apprehensive, she could see this was going to be a struggle. Both male detectives had fairly nonjudgmental expressions. But the woman’s face was set hard, in something close to a grimace.

  “Please come in,” she said, trying not to feel intimidated.

  “Thank you, Mrs. Longworth,” the heavier, mustached man said. “You may not recall but I’m Detective Brady Bowen from LAPD’s West L.A. Station. This is Ryan Hernandez from Central Station. He’s a detective too. And this is Jessie Hunt, she’s a profiler who consults for us. Do you remember talking to us at the hospital?”

  “Kind of,” Eliza said. “It’s all a little cloudy.”

  “We understand,” said the muscular, good-looking detective named Hernandez. “That’s why we wanted to meet with you again, when you were more clear-headed. Do you mind if we ask you a few additional questions?”