“The twenty-second letter in the alphabet; that’s all we got at this point. Thomas’s secretory didn’t mention anything about either of these appointments?” Chase said.
Frank shook his head.
“Figures,” Chase continued. “Doesn’t look like we are going to get any help from the Smith’s at all. Unless…” she let her sentence trail off and Drake was about to ask her to elaborate when the door to the conference room opened and Beckett strode in. It looked like he hadn’t slept in a week.
“Sorry I’m late,” he said. “Damn gangbangers always getting themselves murdered at the worst possible time.”
“Everyone, this is Beckett Campbell, Senior Medical Examiner,” Chase said.
The introduction was irrelevant; Drake knew Beckett well, and the doctor was already well acquainted with Gainsford and Simmons. A nod between him and Detective Yasiv indicated that they had also met previously.
Beckett scanned the board for a second before continuing.
“As you all know, both Neil and Thomas died from injections of some sort of butterfly cocktail.”
Drake cringed at the term, but was grateful that the doctor opted against using butterfly slurry.
“I found a second injection site on the inner thigh of Neil Pritchard along with traces of thiopental, a powerful sedative. Thomas, on the other hand, seemed to have been killed by the cocktail alone.”
“Any progress on a DNA match?” Drake asked.
Beckett shook his head.
“Still nothing. But I can confirm that the blood on both of their backs is from the same female.”
Chase thought about this for a moment, then commented on Beckett’s previous report.
“Two injections for Neil, with the addition of a sedative, but only one for Thomas, which means that he’s getting better at this game. That, combined with the fact that the timing between murders is getting shorter—nine days between Chris and Neil, four between Neil and Thomas—makes me think that we don’t have much time before he strikes again. I think, at this point, we can all agree that the murders aren’t random, at least. It’s on us to figure out how these men are connected, and who’s next,” Chase said. “Frank and Henry, I want you to keep digging into Thomas’s past. Neil’s too—he was single, but the location of his murder was a second residence. The media is reporting that he shares his primary residence with his mother, of all things. Go see her and try to find a connection between the two dead men.”
“What about the Montreal guy—Chris Popo…?” Detective Gainsford asked.
“Papadopoulos,” Chase finished for him. “We are keeping Chris’s involvement to ourselves for now. As soon as the FBI get wind of a cross-border crime, they are going to be all over this. And with SSJ working against us, our only chance of finding the murderer who did this is to work fast.”
“And the article?” Gainsford continued.
Chase shot him a look.
“What about it?”
Drake cleared his throat and stepped in.
“Doesn’t it mention Chris?”
“It does. But that doesn’t mean anything for now. I’ve dealt with cross-border murders in Seattle and Vancouver, and once the FBI and Canadian Security Intelligence Agency get in the way it becomes a logistical nightmare. And that was in Vancouver. I can’t imagine what it will be like dealing with French Canadian cops. The way I figure it, we’ve got twenty-four hours, maybe two days at best before they take over.”
“What about me?” Beckett asked.
“Are you in contact with CSU?”
Beckett nodded.
“Yes, all their findings will go through me.”
“Anything on that front?” Chased asked.
“Nothing. They’re still combing through the garbage from Luther Street, but Neil’s home was pristine—no fingerprints, no DNA, no bodily fluids. I would be surprised if CSU gets anything of value from Luther Street.”
Chase appeared to consider this for a moment.
“Do you have someone that can cover you in the morgue for a day or two?”
Beckett nodded.
“Sure, I have a couple residents with me now.”
“Good, then it looks like you are going on a road trip to Montreal. Maybe you can use that charm of yours to see if you can find out more about Chris’s death before the FBI storm in. Just make sure to keep things on the down low. If anyone asks, you’re going for some good ol’ R and R.”
Beckett smiled.
“Sure thing, boss.”
“And me?” Detective Gainsford asked.
“Stay local, I’ll have something for you soon when Dunbar gets back to me.” Chase said. Luke frowned, but nodded in agreement. “That’ll be all.”
“What about me?” he asked when it was just he and Chase left in the conference room.
“See if you can dig up anything about the psychiatrist; after all, you have some experience with them, don’t you?”
Drake narrowed his eyes, unsure of whether Chase was referring to his mention of seeing a shrink after what had happened to Clay, or if this had something to do with the events outside Hockley Middle and High School.
But Detective Adams’s face gave away nothing, and Drake was reminded of her sleek BMW outside, the one that she had bought with poker earnings. Internet or not, he was beginning to see why she was so good at it.
“And you?” he asked.
“I’m going to see if I can rejuvenate my tennis game,” she replied with something akin to a smirk on her pretty face.
CHAPTER 23
“Psychiatrists,” Drake grumbled as he made his way to his car. Throughout his entire life, he had only known three psychiatrists, all of whom had left him with a sour taste in his mouth.
The first was an old pervert his mother had visited, leaving him in the waiting room at the ripe age of seven, and who he was now convinced that she must have been having an affair with; the second was the NYPD psychiatrist Stacey Weinager who had interviewed him for a grand total of three hours over two days following Clay’s death and subsequently clearing him. And the last had been the man he had bloodied a few days ago outside Suze’s school.
Chase’s offhand comment about Drake having experience with psychiatrists held no water. Even if any of the three psychiatrists could be of some help in identifying who Thomas was seeing—how this was possible, he had no idea—he couldn’t exactly just hop in his car and pay them a visit. For one, the man that his mother had been seeing had been sixty all those years ago, and was more than likely dead. And Stacey? The NYPD psychiatrist? There was zero chance that he would drop by her office. One look at his red-rimmed eyes, pale lips, and a whiff of his whiskey breath and she was apt to rescind her recommendation for reinstatement faster than he could spell her last name. And the third… well, he was just bewildered as to why a uniform hadn’t waltzed down into his office and slapped the cuffs on him yet.
For some reason, he had the sneaking suspicion that Suzan had something to do with that. It was the only thing that made sense.
Instead, he found himself hopping into his Crown Vic and pulling out of the parking lot.
Drake rolled down his window, hawked, and spat a glob of yellowish phlegm onto the tarmac out front of 62nd precinct. Then he sped off, heading to the only place in the world that offered him solace that didn’t serve any Johnny red.
~
The cemetery was quiet, which was what Drake had hoped for and expected for a Friday before noon. He parked his Vic on the street rather than in the small parking lot, then made his way into the sun, wishing that he had Chase’s oversized sunglasses to protect his eyes. He couldn’t remember a spring in New York as hot as this one; everyday for the past week, it felt like it had hit the mid-eighties.
Before closing the door, he took off his sport coat and tossed it onto the seat. He straightened his back, and the strap around his left arm tightened.
“Shit,” he swore. Deserted or not, a passerby might not react kindly to the s
ight of a man with a gun tucked under his arm perusing grave sites.
After a brief thought, he reached under his armpit and unclicked the fastener. Then he lifted his sport coat on the passenger seat, tucked the gun and holster beneath it, and closed the car door. A quick glance revealed that the street was still deserted, and Drake hurried across the street and toward the cemetery gates.
After passing through the metal archway, Drake made his way down a small, grassy slope then took a sharp left around a small, concrete mausoleum. The tombstones behind the mausoleum started out grand—Drake saw one adorned with a gold-plated angel, which reminded him of a cherub pissing into a fountain—but quickly contracted in both stature and opulence. The only thing that remained consistent through the rows of gravestones was the closely shorn grass, which, by the smell of it, must have been cut that morning.
Clay Cuthbert’s tombstone was a plain gray, acid-washed stone with his name and the years 1974-2017 engraved on it.
And that was all in terms of inscription.
There were flowers scattered at the base, but only the tulips were still alive. The orchids had long since wilted and turned brown.
Drake squatted on his haunches, and teased the dead orchids from the red ribbon before tossing them aside. Then he ran his fingers over the letters C-L-A-Y.
“I miss you, Clay. I miss you, man, and I’m so fucking sorry that I didn’t listen. Goddamn it. I would do anything to replay that night over again.” He cleared his throat and stood. “It should have been me that was killed, not you, Clay. It was my case—I should have gone in first. You’re the one with the perfect family, the wife and kid. I’m nothing—just a drunk, a mean…”
Tears spilled down his cheeks and he swiped at them with the back of his hand, trying desperately to collect himself.
“It was—”
A sound to his right caused him to inhale sharply. His ingrained police training kicked in, and he reached for the gun under his armpit… only it wasn’t there.
He cursed under his breath, and then crouched low, trying to hide the majority of his frame behind the modest tombstone. His heart racing, the image of a skull with the finger bones cemented to its forehead flashed in his mind.
The Skeleton King has returned.
Drake felt sweat break out on his face and hands as he scanned the cemetery.
At first he saw nothing, but then he spotted a squat figure approaching from the end opposite that Drake himself had entered the cemetery. The man appeared to be holding something close to his chest, but with his back to the sun, his face and body were all shadows. Just when Drake was certain the man—it was a man, he could tell by the way he moved—was going to spot him, he made a hard right and headed up the aisle of tombstones. He walked for another ten or fifteen meters, then stopped in front of a plain stone the way Drake had done just moments ago.
Relief washed over him when he saw the man crouch, make the sign of the cross, and place a small bouquet of flowers on the ground in front of the tombstone.
And yet, even though the adrenaline had flushed from his system and he was certain that the man posed no threat—it wasn’t the Skeleton King, the King is dead—Drake remained crouched.
It was only when the man turned to leave that Drake realized that like his initial instinct to hide, the reason he remained curled up behind Clay’s grave was instinctual, ingrained from his years as a police officer.
The man muttered something in Spanish—something followed by madre—and then kissed his hand and touched the stone.
When he made his way back down the aisle, Drake’s heart skipped a beat.
Unbelievably, he recognized the man. He had only seen him once, but the stark black hair, deeply tanned skin, and the wiry mustache were unmistakable.
It was Raul, and when the Thomas’s housekeeper left the cemetery, Detective Damien Drake followed.
CHAPTER 24
Detective Chase Adams felt ridiculous in her white athletic tee and black-trimmed skirt. The sweatbands on her wrists and forehead and the tight ponytail she sported, on the other hand, left her mortified.
Sure, she had done far more degrading things back in Seattle trying to catch mid-level drug dealers in the act. Things that had left her with scars on the inside of her elbows, reminders of how low she had sunk that required cover-up to hide each and every morning.
But that was behind her now; New York was supposed to be a clean slate.
And yet here she was again, posing as something she clearly was not on a half-brained whim of trying to extract information from a grieving widower.
She felt gross, dirty.
Chase slung the bag that contained her tennis racket over her shoulder and pushed these feelings aside.
There were three men dead, three families that deserved closure. And one cold-blooded killer that they needed to get off the streets of New York City.
With a deep breath, Chase strode with purpose over to the intercom outside the gate and pressed the button. She waited for a moment, and then looked up at the camera eye tucked into the shrubs.
“What is it?” a soft female voice asked.
“Clarissa? It’s Detective Chase Adams.”
“What do you want?” Clarissa’s voice was stronger now, almost accusing.
Chase looked away from the camera and stared at the intercom instead.
“Clarissa, I’m sorry about before. I just… I—I want to help, that’s all. I’ve brought my racket,” she held the tennis bag up as if to prove her words true.
There was a pause.
“You want to play tennis? Now?”
Chase nodded slowly.
“I’ve been… I have some experience with loss, Clarissa. And what I’ve found is that exercise is the best way to start, and eventually get through, the grieving process. Look, I know Thomas…” the words were proving more difficult than Chase had expected and she took another deep breath, trying to steady her nerve.
Come on, you can do this. You’ve talked people off the ledge, worked your way into trap houses full of thugs that should’ve shot a pretty white girl like you on sight.
“I know you’re hurting. And I won’t lie to you; the hurt will stay with you for a long time, if not forever. But there are certain things that you still can do to try and extract some pleasure from this world. I know it doesn’t make sense to you know—the idea of pleasure and happiness seems impossible—but in time, you will understand. Clarissa, you have to be strong; after all, you still have Thomas Jr. to look after. In order to make sure he can recover from the loss of his father, you need to recover first. And exercise can help.”
There was a long pause, one that dragged on for so long that Chase had all but given up. She went as far as to turn back toward her car when she heard a metallic click and saw the door size cut-out in the wrought iron fence open an inch. Chase nodded to the camera and then stepped through, making sure to close the gate behind her.
She walked briskly up the long, inclined drive to the front door, and halfway to it, it opened. She had expected the man-servant Raul to be standing there, but was surprised to see that it was Clarissa dressed in a tennis outfit. It wasn’t sweaty like the other day, suggesting that she had put it on after Chase had pressed the intercom button.
“Clarissa,” Chase said softly, unsure of the appropriate greeting given the circumstances. She was reminded of the awkward encounter in the woman’s house, sitting across from one another on couches, and hoped that this wouldn’t be a repeat of that.
But a teary-eyed Clarissa Smith immediately stepped forward and embraced her. Her grip was so strong, desperate, that Chase nearly stumbled backward off the steps. After regaining her balance, she leaned into the hug and tentatively returned it.
Clarissa broke the embrace and then wiped tears from her eyes. She sniffed.
“Tennis court is out back. Please, follow me.”
As Clarissa led Chase through the house, first through the front foyer, and then through a family roo
m, she paid attention to the pictures on the walls or in frames resting on expensive looking tables.
“Raul’s not here?” she asked casually after noting the man’s presence in more than a handful of the photographs, smiling behind his dark mustache, his arms wrapped around Thomas’s shoulders, or standing behind the three Smith’s.
“No. He left about an hour ago. Raul is like family; he lives here, sleeps here, helps look after Thomas Jr. He’s either here or he’s out running errands for Weston.”
Chase raised an eyebrow at this, but didn’t press. She had seen the way the widow had interacted with Thomas’s brother; pressing her further would likely cause her to clam up. Better to just let her talk.
They walked in silence through the family room, and then down two steps to another seating area. The back wall was covered in floor to ceiling windows, but the blinds, the kind between the two panes of glass, were at half mast sparing them sun’s full wrath.
To Chase, they reminded her of sleeping, half-open eyelids. Or sad eyes.
“Court is back here,” Clarissa said softly. Her directions weren’t necessary. Through the windows, Chase saw a stone patio with several lawn chairs laid out. After about twenty feet of flagstones, the ground transitioned into grass. Just beyond that, she saw the black wire mesh fence and the green artificial turf of a tennis court.
“I usually have a two-hour training session on Fridays, but I canceled my lesson,” Clarissa said as she pulled the sliding glass door open and indicated for Chase to exit.
Chase nodded and stepped onto the stone patio, strangely nervous about her game. It had been at least a few years since she had stepped onto the court, and it was all she could do to hope that all those lessons that Gampie had paid for as a child had stuck with her.
Is tennis like riding a bike?
Chase certainly hoped so.
Clarissa must have seen this on her face because she offered a wan smile.
“Don’t worry, I’m not very good yet—I’ve only been learning for the past six months or so,” she said as they walked side-by-side toward the court. “I was looking for something to do while Thomas was away on business, and since Thomas Jr started school, I was alone a lot. Thomas suggested that I get a hobby and for some strange reason, tennis popped into my mind. Maybe it was because the US Open was on the TV at the time, or maybe I just always wanted to learn and didn’t know it until that moment. Anyways, two days later, contractors were here, and by the weekend the court was ready to use.”
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