by T. R. Ragan
After the accident he’d had no memory of his sister or his deceased parents. But something beautiful had come from the tragedy. He’d fallen in love with and married the nurse who’d helped put him back together again. At his wife’s insistence, he’d tried to reconnect with his sister over the years, but she and her husband had moved to Florida, and his phone calls went unanswered.
Today was another hot one. The air was thick and dry, sucking the moisture out of every living thing and making it a chore to breathe. It had been a long day, and he was eager to get home. As he approached his 1978 Ford Club Wagon, he heard a distant call for help and stopped to look around and listen.
There it was again. Was somebody in trouble?
He ran to the edge of the parking lot, where pavement merged with soil that sloped downward into a wooded area covered with brittle leaves.
Although he couldn’t see any smoke, he could feel it burning his throat. He heard the crackle and snap of a fire, but he couldn’t see anything unusual. His heart rate accelerated. “Is someone out there?”
No answer.
“Ben! Is there a problem?”
He turned to see his coworker Gavin Whitney rushing to his side. “What’s going on?”
“Do you smell smoke?” Ben asked.
Gavin took a couple of sniffs. “No. I don’t smell anything.” He wiped his brow. “It’s hot as hell out here, though. I bet we could fry an egg on the asphalt about now.” He planted a hand on his hip. “If this heat wave lasts too much longer, people are going to start dropping like flies.”
When Ben didn’t respond, he added, “More people die from a heat wave than lightning, tornadoes, hurricanes, or floods.”
Ben had a difficult time listening to anything but the hiss of the fire as it moved closer.
“I’ve gotta get going,” Gavin said. “Are you sure you’re okay?”
He wanted to grab Gavin’s shoulders and shake him. Couldn’t he hear the fire or smell the acrid smoke? When Ben looked back at Gavin, he imagined himself reaching into his briefcase for a hunting knife and plunging the blade into Gavin’s chest.
It seemed real, and it all happened fast.
The look on Gavin’s face when he realized he’d been stabbed made Ben wonder what exactly Gavin was experiencing. What did it feel like to be stabbed in the chest? Was there pain? Or did shock override all else? Definitely the latter, Ben thought as he watched Gavin stumble backward, leaving a trail of blood as he went.
Gavin’s eyes widened as he looked at the knife protruding from his body. There was no sign of pain on his face, only a shuddering shock wave of surprise.
Ben’s pulse rate spiked, and he blinked to clear his vision.
Suddenly Gavin was smiling and waving. “I’ll see you tomorrow,” he said in a cheerful voice. “Tell the family hello for me, will you? We’ve got to get the boys together again one of these days.”
It took a second for Ben’s foggy brain to clear. Gavin was fine. There was no knife protruding from his coworker’s chest. No blood anywhere.
Ben looked down at the briefcase still clutched within his fingers. He no longer heard screams for help or the crackle of fire.
He sniffed the air. It was smoke-free.
Relief mixed with apprehension consumed him as he made his way to his car. Injuries from long ago made it feel as if his left leg were made of solid steel, heavy and awkward.
The knife in Gavin’s chest, the blood, the screams . . . this wasn’t the first gruesome scene he’d conjured over the past few months, but this one had certainly lasted the longest.
Breathe in. Breathe out.
That was what his therapist would tell him to do if he were still seeing her. Although he didn’t like what had just transpired, he wasn’t too worried. In his line of work, he’d seen it all. It wasn’t the gory thoughts that concerned him, but the disorientation and lack of emotion that accompanied these random imaginings.
He unlocked the van and used the roll handle to pull himself in behind the wheel. Sweat trickled down both sides of his face as the engine roared to life. He drove out of the parking lot and merged onto Capitol Avenue. Forty minutes later, after stopping at the store to pick up a gallon of milk, he walked into the two-story house where he had lived for the past nine years with his wife and two kids. It was a quaint Cape Cod–style home at the end of a cul-de-sac in Citrus Heights. He set the milk on the wooden bench in the entryway and then headed for his bedroom upstairs so he could change his clothes.
“Ben, is that you?”
He made an about-face, grabbed the milk from the bench, and walked into the kitchen instead. His wife stood in front of the stove, making stir-fry. He gave Melony a peck on the cheek. She worked full-time as a trauma nurse at Mercy General, took care of the household and two children, and yet she always had a smile for him.
“Ben,” she said when she noticed his shirt was soaked through, “you need to get rid of that old van and get something with air-conditioning. This is ridiculous.”
“You know we can’t afford a new car right now. Abigail is going to need braces soon, and we need to fix the fence out back.” He sighed. “I’m going to go upstairs and change, and I’ll be as good as new.”
“Is your leg bothering you?” she asked, always perceptive.
“I’m fine.”
When he returned, both Abigail and Sean were in the kitchen helping Melony set the table for dinner. Sean would be eight soon, and his face still lit up every evening when Ben arrived home from work. “Dad!” he said. “Can we ride bikes around the lake this weekend? We could skip rocks like last time.”
“No,” Abigail said in a tone that made her sound sixteen instead of nine. “Mom and Dad promised they would both come to my soccer game.”
Sean frowned. “Soccer is boring.”
“That’s enough,” Melony cut in. “Get the napkins, Sean.”
Ben inwardly smiled. Every so often his coworkers asked him to join them for a beer after work, but he rarely said yes. He preferred to be home with his wife and kids. His nickname at the office was “Family Man,” which suited him just fine.
After dinner and homework were finished for the night, Melony put the kids to bed while Ben washed the dishes and then made his way to the family room to wind down and watch a little television. He settled into his favorite recliner. As he clicked through the channels, the image of a young woman flashed across the screen.
He sat up for a better look.
His breath caught in his chest. Dark hair, mesmerizing green eyes, and a full mouth. He knew that face. Not once since his accident had he felt such an intense feeling of recognition. To this day he had no idea why he’d been in a stolen car with Vernon Doherty, a man with a long list of traffic offenses, including two DUIs.
According to the show’s host, she had been twenty when she went missing ten years ago. He hit “Pause” so he could read the description of tonight’s Cold Case TV. This particular episode had originally aired three years ago and was titled “The Runaway Sister.”
He hit “Play” and listened closely as the host interviewed the missing woman’s older sister, Jessie Cole.
Melony entered the room, and he raised his hand to stop her from speaking. She crossed her arms and waited him out. When it was over, he hit “Pause” again. “Sophie Cole,” he said. “Does that name ring any bells?”
“No. Why?”
“I think I used to know her. There’s something familiar about her.”
“It’s a cold case,” Melony reminded him. “Was she from the area?”
He nodded. “Sacramento.”
“Well, that explains it. You probably did a story on her at the time.”
“I don’t know.” He rubbed the back of his neck. “I’ve been seeing things lately, Mel.”
She took a seat next to him and rested a hand on his back. “What do you mean?”
“Today as I walked to my car after work, I smelled smoke and I heard screams rising above a crackl
ing fire. When Gavin Whitney appeared and asked me if I was okay, I saw a knife plunged deep into his chest.”
He looked squarely into Mel’s eyes. “I saw every detail of Gavin’s face when it happened. The shock. The horror. There was blood everywhere. It was as real to me as you sitting next to me right now.”
Ben couldn’t bring himself to tell her he was the one who had stabbed Gavin, mostly because the images had worried him—made him feel odd, confused—as if a part of him had actually enjoyed watching his coworker suffer. No, he quickly decided. It wasn’t enjoyment he’d felt, but curiosity mixed with fascination.
“But there was no knife,” Melony stated. “Gavin was fine, right? Is that what you’re telling me?”
“Yes. Gavin is fine. There was no knife in his chest, no fire—no one was screaming. But I saw it all plain as day.” He looked away, feeling suddenly exhausted, the end of the day hitting him hard.
“Your doctor told you this might happen,” Melony said. “Do you remember? She said at any given time you might start to see things, disturbing images that could shock you, including flashbacks from the accident. The sound of the fire. The screams. It all makes sense.”
Ben said nothing. She had no idea about all the random images he’d been seeing, or how often. Gruesome scenes of murder and mayhem, dead bodies, lifeless eyes, too much blood, always blood.
“Ben,” she tried again, “you’ve been a crime reporter for twenty years. That coupled with the head injury has surely messed with your brain. It’s a wonder you haven’t been having flashbacks for years.”
There was a short pause before she added, “I’ve seen what head traumas can do to people. It’s obvious to me why you might be having these dark thoughts, but you should talk to Lori Mitchell and see what she says.”
He nodded. She was right.
The kids called for Mom from upstairs. She pushed herself to her feet.
“I’ll be right up,” Ben told her.
After she kissed his forehead, then left the room, he thought of Sophie Cole. He knew her. He’d met her. But where? He rushed to grab pen and paper and then rewound to the part where they provided a hotline number in case anyone knew anything about what happened to her. He jotted down, “Jessie Cole, sister to Sophie, private investigator living in the Sacramento area.”
And then he got an idea.
FIVE
Erin walked slowly around the inside perimeter of the cell, her fingers trailing across rebar and then the rough cement wall as she searched for a way out. She couldn’t stop shivering.
She forced herself to sit back down and think for a minute. Instinct insisted she stay calm. The oil lamps had been turned off, but Erin could still see shadows and hear the crunching of straw whenever Garrett moved.
“You have to kill me,” he said. “The boss is angry, and that means he’ll be back.”
“I won’t kill you, so stop asking. We need to save the battery power and use the Taser on that monster when he returns.”
“You don’t have to use the Taser on me. You’re young, and you haven’t been here long, so you’re still strong. Wrap your fingers around my throat, and press your thumbs against my trachea. If I struggle, don’t let go.”
He crawled close enough to her that she could see the whites of his eyes. “I’m begging you,” he said. “Please. I can’t do this any longer.”
“I won’t do it.”
“You don’t have to use your hands. I’ll lay flat, and you can use your knee to do the job.”
Erin ignored him as she went through the backpack for the third time, making sure she hadn’t missed any secret compartments. So far she’d found a few bottles of water, a granola bar, a pen and paper, a quarter, a nickel, and two pennies.
She heard slurping. Garrett was munching on a sardine. Gross. She tossed the backpack away from her. “There’s nothing in there.”
Garrett scrambled across the floor and began his own search through the bag. His body was skeletal, his skin almost as white as the paper in the notebook she’d found. She squinted and held the notebook inches from her face as she tried to read the madman’s writing. The first person listed in capital letters was ANNA WOOD. Under “Description” he’d written: dark hair, blue eyes, round face. Twenty-six years old, five foot five, with buck teeth and a large forehead. In the margins were drawings with arrows and labels pointing out freckles, moles, and unusually long toes.
Disgusted, Erin turned the page. The next five pages described all the things the sicko had done to Anna Wood, complete with dates and times. She’d died fourteen months ago, right here in the same cell where Erin was being kept.
Her stomach churned.
There were more victims, too. More than a dozen. Men, women, children. He seemed to have no preference as to race, gender, or age. He liked to exploit their worst fears and then torture them to see their reactions.
Erin closed her eyes and thought about her parents and siblings. She’d always hated being the middle of six children, but now it seemed so petty. She was one of the lucky ones. Her parents loved her. They doted on every one of their six kids. She missed her brothers and sisters, and if she ever saw them again, she’d never think a bad thought about any of them for as long as she lived.
A sharp noise came from the third cell in the underground room, making her jump. It sounded like a barking dog. She couldn’t see inside because that cell was enclosed, the walls made of cement instead of rebar. Whoever was inside was barking. Every third or fourth bark sounded like the howl of a wolf. “What is that?”
“That’s just Dog. Get used to it.”
“Is it human?”
“It’s an old man. If you stick around long enough, I’m sure you’ll get a chance to meet him.”
“The guy who has us. Do you know his name?”
“Sir, Master, Boss—take your pick.”
Erin watched Garrett for a minute. He was working hard to rip the backpack to pieces. She wondered what he was doing but didn’t ask. “How long have you been here?”
“Too long,” he muttered. After a long pause, he said, “Three months and three days.”
Chills raced up her arms.
“For the first twenty-eight days, I was here with my wife.”
Hope blossomed. “Did she get away? Where is she?”
“No,” he said. “She’s gone.”
Erin’s shoulders sagged. She wasn’t sure she wanted to know what had happened to his wife, but she found herself asking, “How did he manage to get two of you?”
“We were enjoying a picnic in a remote area. There was a stream and wildlife, a beautiful day. And then this guy comes along, out of the blue, and starts chatting about something. I don’t remember what exactly. My wife, a stranger to no one, began conversing with him. Like her, he had majored in social work. Or so he said. I grew bored and took a short walk to the edge of the stream. Less than five minutes later I returned, and they were both gone. Everything else was still there—the blanket, the basket, the food. Panicked, I think I ran back to the stream and called out her name. Hell, maybe I ran in circles. I don’t remember. Next thing I know, I’m being Tasered. While I was on the ground, he poured something into my mouth. A clear liquid. No taste. I don’t recall anything after that. I woke up here.”
“And what about your wife?” she asked, unable to let it go.
“You don’t want to know.”
“He killed her?”
“I did.”
It wasn’t fear that had her stomach in knots, but surprise. It was clear that Garrett had loved his wife. She watched him and waited, unwilling to press him further.
Garrett remained focused on ripping the backpack into pieces, but it wasn’t long before he continued with his story. “I had to kill her,” he said. “He kept insisting that my wife do things to me that she could never do. And every single time she refused, she was punished for her disobedience, as he likes to call it. On the seventh day, she asked me to put her out of her misery. She w
anted to die rather than suffer another day. On the twenty-eighth day, I did as she asked.”
Garrett was crying now, his shoulders shaking in despair.
“I’m sorry,” Erin whispered.
“I’m only sorry it took me so long.”
Erin thought about how many people had perished down here, and for the first time since she’d awoken in this dreadful place, she wondered if she would die here, too.
SIX
While Olivia sat at the kitchen table doing homework, Colin made some calls and worked on what he needed to go over with his team in the morning. Frustrations in the department were at an all-time high. Now that all leads had been exhausted, he realized it might be time to have one of the retired detectives look over the case files to see if they could find anything that might have been missed.
He also considered getting the media involved, have them do a story on the case and ask for help from the community to see if they could spark someone’s memory. Someone out there knew something. Either he wasn’t willing to come forward, or he had no idea about the importance of what he’d seen.
Too many guys in the department had worked long hours, missing out on family events—and for what?
The Heartless Killer had been hanging around for too long.
He needed to be stopped.
And yet it wasn’t going to be easy to find a killer whose MO kept changing. The Heartless Killer was no Jack the Ripper. He didn’t go after only prostitutes or strangle every victim. Many of his crimes appeared to be premeditated and well planned, which would slate him as an organized killer. And yet he was probably also charming and possibly attractive, since he was able to approach his prey and then lure them away. Only two of the victims had been left at the scenes of the crime. The majority of them were taken somewhere to be tortured and abused for months before he disposed of their bodies. More frustrating, as in most serial-killer cases, the probability that there were victims they had yet to discover was high.