The Criminal Mind

by Thomas Benigno

  “Yes. I’m sure I have. She was a waitress. Sometimes, after her shift, I would pick her up and take her back to my house. She would be tired, so I would go out by myself to do a little shopping for us—to get some food—while she would remain at the house. Come to think of it, she would often ask me for something to eat or a snack that I didn’t have. So, I would go out and get it for her.”

  “You had life insurance, didn’t you?”

  “For estate tax purpose, yes. Both Eleanor and I had policies.”

  “Those policies were not under lock and key, were they?”

  “Come to think of it, no. They were in a desk drawer in the kitchen. I had taken them out of a combination fireproof safe we kept in the master bedroom closet. It took me months before I cashed in Eleanor’s, and I would have completely forgotten about it if not for my daughter, Charlotte, reminding me to take care of it. That’s why the policies were in the kitchen desk—so I would take care of it.”

  “Well, guess what? Either your former girlfriend—or her hooded partner—got hold of your policy, and I’m referring to the one for two million dollars—”

  “How did you—?”

  “It’s still in your desk drawer. I was in your house, remember?”

  “I may have gotten hit in the head more than once, but my brains are still intact. Yes, I remember, Don.”

  “Well, guess what? Someone went on the insurance company’s website and changed the beneficiary from your two kids to the not so lovely Olga Sokolov, alias Maureen.”

  “And how the hell do you know this?”

  “I checked naic.org—the site for the National Association of Insurance. I also checked with Tennessee’s State Insurance Department. Their site has a free policy locator. I then made a phone call, pretending to be you, and confirmed it.”

  “What made her think she could get away with this?”

  “If questioned, all she needs to prove is that you cared deeply for her—which you did—and that she was dependent on you for financial support, which, after her hit in the head was kind of true. By the way, she quit her waitressing job and told her landlord and her boss that she was moving out of her apartment to go live with you—her boyfriend—and that you would be taking care of her now. She used those very words. She was covering her tracks but good, alright. How she planned to collect is what concerns me.”

  “I suppose it should concern me, too.”

  “Listen…I know you’ve been through hell and back, but you still need to continue to be very careful. Meanwhile, I’ll do more digging, because there’s something else I need to figure out. Just give me twenty-four hours.”

  “Really, that long?” I asked sarcastically. “I’ll try to contain my goosebumps waiting for your call. And what is it that you need to find out?” He didn’t answer. “Don, are you there?”

  Once again, Riggins ignored me and without another word, hung up.

  After we landed in New York City, our luggage and Charlie’s chair were put in the trunk of an unmarked car, courtesy of the two FBI agents sent to pick us up—via Riggins’ legacy of influence with the bureau. In turn, Paul was placed on a stretcher and taken away in a waiting ambulance. The unmarked car that Charlie and I were in followed, as the ambulance made its way through the busy streets of Queens and Manhattan, headed for the emergency room of the New York Presbyterian Medical Center—home for the Hospital for Special Surgery.

  The two agents sat up front, while Charlie and I sat in the back. Even though there was no place else to put us, we couldn’t help but feel a bit like suspects in a crime. Since Charlie was, after all, the shooter, and this was his first foray into civilian violence where the rules of engagement were quite different from those of jungle warfare, he had become quite nervous during the drive. Sitting sequestered in the back and fielding a barrage of questions from the agents didn’t help. Overtired, and still rattled from the early morning melee, I assured our two stalwart FBI escorts that we would be more than happy to answer all of their questions after both a good night’s sleep and when my head, in particular, got the proper medical attention. “I don’t know if you’re aware, gentlemen,” I added, in a further effort to end the questioning and calm my loyal friend. “But if Charlie here hadn’t shot the mass murderer and mastermind of the child trafficking ring we uncovered, Paul Tarantino and I would be dead—not to mention many more young boys.” I left out the part about the killer’s pancreatic cancer seeking its own form of final justice. Since it’s been my experience that the evil miscreants of this world seem to find a way to claw onto life longer than most, Charlie deserved all the recognition and reward I could give him. And I wasn’t done by a long shot.

  “You’re a hero, Charlie,” I bellowed. “Once a marine…always a marine.”

  Money, money, money…

  To someone who will never find true love,

  It’s everything.

  And it’s nothing.

  Marion

  When we arrived at New York Presbyterian Medical Center, Paul was quickly taken to the Hospital for Special Surgery for an MRI, while Charlie and I remained in emergency room triage. Since my injuries weren’t as severe as Paul’s, my MRI was done on the premises. and once it was determined that I had no internal bleeding, an intern put a few additional stitches in my head. Charlie was examined also, and though found to be in generally good health, he was severely dehydrated, so the nurses hooked him up to an IV and pumped him with fluids while he slept.

  With Charlie in dreamland, I remained lying in my emergency room bed, stitched up, exhausted—but for a mind and body tingling with nervous energy. I was overtired but couldn’t fall asleep. There was also something I was forgetting, and I knew it—the cards I took out of the killer’s pocket. I immediately checked the pants I was wearing until I remembered that I had changed them at the hotel. I leaned over slightly and spotted my suitcase on the floor next to my bed. Between the stitches, the painkillers I had been given, and my general state of debilitation, I feared that if I rolled over and reached down for it, there was a good chance I would wind up flat on my face. Since my head had already been split open once, maybe twice, I decided to call a nurse.

  When I told her I merely wanted to get a pair of pants out of my bag, she huffed and hurried off—not exactly the call for emergency she was there for. A few seconds later, a sweet elderly man peeked through the opening in my curtain. His wife of fifty-five years was in the bed across from mine. He had heard my plea, called me ‘young man,’ and said he would be only too happy to help. I asked him to open my messy suitcase and retrieve the pair of black pants I had been wearing.

  “I suppose packing is not your strong suit,” he said cheerfully as he looked inside.

  Fortunately, the pants were on top of the heap of clothes. If the kind old man had explored further, he would have come across three pistols, a few thousand dollars in cash and there’s no telling what would have happened after that.

  As he handed me the pants, I thanked him and wished his wife well. He smiled weakly, then graciously nodded. I had a strong suspicion that she was not going to make it back home this time. It was in his expression of resolute sadness.

  After he left and the billowing curtains around my bed came to a close, I inspected the pants. They were still moist from my foray into the well to get Paul. Fortunately, they didn’t smell as bad as I recalled—or at least not bad enough for the old man to comment upon. God forgive me, I said to myself for complaining about the odor, when the source of the smell conjured up the frightening and grotesque images of the remains of the little bodies we left behind.

  While Charlie snored loudly nearby, I retrieved the cards out of the back pocket. A driver’s license was on top and face up. On it was a photo of the killer that must have been taken twenty years earlier. The name on the license was Richard Norris—a combination of his father’s first name and his mother’s (his
father’s aunt’s) last—giving the false impression that he was his great aunt and uncle’s son. No one the wiser that his real father, Richard Holcomb, was alive, and well enough to sire a son with his father’s sister.

  Under the license was a police officer’s courtesy card––the kind that gets you a pass when pulled over for a traffic violation. To an officer in New York City, it’s called a PBA card, which stands for Police Benevolent Association. What I was looking at, however, was an honorary membership in the Sheriff’s Association of Oswego County. Serving our members for 65 years. Penned on the flip side: To Richard Norris from Deputy Phineas Carter. Carter’s cell number was added for verification.

  Had I not felt emotionally and physically debilitated at the time, I probably would have let out a cheer. In my hand was a key element of proof connecting the monster, Richard Norris, to the arrogant, asshole Deputy Carter.

  Despite aching in pain from head to toe, I refused morphine. Double doses of Tylenol were all I would take. I wanted to remain clearheaded. Between nearly losing my life at the hands of a degenerate killer, my concern for Paul, and wondering what more would come from the FBI’s investigation of the cabin and its underground sanctum, it was a small wonder I could close my eyes to rest even for a minute. Though I had relegated the care and control over my body to a hospital staff with the best of intentions—which never seemed to include letting a patient sleep for any prolonged period of time—I tried anyway. And despite my protestations that I wanted to rest but remain alert, the nurses gave me a sedative anyway.

  Lying in the noisy emergency room, machines beeping and buzzing, and Charlie snoring as loud as a train engine in the bed next to me, thoughts about the woman I had called Maureen saddened me deeply. Since the investigation into missing young boys had come to a violent and tragic end, she kept drifting in and out of my mind—thin wisps of memory and feeling coating the empty hollow in my gut over losing someone I thought would continue to be very special to me—a last shot at romance—a last hope for true happiness. With Maureen, the barren sense of loneliness I had felt since Eleanor’s passing had left me for a time. I wished Maureen was real. I wished that at that very moment she was rushing to be by my side, to hold my hand, kiss me, and tell me that she loved me. And in my state of physical and emotional melancholy, all I wanted to do was close my eyes and imagine a Maureen that never was or ever would be—a Maureen I thought I knew but didn’t—like a figment of a broken dream.

  When I opened my eyes, the wicked realization of where I had been in the last twenty-four hours and what I had seen—what I had learned about pure evil, its depths, its partners, its obdurate path, and its victims—I felt deeply ashamed that all I could think about was a lost love and how sad I felt about it.

  When my cellphone played Moon River once again—and once again it was Donald Riggins calling—I knew I would soon get what I deserved for my foolish and selfish imaginings. The black hole of awareness would see to that.

  “My wife can be a pain in the ass,” he began, without so much as a ‘hello.’

  “You sure you’re not the one who’s the pain in the ass, Don?” I snapped back.

  “Oh, no question about it,” he claimed rather modestly. “How are you doing by the way?”

  “Hanging in there. Thanks for asking. Nice to know you really care.”

  “Hey, I wanna get paid when this is over,” he said, while chuckling to himself. “And how’s Paul?”

  “He’s got a road back, but he’s tough as nails. I’m still worried about him, though. He’s at the Hospital for Special Surgery. They’re checking to see if he has internal bleeding. I’ll let you know if I hear anything.”

  “Please do. Paul and I go way back. And your friend, Charlie, the vet?”

  “Sleeping like a baby in the bed next to me.”

  “Good…that’s good,” he said tentatively, and I could hear in his voice that another shoe was about to drop squarely on my already swollen head. After I waited for a few seconds in silence, I could wait no more. “Don, what is it? I know you didn’t call just to see how I’m doing.”

  “I started by telling you about my pain-in-the-ass wife, didn’t I?”

  “I can confirm that, bumps on my head and all.”

  “But I didn’t tell you why she’s a pain in the ass.”

  “Okay, Don. So, tell me. Why is your wife, whom I’m sure is a lovely woman that you don’t deserve, a pain in the ass?”

  “Because…” A woman’s voice could be heard faintly in the background. “Though I love her dearly…”

  “Are you home now, Don? Is that it?”

  “Actually, I am. Back home in Bayside, Queens.”

  “Okay. I get it. Please go on.”

  “My wife is a lovely pain in the ass because she needs to know where I am every minute of every day.”

  “Well, Mr. Retired FBI, who isn’t really retired, that’s probably because she cares about you and is worried about you. I don’t have to tell you what a lucky man you are.”

  “That’s nice of you to say. She’ll appreciate that. But back to my point. Do you know how she knows where I am without calling me constantly and asking me, which would drive me absolutely crazy and once did?”

  “Other than having you followed, you got me.”

  “It’s because of this particular setting app on our iPhones.”

  “Oh yeah, I did that with Maureen.”

  “Really, on which phone? The one Detective McCormick took, or a different one?”

  “The new phone—a different one.” It took a second or two for this information bomb to sink in. “Holy shit!”

  “That’s right. The only way for her to collect on your life insurance is—”

  “For me to die. I get it. And to think how yesterday she almost had her wish.”

  “Get out your phone,” Riggins blurted. “If she can tell where you are, you can probably tell where she is, or at least where her phone is.”

  “Did you really ask me to get out my phone?”

  “Sorry, a senior moment. Now just go to the Find My Friends app.”

  I remembered when Maureen walked me through it. “I got it,” I said.

  “Good. Now, we both know where you are right now, and with that phone in your hand so does Maureen. So tell me, where is Maureen’s phone—sorry, I mean Olga’s? Like I said, if she can see where you are, you can see where she is.”

  “Okay. I get it, but I have to squint. I don’t have my reading glasses.”

  “Well then, squint already.”

  “I’m trying.” I held the phone closer for a clearer read. “Okay…Maureen…or whoever…I’m calling her Maureen…is at 525 East 68th Street according to this app. Damn. What do you know? She’s right here in New York City.”

  “Wait a second.” I could hear Riggings fiddling with his phone. “For God’s sake, Nick! That’s the address for New York Presbyterian!”

  After Riggins rushed to hang up, given the news about the location of Maureen’s cellphone, I should have been wide-awake to the potential danger that awaited me. But I wasn’t. Whether it was because I wasn’t convinced of the accuracy of the Find My Friends app—perhaps I had incorrectly read the location of my cellphone and not hers—I can’t be sure. But there was another reason why I didn’t jump out of bed and hide the instant I became aware that Maureen, and maybe her partner in crime, might be soon paying me an unwelcome visit…

  Having fought off the devil, with head injuries to show for it and little-to-no-rest thereafter, the sedative the nurse had given me was beginning to sink me into a stupor. My thoughts seemed to slow, while I simultaneously struggled to keep my eyes open. In short, I was physically incapable of getting out of bed—and more likely than not to wind up pancake-flat on the hard tile floor if I tried.

  With my senses far from reliable and my vision a blur, when a doctor wa
lked in, I wasn’t sure at first if he was real or imagined. When without so much as a ‘hello’ or an introduction, he quickly stuck a needle into my upper arm, I physically reacted. Whether it was instinct or reflex—the product of my recent fight for survival—I can’t be sure. But what I am certain of is that I shoved him away with such force that even in my weakened condition he was brushed back, and the needle that had been in my arm fell to the floor before it could be injected.

  With eyes half-open, and more of my senses returning, I turned to the man.

  In blue scrubs and about six feet tall with salt and pepper hair, looking more like a soap opera star playing a doctor than a real one, he regained his footing and smiled. “Whoa,” he said blithely. “Sorry, Mr. Mannino. I didn’t want to wake you.” He picked the needle up off the floor.

  I was in no mood to apologize to someone who needle-pricked me while I was dozing off into a desperately needed but perhaps poorly timed sleep. So I didn’t. With a scowl on my face, I watched as he looked down and examined the needle; not for its cleanliness, but merely for its contents. I knew this because he didn’t so much as wipe it clean; nor did he have anything in his other hand to do it with. I looked at my arm. There was a tiny bubble of blood where the needle had entered and exited. I also didn’t recall feeling or smelling any alcohol-based wipe.

  I looked around for a nurse, but the curtain around my bed was completely closed, and—along with it—my view of the corridor. I turned to my right. Charlie was still sleeping. I searched for the call button that had been by my side. It was gone. I felt my adrenaline pumping. More of my surroundings were coming into greater focus and clarity. Why wasn’t a nurse or a physician’s assistant accompanying the doctor? Why was I getting a shot to begin with? I already had two IV drips running into my veins—antibiotics and vitamins—plus a sedative. And why was a doctor himself giving it to me? And why was he holding the needle like he was ready to blow my brains out with it? As a multitude of questions ran through my mind, oddly enough, none had to do with Maureen or her current location.