by Lynde Lakes
****
“I’m here, all right,” he said, frustrated that she couldn’t hear him. He’d heard the tremor in her voice, and longed to reassure her. He glanced over at Ted who shrugged, looking sympathetic. They hadn’t released the cabby for fear he might tip off the killer. The irate taxi driver grumbled about the fares he was losing.
“Pipe down.” York didn’t want to miss anything Jen was saying.
****
Secure that York could hear her if she called out, she walked a little faster. Everything was going according to plan and she had the best protection possible. So why was her stomach in knots? She passed a colorful poster advertising a baseball game. “Go Red Sox’s!” she said as much for her own peace of mind as for York’s.
She wiped her damp hands on a tissue and drew her cardigan tighter against a chill that had nothing to do with the warm August night. Her stomach turned at the scents of garlic, sausages and espresso drifting through the air from the restaurants and cafes.
The bell from Old North Church rang out. She flinched. Calm down, she told herself. “I just passed the Paul Revere House,” she whispered into the microphone. “No limo in sight. Not that I expected to see one. The killer wouldn’t mark himself like that. Hey, this is the pits, talking and getting no response.”
She wondered what the killer had in mind. Would he just walk up and stick a shiv in her back? So far all his victims had been strangled. Victim. She hated the word and refused to be one. But how could she fight someone she couldn’t see? “Show yourself, coward,” Jen said under her breath. Her throat was dry. In a silent mantra she repeated, relax, relax. She passed a poster advertising an all-Mozart program featuring bass baritone Thomas Quasthoff. “Classical music is my bag, York. I’ll bet you’re into jazz and the sound of sweet sax, all of the cool groove stuff.” Had she made him smile?
****
York’s heart wrenched at some of the things Jen had said. She was right-on about his love of jazz. He admired her sense of humor given the situation. She was the bravest woman he’d ever met.
“Oh, wait!” Jen said with excitement. “A car just pulled into a metered space ahead. Might be gray. Hard to tell for sure in night light. Could be silver or light blue.”
A metallic taste rose in York’s mouth when she mentioned it might be a gray car. “Is it a Honda?” But she couldn’t hear. Dammit.
“Should I just keep walking toward it?” She gave a nervous laugh. “What else?” she continued, answering her own question. “I have to force the killer to show himself, don’t I?”
York wiped the sweat from his upper lip. He kept her in his sights, not daring to blink. It was tough with the crowds. She passed an alley. A drunken group of men wearing Shriner hats lurched toward her.
All of a sudden he couldn’t see her anymore. “Ted. I’ve lost sight of her! Sound’s gone dead!” York leapt from the car. Over his shoulder he shouted, “Radio the van. Drive the block. Help me find her!”
He ran up the street toward where he’d last seen Jen. He pushed through the crowd, brushing people aside. God, don’t let me lose her!
****
He raced down the street to where he’d last seen Jen. A gray Honda with its license plates covered with mud skidded into an illegal U-turn, knocking over a fruit cart. Apples and oranges rolled in every direction. The vender shook his fists at the car as it sped off.
Two people rode in the front seat; the woman’s head drooped forward like a wilting rose.
York ran after the Honda until its taillights disappeared into the maze of traffic. “Jen!” My God. I’ve lost her. “No!” His cry raged above the street pandemonium and echoed back at him, savage, tortured. People turned and stared. He slammed a fist into his palm. His heart hammered against his ribs. “Anyone get the description of the guy who got into that gray Honda?” he shouted.
A teenager with green spiked hair said, “It was a bearded dude in a white turban and Jesus robe.”
The teen’s three cohorts nodded in agreement. “His wife fainted,” the one with the pierced nose added.
Fainted, hell! York’s heart thudded. The killer had done something to Jen.
He flipped open his cellular and ordered the cops in the area to tighten their circle, then he called dispatch, snapping his words. “Need assistance from North End patrol units. Stop the gray Honda with mud covered plates going west on Hanover. Unidentified male driver in a white turban kidnapped the woman passenger. Name’s Jen Lyman. They’re probably headed toward H-93. Driver’s armed and dangerous. And get me a helicopter!”
“You got it,” the dispatcher said. “One’s airborne near Fan Pier.”
York hit the disconnect button, and started to punch in Ted’s autodial code when his partner screeched to a stop near the curb. York yanked open the passenger door. Ted stepped out and slapped on a portable light, and both men leapt back inside. “Go. Go!” York ordered.
Ted nodded and activated the hidden siren. “Heard dispatch’s call. Highway 93, right?”
“Affirmative.” York noticed the cabby was no longer in the back seat.
Ted swung into an illegal U-turn and headed southwest on Hanover, siren blaring. “What happened? What about Jen’s wire?”
York fastened his seat belt. “Don’t know on both counts.”
Warm night air blasted through the open windows. They sped through the tangled web of congested streets, running stop lights.
“Why couldn’t the damned city engineers design a direct route to H-93?” Ted asked, obviously forgetting his vow to stop cursing. When drivers failed to pull over fast enough, he let loose with a litany of cruder words.
York got a glimpse of a gray car speeding up the freeway ramp and another going straight. “Two gray cars ahead.” Both looked like Hondas. “If the killer’s headed for the warehouse—but if he’s going somewhere else—”
Knuckles white, Ted gripped the steering wheel. “Dammit, which is it?”
York’s heart pounded. In another second it’d be too late to make the ramp. “Freeway!”
Ted swerved onto the ramp. York’s body lurched to the right, the seat belt digging into his chest. The escaping car passed under a light pole, revealing a glimpse of gray. “There ahead! Fast lane!” Evening darkness made it impossible to count passengers, or zero in on any details, but the driver’s speed and wild lane-to-lane zigzag assured York he’d pegged the right car.
Ted floor-boarded the gas pedal, but the apparently hopped-up Honda outdistanced them.
York wiped sweat from his forehead with the back of his hand. “Keep him in sight.” He gave the Honda’s location to Dispatch. “Where the hell is the helicopter?”
“We needed your fix,” the dispatcher said calmly.
When York gave the pilot their location the guy repeated it and then said, “ETA, two minutes.”
York flipped closed the radio, and concentrated on the chase. The Honda sped past the off ramp to the warehouse. York narrowed his eyes. Had he been wrong about the killer’s destination? “Don’t let that bastard get away!”
Their siren cut the air, rising shrilly above the freeway noise. Cars pulled over, but not quickly enough. The Honda blended into the far distant traffic, hiding itself in the maze of red taillights.
They passed several exits. None of the cars they passed were gray with mud covered plates. Five miles later, York forced himself to accept that they’d lost the gray Honda. “Head back.”
“Dammit,” Ted muttered. “If the other cars had pulled over like they were supposed to, the SOB couldn’t have out-driven me.”
“Keep your adrenaline pumping. We aren’t giving up.” York checked with dispatch. The other police units and the helicopter had found no trace of the Honda or its occupants. No trace of Jen. “Try the warehouse.”
Ted swung off the highway, then on again, headed back toward the warehouse exit.
During York’s years as a cop, he’d prided himself on his ability to stay cool, but tonight he’d
exploded and let fear devour him. Now, he had to focus or Jen was doomed.
Hang on, Jen. Hang on.
Chapter Ten
Jen battled her way out of the foggy bad dream.
Memory flooded back. Not a dream—a living nightmare. She’d been walking down the street in Old Town. Something sharp jabbed into her arm. Her throat constricted; she couldn’t cry out. Her head spun like a runaway carrousel. She fought dizziness. A spinning darkness closed around her as strong arms swept her from her feet.
“My wife fainted,” a vaguely familiar voice said. “Clear the way. Gotta get her to a hospital. Now.”
The man slung her into the passenger side of a car and propped her up with a seat belt.
No! she cried silently, then sank into an abyss.
Time passed. She had no idea how much. Now she was here. Where? Jen tried to open her eyes. Her lids felt like lead. She attempted to shift positions, but couldn’t move. Her hands and feet were bound to something. Sweat trickled down her back. It was difficult to breathe the oppressive air. The place smelled of oily rags. And death.
Oh, God. She remembered the nauseating bile odor now. She was in the warehouse where the strangler had dumped seven dead bodies.
She blinked and squinted at the glare of a bare light bulb hanging from a cord that disappeared into the darkness of a high ceiling. Beneath the light was a wooden table with her purse in the middle of it, belongings spilled in a heap. A lot of good her gun and cell phone did her over there.
A white robe and a turban lay draped over a chair—also a dark, hairy beard. The sense of a sinister presence touched her like icy, phantom fingers. The hair on the nape of her neck rose and she lifted her gaze slowly.
A dark silhouette stood beyond the light, its shadow looming enormous and evil, on the concrete block wall behind it.
“Well, princess. Awake at last.”
Her heart pounded—that voice, that nickname. “Lee!”
He stepped from the darkness into the light and sat on the edge of the table.
“Oh, God. It is you. I prayed it wasn’t.”
“You care.” His voice dripped sarcasm. “I’m touched.” His halo of sunny hair, disheveled from the turban, gave him a boy-next-door look, while underneath pulsed a brain twisted with evil.
Jen’s mouth tasted metallic. “Where’s Buddy?”
“See that small lump of rags in the corner? It’s not rags.”
Her breath caught. “Is he dead?”
“Drugged.”
She was appalled at his matter-of-fact tone. But Buddy was alive. Drugs could be handled. That is, if he didn’t die of an overdose. She doubted Lee would consider the small boy’s weight before giving him anything. “You promised to let him go.”
Lee laughed and began to pace. “I am the boy. The boy is me.” He waved his arms like a preacher. Then he began to mumble unintelligibly. She remembered the out-of-control way he’d wielded the axe. She trembled. Lee was two killers rolled into one—a cool hit man, and an insane, serial killer—and she was caught between both terrifying personalities.
Suddenly he seemed to cycle out of his craziness. He struck a match and lit a cigarette. Flames and evil glinted in his glacier blue eyes. “Never could keep promises,” he said, picking up the conversation where they’d left off without missing a beat. “You wouldn’t know that, of course. You never knew the real me.”
She swallowed. She had to play the game with him and ignore his insanity. “I thought I did. We were friends.” Fighting to keep her voice controlled, she glanced down at her collar.
York, are you hearing all this? Is my wire working?
“You were my cover,” Lee said. “My normal life between jobs.”
She fought terror, rage and a searing sense of betrayal. No time for those emotions now. Just keep him talking. She’d dealt with people with mental problems often enough at the Crisis Center. Stay calm, and above all keep him calm.
Jen took a deep breath. “Is the mayor involved?” She worked her hands, trying to loosen the ropes cutting into her wrists.
“The mayor? Are you kidding?” Lee blew a smoke ring. “He’s too stupid to run a city. That’s why Zombolas runs the show. Zombolas and Tormont have a deal going.”
Lee began to mumble again. “Control...have to…”
“Lee,” she said, trying to bring him back from his lunacy. “A deal? You said a deal?”
Lee blinked, then poured some liquid from a thermos and tossed back two pills from a prescription bottle. When they were together, she’d asked about the pills. He’d said they were for migraines. What were they really? Would they calm him, or send him completely over the edge?
“You know, payoffs…favors,” he said.
It frightened and fascinated Jen how he could go in and out of sanity without losing his former train of thought.
“Coble forked over big bucks for the quick cleanup of the leaking tank at his gas station. But then you already knew that. It’s what got you in trouble.”
She stared at Lee, quivering inside as the total revelation hit. “You killed all those people...you’re a serial killer, for God’s sake.” It was incredible that she could have ever had feelings for him.
He raked a strand of hair from his forehead with steady fingers. The gold friendship ring she’d given him on his birthday glinted in the light. “I prefer hitman,” he said. “I’m well paid, and damned good at my job.”
“Hitman?” In a way, it wasn’t all that much of a surprise; her doubts had been mounting. Now his trips, the whispered phone calls all made sense. She wished it had been other women.
Lee laughed. “You think I’m just some crazy random killer? Everything was planned. And as long as I take my medications I can control my urge to kill until the time is right. Zombolas marked the victims and I deleted them like worthless files.”
Jen winced. Lee had always been a bit taciturn, or pretended to be. Now he seemed to enjoy bragging about his callous acts.
His beeper went off. He took a long drag of his cigarette, then dialed. When someone answered, he said, “Count-down time. Have the last installment ready.” He mumbled something about the warehouse, then hung up.
“Zombolas checking on you?” She immediately regretted her sarcastic tone. Don’t make him mad, for God’s sake.
Lee came very close. He stroked her throat and whispered, “Don’t make me modify the plan.”
Tension crackled in the air between them. If she wanted to live through this, she’d have to curb her smart mouth. She lowered her eyes. Her mock docileness succeeded, and he backed off. As she worked her hands, the rope cut deeper into her wrists. Strained silence hung in the air until she couldn’t stand it. “Why the fishing line?”
“Zombolas’s idea.” Lee rubbed his jaw, looking amused. “I used guns in other cities. Here I’m The Boston Strangler. Been a kick.” His laugh was hysterical.
She had to keep talking, drag this out and give York time to find her. He would. She knew it. They’d talked about this warehouse, and it followed that the killer might bring her here.
“Wait a minute,” she said. “I want to get this all down. Untie me and let me scribble some notes.”
He gently touched his nicked and scabbed ear. “You forget, dangerous lady, I know you—and what you’re capable of.”
She moistened her lips. “No. No. Remember, we talked about rekindling The Boston Strangler’s fame. Only you will know it’s you. Could be your biggest kick ever.”
Lee gave a snort. “I’ll get my kicks and make history, too, but you won’t write it.”
If she had to play this insane game to stall, so be it. “How many people have you killed?”
He arched an arrogant brow. “Here in Boston? Or in my life?”
“Both.” Unblinkingly, she stared at Lee. She didn’t know this man at all. Their two years together were a complete lie.
“Twenty here.” He stubbed out his cigarette on the edge of the table and lit another.
> “Why did Zombolas want all those people dead?”
Lee looked at her, or perhaps through her, his color darkening. “Like you, they were nosey. When they learned too much, it was over.”
She cleared her throat. “Like Kenny Duncan?”
“Ah, yes. Sniffles. Coble hired him to repair his computer. He intercepted one of Zombolas’s messages to Coble. Since it came from the mayor’s office, Sniffles got the wrong idea. But he would have figured it out—”
Jen’s heart pounded at the sound of a helicopter overhead. “What about the victims outside Boston? Were they connected to the toxic waste problem as well?”
Lee shook his head. “Freelance contracts with reasons as varied as the faces. A wife wanting to ice her hubby for insurance...a husband who didn’t want to pay alimony...a young woman’s parents who wanted revenge against her stalker...”
“Why didn’t I see this side to you?” she asked softly. Would she be asking herself this question for the rest of her life? She closed her eyes. If she had a life.
He laughed and came very close again. He slowly ran a finger from the hollow in her throat down to her cleavage. “Did you forget how hot we were in the sheets? And you’ll have to admit, I can be a damned charming guy.”
Bile rose in her throat. She’d slept with an insane man...a hitman...a serial killer.
****
Driving slowly, York and Ted circled the warehouse, shining the car spotlight into every obscure place. They passed SWAT vehicles parked in the shadows, looking dark and ominous. Scattered teams of men with nerves coiled tight waited for a signal. A helicopter scanned cone-like beams over the area.
“No sign of the Honda or any car other than our units,” Ted said. “Any other ideas?”