by Unknown
“Would you care for a glass of champagne?” a brunette waitress asked.
“Sure,” he said, reaching out and taking a glass.
Shane walked into a small crowd of well-dressed guests. The room was fairly large. Small clusters of people were spread out between the sculptures and paintings. To one side of the room, a small table was covered with shrimp cocktails. On the other side, a table held assorted cheeses and decorative bottles of imported wine.
“Shane Lasher,” a female voice asked from over his shoulder.
Shane spun around, away from the shrimp cocktail table, and laid his eyes upon the source of the voice as a woman approached him.
She was absolutely breathtaking. Blond hair, blue eyes, tan skin, and one ear was slightly higher than the other. It was Sandy Parks.
She wore a gold evening gown that left little to the imagination. It radiated on her.
Shane thought that whoever the designer was, he had definitely had her body in mind when he designed that dress.
It also looked too expensive for someone on a cop’s salary to afford. She must have had another source of income.
“Detective Parks. It is good to see you again,” Shane said.
“Thank you,” she responded. She stole the champagne glass from his hand and took a sip. “But it’s just Sandy.”
“Okay. You can call me Shane,” he said.
“So, Shane, what brings a celebrity D.C. lawyer to the Big Apple?”
“I’m sure that you read about my guardian’s murder? My family’s law firm was without a leader. So I’ve stepped in temporarily,” Shane replied.
“So you are running a multimillion-dollar law firm?” she asked. A strip of her hair fell onto her forehead. I sensed that Shane wanted to push it back up.
“Basically I’m just sitting in his office and living in his apartment. One of the senior partners is actually running the ship,” Shane admitted.
Sandy smiled.
“Isn’t that your apartment now?” she asked.
“Right. It is.”
“Listen, I am sorry about what happened to your godfather. I don’t mean to make light of it,” she said.
Terrance Graves was dead and buried. That was all that mattered to us. But Shane had to look the part of a heartbroken son. So he nodded.
“Don’t mention it. It’s true that he’s gone, but it was a year ago. Besides, Terrance wouldn’t have wanted me to be sad all the time. He’d want me to move on. So I have,” Shane said.
“I lost both of my parents years ago in a car accident, so I understand what it feels like to lose someone,” Sandy Parks said.
“How is your investigation going? The murder in the park? The Woodsman?” Shane asked, changing the subject.
“The Woodsman. That is all anybody seems to talk about.
“He is a serial killer that I’ve been working on for about three months, along with two other detectives,” Sandy said.
“So what’s his deal?”
“I can’t discuss any leads with you, but I can tell you what you have already seen on the news. He abducts his victims, drugs them, skins them, and arranges their bodies in some perverted way.
“Some cops think the positions are significant.”
“Significant? What do you mean?” Shane asked.
“Like a totem pole,” Sandy responded. “It was like the killer was positioning each victim to represent something. You know like Earth or darkness or whatever.
“That’s actually how I got hooked up with Townsend.”
Shane drank the last bit of champagne in his glass and looked past Sandy, studying the crowd behind her.
“Townsend?” he asked.
“Yes. He and a dozen other artists have collaborated on this case. They are trying to help us make sense of the meanings in the totem poles,” she said.
“And?”
“And what?” she asked.
“That’s it?” he asked. “You aren’t going to tell me more about what the bodies mean?”
“No. I’m not,” she said.
“Pretty please,” he said.
“No. I’ll tell you that he’s getting more and more brazen with the locales and poses that he’s choosing to use,” she said.
“Anything else?”
“What is it with you and serial killers? Is there anything that I should be aware of about you?” she asked.
He said nothing.
Then she said, “You know, you actual do fit the profile for a serial killer: single, thirties, successful, and if Terrance Graves was your guardian, then what happened to your parents?” she asked.
Then she began circling him as she might a suspect in the interrogation room.
He still said nothing.
Then she said, “Most of all, there is something dark in the back of your eyes.”
She is good, I thought.
Shane chuckled at the accusation. I smirked behind the cold stare in his eyes. Detective Parks had no idea how right she was.
“I have a soft spot for serial killers. I’ve made a career of them. I’ve made a lot of money because of the StoneCutter,” he replied. Then he turned closer to her, took a sip of champagne, and said, “They are my bread and butter.”
“That’s right. They are. You have lined your pockets well. The StoneCutter. That was a bad guy. And he made you famous,” she said. Sandy tilted her head. Her deep blue eyes lured Shane in.
“The fame is the best part,” Shane said.
She smiled at him and said, “Right.”
“So anything else interesting about the Woodsman that you can share without compromising your investigation?”
“There is one thing that the media doesn’t know that I can tell you,” she said.
“Oh?”
I leaned forward in Shane’s skull, pressing my ears against the bone so that I could hear a little better.
“Do you know where the Woodsman’s name comes from? Why we call him that?” she asked.
Shane shook his head.
“After the killer skins his victims, he pours liquefied wood over their bodies. The liquid coats them and quickly dries into a solid wood base. It’s like he petrifies them.
“First he has to shape them in the way that he wants before he transports them to the locations where they are to be displayed,” she said.
The Woodsman covered them in wood? He was doing more than just killing. He was creating sculptures from them. I had to find him. I had to have his carving knife catalogued with my other trophies.
“Wow, that is unique,” Shane said.
“Unique?” she said. “It’s sick! And this son of a bitch deserves to die!” she said. Suddenly, she seemed offended like we had struck a nerve.
“So you believe in the death penalty?”
She said nothing. Sandy Parks just nodded. Her eyes peered down into her champagne flute.
“You sounded like you admired him,” she said.
“In my job, it is required of me to keep an open mind. That’s all. Innocent until proven guilty and all,” Shane said.
“I’m not trying to bust your balls. I’m just messing with you,” she said. She looked at Shane and smiled.
“You are half right. I am a bit of a serial killer groupie, but that’s also required of the job. Like the lawyer who chases ambulances, I chase serial killers,” Shane said.
“I guess that you’d make a fine serial killer yourself,” she said.
Shane’s brow furrowed.
“Huh,” he muttered.
“Don’t worry. I don’t think that you’re a serial killer. I’m just telling you that if you were, you would truly be a challenging one to catch,” she said.
“So then you’re paying me a compliment?”
She didn’t answer. Instead she said, “I wonder where my guy is?”
Then she shot a smile at Shane.
“Sorry to disappoint you. But there is a guy. You’re cute though. But I know better than to get involved with you,” sh
e said.
Then she looked around the room at the crowd as if she were searching for someone. Her eyes swept the room like a trained law enforcement official looking for bad guys.
She stopped. She made eye contact with someone.
A sharply dressed, handsome man walked up to her. He was shorter than Shane, about 5’9”. He was about the same age. His frame was smaller, but muscular, even beefy.
“Hi, darling,” he said.
I felt a slight air of disappointment filter through Shane’s chest. It traveled up his esophagus, entered his throat, and sifted in through the vents at the floor of my chamber.
The man grabbed Sandy and kissed her in a salacious way. He marked her as his own right in front of Shane.
Shocked by the sign of affection, Sandy pulled back. She went for a handhold instead of a kiss.
Then she said, “I’ve been looking for you for like twenty minutes.”
“I’m sorry darling. I was caught up discussing the movement of modern architecture in the twenty-first century.”
“Wow! Boring. I’m glad that you spared me,” she said.
He smiled, but said nothing.
Then she said, “I want you to meet someone.”
She turned to face me. “This is Shane Lasher. And this is Townsend Dry.”
Shane reached out to shake Townsend’s hand.
“I’m actually here to meet you, so this is lucky for me,” Shane said.
Their hands interlocked. I stared into Townsend’s eyes. I lunged forward and pressed hard against the backside of Shane’s eyes.
A creature lurked inside Townsend. I saw him. He stared back at me. He was very, very dark.
Interesting, I thought.
“Shane Lasher. You’re that famous attorney. Something to do with the StoneCutter?” Townsend asked. He expected Shane to respond. But Shane said nothing.
So he cleared his throat and said, “I suppose that Mr. Range sent you here to show Graves & Associates’ support of my work?”
“Lasher & Associates,” Shane corrected him.
“They dropped Graves’ name from the masthead. And you are right. I came here tonight to show you that our firm holds you in the highest regard. We’re aware that you have concerns about a pending suit against this new building design, so I’m here to offer our support.
“We will do everything that we can to make sure that your building stays up. And that your firm is not liable for any fines,” Shane said.
“There is no suit. Not yet. The city hasn’t filed it, only threatened. But thank you for showing up and personally sharing your support. That’s a bold move for your firm,” Townsend asked.
Then Townsend said, “You know, I thought that you were a criminal attorney. Why are you handling my case?”
“I’m not your official lawyer. I am a criminal lawyer. But since I’m the acting face of the firm, I came here to show our commitment to you,” Shane said.
“It’s nice to meet you. Perhaps I’ll come by and speak with you soon. We can make some preemptive measures to protect my company from this potential civil suit,” Townsend said.
Instead of correcting him, by pointing out again that Shane was not his attorney, Shane said nothing.
Townsend reached down to his suit jacket and adjusted the buttons, closing the jacket. Then he reached his hand out to Sandy.
“Detective, let’s go and harass some of the other guests and see if we can get them to invest in my projects,” Townsend said.
He smiled at her.
“Sounds good. It was a pleasure seeing you again. Call me if you remember anything else about the other night,” Sandy said to Shane.
Before they walked away, she shot him a smile that most men would kill for.
We watched as Townsend Dry escorted her into the crowd of well-dressed party guests.
They looked like a new couple: holding hands, kissing, gazing into each other’s eyes.
Townsend dated a cop. Peculiar. Then again, Shane had dated a cop. In fact, Shane had fallen in love with a cop. At least he had been as close to love as his monster would allow him to get.
|||||
Five days had passed since we’d last seen Townsend Dry. Shane exhaustedly researched Townsend’s entire life. He was our age. He was clean. He had no arrest history. He graduated from Cornell with an M.A. in Architecture and a B.A. in Business Management. He’d successfully built a small empire in high-demand architectural design that spread across New York City like wildfire. His designs were hailed by critics as “art that represented the Internet age.”
He owned two properties: an apartment in Manhattan and a penthouse apartment in D.C. that was clear across town from Shane’s.
He had no criminal record. He had no history of violent behavior. Nothing.
Shane swiveled his desk chair. He leaned back, taking a break from reading stacks of magazine articles and watching YouTube videos about the famous architect.
A knock on the office door surprised both of us.
“Come in,” Shane called out from behind the desk.
Tina opened the door slightly and stuck her head in.
“Mr. Lasher. Sorry to bother you, but Ally is on line one. I tried to buzz you on the speaker phone, but there was no answer,” she said.
Shane looked at the phone. A couple of architecture magazines sprawled across the top of it. We had accidentally knocked it off the receiver.
“Sorry. I got it. Thanks,” Shane said. He sat upright and returned the phone to the cradle.
Then he picked it up again.
He answered it.
“Ally, what did you find out?”
“Hey. Nothing on the Woodsman. Not yet.
“But after you texted me this morning on this new client, Townsend Dry, I found out that he’s a talented, sought-after architect. His firm is responsible for more than fifteen hundred designs around Manhattan, Long Island, and New Jersey over the last ten years. Right now they have a dozen projects working, five of which are here in D.C.”
Townsend is a busy guy, Shane thought.
“What else?”
“You mean the strange part?”
“Yes, what about it?”
“The one thing about him that is not sparkling is the criticism of his early work,” she said.
“Explain,” he said.
“Some critics go as far as to say that his mind is demented. And by looking at some of his sculptures, I can see why they think that.
“During Townsend’s sophomore year in college, he created several sculptures and showed them to the public.
“The pieces were mocked and the reviews all came out bad. Some of them have images that you can see posted on a website called tastelessart.com. I’ll send you the exact link when we get off the phone.
“It appears that Townsend’s true passion was to be an artist. But after the failed art exhibition, he changed his major to architecture. Kinda reminds me of Hitler.”
“What was so obscene about his art?” Shane asked.
Ally said, “Take a look at the links. You’ll see for yourself.”
“Thank you.”
“Wait,” Ally said.
“Yes?” Shane asked.
“Come home soon. I miss you,” she said.
“Me too. Believe me,” Shane said and then hung the phone up.
In a strange way, we both missed Ally. She had become invaluable to us, much more than she realized. Shane kept her in the dark about his true self, but she was just as good at assisting us in killing murderers as she was in exonerating them of their crimes.
And Shane meant what he told her. He missed home.
So did I.
I liked the New York setup, but it was not home. We wanted to return home to Washington D.C., the place that we hunted, the place that we belonged.
Shane turned to his MacBook and pulled up his email. Ally had sent him two links. One displayed the criticism of Townsend’s art.
The article was from Cornell’s s
chool paper.