What the hell is wrong with you, Hanna?
As before, the woman had refused to elaborate on her comments. Drake thought that Leroy might have been able to coax something out of her, but even he was unsuccessful.
That’s the Straw Man. He’s—he’s back.
The fact that Hanna suffered from some sort of PTSD was no revelation. Hell, the woman had pretended to be raped by who she thought was the Download Killer and had also helped Drake break out of a mental institution. She’d even facilitated Dr. Kruk’s escape and participated in the ensuing mayhem.
If that didn’t fuck with your head, then maybe you were the one who belonged in the institution.
Drake switched off the radio and tried to focus on the case.
All killers had an objective, a goal, and while their motivations were often basic, and sexual in nature, this one felt different. It felt more pointed and specific.
The placement of the displays, for instance, was anything but random.
But what story was the killer trying to tell? Was he making a statement against the fashion industry? Or was it broader, a condemnation of the materialistic nature of the filthy rich?
Drake grunted, lost in his head.
Neither of those reasons felt convincing, and he cast doubt on them the same way he did on Robert Tiedeman as their perpetrator. Maybe Yasiv’s search warrant, easily obtained following Robert’s arrest, would yield some valuable evidence, but Drake didn’t think so.
The man was a piece of work, there was no doubt about that, but a mass murderer? Someone capable of stripping women of their skins while they were still alive?
Unlikely.
Drake pulled into the DSLH parking lot and was pleased to see that Screech’s car was already there. Once the media got a hold of Robert’s name, things would really get ugly. And even though Yasiv had promised to keep the arrest under wraps, there had been leaks in this case already.
It was only a matter of time before this information got out, too.
“Let’s regroup inside,” Drake suggested to his passengers as he got out of his Crown Vic.
Like him, they too were lost in thought.
The trio had just entered DSLH and were starting to get settled when the door behind him blew open.
“Screech? What’s wrong?”
The man looked as if he hadn’t slept in days.
“No, nothing’s wrong, but get this, I found a link between the department store and the art exhibit,” Screech said, his eyes going wide.
“What? What’s the link?” Drake asked.
Screech threw his jacket onto Hanna’s desk and then went to his computer.
“Get this—I did some digging and found that the same person who has a financial interest in Lexington Designs, the department store, is also part owner of the whole goddamn mall. Wanna take a guess at who this might be? Oh, and spoiler alert, it ain’t Robert Tiedeman.”
“Norm Fairchild,” Leroy said.
“Exactly.”
Screech opened a tab for a real estate firm and scrolled to the bottom. Drake found himself staring at Norm’s pinched face.
“That can’t be a coincidence,” Leroy offered.
“No shot,” Screech confirmed. “They were targeted.”
Drake couldn’t argue with this logic and found himself second-guessing Robert Tiedeman’s involvement. Could he be a disgruntled ex-employee, perhaps? These two businesses were just the tip of the iceberg when it came to the Fairchild’s investment portfolio. And given Lisa’s attitude, Drake wouldn’t be surprised if she had no idea who Robert was, even if he had worked for her in the past. Could Robert be so driven by his resentment that sleeping with the woman wasn’t enough? That he needed a more prominent, and grotesque, display of his displeasure?
Drake stopped himself before his runaway thoughts derailed objective thinking.
The narrative didn’t make sense.
If Robert was behind this, why not just kill Lisa and Norm, hang them up for everyone to see? Wouldn’t that be the ultimate shaming? Why involve these other women? What did they do?
“Yeah, but check this out, there’s more,” Screech continued. “I was looking into taxidermists in the city like you suggested, Drake, but nothin’ stood out. There are less than a dozen in New York and the surrounding area, and moist are just mom-and-pop shops that mount big fish, that sort of thing. But then I started searching for taxidermy places that went belly up. That’s when I found this.” Another click, and a new website replaced Norm Fairchild’s real estate firm. “This is like from a hundred years ago, and the domain has long since been abandoned, but I managed to recover some cached images.”
Gone were the fancy logos and professional head shots. This new website was antiquated to the extent that Drake thought that even he might have been able to improve on it. There were photographs of several stuffed animals across the top that looked like they had been taken using a Polaroid camera from the seventies.
“Now look at this.”
More mouse clicks and the header became ‘We Specialize in Large Game’. But it wasn’t the words that caused Drake to inhale sharply—it was the low-resolution image of two large cages beneath them. “Now, I’m no expert, and I know that Dr. Nordmeyer said—”
There was a loud crashing sound from behind them, and Drake turned just in time to see Hanna collapse, knocking her computer off the desk and onto the floor in the process.
“Hanna!” He yelled as he ran to her. “Hanna!”
Chapter 55
“Get her some water, for Christ’s sake—get Hanna some water,” Drake ordered. He had carried Hanna over to the couch and sat her upright, but the woman, while conscious, still wasn’t speaking. As Leroy went to fetch the water, Screech hovered over them and Drake gently pushed him backward, trying to give Hanna air to breathe.
“She needs space,” he said.
Leroy returned with the water and handed it to Drake. He put it to her lips, but Hanna took it from him and did it herself. With every sip, she seemed to regain more strength and color started to return to her face.
“You okay?” Leroy asked. “You want an ambulance?”
“No, no… my name is Hanna Whitmore,” she replied.
“What?”
Hanna shook her head.
“Nothing.”
“No, this isn’t nothing,” Drake said. “This is far from nothing. I don’t know what’s going on with you, but if you want me—us—to help you have to start talking, Hanna.”
“I don’t need it… I don’t need your help,” she said, but the tremor in her voice suggested differently.
Drake had given Hanna a pass at the morgue and at Robert’s house, but he wasn’t going to do that here. Things had escalated and he feared that they would continue to do so unless they tackled this—whatever this was—head-on. It wasn’t just that he was worried that their case was in jeopardy with Hanna acting even more erratically than usual, but he also cared about the woman.
They’d been through a lot together, and she was one of only a few people that Drake trusted with even his darkest secrets.
“Hanna, you have to tell us what’s going on.”
The woman took a deep shuddering breath, and then lowered her gaze.
“I was fifteen when I was taken,” Hanna began. This handful of words seemed to make the air in the room thicker, harder to breathe. “A man abducted me and threw me in a cage. Stripped me naked, forced me to shit and piss in a bucket. No food or water for days. He would come down the stairs wearing only this black apron and taunt us. Sometimes…” Hanna paused to wipe the wetness from beneath her eyes. “Sometimes he would bring these animals—squirrels, foxes, I dunno—with him and butcher them in front of us, throw their guts in one of the buckets. And then he would sew them together, make these horrible creatures…”
Drake felt sick to his stomach. A fifteen-year-old girl stripped, thrown in a cage, and tortured.
It was every father’s ultimate nightmare.
Baby Clay surfaced in his mind, but he forced the image away.
“I escaped,” Hanna shuddered. “Somehow I managed to get away. And I ran… fuck, I ran forever.”
She stopped then and while Drake thought there was still more to this horrifying tale, Hanna was done for now.
“Jesus Christ,” Screech said after a loud exhale. “Did the cops ever find this guy? The savage who took you?”
Hanna shook her head.
“They never found him?” Screech asked, incredulous.
Drake didn’t need to hear her answer; they hadn’t found the man because Hanna hadn’t told anyone about her ordeal. He wasn’t sure how he knew this, but Drake was certain it was the case, and instead of making her admit it, to bring shame to Hanna, he spoke up.
“And that’s why the pattern on the skins got to you. Because you recognized them.”
“Yeah.” Hanna’s voice was dry, and she paused to sip more water. “I had that exact same pattern on my back. It was from us trying to get away from him, from pushing up against very back of the cage.”
It was from us trying to get away from him…
Drake had noticed Hanna’s previous use of the term ‘us’ while telling her story but had passed it off as accidental. This time, however, it seemed deliberate.
“Hanna, was there someone else with you? In the cage?” he asked softly.
Hanna looked at him, then lowered her gaze. Tears flowed freely down her cheeks now.
This was answer enough.
“Hanna, what happened to the other person?”
She shook her head and while Drake hated putting her on the spot like this, he had to know.
“What happened, Hanna? What happened to the other girl?”
“I got away,” Hanna whispered. “I got away, but she didn’t. The Straw Man got her.”
Chapter 56
Screech wasted no time in calling Dunbar, asking him to look into cold cases of missing girls from about fifteen years ago. Drake wasn’t confident that the detective would come up with anything useful given that they couldn’t even identify the recent missing women, but he didn’t stop Screech. Like his partner, Drake knew that doing something, even if it had little to no chance of bearing fruit, was better than nothing.
In the very least, it felt as if they were helping Hanna.
Screech hung up the phone and looked over at Drake.
“He’s looking into it, but—fuck—he says the DA isn’t going to be happy about linking these recent events to cold cases. Trumbo just wants to move forward with the charges against Robert Tiedeman.”
“What?” Drake snapped. “Robert would have been just a kid back then. I don’t know what his connection is—wait, why are you making that face?”
Screech’s Adam’s apple bobbed and Drake grimaced.
“Tell me he’s not planning on doing a press conference. For the love of God, Screech, tell me he’s not going public. We’re working our assess off trying to stop this fucking maniac from grabbing more girls, from killing them, and he’s going to fuck up the only lead we have?”
“Not today,” Screech said, sounding as dejected as Drake felt. “But Dunbar thinks he’s gonna do it tomorrow.”
This was a massive mistake. If the man who had hired Robert found out he was in custody, he would sever all ties with him. Any evidence that could potentially link the two would either be destroyed or trampled on by the press.
“It’s not him,” Hanna said from the couch. She was sitting up a little taller now. “It wasn’t Robert.”
Drake wasn’t sure if she was referring to the man who had taken her or the man who was responsible for the recent murders, but that didn’t matter—to Hanna, they were one and the same. While this seemed incredibly unlikely to Drake, his opinion was irrelevant. What had happened to Hanna was real, which meant that there was someone out there, someone who had kidnapped Hanna and another girl years ago.
It could be the same person, or people, or it might not be.
Either way, Drake was still going to find him or them.
There was also the undeniable link to Lisa and Norm Fairchild to consider. Where did that fall into the narrative that included Hanna’s abduction in the early two-thousands?
Drake’s phone rang. The number was unlisted and while he typically wouldn’t answer, he was grateful for the distraction.
“Yeah?” he barked.
“Is this the Private Investigator Damien Drake?”
The fucking press found me already. Those vultures—
“Mr. Drake, this is Dr. Karen Nordmeyer from the Medical Examiner’s Office.”
Drake’s eyes narrowed. If there was one person he wanted to talk to less than a member of the press, this was her.
“You have something for me?”
Dr. Nordmeyer paused and Drake could almost see her shake her head in disapproval. But he didn’t have time for niceties or formalities. Not with a murderer on the loose.
“Yes, a couple of things that I would like to discuss in person.”
“It’s gotta be over the phone.” Drake glanced at Hanna. “I don’t have time to drive out to you today.”
“Well, I’m not sure that protocol—”
Drake lost his cool.
“Protocol? Really? I’ve got six dead girls stripped of their skins and a killer whose only protocol is to keep on killing. So, if you have something to tell me, something that’ll help stop this sadistic piece of shit, then you’re going to have to tell me over the goddamn phone.”
All eyes were on him, and Drake pulled his cell away from his ear and put it on speaker.
“Well, these are unusual circumstances, so I suppose that—"
“Good,” Drake interrupted. “Now go ahead, tell us what you’ve found.”
Dr. Nordmeyer cleared her throat,
“Yes, well, I compared the three sets of sutures—one from each of the mannequins and the third that your colleague provided—and I can confirm that not only are they identical, but the mannequin sutures are contiguous.”
“Contiguous?” Drake asked, unfamiliar with the word.
“From one single strand,” Leroy said.
Drake nodded, then indicated for the man to remain silent. He didn’t want to spook Dr. Nordmeyer and give her a reason to stop sharing over the phone.
“Thanks,” he grumbled.
The fact that the mannequin sutures were from one strand was interesting, as was the confirmation that the section Hanna had lifted from the Fairchilds was part of the same set.
All of this evidence was starting to point at one person.
And it wasn’t Robert Tiedeman.
“Mr. Drake?” Dr. Nordmeyer asked.
“Yeah?”
“I also got the DNA results back from the epidermis from the art gallery.”
Drake’s ears perked. The suture information he’d been expecting, the DNA results he had not.
“And? Any hits?”
Dr. Nordmeyer continued as if she was speaking to herself.
“I entered the four DNA signatures into every database I could think of, but only one came back with a single match.”
Drake’s jaw hung open.
Why the fuck wouldn’t you lead with that?
“What’s her name?” he nearly shouted into the phone.
“Marjorie Wilson. One of the girls’ names is Marjorie Wilson.”
Drake snapped his fingers and pointed at Screech and then his computer, indicating for him to look up Marjorie Wilson.
“What database did you get a hit on?”
“CODIS—Marjorie’s DNA was in the database from a suspected date rape case. Charges were never filed, and the case was put on low priority when Marjorie changed her story more than once. The strange thing is that I could only find her date of birth. For some reason, the woman’s forwarding address was redacted. Do you want the date of birth?”
“Yeah, of course. Give it to me.”
As soon as he had this inf
ormation, Screech started hammering on his keyboard.
“What about the others? No hits at all?” Drake asked.
“Negative. But if you have anything to compare these signatures to, I can very easily—”
“Four,” Hanna said softly.
Drake ignored her.
“What about the straw? Is there anything special—”
“Four DNA signatures,” Hanna said, rising to her feet.
Drake gestured for her to sit down, but she was having none of it. Before he knew what was happening, she walked over to him and pulled the phone from his hand.
“You said you entered four DNA signatures,” Hanna repeated.
“Yes,” Dr. Nordmeyer admitted hesitantly. “Who’s this, please?”
Hanna didn’t even acknowledge the question.
“There were three skins—you said there were three skins! Where is the fourth DNA sample from?”
“Ah, yes, well, I managed to pull a signature from a hair off one of the sutures—it belonged to a male. At present, it’s not clear if it is from contamination at the scene, but—”
“No, it’s not contamination. It’s him. We have to find a match for that DNA,” Hanna whispered.
“As I said, I put it through all databases without any results.”
Hanna held the phone out and Drake took it back from her. She looked even paler than when Screech had shown her the pictures of the cages from the ancient taxidermy website.
“We need to find a match, Drake.”
Drake nodded and then let Leroy guide Hanna back to the couch. She collapsed into it, her eyes glazing over.
“Anything else?” he asked.
“Yes, just one more thing,” Dr. Nordmeyer continued, and Drake shook his head. He’d give half his share of the business to deal with Beckett right now instead of her. The woman was beyond infuriating.
Straw Man Page 23