The Jake Boulder Series: books 1 - 3

by Graham Smith

  I grab a soda and join Alfonse who is talking to a group of friends. I hear him asking about Peter Lester, so I turn to a buddy I sometimes played pool with.

  We shoot the breeze for a while until his girlfriend ushers him off to meet someone.

  I keep my eyes open for anyone who may be able to help with our enquiries. Seeing a couple of girls I know, I wander across and join their company. I start with small talk, then begin to seed in the odd question. They give me straight answers, some of which are useful.

  When I leave the group to get another soda, I’m surprised to see George Chalmers talking to Claude. Thinking about it, I realise that since Claude’s business has grown there’s every chance he now needs a professional accountant.

  The bigger surprise is the girl linking arms with Chalmers. I’m no expert on the subject, but I’d say she’s at least six or seven months pregnant.

  Ever the gentleman, Chalmers introduces me to the girl. ‘Mr Boulder, this is my fiancée, Ruth.’

  Ruth’s face is a picture of contentment, and when she speaks her speech patterns and vocal intonations mark her as the perfect match for Chalmers.

  Judging by the lilac twinset and the pearls around her neck, I reckon they’ve both met their soulmate. Their lives will be already planned out, right down to the Florida retirement complex they’ll move to.

  They’ll live safe and sensible lives together with respectability. A pool boy or a secretary may engage them in a dalliance but they’ll never leave the security of their marriage.

  What I can’t believe about their relationship is her being pregnant with only one ring on her finger. As far as I’m concerned, Chalmers is too careful.

  As they move off to talk to other guests, I turn to Claude. ‘How long they been together?’

  ‘I think they hooked up some time last year. It must have been before I opened the new shop. They were at the opening party. They’re a natural couple don’t you think?’

  I remember the opening party, but I don’t recall seeing Chalmers there. Although I do remember being somewhat distracted by the attentions of Claude’s rather forward cousin.

  Casting my mind back and doing some mental arithmetic, I work out Chalmers must have met Ruth a month or so after splitting from Kira.

  I keep my eyes on them as I talk with Claude. Everything about their interaction depicts them as a genuine couple. If Chalmers is faking it to cover his feelings for Kira, he should be a Hollywood star not an accountant in a town like Casperton.

  Throughout the evening, I make sure to circulate and speak to everyone I want to. As alcohol loosens tongues, I learn lots of different things but only a small fraction of it is useful. Having already agreed to meet at his place after the party, Alfonse and I stay apart to better talk to as many people as possible.

  A game of water polo starts in the pool, but I keep my distance.

  As midnight strikes I am talking to a couple of regulars from the Tree when a drunken guest trips over his own feet and cannons into me. I stagger back a few steps before my feet catch on something. Twisting as I fall, I see water rushing towards my face.

  Instinct makes my hands go out to break my fall, but they don’t get any resistance from the water as I tumble into the pool.

  I go in head first. I can feel my knees hit the edge of the pool as water swirls around my head. My eyes and mouth are pressed shut as I thrash my arms around to try and escape the water. The only effect it has is to draw my legs into the pool after me.

  Despite my terror, I feel them slithering over the pool’s edging. I can also feel my heart racing as panic sets in.

  With my body submerged, I thrash for what seems like hours until I find the right way up.

  Pushing my feet down, I locate the bottom of the pool and thrust upwards, desperate to be out of the water as soon as possible – to feel cool air on my skin.

  I just hope I’m not at the deep end. If I am, I’ll have to be rescued.

  When my head breaks the surface I gasp in a precious lungful of air. My push off the bottom is so fuelled by terror it sees me shoot so far out of the water that I lose my balance and stumble backwards when I land.

  A firm hand on my back stops me going under again. My eyes seek the shortest route to safety. I’m three large steps from the side, but the chest level water slows my exit from the pool.

  To my mind it is a living beast, clinging to me, holding on so I can be pulled into its depths and pressured by invasive rivulets, until I open my mouth for air and let it conquer me.

  Concerned with nothing but escape, I ignore the laughter of the party-goers. It’s not their fault they don’t know I can’t swim. That any body of water deeper than a puddle scares me witless.

  I feel a hand on mine. It’s Alfonse reaching into the pool and guiding me to the chrome steps. I realise for the first time my eyes are stinging and my mouth has clamped shut.

  Clambering up the ladder, I see concern in Alfonse’s face and mirth in everyone else’s.

  ‘Sorry, dude. Dunno what I tripped on.’ The slurred words come from the drunk who’d bumped me.

  Knowing that delivering a gut punch to a drunk is a good way to get hurled on, I grab his shirt with shaking hands, shift my weight from one hip to the other and toss him into the middle of the pool. Let the water beast have him.

  He’s lucky. If there weren’t still kids running around, I’d leave him lying in a bloody heap.

  Claude arrives and tosses a towel at me. ‘C’mon. I’ll loan you a pair of shorts and a T-shirt.’

  I follow him into the house, happy to be out of everyone’s gaze and away from the water.

  33

  The Watcher settles down in front of his computer with an energy shake and a packet of power bars.

  His fingers tap out the beat of the seventies classic rock songs blaring from his iPod. He’s too young to have liked the bands in their heyday, but when he reached his teens, he fell in love with the riffs and lyrics. It’s a love that has deepened over time. Now he won’t listen to anything else.

  He chases threads of intelligence as he probes the lives of those who’ve helped him select his next victims.

  He’s thankful for the internet, for Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. Each of these networks is loaded with information about his targets and helpers.

  It doesn’t take long to draw up a list of possibles. After that he just has to whittle down the list until he can select the most appropriate victims. The next ones must have a different connection. Must be able to be taken down together.

  The opportunity has come along to throw a delicious curveball into the pattern and he is excited about making the pitch.

  He knows how much the police are under pressure. He’d watched the cars arrive at Panchtraik Reservoir.

  It had been inspired to place Evie Starr’s body up there.

  After Paul Johnson’s body had been found on the road towards the reservoir, the siting of the old woman’s body would make the cops think it was someone travelling that way.

  Wait until the coroner got her on the slab, cut her open. Then they’d see the power of what they were dealing with.

  Getting the addresses for potential targets and reconnoitring via Google Street View, he learns as much as he can from the internet.

  Satisfied he can do no more without carrying out some physical reconnaissance, he turns his attention to the kills themselves.

  He writes down a new method on a scrap of paper, scrunches it into a ball and tosses it into the glass bowl with the others.

  After mixing them up with a finger, he picks one out, unfolds it and reads the contents. He smiles; the method is a good one. He’s been looking forward to it being selected.

  Next he has to work out where to leave their bodies. Unsure whether he should go for two separate dump sites or put them together, he weighs up the pros and cons until an idea strikes him.

  He examines the idea from a few angles but finds nothing wrong or dangerous about it. In fact, the
more he thinks about it, the better it seems. If set up in the right way, their final resting place will throw police suspicion away from himself. It might only buy him a few days, but any advantage gained can only be a good thing.

  Every day wasted by his pursuers will mean another victim to add to his tally.

  He only has two concerns now.

  The tally.

  The pattern.

  34

  I arrive at Alfonse’s house dressed in clothes loaned from Claude. By a stroke of luck, before I was knocked into the pool I’d passed my cell to someone who wanted to check it out before their next upgrade.

  Alfonse and I take our usual seats at his table ready to compare notes. I gesture for him to start and lean back in my chair, hoping he’s learned more than I have.

  ‘I take it you met George Chalmers and his fiancée?’

  I nod. ‘Yeah. I think it’s safe to remove him from our enquiries. He was never a likely suspect. Besides, he’s now engaged and about to become a father. You’d have to be a certified whack-job to get into that position while still obsessed by an ex.’

  ‘Agreed. I spoke to a few people about Pete Lester. Megan Hutchison told me he’s been seeing her sister for the last six months. Apparently they got together while he was still dating someone else. Megan couldn’t remember the other girl’s name but said her sister had been yelled at by her one night when she was at the Tree with Pete.’

  I cast my mind back to try and recall some details but nothing comes back to me. It isn’t unusual for two girls to get into a slanging match at the Tree. Ninety-nine times out of a hundred the situation is calmed down by friends or the man whose attention they are competing for.

  It is the other occasions when things get out of hand. When men fight they tend to punch or kick at each other. Women, on the other hand, claw, scratch and pull hair, which makes it much harder to separate them. Plus, of course, I can’t retaliate when they start attacking me.

  ‘So, with Upson out of town at the time she was murdered and the other two in stable relationships, it’s not looking as if it’s any of those three. Agreed?’

  He nods. ‘So that puts us back to the wives and girlfriends.’

  ‘Unless it’s nothing to do with her clients and is something else altogether.’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘A family member doing it to stop her hooking. Or…’ I fall silent, trying to pick the right words.

  ‘Or what?’

  ‘Or it’s someone killing people at random. Three people have been found murdered within four days.’

  ‘You don’t really think there’s a serial killer out there, do you?’

  ‘I’m not sure, but it’s a big coincidence if there isn’t.’

  ‘Are there similarities with the victims? The murders? Are the victims connected?’

  Alfonse’s questions are good ones. All three answers are negative. Other than the fact all three bodies were found in a public place, there is no apparent link between the victims. There may be when Chief Watson identifies the lady found at the reservoir; until then, there’s nothing to link the three victims.

  ‘There aren’t any connections or similarities that we know of. But what’s worse – a serial killer targeting the residents of Casperton or three separate killers?’

  He doesn’t answer so I explain my theory to him.

  ‘If it is a serial killer, maybe by helping the police we can use their resources to help us find the person who murdered Kira.’

  ‘I see your point.’ His lips purse as he gives a pointed look at the clock above the sink. ‘So, what’s our next move gonna be?’

  ‘You look into the wives and girlfriends angle tomorrow. I’ll read over the police reports and get a handle on where they’re up to. I’ll see you about nine.’

  I take his sigh as confirmation. I can manage on less than six hours’ sleep, but he likes a solid eight every night.

  Sleep isn’t in my plans when I get home. There are far too many questions assaulting my brain for it to allow itself to be shut down.

  35

  I dump my keys on the counter and flick on the stereo. It’s not that I’m lonely, it’s just sometimes I need a background noise to keep me sane. Living alone suits me, but whenever I read I like to have other voices around me. I select a playlist comprising soft rock ballads and recline my chair.

  I start with the police reports about Paul Johnson.

  Like Kira, he lacks any known enemies. It isn’t that he was well liked, more that he was inoffensive. Reading about his life via the statements taken from co-workers and family members, it seems like he was insignificant to a lot of people.

  He kept his business private, did what was expected of him and then went home to his apartment.

  According to his sister, Johnson’s ex-wife had put him out one day, only to move a boyfriend in the next.

  He’d gone without a quibble. It was the sister who’d put a roof over his head and spent long nights talking him through the break-up. When he was ready, she helped him find a rental apartment.

  The police report detailing his finances doesn’t show any obvious reasons for him to be killed for money. His alimony payments were made on time and there were regular deposits into his daughter’s bank account. A footnote indicates his daughter is studying sociology at the Community College in Salt Lake City.

  A search of Johnson’s apartment has found a life insurance policy naming his daughter as the main benefactor. The payout isn’t enough to put the daughter in the frame. Compared to what he was already giving her, the payout would cover no more than three years in college.

  Following the same logic, I look down the columns until my eyes land on the one detailing his balance.

  Imbalance may be a better term. He’s five hundred bucks overdrawn.

  The next page I read shows his credit card statement. While not maxed-out it is near its limit. A look back at the bank statements and I find what I expect to.

  His salary is due to be paid in a few days. Johnson is living in a boom and bust cycle with most of his income going to his ex-wife and daughter. Left with just enough to get by on, he’ll have been ever fearful of unexpected bills. I spend more per week on groceries than he’s got left to pay for food, gas and other incidentals.

  It is stories like this that keep me single. A decent man has been discarded by an unfaithful wife and left to live the life of a pauper. With no money to spare on luxuries, he’d struggle in the dating pool. All he had to look forward to were lonely nights and the day when he’d be free of his responsibilities.

  The feelings of bitterness would be overwhelming. Like a cancer of the mind, the resentment would devour happiness as his self-confidence plummeted.

  These are my fears. After Mother was abandoned by my father, I saw first hand how corrosive rejection can be. I’ve felt it once, and it isn’t an experience I want to repeat. Despite Mother’s reassurances that it was her my father left, Sharon and I had talked long and often about the fact he’d rejected us too.

  My realisation of the irony in the situation brings a wry smile to my lips as I turn to the next page. I’m investigating the murder of a woman besotted with me and a man I am terrified of becoming. What Kira wanted from me would leave me as vulnerable as Johnson had become.

  The next pages I read tell me little about Johnson’s life, but give me great detail on his death.

  In clinical terms, Emily Green’s neat handwriting tells of the blunt trauma from a wheel wrench found with his body. Hedging her bets, she estimates there are between ten and fifteen separate blows to his head.

  The terminology is unfamiliar to me, but I don’t need to be a doctor to understand he died from having his brain bashed in.

  The accompanying pictures from the crime scene and autopsy don’t make for easy viewing, but I examine them for clues regardless of my distaste.

  When I’ve finished with the pictures, I lie back in the recliner and close my eyes. A slide show of Kira, Jo
hnson and the as yet unnamed woman plays as I consider the different methods of their deaths.

  Kira died from a precise stab after suffering a frenzied attack and was dumped under a bush.

  Johnson’s head was staved in and his corpse bundled into the trunk of his car.

  The old woman had her throat cut in a very exact way. Then she’d been cleaned up and deposited in a public place where she was sure to be found.

  Considering the attacks as a whole, I look for commonalities. Two of the attacks have shown frenzy at some level. To counterbalance this, there are also elements of precision and forward planning.

  There had been no blood on the old woman’s clothes and very little where Kira was found. This speaks of them being killed elsewhere and deposited at the places they were found.

  The precise cut on the old woman and the single penetrating stab to Kira’s heart tell of an attacker who knows the human body and how best to attack it.

  Johnson’s death speaks of opportunism, the wheel wrench to hand when the killer happened upon Johnson changing a flat.

  My next thought is Kira and the woman are connected while Johnson is a random victim, killed as much by chance as by his murderer.

  36

  The Watcher raises the takeout coffee to his lips as he walks down Third. The early morning light glints off the dewdrops as he savours the Java. It’s a rare treat and is for cover more than anything else.

  A dozen or so yards ahead of him is a potential target. The pock, pock, pock of her heels on the sidewalk is at odds with the tree-lined avenue and the hour. It’s the sound of the city, of business. It’s measured and regular, not the arrhythmic clack of a drunk girl staggering home.

  Her Facebook status told him she was an HR manager for one of the oil companies. It also told him she had a colleague from head office joining her for the day, which hotel the colleague was staying at and the hour she was supposed to collect him.