by Graham Smith
A quiet word with Prosser’s brother when she nipped to the restroom had nixed this idea. With constant glances at the door, he’d told me how Prosser had been caught straying in the past and how close he’d come to losing his family over it. He described his brother’s experience as a hard-learned lesson.
I drink the last of the orange juice in my fridge and lift my keys from the counter. When I leave my apartment building I find a car blocking my Mustang into its usual space.
It’s a black Lincoln, which makes the FBI my first guess. My second thought is that unless Mr Steroids works for the FBI, my first guess is wrong.
Three of his fellow drug abusers clamber out of the car. They flex their muscles and throw mean stares around as if they want to intimidate someone or something.
I look behind me and see nobody else to intimidate, their target must be me as the garden doesn’t look scared.
It’s a shame they’ve travelled so far to waste their scowls. I’m guessing they aren’t here for a gurning competition.
Mr Steroids points at me. ‘That’s him. That’s the jerk who put me in plaster.’
I take a better look at the three lugheads as they lumber towards me. The one on the left is the same height as me but twice as wide, giving him the appearance of an orangutan. The one in the centre is the tallest, has a bald head and a goatee, while the final one is wearing a vest top which shows off full sleeve tattoos. The ones on his right arm appear stretched where the steroids have added bulk to an already tattooed arm.
It’s obvious why they’re here, so I start calculating the best way to deal with them. Three against one isn’t a fair fight, but I’ve faced worse odds.
They have muscle on their side but I have unpredictability and intelligence. It’s only Goatee who shows any spark in his eyes. The others have the dull bovine look of a cow being led into a slaughterhouse wondering why it can smell blood.
I’ll need to be quick about this. Superior strength and numbers will always beat a cunning fighter in a long-drawn-out battle.
Orangutan swings his arms wide, completing the look as he pumps himself up for confrontation. ‘You hurt our buddy. We’re here to make you pay.’
I reach into my pocket and pull out a dime which I flip at him. ‘That’s all you’re getting from me.’
It’s a petty insult but he charges at me with a great bellow. The move so predictable I have a smile on my face as I duck his flailing arms and deliver a thumping blow to his solar plexus. He falls, gasping for breath.
One down, two to go.
The other two are cagier now they’ve seen I can handle myself. They advance as a pair, shoulders a scant inch apart.
Goatee feints a right as Tattoos throws a left. My right arm flies up instinctively and makes enough of a connection to turn the punch into a glancing blow rather than a direct hit.
With my attention on Tattoos, Goatee grabs hold of my left wrist and delivers a savage tug.
It feels as if my shoulder has been torn from its socket but I don’t have time to dwell on the pain.
I dance two steps to my right so Tattoos is in Goatee’s way and then stride towards him feinting a left and delivering a roundhouse right. He ducks back causing me to miss, but there’s a thud as the back of his head collides with Goatee’s chin.
My foot connects with his groin before he has a chance to recover from the clash with Goatee. As he clutches his groin, I send a second roundhouse which connects with his chin.
‘Just you and me now.’ I accompany my words with a devil-may-care grin.
I see a hint of doubt in Goatee’s eyes, but still he presses forward.
He feints a couple of times then springs at me. A jab connects with my chin but I’m moving back so it doesn’t do too much damage. The right to my ribs does though.
Taking advantage of the blow’s impact he wraps his hands around my throat and slams me against the wall of the apartment block, pinning me against the rough bricks.
As his grip begins to tighten and his thumbs dig into my larynx, I kick out at his legs. My kicks land but with my back against the wall I can’t get enough of a swing to hurt or unbalance him.
With that tactic out, I have no option but to raise the stakes to another level.
I throw my hands out until my knuckles touch brick. Jerking them together in a pincer movement, I slam the heel of each hand into Goatee’s elbows.
The way he’s got me held, with his arms extended and his elbows locked, makes him vulnerable to this kind of retaliation. There’s a dual snap as both joints shatter.
He yelps and staggers back with his arms hanging and a dumb look on his face as if he doesn’t know what to do.
I solve his problem with a nose-destroying headbutt followed by an uppercut, which drops him in a heap.
Crossing to the Lincoln, I fix Mr Steroids with a more intimidating stare than his buddies could ever manage. ‘This ends here. This ends now. If you come after me again, I’ll finish you and anyone you care to bring with you. Do you get what I’m saying?’
‘Mr Young ain’t gonna be happy with you for this.’ There is bravado in his voice but fear in his eyes.
‘How happy do you think he’d be if I got a friend of mine to tap into his website and identify all the people who have ever hired one of his courtesans? How happy do you think he’d be if my friend was to send an email in Mr Young’s name blackmailing all those clients?’ I’m making this up as I go but pricking his bubble is too much fun to pass up. ‘How happy do you think Mr Young would be if my friend was to send a full list of his clients to every journalist, blogger and radio station in the country?’
He doesn’t answer.
‘Here’s what is going to happen. I’m going to go back into my apartment for a shower. When I come back out, which will be in approximately ten minutes, you and anyone you brought with you are going to be gone.’
I turn to see Orangutan trying to rise from his knees; Tattoos is sitting up attempting to clear his head by shaking his brain some more and Goatee is still lying where I’d left him.
My second shower of the day sees me turn the water as hot as I can stand it. Now the adrenaline has left my body, the pain from Goatee’s punches and the yank he gave my arm is kicking in.
A check out of my kitchen window shows Mr Steroids and his friends have left.
The chief calls as I’m locking the apartment door. I’m half expecting this call, but being right doesn’t make the news any easier to accept.
49
The Watcher enters his kitchen and takes a mouthful of pills. He has two hours to spare before he’s due at work. As a rule, he should have started by now, but he’s lied about a visit to the dentist as a way to buy himself a late start.
He’s pleased with today’s finder. She was a good friend of Melanie’s and as such he knows a few things about her family.
Never caring for the woman himself, he’d tolerated her non-stop chatter because she and Melanie had been friends since childhood, the two of them inseparable until marriage and careers had forced them apart. Still, there had been the obligatory dinner once a month where he’d have to listen to the woman’s husband bitch about taxes and how supermarket chains were destroying small local stores.
His career in the Marines had spared him from these get-togethers but once delisted he’d endured them for Melanie’s sake. Putting up with a chatterbox and a bore for a few hours, twelve times a year was a tiny sacrifice he was happy to make for his wife.
Now the woman’s gabbling has proven useful. He knows about her family. Where they work. Their passions.
Her father seems to be the easiest target. He has spent time in his company at one or two social occasions.
Getting close to him won’t be hard. His place of work is an ideal location to dump a body and remain unseen.
He lifts his bowl and stirs the scraps of paper before selecting one. Opening the scrap of paper, he finds a single word. ‘Seppuku’.
He laughs. Using the
Samurai’s method of self-disembowelling as a way to kill is something he’s been waiting for. He’s even managed to get his hands on the correct type of short sword for the ritualised death: the Tanto.
He remembers what he’s learned about Seppuku – the various rituals, the way Samurai warriors used it to avoid shame or falling into the torturous hands of a victorious enemy. For a time it was also used as a form of capital punishment.
Laughing again, he looks forward to plunging his Tanto into the engorged belly of the chatterbox’s father and moving the blade across and then up. Setting the scene will be important on this one too. He’s keen to observe the ritual as closely as possible.
He will act as the father’s Kaishakunin. It will be an honour to deliver the death stroke.
With a glance at his watch, he gathers what he needs and sets off to hunt his next victim.
The kill won’t take place this morning. He’ll do that later when he can watch the corpse without being missed by anyone.
He knows his cover of being at work won’t last much longer, but he needs to eke out every last scrap of benefit it can afford him. With so many homicides in such a short time, it can only be a matter of days before the authorities start to close in on him.
Yet the pattern must not alter. It and the tally are the points that matter, the staging of the bodies nothing more than a delaying tactic designed to confuse those investigating the murders.
50
The chief ushers me towards his office. Where the reception was awash with a throng of people earlier, it’s now littered by a scant few members of a different family. The smell of stale bodies and nervous tension lingers on, infecting the new arrivals with its all-pervading tentacles of fear.
In his position I’d do the same. After rousing two families from their beds, he’d kept them at the station all night, until he had to deliver the news none of them wanted to hear.
‘So tell me about the bodies that were found.’ I take a seat by his desk.
‘Kelly Oberton was out for an early morning run when she saw a car with bloodstains on the window. She went forward to get a closer look, hurled her guts up, then she ran home to call us.’ He scratches at the white stubble on his chin. ‘As soon as I heard, I sent the boys out to round up her family.’ His voice holds strength and conviction in his decisions, but there is a hint of resigned fatality seeping in at the back.
‘Have you got them all?’
‘No. Her brother left town to go to a conference in Vegas and her father refused to come into custody. Said he’s got too much to do at work without the police jumping at shadows.’
‘So what have you done with the father then?’
He raises his hands from the desk. ‘What can I do, arrest him? He doesn’t want our help and we’re already getting slaughtered by public opinion. I haven’t read it myself, but apparently that Ms Rosenberg took more than a few potshots at us in yesterday’s Gazette.’
‘I trust you’ve got someone on him?’
‘I wish I had the manpower. If I start providing detectives or even patrolmen as bodyguards for every family member who doesn’t do what I ask of them, there’s no way I’ll be able to look after the ones who do. Let alone the rest of the town.’ His scowl lifts for the briefest moment. ‘At least that’s what I told his daughter.’
I smile at the chief’s cunning. He’s using the father as a tethered goat. By not assigning an obvious bodyguard or shadow, he’s creating an opportunity to catch the killer before his selection process becomes public knowledge.
Once that news breaks, the killer may change his methods, move on to a different system or leave town and start all over again in a different town, city or state.
A thought comes to me. ‘Have you tried the FBI again? Got them to check their records for anything similar in other states?’
‘No. The thought occurred to me, but I haven’t had time to follow it up yet.’
‘You said their bodies were found in a car. What have you learned from the scene itself?’
‘To be honest, I’ve never given it a thought. At this moment in time, I’m more concerned with protecting the Oberton family than chasing after the killer.’ He shrugs. ‘If I’m lucky, I’ll be able to keep them safe until an arrest is made.’
‘Your best chance is that he targets the father and whoever you’ve got on surveillance duty catches him before he strikes.’
‘Right now it’s the only chance we’ve got of catching this guy.’
It’s a rare admission from the chief and it makes me understand just how much the strain is affecting him. Not only are the words semi-defeatist, his tone is riddled with the cancer of utter dejection.
‘Do you mind if I go and have a look at the scene?’
The gratitude in his face makes me feel as if I’m the one doing him a favour.
‘Not at all.’ He lifts the phone on his desk and presses a button. ‘Boulder is coming out there. I want you to make sure he gets treated the way I would. If I hear any different, you can leave your gun and your badge on my desk.’
As I reach for the folder he’s handing me, he notices the bruises on my neck and the swollen redness of my knuckles.
‘Have you been fighting, Boulder?’
‘I got jumped by three bozos connected with the strip joint near Salt Lake City.’ I wave a dismissive hand. ‘They attacked me. I defended myself. They learned not to attack me.’
I leave the room before he gets too far into it. There’s nothing to be gained from telling the chief of police how I beat up three men on a public street at eight o’clock in the morning.
51
As I drive to where the bodies of Wendy Agnew and Donny Prosser had been found, I find myself thinking about what I’m about to witness, the questions whose answers I will be seeking and the direction this investigation has taken me.
What started out as helping Alfonse look into Kira’s murder, has in a few short days seen me become the chief’s go-to option in the search for a serial killer. From my initial request for assistance by way of information sharing, I am now being relied on to help steer the investigation.
The responsibility weighs heavy on me, yet I am experiencing a fraction of the burden the chief will bear. In addition to the multiple homicides, he has the everyday concerns of keeping order in a town of twenty-odd thousand.
The biggest worry I’m facing, is the feeling I’m to blame for the latest deaths. If I’d made time to read all of Kira’s journal sooner, both Prosser and Wendy Agnew may still be alive.
While my rational brain tells me it is only a perverse masochistic streak that made me read them in the first place, I’m aware the best breakthrough we’ve made so far has been identifying the killer’s selection process. While not helping us to catch him, it at least gives us a chance to prevent his next strike.
Another part of my psyche is pointing fingers. It has the voice of my mother and the critical attributes of a scorned lover. Like a devil nestling on my shoulder and whispering into my ear, it is telling me I’m out of my depth. That a doorman at a bar shouldn’t be playing detective. It tells me I’m going to fail and people will die because of my failure.
I hear it whispering their blood will be on my hands. That my incompetence has already caused two deaths.
It takes an effort, but I cast the demonic utterances to the back of my mind and force the doubts away.
The road twists and winds its way through the woods. Beristow’s Bluff is a local beauty spot by day and a make-out place by night. Named after one of the founding fathers of Casperton it holds memories for almost every resident.
I reach the car park and leave my car next to Ms Rosenberg’s Chrysler. She’s arguing with a patrolman. He tries to deny me access, but Lieutenant Farrage shouts across and the patrolman steps aside ignoring the protestations and insults coming from Ms Rosenberg.
Give Farrage his due, while he might not like me being there he accepts my presence. The strain of the investigation is sta
rting to show on his face too. Thinking about it, I realise he’ll be under pressure from the chief. As mayor, his father will also be pressing him to solve the case and to top it off, Ms Rosenberg has spent months lampooning him and his abilities. Add the fact no sane person likes to see another human lose their life and it’s no surprise he’s looking so punched out.
His being unfit to lead the investigation is bound to be another factor eating at him. He’ll know for certain he’s out of his depth. The chief bringing Alfonse and I in to help is a public slap to his face, yet he has gone beyond bitterness. For perhaps the first time in his gilded life he is seeing the bigger picture.
Some CSI guys dressed in hooded Tyvek suits complete with overshoe booties are searching the car for evidence.
I see a number of square foot pads leading to the car. I know from my reading it’s how CSI teams approach such a scene. First the ground is scouted for evidence. When the search is done a foot pad is laid and they move forward a couple of feet.
Farrage approaches me. Extends a hand. ‘Look, Boulder, I don’t like you being here any more than you can imagine. But the fact is we need all the help we can get. I can put our differences aside. Can you?’
The gesture and his admission take me by surprise but I don’t hesitate to shake his hand.
‘Of course.’ I point at the car with blood on the windows. ‘What have you got from the scene?’
‘Why don’t you take a look for yourself?’ He reaches into the CSI van and brings out a Tyvek suit, gloves and a pair of overshoe booties.
‘Sure.’
The word carries more than acceptance. It unites us as witnesses to the horror man can wreak on his fellow human beings.
It’s a struggle to wrestle my frame into the suit but I manage not to fall over or rip it in the process. Clad in the protective gear, I place one foot after the other and step onto the foot pads.
As I approach the car, I see the residue of brain matter mixed with the blood on the windows. The stench of vomit carries across from where Kelly Oberton voided her stomach.