by Roger Hayden
Dobson thought of the chain letters he had seen so far, each identical in their message, announcing a twenty-five-year high school reunion “right around the corner.”
Harris laughed, keeping in tune with his ability to find humor at inappropriate times.
“Tomorrow?” Dobson said, astonished. “Every one of those people could be in danger.”
“Oh, come on,” Harris said. “Let’s stay focused on the issue at hand.”
“I am focused!” Dobson said, turning toward him with a glare. “You just don’t get it, do you, Jack? We keep underestimating this guy with every senseless murder that comes our way.”
Harris stepped closer, face reddening. “Spare me the lecture, Mike. You blew this case. Not us.”
Dobson flushed with anger as Jones stepped between them, hands at their chests.
“That’s enough!” Nelson said loudly, rising from his chair.
He rubbed his temples for a moment in the brief silence that followed and then grabbed the remote on his desk. “Compose yourselves and get it together before the Feds come in here and take over the entire thing. I want eyes on this reunion tomorrow. We’ll get extra security there too, if necessary.”
“Why even have the thing?” Jones asked in protest. “If the public knew that all the victims were from the same graduating class, I don’t think a single person would go.”
Dobson took a step back in deep contemplation. “Having the reunion might be the only way to catch him.”
Harris shook his head. “Another sting operation, eh?”
Dobson looked straight at the captain without response. “I think I’ve spent enough time talking about this case. I have a partner to find.”
Nelson pointed the remote at the TV and turned up the volume. “Just wait a minute. Let’s hear what the Chief has to say.” Chief Meeks had just finished his opening remarks and began to address what he called a “horrific and calculated murder of residents of the greater Summerville area.”
Absent from his comments were any mention of the out-of-state murders of Victoria Owens and Elizabeth Hayes. Perhaps it was just too much to mention in one press conference. The chief had his briefing notes along with Dobson’s initial report. Anything else was open the speculation.
“There is an official manhunt underway for the killer…” he continued. “He’s been described as a white male in his late thirties to mid-forties known to often wear wigs and disguises.” He paused and flipped to the next index card as the room went quiet amid still camera lights flashing.
“We believe this person to be responsible for four recent murders in Summerville and at least two elsewhere. The victims were all former graduates of Summerville High, and we believe that to be the connection between the killer and his victims.”
Standing next to Dobson, Harris stared at the screen dumbfounded. “He actually said it.”
“Said what?” Jones asked, looking at him confused.
“That they were all high school graduates from the same year,” Harris said. “Wonder just what happened to this guy back then.” Harris paused and turned to Dobson with a nudge to his shoulder, grinning as though the thought had to get out. “What do you think, Mike? Maybe they pulled this kid’s trousers down in gym class.”
“Whatever it is, I’m not leaving until I find out,” Dobson answered.
“Anyone with information about these murders is asked to contact our department crimeline immediately. The suspect is considered armed and extremely dangerous and is believed to reside in the Summerville area.”
An off-screen reporter suddenly interjected, taking the chief by surprise. “Chief Meeks, how close are you to finding this killer?”
Another off-screen reporter cut in as well with their own question. “Will there be a curfew imposed by the mayor?”
“How will residents know when it is safe?” Another reporter asked.
Meeks raised a hand up and calmly asked for patience. “We’ll be getting to your questions soon enough, but first it’s important that I get the proper information out.”
“How long has the department known about the existence of this serial killer?”
“How accurate is the name, the Chain Letter Killer?”
Captain Nelson turned away from the screen and shook his head. “Just started, and he’s already losing ground.” He then paused and pointed at the three detectives standing in front of his desk. “Get a handle on this thing. Find Sterling.” He suddenly paused again, slightly overwhelmed. “And the Erickson woman… Janet.”
“And as far as the reunion?” Harris asked.
Whatever their differing opinions on the matter, the detectives waited for Nelson’s to reach a decision. “We let it go on until further notice,” he eventually said. “Might be our best bet in catching this guy. Same as what Mike said.”
“You could also be putting a lot of people in danger,” Jones added.
They all turned toward the television as the chief continued his statement, barely able to get a word in edgewise with the constant questions lobbed at him. The prospect of a serial killer on the loose meant that this was no ordinary press conference. It was the beginning of a frenzied coverage cycle destined to reach the national media before the department had much chance to react.
Dobson locked himself in his office and sat at his desk, prepared to reach a breakthrough. The long rolling bulletin board he and Sterling had worked was five feet from his desk with its series of photos, chain letters, and notes tacked across the surface. Betsy Wade’s yearbook rested below Dobson with several case files stacked nearby. He called Sterling’s number a series of times, but it always went to voicemail, though he didn’t expect her to answer.
He envisioned his rookie partner tied up in the darkness of a tightly confined holding cell. She didn’t cry even when taunted by her captor. Next to Betsy Wade’s yearbook was a reprint he had requested from the school a day prior. Beside the reprint was the complete file into the investigation of the plastics factory fire.
His computer screen displayed dozens of open browser searches, Facebook pages of the deceased, and any information he could find on the class reunion, news articles about the plastics factory, and who or what they were dealing with. His cell phone rested nearby on silent. He couldn’t turn it off. Not with Sterling in danger.
In the time since locking himself inside the office, he had received two text messages from Rachel. The first one asked if he was coming home at a reasonable time that evening. The second one presumed that he wasn’t.
Guess not, she said.
Dobson used to get annoyed by the grief he got for working long hours. But after so many years of late nights and unpredictable hours, he knew that no amount of justification was going to make her used to it. Her snarky texts were all she had left. For the first time in a long time, Dobson had no idea when he’d be home.
He typed back, I’ll let you know later, and returned to his work. It felt as though all or most of the pieces were there. The chain letter killer had practically drawn him a map.
The missing page of the yearbook, page seventy-five to be exact, was a collage of random shots around school. From the intact page of the reprint, he saw an immediate red flag in the lower right-hand corner of the page. It was a group photo, and the participants couldn’t have been clearer.
Dobson circled the picture and made note of the names. From left to right there was Janet Hughes, Cooper Erickson, and Elizabeth Butler in the front and Victoria Harmon, Gordon McDonnel, and Betsy Wade in the back. All of them looked to be about twenty years younger—many of them with long wavy hair and bright and dated clothing.
If this was the group together, where is the missing link? Who had ripped the original page from Betsy Wade’s yearbook and why?
He scrolled through the photos of the Gordon McDonnel crime scene, still fresh in his mind. The brutality of the murder, specifically Gordon’s gouged-out eyes, startled Dobson. Perhaps even more than Betsy Wade’s severed head. Vict
oria Owens/Harmon had been scalped. Elizabeth Hayes/Butler was found with her ears cut off.
It was a strange and random assortment of kill trophies, and Dobson was unable to find a clear pattern beyond the simple fact that the killer didn’t collect anything below the neck. That was, until he received an urgent call from his office phone moments later. He recognized the number immediately as the medical examiner.
“Dobson here,” he said, phone receiver against his ear.
“Hey there, Mike. It’s Galligan. Your boys just dropped a corpse in my room.”
“That’s correct, Doctor. It’s the Chain Letter Killer’s latest victim, Cooper Erickson.”
There was a brief pause on the phone as Galligan sighed. “I know. I knew the man. Was a pretty good guy.” He then cleared his throat and spoke with an inhibited tone Dobson had yet to ever hear from him. “I don’t know how to say this, but I’ll just get it out. I noticed a large blood stain on the victims’ clothing mainly around the groin area. After we removed his clothes, we confirmed it. Mr. Erickson has been castrated.”
Dobson gripped the phone, unsure of what to say.
“You still there, Mike?” Galligan asked.
Dobson’s hand unknowingly drifted to his crouch, covering his own area in a subconscious daze. “Yeah. Oh my God. That’s terrible.”
“It’s pretty damn sick. I’d say that we’re dealing with a true psychopath, but we already knew that from the moment we wheeled in Betsy Wade.”
“Thanks for letting me know,” Dobson said as a sickness grew in his gut. He hung up and scribbled some additional notes down. When he had found Cooper Erickson’s body the murder had looked hasty, sloppy even. There were no immediate signs of any further mutilation beyond stab wounds.
The killer, however, had taken another trophy; a piece to add to his growing collection. As he resumed his Internet browsing, Dobson believed that their killer was far from done. His background search into the plastics factory yielded several results. Before becoming a near-smoldering pile of rubble, Priceless Plastics had operated in the greater area for fifteen years.
An electrical fire had destroyed the building and the business promptly closed after the death of four employees and injury of others. Dobson had known of the abandoned factory’s background and the urban legends that had since transpired. What he had found most curious of the Internet articles listed were the dates. He had forgotten that it had been so long ago, decades even. The eye-grabbing headlines said it all:
“Factory Blaze Kills Four”
“Inferno Engulfs Factory, Killing Four”
“Three Dead in Freak Electrical Fire”
Dobson scanned the articles, making note of the victims’ names: Ralph Vargas, 44, Bruce Roland, 56, and Andre Sterling, 35, all deceased, and Landon Kearney, 17, injured. Mr. Vargas was an electrician working on the factory’s faulty machines. The rest were all late-shift employees who had been killed or injured in the fire.
Dobson flipped open the investigation file and began reading. The date of the report immediately caught his eye: Monday, February 11, 1991.
Everything was there, Dobson just needed to figure out the last few connecting pieces. Then he read the first couple paragraphs of the report and caught something he knew he should have noticed at the beginning.
“Mark Kearney Sr. is the owner of Priceless Plastics. He has been cleared of negligence and wrong doing but is facing several wrongful death lawsuits by the families of the victims. The arson investigation deemed unexpected electrical malfunction as the cause of the fire.
“Mr. Kearney’s own son, Landon Kearney, seventeen, was badly injured trying to save the other victims. Mr. Kearney’s wife, Melissa, told investigators that her son sometimes worked late at the factory before school as he was saving money to buy his own car.”
Dobson turned away from the report and immediately scrolled through one of the open articles on his Internet browser, written three years after the incident. The third paragraph talked about the Kearney family and subsequent loss of their factory, their home, and their finances due to lawsuits.
Their own son, the article stated, had been admitted to a treatment and recovery center for burn victims. He had been in a coma for years. At first, many of the physicians didn’t think he would make it. Their son’s mention was brief as the article went back to talking about the once wealthy and influential Kearney family who had soon lost everything as a result of the fire.
Dobson swung around and pulled the yearbook close, flipping to the senior class photos. He went directly to the K’s, half expecting to see a picture of Landon, but there wasn’t any. “Of course,” he said out loud. The date of the fire, February 11, must have been long before class photos, or so Dobson believed.
He flipped a few pages forward to the words, written like fine print, which accompanied the closing page of the senior years. There were several students listed as “not pictured,” and among them was the Kearney boy, Landon, absent on the day the students took their photos.
“*Not Pictured: Landon Kearney.”
Mind Games
Sterling woke up in the darkness of the strange, unfurnished bedroom that had become her holding cell. Even with all light extinguished, windows boarded up, and the door closed and locked, she could sense the emptiness of her surroundings. She saw the shape of a single chair a few feet in front of her next to a plastic bucket. She looked around for a light source and found none. He hadn’t left her any food or water either; a startling reminder of her helpless situation.
She felt a slight stream of air from a small vent above in the otherwise stuffy room. She swallowed the dryness in her scratchy throat just as footsteps sounded from outside the room, moving back and forth. He sounded busy. She recalled him explaining how important it was for law enforcement to “stay out of his way.”
The mattress plastic crinkled as she carefully turned over and sat up, aching arms still tied behind her back. For the moment, it appeared that he had forgotten about her. It felt like hours since he had last entered her room. The increasing discomfort in her back, arms, and legs was on the verge of unbearable. Despite her increasing panic, Sterling considered herself fortunate to be alive and curious of her captor’s reasons for doing so.
She listened for movement outside the room as his footsteps echoed from the hardwood floors. He sounded preoccupied as he failed to so much as slow near her door. Sterling’s headache worsened by the minute. She couldn’t remember how she had fallen asleep in the first place. Perhaps he had drugged her again. Or maybe, she thought, the effects of the chloroform used to abduct her were still lingering.
“Real smart, Angie,” she scoffed under her breath. “What are you going to do now?”
It was her third day as a rookie and she was already facing a life-or-death situation. It felt like a bad dream she couldn’t wake up from. She froze as he passed her room with a cheery whistle. He was up to something, and in his momentary distraction, Sterling saw an opportunity. She pulled at the rope binding her wrists to no avail.
After a frustrated sigh, she backed against the wall and pushed herself up. She stepped off the mattress with her legs wobbly from not standing up for so long. Her sneakers touched the hardwood floor just as a power drill sounded in the distance. The drilling stopped and resumed with her careful steps toward the bedroom door.
She could see slivers of light at the edges of the door frame. She slowly turned the knob and wasn’t surprised to find it locked. The drilling stopped as Sterling pressed her ear against the door and listened. A loud hammering followed. The abrupt clang against metal sent Sterling a few steps back. He was constructing something and had been doing so for hours.
More than ever, she knew that she had to get out of the room and find out what it was. She moved away from the door as his whistling resumed with leisurely steps in her direction. She looked within the darkness of the room for something to defend herself with, though she couldn’t move her hands.
She ta
pped the plastic bucket with the tip of her shoe. It was empty. She pushed against the flimsy folding chair in her path. It could be worth a shot, she felt, if she ever got free. She’d club her captors head in given the chance, but for the moment, she was at his mercy.
She could see the tacky flower pattern on peeling wallpaper, covering all four bare walls around her. It reminded her of a vacant motel room. Wherever she was, it was no normal house. It had the markings of someplace transient, no doubt deep in the woods and away from everybody and everyone.
She moved along the wall to her side and came across a large piece of plywood nailed in the center. Ahead, she could see another. It looked as though her captor had boarded up the windows. In that case, the only clear way out was through the door.
She paced the room, hands tied behind her back, and tried to conjure a plan. She was still wearing her jeans and T-shirt from before she got taken. Her pistol, cell phone, and pocketbook had been taken, which was of no surprise to her. Her thin leather belt remained around her waist. Perhaps she had another potential weapon at her disposal.
“Think, Angie. Think,” she said under her breath as she moved across the floor, back and forth.
There had to be a way out. If she could convince him to free her hands, that’d be a start. She paused and listened as a quietness followed from the house. A chill ran down her spine when she suddenly had the uncanny feeling that he was right outside the door, listening against it. He had told her that his name was Landon.
Whether it was his real name or not, she didn’t know. All that was clear was that his vengeance was far from done. Could she say anything to him to have him reconsider? Could she say anything to him at all?
She inched toward the mattress as a knock came at the door, startling her.
“Ms. Sterling?” the killer’s voice said. “Are you awake?”
Sterling cleared her throat and spoke. “Yes.”
“You’ve been in there for a while,” he continued. “Would you like some food or water perhaps?”