Charity Kills (A David Storm Mystery)

by Jon Bridgewater

  Beginning with Russell, each of them proceeded to report on their individual discoveries to the moment. Russell and Grady told how they had found the names of the other six girls and showed the videos of news reports from the times of the murders.

  Alisha had found files on all six of the girls from the M.E.’s office records and she went over the method of each girl’s death. All had been killed by having their throats cut and all had been anally raped postmortem. None had defensive wounds, and each had been choked before death. She also went on to describe each girl’s appearance and concluded by noting that they were similar in appearance and age.

  Sergeant Hernandez pulled his files and followed along. He, too, had found all six murders. He had found the reports in the unsolved case files of the precinct, he told them. “I remember the last four girls’ deaths from my time working the desk. I also remember thinking that none of these murders were vigorously investigated at the time; they all seemed to fall through the cracks, no leads ever found and no person of interest ever named.”

  But now he also had more information; more background on the victims and ultimately, more commonality. All of the girls worked in or around downtown Houston. All worked for big companies where they were only a paycheck number. All came from small towns in Texas; they had headed to the big city to pursue their dreams in the fast lane, find a job, and maybe a husband. None of the girls had any family to speak of, so nobody to stand up for them or push for their deaths to be solved.

  Grady interrupted. “Does it appear any of the girls knew each other?”

  “Not from what I can find, nor were any of them from the same town. Two of them worked for Tejas Petroleum (but at different times), two in big law firms, one for the county, and the last two for big firms servicing the oil patch,” replied Sergeant Hernandez.

  “Were they all killed during the Rodeo?” asked Storm.

  “Yes, all of them, although last year’s victim was killed later than the others, late in March.”

  Russell jumped in to remind them that the dates of the Show had been moved to later dates last year. They had changed them to coincide with college spring break crowd, which also made it last longer. By changing the dates the Show could run twenty days instead of fourteen.

  Next, they watched the disk of the films from the security cameras that Storm had gotten from the Show. The surveillance of the center’s main entry and escalator proved to contain nothing helpful. Leslie never appeared to have gone into that building. But the stadium disk was a different matter. They saw the girl enter and go to the elevator with other women and men, but one man seemed to be paying much more attention to her than to the other women.

  “Anyone know him?” asked Storm.

  “I do,” replied Russell.

  “Who is he?”

  “Joe Dresden. He is married to Ellen Dresden.”

  “Why do I know that name? Isn’t she the former Ellen Hitchcock?” asked Grady.

  “Yep, the very same,” replied Russell.

  “She took over her dad’s company, didn’t she, and was written up as the lady entrepreneur of the year back a few years?” asked Storm.

  “Yep, and Joe married her soon after. He worked for the company and after they were married she made him president,” smirked Russell.

  “Is he involved with the Livestock Show?” asked Storm.

  “Only because she is; she’s a big contributor and likes the notoriety she gets from it. They buy champions every year and she was elected to the Show Board of Directors a few years back, so he gets all the benefits she gets. He has become a fixture out there, or should I say, in the VIP bars, since they got married. When you see them together, he is the social one and always loving and attentive, but when she is not around he’s the same horn dog he was before they got married.”

  “You do know why you didn’t get any videos from the clubs, don’t you?” asked Russell, grinning at Storm.

  “No, but I bet you know. I wondered about that, but got no inkling from the guy at the show. Why?” inquired Storm.

  “It’s kinda like Vegas—what goes on at the Show stays at the Show. All the big wheels have their, as they call them, their “rodeo wives” and their “real wives” and they don’t want it documented anywhere, so no security cameras or cameras of any kind are allowed in any of the clubs for that matter.”

  “Does everyone out there know that?” Storm asked the question that seemed to flash across all the faces at the table.

  “Well, an outsider wouldn’t know it, but people who spend any amount of time out there all know it.”

  “So you’re telling me Joe Dresden has “girlfriends” and Ellen doesn’t know about it?” Storm asked Russell, while making quotation marks in the air with his fingers.

  “Oh, I think all the wives know about their cheating husbands, but as long as you don’t slap them in the face with it and everything is kept under the covers, so to speak, they choose to ignore it,” Many of these wives are mucho protective of their station and if they did ever suspect infidelities; it is easier to turn a blind eye to them than to accuse your paycheck of being unfaithful. It’s usually about money and position and a dalliance here and there is treated like ‘who cares as long as they don’t bring anything home with them.’”

  “Any of the wives have Rodeo boyfriends?” asked Grady with a twinkle in his eye.

  “I am sure some do, and if they do, that would be a much better kept secret.” Russell just smiled his shit-eatin’ grin.

  “Do you think the victim is one of Joe’s Rodeo girlfriends?”

  “Looks like it from what we just saw, but who knows? It could have been the first time he had ever seen the girl. They pass some of these girls around like you traded baseball cards when you were a kid.”

  Hernandez was going through the files while this discussion was taking place and interrupted, “Hey y’all, this Joe Dresden is mentioned in the police reports as the last one to see two of the other girls alive. It says he was investigated and nothing came of it. His alibi was that he was with his wife at the times the girls were killed.”

  “Still interesting he was last seen with both them and now seen close to Leslie’s death,” said Storm.

  “Russell, do you still have all your credentials for the Show?” asked Storm.

  “Sure do! Daddy keeps me on the list so I still get all my perks,” Russell snickered.

  “I want to go to the Show tonight. I want to go to this club and mingle with the big boys, but I don’t want anyone at the Show to know I am coming ...or Hebert, for that matter,” he said, almost as an afterthought. This was going to be a surprise attack; hopefully he’d catch some people off guard. It was always easier for a suspect to make a mistake when he didn’t know he was being looked at than if he had prior knowledge.

  * * * *

  The meeting broke up, each contributor heading back to their jobs to do all the digging they could without raising suspicion. They each would be looking for anything else that tied the girls together or that might lead to a suspect. They had all signed on now; they were all going to do whatever they could to find the killer of Leslie Phillips and the other six girls, all feeling pretty sure the killer was the same person. None of them took the situation lightly. They knew this was no game or adventure, but none of them thought they could personally be in any danger, not physically, anyway, and not at this time.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Joe’s Big Saturday Night

  Darkness still came early in early March to Houston, and, as always, the weather could change in a heartbeat, but opening night of the Rodeo meant that everyone who wanted to see or be seen would be there and the weather be damned. Hot or cold, it was the night all sizes and shapes of women dressed in their best leather outfits, some of them needing more leather than one cow could provide. Others wore only enough garments for propriety (using the word loosely) and left plenty of flesh to share with the practiced observer. Add to the outfit of choice a new 20X beaver
hat looking like the ones worn by the cowgirls in an old Tom Mix movie and a new pair of exotic skin boots, uncomfortable yet fashionable, and the women were ready for the “Rodeo Parade.” Annie Oakley in Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show had nothing on these gals.

  It was a Tuesday night, but people attending the Show took off work early to go home and change to be at the festivities in plenty of time. Even with advance tickets, committee badges, and parking passes, parking would be horrendous, forcing people to park in adjoining and satellite lots or anywhere else they could get by with. The Show arranged for offsite parking with shuttles to the stadium and a new onsite tram system to get folks to the center or the stadium. The tram consisted of a long line of open cars of eight to ten rows, each row seating four to six people across, pulled by specially designed tractors leased for the Livestock Show. A new committee had been formed just for this function, with the members ferrying people from the bus drop as well as making round trips to the adjacent, but still remote, parking lots. There was also the new Metro train system, which had been inaugurated earlier in the year and could carry folks from downtown or the Medical Center and all the Metro lots in between to the stadium. All in all the Show was doing its best to make accommodations to get as many people in as they could.

  The committee system and sponsors were a financial boon and a money saver for the event. Committees existed for every possible need the Rodeo might have (and some they didn’t), and many of the committees even had sponsors, like the Tram Committee, sponsored by Ford, which paid for the rental of the tractors and other vehicles in return for free advertising. All the twenty thousand members of the almost one hundred committees were volunteers who paid dues to be volunteers! One could say the Show management was double dipping—not only were no salaries paid, but the Show received money to let folks volunteer. There were committees for everything, from ticket sellers and takers to event information to animal auctions to workers in the private clubs and exhibition areas, to lost children. About the only paid employees other than the office staff were the uniformed security, the bartenders, and the servers in the clubs.

  Storm wasn’t too worried about parking or getting in since he was in the company of Russell. Russell received all the perks his father’s status allowed, from free entry into all the events to special director parking. It all came with a special badge and card, which also allowed him entry into every VIP club in the facility.

  When they arrived at the complex, Russell merely pulled up to a guard gate, showed his parking credential hanging from the window and was directed to a special parking area reserved for the “big boys” of the Show, their families and guests. The lot was located adjacent to the center and even at that proximity there were special golf carts made available to make sure that “Show royalty” didn’t have to scuff their boots by walking too far.

  Russell had told Storm to dress the part. “We’re entering the land of the cigar store cowboy and I don’t want you embarrassing me,” he said with grin, which was a tongue in cheek way of saying, “Don’t go looking like a cop.” They both wore starched jeans, a starched button-down shirt, sport coat, highly polished boots, and a properly blocked Western hat. In case it had been too long since Storm had worn a cowboy hat, Russell reminded him the silk bow went in the back of the hat.

  It had been years since Storm had been to the opening night; the last time was with Angie when she made Russell take her to see Reba McIntyre. It had been fun and Angie loved the hobnobbing with the faux famous or even the infamous. She never went anywhere she didn’t know someone and that night had not been any different. Russell had gotten tickets to one of the sky boxes at the top of the “Old Dome.” The seats were actually terrible and the stage seemed miles away, but the box had closed circuit television and the drinks and snacks were free. The Old Dome sky boxes all opened on a common hallway which made for a promenade where folks could walk all the way around visiting the boxes of friends along the way, stopping to have a drink and catch up on the latest gossip. Storm always found himself following Angie’s lead, shaking hands with people he didn’t know (in most cases didn’t care to know) and working to keep a smile on his face. To Angie and Russell schmoozing was the reason to be there, but not Storm. He would run into the occasional old football player he knew from the past or a fan who remembered him and they might recapture the old heroics for a while, but the real fun was watching Angie have such a good time. She truly was the social butterfly; an infectious smile covered her face as she beamed from greeting to greeting. Inside Storm was amazed at how truly happy it made him and how beautiful she was when she enjoyed herself so much.

  This night would be a wholly different story. He was there to watch people, see what he could pick out and hopefully find out if there was a killer in their midst. He wanted to do it with as little fuss and recognition as possible. He was with Russell, just two good ole boys out to have a good time and enjoy the scenery. Their first stop was going to be the VIP room in the center. It was a room where the elite went to have dinner and drinks before they ventured over to the stadium to watch the entertainment and socialize away from the crowd of common patrons.

  The room had been upgraded when the Show moved into the new facility. It was located on the second floor of the center at the end of a long hall in a location where the regular patrons and committee people couldn’t see the perks the directors and VP’s enjoyed. The entry was subtly guarded by special committeemen who checked credentials, along with one or two of Hebert’s cops. No one was sure exactly why the cops were there, but the assumption was that they were there to break up any altercations that might erupt between over-served “cowboys” or jealous “cowgirls.” Storm guessed the gig was mostly just a plum job for some of Hebert’s handpicked underlings; a place they could meet and greet, look out for the big wheels, eat for free, and get paid for about four more hours than they really worked.

  Going with Russell always had its own share of drawbacks, though, because everyone knew him, either because of his dad and family or from television. There were always people yelling “hello” or waving at him. Storm asked him once if he really knew all those people. Russell just laughed and said, “Hell, no, but they think they know me because of television.” Storm knew he was right, of course; he was good in his role and he always made the public feel like they knew him and that he liked them, which Storm was sure he really did. It was what made him popular.

  Even though the committeeman at the door recognized Russell, he still was asked to see his admittance card, which Russell waved in the committeeman’s face as he walked past with Storm in tow behind him. The place was full even at this early stage of the evening. Men and women filled the seats at the tables and others stood in groups around the bar. Most eyes went up to see who came in, and then most went right back to their conversations as soon as they reckoned if they should be impressed or not. Was it someone they needed to wave to, invite over and speak to? And most important, was it someone who could make a difference to them?

  Many of those at the tables waved at Russell or said “hello” and asked about his father. Some would go on to say what a great man his dad was, which Storm knew always embarrassed Russell. Russell had told his friend more than once that he was considered the black sheep because he had never become one of them and worked for the Show. Still, many of the younger women smiled and Storm was sure some of them were women Russell knew in one way or another or they wanted to be.

  Storm recognized many of faces in the room, either because of his friendship with Russell or because they were the movers and shakers in the Houston business world. The ones Storm found to be most interesting were the women; the unattached women he remembered from previous encounters when he and Russell were running the streets as single men drinking and partying, all before he married Angie. By now, most of them were at least in their forties and fifties, still dressed in what he thought were the same outfits they had worn twenty years ago, still stuffing their bodies into leather dresse
s or tight pants with boots; attempting to still look the part of “young, vibrant and wanted.” But in many cases time had been unkind to both their faces and their bodies. Storm had always thought women who tried too hard to stay young hurt themselves and their looks. In a way he felt sorry for them. They had run their traps for way too long, but they couldn’t stop until time and gravity had taken the last vestige of attractiveness from them. Most were now relegated to a Saturday night booty call for anyone who had no luck finding a younger companion.

  As they headed to the bar, Russell asked Storm what he wanted, but Storm just shook his head and said, “Nothing now.” He was occupied surveying the room, watching the people and wondering if Leslie’s killer was among them. On their way to the stadium Russell had again explained to Storm why there were no cameras, including security cameras, allowed in the clubs. He told him that if you were caught taking a photograph in any of the clubs, the cops or the committeemen working the door would make you stop and sometimes even confiscate the camera. Nobody in the clubs wanted there to be any proof of hanky-panky of any kind. So Storm was fairly certain that if the killer was in the room, he felt safe.

  That was when Storm saw Joe Dresden. He got Russell’s attention and nodded toward Joe. “Let’s go say “hello” and you introduce me, okay?”

  “You have that evil smirk on your face you always get when you think you’re going to surprise a bad guy and the bad guy has no clue he’s a suspect yet,” Russell remarked, grinning at his friend.

  They began to move through the crowd like it was any other social move, Russell saying “hello” to everyone who spoke, hugging the women, shaking hands with the men, and always introducing Storm not as “Detective Storm” but as his old college buddy “David Storm.”