Charity Kills (A David Storm Mystery)

by Jon Bridgewater

  * * * *

  All the time Peggy had been following the weatherman and the detective, she hadn’t realized her invisibility had abandoned her. She had not been the only person that had seen the detective checking out possibly the last place Leslie had been seen, nor the only person who knew of his confrontation with Joe. The killer knew it was not a coincidence that a staff member was in a place she shouldn’t be.

  It appeared Peggy was following the two tall men. Did she just happen to be in the same place as these men, or was she tailing them? What could this girl possibly think she knew, or did she suspect something, and who had she talked to? As methodical as the killer was, nothing could be left to chance; this girl would not be the destruction of a perfect plan. Something would have to be done about her and soon.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Method and Madness but No Motive

  The Rodeo telegraph was in full swing and operating without delay. Policewoman Stone had been told of the banter between Storm and Joe Dresden; she had been told of the shock that had registered on Joe’s face and how Joe had jerked his wife’s arm, hurriedly leaving the club. She waited until Sergeant Hebert had finished with the detective and his friend and then updated him on the message she had just received from the officers working in the center.

  * * * *

  The next link in the chain was for Hebert to quickly follow up with Dakota Taylor and inform her. He didn’t know what Storm had, but he did know what was on video and why he would be interested in Joe. Independently Hebert and Storm had come to the same assumption, and that was that Joe was probably the last to see Leslie and he was a player, if not the killer, in this mystery. The conclusion had already been made that if a sacrificial lamb was needed, Joe would be the easiest to give up. It would come out that Joe had the morals of a tomcat; everyone knew that Joe’s reputation as a ladies’ man was not limited to the Show. Joe had a real problem keeping it in his pants and with Ellen’s money, he could fish in many of the more expensive creeks around town.

  * * * *

  On the ride home Russell had filled Storm in on some more of the Show’s little peccadilloes that were hidden from the public, like how money and influence made the difference in who rose in the power structure and who didn’t. How membership in this closed society was passed down from father to son and grandson. How the unpublished ban on cameras was the way for the leadership of the Show to make sure they and their friends could enjoy all the “perks” in a friendly, nonjudgmental environment. Influence, benefits, notoriety, and secrecy all went hand in hand for these birds of rare air. Over the years there had been rumors in the inner circle about various members, but among these powerful men such innuendos and even sometimes negative truths were hushed and forgotten as quickly as they were discovered.

  But...with media scrutiny having become what it was over the past few years, secrets had become harder to keep. There had been occasions that couldn’t be covered up, like a director convicted of child molestation, a vice president arrested for growth and intent to sell marijuana, and an older member of the inner circle “outed” for being a homosexual. Married with grandchildren, that member had paid for young men to be flown around the country to spend weekends in extravagant hotels with him. His passing shortly after it all became public assured, like other transgressions, that all would be forgotten and never mentioned again. The Show distanced itself from such incidents as quickly as possible to avoid any fallout that might tarnish its reputation of squeaky clean family fun and philanthropy.

  As a multimillion dollar cash cow for the city, the charity connected to the Show and Rodeo had always had the cooperation of the police and mayor’s office. Only one mayor had ever tried to take on the Show, wanting to change the image of Houston to a more metropolitan big city image, but she was promptly put in her place. In her case, it was “Cowboys 1, Mayor 0.” Since that time most mayors were more concerned with their wallets than the city’s image anyway, the mayors elected after her all understood it was beneficial to everyone involved to get along and leave things be.

  * * * *

  After an abbreviated night’s sleep, Storm woke up early, not really unusual, but this morning it was with a sense of vigor and vitality after the best night’s rest he had had in years, or at least since Angie’s murder. He still had had some disturbing dreams, but this time they were about Leslie Phillips and how to catch her killer. As he thought about all the girls, he was more and more convinced they had all been killed by the same person.

  He dressed quickly and headed to Reisner Street. As he walked in, Sergeant Hernandez waved him to the coffee room and Storm followed. “The lieutenant is waiting for you and he has company,” said Hernandez.

  “Who?”

  “Some guy from the mayor’s office.”

  “Know his name?”

  “Nope just that he was sitting in the lieutenant’s office bright and early. How did it go last night?” Hernandez asked.

  “Great. Scared the shit out of Joe Dresden,” Storm said, smiling a little.

  Hernandez smiled back; he knew it doesn’t take much for a cop to scare a citizen, especially if the citizen doesn’t know what the cop knows.

  “Can you get me pictures of all the girls?” Storm asked.

  “Sure, but I have to be careful. They will be copies,” he answered, his eyes asking if that was OK.

  “No problem. Cover your tracks, but do it.”

  “Storm, we are going to catch this pendejo,” promised Hernandez.

  “Damn straight, Pancho.” What a great addition to the little team of investigators Hernandez was. He could see Hernandez was feeling like a cop again and that was good.

  “Have you gotten any information on serial murders or any hints on what we should be looking for?”

  “Yeah, some, but I will have more when we meet again.” Hernandez’s smile showed he was pleased with what he had found.

  Storm saw the lieutenant waving him to his office, so he grabbed a cup of coffee and went in. Sure enough, there sat Vern Nagel, the guy he had met at the Show with Dakota Taylor on Sunday.

  “Detective, I believe you have met Mr. Nagel from the mayor’s office,” said Lieutenant Flynn.

  “Yes, sir, we met the other day.”

  “Well, he is here to get caught up on where we stand with the murder at the stadium.”

  “Lieutenant, I am working on it. We don’t have a suspect or a motive yet, but I have viewed the security videos from that night and the victim was on it entering the VIP Club with a man. We don’t have an ID on him yet,” Storm lied.

  “Is this man you don’t know the killer?” piped in Nagel.

  “I don’t know yet. The video shows him going into the stadium with her, but he left with other men around midnight without the girl.”

  “The video doesn’t show her leaving?” the lieutenant inquired.

  “No, the only place she appears is going in, not leaving.”

  “Then she didn’t leave with him?” the lieutenant responded.

  “Seemingly not.” As the questions became more repetitive and inane, Storm was becoming more irritated and his replies more terse. They were talking about things that shouldn’t be discussed in front of an outsider. He had to be careful; he knew everything he said was going directly back to the Show.

  “Do you know the victim’s name?” asked Nagel.

  “Yes, Sergeant Hebert’s people found her purse and her driver’s license in another dumpster on the other side of the stadium. Her name was Leslie Phillips,” said Storm.

  “What else did you find, Detective? We can be forthcoming with the mayor’s office, David.” It sounded strange, the lieutenant using his Christian name.

  “Yes, Lieutenant, well, her clothes were found in the dumpster on the other side of the stadium from where her body was found, but no bloody crime scene could be found anywhere.” Storm replied. Something gnawed at Storm about that, and he felt a renewed urgency to get out of the waste of time that he ha
d become inadvertently a part of and back to discovering where she had actually been killed.

  “How was she killed?” asked the lieutenant.

  “Throat cut completely through her wind pipe. She couldn’t have screamed if she’d tried. She bled out. This was not the work of an amateur.” Storm left out the other things they knew. He sure didn’t want to tell them he believed there had been seven murders and they were connected. That cat had to stay in the bag for the time being.

  “We need to find the crime scene. With that much blood, it had to be a mess,” the lieutenant commented and then asked, “Who’s working on that?”

  “Sergeant Hebert has men who work out at the Show full time, so I’m going to ask him to have his guys continue their search,” Storm said. “And there is always the possibility that the cleaning crew may find something.”

  “Good idea. Get him on it,” the lieutenant replied.

  Storm knew that nothing would come of asking Hebert and his men to do the search. Hebert resented him and all cops that worked downtown. But he would ask, indicating that the request had come from his boss and the mayor’s office, although he didn’t think that would change anything.

  “What’s your next step, Detective?” Nagel again. What a nosy son of a bitch, Storm couldn’t help thinking.

  “Today I am going to the vic’s apartment to see if anything there might give us a lead; messages on her answering machine, threatening letters, photos, or anything that might give us a clue. Then I am going to meet with the man we saw in the video and see what light he can shed on this.”

  “I thought you didn’t know his name.” Nagel sounded angry. “Who is he? Do you know his name or not?”

  Storm could have kicked himself. He knew if he gave Nagel Joe Dresden’s name the word would spread to Dakota Taylor within minutes of his leaving the police station. But, oh well, it was done now. Besides, they had seen the videos. He was sure of that, and Storm suspected they knew Joe was with her, so what did it matter? But Storm thought he would try to throw a curve ball with his answer, anyway. “Lieutenant, since this is an ongoing investigation I can’t release that information to Mr. Nagel.”

  The lieutenant didn’t back down. “Detective, Mr. Nagel is representing the mayor’s office and they want this wrapped up as soon as possible, solved or unsolved. Get it closed with as little public attention as possible. Do you understand me?”

  Storm knew that look. And he knew something else, something new. He now knew how the other murders had been dispensed with. He now understood the pressure that must have been put on the other detectives working those cases.

  “OK, Lieutenant, but this has to be kept quiet. We don’t want him running or covering his tracks. I need to question him before he knows that he is a suspect.” Storm’s voice softened as he spoke. “He might not have had anything to do with it,” added Storm. “His name is Joe Dresden.”

  Storm saw Nagel’s eyebrows arch in recognition, but the lieutenant didn’t seem to have a clue who Dresden was. The lieutenant was new to Houston, so the name most likely didn’t mean anything to him. Storm knew he had just given Dresden to the dogs; the Show would be separating itself from him as soon as they could. It might cost them some of Ellen’s money, but they would find someone else to replace that with and keep themselves clean. They couldn’t replace their holy reputation. Dresden would be the latest pariah. Storm knew giving Nagel Dresden’s name was a dirty trick, and he wished he could have taken it back at this stage of the investigation. He had to admit he didn’t like Joe, but feelings aside, Dresden was a sleaze, so maybe—maybe—giving Nagel and Flynn a possible sacrificial lamb wasn’t all that bad.

  “Detective, we’re done here,” said Lieutenant Flynn. “I need to have a few words with Vern. Close the door on your way out.” Storm knew that was his cue to leave. Storm was sure they were discussing any further exposure the city might have.

  Storm got Leslie’s address from the file and as he headed out the precinct door Sergeant Hernandez handed him an envelope. Storm waited until he got to the car to open it. The photos of all seven victims fell out onto the seat beside him. All seven were the morgue shots; all seven death masks, but the similarity of the masks was what struck him. The killer definitely had a type.

  The first girl was Elaine Gage. She was twenty-five, brunette, from Hallettsville, Texas, no family to speak of, and she had worked for Tejas Petroleum. She was found naked in an abandoned car on Fannin Street across from the Dome. She, too, had been raped and anally abused, and her throat had been cut in the same manner as Leslie.

  The second girl was Debbie Turnbull. She was twenty-three, brunette, from Needville, Texas, and again, had no family. She was found naked and abused in the new construction area for the light rail system next to the Dome.

  The third victim was Michelle Canter, twenty-four, also a brunette, from Yoakum, Texas; Linda Black, twenty-three, from Shiner, Texas was the fourth; Sissy Debuse, twenty-five, from Kingsville, Texas was the fifth; and last year’s victim was Stephanie Gilgore, twenty-five, from Lufkin, Texas. All of the victims were found near the Dome, all looked enough alike to be sisters, all had little to no family to push for an investigation, all had been abused and had their throats severed and windpipes cut through, and all had been forgotten until now.

  Not only did the killer have a type, he had a method. What Storm didn’t have was a motive. He hoped that Hernandez had found something in FBI reports that could help them. He also needed to ask Hernandez if there was anything in the files of the other girls about their clothes. Something about that was still nagging at him, but he couldn’t put his finger on it.

  Before going to Leslie Phillips’ apartment, he would first stop by Joe Dresden’s office. He called to check to make sure Joe would be there for a while. Catching Joe at his office would give him the perception of “home field advantage” and hopefully give him a false sense of security. In Storm’s experience, people made mistakes when they felt at ease.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Ellen’s Dilemma

  Ellen Dresden’s symbol of success was the facility she had built after assuming the controls of her father’s company. She had bought an expansive piece of land virtually littered with small brick and metal buildings all in need of refurbishing and had torn all those eyesores down. In their place she had erected a grand, opulent, very modern three story building with a flair for Texas architecture. A sandstone and mortar façade covered the front of the facility, emulating a rendition of the first Christian missions that had dotted the Texas landside of the past. Ellen was definitely a Texan, and like all true Texans, was proud of her heritage. Anything resembling the Alamo was perfect in her mind.

  The inside of the building sparkled; it was all marble and chrome, with a large circular reception desk and leather chairs inviting waiting guests to take a seat in the reception area. The non-administrative part of the distributorship was the latest in mechanized sorting tables and robotic arms used for overhead storage. The commodities the warehouse stocked were all electronically coded and put on their appropriate assigned shelf. When an order was taken an order entry clerk would input the list of items in a central computer. The computer would automatically create a “picking slip,” which identified where the items were stored, the number ordered, the price, weight, and shipping instructions. The robotic arms would retrieve the items, assembling them at the end of each row of storage, where a floor person would load them onto a cart and verify the order with his or her copy of the order. Forklifts or push carts would then move the products to shipping and out they went. Efficiency was the word for this place. The floor was immaculate; the equipment pristine, and even the workers’ uniforms were spotless.

  * * * *

  Storm gave his name to the receptionist and asked for Joe. When she asked the nature of his business he just replied, “Mr. Dresden will know.”

  About five minutes later Joe appeared, as if by magic. If he was a little shaken by Storm’s visit,
his outward demeanor was that of a businessman meeting a colleague or vendor. Joe extended his hand and Storm accepted with a quick one-time pump and then suggested they go somewhere they could talk in private.

  Joe’s office was exactly as Storm had imagined; a massive burled wood desk at least seven feet long sat in front of windows that overlooked the glistening warehouse. Pictures adorned most of the walls; including some of Joe and Ellen at the Show with the champion animals they had purchased. Golf trophies sat on a side table—Storm realized golf was probably the only sport Joe participated in. Joe was a pretty boy and would never have been a part of something that might cause physical pain. Joe was, just as Storm had thought, a weenie.

  “Please have a seat, Detective,” Dresden said, walking around to his oversized chair behind his desk. Storm wasn’t intimidated—he’d had plenty of experiences with this old Napoleonic businessman’s trick. Storm’s chair was lower than normal, placing him in a position of looking up at Dresden. Since Joe was also short in stature, Storm was sure the furniture had been built to make him feel more in control of whoever was visiting him. For Storm this supposed disadvantage was easily remedied, as he was about to show Joe some more pictures and to do so would require him to stand up and lean over the desk, thus breaching Dresden’s comfort zone. Two can play this game, he thought.

  Storm laid the envelope of pictures he had brought on the desk, and looking at Joe, he leaned across the desk and pulled out the first photo, the picture of Leslie lying, obviously dead and with her throat cut, on the metal examination table in the morgue.

  Storm said nothing, just waited a few seconds to let the significance of what Dresden was looking at sink in. This picture had a much more sobering effect than the one Storm had shown Joe the night before that had been copied from her driver’s license photo. Noting the look on Dresden’s face, he queried, “Do you know her, Joe?”