Savannah scanned the parking lot, looking for her assistant, but a big, yellow, Ryder truck was blocking her vision and the streetlamps were situated too far apart for good lighting and visibility.
“Is your car still in the front row, near the road, where we told you to put it?” Dirk asked. Savannah could tell from his huffing and puffing he was running from the food court.
“Yes,” Tammy mumbled. “I’m putting the stuff in the trunk. He’s about thirty feet away. Watching me. Coming this way.”
Savannah broke into a run. She still couldn’t see around the damned truck.
“Savannah!” Tammy sounded like she was about to cry. “Savannah, I . . . oh . . . shit! Help!”
“Dirk! The kid’s in trouble!” Savannah shouted. “Hurry!”
“I know!” he yelled back, panting. “I’m only halfway there.”
Damn him. Great time to take a taco and nacho break, half a mall away!
Savannah threw down her packages and pulled her Beretta from the shoulder holster beneath her jacket as she ran. “I’m coming, Tammy! Hang on!”
Just as she was rounding the front of the truck, Savannah heard a scream that sent her heart pounding up into her throat. It was a shriek of pain and fear—nothing like the fake screams in the movies. This one was for real.
But when she cleared the truck, she saw something that made her heart nearly stop altogether.
Tammy was bent backward over the hood of her Volkswagen bug. A man—just as she had described, with a white beard, wearing a plaid shirt—was bending over her, ripping her blouse open, clawing at her chest.
Savannah let out a roar of rage and threw herself onto the man’s back. “Leave her alone, you dirty son of a bitch,” she screamed as they both tumbled to the pavement.
She jumped to her feet and with karate expertise landed a solid kick directly to his groin. As he crumpled into a ball of pain, she gave him another chop to the back of his neck with her left hand.
It was only then she remembered she was holding her gun in her right. Proper procedure would have been to level the gun at him and calmly demand he release her assistant.
Yeah, well, screw proper procedure, she quickly decided. Sometimes hands-on, up close and personal contact was the only kind that satisfied the soul.
“Are you all right, honey?” Savannah asked, taking her eyes off her suspect for half a second to check out Tammy, who was still lying across the VW’s hood.
“Oh, Savannah . . .” Tammy was fighting for breath. “You shouldn’t have. Owww!Oh, damn, that hurts!”
“Hurts?” Savannah looked down at her groaning, moaning Santa lookalike. He was still writhing in the middle of a greasy oil slick on the asphalt pavement, holding his privates. “What are you talking about? What hurts?”
Tammy was tearing at her blouse, pulling the thing off. “It’s this stupid microphone it . . . owww. . .it’s shorting out or something . . . I . . . owwwww!”
Dirk ran up to them, his face Christmas crimson all the way back to his receding hairline, sweat dripping from the end of his nose. Perspiration stained his T-shirt with dark circles under the arms and in the center of his chest, making him look even more bedraggled than usual. Dirk was no lightweight himself, and the race had just about done him in.
“What the hell’s going on here?” he demanded as Tammy danced around, holding her chest and screeching.
“It’s shocking her!” Savannah told him, still holding the gun on her suspect. “Get it off her! Quick!”
Dirk might have been a bit out of shape, but after twenty-plus years on the police. force, his reflexes were still sharp. In half a second he had ripped the offending unit and tape off Tammy’s chest, leaving her holding her bare breasts in her hands, blushing violently and deeply furious.
“And I suppose you enjoyed groping me while you were at it!” she yelled at him.
“What?”
“You just couldn’t pass up an opportunity like that! First you loan us lousy, faulty equipment, and then you molest me right here in front of everybody!”
He stared at her for a long time, then slowly shook his head. “You’re a dingbat, you know that, Hart? A first-rate, certified dingbat!”
He picked up her blouse from the ground and tossed it at her. She exposed a breast as she reached up to catch it. Hugging the garment to her, she began to softly cry.
“A nut job,” Dirk said, turning to Savannah. “That’s who you’ve got working for you.”
“Give her a break, Coulter,” Savannah said, handing him her gun to hold on the fellow who was still wriggling like a caterpillar under a sunlit magnifying glass. She hurried over to Tammy. “Are you all okay, sweetie?”
“No,” Tammy said between sobs. “It was awful!”
“I can imagine.” She helped her slip on the blouse and button the front as though Tammy were a distraught kindergartner getting ready for a traumatic first day at school. “That nasty ol’ thing shocking you and that scumbag attacking you. You must be—”
“Attacking me?” Tammy shook her head and sniffed. “He didn’t attack me. He was trying to help me get that thing off my chest. He was just—”
“Oh, damn.” The truth hit Savannah with a whollop somewhere in her solar plexus as she stared down at the fellow on the pavement.
He glared back at her with a mixture of rage and confusion in his blue eyes. Blue eyes. White beard. Rosy cheeks—well, his cheeks were sort of green now, but she was pretty sure they had been rosy a second before she had kicked him in the groin.
“You hurt Santa Claus,” said a small, wee voice behind them. Savannah turned to see a young boy, watching her with horror on his munchkin’s face. “You’re in big trouble, lady,” he went on to explain in painful detail. “I saw what you did! You kicked Santa Claus right in the balls!”
“Don’t say ‘balls,’ honey. It’s not nice,” his mother said, pulling her child closer to her and away from the crazed brunette and the other woman who had just disrobed in public. “We prefer to call them by their proper name, testicles.”
“Yeah,” the kid continued, wide-eyed. “And I saw that lady’s chesticles, too! Did you see them? They were hanging right there and—”
The outraged mother clamped one hand over her son’s mouth and the other over his eyes as she led him away.
“I’m-m-m . . . I’m-m-m-m . . .” croaked Santa Claus as he struggled to rise.
“What is it, sir?” Savannah graciously offered him her hand. He slapped it away.
A couple of fresh-faced security guards in black, wannabe-cop uniforms came whizzing up in a glorified golf cart. “What’s going on here?” the tallest one demanded as he climbed out of the cart. “Oh, Mr. Wilcox,” he said, noticing the man on the ground, “it’s a good thing you’re here.” He consulted his watch. “Your shift starts in three minutes. Are you hurt?”
“I’m-m-m . . . I . . . ack-k-k-k-k.”
“Mr. Wilcox seems to have lost his voice for the moment,” Savannah said, trying to sound helpful, even cheerful. “In fact, I think he should probably be taken to a hospital. You said something about his shift. Does he work here?”
“Sure,” replied the short one. “He’s our five o’clock-’til-closing Santa.”
“Oh, shit,” Savannah whispered to Dirk, “I really did kick Santa in the balls.”
“Definitely classifies as a ‘naughty’ and not ‘nice’ gesture,” he replied dryly.
Still leaning against the VW, Tammy continued to quietly sob.
“I’m-m-m . . . I’m-m-m-m . . .” Once again, the not-particularly-jolly old elf tried to communicate with the world.
“Oh, Santa. I’m so sorry.” Savannah dropped to her knees beside him and clasped his cold, clammy hand between her own. “What is it, sir? What are you trying to tell us?”
“I’m-m-m . . . I’m-m-m . . .”
“That’s it. Just take a deep breath and say it.”
“I’m-m-m . . . I’m-m-m-m-m gonna . . . sue . . . your f
uckin’ ass off!”
6:15 P.M.
Having pulled his car deep into the orange grove, well out of sight from the main road, the driver cut the key. He pulled his backpack from the floorboard and yanked the zipper open. Inside he had packed duct tape, thin nylon rope, and a ten-inch butcher knife—the tools of his trade. Rape was a primal act; it didn’t require sophisticated, high-tech equipment.
Oh, yes, and the disguise. He was particularly proud of the red hat with its white fur trim and the snow white, luxuriously curly beard. Who said he didn’t have Christmas spirit? he thought with a grin as he tossed his keys into the pack and zipped it closed.
When he swung the car door open, the sweet scent of tree-ripened citrus filled his head, triggering memories . . . of last time . . . of the time before . . . and the time before that. Lately, just the smell of his morning glass of orange juice could get him excited and hard.
He glanced at his watch. Six-seventeen. He had to get to the bus stop. The last one ran at six-thirty. Stupid hick town. They folded up the sidewalks at eight.
But he’d be back. In an hour or less, he’d return. With company.
He took a deep breath, smelled the oranges, and felt his blood rush to his groin.
Oh, yeah. He’d be back. And then . . . party time!
CHAPTER TWO
7:30 P.M.
“Now down South, where I’m from, we know how to cure what ails a rapist. Yep. We just chop his damned pecker off. Then we string that sucker on a piece of rough brown twine and hang it around the pervert’s neck,” Savannah told her rapt audience of a dozen women who had assembled at the local library to learn the art of self-defense. “And that usually gets the creep’s attention. He’s not likely to offend again.”
Savannah laughed and her listeners echoed a few nervous giggles. “But here in California,” she continued, “y’all are a mite more civilized. You catch ’em if you can, lock ’em up for a spell, then let ’em go to do it all again. And that, ladies, is why we need classes like this one.”
The group had arrived an hour ago at the library, their clothing and hair all neat and tidy, their faces arranged in pseudo-nonchalant expressions. Unsuccessfully, they had been trying to hide the fact that they were scared to death of the latest threat to their community.
Like all Southern Californians, they took in stride the earthquakes, mudslides, occasional riots and seasonal brushfires. But the serial rapist who had been ravaging San Carmelita’s women had them afraid to run to the grocery store for a loaf of bread. Only the bravest had ventured outside after dark to attend the meeting at the library.
And after an hour of instruction by Savannah and Tammy, an hour of throwing each other around on the mats spread across the carpeted floor of the Children’s Corner, an hour of being told what to expect if they were attacked, the group was a little mussed, a bit disheveled, but in their eyes they had a bold gleam that Savannah welcomed. It told her they were less inclined to become victims than when they had first arrived.
She was moderately satisfied with her results so far. It was a much more productive way to spend the remainder of her fateful evening . . . having been dismissed from the mall decoy gig. After a debacle like that, she would have normally gone home to bury her sorrow in a pint of Ben and Jerry’s Chunky Monkey ice cream.
“Walk with your head high,” she told them, “your spine straight. Walk with an attitude, girls! A rapist is looking for a victim, not a combatant. We know he’s a lily-livered chicken shit or he wouldn’t be attacking women.”
From the corner of her eye, Savannah saw the research librarian seated at the desk. She winced at the colorful terminology. Savannah ignored her. She had some important points to make, and she had her audience’s full attention. “He’s a predator who preys on the weak,” she said. “Don’t give him a reason to think that you’re anything other than a raging bitch. A bitch may not be the most popular member of the P.T.A., but she isn’t as likely to be attacked as a ‘nice girl.’ Sad, but true.”
A teenage girl, who appeared to be about fifteen or sixteen and had introduced herself as “Margie,” raised her hand. Savannah was a little surprised; Margie hadn’t contributed a thing since the class had begun. She had sat quietly on the mat, refusing to join in the physical exercises. The girl could only be described as “bristly,” due to a dozen unconventionally located body piercings, spiked orange and green hair, and a prickly adolescent attitude.
“Yes, Margie?”
“What do you think he’s like . . . this Santa rapist guy?” The fear in the girl’s voice belied her bold appearance and expressed the general sentiment of the room. This was the first time anyone had mentioned the real reason they had all signed up for this class. Sure, they were interested in self-defense, but if a maniac hadn’t been terrorizing the community, they would have probably all been home watching television sitcoms.
At least the Santa Rapist had jarred them out of their suburban complacency.
“How about that, Tam?” Savannah turned to Tammy, who was sitting behind Margie and the other students on the mat. Having demonstrated her best throwing and ball-busting techniques, Tammy had reverted to being a “girlie girl” and was brushing her long blond hair. Momentarily nonplussed to be caught primping, Tammy quickly ditched the brush, shoving it into her pocket.
“What about what?” Tammy asked.
“What about our friendly neighborhood serial rapist? Can you give us a profile on him?”
Savannah watched, amused, as Tammy’s mental disk drive whirred. The young woman was living proof that looking like a blond airhead didn’t make you one.
“Generally speaking,” Tammy said, “a rapist is an emotionally immature individual, socially inept, with a deep inferiority complex. There are basically two types of rapists,” she continued in a practiced, scholarly monotone, “psychiatric offenders and criminal offenders. If he is a psychiatric rapist, he will have an I.Q. that is higher than average, a good education, and may have achieved a high level of success. He lives in a fantasy world, his escape from the normal world where he feels inadequate. He probably knows he’s a sicko and may even feel guilty about it. He may worry about his victims and be ashamed of what he does to them.”
“Yeah, right,” Margie muttered, shaking her psychedelic-colored head.
“Do you have something to add, Margie?” Savannah asked.
The girl shrugged. “From what I read in the paper, he sounds pretty mean, like he enjoys what he’s doing.”
“I agree,” Tammy said. “From what I’ve read and heard about this rapist, I would classify him as the second kind of rapist, a criminal offender, a sociopath who doesn’t care who he hurts as long as he satisfies his own twisted needs. He thinks everyone else is stupid or crazy . . . not him. He’s the smart one—at least in his own not-so-humble opinion.”
“That’s true,” Savannah added. “From the victim’s reports, we can assume this guy is motivated by his hatred toward women. He’s dangerous, ladies. I don’t want to scare you any more than you already are, but you need to know as much as possible about the enemy, to be fully prepared.”
“What are you saying?” One of the softer, sweeter, Sunday-school-teacher types asked, her eyes bright with fear.
“Exactly what you think I’m saying.” Savannah drew a deep breath and decided to be honest with her students. She knew the librarian was listening. The San Carmelita Recreation Department had wanted a much lighter, more upbeat, fun class than the one she was teaching. She would catch hell when the class broke up, but this wasn’t the time to chocolate dip the bitter truth.
“His attacks are becoming more and more violent,” she told them. “We have to arm ourselves with self-defense skills, criminal knowledge and a generous dose of plain ol’ street smarts against this dangerous predator. And then we have to hope to God we don’t run into him. Because he’s on a frighteningly predictable path. Unless he’s caught soon, it’s just a matter of time until he kills one of his victims.�
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8:17 P.M.
Christmas bites, Charlene Yardley thought as she watched one of Santa’s overgrown, slightly disgruntled elves lift a chubby-cheeked cherub onto the big guy’s lap. The two-year-old shrieked. The toddler’s mom yelled, “Hurry up and take the picture, stupid!” to a weary Mrs. Claus behind the camera. The bulb flashed, capturing the precious memory for all time . . . and for the nominal price of $19.95.
Charlene fought back the tears as she turned away from the mall’s center with its twenty-foot tree, cotton batting snow, plywood sleigh and gilded Santa’s throne. This year he would be taking the children . . . her children . . . to see Santa Claus. And even though no one had said so, Charlene knew that she would be going along, too. Just one big happy family.
Home-wrecking bitch, Charlene silently added. May she be impaled on a reindeer’s horn or choke on a plum pit in her Christmas pudding.
As Charlene passed the Victoria’s Secret window she tried not to notice the red velvet and emerald-green lace corset and stocking set in the window, tried not to remember . . . what was it he had said that day? Something like, “If you hadn’t turned into a fat slob after you had the kids, if you had worn something sexy for me once in a while—like she does—I wouldn’t have had to go elsewhere for it.”
Okay, he hadn’t said something like that; he had said exactly that. Now Charlene, who had once enjoyed wearing such things herself, couldn’t see a lingerie ad or watch a diet commercial without considering suicide . . . or homicide, depending on the depth of her depression at that given moment.
Well, Miss Corset and Garters was welcome to him. It would only be a matter of time until he fooled around on her, too.
They deserved each other.
But the kids . . .
It was Christmas, and Charlene couldn’t believe how much her heart hurt to have to share the children with her soon-to-be-ex and his new honey. Her shoulders ached with the burden of packages she carried under each arm, far heavier than her credit card balance could support. The price of guilt. Guilt for not maintaining a traditional, two-parent home for her son and daughter. The price of not “meeting her man’s basic needs” and “making it work.”
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