by Blake Pierce
“Mr. Letterman, we’ll get to the point. We’re investigating a series of murders in the area and currently, everything points to the murderer being a piano tuner.”
“Karen Hopkins…yeah, I heard about her. I heard she had died…but killed?”
“Yes, that’s right.”
“Marjorie Hix…dead?”
“Yes. And while we obviously can’t get into the details, your name came up.”
Letterman looked as if he had been slapped hard across the face. He looked hard at both women, as if he were trying to determine if they were pulling a prank on him. When he realized that they were indeed serious, he started to shake his head. “No, no, not me. I would never even…why would I even be considered?”
“A piano teacher who was linked to the case gave us a tip that eventually led to your name,” Kate said. “As you might imagine, it was an easy leap; there aren’t many piano tuners in the area, even when you get into the Chicago population.”
Letterman started to look afraid and a little bewildered. Kate tried to gauge if the confusion in his eyes was genuine or if he was a very good actor, but she could not tell just yet.
“I don’t see how I can be seen as potentially guilty just because of what I do for a living,” he said.
“I understand that frustration. But with a very short list, we need to start where it makes the most sense. And since your name came up…”
“Mr. Letterman,” DeMarco said, “do you know of any other tuners in the area?”
His eyes narrowed and then he slowly started to nod. “Sort of. I don’t know that he’s still doing it, but…”
“But what?” Kate asked.
Letterman sat down on a workbench next to the organ. He looked bothered about something—not worried about his own future, but as if he was quickly sorting through a series of thoughts that made no sense to him.
“When I stopped trying to play professionally, I knew I wanted to do something with music. I also had a love for fixing things, maybe even building things. So for a while, I toyed with buying these older models of pianos, guitars, and violins, and trying to fix them up. It was a labor of love and while it did make some money for me, it was a handful. So I took on an apprentice—this other guy that didn’t quite make it with the orchestra. A guy named Darby Insbrook. Talented guy but just…well, one of those that tried to master everything, you know? He was too divided between his love of the cello and his love of the piano to ever really nail down one of them, you know? But we became friends and I looked him up when I turned my back on it all. I asked him if he wanted to sort of be an assistant with what I was doing, and he came on board for a while.”
“I take it you don’t work with him any longer?” Kate asked.
“No. It didn’t last long. He…he was obsessed with the work. And he had an angry streak on him that I had not seen in practices and auditions.”
“What kind of an angry streak?”
“He’d get drunk and want to fight anyone that dared to bring up his failures. He would also get quite graphic about his sexual exploits. That was what made me part ways with him. He was telling me how he had met this girl online…a young girl, like seventeen or eighteen. He got drunk one night and told me he sometimes had these fantasies…”
“Rape fantasies, you mean?” DeMarco asked.
“No clue,” Letterman said. And when he looked up at Kate and looked into her eyes, she believed every word of what he was telling them. “He never really described them to me, but I could tell he wanted to. Honestly, he just creeped me right the hell out.”
A chill rode down Kate’s spine but she managed to get out her next question without wavering.
“Mr. Letterman…do you know where we might find Insbrook?”
Letterman gave his best guess through a series of his own tremors and tears, looking back into the guts of the church organ as if he wanted to hide there.
CHAPTER TWENTY TWO
When Anna Forester let him into her home, he did his best not to stare at her neck. She was fairly attractive, he supposed. She looked to be in her early fifties, though she had done her makeup in a way to try to make the world think she was much younger. Still, her smile was pleasant and, as was the case with all of them, she was apparently quite trusting.
The Forester house was a two-story farmhouse knock-off, with wooden beams on the porch and high ceilings inside. Anna led him past the foyer, down a spacious hallway where everything was brightly lit through the picture windows facing them from the kitchen. But before they reached the kitchen, she led him into a smaller room. There was a desk pushed against the far wall, complete with a laptop and a pretentious-looking lamp. She led him to the far corner of the room where a fairly standard Yamaha piano sat.
“There she is,” Anna said. “She’s been good but there are just too many keys out of tune now. I can’t just ignore it. I’ve got a son that needs to start practicing for a recital in a few months and I promised him we’d get this taken care of.”
“Shouldn’t be a problem,” he said. “Do you know right off hand which keys are out of tune?”
“Sorry…no. My husband could tell you, but he’s at work.”
“No worries. I’ll see what I can get done and be out of your hair within half an hour to an hour or so. I’ll grab my tarp out of the back of my truck to lay the tools on; I don’t want to scratch up this gorgeous wooden floor.”
“Perfect. If you need me, I’ll be doing laundry. Laundry room is through the living room and down the hall off the left.”
He gave an utterly cheesy “OK” sign by making a circle with his pointer finger and thumb. She gave him an obligatory grin before leaving the room. He watched her go, finally taking a moment to really look at her neck. For some men, he knew it was all about the breasts or the butt. However, he had always been fascinated by the neck of a woman, particularly the curve where it met the shoulder and the area just above the collarbone. Not that it aroused him in any way; he simply knew this was a vulnerable spot.
He waited until she was out of the room before he headed for the hallway and the front door beyond. He walked back out to his truck, sauntering down the sidewalk as if he belonged there. Because as far as anyone in the neighborhood knew, he did belong there.
He grabbed his toolbox and the old battered tarp out of the back of his truck. He did know how to tune a piano and when he truly was on actual jobs where he had no ulterior motives, he was damned good at it. So, when he walked back toward the house with his tools in hand, he did so with a confident step. He looked around at the lush green yard and the neighboring yard as well, separated only by a large, towering oak. No cars in the driveway and the garage was closed. Of course, that meant nothing on the surface, but it was a good indication that there was likely no one home.
He walked back into the Forester house and went directly back to the piano. He set his things down carefully, knowing that any evidence he left behind in terms of the piano itself would end up in and on the tarp and carried out of the house, just as he had done with the first three women in Frankfield.
He tried to remember just how many times he had done this, but each occurrence sort of blurred with the next.
As he lifted the cover of the piano to expose the keys beneath, he heard Anne’s soft footfalls in the kitchen. A cabinet opened. A glass clinked on the counter. Something was poured into it.
“How long has your son been playing?” he called out.
“About a year. The teacher at his school says he’s got an exceptional talent for it. He’s only eleven but can play at the level of kids that go to college for it. She says he might end up being some sort of prodigy or something.”
He smiled to hear that she had no real issues engaging in conversation. “That’s exciting,” he said. “Already looking into scholarships?”
She surprised him when she came to the entryway between the office and the kitchen. She leaned against the doorframe and smiled. “His teacher has started gathering up
some things, yeah. It really is exciting. Did you once play?”
“Once, yes. I still do from time to time, but I think I lost the drive. I’m perfectly happy to just fix up problem pianos these days, though.”
“Well, I’m just glad you could make it out as soon as you did. I called some place in Chicago and they couldn’t get out here until the end of the week. And my kiddo is dying to start playing.”
“Is he your only one?”
“No. I’ve got another one, all grown up and married. I’m actually headed out of town next week because she’s due with her first baby any day now. My first grandchild. Whew…that’s hard to say.”
He chuckled because, quite frankly, he was done with small talk. To get the point across, he started to push down the keys, one by one, with determined purpose. He cocked his ear to listen and nodded. He then took his tuner out of the toolbox—a device he had hardly ever used but had managed to pull off as a great disguise of sorts many times. Seeing it, Anna gave a polite little smile and walked out of his sight—presumably to do laundry as she had mentioned earlier.
He knew he needed to act quickly. If she was a chatty one and kept coming back, it was going to make his real intention here much harder.
It’s got to be now, he thought. She needs to be dead in the next two minutes.
He went ahead and packed back up the tools he had taken out so far. The time for pretending was over. He tidied up so he would not have to do it afterward and then ran his fingers almost sensually along the keys. He came to the one he was most interested in—the D from the middle scale—and plinked it. The note was mostly in tune; had he actually been here to tune the piano, it would be a string he’d certainly adjust.
But that was not why he was here. Instead of fixing it, he set to removing the string completely—so he could include it in his own creation, waiting back at home for him in his workshop.
CHAPTER TWENTY THREE
Kate had been wrong. Duran had given her until nearly two o’clock before he started to call for her. The first call came at 1:46, as she and DeMarco were rushing to the address Eric Letterman had given them. She ignored it right away. When she did, DeMarco gave her a discerning eye from behind the wheel.
“You may as well answer it. This close to having a very likely suspect, I very seriously doubt he’s going to bring the hammer down so hard.”
Kate knew DeMarco was right, but she was far too focused right now. The last thing she wanted to do was to storm in after their first truly strong suspect with whatever choice words Duran had for her ringing in her ears. She did pick the phone back up but instead of returning Duran’s call, she pulled up Bannerman’s number. They had spoken just three minutes before so when he answered, there was excitement in his voice.
“You already there?” he asked.
“No. Still about five minutes out. I was wondering if you could send at least one unit over as backup, just in case. We know this guy has no issue killing women and that he’s quite crafty about it. I don’t see him overpowering us, but I can see him having some sort of escape plan ready for instances like these.”
“Seems like I’m a mind reader,” Bannerman said. “I sent a unit that way right after I got off the phone with you before. If you’re five minutes out, he should be coming in right behind you.”
“Make sure we’re there before he stops. I don’t want to give ourselves away before we even get there.”
“Roger that,” Bannerman said and ended the call.
The moment Kate set the phone down in her lap, it rang again. She checked the display and saw that it was Duran again. She sighed, looked to DeMarco with a worried grin, and then answered it.
“Kate, where are you?”
She knew he was pissed because he used her first name rather than calling her Wise. “I’m currently in pursuit.”
“Of what, exactly?” he said, nearly hissing.
“A potential suspect. A likely suspect.”
“And why the hell aren’t you home like you’re supposed to be?”
“Because it would be much harder to catch this suspect from home, sir.”
He uttered a profanity, something she had not heard him do very much during their twenty-plus years of working together. “You’re disobeying a direct order from your superior,” he said, still in that hiss-like voice. “Do you understand what that could do to you and your otherwise stellar record?”
“I do, sir. And with all due respect, we’re about two minutes out from an arrest. So you can tell me all about that when we’re done.”
The silence on the phone was heavy and felt as if there was a sharp edge to it. She was waiting for him to threaten her, to perhaps tell her that when she got home, they would terminate the contract they had between them. But in the end, he simply said: “Finish there. The moment you get back to DC, bring your ass to my office.”
“Understood, sir.” And with that, she hung up.
“You know,” DeMarco said, “he’s going to go off on me, too. I was supposed to tell on you if you didn’t go back after he ordered you to.”
“Why didn’t you?”
DeMarco shrugged. “Because you don’t need a babysitter.”
“Thank you, DeMarco.”
She worried what consequences DeMarco would have to pay for her part in this. But those thoughts did not have much time to gain traction, as DeMarco slowed the car to a crawl as they approached Darby Insbrook’s residence.
The timing could not have been better. As DeMarco parked, they saw a Frankfield PD car cruise by the end of the block and then turn in their direction. It slowed down as DeMarco pulled their car to the curb. The police car cruised by, the driver eyeing the agents as they stepped out of the car, and then continued to the end of the block where he finally stopped and parked.
Having gotten the conversation with Duran out of the way, Kate was able to approach Insbrook’s front door with a bit of confidence. Sure, she knew there were repercussions on the way but for now, she could simply be an agent. She could go in and get the job done knowing that, more or less, she had permission to do so. She would face the consequences later.
She knocked on the door and waited. She exchanged a tense look with DeMarco as they waited for an answer and got none. She had shared glances like this in the past, chalking them up to some sort of almost telepathic ability between people who are putting their lives on the line at the same time, people who are relying on one another for protection.
The thought that seemed to bounced between their minds was one of assurance—one of danger, too.
This is it. We’re here. This is the end…
Kate knocked again, realizing that every muscle in her body seemed to be on edge, waiting for something to happen. When she was met with only silence again, she looked to DeMarco, hoping for another of those borderline supernatural pushes, but there was nothing.
She tried the door and was not surprised to find it locked. Kate knew that protocol told them to wait until Insbrook got back home. But Kate had overridden protocol with good old intuition numerous times in her career and her intuition had been right far more often than not.
“Let’s see if there’s a back door,” Kate said.
DeMarco nodded her agreement and started down the porch steps ahead of Kate. One behind the other, they sprinted to the back of the house. Kate did not feel at all odd about putting speed into her step. She could still feel that certainty she had felt on the porch—a certainty that seemed to grow with the passing of each minute.
At the back of the house, the yard had gone to pot. The grass was tall and dead in some places. A few dead rose bushes clung to the side of the house and scattered pieces of wood. Kate saw the ruins of an old piano, the legs dismantled and the grayed keys seeming to smile at her. Beside all of this there was a small set of stairs that led to a back door. DeMarco climbed the stairs and tried the door, finding it locked as well.
DeMarco frowned and looked back down to Kate, standing in the overgrown yar
d.
“Hey, remember how I didn’t turn you in to Duran when you failed to go back home when he asked?” DeMarco asked.
“Yeah,” Kate said, confused.
“Good. If you keep this to yourself, I think we can call it even.”
Before Kate could ask any questions, DeMarco took one lunging step back and then delivered a solid kick into the door. The wood splintered and the door buckled, but it did not give. With another grunt and a stronger kick from DeMarco, the hinges popped off and clattered to the ground, barely audible over the commotion the door made as it flew inward.
Kate was glad DeMarco had done it. Kate herself had been on the verge of wanting to do the exact same thing at the front door.
Kate fell in behind DeMarco and they entered the house. Right away, Kate took in the smells of old wood, some sort of polish or enamel, and an overall workshop sort of smell. The back door opened up onto a sparse kitchen that held a strong odor of black coffee—barely noticeable over the smell of wood and polish.
They exited the kitchen and entered a hallway that seemed to extend most of the length of the house. They passed by a small bedroom on the right, which DeMarco split off into. Kate fell in behind, saw the room was small and unoccupied, and continued down the hall. A doorway appeared on her right, partially open. She peered into the crack between the wall and the frame. A wooden staircase led down into a dark area. The woodshop smell seemed to come from the darkness below. Kate hit the light switch on the wall just inside the doorway and peered down the stairway. A dingy basement floor waited at the bottom of the stairs.
“I think I’ve found the workshop,” Kate called out.
“Kate…”
Kate paused and watched DeMarco come out of the bedroom. She held something in her hand that made no sense at first. But then it registered and it felt like ice forming in Kate’s veins.