Blind Rage

by Terri Persons

  “What kind of household accident causes brain damage?”

  “Exactly.”

  “What do you think happened?”

  The elderly woman shrugged her narrow shoulders and resumed sawing into her meat. “Who knows? Families got secrets.”

  “Did Ruth ever communicate with you in some way? Try to tell you what happened to her?”

  “Like I said, poor thing couldn’t talk.”

  “But did she…I don’t know—signal somehow? Did she indicate she was afraid of Matthew and Luke?”

  “No, no. She loved those boys. I could tell. She looked forward to their visits. Her eyes would light up like sparklers.” Inez paused with a sliver of meat halfway to her mouth. “There was this one time, though.”

  “What?”

  “The older one, the doctor, this one time he treated the both of us to hairdos in the salon here. Three chairs. Looks like a real salon, only it’s open one day a week.” She dabbed at the corners of her mouth with a napkin. “So we’re in there, me and Ruthie, and we’re getting our hair washed in one of those sinks. You know, the ones with the curve in them so you can rest your neck more comfortable. They’re spraying our heads with warm water and something must have gone haywire with the water temp or something. Maybe she just didn’t want someone touching her hair.”

  “Ruthie freaked out?”

  “I looked over at her, and that one finger was twitching like crazy.”

  Bernadette got up from the mattress. A horrific conclusion was forming in her head: someone had put Auntie Ruth in the nursing home via a near drowning. If it wasn’t the brothers, it had to be another relative.

  Inez scooped up a spoonful of pudding and held it out to her visitor. “Tapioca. They do a real nice job with it. You should give it a try.”

  “No, thanks,” mumbled Bernadette, sitting back down.

  “Skinny thing. You should eat more dessert.” Inez shoveled the pudding into her mouth.

  “What about other visitors? Did Ruthie have any other regulars?”

  “Not many. And when they did, well…I don’t think Ruthie liked her daddy all that much. Her eyes got all buggy when he walked through the door.”

  Bernadette blinked. “Did you say her daddy came by? How old was her father?”

  “He’s dead now. Died shortly after his wife. He had a stroke. Took a bad fall. Lucky bastard. Not like Ruthie.” The old woman scraped one last spoonful of pudding from the bottom of her dish. “Pneumonia got her. I suppose there are worse ways to check out.”

  “They call it the old people’s friend,” said Bernadette.

  “Not that she was that old.”

  Bernadette frowned. “How old was she?”

  “Forty or so by the time she died.” Inez licked the spoon clean. “But she was a girl when she got here. I still think of her as a girl.”

  “What?” Bernadette got up off the bed.

  “Ruthie was but a teenager when she came here.” Inez dropped her spoon on the tray and stared at her visitor’s ashen face. “Are you all right, chère? You look like you just seen a ghost.”

  RUTH. THAT’S whose portrait was missing in the First Communion gallery. Ruth was the pretty blond girl in Bernadette’s dream.

  While she drove, Bernadette came up with a sickening theory: Ruth VonHader became brain damaged when her father tried to drown her. Her brothers knew about it, or even watched helplessly while it happened. Upon their sister’s death, one of them started repeating the heinous act again and again—with coeds filling in for Ruth.

  Whither thou goest, I will go…

  SHE WAS WALKING into the cellar when her desk phone rang. It was Wakefielder, and what he had to tell her made her sink into her chair.

  “Agent Saint Clare, I wanted you to know before I came under suspicion. One of my students is missing.”

  Was this for real, or was it some sort of ploy to make himself look good? She grabbed a pen. “Since when?”

  “Nathaniel advised against calling you, but if she’s in trouble…”

  “What’s her name, and how long has she been missing?”

  “I mean…I don’t know what happened to Zoe. You have to believe me. She was fine when I dropped her off at—”

  “Professor. The girl’s name. Please.”

  “Regina Ordstruman. She’s been gone since, well, at least since class on Friday. We don’t have class on Thursday.”

  “Did you try her at home?”

  He didn’t answer.

  “Professor, I don’t care about your extracurriculars.”

  “I tried her at home and got no response.”

  “Her parents?”

  “They’re not close. Haven’t been for some time.” He sounded genuinely concerned.

  “Is it possible she’s just taking a long weekend?”

  “We had a big test today, and she wouldn’t have missed it unless…” His voice trailed off.

  “Professor, was she being treated for psychological problems? Did she have a shrink?”

  “If by that you mean a psychiatrist, no. I tried to get her to go in, but she refused. I did give her some tools, in case she ever needed them in an emergency. I give all my students tools. My courses tend to draw a fair number of…”

  “Train wrecks,” Bernadette finished.

  He paused. “That’s putting it crudely, but yes.”

  “What sorts of tools are we talking about? Do you recommend specific doctors or clinics?”

  “Nothing like that. I give them phone numbers. There’s a suicide hotline. I’ve even got stickers I distribute.”

  He has suicidal girls signing up for his classes, and he gives them stickers. She decided to cut to the chase. “Do you know Dr. Luke VonHader?”

  “That name sounds familiar.”

  “He was Zoe’s psychiatrist. He was also Kyra Klein’s doctor.”

  “What are you saying? Do you think one of their health care providers is involved?”

  “Professor, three girls connected to you have died. Two of them went to the same doctor. Help me. There is some link between you, this doctor, and their deaths.”

  She heard a voice in the background. It was the pit bull butting in on the call. “Agent Saint Clare, we’re getting into dangerous territory here,” said Wakefielder. “I’m going to have to hang up. If you need anything else, please call Nathaniel Selwyn.”

  “Wait. I need more on Regina. A description. Her address. The names of her—”

  “I’ve given you all I can,” he said, and hung up.

  “Dammit!” She snapped her pencil. If Regina Ordstruman was real and had been missing since Thursday, she could be the woman Bernadette had witnessed having intercourse with the killer.

  She looked at the office clock. The first hours of a missing persons case were vital, and this girl had been gone for days. Bernadette needed a shortcut, and her sight would have to provide it. She only hoped it would be a short cut to a live girl and not another corpse.

  She called Garcia and told him to meet her at her loft.

  Chapter 33

  HELL HAD SWITCHED COLORS; NOW IT WAS WHITE.

  He came and went. He periodically removed the gag, let her drink tepid water or juice, and sealed her mouth back up. She didn’t know how long he’d kept her in the blue bedroom, tied to the posts. Days?

  Then he shot her up with something that knocked her out again. When she came to, she found herself flat on her face on his bathroom floor. The odors that had nauseated her during the assaults also permeated the snowy tile beneath her. Wanting to get her face away from the stink of his soap and cologne, she rolled onto her side and curled her knees up to her chest.

  While she was unconscious, he’d changed her binds and gag. Now a strip of duct tape covered her mouth like a giant bandage. More of the stuff twined her wrists together so that her hands looked like those of a silver mummy, palms locked together in permanent prayer. The bastard knew what he was doing; she couldn’t use her fingernails as too
ls. She didn’t look down, but it felt as if her legs were just as thoroughly bound. Why had he bothered to untie the ropes and take her off the bed, only to rebind her with tape and dump her in the john? Maybe he got a rise out of finding new ways to subdue her, the sick bastard. Perhaps it was because she’d been emptying her bladder on the bed, forcing him to change the sheets. Too bad she had nothing in her bowels. Her stomach rumbled and she ignored it. Being hungry was at the bottom of her tally of woes.

  Number one on the list was the large white object sitting on the floor beside her. The tub. He’d been talking about it, what he’d do to her once he dropped her in it. The thing towered over her like a menacing iceberg. Was it filled with water? She tried not to think about it.

  The bathroom door was closed. She heard no sounds coming from the other side, not even the soothing radio voice, her invisible companion in this blue and white hell. Finding her position uncomfortable, she started to lie on her back, but felt something preventing her. A loose corner of the duct tape from her mouth was stuck to the tiles. Maybe she could keep working it and peel off the tape. She pressed the side of her face into the floor so the tape really caught and then rolled her head down onto the tiles. She could feel the tape peeling away. Throwing her whole body into it, she rolled until she was facedown on the floor again, and kept rolling.

  She found herself on her back again, this time free of the gag. Closing her eyes, she caught her breath. The effort had left her nude body covered in perspiration but rejuvenated. She’d removed the tape over her mouth. With time, she could free her hands and legs. How long was he going to be away? She visualized him dead in a car crash, his body slumped against the steering wheel, broken and bleeding. The image energized her further.

  Raising her hands to her mouth, she hooked her teeth over the tape and tried to create a tear in the wrap. There were too many layers, and her teeth weren’t sharp enough. She dropped her hands and ran her eyes around the cell, searching for something she could use to slice the tape. He’d been careful, her jailer. There was nothing sitting on the floor itself, not even a wastebasket or toilet plunger. Even if she could get on her feet to reach for something, there was no medicine chest in the room, only a mirror hung over the sink. The top of the toilet tank was loaded with colognes and aftershaves; the creepy fucker had more perfume than a woman. If she knocked down a bottle, she could use the broken glass to cut her bindings, like in the movies. Forget it. He’d probably hear the clatter and come running.

  The shower door was closed, but she knew there was nothing useful in the stall. While the water pummeled her during her first trip to his bathroom, she’d had plenty of time to study the cubicle and its contents. One bar of Ivory in the wall-mounted soap dish. Two washrags hanging from the neck of the showerhead. A small window made of glass block positioned high up on the wall, near the ceiling.

  Perhaps the metal edge of the glass shower door would work. She rolled onto her side, grimacing when the wad of tape pulled at her hair. Rather than traveling with her, it stayed stuck to the floor. She braced her feet against the base of the tub and used it for leverage to propel her body toward the shower. She curled her legs under her and rolled onto her knees. Slowly, she raised her torso so that she was in a kneeling position in front of the shower.

  Sweat streamed down between her breasts, collected under her armpits, and beaded her upper lip. What would he do if he found her like this? Would he kill her right then and there?

  After a couple of minutes, she mustered enough courage to slide her taped hands up the glass and over to the door handle. She’d have to open it carefully, or she’d end up falling backward onto the floor. The handle was the size and shape of a toilet paper tube, sliced in half lengthwise. She inserted her taped fingers into the curve of metal and slowly pulled toward her. The pop of the door unlatching echoed in the tiled chamber, and she froze. No devil materialized, and she mouthed a silent Thank you, God.

  She opened the door a little wider and slipped her fingers out of the handle. She pressed the outside edge of her taped hands against the edge of the shower door as if she were pleading for mercy—in a real sense, she was—and started to move her hands up and down in short, quick strokes. She concentrated on the edge of the binds. If she pulled her hands apart as hard as she could, she found she could create a small gap between her wrists. The tape that stretched between the gap was a good place to rub, a weak spot, and she could see the very beginnings of a tear.

  As she worked, she kept an ear tuned to the bathroom door. If she heard him thumping around in the bedroom, she’d lower herself onto her belly to keep him from seeing her hands or her mouth. He’d assume she was still out and perhaps leave her alone, giving her time to finish the job. Once free, she’d kill him. She didn’t know how. Maybe she’d come up behind him and strangle him with his own belt. If she could find the crap he’d been shooting into her body, she’d use it to knock him on his ass. She’d fill the tub and dump him in, do him the way he planned to do her. He’d be the one the cops would find floating.

  Chapter 34

  STEPPING OFF THE ELEVATOR, BERNADETTE WAS STARTLED to see Garcia standing in front of her condo talking to her caretaker. The shaggy-haired Harold Winston was in his usual workday outfit of bib overalls while crew-cut Garcia was in his dark suit, white shirt, and conservative tie. A study in contrasts. She wondered what in the world the two men had to talk about, and then it occurred to her: Harry was gossiping with Garcia about the bums in the basement. Her boss didn’t need to be reminded of that mess, and she quickened her pace. She got to her door as Harry was piling on the excuses for the busted front door.

  “So then I told the association folks that all the hardware around here is shit, the doors are shit, the windows are shit, and they’d better start looking at replacing—” Harry halted his diatribe as she came up to the pair.

  She looked at Harry and smiled a tight smile. “What about my dishwasher, Harry? Is that shit, too? When you gonna fix that?”

  He tugged on his beard. “Just waiting on the parts, Miss Saint Clare.”

  “Sure you are.”

  Harry pointed to Garcia. “This gentleman showed me his badge and asked me to let him inside. Hope that’s okay, Miss Saint Clare. Since he works for the feds same as you, I figured—”

  “That’s fine,” she interrupted.

  Harry said, “I escorted him up, to make sure he knew where to go.”

  “He’s been here before,” she said.

  Harry looked at Garcia and winked. “Is that right?”

  Bernadette looked at Garcia and asked flatly, “Shall we take this inside…sir?”

  “Sounds good.” Garcia smacked Harry on the back. “Don’t let them work you too hard, old-timer.”

  Rolling her eyes, Bernadette closed the door hard behind them. “Old-timer. Give me a break. That lazy, overpaid turd.”

  “He seems like a decent enough fella.”

  She shrugged off her coat and tossed it over a kitchen chair. “He’s getting paid a lot and is doing absolutely nothing while the place is falling apart.”

  “It’s not his fault that Murrick did a cut-rate renovation job.”

  “August spent a ton of time and money fixing this place.”

  Garcia followed her into the kitchen. “Awfully touchy about him, aren’t you?”

  “It isn’t nice to speak ill of the dead.”

  He took off his coat and dropped it over the back of a kitchen chair. “What did you get from the nursing home?”

  She leaned her back against the kitchen island. “Ruth was only a few years older than we are when she died. She’d been in the home since she was a teen. Her parents put her there after she became brain damaged. She was injured in a ‘household accident.’ That’s the official line, at least. But I think…” She paused, unsure of whether she should unveil her theory.

  “You think what?”

  “I think her father tried to drown her, causing the brain damage. I think the broth
ers witnessed it. I think one of them went wiggy as a result and is drowning young women.”

  “Why now? If the girl was injured years ago—”

  “Remember. She died in April, the same month the first victim was found floating in the river.”

  Garcia walked back and forth between the table and the island. “If you’re correct—”

  “I am.”

  “How did you get all this?”

  “I talked to one of her former roommates at the home.”

  “Why are all the victims college women, especially ones with emotional problems?”

  “I don’t know. Could be the first victim happened to be a screwed-up coed and he decided to stick with a known quantity. That’s the sort of girl he would have grown accustomed to through the practice. Skinny, emotionally vulnerable women. Easy pickings. Maybe it has to do with the fact that Ruth was injured in the years before she would have started college.”

  He stopped pacing and faced her, propping his butt against the edge of the kitchen table. “Which one, though? Which brother?”

  “I came home to try to figure that out.”

  “You’re going to use your sight.”

  “That’s the plan. I’ve still got the scarf. All I need is the venue.”

  He loosened his tie. “The urinal downstairs again, or should we find a church?”

  “The basement’s good. I want to do this quick.”

  Garcia took off his blazer and rolled up his shirtsleeves. “Let’s get to it.”

  “One more thing: I got a call at the office.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Professor said he’s got a student missing.”

  “Is he up to something?”

  “I think I believe him. He said her name is Regina Ordstruman. Gone since Friday. Maybe since Thursday.”

  “He volunteered that information?”

  “That’s about all I could get out of him before his lawyer friend made him hang up the phone.”