by Mel Comley
“Joshua called, looking for his brother.”
Val sipped her orange juice. “And what did you tell him?”
Rico laughed, the sound loud and raucous. “Told him he’d hear from him today.”
“He could be trouble, Rico, especially when he finds out we don’t need him or Selina any longer.”
“Said the police were there yesterday. Some detectives asked about one of the girls found in the sewer. Number Thirty-Two, I think it was.”
“Candy thinks we should let the other two girls go. What do you think, Rico?”
“Thought you said she was a sociopath? Sounds dangerous to me, especially if you think Joshua and Sims might talk.”
“Sims isn’t going to do anything, and Joshua can be bought easily enough.” She smiled broadly, an idea formulating. “Candy said we should drug them and drop them off at a homeless shelter. Second Chance is already on the radar, so let’s give them a little more to worry about.”
“You like this girl a lot, don’t you?”
“She reminds me of myself in my younger days. With the proper training, she could do great things.” Val nibbled on her toast. “She suggested we bring her mother and her boyfriend in. Mother’s a drug addict, boyfriend probably is, too, so they won’t be much use for research. Perhaps we could find another use for them?”
“You want me to pick them up?”
Val pursed her lips. “Candy needs to die as far as the world is concerned. A tearful Mrs. Granger making a call to the police about her missing daughter should get the ball rolling. Once the police interview her and she and her boyfriend disappear, the idea will already be planted that they killed her. Thirty-Five is about her size. We simply pull the teeth, burn the body beyond recognition, and place it in the trailer and burn it to the ground.”
“What about DNA?” Candy asked from the doorway.
“Good morning, darling. Are you hungry? Rico, ask Henrietta to bring in another plate.” Val patted the seat next to her. “What made you think of the DNA question?”
“We studied it in school. And I don’t think you should get rid of the teeth. Even if my mother killed me, it’s doubtful she would pull my teeth.”
“Beautiful and brilliant. We’ll set aside that plan until we come up with a solution to our DNA problem. Should I make the call, though, have the police interview your mother and get the ball rolling?”
Rico came into the room. “Good morning, Miss Candy.”
“Good morning, Rico.”
A tiny maid with a long ponytail entered with a tray carrying a fresh plate of food and a carafe. “Mr. Rico says you like your coffee with sugar and cream.” She placed the plate in front of Candy and poured out a cup of coffee.
“Thank you, Henrietta. We’ll call you if we need anything else,” Val said. “Why don’t you enjoy your breakfast, and we can finish our conversation later, Candy.”
“No, it’s okay. I was thinking about this show I watched on TV one night when Mom and Duke were going at it in the bedroom. This guy was killing all these people, but instead of burying the bodies, he fed them to the pigs. When the FBI or whoever it was finally found the place, they found shoes, some bones and jewelry. They weren’t sure they would ever find enough DNA to identify all the victims.”
Val laughed. “What exactly do you have in mind, sweetie?”
“I still have my backpack and the things I brought with me. Duke has an old pickup, so after we take them, we load the pickup with a few chosen body parts, drive it out to one of the local pig farms, and toss everything into the pen, then leave the truck there. My mother and Duke are gone. I’m gone. If you leave a few organs in containers in the refrigerator at the trailer, it might even help take the heat off the three bodies they found because they’ll suspect Duke is a serial killer.”
“Rico, I do believe this young lady has more evil in her little finger than you and I put together. What a delightful, sinful deception. I’ll make that call and turn a little heat up on Mom and Duke.”
~
Alex woke to the smell of fresh coffee and bacon as well as a soft knock on the bedroom door. “Come in.”
Tamara opened the door, holding a suitcase, which she plopped beside the bed. “I thought you might need a few things from your apartment.”
“Thanks. What time is it?”
“A little after eleven. The chief called and gave us all orders to get at least four hours of sleep.”
“Did you?” Alex asked.
“I caught a couple. Reefer and I are going to take off in a few minutes. A call came in from a mother saying her daughter ran away a few days ago. She saw the reports about the bodies on TV and got scared.”
“How old is the girl?”
“Fifteen, almost sixteen. The right age for our weirdos. Crimshaw said to tell you to call him when you’re ready to go to work.”
Alex tossed off the covers and sat up on the side of the bed. “I’ll be ready as soon as I’ve had some coffee and a quick shower.”
“Blake’s going to want you to fill him in on what you found yesterday. Why don’t you take the day off, stay here, and work with him?”
“When I need someone to protect me, Tamara, or tell me how to do my job, I’ll let you know.” Alex stood, picked up the suitcase, and tossed it on the bed.
Tamara walked toward the door. “I said something similar to Reefer yesterday. He reminded me that if I screwed up, I had more to lose than just my pride. You might want to think about that, Alex.”
Thirty minutes later, Alex left the bedroom, freshly showered and dressed in jeans and a pullover. She hated to admit it, but Tamara was right. Alex needed to swallow her pride and get over her ego. Her best course of action was to put her head together with Blake and Nobby and sort out a direction on the case. If yesterday hadn’t happened, that was exactly what she would have done anyway. She couldn’t expect the team to accept her as being okay if she didn’t act okay.
“Good morning.”
Blake and Nobby looked up from the computer screen they’d both been studying. “About time you woke up,” Nobby teased her. “Just because it’s your birthday doesn’t mean you get the day off. Grab a seat, and I’ll fix you a plate.”
“How do you take your coffee?” Blake pushed back his seat.
“I can…” Alex stopped in mid-sentence. I would have laughed and let them wait on me yesterday. She pulled out a chair and sat down. “Black is fine.”
Blake handed her a cup of coffee, and Nobby set a plate of toast, bacon and scrambled eggs in front of her. “Thank you both.”
Alex toyed with the food but drank the coffee quickly and rose for a second cup. “Tamara said you wanted me to fill you in on yesterday’s findings. We don’t have a lot.”
“I started a database. Why don’t you and Nobby do your normal thing, and I’ll pop in if I need to ask a question,” Blake said.
Alex stared into her coffee cup for a moment. Morgan was smart—if she bounced the case off Nobby like she’d always done, he would pick up on things the two of them put together and raise questions they might have missed. “The evidence all points to someone specifically targeting runaways and killing them. But I think it’s something much more sinister than that.”
“Such as?” Nobby asked.
Alex exhaled a deep breath. “I don’t know. We followed the lead on Belinda Montgomery to a place called Second Chance. To be honest with you, there’s nothing about the place to raise any questions, but yet Crimshaw and I both felt something was off kilter. Runaways go there for short periods. Mrs. Sims said the girls were required to work to pay for their stay. What if the girls have been forced to prostitute themselves in order to survive?”
“That might work for the two bodies they found this morning, but it doesn’t explain why the first three were butchered,” Nobby said.
“Two more bodies were found this morning?” Alex downed her coffee and rose. “I think I need to go to work.”
“Sit down, Alexandra
,” Blake said. “We’ve already ruled out the two dead girls found this morning being connected to the three found yesterday.”
“Were they runaways?” Alex asked. “And exactly how did you rule them out?”
“They were both raped and strangled to death. The ME says both showed signs of long-term sexual activity, and both were heroin addicts. None of the three found yesterday showed any signs of addiction or sexual abuse.”
“Their organs were missing, so how the hell would anyone know that?” Alex poured another cup of coffee. Her head was pounding. “Do you have any aspirin, Nobby?”
“I’ll get you a couple.”
Alex sat down at the table. “I’m sorry, what exactly do you want me to say?”
“Take the fact they’re runaways out of the picture, and how would you look at this case?” Blake asked.
Alex rubbed her right temple. “You mean if someone were just picking up teenagers off the street and killing them?”
“Here you go.” Nobby handed her two aspirin. “You want a glass of water?”
“No, I’m fine.” Alex chewed the bitter pills. Blake was clearly trying to get her to look at something different, but she had no clue what it was.
“Why did the Escape Artist kill the women in England, Alexandra?” Blake asked.
“What the hell? We ain’t here to talk about him, Blake.” Nobby stomped to the sink and made a fresh pot of coffee. “She don’t need to talk about that bastard today.”
Blake ignored him and lowered his voice. “He said Patterson had to be punished, and you pretty much said the same thing about Scarlet’s murder—he was punishing you. So why did he punish the other women he killed?”
The pounding in Alex’s head increased as she concentrated on something she’d missed, something important. “He said perhaps he wasn’t punishing them.”
Blake met her gaze. “So everyone he killed, except Anders and Patterson, was targeted to punish someone else. Did your team look into that?”
She shook her head. “Bob and I talked about it. We were going to look into the police officers whose wives were killed, but then he killed Scarlet and fled to the States. I’m pretty sure no one ever followed up on it. But it doesn’t make sense. I worked with Terry Dawson, and he was one of the straightest coppers I knew. His wife, Gail, was the last victim before Scarlet.”
“So why would someone butcher three young girls and remove all their organs and parts of their brain?”
She felt a glimmer of the excitement she used to feel when she and Nobby would home in on something that made no sense before, but suddenly made perfect sense. “Do we still have the pictures from the ME?”
Blake pulled a file and handed it to her.
Alex laid them out side by side, staring at the faces, arms, legs, and finally their hair. “Did the ME say anything about them being ill for some time before they were killed?”
Nobby came to stand behind her. “Damn, they do look like skin and bones. Why didn’t we see that before?”
“Because we were all concentrating on them being runaways and digging for information on why they ran away, instead of why they might have been killed.”
CHAPTER NINE
“Nice area,” Reefer grumbled, scanning the trailer park ten minutes or so outside the city.
“Let’s not go in there making any judgements. These days, people are forced to live in places like this through no fault of their own,” Tamara said. “Besides, the mother was worried enough to report her daughter as a runaway after only a few days. A lot of people don’t ever report them.”
Reefer picked up the file. “Okay.”
“Don’t you patronize me, Ben Nicols.”
He laughed. “I wouldn’t dream of it, Tamara Madden.”
Tamara glared at him, got out of the car, and knocked on the trailer’s front door. A woman opened the door, wearing an old, faded dressing gown. A half-smoked cigarette hung out of her mouth. “Yeah?”
Tamara showed her badge. “Mrs. Granger?”
“Yeah, what about it?”
“I’m Detective Tamara Madden, and this is my partner, Detective Ben Nicols. You rang the station earlier to inform us of your daughter’s disappearance. May we come in and speak to you?”
She eyed them suspiciously. “I didn’t call nobody.”
“Oh, so your daughter, Candy, isn’t missing?” Reefer asked.
“Yeah, she’s gone, but I didn’t call nobody. She’ll come home when she gets ready.”
Tamara felt her anger rise and shot a glance at Reefer, noting the slight flush creeping up his neck. “Mrs. Granger, in the last two days, the bodies of five teenage girls have been discovered. Would you care to look at the pictures to see if any of them might be your daughter?”
She walked into the trailer, expecting them to follow her. Reefer made a face at Tamara and bowed, allowing her to take the steps first. The trailer smelled of stale cigarettes and beer; every surface was covered in either discarded clothes or trash. Tamara’s stomach lurched, and she swallowed hard to keep down the bile. What is wrong with people? Just because you’re down on your luck, you don’t have to let your standards drop. I’m not surprised the poor kid ran off. Tamara chastised herself for doing exactly what she’d warned Reefer not to do. Of course, that was when she’d thought the mother was concerned enough to report her daughter missing.
The woman swept the stuff off the couch, clearing a space for them to sit. Neither of them accepted her invitation. She stubbed out her cigarette then immediately lit another one before taking a swig of beer from an open can.
“How old is your daughter, Mrs. Granger?” Tamara asked.
“She’s fifteen, be sixteen next month. You said you had pictures. Where are they?”
Reefer handed Tamara the file. She pulled out the pictures and passed them to Mrs. Granger. “How long has Candy been missing?”
“Two, three days maybe.” She handed Tamara the pictures. “These ain’t her.”
Tamara bit down on her tongue. The woman’s attitude was already setting her teeth on edge. “How about friends of Candy’s? Do you think she knew any of them?”
Mrs. Granger puffed on her cigarette. “Damned if I know. Never seen them before.”
“Then maybe you could shed some light on why your daughter took off?”
Mrs. Granger took another slug of beer and puffed on her cigarette. “She upped and left, no threats or nothing. Me and my man came out of the bedroom and found her missing.”
“Your man? A boyfriend? Does he live here, too?” Tamara asked, unable to keep the sarcasm out of her voice.
“He drops by occasionally. Well, I suppose he spends more time here than at his place.”
“And how did your daughter feel about your boyfriend?”
“I don’t know what you’re trying to say, lady, but there was nothing going on between them.” Her voice rose a few octaves.
“I don’t believe I said anything of the sort, Mrs. Granger. I simply asked how they got along.”
“Good, most of the time, when she kept her smart mouth shut.”
“And when she didn’t?” Tamara asked.
“Look, she’s just an ungrateful bitch. I gave her everything she needed, and this is how she repays me. I don’t know who called you, but it wasn’t me.”
“So why would she run away? Something must have changed. Has she run away before?”
“No, and nothing changed.”
Mrs. Granger refused to make eye contact with Tamara, and she looked over at Reefer and raised an eyebrow, inviting him to chip in with the questioning.
“Unfortunately, Mrs. Granger, this happens a lot when a new man comes on the scene. Could she have gone to her father’s home?” Reefer asked.
“Nope, she don’t know him. Shit, I don’t even know who he is.”
Tamara clenched a fist, and bit back a sharp retort. “That’s a shame. What sort of student is Candy?”
“Why?” Mrs. Granger asked, perplexed.
“It might give us an insight into her character, whether she’ll be the type to survive out there on her own.”
Mrs. Granger chuckled. “There’s a type of runaway that fares better than others? Is that what you’re saying?”
Tamara stared long and hard at the woman.
Mrs. Granger continued. “Well, she ain’t no genius, if that’s what you’re getting at. C student, at best, and only when she wants to be.”
“Which school did she attend? We’ll drop by and have a word with the principal. See if any of her school friends can tell us what was going on in her head or where she might be hanging out, unless you can supply us with a list of her friends.”
“She goes to Bradley. And I have no idea who her friends are.”
Don’t know or don’t care? Again, Tamara bit her tongue. A man stepped into the trailer, and Reefer stiffened. Did he recognize him?
“What’s going on here? Who are you?” He went over to the refrigerator, opened the door, extracted a beer, and popped the top.
“We’re investigating Candy’s disappearance, and you are?” Tamara asked.
“Disappearance? Is that what you call it when a child runs out on her momma the way she has?”
“Sorry, I missed your name.”
He took a swig from the bottle before he answered. “Duke MacIntyre.”
“He’s my boyfriend,” Mrs. Granger enlightened them unnecessarily.
“And may we ask what your relationship was like with Candy?”
MacIntyre pulled himself upright. “What do you mean? If that girl said I touched her, she’s a damned liar.”
“Well, we all know how tempestuous a parent’s relationship with a teenager can be. How did you get on with Candy?”
“Tempestuous sums it up, and for the record, she ain’t my kid.”
“We’re aware of that, Mr. MacIntyre, but did you do fatherly things with her?”
“Are you kidding, lady? I don’t go for any of that filling in for the real father kinda shit. If I’d a wanted kids, I’d a had my own.”
“The day she went missing, were there any confrontations?” Tamara watched the worried glance that passed between MacIntyre and Granger and knew instantly they were holding something back. She decided to call their bluff. “Of course, if you’d rather, we can call a couple of officers and take this down to the station.”