“I remember thinking how beautiful and strong she looked. She was dressed in a perfectly tailored gray suit, and she smelled like peppermint. I thought for a minute that maybe I was dead and she was some kind of spirit. But I realized quickly I was alive and that life was about to get much harder for me. The woman told me her name was Special Agent Lydia Carlson of the FBI. She was sorry to inform me that my mother had not survived the brutal attack in our apartment but that, miraculously, I had. She told me she knew I was tired, and this was not an ideal time to have to rehash the horrific details, but time was of the essence.
“I wanted to speak but my mouth and throat were so dry, and Special Agent Carlson kept talking and talking, hardly allowing an opportunity for me to speak even if I could. Finally she asked me a question that made no sense to me. She inquired if I had ever heard of the Railway Killer? I hadn’t, so I shook my head no. She continued on, telling me that over the last nineteen years the Railway Killer had murdered twenty-two women with the same MO each time. Agent Carlson had been part of the task force assigned to catch him for over ten of those years. They had been waiting for a break in the case, and now they finally had one, she said.
“I couldn’t understand what she was talking about, what this had to do with my mother and me. As she continued to speak the fog lifted and everything became painfully clear. She told me the Railway Killer targeted young women. He utilized brute force and the element of surprise. He would pin them down and drive a railroad spike into their femoral artery, severing it, causing massive blood loss and eventual death. Then he would carve a number into their leg that corresponded to how many women he had killed before them. ‘Your mother had the number twenty-two carved into her leg, and you have the number twenty-three. You are the only surviving victim of a man I have spent a decade hunting. Anything you can tell me will help bring him to justice,’ Agent Carlson said.
“You would think I would have sat up in bed and cried out that not only did I have details that would help the case, but I knew the name of the man they were searching for.” This was the hardest part for Piper, reliving this dark moment of her past was like slicing open an old wound. But she had gone too far to stop now.
“That’s what any rational person would have done in that situation, but instead I lay there, silent. After nearly an hour had passed and she had made her case in every way possible, she left and told me she’d be back the following day and we could talk then. She did come back, every day for five weeks, and I never spoke a word to her. She would tell me how they could keep me safe, how they had reported in the news that I was dead in order to protect me from any more harm. She’d fluctuate between empathy and frustration, but nothing would make me speak. I didn’t want to be the daughter of a serial killer, or the victim of one. I wanted to rewind my life to when things had started to feel right, to when my mom was alive and sober. I knew the moment I told Agent Carlson that my father was the Railway Killer, I could never take it back.”
Piper sobbed with her hands covering her face and her head pressed against the passenger window. She had never admitted her horrible mistake to anyone, let alone someone whose opinion she valued so much. Even if Bobby could overlook the dysfunction of her roots, she found it hard to believe he could move past her not coming clean to Agent Carlson. She assumed he would see it the way she did, as a selfish attempt at self-preservation.
“Piper, you were in shock. You had gone through a horrible event, had nearly been killed, and had watched your mother die. Any officer knows that victims need time. Even when you’re anxious to solve a case, you can’t do it at the expense of the victim.” Bobby reached across the truck and tried to calm Piper by rubbing her shoulder. It killed him to see her fall apart like this.
“You don’t understand. I wasn’t traumatized over the death of my mother. I was sorry she was dead, but she was equally as sadistic and violent toward me as my father had been. She wasn’t my advocate or my protector. Even when we moved on and tried to piece our lives together, we barely spoke. We mostly just coexisted. I think, to her, I was a reminder of a past she wanted to forget. To me she was an enemy I couldn’t forgive. She called my father that day, she did drugs, and she told him where we were. I believe my mother covered up his crimes for years. I don’t think anyone deserves to die that way, but that wasn’t what was keeping me quiet. I didn’t want to deal with the spectacle that would come from telling the truth. I didn’t want my parents stealing any more life from me than they already had, and in that self-absorbed decision I was a part of something that I will carry around with me for the rest of my life.
After my recovery, when on the verge of being released from the hospital, Agent Carlson came storming into my hospital room and threw a handful of pictures onto my bed. They were crime scene photos, and I remember turning away at the sight of a dead girl sprawled out in a puddle of blood. Agent Carlson put her face close to my ear and hissed, ‘Delanie Morrison, a twenty-one-year-old waitress, was murdered last night on her way home from work.’ She pointed to a picture of the girl’s thigh, which had the number twenty-four carved into it. ‘Every number after twenty-three is more blood on your hands,’ she told me.” Piper’s eyes were spilling over with guilt and tears.
“She was right, I could have prevented that murder and because I didn’t, made me just as guilty as my father. That idea destroyed me.” Remembering the day she had found out about Delanie was harder for Piper than the day she had almost died. She had never felt more alone, more immoral and guilty in her entire life. She felt the air in her lungs turning to gravel. She wanted to pull open the door of the truck and jump out. She begged Bobby to pull over.
When the truck came to a stop in a small clearing on the side of a quiet stretch of road, Piper pushed the door open and jumped out, gasping for air. Bobby ran around the truck to try to calm her in any way he could. What she did next took him completely by surprise.
Piper unbuttoned her jeans and pulled them down slightly on one side, exposing her upper thigh. Bobby’s heart broke at the sight of a large, circular raised scar from the number twenty-three carved in her leg. He had asked for the truth and assumed it would be murky and tainted in some way. But he never imagined anything like this.
“I could have stopped him, but instead I kept my mouth shut. After I saw those pictures of Delanie I told Agent Carlson everything. I promised to testify against my father and do anything I could to make sure he was brought to justice. It didn’t matter though, nothing would bring back Delaine, give her parents back their child.” Piper was frantic and her words were hardly coherent.
Bobby came to her slowly. He took her hand from the top of her jeans brought it to his mouth and kissed it. He touched the raised skin of her scar and stared into her eyes. “That was not your fault. What Carlson did was a technique to get you to give her what she needed. They literally train you on this stuff, on getting victims to talk. Your father was the murderer. The blood is on his hands, not yours. The important thing is that you told her everything you knew and they were able to catch him. You did the right thing, and it’s understandable that it took you a little time to process it all.”
“You don’t get it! I’m here in North Carolina because they haven’t caught him. I waited too long, and he had time to run. Someone leaked to the press there was a break in the case and they were pursuing a person of interest due to an eyewitness ready to testify. He is one of the most wanted men in America and no one can seem to find him. I was put in witness protection until he’s apprehended, and I can be called to testify against him. He’s still out there.”
Piper wrapped her arms around Bobby’s waist and rested her head on his chest. Carrying this burden alone for the last two years had been suffocating. Knowing she could say this all aloud and someone would still be there to hold her was liberating, even if the rehashing of her mistake was painful.
“Piper, I’m so sorry that you had to go through all that, and you’ve spent all this time blaming yourself. You’
re not alone in this. I’m still here, and I’m not going anywhere. I’m sorry I doubted you, but I’m glad you told me. Living with that burden by yourself is too much. I’m here to listen to whatever you want to tell me.” Bobby squeezed her tighter and then crouched to lower himself to her eye level. She was still breathing erratically through her tears, and as much as he wanted to kiss her, he didn’t think this was appropriate. Piper needed his support, and he didn’t want any of it to be clouded by passion.
Piper let herself melt into him for a moment before she spoke. “I need you to hear what I have to say about Judge Lions. It’s important, and I’m not sure I can talk much more about my past right now.” Piper wiped at her cheeks and drew a deep, composing breath.
“All right, if you’re sure you’re up to talking about it then go ahead. But can we get back in the truck? It’s getting cold out here and I don’t want you getting sick.” Bobby walked over and opened her door. As she walked by him to hop in, he grabbed her elbow and spun her gently back around toward him, hugging her one more time before the seats in his truck would force space between them.
Piper wasn’t sure exactly how to start this difficult conversation, but she dove in. “I saw something in the alley behind my house one day. I was feeling so lost, school hadn’t panned out, and this seemed like a sign. Judge Lions was assaulting a young girl. I overheard enough of what he was saying to learn he was paying her to have sex with him. At first I didn’t know what to do or who to tell. I felt like the whole system had failed me, and everything I had learned in school led me to believe there was no way a man like Judge Lions would be held accountable for his actions. I started to concoct a plan to take down the judge without having to go through the normal channels I knew wouldn’t work. I saw that girl bleeding in the alley, and all I could think was that I wasn’t going to let someone else get hurt or killed when there might be something I could do about it. I’ve spent the last couple of months slowly gathering information. Well, that search led me to a mill this morning where I was listening in on a meeting between the judge and who I thought would be Christian Donavan.” Piper hadn’t fully recovered from telling her own story. She felt like there was no way she had the emotional energy to tell Bobby what she knew about Stan’s death, but she had no choice.
Bobby cut in, shocked by the thought of her solo surveillance. “Wait, what do you mean you were listening in on a meeting? Like you were hiding in this mill while the judge and Christian Donavan were there? Please tell me sometime in your life you’ve had some training or experience to prepare you for this. Maybe that’s part of the story you haven’t shared with me yet?”
“No,” Piper continued. “And I know that sounds crazy. I’ve mostly been taking it all really slow, thinking through my next move. The meeting this morning was a little impromptu, and I had to make a decision whether or not to go. I’m glad I did though. The person meeting with the judge wasn’t Christian, he was a cop. I need to know, Bobby, if and why you’ve been digging into Judge Lions’s business, because this cop was on to you.”
“I have been,” Bobby answered shocked at her knowledge of his recent activities. “I started a few weeks ago. I thought if you were involved in something this is how I would find out, and if you were in trouble, this is how I’d protect you. I thought if I could figure out what was going on I’d be able to get ahead of this, ahead of you.” He wanted her to know that even though they hadn’t been speaking he was still thinking of her every moment they’d been apart the last couple of months.
“Well whoever you showed the pictures of the judge to is the cop who was at that meeting today. They were talking about how they were going to deal with the situation, deal with you. They decided that hitting you where it hurts would be their best bet to get you to back off. That meant making you realize Betty and Jules were in danger.” Piper was half hoping that Bobby would say he hadn’t shown the pictures to anyone. She was holding out hope that maybe the judge and the cop were talking about someone else, although her logic told her that was highly unlikely.
“That’s not possible. I only showed the pictures to Rylie. There’s no way he’s on the take. He’s one of the most respected guys on the force, and he was a good friend of Stan’s. He wouldn’t get involved with anything that put them in danger. Are you sure you heard all this right?” Bobby asked in disbelief.
The next piece of information would be more of a blow than finding out someone respected was not worthy of it, and Piper was not looking forward to delivering the news. “The judge called the man Red. I don’t know if that means anything to you, but I can assure you, it was clear to me that this man knew you. It was also clear he knew Stan very well too.”
“Yes, that’s Rylie’s nickname. I can’t believe he’d be mixed up in all this. Maybe it’s because he’s so close to retirement. They’re messing with pensions so much, maybe he needed the money.” Bobby shook his head as he searched for any plausible reason why a cop like Rylie would go against the badge like this.
“Bobby, Rylie is going to come to you and try to convince you to back off this. It’s going to be your last out before they take more drastic measures. You need to go along with that. Tell him you’ve been thinking about it, and you don’t need another mark against you like Manton. Give him the pictures and tell him you trust him to do whatever he thinks is best with them. That’s the only way to keep everyone safe.” She was praying he’d agree and make this easy.
“I will, because there’s no way I’m putting the girls at risk over this. He was there for Manton so he’ll understand why I wouldn’t want any more attention on me right now,” Bobby said, trying to convince himself this was the right thing to do.
“There’s more to the story here, Bobby. Rylie was there for the takedown on Manton because he was part of it. The Donavans were supposed to be there that day. Rylie set you up to protect them. He made sure Manton got off the hook so he wouldn’t flip on them. I hate to say this and I haven’t really thought of the right way yet, but there is something else I need to tell you. Something worse.” Piper bit at her fingernail as she tried to find the right words. She was about to stomp on Bobby’s chest, crushing him in a way he probably didn’t believe possible. As much as she wanted him to know the truth, she wished she could protect him from it.
“Tell me,” he said, reaching across and taking her hand, stopping her from ravaging her fingernails. “I don’t see how it can get much worse.”
“I need to know that you’ll handle this right. This corruption is not limited to the judge and Rylie, it runs deep, and we have no idea who we can trust. So when I tell you this I need you to think through all the consequences of any action you take and realize at the end of the day you need to protect the people you care about first and foremost.” Piper paused waiting for him to agree to her terms. He nodded his head impatiently. “The reason they want to target Jules and Betty rather than just take you out is because killing a police officer isn’t as easy as it was ten years ago. Ten years ago the judge and Rylie had more people on the inside willing to help in the cover-up. There wasn’t as much technology, times have changed. So ten years ago they were able to lure a police officer into an abandoned building and shoot him, passing it off as a random robbery gone wrong. They got away with it ten years ago when they killed Stan for digging around in their business and getting too close to the truth. Bobby, Rylie and Judge Lions killed Stan. I don’t know which one of them pulled the trigger, but I know they orchestrated it and covered it up.”
Piper was crying again though she wasn’t sure why. She had never met Stan, but she felt like she had gotten to know him through his family, and the thought of him being betrayed by people he trusted sickened her.
Bobby tightened his hands over the steering wheel until his knuckles were white. Piper could see him grinding his teeth as he processed the new information.
He sat silently for several minutes. Piper kept wondering if she should say something, anything— but nothing she came up
with sounded right in her head. She opened her mouth to speak, but Bobby had beaten her to it. “Betty was right all these years,” he whispered. “I’ve been telling her over and over again that she was crazy, that if there were some kind of conspiracy it would have been uncovered by now. Everything I’ve ever believed about the sanctity of the shield and due process means nothing. If the system can’t flush out the men who killed a cop—a great cop—in ten years, then what the hell are we all doing every day? I need to do something about this. They can’t continue to live above the law.” He punched his fist into the steering wheel and the horn blasted, sending Piper jumping in her seat.
“I have a plan,” Piper said, hoping Bobby’s resentment against Rylie would be enough to sway him. She needed him to ignore his normal instinct to obey the law and let her continue with her explanation without argument. “Originally I was only going to target the judge, but after I heard about Stan this morning I came up with a way to include Rylie and even Christian Donavan in all of it. I want you to know that I have this all under control. As long as you do your part with Rylie and convince him you’re not interested in the judge anymore, then I’ll take care of the rest. The less you know the better.”
“Piper, do you have a gun or another way to protect yourself when you get caught doing surveillance on these guys? Have you ever even fired a weapon? You’re intentions are great, Piper, but you aren’t qualified to do any more of this on your own. Tell me what you’re planning, and I can help.” Bobby’s brain had kicked into high gear as he processed all Piper was telling him. Maybe Stan’s way of handling things was admirable, but it also got him killed. If Piper hadn’t come to him this morning with this information he unknowingly would have put Betty and Jules in danger. He might not think Piper was qualified, but she was certainly doing everything right so far.
Chasing Justice Page 14