Kids didn’t have cell phones yet. I didn’t hear more voices from outside. They could be there scrambling around. I never noticed my ears ringing from the enclosed thunder of the round I expended. In all the excitement I never noticed, which meant their screams might have been louder than I thought. I considered someone might have heard my name.
I weighed my choices. So far no one was racing down the stairs. Kids outside would have had to get in a vehicle and drive—at a safe speed—the winding road’s sharp curves wouldn’t permit fast. Seven minutes to a house with a phone, convince the neighbors to call the sheriff, and if he was available and on this side of the county at least ten minutes to respond— conservatively.
Once poor Benjamin slumped into unconsciousness, he wouldn’t last twelve minutes.
I slipped back into the hidden room.
VI
“I TAKE IT the boy died?” Ed asks.
“Yes. He bled out. Double murder, or as the newspaper called it, a suicide pact. The reports conveniently left out there was no gun to be found. I did get some scuttlebutt from a few student conversations about the bullet taking Benjamin’s life being from the Civil War.”
“Someone in the police department had to have shared that tidbit. Cops are dumb.”
“We know they have faults. We’re not here to discuss their bumbling,” Jane says.
“Why are we doing this if it’s not to discuss how it makes us feel?” Al asks.
“We are, but the ineptitude of the police is not why we did what we did. It’s why we’re allowed to continue and brought ourselves together to prevent future actions,” Jane says.
“I understand how Robert allows some to live if they escape his hunt after the way Cindy died. She just climbed into the noose with no struggle. Someone willing to fight to stay alive deserves respect.”
“The hunt is important, even the killing. When the one victim refuses to roll over, I couldn’t bring myself to kill,” says Robert. “Funny thing, of all those I’ve drug into the woods to hunt, women are the strong ones. They transform into fighters.”
“They have no choice. Men are expected to be the prize winners. Most are not gladiators anymore, but women who are expected to be docile have only one direction to go,” remarks Edgars.
“Many of us stalk women because they are weak, easy to manipulate to our will. You, Sir Robert, reward when they prove to be worthy. Have you freed many?” The Plagiarist asks.
“You weren’t at the first meeting, but I put three arrows in that Gabby-bitch and she kept going. Her lover just gave up. Died in the snow.”
Jesse clenches the moment to gather the information he needs to track these people back to their normal lives, determining if one murdered his sister. The professor will demand more detailed information since several of these killers don’t stalk in their home neighborhoods. “What happened after you let her go? How did they not find you?”
“It’s not the direction we should be exploring,” Jane says.
Robert speaks before there are any more shifts away from his methods.
“She was found a few miles down the road half frozen, nearly bled out. The paper said she needed seven surgeries to repair the damage from the arrows. When the cops finally got to interview her, she had forgotten much of the attack.”
“Or she’s afraid you’ll intervene. Did you keep her identification?” Edgars asks.
“I burnt anything I kept from any of my victims, as Jane suggested.”
“She has no idea you just severed your connection to her. She knows you have her license.”
Jane refocuses the group, “Robert, how did it affect you when you destroyed your trophies?”
“I built a fire. I touched them and smelled them and soaked in every bit of memory from each kill. And I tossed each child in one at a time. Each burned to nothing before I did the same to the other children.”
“You think of your trophies as your children?” Edgars asks.
“Yes.”
“I don’t collect trophies, unless you count the novels. They are my children,” Edgars says. “I could destroy my notebooks.”
NOOOOOOOOOOOO! Jesse screams in his head. My God. The evidence and the uniqueness of each murder, he might be the one who killed her. He’s old enough. He traveled and did not murder in a pattern. I need those notebooks. It may not be enough to read his novels. How many more murders has he committed that are unwritten?
“It would be the start to recovery,” Jane says.
“You have said so several times. What else do we do to quell our urges?” Jack asks.
“You killed to avenge your family. Why can’t you just stop?”
“As I eliminated the drug trade in my town other crimes dropped. The town returned to the type where people didn’t have to lock their doors at night,” Jack says.
“But a murderer was on the loose.”
“The targets were criminals. Much like those of you who choose prostitutes as targets, no one cared when the local drug dealers got bumped off. There were no signs of a turf war so the cops didn’t investigate too deeply,” Jack says.
“No one prays for a dead crack dealer.”
“If the town is safe then just retire,” Jane says.
“It’s not safe—it will never be safe.” Jack clinches a fist.
“Nowhere is safe. And even if you stopped those drug dealers and we stop killing, others will take our place,” Al says.
VII
I CHOSE THIS mall because no cameras surveyed the parking lot. Security was more concerned with catching shoplifters over the safety of the female employees going to their cars after midnight. Most women would go in pairs, but once they were in their cars and on the road, they lost all the fear they had of being attacked. Most never noticed they weren’t alone on the road.
I tracked a half dozen, but none of them matched my need. It was more than selecting an easy target—most of them were. One would stop to buy gas at a service station with only the pumps on and no employees around. They believed some crazed worker might grab them.
I had prepared my den. I needed a new play partner.
I thought about this one the second time she bought gas at 1:23 AM on a Tuesday. The place had cameras, but I could park out of range and drag her. All they would get was my build and height, but so many white men were five ten. With a jacket and rolled towel fitted from sleeve to sleeve I appeared super broad shouldered.
No—she wasn’t right for me.
Then the night a man escorted this adorable redhead to her car, I knew I had found her. She was beautiful. So trusting of this man I’d never seen before. Both must have been new to working the late shift. He kept her talking, each by their perspective cars, until the lot cleared.
I knew.
I knew what he was.
He angered me.
He wasn’t a true predator.
Not like me.
He was a jackal.
What I did was love.
At some point during their chatting he wormed his way around to the passenger side of his car and was within a few feet of her.
Amateur.
He tugged and pulled on her arm hard enough to dislocate her shoulder. Luckily, he didn’t. It also gave her the opportunity to scream, which worked for my benefit because it scared him. He flung her into the back seat and bound her hands. He would pay dearly for bruising her skin with the second punch. I’m sure the first was hard enough to keep her from screaming further, but he had to have a second to prove what a man he was.
In his stupid panic he may have watched for cars when he fled, but his mind was only on avoiding flashing cherry lights not the UV lights of a mid-sized SUV.
I drove past when he turned off on a conservation road leading to a boat launch. I flipped the lights off and turned around. It had only one exit. As upset as he made me by harming my love, my calm must be maintained. This was a spontaneous action and those lead to mistakes cops uncovered if care was not maintained.
By the time I pu
t my car into park he was holding open the back door. She had kicked him from the way he was doubled over and using the door to support his weakened knee.
I kept a gun with me. Normally, I didn’t load it in case a feisty girl was able to get it away from me, but they never knew it lacked bullets. I chose not to risk it with a male. I knew nothing of him or his capabilities.
I think he wet himself when I stepped from the darkness, my hands covered by latex gloves.
The redhead thanked me for saving her. Fool had bound her with a necktie. I unwrapped her wrists and tossed it in the back seat. Her DNA was all over it. He protested. It was what she wanted.
“Drop your pants,” I ordered.
“What?”
“Drop your pants around your ankles.”
She snickered at this. He wouldn’t be able to rush me without tripping.
The poor girl hugged me as if I was her savior.
“I’ll show you how to do it.”
Before my words sank into her brain, I had her pinned against the back of the car with my body and her wrists cuffed behind her with my free hand. I could tie up a woman in my sleep now.
“Move to the car,” I ordered him.
He reached for his pants.
“Leave them.” I waved the gun.
He duck waddled to the back seat of his car.
Her long hair was so soft in my hand as I guided her to her knees.
“You’re a sick fuck,” she berated me. Her protests were broken. “Oh my God, he’s fucking hard. You’re both sick fucks.”
“You want to live, then I suggest you finish yourself off. Shoot it into the back seat,” I instructed him.
“You fucking want me to jack off!?”
“Beats a bullet to your skull.” I clicked the hammer—unnecessary, but it had an effect.
Men won’t maintain an erection when in fear. I rubbed her face against his crotch to keep him stiff. I removed her, allowing him to work himself to climax. As he fondled himself I tore away the ginger’s purple lacy panties. I tugged and tore until one leg was torn free. I hated to proceed with my inspection of her there, but I pushed the panties inside. Her protest of where my fingers were exciting her first attacker.
The dome light allowed a clear visage of sploodges as he squirted in the back seat. He painted it better than I hoped.
Spent he hung on the car door for support. She would give in or fight me, depending on what she thought I would do to her next.
I drug her to the passenger side of the car. Taking the keys from the ignition, I ordered him back into the driver’s seat. This was tricky. I tossed her DNA soaked panties on a glob of splooge in the back seat.
The police detectives would have a field day with her disappearance. They would speculate sex occurred. I removed one handcuff and recuffed her pinioned arms in the front. Unsure of my motivations she followed my instructions.
I handed her a wooden hinged box and explained in baby steps the process she was to obey.
She tied a band around her would-be attacker’s arm to raise the veins. I kept certain drugs on my person in case I flubbed an abduction and needed to dump a body. The cops never investigated too closely an overdose, even when it was mommy’s perfect angel.
She injected him like a pro. “Leave the needle in his arm.”
They would think he passed out from the high. It was enough to kill a horse. A minute passed. He convulsed once and aspirated a snore. I scattered the drug kit on the floor next to him and tossed the car keys in for good measure.
I drug her to the back of the car and bent her over the trunk. She had lost all struggle in her. Some people froze as part of their natural flight or fight response. Her rump was so smooth and soft. I pushed back my own erection, pinching her rump until a useable vein rose. It wouldn’t. It might have if she was thinner. I didn’t need much. The needle I jabbed into her forearm wouldn’t scar her that would be later. I drew blood.
She wore these thigh high socks. It was sexy on her, and I would have to replace the pair. I took both off her after I placed her in my vehicle. She would be secure under the third-row seating I gutted to make a female cubby space.
I tore one sock up and squirted blood onto it before tossing it in the grass. The second I tossed in the trunk, not sure what detectives would deduce from sock actions, but the news shows would explain why he did what he did.
I depressed the plunger, flinging drops in the back seat. The remaining half tube I sprayed over his now flaccid cock and pubic hair. Damn. Many redheads avoided grooming their pubis due to the extra sensitive skin. I should have plucked some hairs. If the panties and blood weren’t enough to convince the cops, a few pubes meant nothing.
As I drove away, I thought about his claiming he didn’t hurt the girl would be the cornerstone of his defense. How some mysterious stranger stole her from him, but first made him jack off and take drugs. To be in the interrogation room as his story unfolded would be better than an amusement park ride, and the craziest story a cop ever heard.
VIII
“THANK YOU FOR sharing.”
“Thanks for the share, but I want to know about the investigation. We’ve all heard what you do to the women, Al. What did the cops do to the man you doped?”
“We are not here to indulge—” Jane attempts to redirect.
“I followed the case constructed against him. So much DNA allowed for testing and a few hits on CODIS.”
“His semen was in the rape database. You ended one of society’s problems,” Jack says.
“Your soul must be torn. You condemn such actions, and yet what you’ve done is no different.”
“I don’t rape. My crimes better my community.” Despite his advanced age Jack vaults to the balls of his feet, hands drawn to pounce.
“Gentlemen. We won’t be fighting here. It won’t help,” Jane repeats, now a broken record.
“We’re all killers. There is no way to help us. I don’t know why I bothered,” Jack admits.
Jesse raises his arms like a referee. “I know exactly why I’m here.” Figure out which of you fuckers murdered my sister. “I don’t have remorse for the death of the professor, I liked it. But killing him was wrong. If I report myself to the police, I’ll get no treatment program. I don’t want to murder again—I enjoyed it.”
“There’s still hope for the kid. Not for me. Those I kill aren’t even people,” Jack says.
“Those you kill aren’t people. Of all of us you are doing society a favor. How many people do you save when you take down a drug dealer? If we all turned our urges in your direction, we might be productive. More productive than police, we don’t have to live by the rules,” Jane says.
“A vigilante group of serial murderers who protect the neighborhood. Some Dark Avenging League. I do what I do, and it falls into your category of wrong,” Al says.
“I can’t stand to be in the same room as a man who chokes out women, even if some are prostitutes. From what I’ve seen most of those poor girls are forced into it. Some take the mantle by choice, but those pressed into service are victims and need to be defended, not have their life stolen,” Jack spits.
“We are losing our focus.” Jesse falls into his chair.
“No,” Jane realizes, “We need to work out our aggressions. For group therapy to work we must come to terms with each other first.”
“You want me to come to terms with a rapist?” Jack’s fingernails dig into his whitening palms.
“Now we know your true sentiments,” says Al.
“You saved that girl for yourself, not to protect her. What you did was the worst. When I kill, it sets people free,” Jack confesses.
“Not your victims. And how free are they? Did you follow up on the first girl you saved? She would have been placed in the foster care. Most children don’t fare well in the system. You know the ratio of those who turn to prostitution after being in the system. You protected her from one abuser, what about the rest she must face?” Al says.
“But it should be. Even in the dark I detect your smug, self-serving, better-than-the-rest-of-us vibe you radiate. When we steal one girl our actions have consequences. What you have done is no different. And before you heal you must admit it,” Al says.
Jesse considers the old man a potential ally. His sister was never a criminal, although she may have partied like any teen girl her age. He accepts she might have drank and fornicated, his mother never spoke about her. Sissy never did anything criminal to put her under Jack’s radar. Jack might even help him. He despises these true killers of innocent people as Jesse does.
“I make my choices and weigh many factors. But those I kill are hurting their own families less by being dead than by what they do when they are alive,” Jack says.
“You’re a hypocrite,” Al says.
“As are we all, or we would simply turn ourselves into the authorities. What we do here is getting to both have and eat our cake,” Al says.
“Everyone, we clearly have a long way to go, but this is progress,” Jane says.
“How is this progress?” asks Robert.
“It’s entertaining, but I don’t see no healing,” Ed says.
“We are hitting the root of our problems. To overcome them we must understand why we do what we do. Jack couldn’t protect his granddaughter from an impaired driver.”
“He was high on heroin.” Jack mumbles, “There are no more heroin dealers in my town.”
“You killed them all.” Robert seems impressed.
“NO. Some left before I could track them down,” Jack says.
“How many did you kill to run the rest out of town?” asks Kenneth.
“It’s not my turn to share,” Jack stews.
“This is good. We’re reaching to the core of our issues. Let’s explore more. It may not be your turn, Jack, but let’s explore while what you’re feeling is on the surface,” Jane says.
The old man huffs more like a teen refused the car keys than a man in his late sixties. “The second action was just as sloppy as the first. I used remaining by my granddaughter’s bedside at the hospital as my alibi. The possibility of her a wakening from a coma decreased with each day. So did the number of times the nurses checked on Nina. I think they tired of placating me with false hope. They only came in for the required bed checks or to turn her. Even if I wasn’t in the room they figured I needed coffee or was in the bathroom. I’d leave the bathroom light on and door closed. They would hurry vital checks and get out so they didn’t have to lie to me about her now impossibility of waking up.”
SKA: Serial Killers Anonymous Page 15