“Didn’t your daughter study gymnastics?”
“A couple of lessons—she was just a beginner. Why do you ask?”
“Jordan took a few gymnastics lessons, too. Just to build a foundation for her cheerleading. This never came up in the investigation?”
“Not that I know of. You seem quite conversant about Jordan, Detective Pryor. How well did you know her?”
“Not well, but we were friendly. The gymnastics aspect I learned from talking to several of our mutual friends from back in high school.”
Elkins was no dummy. He wrote about crime, and the research that required gave him a leg up; and he created densely plotted thrillers, which meant he could put things together. Still, his next question jarred Mark.
“You’ve got a suspect, haven’t you, Detective?”
“Well… suspect might be too strong a word. Let’s say… person of interest.”
“That’s a stupid phrase,” Elkins said, with a sneer that hinted at the man’s underlying anger. “I hate that it’s entered the law-enforcement lexicon. What the hell is a ‘person of interest,’ anyway?”
“A person who isn’t a suspect yet, but is under consideration.”
Elkins scowled. “I know that, Detective. It was a rhetorical question. Mine isn’t—who is your ‘person of interest’?”
“I’m sorry, sir. You’re not a novice in these matters. You know I can’t share that with you.”
“Why don’t I tell you then?”
“Sir?”
“Basil Havoc.”
That didn’t jar Mark—in a way, getting Elkins to identify Havoc as a suspect had been his intent, bringing up the gymnastics tie. But he was more and more impressed with the writer.
Mark asked, “Why would you mention Mr. Havoc as a possible suspect?”
Elkins returned to his beer for a sip and leaned back in the recliner, again not reclining. “Havoc was in charge of the gym where Akina went. He’s a publicity hound and a prick. But not a killer.”
“Why do you say that?”
“Why a publicity hound and a prick? He used my daughter’s death to get on the news and talk about how much promise she had, as if she’d been his star student, which she most definitely hadn’t been. It was nothing but a publicity grab for him and his gymnastics school.”
“But he did coach Akina, right?”
Elkins grunted. “He may have worked with her once, maybe twice. Hell, he was barely ever at that ‘school’ of his. His flunkies actually trained the kids. Oh, he might have worked his magic with the best and the brightest, but the beginners’ class? He might come over, say hello on the first day, give a little pep talk, then fade away.”
Mark had watched video of Havoc’s interviews again and again. The coach always made it sound like the girl was practically his protégé.
Elkins said, “He couldn’t have picked my daughter out of a lineup of any six girls in that dump. If, as you say, Jordan wasn’t serious about gymnastics, the chances of her having much personal contact with him are next to nil.”
Had he singled out Havoc too soon, too easily? Mark wondered what he might have missed. Who he might have missed.…
“But maybe Havoc isn’t your suspect,” Elkins said. “Maybe it’s one of Havoc’s staff. You know, he was frequently out of town, judging tournaments and making personal appearances.”
Mark sat up. “That kind of travel would be ideal for this killer.”
“You’ve seen the case files, so you know CPD didn’t look at Havoc very hard, if at all. He’s your person of interest, not theirs.”
“I didn’t say that.”
“Well, I don’t find him a very interesting person at all.”
Mark just sat there, the wind out of his sails.
“But maybe you’re looking at Havoc’s staff,” Elkins went on. “Is that what you’re up to?”
He hadn’t been. Mark hadn’t really looked into the staff carefully at all—didn’t know who, or how many of them, traveled with the man.
But what about the encounter in the parking lot of Apollonia’s? And Havoc’s jab about the osso buco being “to die for”? Or had it been a jab? Could it have been nothing more than a guy spouting a cliché with an unfortunate, unintentional resonance, and Mark all too eagerly misinterpreting it?
“So is that it?” Elkins was asking. “You have a suspect on Havoc’s staff?”
“I’m sorry, sir. Not at liberty to say.”
“Then why did you bring up Havoc?”
“Actually, sir, you brought up Havoc. I merely pointed out that both girls studied gymnastics at his school, if briefly. It just demonstrates one connection I’ve found that was overlooked in the initial investigation of your family’s murders. There might be others, and that’s what I’d like to talk about.”
“Maybe looking at Havoc and particularly his staff is worthwhile, and I wish you luck. But I have nothing to contribute.”
“Sir…”
Elkins let out a sigh that filled the room. “Look, son. Detectives have come around every few months since this goddamn thing happened. They seem always to have some little new thread to pull on, but it winds up leading nowhere, and I have to revisit the… the horror of it all… over and over and over. And each time, it cuts off another little piece of me.”
“I’m sorry you’ve been put through that,” Mark said, “and needlessly. But those detectives, none of them have been pursuing the serial killer possibility, have they?”
“That’s true. That is true.”
“So they haven’t looked for the kinds of connections that I have. Like your tragedy and Jordan’s. And there are more, not just around here, but all over the map.”
Elkins sipped more beer. He leaned back, rocked a little, thinking. Then a brusque laugh came out of him. “You know, Detective Pryor—it’s funny.”
“What is?”
“Some of my support group has been working on this very theory for a long goddamn time. Serial killer notion? And way at the beginning, when we first saw the pattern emerging, we took it to the police, and they basically patted us on the head and sent us on our way.”
Someone else was investigating his theory? Victims of the killer, no less. Were they Jordan’s circle of friends he’d seen exiting the coffee shop?
Mark gave his host a bitter grin. “You and me both, Mr. Elkins.”
“Huh?”
“Sir, my investigation is strictly off the books. I’ve managed to be taken just seriously enough by my captain to secure permission to explore this on my own time.”
“Are you sure you and Jordan weren’t good friends?”
Mark ignored that. “What made you and those other group members think a serial killer might be behind these different cases? No one else did.”
Elkins sent the question back: “What made you think this was a serial killer?”
“Families as victims. That’s the common dominator.”
The writer sat forward again, nodding. “That was our thinking, too. But they all seemed too different to be connected.”
“The details vary,” Mark said. “I believe we have a shrewd actor who knows all about MO. But underlying these assorted atrocities is a desire to destroy a family, leaving one family member alive to suffer.”
Now Elkins was looking at Mark in an entirely new way. “Maybe I can get the group to meet with you. You could be our door into the police.”
“I’m anxious to see what you’ve got,” Mark admitted. “But I don’t think I can share what I’ve found with you.”
“That doesn’t seem like much of an arrangement.”
“I know. But if my superiors do finally accept my theory, my investigation will suddenly be a heck of a lot more official than it is now. I can’t be seen as having compromised it by showing potential evidence to civilians.”
Elkins was nodding again. “I can understand that. Perhaps… perhaps it’s enough that we share the same goal.”
Mark nodded back. “To put th
is monster away, yes.”
Before they could go any further, Mark’s cell chirped. He slipped it out of his jacket pocket, saw an unfamiliar number, and almost ignored it. But a hunch told him to answer—wasn’t he waiting for a call, after all? He hit the button, knowing it couldn’t be her.
Yet it was: “This is Jordan Rivera.”
Getting quickly to his feet, Mark put a hand over the phone and told Elkins, “I need to take this.”
Elkins waved permission and Mark excused himself to the front porch.
“Are you there?” Jordan asked.
“Sorry,” Mark said. “I needed to step away from something.”
“Okay.”
“I’m, uh… a little surprised you actually called.”
“Not as surprised as I am.”
He thought of how she’d looked when he saw her at the grocery store, close-up for the first time in so many years, as beautiful now as she had been in high school—maybe more so. Not a lot of makeup, dressed casually, a baseball fan like him, apparently, judging by the Indians cap.
“I’m ready for us to talk,” she said.
“When and where?” he asked, perhaps a little too eagerly.
“Whoa, big boy. I’m not looking to hook up or anything. This is police business. Right?”
“I know, sorry,” Mark said, still too darn eager.
“Come over to my place at nine. Bring pizza. Thin crust. Sausage. See you then?”
“Sure. What’s your address?”
“Your buddy Grant didn’t give it to you?”
“No.”
“Oh, I get it. You’re asking because I’m not supposed to know you followed me home from the market the other day.”
Busted.
“Sorry,” he said automatically.
“Don’t sweat it,” she said.
“You mad?”
“Fucking furious.”
“I’m really, really sorry.”
“It’s all right,” she said. “The only men I’ve ever known I could trust were my father and my brother, and they don’t seem to be around.”
He was searching for something to say to that when she clicked off.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Levi Mills was already doing research online when David Elkins phoned with a new name for him to start digging into; meanwhile, the writer would drive across the city to meet up with him.
Though this name meant nothing to Levi, he didn’t question his fellow group member, just followed his instructions, looking forward to having David come over. The writer had sort of taken Levi under his wing, a year ago or so, and the younger man looked upon the older as a mentor, maybe even a father figure.
By the time he heard his friend’s footsteps out in the hall of the Shaker Square apartment building, Levi had already amassed a pretty good pile of information on this new lead. David would be pleased, a reaction that always gave Levi a boost.
As for his apartment, it was nice enough, if on the small side—modest living room, one bedroom, half kitchen, fair rent, and no bugs, though calling the walls paper-thin wasn’t as much an exaggeration as you might think. Good thing Levi liked his neighbors, that lesbian couple next door—in addition to friendly if quick conversations in the hall, he knew what TV shows they watched, what music they liked, what they argued about, and sometimes, deep into the evening, heard sounds that reminded him he hadn’t had a date in a very long while.…
Life for a single gay guy in Cleveland wasn’t always easy. But in Ashtabula, it would have been impossible, which was why he stayed in the closet till he moved, which had been right after high school. His parents had saved a little money and there’d been some insurance; still, if some very nice people from the PTA and Planned Parenthood hadn’t raised funds to help him go to college, he would have been shit out of luck.
Leaving Ashtabula when he did gave him guilt pangs, but that little town just wasn’t a place where he could be himself. Where he could grow. He still kept in touch with a few high school pals and some of his parents’ friends who mounted that fund-raising drive; but the honest truth was: first chance he had, he split.
The siren’s call he heeded took him not to France or New York or Hollywood, not even San Francisco, and not very far from home, at that. The ethnically diverse campus of Cleveland State University offered a place where Levi could be openly gay and nobody gave a toss. That wasn’t always true in Cleveland itself, particularly in blue-collar areas, but overall a city that size offered possibilities way beyond what his hometown could offer.
For three years he dug in and worked hard and graduated early. He didn’t find anything in the computer field, but at least he got a job, and quickly, working as a night desk clerk at a Marriott Courtyard. Nothing spectacular, but it paid the bills, and his computer skills had been noted by management. Who knew? Maybe he’d move up in the company.
The printer was spitting out the final page of his research as Levi opened the door for David. The writer wore jeans and a navy polo, dressed up compared to Levi in his ragged Chuck Taylors, jeans, and FREE PUSSY RIOT T-shirt. David lugged a laptop in a shoulder bag.
Moving through the living room with its secondhand array of sofa, three chairs, coffee table, and end tables, David went straight for the kitchen and took a seat at the old Formica table, the other end of which Levi’s laptop, printer, and accessories dominated. This served as Levi’s office (he regularly ate on a TV tray in front of his small flat screen in the living room).
David, unpacking his gear and plugging in, asked, “Find anything?”
“Hmm-hmm. But first, what brought this on? Where’d you come up with this name, anyway?”
“Havoc is somebody I dismissed early on as a suspect. Looks like I may have been hasty.”
The writer told Levi about Detective Mark Pryor’s visit, and their wary exchange of information.
Levi frowned. “So this Pryor guy didn’t really cop to Havoc being his suspect.”
“No,” David admitted. “But he didn’t deny it. And this opens up a whole new area for us—not just Havoc, but his coworkers.”
“Sounds like it’s reopening an old area.”
David’s shrug was elaborate. “Maybe I’m grasping at straws. We haven’t had a glimmer of hope in… how long? Now this Pryor is actively investigating, and we’ve added Jordan Rivera to our team.… Maybe, at long last, we’re getting somewhere.”
“That’s great. That’s terrific. But, David, let’s not set ourselves up for another disappointment. This needs to be a methodical process—”
“Skip it,” David said testily. “Show me what you’ve got.”
Levi was gathering the computer printouts when another knock came at the door. Both men turned, David with a nervous start.
“Damn,” David said. “Did that cop follow me?”
“No,” Levi said, “that’ll be Phillip.”
“Yeah?”
Levi was halfway to the door. “I called him after you called me. If we’re going down a new road, even if it’s another blind alley, we can use the company.”
“He does appear to know his stuff,” David said.
Levi opened the door and Phillip paused until Levi gestured him in. As usual, the teacher wore a nicely cut suit, navy blue, with a white shirt, red-and-navy striped tie, and black loafers—a laptop bag slung over his shoulder.
“Welcome to the madhouse,” Levi said as they shook hands.
David came over and held out his hand and the two men shook, with the friendliness of Phillip’s smile making it not quite so ghastly. The plastic surgery repairs to the man’s damaged features had so far worked no wonders.
David said, “Nice of you to come on such short notice, Mr. Traynor.”
Traynor was Phillip’s last name. Before their team meeting at the coffee shop had broken up late this morning, Levi had gathered the basic information—the last name of the support group member as well as his cell phone number.
“Glad to be included,” Phillip said
, his breathing clearly audible. “Levi said you had a new name for him to check.”
“That’s right,” David said. “We may have a lead.”
“Splendid,” Phillip said.
Levi led the two men to the kitchen table, where Phillip set up his laptop, as well. Playing host, Levi fetched coffee for Phillip, a Michelob for David (Levi was not a beer drinker but stocked some for his friend), and a Diet Pepsi for himself. Meanwhile, his two guests chatted.
“Well,” David was saying, “I know your last name now, and that you’re a teacher, but the rules of the support group have kept us strangers in many ways. What kind of teaching do you do exactly, Phillip? You do prefer ‘Phillip’ to ‘Phil’?”
“I do prefer Phillip, if that isn’t too pretentious.”
“Not at all. I prefer David to Dave. We’ll be pompous together.”
The two men exchanged smiles.
“Of course,” Phillip said, “I know about you, at least the basics—I believe just about everyone knows David Elkins and his thrillers.”
“I wish that were true. And who knows? Maybe someday I’ll even write another.”
Levi joined them, saying, “Phillip and I spoke on the phone earlier, got to know each other a little. His teaching gig is pretty interesting. Pretty cool.”
Phillip shrugged, as he offered another lipless smile. “I teach online. Levi says he envies me, because my job pays fairly well, yet my time is my own.”
Levi had not been surprised to learn that Phillip’s current teaching did not involve standing before a classroom, not with his compromised countenance.
“Sounds like interesting work,” David said. “What is it you teach?”
“Religion, actually. Of the Judeo-Christian variety.”
“The Bible, then.”
“I offer a course on the Torah, as well. I’m afraid my work is quite mundane compared to writing novels.”
“Plenty of action, sex, and violence in those books,” David said, and sipped his beer.
“Sounds very cool to me,” Levi said. “But then I’m a night clerk at a Marriott. What do I know?”
Levi handed around his stacks of computer printouts. Then David repeated his story about his meeting with the detective.
What Doesn’t Kill Her Page 14