“Why not?”
“I don’t know if there’s ever a sense of accomplishment. It feels like there’s always more work to do. Always worse people out there that you need to find. I like closure.”
“No, there’s no closure in this.” He sat on one of the desks, keeping his eyes glued on hers. “I’d like to do something really lame tonight. I’d like to take you to dinner and a movie. Just a good ol’-fashioned date.”
She looked back at Gio. Gio had not asked her anywhere. In fact, since they’d been back in Arizona, he hadn’t really talked to her. “Sure,” she said. “Why not?”
“I’ll pick you up at your hotel tonight.”
As Stefan walked away, she turned back to Gio. A cold feeling gripped her guts when she looked at him, and she knew why: she was worried that he had only been nice to her because he knew she could help him on this case. Now that it was over, maybe he didn’t want anything to do with her? She told herself Gio wasn’t like that, that despite their differences, he was one of the good ones. But the feeling wouldn’t go away.
Gio sat on a desk, sipping sparkling apple cider out of a paper cup as the other agents and staff hung on every word. He described how California Bill’s face had lost all its color when they brought the rug into the interview room, how he began to weep and told them everything they wanted to know. Half a million videos involving about twenty thousand children. Some of the videos were twenty-five years old, transferred to digital from VHS tapes. Some were as new as a few weeks. And Bill knew who had made a lot of them. If he didn’t know, he had email addresses, and IP servers could be subpoenaed to find out who they were.
Sarah knew this was a big deal, even if she didn’t understand the legal aspects of it. Not only was it the biggest child porn bust in recent history, it would lead to a massive number of arrests of people who made the pornography. But Stefan was right—she was no closer to finding the man who had made the Murder 42 video than when she had first been brought in to help with this case. Though she never liked to give up hope, she knew deep down that he was going to get away with it.
She wanted to tell Gio that she was leaving. She would go back to her hotel room, go out with Stefan tonight, and then be on a plane back to Philadelphia tomorrow. But Gio was joking and celebrating. His face was creased with the amount of laughing and smiling he was doing, and for some reason, she thought that he would stop if she interrupted. So she left without saying anything.
Once outside, she looked up at the sun and grinned. The sky was so blue and clear she could make out the different shades of color reflected in the clouds. Some were light orange, some purple, some a hint of red as the sun began to set. In some parts of Philadelphia, there was so much smog she could hardly see the sky, much less the sun, on some days.
She took a slow walk up the sidewalk and stopped at a little coffee shop near a bookstore and a boutique clothing shop. Ordering hot tea and a chocolate biscuit, she then sat down near a table of some students studying.
She had never gone to college and felt insecure around those who had. The kids were discussing the impact of corporations moving operations overseas to avoid taxes, and she was somewhat lost. She didn’t understand terms like “tariffs” and “oligarchies,” but it was nice to listen to kids who were interested in ideas and thought ideas could change the world. Or maybe it was just nice listening to people who hadn’t seen the darkness that waited for them out there.
Sarah sat in the coffee shop much longer than she had anticipated and then had to hurry back to her hotel for a quick shower before Stefan picked her up. As she was getting out, she heard a knock on her hotel room door. She threw on her clothes and went out to the front door. She answered without looking through the peephole first and was about to ask Stefan to wait when she saw another man standing in the hallway.
The man wore a denim jacket and had long hair that came down to his shoulders. He looked skittish and glanced down both sides of the hallway before looking at her.
“Can I come in and talk?” he said.
“Um, no. Who are you?”
“I’m someone who knows who you are, Sarah. I know all about your abilities and what you can do. I also know you don’t know who made the Murder 42 video… I do.”
Sarah hesitated. “Someone from the FBI is coming in a few minutes. Let’s go down to the lobby and wait for him, and you can—”
“No, no feds. This is just for you.”
Sarah waited a beat. “Okay, come inside.”
He brushed past her and took in the hotel room quickly before sitting on a chair across the room. Sarah left the door open a crack by placing the metal lock between the door and the frame. Then she sat on the edge of the bed, scanning the room for weapons in case she needed one.
“What do you want to tell me about that video?” she said.
“Have you seen it?”
She nodded.
“A man who can do that,” he said, “can do anything.” He paused. “I’m an addict. My particular drug is child videos. People don’t see it as a drug, but it is. I’ve tried to stop watching them, stop masturbating to them, and I can’t. It’s too cemented in my mind. I can’t stop.”
“There are counselors that can help you.”
He shook his head sadly, his eyes moving to the window. “They have an obligation to turn you in for stuff like this, if it’s an ongoing crime. I got no one to talk to about it.” Another pause before he inhaled deeply and said, “Anyway, that’s not why I’m here. I just told you that to give you some context about what I’m doing. I love children. I would never harm them.”
Sarah withheld her disgust. The fact that this man thought raping children wasn’t harming them showed he was detached, and anything she said wasn’t going to persuade him, so she remained silent.
“I saw that video, too… and I cried. I cried because I couldn’t believe the amount of pain that child went through before death, and then what he did after death…” The man’s eyes welled up, and he took a moment. “It was sent to me. It was sent to two places in Arizona: one was Naughty Nancy’s; the other was my place, a dance club. I don’t know how he knew I was connected to this community, but he did. He sent me that video to distribute for him.”
“Who?”
“I don’t have his name, but I do have his address.” He paused. “I don’t know why he sent this out. He put himself at risk unnecessarily. Doesn’t make any sense. He could’ve just posted it online or on the file sharing websites, but he didn’t. I don’t know why he’s doing this.”
“How do you have his address?”
“The video was sent to me through a mail forwarding service out of Las Vegas. I needed to know who sent it, so I called a friend of mine who works at the Post Office. He got me the address the video was sent from.” The man took out a slip of paper and placed it on a small table next to him. “That’s where you’ll find him.”
Sarah stared at the slip of paper a long time. “How do you know who I am?”
“I was a bit of a… I don’t know what you’d call it, not ‘fan,’ maybe ‘fascinated connoisseur’ of the Blood Dahlia case last year. I followed it pretty closely. It was just so weird and intriguing. So I read all the articles about it, and they said the FBI had brought in a psychic to consult for them. And then I saw you on the news standing next to the FBI talking about this video. I know you’re not law enforcement and that you won’t turn me in for helping you.”
Sarah thought, for a moment, that she could. She could call Gio right now or stall until Stefan got here and have this man arrested. But she wouldn’t. The man had tried to help her; no matter how vile and disgusting he was, she couldn’t just betray someone who tried to help her get the creator of that video off the streets.
“I want you to find him, Sarah. I want you to find him, and I want you to kill him. People like that can’t be allowed to live.”
“There are some people who feel that way about you.”
“I don’t care. All I kn
ow is this guy is not a human being. You have to rid the earth of him.” The man rose from his seat. “I have to go.”
He scuttled out of the room and was gone. Sarah stayed on the edge of the bed and gazed at the slip of paper. Finally building up enough courage, she rose and walked over to it. It was an address in Los Angeles.
33
Natalie Gibb stared at her home from the curb. Her mother’s arms were around her, and her father was getting her bag out of the car. She hadn’t been home in two weeks. Two days in trauma, one in surgery, and the rest in recovery. Her face still bore the evidence of her suffering. The orbital bone around her eye had been shattered, and it made one of her eyes droop. The ER doctor had told her to consult a plastic surgeon, but the plastic surgeon wasn’t hopeful. He said he could improve it, but it would never quite look the same.
She now had two false teeth that had to be glued into her mouth, as well as massive tears that were just staring to heal in her uterus and rectum. She felt as though she’d gone through a meat grinder. And worse, she was so jumpy any small noise would set her off. A child had run by her hospital room, and she nearly had to be sedated.
Night was the worst. She’d see the black figure standing over her in his bed. He’d cut her arms and legs so badly, drained her of so much blood that she didn’t have the strength to move. And then he would smile before he did something, and she would scream. The screams were what he wanted. She realized that early on. So even when he did something that wasn’t particularly painful, she would scream right away, hoping he would stop.
By the end, she lay on his floor, a bloody mess of flesh and bone, while he showered and dressed. He treated her like a piece of trash, and that was the worst part: he didn’t recognize her as a human being.
“Are you ready?” her mother asked, setting her hand on Natalie’s shoulder.
She tensed, feeling every instinct tell her to swat her mother’s hand away. But she fought it and just looked at the ground with a small nod.
They headed up to her two-bedroom apartment. She’d gotten it for the price of a one-bedroom because she’d moved in when the apartments had just been built and were looking to fill the vacancies quickly. Hers was on the third floor, and it took them several minutes to climb three small flights of stairs. Each step sent a small shock of pain through her, and she had to stop frequently to catch her breath.
On the second flight, she stopped, put her face in her hands, and wept. Her mother rubbed her back as her father waited patiently just behind them.
“You must think I’m so weak,” she said through tears.
Her mother didn’t respond at first, but eventually she began to cry as well. She wrapped both arms around her, and they wept together on the stairs. Only when someone came out of an apartment did Natalie pull away. She wiped her tears with the back of her hand and continued up the stairs.
Once she got to her apartment and opened the door, it felt as if a weight were taken off her shoulders. She was home—a place of safety and comfort. She had seen television shows about women who were raped and then never left their apartments again. Suddenly, she could see the allure.
“I’ll get you some tea,” her mother said.
Her father sat next to her on the couch but didn’t touch her. He seemed to be in a daze, unable to process any of this. His gaze looked over the apartment but didn’t seem to be taking any of it in. Neither of them spoke.
Her mother set the tea on the coffee table and sat between them. “We could stay the night,” she said. “The offer’s still open.”
Natalie shook her head. “No, I’m home. It’s fine.”
“It’s not fine, dear. It’s not going to be fine for a long time. You have to accept that it’s going to be a long road until you feel normal again.” She leaned over and kissed her cheek. “I’ll stop by tomorrow to drive you to the therapist.”
“I don’t need a therapist.”
“Yes, you do. I’ll be here at ten a.m. sharp. Please be ready. You sure you don’t want us to stay?”
She shook her head. “I have to spend my first night away from other people some time. Might as well be now.”
Her mother looked at her father, who rose from the couch. Both of her parents hugged her and then left. She stood alone in the middle of her apartment. Once she was alone, she hurried to the door, locked it, then set her back against it and slid down to the floor, tears rolling down her cheeks.
She didn’t know how long she cried for, but it was long enough that by the end she felt she didn’t have any more tears. Finally, she stood up and crossed the living room to her bedroom. They had bathed her at the hospital, but she hadn’t had a shower for two weeks. The feeling of hot water on her skin was exactly what she needed right now, to let the steam block everything out and loosen her muscles and her mind.
She walked into her bathroom and avoided looking at the mirror. Undressing, she glanced at the bruises on her arm where IV antibiotics had been given and then grabbed the shower curtain and opened it.
Farkas stood there with a smile on his face.
“No!”
She tried to run but felt him grab her hair, and he swung her into the bathroom wall. She hit it with a thud, and flashes of bright color lit her vision as he slammed her head into the wall again. He threw her to the floor and stood over her.
“No,” she cried, “no, please. I can’t take anymore. Please.”
He just smiled and pulled a knife out of his pocket. He bent down and cut along her breasts, and she screamed and writhed, but he wouldn’t stop. She thrashed around, swiping at anything with arms and legs, a hysterical animal backed into a corner. She couldn’t think, couldn’t feel. All she did was scream and fight.
It made him laugh, and he stood upright. As she lay there, he said, “You’re gonna get brave when I leave. So brave, you’re going to think you can call the police. But guess what? I’ll find you. If I feel you’re a threat to me, it would be easier to kill you than allow you to live, wouldn’t it? Are you a threat to me, Natalie?” He bent down and ran his fingers through her hair, and she hit his hand. “Tell the police you were mistaken. It wasn’t me. You were drunk and aren’t sure who it was. I’ll be watching, and I can get to you anytime I want.”
She didn’t know when he’d left, but when she opened her eyes, he was gone. She rolled to her side and cried, the blood dribbling down her chest and splashing in small drops on her white linoleum floor.
34
Sarah stood back as Stefan pounded on Gio’s hotel room door. He opened it, dressed in jeans and a T-shirt, and looked at them both before saying, “Where’d you guys go?”
“Doesn’t matter,” Stefan said. “What matters is this.”
He handed Gio the slip of paper.
“What is it?”
“It’s the address of the man who made the Murder 42 video.”
Gio looked down at the slip of paper again. “How’d you get it?”
“We can explain on the way. Let’s go.”
Gio shook his head. “Not with her. I’m not putting her in any more danger that we don’t have to.”
“I want to come,” Sarah said.
“If this is real, then it’s a takedown. You can’t add anything to it. You’re going back to Philly.”
He looked at Stefan again, and Sarah could tell there was something there, some conflict, and she wondered what it was. Just plain male machismo, or was it over her, or the fact that Stefan had been the first to see this address?
“I’m sorry, Sarah,” Gio said. “Your involvement with this is over.”
Once at the airport, Sarah stood outside the car. Stefan sat in the passenger seat, and Gio was behind the wheel. Stefan held out his hand, and she shook it.
“Pleasure, Sarah,” he said. “You were the most interesting consultant I’ve ever dealt with. I hope our paths cross again.”
She blushed, or at least thought she did. “It was nice meeting you, Stefan.”
Gio stepped out o
f the car. He came around and lifted her bag. “I’ll walk you in.”
They crossed the walkway leading into the terminal. Gio reached out and held her hand. “What’s going on with you and Stefan?” he said.
“I don’t know what you mean.”
“I’m not stupid, Sarah. Are you gonna see him again?”
“Not that it’s any of your business, but no, I’m not going to see him again. I’m in Philadelphia, and he’s in Phoenix. Long distance doesn’t sound appealing to me.”
“But if it wasn’t long distance, you’d be interested?”
She looked over at Stefan, still waiting in the car. “Why not? He’s sweet to me. And he’s cute.”
Gio’s jaw muscles flexed and then relaxed.
“You’re also cute when you’re jealous.”
“I was thinking that… maybe when this is over…”
“Why did you ignore me?”
“When?”
“After everything. It seemed like you got what you wanted and didn’t need me anymore, so you just ignored me.”
He put his hands on his hips and stared down at the pavement. “It’s complicated. I have a part of me that wants to push you away and says I can’t have that kind of connection to someone in my life. And then I have another part that says that’s the only thing worth living for. So I don’t know what to do.”
“How about first, you be safe, and then you call me.”
He nodded. “I can do that.”
Despite wanting to be mad at him, she leaned in and kissed him quickly on the lips. Just a peck, which was enough to put a grin on his face. She took her bag from him and walked into the terminal without looking back.
35
The plane hummed along, the vibrations lulling Sarah to sleep. She tried to stay awake so that she could fall asleep easier that night, but it wasn’t happening. A child farther back on the plane was speaking. She couldn’t see him, and at first she thought he was speaking with someone but then realized he was reading a book to himself. The voice was even and calm, the voice of someone concentrating completely.
Murder 42 - A Thriller (Sarah King Mysteries Book 2) Page 13