Beckett’s bike.
Only Beckett had said that he had urgent business at the morgue, not at the university.
Oh, there was a secret all right. And Drake hated being out of the loop.
Chapter 55
“Come on, Suze, pick up your damn phone,” Beckett grumbled. At first, he thought that Chase was just being paranoid, that there was no way that SC123 was Suzan, trying to get in touch with the internet persona that might very well be their killer. But now, after trying her at home, and having to make up some story about Suzan missing class to appease her mother’s anxiety, and calling her on her cell phone a half-dozen times and her not picking up, he wasn’t so sure.
And then there was her cryptic message—Beckett, it’s Suzan. I’ve found something online. Give me a shout when you get this.
Beckett hurried into the NYU medical building as he listened to her phone ring. He walked briskly toward his office, hoping to find her inside.
She’s asleep. She fell asleep at my desk. Or at the library. That’s why I can’t reach her.
But when Beckett made it to his office, his heart sank. The door was closed, and the lights were off.
That’s okay, she just turned off the lights before taking a cat nap behind my desk, he thought, his mind trying desperately to convince him.
He tried the door, but it was locked.
She locked the door, too, just to be safe. After all, there’s a murderer out there.
A robotic voice on the other end of the line told Beckett that the voicemail of the person he was calling was full. He swore, and then hung up the phone. Pulling his set of keys from his pocket, Beckett knew deep down, even before he threw the door wide and found the room empty, that Suzan Cuthbert wouldn’t be inside.
“Damn,” he muttered as he flicked on the lights. “Where the hell are you, Suze?”
Beckett slumped into his chair and swirled his mouse, waking his computer. Surprised that it was still on, he leaned forward and typed in his password.
A web browser was already open, and when Beckett saw the address at the top of the page, his heart skipped a beat.
“No, c’mon, this can’t be happening.”
Suzan had logged into the bulletin board, and there was a new message pending. His hand trembling, he scrolled over to the envelope icon and, after a deep breath, clicked on it.
“No,” he moaned.
Beckett scrambled for his phone, quickly dialing Chase’s number, his eyes locked on the private message from Arsonist514.
“Chase, we have a problem. A fucking huge problem,” he said when she answered.
Beckett shook his head as he stared at the message, trying to will it away.
Okay Suzan, see you soon :).
Chapter 56
Chase left the crime scene in the capable hands of Detective’s Yasiv and Simmons, and hurried back to the station. She wasn’t looking forward to another meeting with Sergeant Rhodes, but at this point, she could see no way of avoiding it.
They had to catch the killer before he struck again.
If he hadn’t already, that is.
Armed with photographs from the most recent crime scene, of poor Toby Teager, Chase raced across the city and pulled into 62nd precinct just as night descended on New York. She recognized the similarities between what was happening now and the Butterfly Killer case, but the most recent killer was a different beast entirely. Dr. Mark Kruk had murdered people who had tortured him in his youth, and while this in no way justified what he did, citizens of New York could rest easier knowing they weren’t involved. Now, however, there was someone out there targeting random people, murdering them without hesitation, without remorse, all to fulfill some sick, twisted fantasy.
Yet that wasn’t the worst part; the worst part was that there was a serial killer out on the streets of New York City—a serial killer who had already killed six—and nobody knew about it. She despised the media and their propensity for inciting panic with five-second sound bites, but there was something to be said for transparency. Without it, with all of NYC in the dark as a killer roamed their streets, Chase just felt dirty.
She kept her head low as she made her way to Sergeant Rhodes’s office, making sure not to make eye contact with anyone that might serve to distract her.
With a deep breath, she knocked once on Rhodes’s door and then opened it without waiting for an answer.
Rhodes looked up at her over top of round spectacles that were pulled low on his narrow nose as she stepped inside.
“Well come on in,” he said with a frown.
“There’s been another murder,” Chase said.
As expected, her bluntness gained Rhodes’s attention, and he lowered the newspaper he had been reading, which, Chase noted, was opened to pre-election polling results.
“Murders? Please tell me you’re talking about the home invasion on 32nd Avenue. Please, please tell me that that’s what you are referring to, Chase.”
Chase shook her head and proceeded to place the photographs of Toby Teager on top of Rhodes’s newspaper.
“You know I’m not here about that.”
Rhodes made no effort to disguise his displeasure.
“Who the hell is this?” he said, indicating the photographs. “Is this the tow truck driver who managed to zap himself?”
Chase ignored the comment and took a step backward.
“Look at the photographs.”
But Rhodes didn’t look. He simply stared at her.
“Are you fucking serious with this shit, Detective Adams? We had this discussion already.” He interlaced his fingers slowly. When he spoke next, his voice had acquired a low, husky tone that matched the expression on his face. “I’m going to give you one chance to pick these photographs off my desk and then get out of here. One chance.”
Chase felt her face get hot.
“Just look at the pictures! There’s no way that this man, who spent twenty-two years as a tow truck driver somehow, oh, I dunno, managed to slip and accidentally clip the jumper cables to his neck and shoulder. The ME even says that it’s impossible to electrocute yourself from a car battery! Not only that, but we found a calling card on all of the bodies—a smudge of dirt. There’s a murderer out there, Rhodes, someone who has killed six people already, someone who won’t stop until he finishes the course… until eight people are dead. And even then, I don’t know if he’ll be done.”
Chase was breathing heavily when she finished, but it felt good to finally get it off her chest. She even thought that Rhodes, despite what he had said, might also be receptive to her words, given the way he just sat there, stone-faced.
“Maybe our tow truck driver was just sick and tired of living? Hmm? You ever think of that? Maybe he just offed himself like all the others.”
Chase opened her mouth to say something, but Rhodes continued before she could make a sound.
“A smudge? A fucking smudge? Really? You found a smudge on the body of a man who’s been electrocuted? Do you realize how stupid that sounds? And the other bodies? Do you have photographs of the other victims of their smudges?”
Chase shook her head.
“I—I—” gave them to you already, she intended to say before Rhodes once again cut her off.
“I told you already; I won’t listen to this crap. Not now, not ever. Get out of my office and go home, Chase.”
Chase looked up at the Sergeant, surprised at how calm he appeared. Somehow, this demeanor was even worse than him yelling and screaming at her, his face turning the ruby-red shade of an overripe tomato.
“Go home. Go home and stay home. A week, maybe more. If I see you around here before I call you, you’re done.”
Chase simply gawked.
“Wh-wh-what?”
Sergeant Rhodes curled his lips.
“Pick up your photographs and get the hell out of here,” he hissed.
“But—”
Rhodes suddenly swept his hand across his desk, sending the images of Toby
Teager flying across the floor.
“Pick up the damn photographs and get out!” Rhodes shouted. “Get the hell out!”
Rhodes’s voice was so loud that it snapped Chase out of her stupor and she scrambled to scoop up the photographs.
She looked up one final time at Rhodes’s now red face and debated getting the final word in.
You’re going to regret this, Rhodes. I promise, you’re going to regret this.
Deciding that saying another word would end her career, Chase bit her tongue and left the office, more frustrated than she had been when she had arrived.
Sure, she would leave for a week, or however long Rhodes suspended her, but there was one thing she had to do first.
Walking briskly, again with her head low, she made her way to the stairwell and opened the door to the subbasement.
At the end of the long, dark hallway, was the door to Records. Chase was surprised to see Dunbar standing in the doorway staring at her as she approached.
Word travels fast in this precinct, she thought with a grimace.
“Dunbar, things have escalated. There’s someone I think you should meet.”
Chapter 57
The gag was filthy, and every time her tongue brushed up against the coarse material, Suzan felt vomit rise in her throat. Tears streaked her cheeks, making muddy tracks through the soot that covered her face.
The man in the mask had directed her to a condemned building nestled near the end of a quiet cul-de-sac. During the drive, Suzan had tried to keep track of the directions, to map the direction to the house, but this had proven difficult, what with the tears that filled her eyes, and the fear that coursed through her veins.
She knew that they weren’t far from the university campus, ten miles, fifteen max, but it wasn’t a location she recognized.
“Stop here,” the man in the mask grumbled. He then instructed her to get out of the car.
Suzan stepped into the night and for one, fleeting moment, thought that she could run. But then she felt the knife tip press into her spine, and the fantasy of escaping vanished.
“Move,” the man instructed, and Suzan obeyed.
He led them down the side of the house, staying low, warning her that if she shouted, he would drive the knife through her spine. The windows were all boarded up, but the man easily peeled a piece of plywood back—Suzan got the impression by the way it came free easily that this wasn’t his first time removing it—and then she was forced inside.
Most of the walls on the ground level had been removed, torn down to the studs. Where walls remained, they were streaked with floor to ceiling scorch marks. Even though it was obvious that the fire that had ripped the two-story colonial had happened many years prior, the smell of burnt wood was still strong in the stale air.
“Upstairs,” the man ordered.
Suzan felt her legs go weak and threaten to buckle.
“Please,” she tried to say, but the gag rendered the word unintelligible.
“Now!”
Sobbing, Suzan took the steps slowly, one foot in front of the other, worried that at any moment she would lose control of her limbs and fall backward, impaling herself on the eight-inch blade in the process.
But somehow, with strength she hadn’t known she possessed, Suzan made it all the way to the top.
The floor of the second floor was warped, with large sections removed, revealing singed floorboards beneath. The walls, however, had fared better on this level and remained mostly intact.
The man led her to a room without a door, but with four complete walls. He forced her to a seated position, and before she knew it, her hands were bound behind her back with lengths of worn rope that looked too much like the section that had been wrapped around Eddie’s neck to be a coincidence.
Suzan wept as the man started to set up a tripod and camera across from her. He worked quickly, but without giving the impression that he was rushed. He was clearly not worried about anyone interrupting them.
“Please,” she tried to say again, but once again the word was muffled by the filthy gag.
The man didn’t even acknowledge her. After locking the camera on top of the tripod, he got behind it, and then proceeded to focus the lens on her.
Suzan shook her head, causing her hair, damp with sweat, to fall in front of her face. It was a petty maneuver, but the only thing that she could control.
He can kill me, but I won’t give him the satisfaction of seeing my face when he does.
She was disappointed when the man didn’t seem bothered by her petulance.
Apparently satisfied, the masked man clapped his hands together and Suzan’s body jolted as if shocked by electricity. She was sobbing uncontrollably now, her entire body quaking.
The man strode over to her and crouched down low, tilting his head to one side as he observed at her. At first, Suzan refused to look, but when it became apparent that he wasn’t about to leave without making eye contact, she flipped her hair back and stared.
The man had pale blue eyes that seemed out of place buried in the black leather mask. Paradoxically, they seemed like caring eyes. Soft, placating.
“You made a mistake, Suzan. This didn’t have to be you. You just had to stay out of it, mind your business.”
Suzan wanted to say something, wanted to yell in his face that it still didn’t have to be her, but she didn’t say anything.
Even without a gag, terror so gripped her that she would have struggled to form a single word.
The man in the mask reached behind him, and Suzan cowered, thinking that he was going to pull out his knife and cut her throat right there on the burnt hardwood, before snapping his macabre photographs.
She wondered, strangely, if the photos would get back to her mother, and how she would cope after losing both her husband and daughter to different serial killers.
Jasmine Cuthbert was a strong woman, she had to be, but everyone had their breaking point.
Suzan couldn’t imagine that her mother would come out of this with her sanity intact.
But it wasn’t a knife that the man pulled out, but another section of rope. He wrapped it around her ankles, pulling her legs together tightly as he tied it.
After he was done, he patted her on the knee.
“There, now sit tight. And don’t worry, you won’t be alone for long. Soon, you’re going to have company.”
The masked man stood and before she could even blink, he was gone from the room. Less than thirty seconds later, she heard the sound of a car—her car—starting up. And then that too faded away.
Suzan allowed herself one more sob, one more deep breath, and then she started to look for a way to escape.
Chapter 58
“Officer Robert Dunbar, meet Screech,” Chase said as she stepped into Triple D. Drake’s eyes lifted from behind his desk.
What the hell?
The introduction surprised Screech as well, and he made a face before shaking Dunbar’s hand.
“Hi,” Screech said hesitantly.
“Dunbar is going to help with the search—he has access to certain databases that you can’t get into,” Chase said flatly.
Officer Dunbar nodded and then turned to Screech.
“Chase says you’re pretty good with computers.”
Screech took the compliment in stride.
“Well Chase is a smart woman. Here, let me show you what I got,” he said, guiding Officer Dunbar over to his computer in the reception area.
“See if you can find out anything at all about Dr. Moorfield and who this damn student or faculty member she went to the tribunal with all those years ago.”
“Got it,” Dunbar said.
Beckett entered Triple D next, a deep frown on his face. His blond hair, usually spiked, lay flat against his head. He looked tired, and oddly old.
As Drake watched, Chase and Beckett exchanged a look and then a nod before coming toward him together.
“What’s going on with you two?” Drake asked, th
e words coming out with more venom than he had expected. “Are you guys going to clue me in on your little secret, or what?”
Chase bowed her head as she entered his office. Beckett followed closely, closing the door after they were all inside.
“What the fuck’s going on, guys?”
It was Beckett who answered.
“It’s my fault,” he began quietly. “I brought her onboard.”
Drake’s eyes narrowed.
Her?
“Who? What are you talking about?”
Beckett shook his head and appeared to be speaking to himself now.
“I just thought… shit, she was my TA, and I thought that she… she just wanted to help.”
Drake felt his frustration reach a peak and he jumped out of his chair. He started toward Beckett, but Chase stepped between them.
“It’s Suzan, Drake. He’s got Suzan.”
Drake’s entire world collapsed.
“Suzan?” he heard himself say, but had no idea that he was actually articulating the words. “Suzan Cuthbert?”
Drake felt as if he were falling forward, but Chase wrapped her arms around him, preventing him from going down. And then Beckett was there, too, guiding him back to his chair.
The rain was coming down heavily, soaking both him and Clay as they stood outside Peter Kellington’s house.
“Should I announce our presence?” Clay asked as he peered through the gap between the door and the frame.
“Should I?”
Then Clay started to turn, and as he did his features became softer, the beard fading, the dark hair on his head growing longer and becoming straighter.
“Should I, Drake?” Suzan Cuthbert asked, the rain streaking her cheeks like tears. “Drake? What should I do?”
“Fuck, Drake. Snap out of it. We need you.”
Drake blinked hard, then shook the fog from his mind. Without thinking, his hand shot out and he grabbed Beckett by the throat. And then he started to squeeze.
“You brought Suzan into this?” he hissed.
“Drake, let him go!” Chase shouted.
Cause of Death Page 17