JF Gonzalez - Fetish.wps

by phuc

  John hoped to God this one wouldn't be.

  “I want to help Chrissy,” Rick said, sitting up straight in his chair, regaining his composure. “I ... I have to tell them everything."

  “That's my man,” Danny said, patting the youth on the back.

  “I'm just so scared, man,” Rick said, the hint of tears in his voice. “I called Maria when Chrissy didn't come back, and she told me Chrissy had left around nine for two outcalls. The last one was around eleven, which meant she should have been home by one at the latest. But when she didn't come back by three, I got worried. It took me until ten o'clock Saturday morning to track Maria down, and when I talked to her she didn't know where Chrissy was. I called Chrissy's house and her brother and sister hadn't seen her. I drove around trying to find her. I checked with her folks a few times, and the last time I drove by yesterday afternoon the police were already there. I called from a pay phone and her brother said the police were looking to question me and I got scared. By then I knew that Sanchez would be looking for me to get his money, so I took off."

  “Sanchez?” John looked at Danny in puzzlement for clarification.

  “He's the guy Rick was supposed to pay back,” Danny said. “Chrissy was working to pay back the debt for Rick."

  “He said if I didn't paid him by Saturday morning he'd kill me,” Rick said, his voice rising hysterically. “And he will, too. If he finds me."

  “He ain't going to find you, homey,” Danny said, putting an arm around the younger man's shoulders.

  “I still think you should go to the police, Rick,” John Glowacz said. “At this point they are on the assumption that Chrissy is a runaway. They don't know anything about her activities Friday night, most likely. If they knew this, that would narrow their search. If they are able to talk to this Maria, she may be able to provide some clues as to some of the ... er, customers she may have seen.” He didn't want to proceed too much farther down that train of thought. He didn't want to scare Rick. “If on the off chance they did place blame on you, if you tell them this it would take that suspicion off."

  Rick nodded, as if he was seeing the light. “You're right, Father Glowacz."

  But I pray that I'm not, John Glowacz thought. Nevertheless, he picked up the phone on his desk and handed the receiver to Rick, who took it wordlessly. He glanced at Danny briefly, who nodded. Rick looked calm, more in control of himself. “If you want we can go to the police together. The three of us. We'll do anything we can do to help, Rick."

  “I'd like that,” Rick said. He motioned to the phone on the desk. “Go ahead. Call them."

  Trading one last glance with Danny, John Glowacz consulted the yellow pages on his desk for the phone number of the Los Angeles Police Department, then dialed the number.

  Chapter 11

  Late February in Newport Beach is often cold and windy and today was no exception. Detective Daryl Garcia stood about fifteen feet from where the ocean swelled onto the sandy beach. Detective Steve Howe stood beside him, both men dressed in long, black trenchcoats, holding umbrellas over their heads to shield themselves from the light drizzle. An hour before it had been pouring rain and the weather forecast called for this particular rainfall to be the last for at least a week. Hopefully it will begin to clear soon.

  Dredging in sandy soil looking for corpses wasn't Daryl's idea of a fun time.

  The beach had been roped off and about a dozen people stood behind the yellow crime scene tape watching the detectives work. Daryl and Steve were the only two from LAPD Homicide on the scene. When Daryl took a peek under the plastic tarp that covered the body and saw what they were dealing with, he hightailed it back to the car and called the Butcher Task force members. That had been fifteen minutes ago. It would be another forty minutes or so before the first of them started arriving.

  They had been called to the scene by Newport Beach P.D., who had been alerted to report to the Butcher Task force any murder they came across that involved decapitation or dismemberment. All police departments from San Diego to Santa Barbara had been asked to notify the Butcher Task force if they came across such a crime, and since December Daryl and Steve had been called out to no fewer than half a dozen such crimes. In all cases the murders were the result of lover's triangles or drug deals gone bad in which the killers, in their fury, hacked the victim apart with an axe or cut them up with a knife. Gruesome, but it happened. It was the nature of the human beast.

  Daryl and Steve took one look at the lump of flesh beneath the tarp Newport Beach P.D. had covered the body up with and knew that this was the work of the Butcher.

  Daryl could only think back to the first body in the Butcher murder series, the still unidentified Lady of the Ocean who was found a mere half mile from this very spot, and wondered if this maniac had struck again.

  Now as they stood in the gloom of the drizzly afternoon Daryl motioned for Steve to follow him up the beach. They walked away from the circle of police officers and detectives and stopped. The look on Steve's face told Daryl that he was certain this was the Butcher's latest victim. “He's done it again,” Daryl said.

  As in the case of the first murder back in ‘94, this latest victim had been found by a homeowner, a record company executive who owned a beachfront house almost directly across from where the body now rested. The homeowner had gone out to jog along the beach before it rained again when he noticed something strange that the tide appeared to have washed ashore. Thinking it to be the body of a large animal, or perhaps a beached porpoise, the man had trotted onto the beach to investigate, then had run back to his house to call the police.

  The object turned out to be the lower portion of a female torso, minus both legs.

  The torso was bisected at the mid-section, the legs at the hips. Looking at the remains, Daryl couldn't help but think that despite the fact that the skin was bleached white from being immersed in the cold water, this unnamed victim was probably from the East Los Angeles area as well. In fact, his mind was already rushing to conclusions: she was young, probably Hispanic, was either involved in a gang or hung out with gang members, and she was recently reported missing. He was going on this assumption due to the fact that he had asked the East Los Angeles division to keep him updated on any missing persons from the area, and a few days ago they had informed him that a teenage prostitute, with ties to a motorcycle gang, was reported missing by her boyfriend and the girl's parents. The missing girl in question had a small tattoo of a butterfly on her left buttock; the corpse under the tarp bore a similar tattoo.

  “I'd lay odds that this is our missing girl,” Daryl said, jerking his thumb back at the scene.

  “I was just going to say the same thing,” Steve said.

  “When the task force gets here we'll split into four teams,” Daryl said. “The first two will explore north of this area up to the Huntington Beach Pier. The next two will explore south down to Laguna Beach, maybe San Clemente. We'll coordinate with the Orange County Sheriff to have them drag the canal that feeds into this beach. Also contact the Coast Guard and have them conduct a search from San Pedro to say, oh, San Diego."

  “That far south?” Steve asked.

  Daryl shrugged, looking out at the rolling waves. “Why not? If he dumped the remains in the canal that runs off into the Long Beach Harbor, the remains could have drifted down that far in the last few days. We'll know more how long she's been in the water after the coroner looks at her, but I'd be willing to bet she's our missing girl, and if she is, she hasn't been in the water that long."

  “What about the press?” Steve was looking back toward the strand where a news van had parked.

  “The FBI will know how to deal with them,” Daryl said.

  Steve opened his mouth to say something else, then closed it. Daryl noticed it but paid no heed. He knew what Steve was going to say. For the last two months the two detectives had been at odds with each other over Rachael Pearce. While Steve wouldn't come right out and spit it out, he gave Daryl the impression that t
he other detectives, especially those on the Butcher task force, didn't approve of Daryl's relationship with the reporter. While nobody had actually voiced their disapproval, it was said through body language, tone of voice, and the vibes floating around. Plus, Daryl knew from experience what the other detectives felt about the relationship. Journalists were at times both a panacea and a cancer to the police. Many times they could be helpful in assisting in investigations; in keeping the public informed, and in showing them what the department did to solve cases like this to help foster a better understanding of public safety to the general public. They were a good forum for getting information out to the public. On the other hand, when it came to delicate cases they could hinder it, sometimes with disastrous results. One only had to look at the O.J. Simpson case to see how the media could destroy a case before it ever got to court. Because the Butcher case was a sensitive case for the department, it was imperative that the only information the press received was that released by LAPD's Media Relations. The minute Daryl Garcia made the mistake of casually mentioning to Steve Howe one morning before work that he was dating a new woman in his life and that her name was Rachael Pearce, he had cast himself in a new light in the eyes of his peers.

  On hindsight, he probably shouldn't have said anything to Steve, but it was too late for that now. Most guys on the force would have quickly aborted a burgeoning relationship with a female newspaper reporter, but not Daryl; in the last four months he had become really attached to her. He had known that she was something special after their first date, and he had to resist the urge to rush into the relationship. After a few weeks of casually seeing each other, they had talked about the future of their relationship one night in December. Rachael had wanted to take things slow, too, and Daryl couldn't have agreed more. When Daryl had asked Rachael if she thought they might have a future together she had smiled. “I think so. I really like you, Daryl. A lot. But ... my heart's been broken before. I have a feeling yours has, too. Let's continue to see each other, but take it slow. Okay?"

  How she had sensed that he had been hurt by past loves was something that Daryl found remarkable. It was evidence of Rachael Pearce's ability to observe other people, listen carefully to what they said, analyze them, and come to logical conclusions. It was then that he had told her about his first marriage and how it had ended. She had listened sympathetically, and while he had wanted to tell her more, specifically about Shirley, he didn't feel that had been the right time. Rachael hadn't pressed the issue, and Daryl was thankful for it.

  But when Daryl tried learning a little bit more about Rachael's past—specifically her childhood, since they had practically grown up within the same general area—she had given him only a general background. “There's not really much to tell,” she had said one morning at a coffee shop in Pasadena. She had spent the night at his house, and they had walked to Peet's Coffee on Lake and California and were enjoying an early morning stroll and had decided to stop for a morning coffee. “I never knew who my real parents were; I was given up at birth and placed in foster care. I was shuttled to different foster homes throughout my childhood and never really grew close to any of my foster parents. Other than that, I did things normal kids did. I lived in a middle-class neighborhood and had a middle-class lifestyle like everybody else in that area. Besides, I don't like to live in the past; I live in the present. I guess that's where my independent streak comes from. I've always felt that I was on my own, that I've always had to take care of myself, that I could never rely on family for help because I felt that I never really had a family."

  It was a stunning confession, but it wasn't too surprising. Daryl found himself drawn to Rachael even more. She had come from a shattered past that he could relate to very much, and she had triumphed. That's one of the things Daryl liked about Rachael.

  She was always looking forward: to the next story, the next feature, to what might be coming up on the wires. She had seen the potential for a book on the Butcher murder series and had started compiling notes. Rachael Pearce was looking ahead to the future while Daryl was still stuck in the past, clinging to a job he had sought out of frustration due to the murder of his first wife, a job he used to vent his frustration at the gang members that he hated and despised.

  And as 1997 dawned Daryl realized one other thing: he was slowly falling in love with Rachael Pearce.

  “Let's get back to the scene,” Daryl said, dismissing the thought from his mind.

  Steve followed him, and as they headed back to the crime scene he knew that he was being scrutinized by his peers for his relationship with Rachael Pearce. He knew that seeing her was considered a big no-no, but he thought he had done pretty well in distancing his work from his personal life. He had already made it clear to Rachael that he wouldn't talk about the Butcher case to her and she hadn't pressed the issue. In fact, she had been a dream when it came to respecting his wishes of not talking about the case.

  “This case is important to you and I don't want to jeopardize it by you divulging information,” she had said when he brought up the hands off policy in their relationship.

  Daryl not only respected her a lot more as a journalist, it helped push him over the edge of liking the hell out of her, to possibly falling in love with her.

  But business was business, and ever since he had spilled the beans about the relationship to Steve Howe, he had kept silent on the issue. He didn't talk about his weekends anymore, nor did he care to talk about Rachael when she was brought up in conversation. He wanted to keep his private life separate from his professional life, and his reluctance to divulge some of his dirty laundry had earned him some behind-the-back snickers from his colleagues. He knew they talked about him when he wasn't around but he didn't care. Fuck ‘em.

  Quickly shifting his mental gears from his personal life to his professional one, Daryl got back into the business of overseeing the preliminary investigation into the discovery of the partial remains of what he felt was the latest victim of the Eastside Butcher.

  Some dopey variety show was on MTV as they sat up in her big queen size bed, but Daryl wasn't paying much attention to it. He was reading the Metro section of the Los Angeles Times, which had devoted a tiny portion of page three to the latest victim. The paper reported what he already knew: the remains had been that of Chrissy Melendez, a sixteen-year-old known prostitute and associate of the Devil's Army, a biker gang. She had been reported missing around February 13 by her parents.

  Daryl closed the paper and turned to Rachael, who was leaning back against a mountain of pillows looking at the program with a hint of disdain on her pretty features.

  The show was a cross between the Dating Game and the Tonight Show, and its cast and host were all under twenty-five. What the hell was wrong with MTV nowadays? Did kids really like watching this shit?

  “Crap,” Rachael said, flipping the channel to VH-1. David Bowie was gyrating in a leisure suit to “Cracked Actor."

  “At least this is better,” Daryl said.

  “I love David Bowie,” Rachael said, setting the remote down in her lap to watch it.

  “More than you love me?"

  Rachael giggled and kissed him.

  It was Friday evening and he had gone to her place immediately after getting off of work. They had gone out for dinner at a Chinese restaurant they had discovered a month ago, and afterward gone straight to her place. Once there, they had changed to swimming trunks for him and a bikini for her, and gone to the complex's sauna to bask in steam for a good thirty minutes. The sauna had relaxed him, taking out all the frustration that had been building up. They had gone back to her condo, showered together, then made love. Now between brief interludes of foreplay they were watching whatever was on the tube and making conversation. Winding down from their busy week.

  “Did you still want to go up to Big Bear next weekend?” he asked. He had a friend from high school whose family owned a cabin in the mountain retreat who often let Daryl borrow it for a weekend whenever the mo
od struck, provided it wasn't occupied.

  Next weekend it was free and clear.

  “I'd like that.” Rachael said.

  “Good.” Daryl said.

  Daryl had been turning over the idea of talking to Rachael about the case this past week. While their relationship had started off slowly, it had blossomed into something really nice, so nice that Daryl began to think of Rachael as somebody he could confide in and trust with anything. She was certainly doing her best in being open and honest with him in everything, from telling him her story about her marriage and her slow rise through the journalistic ranks of the LA Times, to the various anecdotes of her week. She finally revealed a little slice-of-life picture of herself during her formative years growing up. She admitted that in high school she had been pretty much a ‘nobody'. Despite a short stint as a Girl Scout, and some extra-curricular activities she had volunteered in, she hadn't been that outgoing or popular in school. She must have been painfully shy as a child and teenager and was just now starting to blossom as an adult. Sometimes that happened.

  He tried being honest with her about his life as well, but some parts were just too tough, the Butcher Case notwithstanding. There was still the issue of his first wife Shirley to deal with. He wanted to tell her about that, but he couldn't right now. He had the feeling that if he did, the same old problems would creep up again, affecting his relationship with Rachael and she would leave him just like all the other women had. He had told her about his second marriage to Diane, just enough to satisfy her curiosity, but not enough to get into the nitty gritty. And she hadn't dug too deep either, which was how he liked it.