Her Last Chance

by Toni Anderson

  Enormous canvases covered the wall behind Walker’s head, distracting Marsh’s gaze. The colors were white flames with the occasional intense splash of color that writhed and twisted as if trying to escape. He remembered the first time he’d seen them. Stunning, evocative—like the woman who’d painted them.

  “Want to tell me what happened? Or shall we move on?” Marsh asked. Tension joined forces with a headache that beat the crap out of his skull.

  Beetling his brows, Vince said, “I don’t know if I can protect her if she refuses to cooperate with basic instructions.” His eyes were on Marsh, intelligent, loyal and playing Josephine like a pro. Except she’d never played well with others.

  “I don’t need you anyway. I’ll disappear. I know how—”

  “Yeah, that worked out so well last time.” Marsh was careful with words in front of Sam Walker, but her flinch of pain told him he’d struck home. The Mafia had tracked her down after torturing and murdering her father and the woman who’d raised her. If Marsh hadn’t found her first, she’d have been dead. Their gazes locked, the blue of her eyes so vivid they looked like they’d been daubed on a fresh canvas.

  Sam Walker took a seat next to Vince on the opposite couch, looking short by comparison.

  “I don’t think it’s a good idea to take off.” Walker’s tone was subdued.

  Josephine’s hands gripped each other like tangle weed.

  “Why? What do you have on this guy?” asked Marsh.

  Walker pulled a folder out of his case. The sober quality of the man’s stare made Marsh pay attention.

  “Detective Cochrane pulled up a list of possible victims linked to this killer as far back as the mid-nineties, two cases from New Mexico and two from D.C. I’ve been going back through the records trying to link more possible victims—”

  “What are you using to assess linkage?”

  Sam shot a look around the room. “Whatever I say is classified. If any of this information is leaked I’ll get you all charged with obstruction.” He rested his elbows on his knees, a pen held loosely between his fingers. “Even you, sir.” He nodded at Marsh.

  Marsh figured he must have checked his alibi for the murders and he was off the hook. About time. “Then why are you telling us?”

  “Because I know you have the clout to get the information anyway and I like the illusion of control.” Walker didn’t look impressed with Marsh’s status and Marsh respected him more because of it. But he’d do whatever it took to keep Josephine safe from a killer. Walker stared hard at Josephine. “And because I think you’re the first victim.”

  “I’m not a vic—”

  “Are you sure?” Marsh cut across the denial that was an integral part of Josephine’s existence.

  Walker nodded and reached for a picture from the top of the pile. “I was initially concentrating on this woman in New Mexico because I thought she was the first victim. Her name is Donna Viera, murdered in the early nineties.”

  The photograph slid across the surface of the coffee table with a whisper of sound that stirred the hairs on Marsh’s nape. Blonde. Skinny. Her body covered with a series of crisscross patterns that had bled profusely, streaking her skin.

  “Cause of death?” Marsh asked.

  Josephine averted her eyes and sipped water. Vince hunched over the table, staring at the photos of ritualized slaughter.

  “She bled to death.” Walker pulled out another photo and placed it beside that of Donna Viera. Angela Morelli. The woman from downstairs. Two decades apart and the sonofabitch was still killing. Marsh tried to control the fury that surged through him.

  “These victims are almost definitely the work of the same person. Both vics are blonde, Caucasian women, late twenties to early thirties—attractive women.”

  Josephine put her water down abruptly, spilling it. “I’ll get a cloth.” She was halfway to her feet, but Marsh planted a hand on her thigh and held her in place. Vince got up to search for a towel. Marsh knew she wanted to avoid this, but it was important that she understood exactly what she was dealing with.

  “Angela Morelli was a dyed blonde.” Walker pointed to the woman’s pubic region. “He skinned her genitals, probably as punishment.”

  A wave of revulsion rose in his throat, but Marsh shoved it down. Josephine had her hand over her mouth as Vince handed her the cloth. It dangled uselessly from her fingers so Marsh took it from her and wiped up the water she’d spilt.

  “What about his MO?” Marsh asked.

  Walker glanced across at Vince. “I know you’re a decorated soldier and a war hero and all, but if this gets out…”

  “I had top security clearance as of three months ago and you think I’ve forgotten the rules already?” Vince’s amused expression didn’t fool Marsh. The slur on his character insulted the ex-SEAL.

  “Vince is the most discreet person you’ll ever meet,” Marsh stated.

  “And the most law abiding.” Josephine shot Vince a glare, but he returned it with a quiet smile and a wink.

  “I figure you need to know what the danger is.” Walker pulled out two more photos. Two more women brutalized.

  “These women were attacked in their own homes. They’re single and were alone during the time of the attack. He spends considerable time with the victims. Several hours according to the evidence.”

  Josephine opened her mouth to speak, but closed it again, no words escaping.

  Walker carried on. “Evidence suggests he gags them, ties them to their beds and then he cuts them. Repeatedly.”

  “Any DNA or trace evidence?” Marsh asked, hoping against hope.

  Walker shook his head. “Nothing yielded a viable biological sample until the blood we found on the floor downstairs when you bit him. Analysis isn’t back yet but they have a rush on it. Let’s hope he’s in the system.” Looking at Josephine, he said quietly, “From what you’ve told us we figure he wears some kind of hat or mask, at least until he has the victim secured.”

  Josephine shuddered and turned away. Her skin was so pale the blue of her veins was visible beneath the surface on the backs of her hands.

  “Why does he cut them?” Josephine’s voice was high pitched.

  Walker shrugged. “Piquerism? Some people get sexual gratification from the act of cutting or stabbing. Or get off on the victim’s pain.”

  “Sexual assault?” Marsh asked.

  Walker shook his head.

  “He didn’t rape me.” Josephine’s tone held relief. Marsh reached out and took her hand, rubbing her cold fingers with his. She turned to face him, eyes stark with confusion. “Why not?”

  “Maybe he’s impotent.” Marsh shrugged. He really didn’t know what drove a man to kill for fun. The fact the victims hadn’t been sexually assaulted was a plus, but he still made them suffer.

  Walker fingered another file. Marsh recognized it and gritted his teeth. His secretary Dora had sent a copy of the report on Josephine’s attack from his office in Boston to the NYPD and FBI at his insistence. Walker took out another photograph, this one a thin hollow-eyed child who lay sleeping in a hospital bed.

  Every muscle in Josephine’s frame tensed to stone. Then she started to shake. Slowly she extended a hand and stroked the edge of the photocopy like it was alive and the child might wake if she disturbed her.

  The form in the picture was flat-chested, narrow hipped. Androgynous. Sexless.

  “I think you were lucky on several counts.” Josephine flinched but Walker continued. “His behavior hadn’t escalated to murder yet, or you didn’t fit his victim profile.”

  “You don’t think he chose her specifically? You think she was an accident? Or an opportunistic attack?”

  Walker shrugged. “It’s a theory.”

  Vince stared hard at the table, mouth turned down, eyes focused on the images. “Is that you?” He nodded to the picture.

  Picking it up, she nodded, her eyes wide with shock.

  His deep baritone stirred the air. “So how many women do
you think this animal has killed?”

  Sam Walker looked grim, rubbed his hands over his face.

  “Well, after interviewing Ms. Maxwell, I decided to run the information through ViCAP again, only this time I omitted the MO and just used the knife wound information.”

  They locked eyes and Marsh held his breath, dread settling into his marrow. “How many?” he asked.

  “I’ve found ten that fit with what we already had—all blondes, with their skin sliced rather than stabbed, some found in remote locations, others pulled out of rivers, some even burned.”

  “He’s destroying evidence.”

  Walker nodded at Marsh’s grim statement. “And now Interpol is involved…” The silence stretched on and on until Marsh wanted to grab the man by his jacket lapel and shake the information out of him.

  “How many?”

  “We’re setting up a timeline of disappearances going back as far as nineteen ninety-three when Josie was attacked—”

  “How many?” Marsh repeated harshly.

  “Maybe fifteen since ninety-three,” said Walker. “Sometimes it’s impossible to tell if decomp is too advanced.”

  Vince swore and turned away.

  Fear and unease radiated from Josephine’s taut frame like a violin string being plucked. Walker stared at her, but Marsh didn’t know what the man expected her to do. Feel guilty? For what? He doubted she knew her attacker, though she wasn’t telling them everything.

  Marsh hated seeing her scared. It tied a knot in his gut and scrambled his brains when he needed them most. He stared at the hardwood floor, knowing this situation was going to get worse before it got better—unless they got very, very lucky.

  “Why does he cut them?” Marsh repeated Josephine’s question.

  Vince frowned, hunched forward, his hands clasped together.

  “Scarification is big on the S & M scene. Lust murderers are often involved in sadism.” Walker shrugged. “We don’t know, we’re guessing at this point.”

  “So have you guys worked up a profile?”

  “The guys at the BAU are working on it now we have more information—unfortunately there are more murderers than FBI resources.” Walker frowned down at the coffee table, ran his hands along the hard edge. “We know we’re looking at a geographically transient, organized offender.”

  “The hardest type to catch.” It wasn’t news to any of them that they were dealing with a smart bastard, but even smart bastards made mistakes.

  Walker flipped some pages in his notebook.

  “Age,” he pressed his lips together. “This new information revises our age estimate. Assuming he was between eighteen and twenty-five when he first attacked Ms Maxwell, that puts him around thirty-eight years to forty-five years of age.”

  Which gave him a lot of good killing years left…

  “Caucasian?” Vince queried.

  Walker looked at Josephine who nodded in confirmation. “Yes, average height, white male with gray eyes is about our only solid point of reference right now.”

  “What do you want from me?” A single silvery tear tracked down her cheek. She didn’t wipe it away, perhaps thinking they wouldn’t notice it if she didn’t draw attention to it.

  Marsh answered for Walker. “In serial murder cases, the first and last victims are the most revealing about the UNSUB.”

  He moved the photograph of Angela Morelli next to the picture of Josephine as a child, mentally recoiling from both. She was the key.

  Her gaze was transfixed on the gruesome photographs.

  “What were you doing in Queens that day, Josephine?” Marsh asked.

  Pain filtered through the deep blue eyes, followed by denial. She shook her head and then opened her mouth to speak. Shut it again. Frowning, she picked up a shot of Donna Viera.

  “Oh, god.” Shock made her sit up straighter, balancing on the edge of the cushion.

  “What?” Walker pushed. “What is it?”

  “My mom. This woman looks like my mom.” Josephine covered her mouth. “Maybe he was stalking her, the night he found me.”

  “I thought you said your mother disappeared before you were attacked?” said Marsh.

  She went silent and Marsh wondered if she’d finish telling her story or clam up the way she usually did.

  Mouth half obscured by hair and fingers she said, “I followed her that night. That’s why I went to Queens.” She squeezed her eyes closed, clearly torn with indecision, a pink flush rising up her cheeks and neck.

  “Why did you follow your mom, Josephine?”

  “It was so long ago.” She slouched back against the couch, staring at the high ceiling.

  “Try to remember.” Sam Walker barely contained his frustration. Marsh knew exactly how he felt.

  She gave a bitter laugh. “That’s the trouble. I remember every detail.”

  The slight tilt of Walker’s lips gave away his skepticism. Eyewitnesses were notoriously unreliable. And after all this time…

  “I was worried she was going to leave me again. She’d left for a few weeks when I was younger and…” Her laugh was bitter. “Well, I was right wasn’t I? I never saw her again.”

  Her eyes glazed over as she looked into the past. “I was on my way home from school when she got on a bus I was riding, but she didn’t see me because I was sitting toward the back.”

  Marsh had to strain to hear her voice as it grew softer.

  “She’d been acting strangely, dressing nicer, wearing make-up, smiling.” Josephine caught her lip with strong white teeth. Continued to stare at the high vaulted ceiling. “So I followed her. She got off in Queens, went into this big red-brick building with a fire-escape that snaked up the outside.

  “I climbed onto a Dumpster and managed to catch the lower bar of the fire escape and hauled myself up. I was a gymnast back then so it was easy.” A slight frown touched her brow.

  Exchanging a look with Walker, Marsh wondered if this was the break they needed.

  “I peeped in different windows searching for her and finally, I found her.” Disgust dripped off her words. “Being fucked against the wall by a guy from St. Mary’s Church.” Slowly, carefully, she picked up her glass of water and drained it. “Nice, huh? Brought a whole new meaning to Come all ye faithful.”

  “You remember the guy’s name?”

  She shook her head.

  “So what happened next?” Walker prompted, stone-faced.

  Josephine glared at him, rubbed her hands over her knees in an unsettling repetitive gesture. “It got dark, but I hadn’t realized. I just sat on the fire-escape, watching, waiting for Mom to go home.”

  Marsh’s chest tightened as he fought for breath. Imagining the child on the fire escape.

  “Then all of a sudden this guy wearing a mask was beside me.” She looked up, eyes stark in her pale face, “He clamped his hand tight over my mouth and dragged me to that alley.” She shrugged. “Everything else is in the police report.”

  Special Agent Walker tapped a pen against a notepad that had appeared in his hand. “Could your attacker have been the same man who was in the room with your mother?”

  Her hair fell out of its knot. She shook it out in an untidy halo. “I don’t think so. They’d gone into the bedroom or bathroom, out of sight. I was watching the front door, and I never saw him leave.”

  “But is it possible?” Walker pushed.

  Josephine shrugged, looking confused, “I suppose, but why’d my mom let him hurt me? Oh…” Her mouth opened and closed. Ashen-faced, she caught up with where Agent Walker had been trying to take her. Marsh wanted to cradle her in his arms and soothe her rigid muscles. He didn’t dare touch her.

  “You think my mother’s dead?” Her voice rose and she lurched to her feet. “How could she be dead? There was no report of a murder.”

  “Maybe we never found the body,” Walker suggested gently.

  “Why leave me alive?” She paced toward the covered windows, her black pants clinging to slender hip
s, her droopy sweater hanging loosely across her shoulders.

  “Maybe he couldn’t bring himself to kill a kid?” Marsh suggested. “When you passed out he took the opportunity to get rid of the body before you woke up?”

  Josephine stopped pacing, her hands coming up to cover her face, sobs wracking her shoulders.

  “Dammit.” Kicking himself for forgetting the body might be Josephine‘s mother, Marsh moved to where she stood and wrapped his arms around her, forced her head to rest on his chest as her body shook.

  “The interview is over.” Marsh stared at Agent Walker whose mouth tightened with annoyance. “Read the police reports, check the tenant records of the buildings Josephine was found near and see if any Jane Does matching, damn, what’s your mother’s name, Josephine?”

  “Margo, Margo Maxwell. Margo Thomas before she got married.” The words were mumbled into his shirt, tears wet against the thin fabric, making it stick to his skin.

  “See if any Jane Does matching the profile turned up in the six months after Josephine’s attack, or if Margo Maxwell surfaced alive elsewhere—check her Social Security number and driver’s license—that should tell you whether or not she’s dead.”

  Josephine’s sobs grew louder. Christ, he was as sensitive as a neutron bomb. He held her tightly, trying to offer comfort, but the muscles in her back were cast-iron beneath his fingers.

  “Will we see you tomorrow, Vince?” He stared at the big man. There was something unsettled about Vince that suggested he didn’t want this job. Who could blame him?

  Ebony eyes looked up, the diamond stud glinting briefly in his ear. “Oh-seven-hundred, sir.” Gathering his huge frame, Vince stood. “She gonna be all right?” He nodded uncertainly toward Josephine’s worsening cries.