It wasn’t as if Kathleen contributed anything to society. The only contributions she made to charity were to attend fancy benefits where she could attract more wealthy clients. One less Kathleen in the world sounded fine to him. Who would really miss her? Her friends were superficial, her clients would forget her, and her only relative, a sister who resided in Los Angeles, hadn’t spoken to her for years.
Parking in the garage, Dean quickly opened the back door of the Mercedes, peering into the trunk through the opening between the seats. The drunk’s rancid smell permeated the car. Placing his knee on the seat, he reached through the hole and poked him. He was startled when Arnie latched onto his hand. The door to the house sprang open.
“What are you doing, Dean?” Kathleen asked, standing in the doorway.
The fingers that were curled around his hand went limp and released him. “Nothing,” he said, perspiration soaking his shirt. “Just picking up something I dropped.” He got out and slammed the car door. His ears perked, dreading a sound from the trunk. “I’ve been out in the rain. Let’s go inside.”
Kathleen had already changed into a blue silk nightgown. Once he stepped inside the hallway leading to the kitchen, she took him by the arm, then rested her head on his shoulder as they continued walking. “I have so many deals in the fire, Dean. If I go on the road with you, I’ll have to hire more people. Elaine can’t possibly handle everything by herself. There’s the banking, making arrangements for someone to look after this house. You’ll have to help me with the…”
Fucking bitch, Dean thought, tuning her out. “Everything’s going to be fine, darling,” he said, stopping and peering at her eyes. Her pupils were constricted. He should have known she couldn’t give up her addiction to Valium. To cover up the fact that she’d sedated herself, she’d turned into a motor mouth. He struggled to keep a pleasant expression on his face when inside his stomach was doing cartwheels. His eyes came to rest on the long curve of her neck. He imagined choking the life out of her.
Kathleen went behind the marble bar in the family room. “I’ll make you a drink. Tall or short?”
“Neither,” Dean said, sniffing his hands. He could still smell the stench of the homeless drunk. He couldn’t take a chance Kathleen might notice. “I need to go to the bathroom.”
“Damn it, Dean,” she said, “you tracked in mud. Why didn’t you take your shoes off before you came in the house?”
“I forgot,” he said, slipping them off his feet.
“Don’t leave them in the middle of the room,” Kathleen said in a shrill voice. “Take them to the laundry room, where they belong. And bring me the carpet cleaner and a clean rag.”
“Don’t scream at me like that, Kathleen,” Dean said, placing his hands over his ears. “You know how it annoys me.”
She lowered her voice, smiling sweetly. “Will you please bring me the things I asked for?”
“Can I take a leak first?” he said, continuing on to the bathroom. As he scrubbed his hands in the ornately decorated guest bathroom, he caught sight of his reflection in the mirror. His lips were compressed, the muscles in his face rigid, his eyes cesspools of hate. Kathleen was so caught up in herself, she hadn’t noticed that she’d opened the door to a murderer.
The cleaning crew had come yesterday, Dean remembered, mentally running through his checklist. Kathleen was obsessed with keeping the house clean. She claimed she had allergies, but he thought it came from being in real estate, where everything had to look perfect. Her friends joked that her house was hermetically sealed.
Before he’d left earlier, Dean had gone upstairs and collected all the photographs of them together, pulling them out of the frames and shredding them. Leaving the store pictures inside, he’d shoved the pieces of their photographs into his jacket pockets. The police would assume the store photos were of relatives or friends. He always tried to keep anyone from taking pictures of him. Sure, people in Carmel had seen him, but he was certain no one had snapshots outside of Kathleen. Composite drawings weren’t nearly as threatening as photos, which could be placed on the Internet and viewed by every law enforcement agency in the country. He was constantly changing his appearance, but there was no reason to take a chance.
Dean realized he would have to take the trash and dump it somewhere away from the house. Kathleen insisted the vacuum cleaner bags be replaced every week. Of course, he would have to go over the house again. It shouldn’t be that difficult to remove any remaining sources of his DNA. Other than a few of his suits, the walk-in closet in the master bedroom was crammed full of Kathleen’s clothes. The rest of his clothing had been washed the previous day. He hadn’t showered or used the upstairs bathroom since he’d returned, which made his job fairly easy. All he needed to do was run the handheld vacuum over the suits.
If Dean hadn’t stumbled across the drunk, he would have been forced to go to far greater lengths to cover his tracks. Since he would make certain the police had overwhelming evidence to convict his unwilling accomplice, whatever they found that didn’t link back to old Arnie would soon be discarded. There was no statute of limitations on murder, and recent circumstances had forced him to take every possible precaution. His past deeds might never surface, or, then again, the police might catch up to him any day.
Before leaving the guest bathroom, he dropped to his hands and knees, checking for hairs and finding nothing. Fingerprints weren’t a problem, as he’d never been printed. The driver’s license he used was phony, and he always made it a point not to speed. Thus far, he’d been lucky and had never been stopped by the police. The only place he’d held a valid license was in the state of New York, and it had long ago expired. Fourteen years ago the DMV didn’t collect fingerprints.
When he returned to the room, Kathleen was stretched out on the sofa. “I confess,” she said, stretching her arms over her head. “I’ve been a bad girl, darling. After you left, I was so upset that I took half of a Valium. I just wanted to forget everything and sleep. I promise I’m not going to take them anymore.”
Half, Dean thought. She had probably taken ten. Her lids were dropping, her words uncharacteristically slurred. Nothing she did mattered, though, and without knowing it, she had made it easier for him to kill her. Valium was also a muscle relaxant. “You should probably go upstairs and try to rest. We’ll celebrate your birthday tomorrow night. I have some things to do. Here…” He placed his arm around her shoulder and escorted her up the stairs.
The master bedroom was over five hundred square feet. A floor-to-ceiling window provided magnificent views of the ocean. When the fog rolled in, as it did almost every evening, they were lucky to be able to see an occasional star.
“Why don’t you join me?” Kathleen said seductively. “I’m the one who threw a wrench in our party plans. You deserve a little loving.”
He looked at her as if she was crazy. Seeing her cheerful demeanor was like having someone hammer nails into his forehead. “We’ll have plenty of sex later.”
Kathleen stood at the edge of the bed, letting her silk gown fall to the floor. “Come on…I want you. I was so mean to you earlier.”
“The Valium should be taking effect soon,” Dean told her. “If we make love, I want us both to enjoy it.”
“Are you sure, honey?” she asked. “I could take care of you if you want.”
“No,” he protested. “I have to make a trip to the store to pick up some things for breakfast.”
Dean left and stood outside the doorway. Did he hate her enough to kill her? Even if he didn’t hate her, she knew too much. But for his plan to work, it had to look like a random act of violence.
In sleep, Kathleen looked demure and sweet. Her confident facade was his creation. When they’d met, she had been miserable. After being tossed aside for a younger woman, she’d taken to spending her nights in the bar at the club, guzzling booze and chasing it with tranquilizers. Her hair had been dry, her nails ragged, and she’d been twenty pounds overweight. Turning a woman on t
he skids around wasn’t easy. Dean had put a lot of time and effort into Kathleen Dupont, and for what? To end up with a woman who’d been ready to call her lawyer and eradicate him from her life because she couldn’t get what she wanted. She should have bought herself a damn poodle.
Creeping into the bathroom, he found a plastic cap Kathleen used when she conditioned her hair, placing it on his head to catch any hairs that might fall from his head. The truth was he didn’t need Kathleen anymore. During what he called the rehab phase of their relationship, she had idolized him. Until today he hadn’t considered killing her, just taking off whenever he tired of her. But like his other wife, she’d turned everything he’d done for her against him, thinking she could get along fine without him. She was beautiful because he had made her beautiful, and not simply by picking out her clothes or putting her on a diet and exercise program, or insisting she cut back on her consumption of alcohol and tranquilizers. Women felt beautiful and projected beauty when they were loved and constantly reassured by an intelligent, successful man.
His days as a psychiatrist seemed far away, but Dean didn’t need another shrink to tell him that he was a narcissist. They even had a name for what he craved—narcissistic supply. He would secure another source, one that could provide him with far more than Kathleen.
Dean went downstairs. Before heading to the garage, he pulled on a pair of black leather gloves. In the garage he grabbed a towel and at the utility sink, ran water over it.
Releasing the latch to the trunk of the Mercedes, Dean stared down at the unconscious man. Arnie was curled up like a baby holding a bottle. It was good he was still out, but he needed to let go of the evidence. “Arnie, Arnie,” Dean said in hushed tones. When there was no response, he checked the man’s pulse, detecting the faint beating of his heart. He grabbed the empty bottle and gave it a yank. It didn’t budge. Arnie wasn’t going to give it up easily.
He ran into the kitchen and found the bottle of cognac, then rushed back to the car and jabbed Arnie in the ribs. The man’s eyes opened. “You’re almost empty,” Dean told him, waving the other bottle in the air. “Wanna trade?”
“Sure,” Arnie said, taking the alcohol and drinking it as if it were apple juice.
As Dean yanked the cognac bottle away from Arnie’s lips with one hand, he pulled back his other in a fist and punched the man, sending him back into dreamland. Blood dripped out of Arnie’s nose. When the police investigated the crime, the drunk’s injury would make it look as if Kathleen had suffered a spasm and her fist had inadvertently connected with her assailant’s nose when he forced the knife through her abdominal wall.
Dean took the Old Crow whiskey bottle, wiped it clean of his fingerprints, and pressed Arnie’s fingers against it before he carried it back inside the house. He even removed several doorknobs and brought them to the car.
In the next hour, he carted various items from the house to the car in order to place Arnie’s prints on them. He even plucked several matted hairs from the man’s mangy head.
Next was a sweep of the house. The bed linens had been changed the day before. Finding the portable Dust Devil in the cleaning cabinet, he vacuumed the sofas and carpet in the family room, then went upstairs and ran it over his suits and the carpet on the closet floor. He cleaned out the drains in the bathroom shower and sink. Afterward, he emptied the Dust Devil and scattered its minute contents in the backyard, where he knew the wind would blow them away.
Dean knew the clock was now ticking. He had to move fast, but he couldn’t be careless. He reached in and lifted Arnie’s right arm out of the filthy wool jacket, then pulled until the man rolled over and the clothing came free. Next he removed Arnie’s boots and reluctantly stepped into them.
Selecting a twelve-inch stainless-steel carving knife in the kitchen, he removed it from its wooden holder and climbed the stairs to the master bedroom, leaving a trail of muddy footprints.
The room was dark and silent, except for the faint sounds of Kathleen’s breathing. If she awoke and he couldn’t continue, all she would remember was the putrid smell of Arnie’s wool jacket. That way, he could cover himself by telling the police that he’d come home and chased off the attacker. Taking the strands of hair, he separated them and placed some on the bed and a few others on the floor.
DNA testing was both his friend and his enemy.
The toughest part of any journey was the beginning. Kathleen had always looked good with her mouth closed. Her expression was pleasant, and her features bore a softness he never saw when she was awake. She was stretched out on her back, her curly blond hair fanned out on the pillow.
With only a slight hesitation, Dean raised the bottle high and crashed it into her skull. After she whimpered a few times, her head fell to one side, and he felt certain she was unconscious.
The shattered shards of glass sliced into the skin on the left side of her face. Blood streamed from the multiple abrasions. “It’s your fault it has to end this way,” Dean said, twirling the knife in his gloved right hand.
He began to shake uncontrollably. The room was spinning. He found himself on his knees on the floor next to the bed, perspiration oozing from his pores. He pushed himself to his feet, taking off the tan wool jacket and covering her head. Looking at the face of someone whose life he was about to end wasn’t something he relished. It wasn’t the blood, but the squinting eyes, curling lips, the excruciating pain he’d inflicted. And this wasn’t the face of a stranger. Of course, he’d never killed someone he didn’t know. That’s what separated him from the others. When he took a life, he always had a reason.
There was no turning back now.
Dean stared down at her, tears pooling in his eyes. Instead of Kathleen’s face, he saw the soft face of his beautiful baby sister. When he felt the dampness on his cheeks, he panicked and wiped them on his shirt. Whipping the satin comforter off, he placed his hand on her stomach. When he moved the knife a few inches from her skin, his hand trembled as if he had Parkinson’s. He tried to emotionally detach himself. There were dozens of other ways to kill. A carefully placed bullet was one of the easiest. You didn’t have to get that close to the victim, which made it less gruesome and messy. The only problem was it left evidence, and digging out a bullet could be tricky. Strangulation was good under the right circumstances. It did require a lot of strength, however, and while people were resisting, they could scratch you and draw blood. This time the murder had to fit the murderer, a lowlife bastard like the man in his trunk.
The tip broke the skin. Taking his free hand and clasping it tight over his other on the knife handle, Dean raised his chin and squeezed his eyes shut, trying to mimic the actions of a psychotic maniac, merely lashing out in a murderous fury.
Taking several deep breaths, he plunged the blade downward. Kathleen let forth a bloodcurdling cry as she buckled forward. Dean grimaced as he pulled the knife out and watched as her body collapsed back on the bed, still and limp.
CHAPTER 18
Tuesday, September 19—7:00 P.M.
Mary dropped Carolyn off at home after their trip to San Diego. Veronica had come over at seven that morning, dropping her off to pick up John’s car from the parking structure. Then she followed her to the house and drove her to the body shop to get her Infiniti.
John was at work, so Carolyn and Rebecca prepared dinner together. The girl poured frozen corn into a pot to boil while her mother defrosted two chicken breasts in the microwave. Carolyn cut up vegetables for a salad, plunked the wooden bowl down on the table, and carried the chicken to the barbecue grill in the backyard.
Her thoughts still on Carl Holden, Carolyn reflected again on the alarming scenario they had to consider, as she’d discussed with Mary on the drive home. What if Holden and Matthew Sheppard turned out to be the same man? As yet, no one knew how long the Sheppards had been married, or even if they were in fact husband and wife. Since Holden had been out of prison for two years, it was possible that he and Sheppard were the same person. Holden
wasn’t a bad-looking man, and he could come across as an educated individual.
When Carolyn had entered the house, Rebecca met her at the door with a curious stare. “I can’t believe you planted artificial flowers in the front yard. You might need to see a shrink, Mom. I’m serious. That’s totally weird.”
Carolyn sat down at the table, burying her head in her hands. She was certain Marcus would have called by now. “You didn’t erase any messages from the answering machine, did you?”
“One,” Rebecca said. “It didn’t sound important.”
“You have to stop erasing my messages,” her mother said, standing and angrily placing her hands on her hips. “I’ve told you a dozen times, Rebecca. How would you like it if I erased your messages?”
The girl removed the pot of peas from the stove, and carried it to the sink to drain the excess water. “I was going to write it down, but I figured it wasn’t a big deal. He didn’t leave a phone number or ask you to call him back. It was probably one of those people trying to get you to refinance the house. His name was Mark or Marcus. He said he’d get in touch with you tomorrow.”
He called, he called! Carolyn thought. It was amazing how a simple phone call could change her world from bleak to wonderful. She felt like twirling around in circles. Instead, she rushed over to her daughter and kissed her on the forehead, then wrapped her arms around her waist and squeezed her.
“Mom,” Rebecca yelled, “you’re hurting me. What’s wrong with you?”
“I just want you to know how much I love you,” Carolyn told her, kissing her again before she darted outside to get their food before it burned.
When they sat down to eat, the girl leaned forward over the table. “Rapid mood changes can be a sign of mental illness, you know.” She held the bottle of blue cheese dressing over her salad, waiting for it to dribble out, then slapped it hard with the palm of her hand. A fourth of the bottle came gushing out. “Well, that didn’t work out, did it?” She went to the cabinet to get a clean plate for another serving of salad. When she returned, she smiled at her mother. “Are you going to tell me who this guy is? I mean, he’s obviously someone special. You almost peed in your pants when I told you he called.”
Sullivan’s Evidence Page 17