Thicker than Blood (Zoe Bentley Mystery)

by Mike Omer

  “So you’re done for tonight?” Zoe asked. She was only through about half of the cases. She wondered if O’Donnell would let her stay.

  “Nope. Still got her bank and credit statements. I have about an hour to go.” O’Donnell looked exhausted. She glanced at the time. “Aw, crap. It’s after eleven. I forgot to call my daughter.”

  “You have a daughter?”

  O’Donnell nodded, picking up her phone. “Nellie. She’s five.”

  “Oh. That’s nice.” Zoe wasn’t in fact sure it was nice, but she couldn’t think of anything else to say.

  O’Donnell nodded, phone to her ear. Then she said, “Hey, hon. Sorry. I didn’t notice the time. When did she go to sleep? Oh. No, that’s okay. I’m sorry. I should have . . . yeah.”

  Zoe tried to concentrate on the screen, but she couldn’t focus. O’Donnell’s tone was so different, so much softer, when she talked on the phone; it was distracting.

  “How was her school today?” O’Donnell asked. She listened for a few seconds, her face getting rigid. “They what? And what did she do?”

  A long pause, in which Zoe quickly skimmed another case of a drug addict found shot, multiple needle holes in both arms. She didn’t even bother noting it. Irrelevant.

  O’Donnell sighed. “I’ll talk to her tomorrow. Thanks. Good night, hon.” She hung up and promptly exploded. “Those bitches!”

  Zoe blinked. “Is everything okay?”

  “Nellie has a friend . . . had a friend. Winona. And now Winona became friends with this group of girls, and they don’t want to include Nellie in their sticker-collection group. It’s like . . . Smurf stickers or something. So today Winona told Nellie she’s not talking to her anymore.” O’Donnell’s voice trembled with rage. “And Nellie just spent the evening crying. It’s the third time this month she ends up crying at home.”

  “It’ll pass. Kids fight,” Zoe said.

  “Nellie doesn’t fight. She’s always so sweet. And last year, Winona didn’t have any friends. She was so happy Nellie would be her friend.”

  “It’s probably a phase.” Zoe just wanted the discussion over. O’Donnell was overreacting.

  “You know what I’d like to do? March in there, waving my gun around, maybe fire a few shots into the ceiling. Tell them I’m going to arrest them all. Put the fear of God into them.”

  Zoe wondered if she’d misjudged O’Donnell. The woman had seemed like a reasonable person at first, but now she sounded demented. “Maybe Nellie needs a different friend,” she suggested weakly.

  “Well, yeah, but she doesn’t want a different friend. She wants Winona to be her friend. I should get her to start a different sticker-collection group. With better stickers. It’ll be a sticker war.”

  “You should stay out of it. Let Nellie sort it out.”

  “Do you have kids?” O’Donnell eyed Zoe threateningly, her tone sharp.

  “No. But research studies show that when parents start to involve themselves in their kids’ lives more, it causes—”

  “I don’t care what researchers say, Bentley! My daughter cried herself to sleep today because of those . . . those . . .”

  “Five-year-olds?”

  “Those horrid . . . sticker-collecting gremlins.”

  Zoe decided to disengage from the crazy woman. She focused on the next murder case. Murderers she could understand.

  O’Donnell flipped the pages of the bank statements violently, ripping one of the pages. Occasionally she’d mutter, “I’ll give them stickers.” Or, “Suddenly she’s Miss Popular, and she doesn’t want Nellie anymore.” Then, after a while, she became silent.

  Zoe was getting to the end of the case files. She had a handful of possible leads, but nothing more.

  “Catherine emptied her bank account,” O’Donnell suddenly said.

  Zoe turned to look at her. “What?”

  “She began to withdraw funds every week. The sums weren’t particularly high—two hundred or three hundred a week, but she was consistently emptying her account.”

  “Did her father mention anything about it?”

  “No, nothing.”

  “Drug habit? Gambling?”

  “No drugs found in her home, but I’ll make sure the toxicology tests include the widespread drugs she might have used. No online gambling in her browsing history, and no evidence of real-life gambling, either, so far, though it’s possible. In any case, she was about to run out of cash. She has one hundred seventy-five dollars and change in her account. I’ll ask the nearby bank for ATM security footage for her withdrawals.”

  “Why?”

  “To see if anyone was with her when she withdrew the cash. And maybe get a glimpse of her state of mind when she did it. Was she crying? Was she getting the shakes?” O’Donnell shrugged. “I’ll know it when I see it.”

  It sounded like a long shot, but Zoe supposed it couldn’t hurt. “Good idea.”

  “I’m not actually going to arrest five-year-olds. Or start a sticker war.”

  “Glad to hear it.”

  “I’m just tired and frustrated. And kinda sick of nuts.” O’Donnell pushed the nut jar away from her. “I accidentally skip meals, and then I end up eating those damn nuts.”

  “There’s your real problem,” Zoe said. “This is a clear case of chocolate withdrawal.”

  “I don’t really like chocolate.”

  Zoe tried to adopt a playful tone, like Andrea did when she joked around. “Are you an alien? From planet Mars?”

  O’Donnell frowned and tilted her head. “Um. No.”

  Joking wasn’t Zoe’s strong suit, but she tried again. “When I think about it, even an alien from Mars would like chocolate. Because of the um . . . planet name.” She could feel her joke dying in her mouth. Maybe someone else could deliver that pun hilariously, but with Zoe it ended up as flat and stale as a year-old cracker.

  “Oh, really?” O’Donnell folded her arms, letting a small smile show. “Well, I’m from planet Snickers, and we despise chocolate.”

  Zoe frowned, trying to figure out if O’Donnell was making fun of her. She finally decided that wasn’t the case. “Here, let me show you.” She got up.

  “Where are you going?”

  “To the snack dispenser in the hallway. Or as I like to call it, the emergency chocolate machine.”

  She quickly marched out to the dispenser, got two Kit Kat bars from it, and returned to O’Donnell’s desk, handing her one.

  O’Donnell unwrapped her Kit Kat and took a bite.

  “What are you doing?” Zoe asked, aghast.

  “Eating chocolate,” O’Donnell said, her mouth full, a smudge of chocolate on her front teeth. “Why? What’s the matter?”

  “You don’t eat Kit Kats like that! You break the fingers one by one.” Zoe unwrapped her own chocolate and demonstrated by breaking a Kit Kat finger.

  “It’s unbelievable. You’re patronizing even when it comes to chocolate.” O’Donnell shook her head, still smiling.

  Zoe shrugged and took a bite. She shut her eyes, the sweetness mixing with the leftover saltiness from the nuts. So good. She let the aftertaste linger and then ate two cashew nuts, followed by more chocolate. “These mix really well together.”

  “You’re weird, Bentley.”

  “You can call me Zoe.”

  “Okay then.” O’Donnell took another bite from her own chocolate. “You’re really weird, Zoe. But you’re right. I needed chocolate.”

  CHAPTER 17

  The van’s interior smelled of cigarettes and rotting food. The man in control breathed shallowly through his mouth, trying to ignore the stench. They’d cracked down the windows, despite the night’s chill, to make the wait more bearable, but it would take a lot more than that faint breath of air to get rid of the smell.

  He’d wanted to take a good rental, but Daniel had insisted they rent this used van for cash, leave as little trace as possible. And he trusted Daniel’s intuition.

  His friend sat in the passenger
’s seat, biting his nails. He’d been jittery all afternoon, had almost canceled the hunt. Daniel’s photo had been circulated on some local news websites. They got his name wrong, calling him “Rod Glover,” which should have been good news, but it just made Daniel angry. He’d even snapped once when they were getting ready, though he had quickly apologized.

  The man in control understood. Everything was difficult when it became public.

  The train station’s parking lot was almost empty now; most of the vehicles had left during the early evening. They had been there for the past four hours because Daniel had said it was important to enter the parking lot during the busy hours to avoid any attention. When the eleven p.m. train had arrived, they’d both tensed, but all the passengers who had passed through the parking lot had walked in groups, except for two men. And besides, there were still too many people.

  The midnight train was better. His heart thrummed when he watched the few figures crossing the parking lot. One was alone—a woman. But Daniel shook his head, not saying a word. She was the wrong kind of woman. Daniel had a way of knowing which was the right kind.

  The man in control fidgeted. The one-thirty train was about to arrive. The seconds ticked slowly. Daniel didn’t seem to mind; he sat in his seat, hardly blinking, his lips somewhere between a grimace and a grin.

  He kept thinking about that baby. It would have been so easy to grab it. At the time, he’d lost his nerve, but would it have really been so risky? It had been dark; he would have grabbed it and dashed off before the woman could even react. And there was nothing purer than a baby. People shoved endless shit into their bodies as they grew up. Junk food, sugar, cigarettes, drugs. Their blood changed as a result, became tainted. But a baby would be different. It would—

  He shifted in his seat, trying to break the train of thought. They weren’t here for a baby. They were here for a woman.

  “What if it’s a bust?” he asked Daniel.

  “Then we’ll come again tomorrow,” Daniel said. “This is a good place to wait. Trust me.”

  He did. Except he needed someone soon. He needed the blood. “Okay, but—”

  “Just focus on the plan. Do you remember the plan?”

  “Yes.”

  “You walk after her. Not too close. If she screams, it’s over, you got that? If you see her calling someone, you get that phone before she has time to say a word.”

  “I remember.” He did. He was in control. He remembered.

  “I know you do.” Daniel turned to him, gave him a smile. “You’re as cool as ice, you know that?”

  The man in control was glad for the darkness, as he felt his face getting warm.

  The screech of the train behind them made him clench his jaw. He’d always been terrified of trains. As a kid, he’d throw a fit every time his mother tried to take him on one. As a grown-up, he’d avoided them completely. Until he met Daniel, he’d never thought trains had other uses. You didn’t have to ride them. You could wait for them to come to you.

  The train rumbled as it left. The man in control searched around for the passengers. Only one figure moved in the darkness. For a moment his body tightened, but then he saw it was a large fat man.

  “Damn it,” Daniel whispered.

  Would they wait for the next train? It was freezing in the van, and he needed to pee, and it stank, and—

  “Look.” Daniel leaned forward in his seat, excitement in his eyes.

  Another passenger. Walking slowly. Thin, petite, long curly hair. She had her eyes on the fat man in front of her. She must have waited on purpose because she didn’t want this man walking behind her. She’d thought he was the risk.

  The man in control grabbed the door handle. Daniel caught his arm.

  “Wait,” he said. “Not yet.”

  “But if she gets to her car—”

  “She won’t. That’s her car, over there.” Daniel pointed at one of the farthest vehicles. “See how she’s looking at it? I bet she’s regretting parking so far away now.”

  The man in control waited. Breath held, his heart racing, teeth almost chattering.

  “Okay,” Daniel said. “Go. Don’t forget the bag. And remember, not too fast.”

  The man in control shouldered his bag and got out of the van without shutting the door behind him, just like they’d planned. He followed the woman, his steps long, hurried. He tried to make as little noise as he could, the sound of his feet on the paved parking lot thudding in his ears as if amplified. The woman hadn’t noticed him yet. She strode briskly, probably both cold and afraid. Daniel was right: he could see how she focused on her car, her sanctuary. She rummaged in her bag, and he prepared to lunge as soon as he saw the shape of a phone. But all she took out were her car keys. She was completely intent on her one purpose—getting into her car.

  And then she glanced backward. She saw him. If she screams, it’s over.

  But she didn’t. Daniel had told him they almost never screamed at first. They walked away, mind churning with denial, hoping that the man following them was just a random guy. They were scared, but they didn’t want to cause a scene.

  She walked faster, getting away from him. He needed to keep pace. Daniel had told him not to give chase. That wasn’t the plan. He had to stick to the plan, he was in control, and the plan was that he just follow her, get her away from the road and the station. He was in control, he was . . .

  He ran now, his mouth full of saliva. He could smell her scent in the air, perfume, and shampoo, and sweat, and underneath it all, warm blood. He was almost upon her. She glanced back and screamed.

  If she screams, it’s over.

  He didn’t care. He kept running, chasing her—she was almost within his grasp. But she had reached her car, was about to unlock it, to drive away.

  Daniel’s figure unfolded into view. He’d circled the parking lot and had waited for her behind the car, and now he grabbed her, hand over her mouth before she could yell for help. She squirmed in his arms, struggling, her screaming muffled.

  “I got her,” Daniel hissed. “Damn it, why did you—”

  He gasped as the woman elbowed his stomach. Daniel’s hold over the woman became lax, and she clawed at his arms, raking them. Daniel let out a grunt of pain and pushed her, and she fell to the ground. The scent of blood filled the air.

  She stumbled as she ran away from them, but in the wrong direction. She should have headed toward the road, toward help, and the train station’s security. Instead, she ran the other way. She screamed now, but her voice was breathless, shuddering with fear. She was in a deserted parking lot, the few commercial buildings around them empty for the night.

  The man in control ran after her, the thrill of the chase filling him with pure ecstasy. This was what he was born to do. As he ran, getting farther away from the road, the ground changed, gravel crunching under his soles, the moonlight shining on cracks crisscrossing the pavement. Ahead, the shadows of trees loomed. She saw them, swerved to the right, toward the structures, toward civilization.

  Too late.

  He crashed into her, and they both tumbled to the ground. He bit his tongue, a sharp blinding pain, and then he could taste his own blood, which only excited him more for what was to come. She struggled under him, trying to push him away, but her movements were sluggish. She looked dazed. Perhaps she’d hit her head; it didn’t really matter.

  He had a syringe in his bag. But he didn’t need it. He was a predator. She was prey. Slamming her head to the ground, he ripped the scarf off her neck. Bent down, her scent enveloping him, intoxicating.

  He bit hard.

  She screamed so loud that his ears rang, but he was beyond caring about screams, about getting caught. Her taste filled his mouth, salty and wonderful. He grunted as he slurped the bleeding wound, the world fading away around him. Only this mattered.

  And then he was shoved away. He blinked in confusion, raised his eyes. Daniel stood above him, looking furious.

  “Jesus!” Daniel spat. �
�What’s the matter with you?”

  The words made no sense. Wasn’t this what they were there to do? He licked his lips, the tangy taste of the woman divine. He wanted more.

  “No!” Daniel pushed him away. He lunged, punched Daniel in the face. Daniel stumbled back, blinking in shock. For a few seconds neither of them moved.

  Then the woman groaned.

  “We’ll take her to the trees,” Daniel said, his voice clear and forceful. There was no arguing with that voice.

  The man in control nodded, feeling drunk.

  They dragged the woman to the trees, and he glimpsed the dark shape of the channel beyond them, the moonlight gleaming on the brackish water.

  “Here’s good,” Daniel said, and the man in control heard an echo of his own intoxication in his friend’s voice.

  “Remember your job,” Daniel said.

  For a second he didn’t. What was his job? But then he recalled the plan, the details. Why they were doing it all. He checked his bag and nodded at Daniel.

  Daniel pushed the woman to her knees, wrapped a tie around her throat. The man in control had seen his friend do this before at Catherine’s home. Back there, it had been shocking; he’d nearly lost his nerve. But now he was ready. Didn’t even flinch when Daniel cut the woman’s pants.

  Something was wrong. His friend muttered to himself, sounding furious. The woman gagged, trying to breathe, and Daniel prodded at her, hit her, sounding more and more enraged.

  It took the man in control a second to understand what the problem was. Daniel was struggling to get an erection. The man in control looked away, embarrassed, but then recalled his own job. He had an important part to play. He unslung his bag and opened it, began performing his task. The woman’s eyes bulged, no sound coming from her now, her fingers clawing at the tie around her throat. Daniel yanked it hard, cursing, voice hoarse.

  And then she was lying in the mud.

  “Damn it!” Daniel snarled. “Fucking bitch!” He kicked her.

  “Daniel,” the man in control said.