[Killing Game 01.0] Invitation to Die

by Jaden Skye

  Hunter took the seat opposite Tracy, opened his computer forcefully, and stared at it unblinkingly. Then he rubbed his forehead slowly. It was an old habit of his that Tracy remembered.

  “You saw the crime scene photos of both women?” he started.

  “I saw the location the bodies turned up in,” Tracy quickly corrected him. “The women could have been killed anywhere and dumped.”

  “I know, I know.” Hunter tossed her comment to the side. “We take what we get. For now this is what we have to work with. This is the crime scene.”

  “Okay.” Tracy let him continue. But if a crime scene wasn’t the place where the victim had been killed, it had different implications for understanding the mind of the killer. Tracy had to know exactly where they’d been killed, along with how. It made a difference. She would deal with that later on. Right now she needed to hear what they had.

  “From the looks of it, the second victim, Shannon Glaze, was strangled to death,” Hunter started. “There was a thin ligature around her neck. After that, the killer twisted and mangled her. Of course we have to wait for corroboration by the medical examiner, but that’s the early take on it. Agree?”

  Tracy nodded. She’d thought as much from seeing the photos.

  “Shannon’s body was placed on the boat before the rides opened. So the killer had access to the Gardens. Does he work there? Hang around regularly? Did someone at the Garden spot a strange-looking guy?” Hunter continued.

  “Good questions,” Tracy responded. “Though I doubt he’d present as a strange-looking guy.”

  “Why?” Hunter was stopped for a moment. “It’s obvious we’ve got a real psychopath on our hands.”

  “Not so obvious yet,” Tracy corrected him. “There are all kinds of possibilities to be explored. I’m not ready to discount anything yet. Give me a little time to check out the crime scenes first and conduct some interviews. How long was the second victim dead before you found her?”

  “Not sure yet, but again from the early look of it, her death was recent,” said Hunter.

  “That makes a difference,” Tracy mused. “He kept her alive awhile then, and tortured her.”

  “No direct signs on her body of her having been tortured,” Hunter filled in. “We have about two weeks between the time she went missing and when her body turned up dead. Anything could have gone on.”

  “What?” asked Tracy. “That’s crucial. I have to know the time of death exactly. The exact length of time he kept her alive is important. It will tell us more about what happened between them. Of course, that message he left on the boat is the heart of everything.”

  “Maybe,” Hunter remarked, “but this could also be a copycat crime. Obviously, the killer’s crazed for attention, letting the victim be found like that. I’m not sure we have just one killer, though. The two victims lived such different lives and were killed so differently. The first victim’s body was dumped right after she was killed. He held the second victim longer. Right now it’s hard to see any true links between them. That’s why we’re thinking there could be more than one killer.”

  Tracy disagreed. “There’s just one killer,” she insisted.

  “What do you base that on?” Hunter looked put off.

  “Along with placing his victims out in the public in pure daylight, the killer’s also camouflaging himself with every act,” said Tracy.

  Clay sat forward. “How’s he doing that?”

  “His choosing such different victims and killing them in such different ways is not accidental,” said Tracy. “He’s trying to garble his signature and MO, while taunting us to find him.”

  “Either that or he’s desperate and wants to be stopped. He wants to be found,” Clay chimed in.

  “Both can be true at the same time,” said Tracy, “but the central point is that this guy is playing a cat-and-mouse game with us. The note he left is just icing on the cake. The police and public are also his victims. He’s trying to outsmart us at every turn. The third victim will make it all clearer.”

  Hunter’s head shot up like an arrow. “We’re not expecting a third victim. Let’s stay positive here.”

  Tracy was stunned. “You don’t truly expect that the killing is over?”

  “I don’t expect anything, I never expect anything,” said Hunter in a steely tone. “I take one day and one fact at a time.” Obviously, Tracy’s comment had hit a sore spot.

  “Right now we’re going on the hypothesis that this could definitely be a copycat killer,” Clay intervened trying to bolster Hunter.. “The reason for that is that the second body was found in a park filled with families. This particular killer is mocking family life, shaking up kids. The first victim was a prostitute, found in a back alley quickly after she was killed.”

  Tracy’s heart clenched for a moment, hurt for Tina. “She was more than a prostitute, she was a person, Clay.”

  “Of course, of course, I didn’t mean to malign her.” Clay looked as though he felt sorry, too. “I’m just pointing to the completely different nature of the victims.”

  Tracy knew Clay meant well and this certainly wasn’t the time to get sidetracked. “I’d love to hear about what you guys got from your interviews with Tina’s family and friends,” she continued. Most likely they hadn’t yet had a chance to speak to many of Shannon’s contacts.

  “What we have so far is interesting,” Hunter intervened. “I sent you a summary of the written reports of interviews in the file.”

  Tracy had read it, but wanted more. “What else can you tell me?”

  “I thought the report spoke for itself,” Hunter said. “First victim got hooked on drugs and went downhill from there. Not such an unusual story.”

  “Each story is unusual,” Tracy countered. “Like each person’s fingerprints, no two are the same.”

  Hunter stayed cool. “Right now there’s lots of people who could have killed Tina,” he went on. “It could be jealous co-workers, a hungry pimp, johns who got wasted, a passing encounter that went too far.”

  “Tina has a brother Kirk who cared about her,” Tracy chimed in.

  “Yeah, that’s true. So what?” Hunter replied, looking up at Tracy, curious. “He cared about her, and still look how she ended up.”

  “I want to talk to the brother,” Tracy noted. “Also this guy Salty, her pimp.”

  “We spoke to both of them already,” said Hunter.

  “I want to do it again,” Tracy insisted.

  Hunter made a sour face. “Is that the best use of your time here, Tracy?”

  “Let her do it. You know how she works,” Clay chimed in. “Tracy’s a magnet for strange tidbits of information that lead us right where we need to go.”

  Hunter put both hands on the desk flatly, as if surrendering. “You’re right, she is. I know it,” he said.

  “Have you spoken to anyone who knew Shannon yet?” Tracy asked him. Hunter seemed more high-strung than usual.

  “Yeah, sure, we’ve done initial interviews,” he answered looking momentarily distressed. “We’ve had people she knew coming into the office all day today. She had two little kids, a great husband, and from what we can tell, everyone loved her at work. People are totally freaking. This is the last thing anyone could have imagined.”

  “Tina’s death could easily be imagined,” commented Tracy, “but someone like Shannon’s could not. What does that tell us about the killer?”

  “We need to find out more about both victims first,” Clay responded in a low tone.

  “You guys find anything in the back alley where Tina was dumped?” Tracy shifted the focus a little bit now.

  “The place was combed carefully,” Hunter picked up on it. “We found half a footprint that doesn’t match anything we have in the records. That’s it.” Hunter looked upset. “Nothing was found on the body, nothing! No fingerprints, hairs, DNA, or unexpected presents from the perv.”

  “We’ve got a professional on our hands here,” murmured Tracy. “This guy
knows what he’s doing.”

  “There was no sexual activity either,” Hunter added for good measure. “Not with either victim.”

  “Important point!” Tracy exclaimed.

  “Yes, it is,” Hunter agreed. “From the nature of the crime we would have expected that both victims would have definitely been raped. They weren’t.”

  “That leaves out a john who got wasted or a passing encounter that went bad,” Tracy commented.

  “Possibly, but not definitely,” Hunter replied. “Could be we’re looking at a sadistic perv who gets his thrill from the killing itself and doesn’t need the sex that goes with it.. Doesn’t mean he doesn’t want it other times.”

  “Possible,” said Tracy, but she didn’t think so. “Tina was slashed across her breasts and belly. Then she was placed in a sexually degraded position. This pattern’s almost always accompanied by rape and torture, either before or after death. The fact that there was no sexual activity here is unusual. We shouldn’t minimize it. It’s an important clue.”

  Tina noticed Clay nodding emphatically. Hunter also listened without batting an eye.

  “Was the guy impotent, unable to perform?” Tracy continued. “Was he taking out his fury about it on a woman who slept with lots of guys? Or, is this a guy who hates sex, a moralist who’s cleaning up the neighborhood? For him Tina could just have been filth.”

  Clay balked a moment and then settled back down. Tracy knew it was hard to hear her talk this way. She didn’t care.

  “These points have to be kept in mind,” Tracy insisted. “They narrow the field.”

  “Good points, good thinking.” Hunter tapped his hands on the desk formidably.

  Tracy sensed that he wanted her to stop a minute. But the image of Tina stuck in the back alley haunted her. She couldn’t stop. “Did Tina have some weird encounters online, maybe?” Tracy continued. “Did you check her social media?”

  “We checked it,” Clay joined in. “There was nothing out of the order. And, believe it or not, I even found some emails from her girlfriends back home.”

  That surprised Tracy. Usually most ties to home dissolved when someone became a prostitute. The streets were a world of their own. The fact that Tina got emails from old friends said something about her.

  “Did Tina actually go back home to visit?” Tracy asked.

  “I don’t know that,” said Clay, “but her emails to her friends didn’t sound so different from other young women’s.”

  Clay always looked for and found the best in everyone. That touched Tracy. “It’s important information,” she responded. “Tina’s killer could have been someone from back home. What about her other brother or the rest of her family?”

  “I doubt that very much,” Hunter interrupted. “This is a normal family that attends church regularly.”

  “She must have been a tremendous shame to them,” Tracy noted.

  “I’m sure she was,” snapped Hunter, “but to assume they killed her? Far afield.”

  “Law enforcement has interviewed lots of people in Tina’s life,” Clay went on methodically. “She was a dancer at the club and they’ve spoken to people who knew her there. She was also attending recovery meetings for drugs. The police talked to people who attended the meetings. Nobody noticed anything peculiar, or knew of anyone in her life who bothered or stalked her in any way.”

  The fact that she attended recovery meetings struck Tracy. “How long had she been going to those meetings?” she asked. “I know she ran away from rehab a few years ago. What got her to go back? Did someone go with her? Could the killer have been someone she met at the meetings?”

  “Keep speculating, Tracy,” Clay was excited. “Even the most outlandish possibilities could lead somewhere.”

  “Of course, keep speculating, that’s why you’re here,” Hunter quickly agreed.

  Whether or not Hunter agreed, Tracy was on a roll. “You said the second victim was also not sexually assaulted,” she went on. “That’s important. At least we have one fingerprint of the killer, the same trait in both crimes. No sexual activity.”

  “I wouldn’t go overboard about this,” Hunter cautioned. “The second victim’s a mom who teaches nursery school. That’s about as far away from Tina as you can get.”

  “Maybe not in the mind of the killer,” said Tracy. “We have to know what these women represent to him, why he chose them, what he got out of the killing. Tell me more about Shannon.”

  “We’ll talk more to her friends and family tomorrow. You’ll join us,” said Hunter.

  “Great,” Tracy replied, “and I also want to talk to the people who knew Tina and visit both crime scenes personally.”

  Hunter threw his head back and took a deep breath.

  Tracy stood up then and straightened her slacks. “I want to see everything with my own eyes,” she insisted.

  “You will.” Hunter stood up opposite her. “You’ll probably see more than you bargained for this time around. Meet us back here at eight sharp tomorrow morning. You need some rest and so do we. We’ve got you a suite in the same hotel as before, a few blocks away. If you need anything in the meantime, or if something comes up, you’ve got my cell phone number and I have yours. Keep your phone next to you and keep it on. We have to be ready. Is there anything else you suggest we do so far?”

  Tracy slid to the edge of her seat. “Time is of the essence. Let’s smoke him out right away. He wants to play cat-and-mouse, so let’s play it. He wants to make things public, that’s fine with me. Call the news and announce that I’m on the case. Let’s scare him a little, up the ante. Once he’s off his game, even a little, a guy like this can make an important slip.”

  Chapter 4

  Tad Warehouse had a good job in Boston. He was pleased with it, it satisfied him. And the people he worked with liked him, too. If you asked any of them they would tell you Tad was one of the most reliable workers on board. Needless to say, that made Tad very happy. It mattered to him what people thought. And it mattered to him how people acted. Mattered to him very much.

  After a long day’s work, Tad liked coming home and going over his day. He’d sit in a chair and look out the back window at the scraggly field behind his house, remembering everything that happened that day. Tad wouldn’t even let even a small detail go by. He liked figuring what he did right and what he did wrong. He’d make a list of every single thing that happened and put them in two columns, one right, one wrong. If there were more rights on the list, it had been a good day. If there were more wrongs, he didn’t sleep well that night.

  Now it was still light outside, almost seven o’clock. Spring was definitely here, Tad realized. But today had been way too sunny, and Tad felt dizzy. He’d just eaten a dinner which was spoiled, through and through. He knew it was spoiled while he ate it and that he’d feel rotten later, but he couldn’t bring himself to waste any food. Do you know how many poor people there were who went to bed hungry. It bothered him. The very least he could do to make up for it was to finish what was on his plate, no matter how rancid. Tad wasn’t quite sure whether to put that into the right or wrong column. He was right, he finally decided, to do what he could to help the universe.

  But there was plenty of stuff today for the wrong column, too. Tad made a mistake doing so many errands in weather like this. It was too much. How dare it get so hot this early in spring anyway? May was just the beginning of everything, the time for planting flowers, wasn’t it?

  What else did he do wrong? He didn’t smile back at that young lady who smiled at him in front of Molly’s Deli. He should have, he knew, but she looked too needy. She was definitely someone he’d never get rid of. One smile from him would be all it took. Tad put that encounter in the wrong column and marked it with a star.

  There was plenty else to think about, too. Tad let his mind roll back and forth not only over the day, but his whole life. When he did that it gave him a feeling that nothing changed or ever went away. He smiled to himself now, thinking of
his mother. Spring never meant much to her. She hardly noticed the seasons, always planted flowers much too early.

  Tad always warned her, too. “Ma, if you plant flowers this early, they’re not gonna grow.”

  “Everything grows sooner or later, son,” his mama would say to him, smiling her crooked smile, showing her little teeth. Tad didn’t like seeing those ugly teeth, but never told her so. Of course she didn’t listen to a thing he said, just kept planting anyway, right in the middle of winter, too. Knocking herself out for nothing.

  When Tad saw her do that he’d laugh. “Some things die before they’re born, Ma,” Tad liked to warn. “Look, it’s freezing, the wind’s blowing, the earth is tough. Give it at least another month.”

  Do you think she listened? Of course not. Why would she listen to a rotten kid like him, whose father left the family the very day he was born?

  “Your dad just took one look at you, son, gritted his teeth, and backed out of here fast.” Tad’s mother told him that over and over. “Did he even leave us a thank-you note? Nah, he took it all for granted. You gonna go find him for me one day and bring him back home again?”

  “Maybe I will,” Tad told her, “you never can tell. Maybe one day I’ll be beautiful and he’ll be happy to see me again.” If that ever happened, Tad would put that in the right column for sure.

  “Beautiful, you?” His mother rocked with laughter.

  When springtime came and her flowers didn’t bloom, Tad looked at the scrawny leaves that pushed up through the soil and jeered at her.

  “See, I told you,” he said, pointing at them.

  “Shut yourself right up,” his mom snapped back at him.

  “Okay, Mom, I’m shutting up.” Tad would grab his school bag and skittle away down the block, looking at all the other yards, where irises, geraniums, and tulips would soon be blooming, flaunting themselves in the warm sunshine, making a fool of her!

  Of course that was years ago. But it was spring again now, wasn’t it? Tad wondered if his mother could see him these days, planting flowers everywhere?