by J. D. Barker
Weidner’s eyes fell on Porter for a moment, and then he turned back to the warden. “Good morning, sir. What can I do for you?”
The warden pointed to the other vacant chair, and the guard sat, moving slowly. Prison guards always seemed to move with caution, running every possible scenario before making a move—at least the good ones did. The rest tended to get hurt. Considering the scar, Porter wasn’t quite sure which camp Weidner fell into.
“This is Detective Sam Porter with Chicago Metro. He’s chasing down a lead and asked for our assistance,” the warden explained. He nodded at Porter. “Do you have that photograph?”
Porter pulled the photo from his jacket pocket and handed it to the guard. “He pointed at the woman walking between the two guards. “Do you recognize her?”
Weidner tilted his head a little to the right. “She’s a doe.”
“A what?”
“A doe. Unidentified. Jane Doe number 2138, I believe,” Weidner said, returning the photograph. “What’s this about?”
The warden pulled his computer keyboard closer and typed with both index fingers. “Jane Doe number 2138. She joined us on January eighteenth of this year, a little over three weeks ago. She’s been arraigned, pled guilty, and is awaiting sentencing. Picked up for grifting down on Bourbon.”
“I guess your catch-and-release policy doesn’t apply to petty theft?” Porter said.
The warden scrolled through the screen. “She stole the wallet of a man from Jersey, and it contained . . . oh, that’s rough.”
“What?”
“He had five hundred and twelve dollars in his wallet,” the warden said. “Theft of anything over five hundred in Orleans Parish carries a felony charge. If the man had bought one more hurricane, she would have most likely been tagged with a misdemeanor and would be heading home soon. As it stands, she’s looking at a minimum stay of two years, maybe longer, if this isn’t her first offense.”
“Ouch.”
“Yeah. Well, if you’re gonna play, though, you gotta be ready to pay,” Warden Vina said. “Apparently, she had three other wallets on her person. None of the identification matched her, and she hasn’t given her name.”
“What about her prints?”
Vina shook his head. “Not in the system, ours or national. She has one identifying mark, a small tattoo on her wrist.” He turned the monitor around so Porter could get a better look.
Porter’s eyes widened. He leaned over the desk. It was a small figure eight, identical to the one found on the wrist of Jacob Kittner, the man killed by a city bus and originally believed to be 4MK. Bishop branded Emory Connors with the same tattoo. “I need to see her,” he said.
The warden turned the monitor back around. “We’ll need to get permission. She’s lawyered up.”
Porter frowned. “How’d she get a lawyer without providing a name?”
Weidner cleared his throat. “I was there for that. It happened on intake during her initial interview. She didn’t say a word from the moment we took her off the bus until more than an hour after we sat her down in Interrogation. She just stared at the detective running the questioning, Detective Dunleavy. She had this grin on her face the whole time. After an hour or so, she leaned across the table and said three words: ‘Lawyer, Sarah Werner.’ Then she leaned back in her chair, folded her arms, and smiled again. I don’t know how Dunleavy kept his cool. I sure as shit couldn’t.” He caught his language and glanced at the warden, who waved him off.
“Who’s Sarah Werner? A local?” Porter asked.
“You’d have to ask Dunleavy,” Weidner replied.
The warden put his phone on speaker and dialed a number.
A gruff voice answered. “Yeah?”
“Dunleavy? This is Warden Vina at the OPP. I’m here with a detective from Chicago and one of our guards. What can you tell me about that Jane Doe from a few weeks back? Represented by Sarah Werner?”
“Oh, hell. That bullshit again?” Dunleavy sighed. “Not much to tell about the crime. She got caught grifting the wrong pocket. He said he’d been pickpocketed in the past and had a habit of checking his wallet sporadically when he walked in public. She gave him a light tap walking past, his fingers went to his pocket, discovered the lack of wallet bulge, and he grabbed her arm. She countered with a mean scratch to the side of his face and started screaming at him, random shit like ‘I’m not coming back, you’ve got to let me go! I’m not gonna let you hurt me anymore, I’ve had enough!’ That got the attention of a couple local boys who had been partaking in happy hour at the Crooked Broom. They came stumbling out, pulled the two apart, and proceeded to beat the hell out of the guy.”
“Crap,” the warden said.
“Broke two ribs, knocked out three teeth, and blackened up both his eyes real good. Could have been much worse, but the man’s wife came out of the bar at that point, saw her husband at the wrong end of the shitkickery, and screamed.” Dunleavy took a breath and went on. “Scream number two was enough for the local boys to snap out of caveman mode, and one of them grabbed our little grifter before she could disappear in the crowd. A tourist saw the local grab her, thought he might hurt her, and nearly got into a fight of his own pulling her away from him. PD showed up at that point and pulled everyone off everyone and sent them to neutral corners in zip-tie cuffs until they could sort things out.” Dunleavy covered the phone and shouted something to someone. Porter couldn’t make it out. He came back a moment later. “I didn’t have the privilege of meeting Ms. Doe until they got her back to HQ and set her up with accommodations in one of our interview rooms. At that point the conversation was decidedly one-sided. I worked her for a bit, got absolutely nowhere, and then she played the lawyer card.”
“Sarah Werner.”
“Yeah, Sarah Werner.”
The men went quiet. The warden looked at Porter, who nodded, then glanced down at the phone. “Thanks, Rick. If we need anything else, we’ll be in touch.” “Wonderful, you do that.”
The line went dead, and Warden Vina pressed the Off button, leaning back in his chair. “Getting you in to see her will be tough. As a civilian, you’d have to have her agree to meet with you and put you on her visitors list. As a detective, you can’t be allowed in to see her unless her attorney clears it first. Either way, there is some hoop jumping in your immediate future.”
Porter said, “Where can I find Sarah Werner?”
41
Larissa
Day 3 • 8:53 a.m.
Black murk, tiny flecks of color and dust spinning through the air, dancing in her vision. Larissa Biel rolled over, reached for her quilt to pull it over her head.
Saturday.
No class today.
No class meant sleeping in. No school meant she could burrow under her thick quilt and sleep until midmorning, maybe later if she wanted to. Her mother was working today. The house was empty, quiet. Then she remembered her appointment with the driving school. She’d set an alarm. The alarm would go off soon. Until then, though, she could sleep. She reached for her quilt, and her hands found nothing.
Her room sounded funny. An unfamiliar electric buzz, equipment running.
Larissa had already gotten up.
She had left the house.
She remembered walking to the corner in the cold to meet the instructor, getting into his car.
Her mattress was cold and hard. Her bedding smelled awful.
“Would you like milk? I brought you milk.”
The voice was soft, hesitant, a stranger. Larissa fought back the sleep, willed her eyes to open. When they fluttered open, so heavy and tired, a pain wrapped around them, like someone had beat around in her head with a golf club and squeezed.
“It might be warm now, but warm is good. I like warm milk.”
He’d stabbed her with something, the instructor. Right after she fastened the seat belt, there was a prick at her thigh, a sharp pain. She remembered looking down, seeing the needle, seeing him push the plunger on the needle
.
Nothing then.
The dim basement came into view, the shadow sitting on the stairs at the opposite wall, chainlink between them.
Larissa sat up and nearly fell back over, her vision filling with a quick white light before leveling back off. The room was dark. The only light coming from somewhere at the top of the staircase.
“The milk will help get the drug out of your system. I’m sorry I had to do that to you, but you wouldn’t have come if I hadn’t.”
The man in the black knit cap, the instructor.
She was in a cage, a chainlink cage, wrapped in a filthy green quilt on a concrete floor. Her head snapped around, taking in her surroundings. A water tank, heater, workbench. There was an old white freezer against the wall with the stairs, but it must have been broken—the freezer made no sound and the lid was open, leaning against the wall.
At the base of the freezer there was something on the floor covered with a painter’s tarp. She saw herself under that tarp, being found under that tarp.
“What’s that?” she said, her voice hoarse.
He stood up from the steps, fast, angry. “Never mind that. You never mind that.”
She heard him shuffle closer, one leg dragging slightly behind him. He stopped about three feet away and scratched at his knit cap. Larissa saw his eyes now, dark around them, sunken in his face. They looked gray, listless, the eyes of a much older man. They were bloodshot, and dried tears crusted in the corners.
“Don’t look at me, not like that.” He took a step back, backlit now by the light at the top of the staircase, his features obscured.
Larissa forced herself to her feet, every muscle in her body protesting, weak and tight. The filthy green quilt fell to the floor. Her jacket was gone. She crossed her arms at her chest, pulled the sleeves of her sweater down, and curled her hands up inside. “If you let me go, I won’t tell anyone about this. It can be our little secret.” She thought about the dance tonight, she thought about Kevin Dew. She couldn’t be here, this wasn’t real. “My parents know where I am. They know I met you for lessons. If I’m gone too long, they’ll report me missing. They’ll call the police. Do you want that? If you let me go, it won’t come to that. I’ll forget all about this.”
This was a lie. Her father had left early for the construction site, and her mother had planned to go into the office. She liked to work on Saturday afternoons because nobody else was there. Her parents planned to go out to dinner tonight, and both knew Larissa was going to the Valentine’s Day dance. When they got home from work, they’d just assume she was at a friend’s getting ready—they wouldn’t expect her back until midnight, maybe later. Nobody would be looking for her. Nobody would miss her.
“Are you of clear mind and soul?”
He had trouble pronouncing the word soul, and he made a strange grunt afterward, as if angry with himself.
“I don’t understand.”
He leaned forward for a moment, caught himself, and slipped back into the shadows. “To see, you must be pure. To be pure, you must be of clear mind and soul.” He began to rub his thumb and forefinger together in a circular pattern, some kind of nervous tic. “The last one, she wasn’t of clear mind and soul, and I think that’s why she couldn’t see. It will be different for you. I’m certain.”
Larissa’s eyes went back to the tarp on the floor.
“The sooner we start, the sooner you’ll be free. You want to be free, don’t you?”
“Yes, I want you to let me go.”
“I can set you free, but I’m afraid I can never let you go.”
She crossed her small cage and went to the gate, secured by a padlock at the top and another at the bottom. She gripped the gate with both hands. “Let me go, you crazy fuck! Let me out of here!”
Aside from the rubbing of his two fingers, the instructor didn’t move, a shadow against darker shadows. He licked at his dry, chapped lips.
Larissa screamed.
She screamed as loud as she could, a scream so loud, her throat burned. She stared him directly in the eyes and screamed until every ounce of air had left her, and then she sucked in another breath and screamed again. When she finally stopped, the room fell into a deep silence, nothing but the hum of electrical appliances and a slight ticking noise from the water heater.
“I sometimes scream too. Screaming makes me feel better,” he told her. “Nobody ever hears me, and they won’t hear you either.”
He started for the stairs, pausing at the foot. “Drink your milk. You’ll need the strength. I’ll be back soon, and we’ll get started.”
She watched as he climbed the steps, favoring his right leg. When he reached the top, she heard a door close. He left the light on.
The glass of milk sat in the corner of her cage, just inside the door. Larissa picked it up, poured out the milk onto the concrete, and wrapped the glass in the green quilt before dropping it to the floor and stomping on it with her shoe. Then she unwrapped the quilt and carefully selected the sharpest shard, a piece about three inches long, holding it in her shaking hand. “Let’s get started, fucker.”
42
Clair
Day 3 • 8:59 a.m.
Clair heard Nash and Klozowski in the hallway a few seconds before they came through the door. They were arguing, something about Neil Diamond.
She shook her head.
When Nash walked into the war room, she tossed a pen at him. He caught it mid-flight.
“What the hell, Clair-bear?”
Kloz ducked past him and shuffled to his desk. “Didn’t Porter instigate a ‘no throwing stuff at the other detectives’ rule?”
“Porter’s on suspension, so that rule is null and void,” she told them. “I’ve got something. This could be big.”
Nash sat on the edge of the conference table. “Good, because we struck out at the car dealer. Turns out Ella Reynolds was paying off a Mazda behind her parents’ backs. We talked to all three employees. Brandon Stringer, one of the sales guys, recognized Ella from her photo, but that was the extent. He was with another customer when she first came in. Cumberland, the owner, handled her from there. None of them knew Lili Davies outside of the news. There’s a mechanic on site, Douglas Fredenburg, but he’s not our guy. He’s got a wife and five kids at home. He wouldn’t have the time to orchestrate a poker game let alone multiple kidnappings and murders. Besides, Cumberland gave him a full alibi. None of them seem right for this. More dead ends.”
Clair had a number of printouts laid out on her desk. She picked one of them up and handed the page to Nash.
“What’s this?”
“Read.”
Nash held the page up and read aloud. “In loving memory of Floyd Bernard Reynolds, May 11, 1962—February 13, 2015. Please join us Monday, February 16, 2015, at 5:00 p.m. at Saint Gabriel of the Sorrowful Virgin Catholic Church for a memorial service honoring Floyd, who was a loving husband and father. There will be a reception immediately following in the church hall.” Nash lowered the page. “It’s the obit for Reynolds, so what?”
Clair retrieved another printout and handed it to Klozowski.
He gave her a sidelong glance, then cleared his throat. “In loving memory of Floyd Bernard Reynolds, May 11, 1962—February 13, 2015. Father of lies, husband of death, finally found peace among the roses. No more flowers please, send only your blessings.”
“That’s a bit dark,” Nash said.
“That’s ex-girlfriend dark,” Kloz agreed, handing the sheet back to Clair.
Clair turned back to Nash. “The one you read appeared in this morning’s Chicago Examiner. This one”—she shook the page in her hand—“ran last Wednesday, before Reynolds died, also in the Examiner.”
Nash reached for the paper. “Let me see that one—”
Clair ignored him and went to the whiteboard. She taped both pages up beneath Floyd Reynolds’s information.
“Or not,” Nash said under his breath.
Clair went back to her desk.
“There’s more.”
She snatched up another sheet and read aloud. “Dr. Randal Frederick Davies, husband of Grace Ann Davies, father of Lili Grace Davies, has left us with bated breath, smelling of lavender and cat’s claw at both the end and start of his wasted journey as he walks in hand to the light.”
“Not exactly ringing of sunshine and rainbows either,” Kloz said.
“Davies died?”
Clair nodded. “Late last night. He suffered a severe stroke. A complication from the drop in blood pressure.”
“They got the obit out that fast?”
Clair walked back to the board and taped the page up under the name Randal Davies. “Whoever ran it didn’t wait for him to die. His obituary ran four days ago, also in the Examiner.”
“So this guy is running obituaries in advance for the people he plans to kill?”
“Yep.”
“What about the girls?” Kloz asked, pulling his laptop from his bag.
“I looked, but I couldn’t find anything on the girls, only the fathers.”
Nash walked over to the whiteboards and studied the printouts. “Do we know who ran them?”
“That’s the odd part.”
“That’s the odd part?”
“I just got off the phone with the woman in charge of obits at the Chicago Examiner. She’s been there for forty-three years, says she personally reads every obituary before they go to print because, in her words, ‘common folk have no respect for grammar,’ and she swears she has never seen the two messages that appeared last week. She did remember the one from today—she even recalled the corrections she made before going to press. When I read her the other messages, she scoffed at them, said she would have flagged both. Apparently obituaries are submitted via a form on the Examiner’s website, and they get their share of false deaths, mainly kids playing pranks. Normal practice is not to run anything without verification. She usually gets a copy of the death certificate or confirms with the funeral home. There is also a charge.” She crossed the room and sat back at her desk. “Obits are big moneymakers for the papers. In all three cases, credit card data was provided. The card used for both of Reynolds’s obituaries is the same and belongs to his wife. The card used for the false obituary on Randal Davies was Grace Davies’s American Express. On the false obits, somebody submitted the data online, then immediately hacked their system and coded them as ‘approved’—they essentially bypassed this woman and the paper’s safeguards by sending them directly to print without any verification.”