One by One

by Chris Carter

  She placed her bag on the floor by the door and rubbed her tired blue eyes for a moment. It felt as if her brain was melting inside her skull. Headache pills had had no effect. What she needed was a long shower, a large glass of wine and a lot of rest.

  ‘Actually,’ she thought better of it, ‘champagne would be much more appropriate.’ After all, all the effort she’d put into her work in the past few weeks had finally paid off.

  In the now dim light of her living room, her eyes found the portrait of her mother on the shiny black console by the window, and she gave a smile full of sadness.

  Christina had never met her father, and she never wanted to. She had been conceived in the men’s restroom of a nightclub in West Hollywood. Her mother was drunk. The guy she had sex with was high on drugs. They had met that night. He was good-looking and charming. She was lonely. After they left the restroom, she never saw him again.

  When Christina was old enough to understand, her mother told her the whole story. She also told her that she couldn’t even remember his name. But her mother wasn’t a bad person. Against all her friends’ advice, she decided not to have an abortion. She had her baby daughter, and she brought her up on her own, in the best way she could. She saved every spare cent, and when Christina graduated from high school her mother had enough put away in a savings account to send her daughter to university. When, four years later, Christina received her diploma, there was no one prouder in that graduation ceremony than her mother.

  That same night, her mother died in her sleep from a brain aneurysm. That had been seven years ago. Christina still missed her like crazy.

  Christina walked into her open-plan kitchen and checked the fridge. She had a bottle of Dom Ruinart 1998 she’d been keeping for a special occasion. Well, this sure as hell was one. She pouted her lips, pondering.

  ‘Should I open it or not?’

  It seemed a shame that she had no one to share it with.

  Christina wasn’t married, and though she’d had plenty of affairs and flings, she wasn’t seeing anyone at the moment. She thought about it for a second longer and decided that right now there was no one she would’ve wanted to share that bottle of champagne with anyway. She reached for it, undid the wire seal and popped the bottle open.

  Christina had been told plenty of times that good wines needed to breathe. She had no idea if the same applied to champagne, but she didn’t care either. She poured herself a glass and had a large sip – heaven. Her headache was already starting to fade.

  Kicking off her shoes, Christina crossed the living room and took the corridor that led deeper into the house, and to her bedroom at the end. Her room was large and a lot more girly than she would like most people to know. Pale peach walls were complemented by a light pink ceiling skirting. Long floral curtains covered the glass sliding doors that led to her backyard and swimming pool. A pink dresser, complete with a mirror and dressing room-style lights, sat in the corner of the room. Her king-size bed, pushed up against the north wall, was overflowing with cushions and stuffed toys.

  Christina placed her glass and the champagne bottle on the bedside table, attached her MP3 player to the portable stereo on the dresser and started dancing to the sound of Lady Gaga while undressing. Off came the shirt, followed by her jeans. She returned to her champagne and poured herself another glass, drinking half of it down before pausing in front of the mirrored wardrobe doors. The champagne was starting to have the desired effect, and she began dancing again while undoing her bra and slipping off her purple panties. Naked, she ran her hands over her breasts, pulled a sexy pose and blew herself a kiss in the mirror before bursting into laughter.

  She unclipped the clasp on her diamond Tag Heuer watch, a present from an old lover, and as she pulled it off her wrist it dropped to the floor, hit her foot and slid under her bed.

  ‘Damn, that hurt,’ she said, bending over to massage her right foot. Without looking, she quickly swept a hand under the bed. Her fingers found nothing. ‘Shit.’

  Christina got down on her hands and knees and brought her face about an inch from the floor.

  ‘There you are.’

  The watch had slid toward the wall against the headboard. To reach it, she had to slide halfway under the bed. As she did, for no reason at all, her gaze wandered across the floor to the other side, and all the way to the glass sliding doors and the bottom edge of her long floral curtains. And that was when she saw them.

  A black pair of male shoes with their heels pushed tight against the glass door.

  Shock and fear caused her eyes to slowly glide up the curtains, and she noticed that at that exact spot the folds didn’t sit right. For Christina, the next few seconds passed in slow motion. Her gaze moved up a little more before stopping dead.

  From inside her room, through the break in the curtains, someone was staring straight back at her.

  Sixteen

  After managing four and a half consecutive hours of sleep, fantastic by his standards, Hunter got to his office at 8:10 a.m. Garcia was already at his desk reading through all the overnight emails – nothing interesting.

  Hunter had taken off his jacket and powered up his computer when the phone on his desk rang.

  ‘Detective Hunter, Homicide Special.’

  ‘Robert, it’s Mike Brindle. I’ve got the result from that partial tire print we got in the alleyway.’

  ‘Anything good?’

  ‘Well, we’ve got a match.’

  ‘I’m listening.’

  ‘The print came from a Goodyear Wrangler ATS tire. Specifically, a P265/70R17.’

  ‘And that means . . .?’

  ‘That we’ve got a common pickup truck tire,’ Brindle explained. ‘The ATS range is used by several truck manufacturers as the original equipment tire on new vehicles. The one in question has been used by Ford for their F-150 and F-250 trucks for the past four years, and by Chevrolet for their Silverado for the past three.’

  ‘Damn!’

  ‘Yep, I’ve asked someone to check. Even with the recession, in the whole of the USA Ford sold about 120,000 F-150 and F-250 trucks in the past year alone. Chevrolet sold around 140,000 Silverados. What percentage of those is dark in color, or has been purchased in California, is something you and your team will have to find out.’

  ‘We’ll get on to it,’ Hunter said. ‘I’m guessing that those tires aren’t very hard to come by either.’

  ‘That’s problem number two,’ Brindle told him. ‘They’re readily available, which means that anybody with an older or even a different brand of truck could drive into a shop and equip their trucks with those specific tires. But they’re an expensive option, so chances are most people would go for a cheaper make if they are buying new tires for an older truck.’

  Hunter nodded in silence.

  ‘Now, as you will remember, the back alley was a blacktop,’ Brindle carried on. ‘Which makes finding things like footprints a lot harder, but with the help of some special lighting we managed to find a few. They belong to at least eight different people.’

  ‘Not surprising,’ Hunter thought, given that that alleyway serviced several different shops.

  ‘But a couple of them were very interesting.’

  ‘In what way?’ Hunter asked.

  ‘They were found just by the space between the third and fourth dumpster, where the body was found. The prints came from a size eleven shoe. Keon Lewis, the only other person we know who had walked around that same area, is a size thirteen. The left shoeprint seems to be more prominent than the right shoe one. That could indicate that the person walked with a slight abnormality, like a limp, depositing more of his weight onto his left leg.’

  ‘Or that he was carrying something heavy,’ Hunter said.

  ‘That’s what I was thinking.’

  ‘Probably over his left shoulder. Not in his arms.’

  ‘Precisely,’ Brindle agreed. ‘He gets the body out of the car, throws it over his left shoulder and carries it to the space be
tween the dumpsters.’ Brindle breathed out. ‘Now, the victim was quite a large man.’

  ‘216 pounds,’ Hunter said.

  ‘Well, carrying 216 pounds over one of your shoulders isn’t for just anyone, Robert,’ Brindle said. ‘The guy you’re looking for is big and strong.’

  Hunter said nothing.

  ‘In the alleyway he was also very careful,’ Brindle continued. ‘Though we found footprints, we got nothing from the sole. No kind of imprint whatsoever.’

  ‘He covered his shoe,’ Hunter concluded.

  ‘Yep. Probably with a plastic bag. I’ve also got toxicology for you.’

  ‘Wow, that was fast.’

  ‘Nothing but the best, my friend.’

  ‘Was the victim drugged?’

  ‘Anesthetized,’ Brindle said. ‘Traces of an intravenous anesthetic – phenoperidine – were found. It’s a strong opioid, and with a little research you would find several illegal drugstores willing to sell it to you over the Internet.’

  ‘The wonders of the modern age,’ Hunter thought. ‘You said traces?’ he queried.

  ‘Yep, almost negligible. If I had to guess, I’d say the killer used it only to subdue the victim for a short period of time. Probably during the abduction process. After the killer had the victim in a safe location, the anesthetic wasn’t re-administered.’

  He scribbled something down on a notepad.

  ‘We’ve also got the results from the voice analysis done on your telephone conversation with the killer,’ Brindle said, moving on. ‘It seems that he was filtering and refiltering his voice several times over, only slightly altering the pitch each time. Sometimes higher, sometimes lower. That’s why, even with the electronic variation, the voice still sounds so normal, so human, but nevertheless unrecognizable if you were to unknowingly have a conversation with him out on the streets.’

  Hunter said nothing in reply. From the corner of his eye Hunter saw Garcia’s face light up as he read something on his computer screen.

  ‘Anyway, I’m emailing you all the results we’ve got so far,’ Brindle said. ‘If anything more comes up from the fibers and hairs, I’ll let you know.’

  ‘Thanks, Mike.’ Hunter put the phone down.

  Garcia hit the ‘print’ button.

  ‘What’s up, Carlos?’

  Garcia collected the printout and showed it to Hunter. It was a black and white portrait of a white male in his mid to late twenties. His light brown hair was short and messy. His face was round with chubby cheeks, a prominent forehead and thin eyebrows. His eyes were dark and almond shaped. On the portrait he had a bit of a spaced-out look on his face.

  Hunter’s eyes widened. He would’ve recognized that face anywhere. He’d stared at it for hours on end. He watched him die again and again. There was no doubt in his mind. He was staring at a photograph of their victim.

  Seventeen

  Hunter finally blinked.

  ‘Where did you get this?’

  Garcia had handed the printout to Hunter and was already back at his computer, reading the email he’d just received.

  ‘Missing Persons. They just sent it over.’

  Hunter’s eyes returned to the photograph.

  ‘He was reported missing on Wednesday,’ Garcia said. ‘It took the Missing Persons’ face recognition program until this morning to partially match that picture to the snapshot we sent them.’

  ‘Who was he?’

  ‘His name was Kevin Lee Parker, twenty-eight years old, from Stanton, in Orange County. He was currently residing in Jefferson Park with his wife, Anita Lee Parker. She was the one who reported him missing. He worked as a manager in a videogames shop in Hyde Park.’

  ‘How long was he missing for?’

  Garcia scrolled down on the attached file that had come with the email. ‘Since Monday. That was the last time his wife saw him. Monday morning, when he left for work. He didn’t go back home that evening.’

  ‘But she only reported him missing on Wednesday,’ Hunter said. ‘Two days ago.’

  Garcia nodded. ‘That’s what it says here.’

  ‘Do we know if he turned up for work on Monday?’

  A little more scrolling. ‘According to his wife, yes. She called the shop on Tuesday morning and they said that he did turn up for work the day before.’

  ‘But not on Tuesday?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Does he have a cellphone?’

  ‘Yes. Ms. Lee Parker has been calling it since Monday evening. No answer.’

  Hunter checked his watch. ‘OK, let’s get the research team to run a check on Mr. Lee Parker’s name. Usual stuff: all the background they can get.’

  ‘They’re already on it,’ Garcia said.

  ‘Great,’ Hunter said, reaching for his jacket. ‘Let’s go talk to Mrs. Lee Parker.’

  Eighteen

  Jefferson Park, with its single-story homes and low-rise apartment buildings, was a small district in southwestern Los Angeles. It had begun as one of the city’s wealthiest areas at the turn of the twentieth century. As the city grew, and newer, more modern neighborhoods were created, wealth started to abandon the area. A century on and Jefferson Park had become just one of many lower-middle-class neighborhoods in a city that never seemed to stop growing.

  At that time in the morning the traffic on Harbor Freeway was a bumper-to-bumper snail procession, and what should’ve been a ten to fifteen-minute drive took the best part of forty-five minutes.

  Kevin Lee Parker’s street looked like a suburban postcard. Set back, single-story houses lined both sides of a road where tall trees shadowed the sidewalks. His house was white with blue windows, a blue door and a two-way pitched terracotta roof. The white picket-style fence that surrounded the property looked like it had received a new coat of paint recently. The front lawn, though, could’ve done with a trim. Two young kids were riding their bicycles up and down the street, incessantly ringing their handlebar bells. As he stepped out of the car, Hunter noticed a neighbor from the next house along studying them over her pristine hedge.

  The short walkway from the wooden gate to the front door of Kevin Lee Parker’s house was old and paved with cement-colored blocks. Several of them were cracked. Some were missing one or two corners.

  They got to the porch and Garcia knocked three times – nothing for a long moment. He was about to knock again when the door was finally opened by a plump woman in her early twenties. Her disheveled hair was dark and short, her face round and meaty. She had a baby propped on her hip. She looked exhausted, and her eyes had the gritty red tint of someone who’d been crying, or had had very little sleep, or both. She just looked at the two detectives without saying a word.

  ‘Ms. Lee Parker?’ Hunter asked.

  She nodded.

  ‘My name is Robert Hunter. I’m with the LAPD. We spoke earlier on the phone.’

  Anita Lee Parker nodded again.

  ‘This is my partner, Detective Carlos Garcia.’ They both showed her their credentials.

  The baby girl in her arms smiled at them and moved her right hand, as if wanting to greet both detectives. Looking at the tiny baby, Hunter smiled back, but inside him his heart sank.

  ‘You find Kevin?’ Anita asked in an anxious voice. She had a strong Puerto Rican accent.

  ‘Could we maybe talk inside, Ms. Lee Parker?’ Hunter suggested.

  For a moment she seemed confused, as if she hadn’t understood him. Then she took a step to her left and showed them inside.

  The front door led them straight into a small living room. On one corner, a portable fan stirred the air, which was heavy with the smell of baby stuff. A three-seat sofa and two armchairs were draped with multicolored sheets that looked like patchwork quilts straight out of the Deep South. A large picture of Jesus decorated one of the walls, and family portraits were scattered around the room. Anita was so nervous she didn’t offer anyone a seat.

  ‘You find Kevin?’ she asked again. Her voice almost faltering. ‘Where is he?
Why he no call me?’

  Anita already seemed on the verge of a breakdown. Hunter had been in that situation too many times before to know that he needed to extract whatever information he could out of her before she went hysterical.

  The baby in her arms was starting to sense her mother’s anxiety. She had gone from smiling to frowning, on the verge of crying.

  ‘Anita,’ Hunter said warmly, indicating the sofa. ‘Why don’t we all have a seat?’

  Again, she looked at him as if confused. ‘Don’t want no seat. Where’s Kevin?’

  The baby girl started kicking her legs and flapping her arms. Hunter smiled at her again. ‘What’s her name?’

  Anita looked down at her daughter with tender eyes and started rocking her. ‘Lilia.’

  Another smile. ‘That’s a beautiful name. And she’s a beautiful baby, but because you’re upset she’s getting upset, see? Babies can sense these things better than anyone, especially from their mothers. If you have a seat, it will help Lilia feel more comfortable. And so will you.’

  Anita hesitated.

  ‘Please.’ Hunter indicated the sofa again. ‘Just try it. You’ll see.’

  Anita placed Lilia’s dummy in her mouth. ‘No llores, mi amor. Todo va a estar bien.’ The baby took the dummy and Anita finally took a seat. Hunter and Garcia took the armchairs.

  Lilia settled into a comfortable position in her mother’s arms and closed her eyes.

  Hunter took that opportunity to fire a question before Anita could fire hers again.

  ‘You said that the last time you saw Kevin was on Monday, is that right?’

  Anita nodded. ‘In the morning. He ate breakfast and left for work, like every morning.’

  ‘And he didn’t come home that night?’

  ‘No. That was not so strange before, but since Lilia was born he no play late no more.’

  ‘Play late?’ Garcia asked.

  Anita chuckled nervously. ‘Kevin is a big niño. He works in games shop because he love games. He always playing games like a child. Before Lilia was born, many nights he stay in shop after work, playing games on Internet until morning with work friends. But he always called me to say he be playing. But now that we have Lilia, he doesn’t play late no more. He’s a good father.’