by LS Sygnet
He nodded. “I remember it,” he said. “I don’t know how I could’ve forgotten that. It tore me up, thinking you…”
I thought about Johnny’s reaction earlier, realized that it was the part of the equation I didn’t witness the first time around. I didn’t watch the battle rage in his good character between doing the right thing and protecting the woman he loved.
“Was that why you went to see my father?”
“I figured nobody knew you better than he does, sweetheart.”
“He’s the one who told you how to frame someone for Rick’s murder.”
Johnny laughed softly. A disbelieving sound. “He used me, the cagey bastard.”
“What?”
“He knew goddamn well you didn’t kill your husband. But he must’ve known that the FBI would hound you relentlessly too unless they had a viable alternate theory. God, he’s smart.”
I gripped Johnny’s arm and tugged until he turned around. “Tell me what really happened with Dad.”
“I told David Levine that I went to see him because I figured nobody knew more about crime families on the east coast than your father.”
“Yeah.”
“It was complete bullshit. How would he know anything about Marcos or his associates? He’s been in prison for twenty years.”
“He does know a lot about things like that.” I censored myself. After all, just like Datello knew where the bodies of his uncle’s buried victims were, I knew full well about crimes my father committed that the authorities had never uncovered. At least I thought I knew what his crimes were. I was certain that he had a justice system of his own.
“Did you ever tell me that?”
I shook my head.
“Maybe I sensed something.”
“What are you saying?”
Johnny impaled me with a probing stare. “If Datello slips through the cracks and weasels out of the charges against him somehow, what would you do?”
I broke the gaze and stared at one specific button on his coat. “I… I don’t know.”
“Bullshit. Let me rephrase,” one index finger tilted my chin up until he paralyzed me with that look again. “Would you be tempted to enact a little justice of your own?”
Teeth sank into my fleshy lower lip.
“It’s a very human temptation, Helen. Don’t think I haven’t felt it over the years. I know you felt it when Southerby tried to kill me.”
I nodded.
“But your dad, he took it a step beyond imagining how good that might feel, didn’t he?”
“I’m not –”
“You don’t have evidence. That’s not the same as being sure. I have no proof that you know anything, but I’m sure you’ve got a lifetime of memories that make you understand completely what your father was capable of doing, what he really did while you were growing up. Tell me I’m wrong.”
“Johnny –”
“I get it. He’s your dad. He loves you. Did I tell you that he loves you? He told me when I visited him.”
Gravity pulled another tear to the floor. I nodded again. My words fled.
“He knew. He read me like yesterday’s news.” Johnny laughed softly.
“How is this funny?”
“C’mon, Doc. Your dad sized me up, knew exactly why I was there. I wanted to believe that it had to be something other than what it looked like. He led me down the path that he wanted, a surefire way to protect you from the FBI while at the same time, he protected you from me.”
“What?”
“I bet he never imagined I’d come back here and tell you what I did.”
“Technically, I don’t think you wanted to. But after David told me they found the gun they believed killed Rick, I knew you had to have done something.”
“And what was the result of that conversation?”
My eyes widened. “We broke up.”
“Exactly. At the same time, your dad got to screw with someone else who slipped through the cracks in the legal system.”
“He knew,” I whispered. “He knew exactly what I’d do.”
“Uh huh. And I bet he counted on fear to keep us apart.”
“But why?”
“Seriously? He doesn’t know me from Adam, Doc. Maybe he thought I’d have an attack of conscience. Or maybe he thought you’d tell me the truth about Rick’s true cause of death and I’d tell the FBI that I set up Marcos’ to take the fall for a murder that never happened, and there would go his chance to stop another bad guy from doing his thing.”
Or maybe Dad knew that I was a chip off the old block in more ways than the red highlights in my hair. What he counted on was my desire to avoid the same fate he suffered. Suicide was the only plausible explanation if Rick wasn’t murdered. He bet on years of subtle education to kick in right on cue.
For months I wondered how Dad managed to nudge Johnny into doing his bidding. Maybe murder wasn’t the only thing in our blood. Johnny was right. Dad profiled him to a T.
Warmth enveloped me. “Let’s go back to bed,” Johnny whispered into my hair.
“What about Belle?”
“CSD will be over there all night. Maya’s got to do her thing. We’re following the leads on the other cases, and I’m convinced enough that Belle’s murder could be linked. We gotta sleep sometime, baby.”
“I think Madden knows more than he’s told me.”
“Hence the date.”
“Yeah.”
His lie detector eyes trapped mine again. “Is that all this dinner date thing is about?”
“Of course it is.”
“Helen, don’t lie to me. Weren’t you trying to piss me off a little bit because I told you I didn’t want to hear your story about Rick Hamilton?”
Fine. Maybe a little bit. He read my chagrin and laughed.
“God, how I love you.”
“Sure took you long enough to remember,” I grumbled.
“Hey, I never forgot it. I didn’t understand why I felt the way I did, how I knew someone was missing in the hospital, but in my heart, I knew it meant something important.”
The door to the house opened, and sleepy-eyed Devlin appeared. “Oh, you are back. Phone’s been ringing off the hook. Briscoe said he hasn’t been able to reach either one of you on your cells but that he needs to talk to you like right now.”
“We shut them off before we talked to the Goddards,” Johnny said. “I’d better call him back, Helen. It sounds –”
“Like we’re not getting sleep tonight,” I said. “Go ahead. I’ll make sure Devlin gets back to bed without falling down the stairs.”
Johnny stole a quick kiss. “You’ve got an elevator, sweetheart. He’ll be fine.”
“You heard the man. Be careful out there.” Devlin closed the door before Johnny had his phone out to call Briscoe.
“Hey,” he engaged the speaker function before Briscoe answered. “What’s up, Tony?”
“We got another call,” he said. “Damnedest thing, Johnny. Luke Napier’s wife just called Bay View Division about half an hour ago. He never came home from the office last night and she got worried when he didn’t answer the phone.”
Luke Napier? Why was that name familiar?
“As in Reverend Luke Napier, one of three people that Belle quoted in her article in the paper yesterday?” Johnny dragged the article back to my thoughts.
“Shit.”
“My thoughts exactly, Helen,” Briscoe said. “We got a car headed over to Crevan’s folks place right now.”
“What the hell is going on? How can this guy be killing gay boys on one hand, and killing those who condemn them at the same time?”
“Well, Napier is as dead as poor Belle,” Tony said. “There’s another message. They figured they’d run it up the flag pole and see if the two of you want to take the lead on this one too.”
“Where’s the body?” Johnny asked.
“Foundations Baptist Church,” I said. “It stands to reason, if he was found where his wife expected h
e’d be.”
“She’s right, Johnny. Only the poor guy didn’t keel over dead at a desk. Guess they found him splayed out on the alter like the proverbial sacrificial lamb.”
“Do me a favor, Tony. Meet us at the church, and call whoever’s got the scene over there and let them know Doc and I are on our way. We’re not far, maybe twenty minutes away.”
“Does Crevan know what’s going on?” I asked.
“Nope,” Tony said. “Lou sent him home.”
I glanced at Johnny. “Do me a favor. Let’s get someone over there tonight too,” I said. There was no way to explain the niggling sense of unease uncurling in my belly, but I had a distinct feeling that things were going to get a lot worse before the case closed.
“Do you think he’s in danger?” Johnny asked as we climbed back into my Expedition.
“Crevan? I’m not sure. He’s probably more capable of defending himself than our other victims, but something about this just doesn’t feel right.”
“Talk to me.”
“I already said it. There’s a huge dichotomy going on here. What do two young men who favor living as women have to do with a reporter and a fundamentalist minister? What did we miss?”
“We won’t know that until we find out what Napier and Belle had in common with our first victim,” Johnny said. “I could be wrong, but I’ve got a feeling that this whole thing has been about Kyle Goddard from the moment the kid stepped out of the closet.”
I couldn’t disagree.
Chapter 34
Maya nudged the middle of my back with her shoulder. “We gotta quit meeting this way, girlfriend.”
“Have you ever seen anything so bizarre?”
Her mouth twisted into a pucker. “Give me a break, Helen. We’ve seen women beheadings, guys kicked to death by cancer ravaged cows, a man that was embalmed before he was dead. What’s so weird about a pastor being gutted on the alter of his church?”
“His mouth is sewn shut,” I pointed to the crude stitches. “And could that be the missing appendage from the Tippet crime scene on a shish kabob uh… where the sun don’t shine?” Napier’s pants weren’t removed, just ripped crudely through the seam of the rear-end.
Maya wrinkled her nose. “Uh-huh, but I guarantee, that wasn’t the cause of death. Unless of course, the idea of finally shutting him up made him keel over dead or the notion of taking it up the keister did the trick. I hear this guy isn’t the shy, retiring type, especially where his Old Testament laws are concerned.”
“I wasn’t aware he had a reputation.”
“Briscoe told me,” she grinned. “So what’s your take on the whole mess? I don’t see any more creepy scripture scrawled in blood on the walls.”
“No, he just used Napier’s blood to highlight the bible passage he wanted me to see at the pulpit this time.”
“What was it?” she asked.
Johnny appeared on my other side. “Isaiah 53:7,” he said. “He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth: he is brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he openeth not his mouth.”
Maya shuddered. “Ok, you win, Helen. This one is the most bizarre. What the hell.”
“We’re not going to find a message for Kyle Goddard,” I said.
“Why not?”
“I think she’s telling you that Kyle was the message, Johnny,” Maya said. “It was the semen, wasn’t it?”
I nodded. “If Kyle had physically been Kylie, there wouldn’t have been a murder. Dammit. This has been staring me in the face since the beginning. I can’t believe I missed it.”
“I don’t follow. Why did Napier’s death, and this message specifically, help you figure out what you missed?” Johnny asked.
“I’ll explain later. Right now, I need to talk to Crevan.”
“Helen –”
“Not as a suspect, Johnny, but as the single person I can think of who knows more about the last two victims than anyone else. We don’t need to be here. I think the cause of death is evident. If we’re going to stop this guy before he hits anybody else, I need to talk to Crevan. Either you’re coming with me, or you’re finding a ride home to get your car. I’m leaving now.”
“I’m in,” Johnny said. It was for the best. I had no idea where Crevan lived since his legal separation and near divorce from Belle.
He started pumping me for information before we were out of the church parking lot. “Spill it, Doc. What’s this thing you think you overlooked? How can Crevan tie these crimes together?”
“I need to know about Napier and Belle’s history.”
“Because you already suspect something.”
“Yeah, I do. See, the thing about this case that seemed like such a slam dunk to me a day ago has gotten pretty murky in light of Belle’s murder. I’ve been unconsciously bashing my head against a wall trying to understand what the link is.”
“And now you know.”
“Honestly? I’m not sure about anything at the moment. But I’ve got all these statements people have made swirling around in my head. The first murder seemed very cut and dried to me. Someone killed that boy after they realized he wasn’t a girl.”
“So now it’s a crime of passion.”
“Fueled by homophobia and bias,” I nodded. “So Tippet’s death wasn’t far outside the same vein of thought. He was a female impersonator. But after I talked to Alex Waters, it seemed like it could’ve been the parents. They targeted the people they felt were responsible for their son’s abomination. His best friend Kyle first, and then probably Alex if you hadn’t had the foresight to intervene and put him in protective custody.”
“But we don’t think they would’ve killed Belle, right?”
“I highly doubt it. She had an opinion someone didn’t like, if we’re to believe the message at the crime scene. There’s also her bias against homosexuals. In evidence is our dear friend Crevan and the way she has threatened him and engaged in emotional blackmail to get everything she could from him in their divorce.”
“Ok, I follow this far. How does Napier fit in?”
“She quoted him in the last story she ever wrote for The Sentinel, and his disgust with homosexuality was blatant. He did something else too.”
“What?”
“He attacked the religious status quo in this city.”
“Huh?” Johnny’s neck twisted for a quick stare at me.
“Catholics, Johnny. He essentially said that his religion is the only true church, because they actively campaign against the moral decay in this city.”
“So now it’s a gay bashing Catholic committing these murders?”
“I highly doubt it. I need to talk to Crevan.”
“Because…?”
“There’s a link, something that ties Belle and Napier together, puts them in a guilty position in the killer’s mind that is right on par with Bobbi Tippet and Kyle Goddard. I don’t doubt that there’s bias involved in these murders. I’m just not convinced it’s as cut and dried as I initially thought.”
“So what’s this thing you think has been staring you in the face since Sunday night?”
“We never found out who Fulk Underwood was meeting for his little sex sandwich rendezvous,” I said. “He told me that two girls were meeting him in another building at the performing art’s center that day. I’d be curious to find out their names and if they ever showed up.”
Johnny groaned. “You think he was meeting Tippet and Goddard.”
“I think it’s a distinct possibility. Chris and Devlin might’ve been right all along.”
“But why is he still killing people?”
“I need to talk to Crevan,” I said. “He’s younger than Underwood.”
“He’s a day older than you are,” Johnny said.
I frowned. “Underwood?”
“Crevan. Didn’t you know? His birthday is a day before yours. Same year.”
“You’re just remembering all sorts of things a
bout me now, aren’t you?”
Johnny chuckled. “I did request information from the FBI about you, sweetheart. Did you think I wouldn’t notice something as important as the day you were born?”
“I suppose you can tell me if a Gemini and a Capricorn are compatible too.”
“You don’t buy that crap any more than I do. Besides, other than your duplicitous nature, you’re not very Gemini-like,” Johnny grinned. “And I’m nothing like what the silly horoscopes say I’m supposed to be.”
“I bet you didn’t know that I missed being born on June first by only a few minutes.”
“Seriously?”
“Does that matter?”
Johnny reached over and grabbed my hand. “No wonder I love you both so much. You and Crevan were almost born at the exact same time. He missed June second by one minute.”
I laughed. “He’s eleven minutes older than me?”
“What are the odds, huh?” Johnny kissed my knuckles.
“Crevan told me that he was a twin,” I said. “I’m sure you know the story.”
“Yeah,” Johnny sobered. His thumb swished back and forth across my hand. “His father’s a real son of a bitch, Helen. What kind of parent tells their son something like that?”
I thought about Wendell again. “I don’t know. I look at what my dad did to protect me, how he always nurtured and loved me. He might be a cold blooded killer and a criminal of the worst kind, but I’d take him in a heartbeat over someone like Crevan’s father.”
“I know what you mean, Doc. This is gonna sound weird, but I’m glad he loves you as much as he does. Even if I suspect that he wanted you as far away from me as humanly possible.”
Johnny pulled over in front of an old apartment building. “We’re here.”
I surmised as much, based on the number of squad cars parked around us on the street. I counted four. “Something feels wrong.”
“I’m sure it’s just a precaution.”
“Then why are their cars empty?”