The Bricklayer of Albany Park

by Terry John Malik

  “That’s a starting point.”

  “C’mon Sean. There are thousands of those bungalows in Chicago.”

  “Yeah, but at least we will be able to match the particles to the kill brick, if and when we find it.”

  I nodded in agreement, although I knew it would be a long shot. I continued. “Tissue samples from the genitals he left behind indicate that the genitals had been frozen, maybe for as long as a year, so we know the prior kill was not all that recent. The M.E. confirmed that a small electric reciprocating saw was used to sever the hand, and he speculates that bolt cutters were used to remove the genitals.”

  “What do you think happened to the severed hand?”

  “Foster thinks he’s collecting trophies.”

  Without taking his eyes off the road, he asked, “I understand Foster’s explanation of possible motivation for the mutilation, but does this guy get off on the mutilation or not?”

  “The report says that no semen was present anywhere on the body— that could have been as a result of the bleach. But that doesn’t mean the killing wasn’t sexually motivated. The removal of the genitals and the postmortem anal penetration with a wooden object certainly point to some sexual connection.”

  We were stopped at a traffic light, and I could see that Sean was piecing it all together.

  “The tarp was no help: mass manufactured and available at thousands of home improvement stores. And it was clean except for the smeared blood message.”

  Sean looked over to me and said, “The M.E.’s hunch about a third person’s dried blood being on the bolt cutter and transferring to the sheered ends of the rib cage was right on. The DNA from those samples didn’t match Edwards’s or that of the severed genitals stuffed in Edwards’s chest.”

  Sean continued trying to get a fix on the complicated blood sample analysis that was yet to come: “So, we have four DNA samples.”

  “Right. One from Edwards; that’s easy and the least complicated of the four. Forensics will run the other three samples against the FBI’s CODIS DNA database and let us know if they get any hits.”

  Sean finished the thought. “But only if these guys have a record.”

  He was right, of course. Only convicted felons were required by law to provide DNA samples that were then added to CODIS. There is an exception under both federal and Illinois law: A suspect arrested and arraigned on a short list of specific felonies could be ordered to provide a DNA sample that would be fed into CODIS. That list included murder, aggravated sexual assault, and predatory criminal sexual assault of a child.

  Sean continued. “Right now we don’t know much about the other three samples: one from the dried blood on the rib cage, one from the genitals, and one from the dried blood in the facial laceration. All we know for sure at this point is that none of them match.” As he pulled into a parking space at the station house lot, he looked over at me. “The question is, which of the unidentified DNA samples belongs to our killer.”

  “We’ll get all the DNA results in the next few days. The DNA Unit is running what they have against CODIS.”

  “Hopefully, we’ll have something to go on.”

  “It would be great if either the dried blood from the rib cage or from the facial laceration was the killer’s, but I doubt it. I agree with the M.E.’s hunch that the dried blood that he took from the rib cage came from the bolt cutters and probably was left on the cutter’s blades from a prior victim.”

  As Sean turned off the engine, he looked straight ahead at the traffic on Belmont. With frustration in his voice, he said, “If that’s the case, then you and Foster are right. There’s at least one other body out there somewhere. And more on the way.”

  CHAPTER 43

  Anthony

  It was 3:00 a.m. on a night when the city braced for more frigid weather. The garage’s electric space heater couldn’t generate enough heat to keep up with the plunging temperature—the orange glow of its single coil element had faded to black around two o’clock. I had rooted through the camper’s storage bin, found a heavy red plaid wool blanket stinking of mildew and musk, and had draped it over my head and shoulders. The yellow light from the kerosene lantern atop the freezer threw my shadow across the side of the camper so that it rippled as I paced, cursing the night, the cold, and the apparition’s unrelenting demands.

  I’d scoured the area around Broadway and Hutchinson searching for a secluded spot to subdue and abduct Anders. I even considered grabbing him at the school, but I couldn’t risk the possibility of being seen in daylight by curious neighbors, late-working laborers, or students in no rush to go home. My head throbbed. The pain kept me from thinking straight, kept me from planning the how and when, kept me from the peace of a single night’s sleep. Tonight, the apparition had called to me in anger, displeased with my delay, displeased I had not yet exacted retribution for the attack on my friend. There was no escape from it, no refuge from its demands.

  My knees suddenly gave way and I staggered, reaching out with one hand, leaning on the freezer to steady myself. Blinding pain, as if my skull had been cleaved in two by lightning, shot through my head. I dug knuckles into my temples and tried to blink away the vision before me, the replay of that spring night more than thirty years ago—an erratic black and white slide show projected on the garage wall.

  My friend entered the yard from the alley and walked along the narrow sidewalk next to the garage.

  “No! Stay away from the garage! Stop!”

  The man appeared from the side door of the garage.

  “Run, dammit, run away!”

  The man grabbed my friend by the back of the neck.

  “Yell! Scream. Do something!”

  He pushed the boy’s face against the brick wall of the garage and pulled his pants and underwear down around his ankles.

  “You fucking weakling! Fight back! Kick, bite—whatever it takes!”

  The lights flashed on, and I could see the man’s face.

  “You bastard! You’ll pay for this—you and your like will pay. And I’ll make sure that the whole world knows what you did!”

  I slammed both hands on top of the freezer. The lantern tumbled to the floor and rolled under the camper, its flame extinguished. My brain pulsed and throbbed as if trying to burst through my skull. The memory of the pain of skin and bone against the bricks became real, digging deeper and deeper. Sweat trickled down my back and beaded up on my brow as the pressure of the man’s body pushing against the boy hammered into my psyche—bile soured my mouth. I clutched my head in both hands and dared to scream at the apparition. “Stop! I’ll make them pay. I swear. I’ll make them all pay. Just leave me alone for now. For God’s sake, leave me alone.”

  I threw off the blanket as if it were a shroud I refused to accept, and then, one by one, the faces of the men I’d killed looked back at me from the darkness. My vision narrowed, and I felt myself sway, stagger, steady myself, and sway again until I toppled backward and lay sprawled on the freezing floor, in a garage where the muffled screams of horror escaped from even the tiniest cracks in the blood-stained concrete slab—screams that filled the garage and echoed in the rafters. The screams grew louder and louder, until I realized they did not come from the lips of dead men, but from my own gaping, gasping mouth.

  CHAPTER 44

  Detective Frank Vincenti

  We didn’t have to wait long for the DNA results after all. The report was emailed to Sean and me three days before Christmas. I was at my desk that morning before Sean arrived.

  “You’re in early.”

  Disconnecting my iPad from its charger, I explained, “I had trouble sleeping. I finally gave up, went to Jake’s for an early breakfast, and decided to catch up on our overdue incident reports.”

  “What’s the problem with the sleep? Our guy in your head?”

  I couldn’t help but glare at Sean. He knew better than to keep asking me. “No. Beth is.”

  Beth and I had argued again last night over Christmas at
the Kellys’. She had made reservations for Christmas brunch at the Four Seasons, and when I suggested we could just stop in at the Kellys’ aftewards, the best I could get from her was a muttered, “maybe.” I doubted she meant it. No point in telling Sean until I had a definite answer.

  “You two going to be OK?”

  “Normal husband-wife stuff, that’s all.”

  “There’s been nothing normal about you and Beth for a while, buddy.”

  Without looking up, I changed the subject. “The DNA Unit sent over its report late last night. It’s on your desk.”

  Sean glanced at his desk. “Anything interesting?”

  “Take a look for yourself.”

  Sean threw his coat over the cubicle’s partition wall, eased himself into his desk chair, and began to read. He wasted no time reacting. “Christ! The foreign DNA from the rib cage is different from the DNA of the genitals found in Edwards’s chest cavity.”

  “Yeah, and the DNA sample from the severed genitals didn’t get a hit. And you’ll see on page two that the blood sample from the rib cage can’t be the killer’s. It’s from someone named Joseph Druski of Melrose Park. He was reported missing more than a year ago.”

  “Why was he in the database?”

  “Convicted pedophile. Served six years at Danville.” I made the connection to Edwards, but I wasn’t sure if Sean did.

  Sean looked over at me. “That makes him the second victim— although we can’t be sure of the timing. The severed genitals could have been victim number one, and the blood from the rib cage victim number two, or visa versa.”

  I looked up from my iPad. “It’s the second victim we know of. Either way, Foster was right. There are more bodies out there. The DNA from the facial laceration was fish DNA. I’d say the blade was likely a filet knife like the one my father used when we went fishing in Wisconsin.” I immediately regretted mentioning my father or the damn fishing trips.

  Sean looked up at me. He knew better than to pursue it. Instead, he simply said, “Fishing wasn’t a Kelly family thing.”

  I changed the subject again. “Looks like Henry Edwards doesn’t have a criminal record; no hits in CODIS. But that only confirms the AFIS fingerprint search.”

  Sean leaned back in his chair. “OK, so there may be two other victims we haven’t found, but Foster confirmed my theory that our guy wants the bodies to be found. He wants us or the press to deliver his message—whatever the hell it is. Have we missed something?”

  “I’ll go online and check the felony databases of the Indiana and Wisconsin state police. If our guy has killed before and we haven’t found the bodies, maybe he started out of state. If they don’t have anything, I’ll widen the search.”

  “I’ll make some phone calls. Some details don’t always get into those databases. There’s an unassigned detective in VCS who just transferred over from Property Crimes. I’ll see if she can help out by checking incident reports that haven’t made their way into the Department databases.”

  Just then, Sean’s phone rang. He looked at the caller ID. “It’s Mom. She’s probably calling about Christmas. She’s going to want to talk to you.”

  My morning was already going downhill, and I had run out of excuses for Beth’s intransigence. I had also run out of patience with Sean’s mom. I got up to get coffee. “Tell her I’m not here.”

  CHAPTER 45

  Anthony

  Guessing Anders was the kind of guy who hung around a bar until “last call,” I returned to the White Shutters shortly before closing time, a couple of days before Christmas. The winter sky cloud cover had moved out during the afternoon and it was a clear night with a full moon—too cold for snow. As I turned into the alley off Hutchinson, I was pleased to find the Crown Vic again parked in the bar’s lot, this time next to a white Cadillac. I touched the brakes slightly, paused momentarily, and then continued down the alley, returning to the grocery store parking lot.

  Satisfied the camper was out of the line of sight of security cameras, I started toward the other end of the alley, trying not to be seen by walking on the far side of the alley where the piled slush had frozen over and crunched underfoot. Although there was a city streetlight perched on an old wooden pole near the mouth of the alley, the stretch of alley immediately behind the closed restaurant and the gay bar was dark except for an intermittent splash of light from a large electric sign over the back door of the bar. The illuminated words on the sign, White Shutters, flickered and blinked and made a clicking noise as if there was a loose connection or a short in the circuit.

  The bar’s lot was only about thirty yards ahead of me when I heard a car door slam and a car engine start. I could see only the entry to the lot, not the car. A red glow splashed on the pavement followed immediately by small white shafts. Taillights and back up lights! Damn. If that’s the Crown Vic, I’ve lost him before I’ve even started.

  Careful to stay in the shadows, I waited. The Cadillac backed out, turned toward the mouth of the alley at Hutchinson, and drove away. After five minutes, there was no new sound from the bar’s lot, only the occasional crackling of the electric sign. Anders was still there.

  When I was within ten yards or so of Anders’s car, my observations from the other night were confirmed: the only security camera in sight was located on a metal pole behind the restaurant, pointed toward its rear entrance. There was no traffic on Hutchinson, but there was still the chance that a car could turn into the alley and make a quick entry into the White Shutters lot. If a car approached from the opposite end of the alley, I’d have plenty of lead time to move behind the dumpster sitting next to the restaurant’s fence.

  Walking briskly across the alley and into the lot, I dug into my pocket for my car keys. If anyone had seen me at this point, I would’ve looked like just another customer hurrying to get a beer before closing time. As I came to the rear fender of Anders’s car, I released my grip on my keys and let them fall to the ground, where they landed near the left rear tire as I’d intended. In case I was being watched, I shook my head in feigned disgust as if surprised by my clumsiness. I got down on one knee, swooped up the keys, unscrewed the cap on the tire’s valve stem, and pressed the tip of one of the keys against the top of the tire’s valve. Just as I started to release the air, the distinct bright light from LED headlights illuminated the fence on the other side of the alley.

  “Shit.”

  I paused, then quickly unlaced my work boot, and started retying it, keeping my head down the entire time. A black Audi turned into the alley but didn’t stop; it sped down the alley and out of sight. It took two minutes to completely flatten the tire. Crossing back to the other side of the alley, I took up a position just behind a large blue residential recycling bin. I waited calmly, unafraid. Impatience and fear breed mistakes.

  It was a long twenty-five minutes before the bar’s back door opened and Anders stepped out. He held it open as he turned and said something to someone still in the bar. Anders laughed, waved, and headed to his car. He turned up his coat collar and adjusted his scarf. As he dug in his pocket for his key fob, he spotted the flat tire, stood still momentarily, shook his head, and pointed his fob at the car, popping open the trunk. He stared into the trunk with a look of bewilderment. He bent over and retrieved the hydraulic jack from the trunk, and stood reading the instructions for more than a minute, and then walked to the side of the car, squatted down on one knee, and fumbled with the jack.

  Just as I thought. The faggot doesn’t even know how to change a tire. Watching him closely, I left the shadows, and walked back across the alley toward Anders.

  “Hey, buddy, ya got a flat tire.”

  Without looking up, Anders grumbled, “Yeah. Tell me something I don’t know.”

  “Ya ever change a tire on a Crown Vic before?”

  Anders glanced up and replied, “I’m learning on the job.”

  “Lemme help.”

  Anders turned away and resumed fumbling with the jack. “I’ve got it.” I
bent over and wrapped my right arm tightly around his neck, and whispered in his ear. “No. I’ve got it, you little fag!” Anders gasped for air and tried to scream for help, but no sound came out as my chokehold closed his windpipe and put pressure on his larynx. He struggled, trying to reach over his head to grab my face. In one last desperate attempt to break free, he twisted and turned and then kicked his feet up against the rear fender trying to push backward against me, but his attempts were futile.

  I didn’t release my grip for almost forty seconds. I didn’t want this one to regain consciousness as quickly as Henry had. Finally, his body went limp, having put up more of a fight than I had expected.

  I took a quick look around the alley and back at the bar door. No one. Bending low, I lifted Anders under the arms and, walking backward, dragged him to the rear of his car. I lifted his body, hoisted it over my shoulder, and quickly flipped it into the trunk. The bully’s limp body hit the padded floor of the trunk with a muffled thud. I removed the car fob from the pocket of his overcoat and slammed the trunk shut.

  I stopped for a second to catch my breath. Another set of headlights suddenly turned into the alley. I waited, hoping whoever it was would be in a hurry and just drive past. Shit! A Chicago PD cruiser came to a stop in the alley no more than a few yards from where I leaned against the trunk. The driver’s door swung open and a tall, thin African-American cop got out of the car and walked toward me. “Sir, may I help you?”

  “Help me?”

  “Yeah. You have a flat tire there and looks like you’re having trouble with the jack,” the uniformed officer said as he pointed to the side of the Crown Vic where the hydraulic jack lay on its side. “It’s late. I’ll be glad to help change the tire.”