A Life Removed

by Jason Parent

  Bruce wagged a finger at her. “Let’s not get ahead of ourselves. First, let’s examine what we know. Only from facts can we extrapolate a rationale, motive, and method.”

  Before interviewing Maura, Jocelyn had been beating herself up for finding so little to go on. Now that they had something to work with, she was eager to let the wheels of her mind roll. But her partner and mentor was right: jumping to conclusions wasted time and cost lives. “Okay. According to Dr. Hawthorne’s reports, the bodies were sterilized and dried, stripped of almost all evidence that could be used to identify their killers, before they were put on display. The victims were wrapped up, likely in cellophane, given the imprints on the skin, for transportation purposes. Whatever the killer used, it kept the bodies preserved.”

  “Yes,” Bruce said, “but Hawthorne found no foreign substances on the bodies: no hair, no skin, no blood, no dirt, no dust, no chemicals. Nothing. The more people involved, the more likely some DNA evidence would be left behind.”

  “Are you forgetting the skin cells under the dead woman’s fingernails? You don’t get much more damning evidence than that, assuming we can find a match.”

  “There are questions about whether that sample is contaminated, and there’s no guarantee it belonged to our killer.”

  “No guarantee!” Jocelyn huffed. “Come on, Bruce! The incidents of pre-mortem injury are slight. These victims were taken unaware and overpowered. The amount of strength it would take to hold someone down and carve open his chest with a freaking serrated knife? The autopsy reports were clear: the cause of death for each had been the ritualistic carving. The victims were still alive when the killer began cutting and would have likely been thrashing and kicking like crazy! No way one person could do it alone.”

  Bruce tapped his pen. “The medical examiner found bruises on the woman’s neck and rope burns around Fernald’s wrists. Perhaps they were bound, drugged—”

  “Hawthorne conducted a litany of tests for controlled substances. She didn’t find a thing.”

  “Not all drugs are traceable.”

  “You’re just trying to make me second-guess myself.”

  Bruce smiled. “You know me better than that.”

  Jocelyn crossed her arms and pursed her lips. “They sawed through all four victims’ chests and removed their hearts like scooping the pulp out of a jack-o’-lantern. It must have taken tremendous strength and a wickedly sharp blade to chisel and grind through the ribs. The metal chips that broke off the weapon and the bone fragments prove a considerable effort went into each crime. No one man could have pulled this off once, never mind four times. And now, we have an eyewitness who puts two men at the scene of the abduction.”

  “We only have a single witness. No corroboration.”

  “That’s horseshit, and you know it. We have two killers here, maybe more.”

  “Statistically speaking, do you know how unlikely that is? Contrary to popular belief, not all serial killers are loners, but they do tend to kill alone.” He held up a finger. “Even so, I agree. We can’t rule out the possibility.”

  “Probability. One of the gangs around here could have raised its bar for initiation. Some of the more hardcore, big-city gangs consider murder a prerequisite to joining up, one hell of a membership fee.” She shook her head. “Then again, most of Fall River’s gangs are poorly organized and, well, too stupid to get away with something like this.”

  “That’s a possibility but also unlikely. And just because the murders have taken place around here doesn’t mean we can rule out a murderer who doesn’t shit where he eats.” Bruce sighed. “We’re getting way ahead of ourselves here. We don’t know who drove the van or even if the van is linked to the crimes. Maybe the killer met Huntley later in the evening.”

  “But the autopsy report approximated the time of death between one and three a.m.” Jocelyn was sticking to her theory, but the interplay between her and Bruce always brought out the most logical conclusions. Unlike most in her department, she could tolerate Bruce and knew they made a good team. Her questions were met with sincerity rather than his usual sarcasm. “You don’t think feeble little Maura could have done this, do you?”

  “I’m not ruling her out,” Bruce said. “Where was her husband that night? He could have killed Huntley and made it look like our guy.”

  “A copycat? No way. You read the autopsy report. All the victims were killed in exactly the same manner. The only way someone would be able to copy these murders is if he had access to our investigative reports. The weapon information was kept from the press. The inox steel alloy is, fortunately for us, uniquely high in chromium, corroborated by particles found in each wound. Our killer’s weapon of choice wouldn’t be easy for a stranger to duplicate.”

  Bruce stroked his chin, his thumb and forefinger tugging at two white hairs that grew from a mole at the jawline. “Every lead must be looked into. All theories are possible until proven otherwise.”

  “I agree with you there.” She knew him well enough to know that he was just playing out every scenario in his computerlike brain, but some scenarios were highly doubtful. Often, he pushed the role of devil’s advocate into the realm of implausibility. When Jocelyn had a theory she could wrap her fingers around, she wanted to run with it, letting each piece move where it may. Being wrong meant wasted resources and the need to pursue another avenue. Being right, though, meant fewer people died.

  But Bruce understood the politics and strategy elements of investigating better than she did. She’d learned not to question him in that regard the first time she’d ended up tasting her foot. But procedure required that all possible leads be investigated. Jocelyn would just check up on the most promising first, and if she needed the rest, she would get to them when she got to them. The numbers on Reinhart’s head seemed of lesser importance, since he’d been the only victim with those markings so far. For fear of appearing foolish if she were wrong, she hadn’t even mentioned to her partner that she thought they could be a Biblical reference. It wasn’t the first time her lack of confidence kept her mouth closed. She wanted to research it herself first.

  She leaned forward in her chair. “Okay. What do we have to follow up on? We need to corroborate Fleurent’s story: her reservations, the bar, the parking garage. Any video surveillance? There should probably be some at the mall. We need to get officers checking into all of that, including whether a white van was spotted at these locations. We also need Fleurent’s and Huntley’s phone records and those of their spouses.” She raised an eyebrow. “Huntley’s wife is not going to like learning about her husband this way, but if we have to rule her out as a suspect, so be it.”

  Bruce nodded. “Also, let’s not forget the specifics of the van. It has a sliding side door. Is that common? We need to have a researcher look into makes and models of vans with sliding side doors. It may be useless if there are a lot, but if not, it could limit our search.” He sighed. “I hope we can keep this information out of the press. I don’t want the killer to think we’re getting closer, if we are getting closer. Do you think calling Fleurent back in for a police sketch would be useful?”

  “Probably not, but it couldn’t hurt. Fleurent has been helpful, but I wish she had more to give us—a name, a license plate. Anything. Maybe we’ll get lucky with the phone records.” She thought about the victims.

  “What’s wrong?” Bruce asked. “You look aggravated.”

  She felt responsible for letting a murderer remain free.“I can’t understand why no one, myself included, has any clue why the victims were chosen. I can’t see any connection between the four.”

  “They could have been chosen at random. What about the woman? Any update there?”

  “I showed her pic to some of the guys here the other night. Officer Lambert recognized her as someone he’d brought in on possession. Her name was Eliza Ramirez. She had four arrests, two for prostitution and two for p
ossession of cocaine. Lambert doesn’t recall her being any trouble. He said he felt sorry for her, thought she had a rough life.”

  “Oh, please. ‘My daddy abused me, and my mommy never loved me, so I turned to a life of hooking and drugs.’ Is that the story? Lambert should save his swan songs for someone who gives a shit.”

  Jocelyn pushed down her righteous indignation. She hoped that when she had as many years on the force as her partner, she wouldn’t dismiss human life the way he did. “Actually, Ramirez came from a well-to-do family with no signs of a troubled childhood. Her parents told me they threw her out when her addiction became too much for them to handle and rehab wouldn’t take.”

  Bruce waved a hand dismissively. “Well, that gives us a hooker, an attorney, a diddler ex-con, and—what did the fourth guy do again?”

  “Antiques dealer and appraiser. Yeah, if these four are somehow connected, their employment doesn’t seem to be the common link.”

  “The whys aren’t nearly as important as the whos and hows right now. Let the psychiatrists determine the whys later.” He tapped the folder on his desk. “Except this one. Why would Huntley run out on his fuck-pal to get into that van at one thirty in the morning? I mean, assuming, for the sake of argument, the van’s occupants are our killers or could somehow lead us to the killer, the question we need to answer is how did they get Huntley into the van willingly?”

  “There was obviously a lot Huntley wasn’t telling Fleurent, so there could be countless reasons why he’d get into the van. Most likely, though—and this is only if Fleurent’s story is to be credited, mind you—Huntley would have gotten into that van for one of two reasons: he was threatened or he knew and trusted somebody in the van.”

  “Or both,” Bruce added. “It’s a hell of an assumption. Have an officer contact Huntley’s family and find out if any of his friends, relatives, co-workers, or acquaintances own a white van.”

  Jocelyn grinned. “Finally, we have people to question and facts to investigate. Our luck is starting to change.”

  “Let’s just hope one of our leads hits.”

  CHAPTER 5

  Peter Robillard was nothing if not consistent.

  Every morning, after a cup of coffee and a bagel with cream cheese from the doughnut shop down the street, he arrived at the Swansea PetPro Clinic where he worked as a veterinary technician promptly at eight o’clock. The clinic didn’t open until nine, but he was tasked with opening up, caring for the animals that had stayed overnight, and cleaning up after the human animals who’d worked the night before. His digital watch beeped, signaling the beginning of the eight o’clock hour as he turned the key in the entranceway’s lock. Smiling, he stepped inside and locked the door behind him.

  He had barely flipped on all the lights and fed Moogle, the clinic’s housecat, when someone pounded on the glass door. Walking toward the entrance, he saw two men standing outside. One was of average height and build, with an immaculate appearance, as if every hair on his head was exactly where it belonged. The other, though, made Peter slow in his steps. The guy was freakishly huge. He belongs in a carnival. If not as the strong man, then as the elephant.

  “I’m sorry!” he shouted through the door. “We’re not open yet.”

  “Could you let us in, please?” Clean Cut asked. “It’s an emergency.” He held up some sort of animal wrapped in a blanket, either a cat or a small dog, maybe a bunny.

  Peter glanced at his watch: 8:12. Georgia wasn’t due in until half past the hour, and she was never on time. Still, an animal in need… “What’s the emergency?”

  Clean Cut shifted the blanket, revealing the head of a kitten. The animal was shivering and looked terrified. With a delicacy unbefitting one his size, Circus pulled the blanket away from the kitten’s front paw.

  Peter gasped. The leg was unquestionably broken, bent at such a wrong angle that it was a wonder the animal wasn’t screaming.

  “Oh my God.” Peter unlocked the door with trembling hands. “Come in! Come in!” He stepped out of the way to let the two men into the building.

  “Thank you,” Clean Cut said.

  The bigger man just stared at Peter with stone-cold eyes, not the eyes of a concerned pet owner.

  Clean Cut smiled. Pete barely had time to wonder why the guy would be smiling before the man yelled, “Catch!” and tossed the bundle at Peter.

  “No!” Peter managed to catch the poor feline but dropped it when the big man’s fist slammed into his stomach. With the wind knocked out of him, he couldn’t get enough breath to scream for help.

  Mighty hands encircled his neck and squeezed. Circus lifted Peter off the floor then pressed him down on the reception desk. Pens and paper clips scattered. Peter flailed his arms, searching for anything he could use as a weapon. His fingers curled around a small chain dog leash. He whipped it into Circus’s face. The metal clip on the end hit Circus squarely in the left eye.

  The big man yelped and released his grip on Peter’s neck to bring his hands to his face. Peter raised both legs, planted his heels on the man’s stomach, and pushed off. He fell to the floor behind the desk. He jumped to his feet and ran for the back exit.

  A man and a woman stood in front of the door. “Oh, thank heavens!” He almost sprinted to hug the couple before his mind could process that they had no business being there, between him and the exit.

  At the last moment, he changed his trajectory and dove into a small examination room. He slammed the door behind him and locked it, panting like a dog under the hot sun.

  “Monsieur Robillard!” Clean Cut howled.

  Peter pressed his ear against the door and listened, hoping they would just take what they came for and leave. He figured they wanted drugs. Fall River was loaded with their type, junkies willing to do anything for their next fix. Sometimes, the city’s neighbors had to deal with its runoff. The addicts would leave as soon as they realized the clinic didn’t keep narcotics on hand, at least not any that would be worth the time and effort to steal.

  Unless they think the good stuff’s in here with me.

  “You should have knocked him out,” Clean Cut said. “You had one fucking job to do, Doug. One fucking job! Why couldn’t you do it right?”

  The other man grunted. “I shouldn’t be choking him anyway. We need a better way of doing this. I could have killed him.”

  “I have a stun gun.”

  “What? You could have told me that sooner.”

  Clean Cut huffed. “The weak need to be led. The sheep need their shepherd. How many weeks did we spend planning this one? Well, let’s get our heads out of our asses and do what we came here to do. Take down that door. Kelly, bring the van around back. We should be gone in less than ten minutes.”

  “Oh shit.” Peter backed away from the door. He scrambled to pull his phone out of his pocket, but in his panicked haste, he dropped it.

  With a thunderous crash, the door broke off its hinges. The lock splintered through the frame just as Peter was picking up his phone. He jabbed at the buttons to call 9-1-1.

  “Now, now, Mr. Robillard,” Clean Cut said, sounding almost motherly as he stepped through the door with Circus and the couple behind him. “We can’t be having that now, can we?” He thrust out his hand, and something shot toward Peter.

  A horrible jolt coursed through his body.

  “9-1-1. What’s your emergency?” a woman said on the phone. “Hello?”

  Dazed, Peter tried to speak, but all that came out was drool. Clean Cut bent over, and Peter realized he was lying on the floor. His attacker reached out and plucked the phone from Peter’s hand.

  “What do you want from me?” Peter’s words were so slurred, he wasn’t sure if the man understood him.

  Clean Cut stared back at Peter with a smile as big as the Cheshire cat’s. “Your soul.”

  Peter awoke in a strange place. A blinding li
ght overhead forced his eyes shut again. He winced and squinted but saw only a white flare. His other senses worked fine, though. He lay flat on a cold, hard surface that felt like metal. An operating table? He had laid so many of his own patients delicately, kindly, upon a similar table.

  Moist air hung heavy around him, thick with mold. It stank like the inside of an old refrigerator kept in a cellar then finally opened after years of disuse.

  He tried to bring a hand to his nose, but he couldn’t move his arm. He looked to the right and saw that his wrist was tied around a metal pole. An operating lamp? He swallowed hard as he raised his head a little. His other wrist and ankles were similarly bound. He tried to scream, but his mouth had been gagged and duct-taped shut. A muffled gargle was all he could manage.

  In the distance, he heard a man’s voice, then a woman responded. They were arguing. A door slammed. Footsteps came closer. Another door opened nearby. He shuddered violently, his body rattling against the table. He opened his eyes wide, but all he saw were hazy purple shadows on the peripherals of a wall of light. The door slammed, and his heart leapt into his throat. Tears crept from the corners of his eyes. His bowels let go. The stench quickly filled the room.

  “That’s disgusting.” Clean Cut’s smiling face appeared above Peter.

  Peter couldn’t see anyone else, but he could hear their whispering. Where the heck am I? He tried desperately to piece together all that had happened. The overhead light shone relentlessly on his face. Slowly, his eyes adjusted until he could see rust-colored walls. He turned his head, and a moldy, water-damaged tile floor came into view.

  A shadow flickered on the rotted wall. Candlelight? He wanted nothing more than to be home with his wife, Charlotte.

  Three or four different voices began speaking in unison. They spoke softly, as if reading a children’s bedtime story. He couldn’t quite make out the words. In any other setting, Peter might have found the sounds comforting, harmonic even. There, they made him want to vomit.