I was hurtling toward the traffic lights, mostly on the wrong side of the street. I yanked on the parking brake and screeched a ninety-degree turn through the lights. It was the only way I could make the turn without losing too much momentum. Smoke poured from my tires as I headed eastward on Santa Monica Boulevard and if I had calculated correctly, we were due to have a head-on collision in approximately sixty seconds . . .
Eastbound on Santa Monica Boulevard, Santa Monica, CA 90404 – 7:40.
Sure enough, I could see the flashing lights as at least ten squad cars were hot on the heels of a dark blue sedan. I gritted my teeth, flicked on the nitrous and headed straight for it. The Hangman could see me for sure and was wondering what to do. He couldn’t stop, that would mean certain capture; to have a head-on collision at the speed we were going would mean certain death; he could swerve at the last second but risk overturning and facing arrest and/or death. It was interesting. I could feel the blood pumping through my veins and the hairs on my neck stand up. Death or glory. I lived for this sort of stuff.
“Spooky, is that you, goddamnit!?” I heard Dekes’s voice over the radio. “Answer me now, damnit!”
I lined up with the Hangman. It was going to be over in ten seconds, when one of us would have to concede, and it sure as hell wasn’t going to be me. The police cars suddenly stopped realizing that there was going to be one hell of a crash that they were going to plow into, which was a scenario they did not want.
Five seconds to impact and with a sinking heart I thought he wasn’t going to swerve and I would die, and for the first time in a long time, I realized I didn’t relish the thought of death anymore. I yanked on my parking brake, but then realized I was going sideways down the street, making me an even bigger target, instantaneously I saw smoke pour from his tires and we broadsided in unison. I fought against the steering wheel that juddered, jerked, and tried to wrestle from my grasp when the centrifugal forces took over and my car flipped over.
My bones juddered as my beloved Camaro went into a roll. I saw the street, sky, and buildings in rapid succession as I rolled twice and thankfully landed back on my wheels. I shook my head and my vision cleared and saw that the sedan had rolled, too, but in the other direction; his car ended up on his wheels, too, and he was away speeding off towards the coast. I hammered the 5.7-liter V8 engine and was snapping at his heels. He smashed through the set of red lights and screeched to the left, scattering cars and pedestrians. I followed suit with the squad cars a few seconds behind. He turned on the Pacific Coast Highway and he kept up a zigzag maneuver to stop me from overtaking. It was starting to get boring now, but I kept on his tail; the squad cars were in a cluster safely behind. I wondered about a roadblock as we headed towards Malibu. I saw a news chopper above. I’d had enough and as we passed through Malibu and started to climb high up the rugged coast, I took a shot at the Hangman’s tires, but we were going too fast. I cursed and kept on his tail when suddenly there was a bang and a cloud of smoke appeared from under his hood. Had he cooked the engine? Was this going to be our first bit of luck?
The sedan kangaroo-hopped and the Hangman drove up onto the grass picnic area, sitting high up on the cliffs overlooking the Pacific and the Catalina Island in the distance. Tramps were being fed in an outdoor soup kitchen; they watched in wonder as I chased the blue sedan across the grass as it chugged to a halt. I sideswiped it for wrecking my car. I saw the Hangman shake violently from the impact. Good, I thought, the very least the sonofabitch deserved. Yet, he was out in a flash and running towards a cycle path, running parallel with the cliff’s edge. I was out in seconds and right behind him. There really was no escape this time. Chalk one up to the good guys. The Hangman ran full pelt towards the security fence. Surely he knew there was only a sheer drop down the cliff face on the other side of the fence. I ran after him, calling out, warning him there was no way out. He climbed up onto the fence and looked at me. I could see from his body language that it was all over. The pathetic Hangman dressed in his all-black Halloween costume was caught. He’d get his moment in court and the limelight that he so coveted, have endless books and magazine articles written about him and just what made him tick.
But one day he’d be forgotten about when the next lunatic came along, and there would always be another maniac to take his place. He’d be on death row to await his fate, or worse, left to rot for the rest of his pitiful life. I was about two yards away and already reaching for my handcuffs when the Hangman stood up on the fence, balancing on the thin rail, stretched to his full height, flicked me a salute and jumped.
PART IV
During the fourth minute of a hanging the brain is starved of oxygen, cells start to die off, and if I’m not saved very soon, I will end up brain-dead. I feel my body twist, which increases the pressure on my neck. I can see flashing pin pricks of light fly from the back of my orbital sockets to swim in front of my eyes, making it feel like my eyes are being jabbed with needles, and the blood in my ears is hissing, like a kettle coming to the boil. The root of my tongue is forced up and blocks my airway. It wants to bulge out of my mouth, but insanely I’m fighting this. I don’t want my body discovered in the typical hanging pose.
The hissing in my ears increases as the rope digs deeper into my carotid artery: surely that’ll cut off the oxygen to my brain and render me unconscious? I feel my legs spasm and kick uncontrollably and the hemp tightens and bites into my skin; the noose compresses and chokes me further and I manage a hoarse gasp. I can hear a banging sound, which I guess is the blood pressure building up. The hissing in my ears increases as the rope digs into my carotid artery: surely that’ll cut off the oxygen to my brain at any moment now.
I feel fluid dripping from my nostrils and realize that it’s blood and it drips onto my chest and runs down my stomach. There’s an immense pain in my chest as my heart hammers away. I try for one last rasping breath, but all I manage is a rattling sound and, if anything, I feel worse. But whatever sound I emitted startled the Hangman who looks around uneasily and I try a grin just to piss him off.
I felt dizzy and light-headed. Then bizarrely I saw my father, which was impossible, as he had died many years ago, but his image was as clear as anything and then I realized I was hallucinating. I chuckled, or tried to, which once again alarmed the Hangman, I guess that he was getting used to hangings and the last thing he expected was for someone to laugh, but it struck me as funny, as the last time I saw my father he was hanging, too, and he took his own life. Now I could see him, had he come to find me to take me to the next world? I hope not, as I had assumed that he’d gone to Hell.
Then there was my own suicide attempt. Suicide was considered a sin, so I guess attempting it is, too. I’d had mental problems since my father’s death which culminated in my late-teens, to the point where I did not want to live anymore and as I still lived in the same house, I’d tried to replicate my father’s suicide attempt, but I screwed it up and I slowly strangled and I still have a very visible scar to prove it.
I was committed to a local asylum, but found the conditions and medication made me ten times worse. It wasn’t a prison and I was free to come and go after the initial twenty-eight days, but the doctors felt I would be better off with them, but one day I didn’t return. It was a hot summer’s night and I didn’t want to go back to the sweltering hospital and stayed out the night. I slept under a bridge and it was the best night’s sleep I’d had in ages, so one night became two and I spent the days hiding until I realized that no one had come looking for me. For weeks I ate in soup kitchens and pan-handled for a living. Luckily, one of the kindly helpers at a soup kitchen befriended me and got me into a program, but she doesn’t remember me. Yet I’d come full circle about to die, by hanging. . .
Homicide Special Section, 100 W 1st St 5th, LA, CA 90012 – 9:30.
In the aftermath that followed, Dekes tried to blame me for the fiasco, though I could not follow his reasoning. If it wasn’t me, someone else would have cornered the Hang
man and he still would have jumped, but this was classic ass-covering in today’s police force. Dekes was still spitting mad when the captain arrived. “Now you’re for it,” said Dekes.
George McGinty said, “Well, that’s that. I wish all the murdering bastards would jump to their deaths. It’d save on the paperwork.”
“You’re not kidding,” Milo said.
Ferdy came in grinning excitedly. “Is it true? Is the Hangman dead?”
“He sure is, good buddy,” said George with unusual cheeriness.
Ferdy’s face scrunched up, puzzled. “Well, that’s just great, but . . . never mind,” he said.
I said, “Spit it out, Ferdy.”
“It just seemed a bit too easy.”
“I know what ya mean.” I agreed. “We were utterly clueless, then we get a tip-off, chase him and then he jumps to his death.”
“Don’t knock it, son,” George said. “We won, enjoy it.”
“Job well done,” said the captain entering from his office. “All of you.” I think it was the first time I’d seen him smile. He popped a bottle of champagne and poured us all a glass, amid cheering and laughter. We were finally able to let off steam after such an intense time. “Well done, team. We deserve this.” His smile got wider and I found it unsettling; he looked around the squad room and asked, “Where’s Mia?”
We all felt it at the same time. George hammered his phone to call her and shook his head. I became aware of my cellphone buzzing in my pocket. I had it on silent. With sinking dread, I removed it and looked at the screen. The others watched me, “It’s Mia’s cell,” I said as I saw it was a FaceTime symbol. The room went deathly quiet. I answered and the image of the Hangman filled the screen. The Hangman’s booming voice said, “Surprise!”
CHAPTER 33
MF Movie Props Storage Facility, Wilshire Boulevard, CA 90010 – 10:10.
The Hangman prowled around the operating table and glanced down at Doctor Ruiz tied spreadeagled upon it. She was minus one of her hands, which had been dispatched to me at the police department. She came around, saw the hooded Hangman, and shrieked. The Hangman’s metallic voice boomed, “Are you hungry, honey?”
Doctor Ruiz nodded, her face took on a euphoric expression and she assumed that if the Hangman was feeding her then maybe, just maybe, he wanted to keep her alive. The Hangman turned to a nearby gas-barbeque where meats were roasting, turned them over and was satisfied that they were ready. He pressed a button on the side of the bed, which elevated at the head end and Doctor Ruiz was almost sitting upright. The Hangman fed her a lump of dark-colored meat. She chomped on it gratefully as she tried to remember when she had last eaten, one day, two? He fed her some more and she accepted it into her mouth willingly.
“Try this one, it’s sweeter,” the Hangman said and offered her a forkful of white meat. Doctor Ruiz swallowed it eagerly. “Which do you prefer?” the Hangman asked her. “Light or dark?”
“Light, I much prefer the light.”
“What do you think it tastes like?”
“Pork, it tastes like pork.”
“That’s interesting,” said the Hangman. “Would you like some more?” She nodded and the Hangman offered her another forkful of the light meat. “It’s actually part of your buttock,” he said matter-of-factly after she had swallowed it. The doctor choked, spluttered, and tried to force herself to vomit. “The darker meat was from your biceps.”
The doctor looked at her arm and saw a dip through the bandages where the muscle should be and screamed . . .
* * *
I switched off the tape unable to watch any more of the grim video. “That douchebag!” George said and flopped into his chair in a crumpled heap. “Feeding her meat from her own body. That is so disgusting.”
Milo crossed himself and mumbled a prayer.
I asked, “When was this released?”
“Ten minutes ago,” Ferdy said. “But it could have taken place yesterday.” He shrugged a shoulder, displaying the helplessness we all felt.
Once again, department protocol forbade us from investigating Mia’s case officially, but the last thing I wanted was for Dekes and his crew to be in charge with finding Mia. She was too important to me for that. I wanted to go straight to her home but knew that that was the first place Dekes’s team would look and they were going to find evidence of me all over her place. That was going to be an awkward situation, as we had been meticulous in keeping our affair secret. Funnily enough, we had just decided to come clean and let it be known and just see what happened; if we were split up as partners, so be it, we had the rest of our lives to be together.
I wondered if anyone would pick up on the fact that I’d known three of the victims intimately.
“Why would he snatch Mia? She doesn’t fit the profile,” the captain asked.
“What profile?” Ferdy said, with a touch of admiration. “That’s the genius of the Hangman – he doesn’t have one.”
“Mia’s not pierced,” I said without thinking.
The room went silent and they all looked at me. “And just how would you know that?” asked the captain, raising his eyebrows.
“We, er, were lovers,” I said weakly.
“Bullshit!” said George. “No way, that lady had class.”
“Has class,” I corrected.
“Were you peeping on her in the shower or something?”
I glared at him and wanted to pound him to death. Not Elvis, this time. Me. I was up in a flash, no warning for the sonofabitch and had him up against the wall and I heard later that I was in a frothing at the mouth-type rage. The captain stepped between us, making ‘cool it’ gestures with his hands.
Corner of Sunset and Vine, Hollywood, Los Angeles, CA 90028 – 11:00.
I was sent home, unofficially suspended by the captain after my tantrum. I’d had the red mist and did not remember much of what had just happened.
“You Putz,” Sheldon said. “How did that help yourself or her for that matter?”
It seemed as if I went crazy apeshit and smashed up the squad room; it took three of them to restrain me. Three? I’m slipping; it wasn’t so long ago it’d have taken five or six. I was slowing up, but it happens to the best of us. I had a vague memory of the guys sitting around and shrugging, acting helplessly as if that was it, there was nothing they could do. I felt rage at their apathy. I kicked out at a trash can and that was the last thing I remembered, but it appeared that was the least of the things I kicked or broke. It might be time to increase my medication. I can’t have bouts of red mist and memory loss.
Mia was in trouble and time was of the essence: we needed to find her and find her quick, the Hangman had misdirected us again. I’d thought all along that the ‘tip-off’ was bogus: it was such an unlikely thing to happen, information on the Hangman’s whereabouts just drop in our laps like that. It should have rung alarm bells, but we were so keen to capture him that we fell for it and wasted valuable time chasing him.
But why?
I ran it through my mind, analyzing it. It had to be rigged in advance. The Hangman had some sort of trap-net a short way down the cliff. He would’ve reconnoitered the cliff earlier to discover its natural overhang; we knew that the Hangman was thorough in his planning, but this was pure brilliance. He’d dispose of the apparatus before we had the nerve to peer over the edge of the cliff. Then he’d swiftly climb along the cliff ten feet down and reappear further along where he could climb back up undetected before we had managed to scramble the police helicopter in the air. The news chopper had hovered over us filming our running around and the mass of cop cars all piled into the small picnic area. The Hangman would get into a second vehicle that he’d left somewhere nearby earlier and sneak off to Mia’s.
She had been on rotation and she’d have undoubtedly heard on the news of the Hangman’s demise and would have let her guard down. When I left her place that morning, I’d recommended that she lock her windows – a shame, I know, given the heat. After hearing the
news of the Hangman’s death she was probably relaxing out on the balcony, wallowing in the victory over one of the worst sadistic killers in recent times. She might have even dipped into her fridge for champagne, as it was a special occasion, definitely worth celebrating. Just thinking of Mia gave me a pang in my heart. She would already be terrified: she knew what the Hangman was capable of and knew it would not be quick, or painless.
I hit my horn not knowing what else to do, feeling completely hopeless, useless, and powerless. I’d spent my life serving the people of this city and had an exceptional conviction record. Yet this was a crime that was so close to home that I could literally feel my heart break. I thought with despair that it was possibly going to defeat me. We had no more clues to who the Hangman was than when we first started. We did not know who he was, where he lived, what he looked like, not even his height or hair color, we had not one shred of evidence: he’d been so careful in not leaving even one hair or a usable piece of DNA. It was as if he was a phantom. All I knew is that I couldn’t sit around doing nothing, I needed to be in the middle of the action, not left out on the fringes. And as I had another unofficial day off, I would go back over the case and rattle some cages. Mia thought that the case revolved around sexual practices of a darker nature, and with that in mind I went back around my old haunts from my days in Vice, thinking someone must have heard something, a rumor would do, anything: I needed something badly.
* * *
I turned away from my home and drove along Sunset Strip to where the low-rent hookers plied their trade. It was somewhere to start. I cruised up to the curb and I was shocked by the number of new girls working the Strip. Some were so young and fresh. I remembered Mia’s description of the busloads of girls arriving every day in LA with big dreams of stardom, who would be preyed on and exploited. Their pimps would first pretend to be their boyfriend and lavish them with gifts, drugs, and promises of contacts in the industry. The girls would lap it up, then shortly find that they were not the only girlfriend, but by then they would be hooked on crack or crystal meths, and would have to ‘earn’ their board and drugs. With nowhere to turn they end up out here on the streets, the green ones still believing the pimp loved them and was working hard to find them a movie role.
On The Edge Page 30