by Ken Douglas
“ I’m going home to get a shower and kiss the wife and kids. See you at around 10:00 or so.”
“ Right.” Mouledoux closed his phone.
It hadn’t been hard for him to convince the powers that be that Dr. Eisenhower was, at the very least, a person of interest, though everybody except him had a hard time accepting the fact that a dying seventy-seven-year-old woman could be responsible for six deaths in one night.
He needed that DVD, but he was beginning to believe he wasn’t going to get it. Dr. Eisenhower had been ahead of him every step of the way. Now she was gone to who knows where, probably turning herself into an unrecognizable child. Christ, he didn’t see how they were ever going to catch her.
Then he had an idea. The flaky neighbor who had been drinking. But first he had to drop by Dr. Eisenhower’s and check out her computer.
An hour later he was home with the jpeg files he’d copied from Isadora Eisenhower’s computer. There were several shots of Amy and others in Dr. Eisenhower’s backyard on several different occasions. It looked like they did weekend barbecues for friends, sometimes just the two of them. Dr. Eisenhower wasn’t in many of the shots, so Mouledoux assumed she was the photographer and she was pretty good.
And fortunately or unfortunately, depending on your point of view, Mouledoux was pretty good at Photoshop. He could put a cow on the Moon and make it real. So, putting Amy in a photograph with herself, then changing the eye color on one of them was dead easy.
Back at Dr. Eisenhower’s, he deleted the originals, set back the computer’s clock, then copied his copies with the two Amy’s into one of the files that had been taken only a couple months back. Now all he had to do was to get a warrant, find the pictures and bingo, the whole world would be on the lookout for young again, brown-eyed, Isadora Eisenhower.
After resetting the system clock, he went next door to prime Thelma Prescott, but when he knocked it wasn’t her who answered.
“ Who are you?” Mouledoux didn’t flash his badge. He didn’t have to. This guy was as shifty looking as they came, the kind who could spot a cop clear across the casino from whatever table he was cheating at and be out the door, before a jack rabbit could jack.
“ Robbie Finch.” The man was wearing a purple shirt with a miniature sheriff’s badge pinned to his shoulder, but the man was no sheriff, no cop, not even a wannabe. Just a shark trying to curry favor with any law enforcement official he might come in contact with by showing his support.
“ What’s with the badge?” Mouledoux pointed to the man’s collar.
“ My dad was an L.A. County Sheriff. Killed in the line of. This was his, I wear it in his memory.”
“ Ah,” Mouledoux said. Then, “I need to talk to Thelma Prescott.”
“ My mother, she’s pretty traumatized about what happened last night.”
“ Yeah, I got that, that’s why I told her I’d come by today for her statement, rather than having her come right on downtown, you know courtesy of the RPD.”
“ That was considerate of you,” Finch said.
“ Different last names,” Mouledoux said.
“ My mother outlived two husbands. My father was the first.”
“ Ah.” Mouledoux smiled. “You tweaking?”
“ No.” Finch was sweating. His pupils were dilated. He was fidgeting. He was lying too. His mother was a drunk and he was a tweaker still living at home.
“ Listen, Mr. Finch, I don’t want to make your mother’s life any more difficult than I have to. She was pretty loaded yesterday and I should’ve taken her in.”
“ She might have had a few drinks.”
“ Yeah and a little meth.” Mouledoux was sinking the hook. “I’m betting if I were to come inside and have a look around, I’d wind up taking you two down to the hoosegow. Wouldn’t that be something, mother and son sharing a cell?”
“ You’d need a warrant.” If fear had a smell, Finch would be reeking.
“ And I have one, but I don’t necessarily want to use it.” He tried to look sincere. “I’d rather tear it up and I would if somebody could corroborate your mother’s story.”
“ Anything to help the police.” Finch reached up to his collar, fingered the badge. “What do you need?”
“ The problem is nobody seems to know anything about this mysterious woman she saw running off with a gun in her hand.”
“ Nobody seems to know what happened to the two cops either,” Finch said.
“ I’m taking this one thing at a time. I need the girl. Maybe she can explain what happened here. We know she killed two, maybe three people, maybe more. Then you’re right, there’s those missing policemen to think of.”
“ So you think the cops vanished, like my mom said?”
“ I don’t know what to think, but I know this, I need someone else who has seen this cousin of Amy Eisenhower, who could pass as her twin sister, otherwise I’m going to have to think your mother was a bit too under the influence, maybe illegally. So if you knew anybody who’d seen these two look alike girls together next door, say maybe a couple months ago, that’d really help the case.”
“ Jeez, yeah, I saw ’em. I thought they were twins.”
“ You see Dr. Eisenhower taking pictures of these girls, you know, like maybe you were looking outside that back window there?” Mouledoux pointed toward Eisenhower’s backyard.
“ Come to think of it I did.”
“ You’ve been a big help.” He turned to go, turned back. “You should know I appreciate you telling me this and that it’ll help catch a killer.” Mouledoux smiled. “And you should also know it’s against the law to lie to a police officer. So, if anybody else comes asking-”
“ I’m not stupid, Detective Mouledoux.”
“ I never thought you were.”
Chapter Eleven
Izzy felt like she was running on emotional overload as she pulled into the gas station in McCloud, a tiny Northern California town nestled among tall pines. The sunrise promised to be gorgeous. Lately she’d been spending her mornings enjoying every one as if it might be her last; sunsets too, because at the rate the cancer had been moving through her body, they could’ve been.
She got out of the car, reached into her oversized purse, pushed the forty-five aside, got out her wallet, withdrew a credit card, but stopped herself as she was putting the card in the pump. She jerked her hand back as if she’d been scalded. What had she been thinking? Hadn’t she told Amy to destroy her cell phone, because she didn’t want her tracked? Hadn’t she seen enough detective shows on television? Use the card, tell them where you are.
Oh shit! She’d used the card to rent that motel in Susanville. How bloody stupid. She was going to have to be more careful, because she was sure they’d track her there and now they’d know she was heading to California, where they’d figure she was either going north, to Canada maybe, or south to L.A. and perhaps Mexico beyond.
She put the card back in her wallet, started for the convenience store and the cash register inside.
“ I’d like to fill it on three,” she told a smiling teenager. He had hair yellow as the sun she’d been watching so much these past few weeks. It was long and framed a freckled face with twinkling blue eyes and a golden smile. He was watching CNN on a small ceiling mounted television.
“ Sure thing.” He tapped on a computer screen as she laid three twenties on the counter. “That little girl’s gonna live. They say it’s a miracle.”
“ The one they got out of the well?”
“ Yeah, she rallied during the night. It looks like she’s gonna make a full recovery.”
“ That’s great.”
“ Yeah, it’s good when you can start the day with a positive news story.”
“ It is.” She returned his smile. “I’ll be back for the change.”
“ Okay.”
When she got back he was still engrossed in CNN, but his smile had been wiped away, replaced by a furrowed brow.
“ Something h
appened to the girl?”
“ No, breaking news,” he said. “Someone went on a killing rampage in Reno.”
“ What?”
“ Six people dead. Three doctors, a lawyer and two security guards, plus another doctor is missing and presumed dead. They all worked at St. Catherine’s Hospital.” He looked worried. “My mother’s there. She’s having cataract surgery.”
“ Did they catch the killer?”
“ No, she’s still at large.”
“ She? A woman?”
“ They’re calling her the Slaughter Queen.”
And for the next five minutes or so Izzy watched newscaster Nick Nesbit on the overhead television with the freckle faced kid and learned that the Slaughter Queen had killed two hospital security guards and hospital CEO Aaron Shaffer at Dr. Isadora Eisenhower’s house. Seventy-seven-year-old Dr. Eisenhower was missing and presumed dead. From there the Slaughter Queen went on to kill Dr. Carmin Romero in his home and then onto young Dr. Elizabeth Jordan. Three doctors dead and one missing, but that wasn’t enough for the Slaughter Queen as she’d also killed the hospital’s lawyer, Simon Drake. Six dead, one missing and who knew who else was on her list.
Nesbit, who looked as serious as Izzy had ever seen him on television, went on to say the killer was somehow related to Dr. Eisenhower, perhaps a niece, they weren’t clear on that, but the police had pictures and they hoped to have them distributed to the media within the hour. Meanwhile they had this description: she was Caucasian, had shoulder length brown hair, brown eyes, was very attractive, weight about one fifteen and was about five-six.
“ Maybe her medical insurance didn’t cover her doctor bills,” the kid said.
“ What makes you say that?”
“ She killed the lawyer, too.”
“ I can’t believe a woman could do that.” But she could half believe it, even though she didn’t say it, because she’d killed the two security guards and though she hadn’t killed Shaffer, she’d watched him die. But the others, Romero, Jordan and Drake. She knew them. Who could’ve done it? Someone who knew about her, because the odds were way too far out of the ballpark to assume the crimes weren’t related.
Back in the car, she continued north for about fifteen minutes. When the road met Interstate 5, she went north, got off at Mount Shasta and found a Rite Aide drugstore, where she started for the hair dye. She’d always wondered if blondes had more fun. She didn’t think she’d be having very much of that, but she needed a change.
Then she saw a display of scissors and all of a sudden she knew how she’d disguise herself, because that’s what she had to do, alter her appearance as radically as possible. She picked up an electric shaver, like the one she’d used to shave her head after she’d started chemo, then she went looking for the mascara. Though dying her hair blonde had been her first idea, she’d’ve had to rent a motel room. Plus it would take a lot longer to dye her hair than it would to cut it off.
The hair had been nice, but it had to go, because she had no illusions about whose picture they were going to be showing on the news. Shaffer’d told someone and that someone had told someone else and eventually, pretty quickly actually, someone had probably gotten the bright idea to use a photo of Amy. And Izzy, except for the eyes, looked just like her. In fact, she wouldn’t be surprised if they’d doctored a photo of Amy, giving her brown eyes.
Leaving the Rite Aide, she got back on the freeway, taking the off ramp at the Weed rest area. It was early and except for a couple truckers sleeping in their cabs, the rest stop was deserted. In the restroom, she plugged in the shaver and gave herself a quick bootcamp type haircut.
Taking the mascara out of her bag, she lightly applied some under her eyes, then on her eyelids, trying for a gaunt, goth kind of look. Maybe a girl on drugs, maybe a girl with cancer, the kind of girl one looked away from, the kind people didn’t want to notice.
Satisfied for now, she surveyed her mess. Hair in the sink, hair on the floor. Fortunately it was thick and long and easy to pick up. She put it in the trash with a sigh. It had been so long since she’d had hair and this hair had been beautiful. Such a shame.
Back at the car, she wanted to be on her way, but the dog hadn’t been out for quite a while, so she opened the door and Hunter took off, shooting across the rest area to the open field beyond. For a second Izzy wondered if he was coming back. He’d saved her life with Shaffer and she owed him, but a life on the run would be easier alone.
But after a couple minutes, Hunter came bounding back. He jumped into the backseat and Izzy was on the road again. She needed ammunition for her guns, because they, whoever they were, were going to be coming after her and she needed to be ready.
Years ago she’d had an affair with a married man in Medford. Not her proudest moment, but it had been so long since she’d had a man in her bed. She’d met him on a consult. He was a few years younger and better looking than any man had a right to be. He was a young heart surgeon with a future and he had the sweetest grin.
That he’d been using her to get out of podunk Medford never crossed her mind. That he’d been married should have been a clue, but he’d seemed so genuine and genuinely in love with both her and his wife. The poor man had seemed torn and she’d been so stupid. After she’d recommended him for an opening at prestigious Massachusetts General, he and his wife left town and she’d never heard from him again.
She’d put him, Mass General and the shitty town she’d met him in out of her mind. But now, as she was heading north on Interstate 5, she was glad she knew her way around Medford. She knew where to get the ammo she needed, the clothes she needed and where the seedy motels were, the kind that wouldn’t ask for a credit card if you had some extra cash.
She took the first of the two Medford off ramps, turned west on Barnett, then right into the WinCo parking lot, where she pointed her car to a line of stores to the right of the supermarket, parking in front of Ace’s Guns.
Inside, she found just about the seediest man she’d ever imagined could hold a job. He looked like he belonged sleeping under an overpass somewhere and he smelled like he’d bathed in gin.
“ Can I help you?” At least he had all his teeth.
“ I don’t know.” Something about him wasn’t right. “Maybe I should be asking you that question.”
“ Don’t let the getup fool you.” He smiled and she saw a twinkle there. “I got a meeting with the IRS coming up at 10:00.”
“ And that’s how you dress? You’re really going to impress them.”
“ I haven’t paid any taxes since ’73. My plan is to tell them I’ve been homeless. Think they’ll buy it?”
“ I would’ve.” She returned his smile. “But how do you know I’m not a revenuer?”
“ Now that’s a term I haven’t heard in a long time.”
“ Well, how do you know?”
“ I can smell ’em and, lady, you smell way too sweet to be a tax man and you look too pretty to be a cop. But you got a look of desperation about you. You’re a girl on the run.”
“ I’m a girl with a couple guns who wants as many clips, bullets in ’em, that you can get for me. And I need ’em before you go off to meet the tax people.”
“ Who you running from?”
“ You name it.”
“ What did you do?”
“ Nothing, but they’re going to say everything?”
“ You’re not going to get far. Your picture is all over the TV. The internet, too.”
“ Shit.” She clenched her fists. “But I cut off my hair, darkened my eyes. I don’t look the same. Double shit. They have no pictures. They faked it.” How could she ever hope to elude them. “How the hell did you spot me?”
“ You’re too clean. You don’t look road weary and you don’t look like you been rode hard.”
“ Are the cops on the way? Did you push some kind of alarm button when I walked in?”
“ Nah.” He smiled with his eyes, but not his mouth. “You’d a done
what they said, you’d a walked in here, shot me, took what you wanted and been gone. Besides, revenuers ain’t the only bastards I can smell out. You’re on the run, but you didn’t do anything wrong.”
“ I killed two people, caused a third to have a heart attack.”
“ You have a good reason?”
“ Jeez, I can’t believe I’m telling you any of this.” It made no sense talking to him, but then everything that had been happening to her made no sense. “I gotta go.” She started for the door.
“ Without your ammo?”
She stopped, turned back and faced him.
“ I am in trouble and most likely I’m going to be dead very soon. I’ve got two guns, one empty, one almost empty. I can’t use my credit cards, can’t get at my bank account. When my money’s gone, I’m going to be a sitting duck, but when they catch up to me, I’d like to give the hunters a run for their money.”
“ Wait.”
She stopped, watched him come from behind the counter, go to the door, lock it. For a second she thought he was locking her in, but the look on his face told her he was locking others out.
“ Name’s Nate,” he said. Then “Come on to the back.”
“ I don’t have a lot of time.” But she followed him into a back room anyway, where she saw a small desk with a couple coffee cups on it.
“ Everyone’s got time for a good cup of coffee.” He opened the top desk drawer, took out a thermos, then a flask. “Take a seat.” He motioned toward a chair, then poured a couple cups. “Irish whiskey.” He poured a generous shot from the flask into each cup. “I’m not gonna ask what kind of trouble you’re in. I saw it on the news. And I’m not gonna ask did you do it. Some of it you told me, but I know a frame when I see it, ’cuz I been spending my life under the radar ’cuz a one.” He pushed a cup toward her, lifted the other as if to toast.
“ Really, I’m in a hurry.”
“ Have a drink, relax for a minute. You’re safe here.”
“ Alright.” She took a chair, then picked up the cup.