There were more discrepancies in execution. Olivia had been strangled by a length of electrical cord, of the same size and circumference as the implement used in the later murders, but the marks on her neck looked very different from the marks on the other victims. They were multiple, for one, and tentative, for another. They were the kind of marks a fledgling killer would make, as though he wasn’t sure how much pressure to apply.
Or as if he was entertaining second thoughts.
Troubled by the idea, Sonny shuffled through the file folder, looking for more information about Darrius O’Shea.
A decorated veteran of the Vietnam War, O’Shea had suffered a head injury during his final tour of duty. His marriage had dissolved soon after his return to San Diego, and in the following years he had few personal ties and no permanent address.
If not for the disability check he’d collected in person each month, one would have never known he was alive.
Less than forty-eight hours after Olivia Fortune’s body was found, the police arrested O’Shea for vagrancy. Upon finding a monogrammed towel with Mrs. Fortune’s initials stitched in gold thread, along with the infamous murder weapon, mixed in with his personal effects, two homicide detectives interrogated him.
O’Shea confessed to the crime eventually. Tests on the items in his possession left no room for error. And yet, he had no motive, no history of violent attacks. In addition to the towel, only a small piece of jewelry had gone missing from the Fortune household. Olivia’s wedding ring, which boasted a sizable rock, hadn’t been touched, and Ben’s money clip had been in plain sight, not far from the point of the attack.
O’Shea had been mentally evaluated and declared competent. The homeless vet was a man of few words, apparently, but his statement of guilt had been unequivocal. He spent the next three years in a maximum security prison. News of his death had been widely reported, although the specific details hadn’t been made public.
Sonny reorganized the files and pushed them aside, lying back on the bed and staring up at the ceiling, collecting her thoughts. For the first time in her life, she was having difficulty separating her emotions from the case.
It wasn’t like she’d never handled a rape/murder before. With her personal history, they were the most difficult, but she refused to let the past overwhelm her.
At least, not at work.
Tomorrow, instead of drooling over Ben Fortune, she would visit the prison where O’Shea had spent his last days. In order to move forward with the investigation, she had to delve deeper into the mind of the man who may or may not have killed Ben’s wife.
Once her dad fell asleep, Carly snuck away from the house, needing ultimate privacy for the ritual she was about to perform. He’d removed all the locks to her room, even the one to her bathroom, so there was no longer a place at home where she felt safe from discovery.
Now she was hidden amidst a cluster of rocks at the northern tip of Windansea Beach. It was dark, and late, and she was alone. This time she made sure no one followed her.
She sat down on the damp sand with her back against a flat rock, casting one last look around before she removed the washcloth from the pocket of her jeans. She unfolded it gingerly, careful not to cut her fingers on the razor blade it concealed, and pulled her shirt over her head. Placing the washcloth against the lacy cup of her bra so blood wouldn’t seep into the pristine white fabric, she lifted her elbow slightly, poised to draw the edge of the blade across a patch of smooth, unblemished flesh.
She inhaled sharply, savoring the moment, anticipating the quick flash of pain, the slick red trickle, and most important, the exquisite emotional release, as sweet and tender as a sigh.
Carly didn’t have an eating disorder, but it was easier to pretend she did at the group therapy sessions her dad made her attend. Several months ago, he’d caught her hunched over the toilet, vomiting her guts out after her first attempt at cutting. Lots of the girls at her school were bulimic or anorexic; like drug and alcohol addiction, it was a designer disorder. Nobody sweated you for puking in the john after lunch-the only trouble was elbowing past the other Barbie dolls to get your turn.
She couldn’t blame them, now that she’d seen their faces in group, had heard their stories, their confessions. Purging was the same as cutting, in a way. A fast tension reliever, an easy, purely physical liberation, a quick release of blood or food, in the place of emotions that were too strong or awful or dirty to be dealt with.
Carly understood the other girls, and commiserated with them.
She did feel bad about deceiving her dad. In group, the counselors droned on and on about honesty and open lines of communication, until the refrain repeated in her head like a drill.
But hadn’t he let her down a thousand times?
Fuck group, she decided viciously, willing her hand to let the blade descend upon her flesh. Every time she went to therapy and hung with those losers, it got harder to make the first cut, and after she came down from the high it gave her, she felt twice as guilty.
“Don’t do it.” The low voice came from the rocky outcrop above her.
Carly let out a strangled squeak, almost slashing herself accidentally as she jumped. With horror, she realized that the voice was male, so she dropped the blade into the sand and brought her shirt up to cover her chest.
When he leaned forward, out of the shadows and into the moonlight, she took an unsteady breath. He was just a boy, her age, and therefore unthreatening.
“It’s none of my business, of course, but it seems a shame to put scars on such beautiful skin.” He leapt off the rock he was crouched on and dropped down to sit beside her.
Clutching her shirt to her chest, she began to scoot backward, reassessing him as a possible menace. She was tall, but he was taller, certainly heavier, and he moved quick. Plus, he’d been skulking around in the dark, watching her.
He plucked the razor from the sand and held it up to catch the meager light, showing her his intentions before he stashed it. “As a man, I’d say a mark or two doesn’t hurt. But I’ve never known a woman who wanted to ugly herself up. Especially at such a pretty place.”
In spite of herself, she smiled. He was probably just a smooth-talking juvenile delinquent, but she liked being thought of as a woman. “You’re not a man,” she said.
“Sure I am. Enough so that I was enjoying the peep show.”
“Then why’d you stop me?”
“And let you mar perfection? Not a chance.”
“I’ve done it before,” she bragged, flattered by his compliments.
“I know. I’ve seen you.”
Carly was disconcerted by the idea of being watched in a private moment. “My dad’s going to kick your ass when I tell him you’ve been spying on me.”
He eyed her shrewdly, or perhaps he was only trying to get another glimpse of what was under her shirt. “Go ahead and tell him,” he said, calling her bluff. “I’ve got your razor blade, and I’ll bet you have some old marks, scabs and stuff, under that lacy little scrap you call a bra. Yeah, bring him out here. I’d like to talk to him about what you’ve been doing.”
“You’re a freak,” she said shrilly, worried now.
Carly was just about to run when the clouds shifted and a fortuitous ray of moonlight struck his face. She couldn’t discern the exact color of his eyes or hair, although she assumed both were dark, but could make out his well-arranged features, and they were familiar.
“I know you,” she said. “I remember you from junior high. You were a year ahead of me. What’s your name?”
“James.”
“James what?”
“James Matthews.”
Despite the tension, or perhaps because of it, she laughed.
“What’s so funny?”
“Your name. It’s like two first names.”
“Okay, Carly,” he said, with more sarcasm than was necessary to make his point.
She felt a flutter in her belly, like the tension she sometimes g
ot before a big test. “You remember me?”
“Yeah.”
“Where’ve you been? I mean, I haven’t seen you at Shores.”
“You go there?”
She rolled her eyes, nodding. “It sucks.”
“I thought you went to private school, rich girl.”
“No,” she said glumly, letting the slight pass. “Dad’s into social justice.”
“What’s that?”
“I don’t know. Where do you go?”
“Nowhere. I have homeschool.”
Her heart made a funny little twist. Only religious wackos and lowlife dropouts had homeschooling. “How is it?”
“Sucks.”
They understood each other perfectly, for a moment, before a strange glint in his eyes made her remember that she wasn’t wearing a shirt. James was cute, dangerous, and a little scary. It was an appealing combination, but she wasn’t ready for what his eyes said she’d get if she lingered here. “I’ve gotta jet.” She stood, careful to keep her shirt from slipping.
He jerked his chin up in a gesture boys used as hello, good-bye, who cares, and whatever. “Don’t come back here, rich girl.”
She looked over her shoulder, aware that the pose was provocative, considering her mostly naked back. “Why not?”
“This is my place.”
Carly started to argue, then rephrased the negative comment into a question, like they’d taught her in group. “What do you do here? Besides peep at girls?”
His eyes licked down her back then went far away, across the ocean. “Same thing you do. I hide.”
Ben heard Carly come in through the back door, but he didn’t go downstairs to confront her. Instead he waited, listening for the sound of her footsteps, his pulse pounding with adrenaline. All of the fear and anxiety he’d experienced over the past few frantic moments upon finding her bed empty, transformed into rage.
She tiptoed up the stairs, making very little noise, for she’d had the foresight to remove her shoes in the hallway. Once inside the safety of her own room, she let out a deep breath and pulled the door closed behind her.
He reached out to click on her bedside lamp.
She blinked at the sudden light, her eyes huge with guilt and wide with surprise.
“Where the fuck have you been?” he asked. His voice was clipped, his enunciation carefully controlled.
She moistened her lips, eyes darting around the room.
“Don’t lie,” he warned, forcing himself to remain seated. He’d never hit her, never even spanked her as a child, but he was mad enough to make up for that oversight right now.
“I was with my boyfriend,” she said, lifting her chin in defiance. “What’s the big deal?”
He searched her face for signs of deception. Carly was a poor liar, despite having plenty of practice, but he couldn’t always tell. “Summer told me you didn’t have a boyfriend.”
Her forehead wrinkled. “What does she know? You guys, like, discussed me?”
“What’s his name, then?”
“James Matthews.”
“You made that up.”
“Did not.”
Ben believed her, and it did nothing to assuage his anger. He hated the idea of some teenaged dirtbag taking advantage of his daughter’s precarious emotional state. The last thing she needed right now was more turmoil.
Grabbing the makeup bag he’d found in her bathroom, he upended it on the bed, spilling its contents over the snowy white duvet cover.
Her pretty face paled. “You went through my stuff?”
He rose to his feet, eliminating the space between them in two angry strides. “Is this what your boyfriend taught you?” he yelled, gesturing to the bloody washcloths and razor blades on the bed. “To cut drugs and wipe up cokehead nosebleeds?”
When she didn’t answer, he took her by the upper arms and shook her, trying to scare the truth out of her.
“It’s not what you think,” she stuttered.
“What is it, then?”
She stared down at the carpet, refusing to answer.
He released her, trying to maintain a semblance of control. It was impossible to describe the way he’d felt while searching her room. The scenarios he’d imagined and memories he’d relived. “When did it get so difficult for you to look me in the eye?” he asked quietly. “I tell you that I love you, and you act like it kills you. What the hell is going on with you, Carly?”
Closing her eyes, she leaned back against the door. “It’s not what you think,” she repeated in a whisper.
“We’re not leaving this room until you tell me.”
“Lisette and I were trying to give each other tattoos,” she said in a rush of inspiration. “In Cultural Studies, we learned about this tribe in New Zealand, and figured we could do the same thing they did, with pen ink and razor blades.”
“Bullshit,” was his succinct response.
“If I was into coke, don’t you think you’d find some white powder on that stuff?”
He glanced at the jagged pile of razors and stained washcloths. “That’s a lot of blood for amateur tattoos.”
“Yeah, well, we fucked up. It didn’t work.”
His eyes cruised over her warily. “Show me.”
“Show you what?”
“This tattoo shit.”
Trembling, she crossed her arms over her chest. “No.”
“Why not?”
“It’s on my chest.”
“So?”
“It’s on my boob, Dad.”
He wasn’t deterred by her display of modesty. “Show me now, or I’ll call Lisette’s parents and tell them what you just told me. At the very least, they can hear about the joints you two were toking Saturday.”
“Fine,” Carly grated, pulling her shirt up and the top of her bra down quickly, revealing a flash of crisscrossed scabs.
It was enough to send him over the edge.
Grabbing her by the arms again, he pushed aside the fabric, exposing a dozen raw-looking red lines. Some were partially healed, others fresh and ugly.
In an instant, he was murderous. “Lisette did this to you?”
She shook her head in denial, covering herself with her hands.
“This Matthew-Mark punk? I’ll fucking tear him apart.”
“No, Daddy,” she said, her eyes filling with tears. “I did it. To myself.”
For a moment, he was so stunned he couldn’t breathe. He’d heard about self-mutilation before, but he’d never suspected his own daughter would resort to such measures. How could he not have known? And what else had she been doing while he’d had his head buried in the sand?
He sat down on her bed, shocked to the core. “You told me-no, you promised me-that you weren’t suicidal,” he said when he trusted himself to speak.
She began to cry in earnest. “I don’t want to kill myself. Not really. I just get these feelings, and I can’t get rid of them, so I cut myself, and they go away.”
“I thought you were getting better,” he said, wrapping his hand around her thin wrist and pulling gently, urging her to sit down next to him. “You said group therapy was helping.”
“It is helping,” she said in a choked voice. “I’m just crazy.”
“You’re not crazy, Carly,” he said with the conviction of someone who loved her more than life itself. He put his arm around her. “But if you’re getting better, why are you cutting yourself?”
“I don’t know.” She wiped the tears from her face with the hem of her hooded sweatshirt. “It’s easier than feeling all tied up in knots.”
So was drinking, he knew from experience, and felt an ugly stab of guilt. He wracked his brain for some of the tenets of AA. “When you want to cut yourself, will you talk to me instead? I promise not to get mad. Maybe I can help you through it.”
“Maybe,” she replied with a noncommittal shrug.
“And you can work on that old rust-bucket in the garage. If you get it running, I suppose I’ll have to let you
drive it around sometimes.” He cringed as soon as he made the statement, but she perked up visibly, so he couldn’t retract it. Carly was obsessed with sports cars-and wouldn’t you know it, he could afford whichever one she wanted. About a year ago she’d talked him into buying her an antique Corvette Stingray, a fixer-upper.
Determined to make it roadworthy, she’d taken two semesters of Auto Mechanics since then, and she was a whiz at it. Carly might be moody and spoiled, but she could also rebuild a carburetor like nobody’s business.
He could only imagine how dangerous she would be in the driver’s seat. His daughter was wild and reckless, just like Olivia. Just like him.
With parents like these, who needed enemies? Taking risks was in Carly’s genes.
She looked up at him through dark, wet-lashed eyes, the picture of her mother, achingly beautiful in the lamplight. Ben almost couldn’t bear the resemblance. Most of the time, the pain of losing Olivia was like a dull throb, an ache that receded more every year. Other times, like now, when they really needed her, it was so damned sharp…
Carly must have felt the same way, because she ducked her head, hiding the fresh tears that were swimming in her eyes.
He put a finger under her chin, tipping it up. “We’ll be okay. We’ll get through this. We can get through anything.”
“Yeah,” she said, trying on a wobbly smile.
He pulled her close, all but crushing her in a fierce embrace, then just held her for a long time as she cried.
“Did you find one yet?”
His dad’s sly, cantankerous voice rang out, startling James as he shut the door behind him. When he saw the dark thing in the corner of the living room, the hairs on the back of his neck stood up.
Arlen Matthews was sitting back in his recliner, smoking. The cigarette smell and its glowing tip were the only indications of his presence.
“Maybe,” James mumbled, clenching the keys in his fist. For the millionth time, he wished he had the balls to stand up to his old man.
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