Thrills: Vol.2

by Jason A. Joseph

  She finally managed to get her phone out and she texted Elliot before she lost her chance. ‘Benner made move. Kidnapped. Help.’ She waited a few minutes to make sure the text got through, then she dialed Elliot’s number with speed dial before putting her phone back into her purse. This was her one shot. If Elliot didn’t believe her, or if Elliot didn’t answer his phone, it would all be over. She closed her eyes again quickly and pretended like she’d never woken up.

  ***

  It was late, and Elliot and his newbie partner were the only ones at the Barn. His eyes were closing, and he had to admit that he hated the late shift. This was usually the time that he was crawling into bed and waiting for oblivion to come. His phone beeped. He groggily took it out of his pocket and looked at the screen. Who would be texting him this late at night? Isabelle. Of course. He read her text, then shook his head and read it again. Oh shit. She wasn’t ready for this. He was still contemplating what he could do to help when his phone rang. It was Isabelle’s number. He picked up quickly.

  “Hello? Hello? Isabelle can you hear me?” There was silence on the other end of the line. Well, not exactly silence. There was background noise and what sounded like a large SUV or van running. That clever girl. She’d called him and left the phone on in case something happened where they could find out where he was taking her.

  He kept the phone to his ear and hit mute so no sound would transfer from his end of the phone over to the situation that was going on. “Call everyone in. We have a situation. One of our own was taken by the serial killer from the park. We need to find out where she is and get there before he leaves her in pieces for us to find.”

  ***

  The van came to a stop and Isabelle heard Benner get out on his side and come around to the back. She closed her eyes again, hoping it would buy her time. He grabbed her foot and pulled hard enough to slide her down towards the very edge of the bed. If Isabelle thought that he would let her wake up gently, she was dead wrong. He grabbed her shoulders in his bony grip and shook her for all he was worth. Unfortunately for her, even for an old man, that was a lot. Her teeth clicked together and she decided she’d better let him know she was awake before he rattled her brain loose.

  “Ah, Megan, I see that you’ve decided to join me after all. I was afraid I’d hit you a little too hard.” He slung her over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes. She could barely see in the darkness surrounding them. They must have been somewhere out in the woods, because the ambient light of a city was nowhere to be found.

  “Where are we?” Isabelle was hoping that her phone had reached Elliot, and that whatever Benner said would give him a location to come and find her.

  “Somewhere that I’ve had stashed away for many, many years. Don’t worry though, I cleaned it up just for our date tonight.” There was a maniacal glint in his eyes. Between his legs, she could see what looked like a makeshift workshop. Sheet metal made the walls and roof, and it seemed to be barely holding together.

  “I don’t know what delusions you’re under, Benner, but I have news for you. My name is not Megan. It’s detective Isabelle MacIntosh, and I’m a member of Thirteenth Precinct Police Department.”

  Benner stopped walking for a moment. It seemed like he was trying to decipher if she was lying to save herself or if she was really telling the truth. Well, questions and answers would have to wait. He opened the door and flicked on the light switch. The glare of the fluorescent lights blinded Isabelle long enough for Benner to get her on his butcher table and strapped down.

  “Now, let’s have a little chat shall we? Why don’t you tell me exactly what’s going on?” Benner sat back in a rolling chair and waited for her answer.

  “Exactly what I told you. I’m a detective, and it was my job to get close to you. We know that you murdered those women and left them in the park. I was supposed to be your next mark so we could catch you. Clearly it worked.” She gave a much more confident smile than she felt.

  “If that were so, why is it that there’s no swat team here to rescue you? I believe that you were telling the truth, but I also believe that you are the only one who believes the killer to be little old me. I also believe that you were going to try to be my next target. I think you were hoping for me to snatch you at a later time, and instead I surprised you tonight, is that about the gist of it?”

  Isabelle refused to answer him. She wouldn’t give him the satisfaction. He was right though, no one knew where she was except for him. There was nothing at all that was going to save her from being another pile of prettily wrapped parcels hidden somewhere in plain sight on the running trail in the park. She tested the restraints as quietly as she could. No, there was no hope of escape. The bands were brand new leather, with absolutely no weak spots to be exploited. She collapsed inside. That had been her last hope.

  “So what now? I lay here and let you slice and dice me?” She tried to put some bravado into her voice, but even she knew she’d failed miserably.

  ***

  The Barn was bustling with activity. Everyone had come in at once when they’d heard that Isabelle had been taken. So far, nothing forthcoming had come from the cell phone, but Elliot still kept it pressed firmly to his ear just in case. It must have been close to Isabelle, because he could faintly hear her talking to Benner.

  “Keep looking. He said it was a place that he’d had for a long, long time, so check with his family. Any wooded area that was owned by someone in his family. We have to get to her before he kills her.” The detectives were searching everything they could, and even though he knew that, he wasn’t satisfied with their efforts. He’d made a vow to himself never to lose another partner, and this meant finding Isabelle.

  “Sir! Sir! I think I’ve got it!” Of all the people doing the research, it was the newbie he’d been working with for the last few weeks.

  “What? What is it? What did you find?” Elliot ran over to the terminal the young man was sitting at and tried to read over his shoulder.

  “There’s an old piece of land that’s been in the Benner family for over a century, and it’s a wooded area far from the outskirts of town. That would be out of the way and he could do what he wanted up there without anyone else catching him.”

  “Good work. Where is it exactly? How far would it take to get there?” The newbie punched a few more keys and Elliot waited for the computer to spit out the data.

  “It looks to be about forty miles from here. If we hurry we could be there in twenty minutes.”

  “Listen up everyone! Come over here and get the coordinates from the computer, put on your vests and make sure you have a second weapon on you before you leave the station. We don’t know what kind of weapons he has out there. Be careful. We don’t know what kind of state we’re going to find Isabelle in, so make sure you don’t do anything that could jeopardize her safety.” Elliot dispatched unit after unit. He looked at his cell phone and softly clicked it shut. “I’m sorry, Bells. I should have been on board with you from the beginning. We’re coming. Just hang in there.” He grabbed a copy of the coordinates from the printer for himself and headed out the door. The newbie made as if to follow him.

  “Wait for me, Elliot.”

  “No. I need you to stay here and make the proper notifications. Let the appropriate channels know what’s going on, and keep the dispatch manned. We need to make sure that we have all the information possible to help her. Can you handle that?” The urgency in his voice scared the newbie a little, but he nodded and took a notebook with him over to the radio console that served as the main dispatch. He jogged out to his cruiser. “I’m coming, Bells. Just hang on.”

  “Now, tell me what you’ve done for my profile. I’m curious to see how you made me out.” Jacob Benner was sitting in a chair, talking to his newest victim. He was actually happy that he had been hoodwinked by the young woman. This meant he was going to be able to kill a cop. That would make his final masterpiece that much more wonderful. It would be a slap in the face for the
department that was hunting the killer. It would do them well to see one of their own hacked to pieces and put on display for the whole world to see.

  “Well, honestly, I didn’t need to start a profile. As soon as I met you, I knew it was you. I have a feeling about these things and usually I’m never wrong. It’s just a matter of finding evidence to support it. I can’t really explain where that skill came from, but it has never failed me yet. So, I am sorry to disappoint you, but I don’t have an answer for you.” Her answer made Benner’s blood boil. He wanted to hear her talk about him and how great he was at hiding the evidence, how precise he’d been with cutting the pieces off the bodies, how sneaky he’d been when he’d delivered the bodies into a highly public area.

  “If we have nothing else to talk about, shall we begin with the evening’s entertainment then?” He stood up and stashed his chair back in the corner from which he’d pulled it out. Isabelle knew what happened to those girls before they were killed, and she bitterly regretted wearing a dress to dinner. It would make it that much easier for Benner to rape her.

  “Wait! Don’t we have more to talk about? Don’t you have any other pressing questions that you want answered?” She was stalling for all she was worth. She had no idea how long they’d already been here, and how long it would take for him to lose his patience with her.

  “No, Miss MacIntosh, I don’t. I’m a man, here alone in a secluded area with a beautiful woman. There is no one here to hear your screams. I want what every man wants…” Benner began walking towards her, unbuckling his pants as he went. Tears began to slide out of Isabelle’s eyes. The rape would only be the beginning. She knew it would only get worse from there. She swore to herself that she wouldn’t say a peep. No matter how much he hurt her, she wouldn’t make a sound. She wanted to fight back, but there wasn’t anything she could do, strapped down to the table like she was. This was going to be the most humiliating moment of her life. Now she was only worried about how much longer that life was going to be.

  ***

  The convoy of police vehicles were breaking every speed limit that was posted, and the roads were thankfully clear enough that it wasn’t going to be an issue. The fire department had sent one of their big trucks, and an ambulance was also spattered between the black and white cars that took up most of the road. Elliot had been the last to leave, but thanks to his aggressive driving, he was the lead car eating up the road to the wooded area his GPS was pointing him to. If the GPS could be trusted, he would be close to Isabelle in about ten minutes. He turned his sirens and lights off, and the rest of the convoy took their cue from him. He didn’t want to tip off Benner, just in case Isabelle was still alive. He wanted to make sure he caught the bastard before he could do anything to another innocent woman.

  “Alright, we’re approaching the target area. I want radio silence unless someone finds something. Look for anything that could be used as a room. Look for entrances to underground cellars if you have to but find them!” His urgent voice came across the radio in a total of thirty vehicles, and confirmation came back to him from each driver. “Spread out. We’ve reach our coordinates.” He watched in his rear view mirror as the car behind him branched to the right. The one after that went to the left, and so on and so forth until he couldn’t see any more. He parked, and pulled his flashlight and his pistol out of his belt. He wasn’t going to let anyone take him by surprise. Straining his ears for the slightest sound, Elliot crept forward in a straight line, working his way between briars and brambles, doing his best to make as little noise as possible. He wanted to make sure Benner saw his pistol before he heard his footsteps.

  “Come on, Bells, give me something to go one here. If you’re still alive, just hold on ok? I’m coming. I won’t leave you behind.” Elliot stopped suddenly, thinking that he could hear something that didn’t belong in the far reaches of the woods. It sounded like laughter. An old man’s laughter. Elliot raised his pistol again and plodded forward.

  ***

  “Are you ready, my dear? I’m afraid at my age, we men don’t last very long. Then again, that just means that your humiliation will be shorter.” Benner was standing next to Isabelle now, with a pair of scissors in his hand. Isabelle was crying silently. She didn’t know exactly what the scissors were going to be for, and she wasn’t sure she wanted to. She closed her eyes and faced the wall. She wasn’t doing it to be defiant anymore, she was doing it out of fear now. Her fake bravado had died in its tracks, and she was just trying to survive for as long as she could. Benner stepped up to her and picked up the hem of her dress. He lifted it to chest height, then took the scissors to it, and neatly began to cut the dress off of her, as if she were about to undergo an autopsy. Once the dress was cut and laying to either side of her, he moved on to her bra. “I see that you’ve come prepared. A front snap. Wonderful, dear, wonderful. Now I don’t have to ruin that exquisite bit of lace; not that there’s really much there now is there?” Benner laughed as he unsnapped her bra and laid the pieces to either side of her. “Now, let’s get rid of these pesky little panties, shall we? Then we can really begin with the fun.” He cut once between the leg holes, and once from top to bottom, and the flimsy bit of cloth was as good as disintegrated.

  When Isabelle felt the cloth give way, she screwed her eyes shut even tighter than she already was. This was it. She bit down on a scream as he pushed into her. Although, if she had screamed, maybe Elliot would have found her sooner…

  ***

  Elliot was following the direction from which he thought he’d heard laughter carefully and slowly. The moon came out from behind the clouds and he froze. He was standing in a clearing with no cover or concealment, and was thereby an open target for anyone who was out there hunting. Seconds went by with no sound or movement, so he dashed to the other side of the clearing as quickly as he could. Once he dove under a bramble bush, he tried to orient himself from the direction he’d come.

  The light from the moon glinted off of something just in front of him that happened to be covered in tall cattails. As he got closer he could see that it was a shack, made up of huge pieces of sheet metal that were welded together very poorly. He could see that three other officers had surrounded the building as well, and were now waiting on his instruction. He used symbols to ask if there was another entrance other than the one he was looking at, but the men on the other side shook their heads. That meant there was only one way in and one way out. Motioning the men to his side of the building, he had them stack up behind him, ready to make entry.

  ***

  Inside the workshop, Benner had just finished and pulled his pants up. He went over to the rack on the wall behind Isabelle’s head and pulled down his assortment of blades. This was the best part. First, he would need a trophy for his collection. He took a small scalpel out of the rack and laid the tip of the blade to Isabelle’s cheek.

  “This, my dear, is how I take my trophies. I’ll bet you didn’t even consider that when you were trying to profile me, now did you?” Isabelle said nothing. She didn’t want Benner to be the last person that she spoke to, and she didn’t think she was going to be coming out of this alive, so she decided not to speak at all. He pressed down on the blade and a line of blood marred her cheek. Picking up an eye dropper, Benner sucked a little bit of her blood up and dropped it onto a piece of glass.

  If Isabelle were to guess, she would say it was half of a wet slide, like the ones she’d had in high school biology. He put a cover over the drop of blood, confirming her wet slide idea. He carefully put the slide in a box on the table. Isabelle couldn’t help herself, she was curious. She looked at the box and saw that there were multiple slides in there, some of which she knew were going to match the other girls found in the park.

  “You won’t feel a thing. I promise you that. This ice pick will go directly into your heart, causing it to explode on impact. You won’t even know you’re dead.” Benner wiped off the ice pick and raised it high over his head.

  He was on
the downward arc when the door to the workshop burst open, and four pistols were bearing down on him.

  “Drop it, Benner. Right now. Drop it and I won’t have to shoot you.” Elliot began to advance on Benner, while the other three officers spread out behind him, making sure to cover every possible angle of the workshop. Elliot tasted bile in the back of his throat.

  This old man was the epitome of the harmless joke ‘that dirty old man’. Unfortunately, Benner had been alone with Isabelle for hours, and there was no telling what he’d done to her in that time. Elliot wanted to throw up. Maybe it was because he knew Isabelle personally, or simply because he’d been working the cases that this man had produced.

  “Now why would I do that? I already have her blood in my trophy case, so I might as well finish the job right? It would make sense.” Benner raised his hands again.

  “If you finish the job, I’ll finish you. How’s that for sense?” Elliot was now only five feet away from Benner. He glanced sideways at Isabelle. She opened her eyes, assuring him that she was still alive. Motion dragged his gaze back and he saw that Benner was still going to stab Isabelle.

  “No!” Elliot pulled the trigger as he shouted, and Benner fell back against the wall. The other officers ran to handle him while Elliot went to tend to Isabelle. Benner was still moving when Elliot reached the table, so he drew his pistol on him again. The police academy had taught him to shoot at center mass, but this was a special case.

  Elliot was aiming about four inches south of Benner’s belt buckle. He’d used one bullet for Benner’s chest, which left him five more for the groin. Once the pistol was empty, he tossed it aside.