“How well did you know Dakota, Tess?”
“She was my cousin! I mean, we weren’t super close, but we were getting closer now that she lived here.”
“Could she have had another life outside of the ballet?”
Tess snorted. “She went to class every morning, rehearsed all day, and performed at night. She ate, slept, and dreamed ballet, Ron. It’s like a religion for these girls. There’s no secret existence. I went out with some of them for lunch, and all they talk about is ballet. They don’t have any life at all except dance. It’s super competitive.”
An hour of questioning went by, at the end of which Ron was nearly as exhausted by the ordeal as Tess. The image he had of Dakota from the tape was of a young woman still halfway in the world of adolescence, horribly mangled by an unfeeling monster, and Tess had imbued her with life – now it wasn’t just another unfortunate, but a thinking, breathing beauty with a limitless career, who would now never grace the covers of magazines or make history in her choice of pursuits. And unlike the second woman, who’d been a pro, or the first, whom a witness had finally confirmed and identified as a prostitute from Pennsylvania named Connie Vance, Dakota wasn’t a sex worker – so she appeared to break at least that part of the pattern.
When Ron showed Tess out, he promised to call later and made plans to take off early to spend the evening with her. She was visibly stunned and shouldn’t be alone – not if he could help it. He watched her walk away, her eyes unfocused and her steps unsure, and it took all his willpower to keep from running down the sidewalk after her and taking her into his arms.
Back at his desk, he saw that he had a message from the captain, instructing him to come to his office at once to discuss damage control and a press release. Another message slip, this one only a few minutes later, reiterated the demand and underscored that the mayor would be attending the meeting via speakerphone. Ron groaned softly at the thought and quickly ran through the remainder of the messages before standing and making his way to the door, resigned to another agonizing round of bureaucratic inaction masquerading as progress.
The truth was that after three brutal murders they had nothing, and at this point there was little chance that they’d be able to do anything to stop the killer before he struck again.
Which, Ron was sure, he would.
Chapter 19
Tess sat in her hotel room, staring vacantly through the window at the darkened city, the television on but muted. How had everything gone so wrong and ugly so quickly? Dakota dead, victim to Manhattan’s latest serial killer, her life snuffed out without compunction by a monster who reveled in his ability to strike terror in the heart of the population. She’d read the newspaper descriptions of the deeds memorialized on the videos, and her stomach roiled at the thought of her cousin having been subjected to such atrocities. She’d vomited twice, heaving until her stomach was empty.
She knew from her prior experience that the media didn’t release completely accurate information; but still, what was described was beyond sick – the acts of a demented animal who showed no mercy for his innocent victims.
How had Dakota fallen prey to him? The question had been cycling through her brain since her numb departure from the police station. How had she been targeted? And then lured? Through the ballet? Someone she knew casually from a coffee shop or a bar?
Or her boyfriend, Jeremy? Who didn’t like crowds and couldn’t get out of the bar fast enough with her? Who was evasive when asked routine questions? Could he be involved?
The thought seemed ridiculous on its face, but then so did the notion that her teenage cousin could wind up hacked apart on a torture tape. What did she know about the man, anyway? A first name, and that he worked in the financial industry. That wasn’t much. Could Dakota have been dating a serial killer?
Tess realized she was stretching to make sense out of something that was likely entirely random, or whose connection to Dakota was something she simply wasn’t seeing. More probable was that the killer worked somewhere that he’d seen Dakota, and had taken an interest in her. Maybe at the theater? The ballet? A diner or market nearby? Perhaps the apartment she shared with the other girls? The possibilities were endless, and if it was simple luck of the draw, the police might never identify the killer.
The thought that the murderer could go free sickened Tess almost as much as the mental image of Dakota being butchered. Someone would pay for robbing her of her life. There was no way that would go unpunished, and Tess felt anger building at the thought.
The phone rang, jolting her from her funk, and she realized that hours had gone by since she’d returned to the hotel. She reached for the handset.
“Hello?”
“Tess, it’s Ron. I’m downstairs in the lobby. How are you holding up?”
“Terrible, Ron. I…I still can’t believe this is happening.”
“I know.” There was an awkward pause. “Have you eaten anything?” he asked.
“I don’t think I’ll do very well going out anywhere.”
“You want some company? We can order room service.”
The last thing Tess wanted was to see anyone, but she also realized that sitting and staring at the wall, replaying dark thoughts, wasn’t doing her any good. And maybe she could bounce her suspicions off Ron…
“Sure. Give me a few minutes to put myself together.” She gave him the room number and hung up.
Ron’s knock was soft, as though fearful of jarring her further. Tess opened the door, her chin high, but within seconds her lower lip began to tremble and her eyes brimmed with moisture. Ron wordlessly hugged her as she broke down for the umpteenth time in a few hours. He cradled her until the wave had passed like a summer storm, and when she’d stopped crying, he wiped the tears from her face, his touch soft as a butterfly’s wings.
She closed her eyes, and before she knew it, her lips were crushed against his, as though she needed pain introduced into the pleasure of the connection to remind her that she, at least, was still alive. The moment stretched as heat built between them, and then she pulled away with a shake of her head.
“I’m sorry, Ron…”
“No need to apologize, Tess. I didn’t come over…for anything more than to spend time with you.”
“It’s just – it’s all wrong, Ron. Everything is, right now.”
He nodded and pushed the door closed behind him. “I know. Don’t sweat it.” He brushed a lock of hair from her forehead. “How are you doing?”
“Not so great. I can’t help going over this again and again. None of it makes sense.”
“Often that’s how it works, Tess. You see a lot of things on the job you can’t explain. At some point you have to stop trying to understand the unthinkable and settle for catching the perps and taking them out of action forever.”
“I feel so hollow. Like everything good in the world is gone.” She sat on the bed, her hair in disarray. Ron sat beside her and took her hand.
“It’s natural to feel that way, Tess. You wouldn’t be human if you didn’t.”
Tess nodded and they sat in silence. Eventually she turned to him. “What about Dakota’s mom?”
“A detective I know in Chicago is going over to her house as we speak. Technically, we don’t have a body, but in light of what we know, it seems reasonable to break the news to her.”
“That poor woman. All of her hopes and dreams for her child crushed, over…over nothing. It’s not right, Ron.”
“No, it isn’t. And you have to believe me when I say that I won’t rest until we catch him.”
She released his hand and went to the bathroom for a glass of water. When she returned, she sat at a small table in the corner of the room. There was only one chair, so Ron remained on the bed. “I’ve been thinking, Ron. About how Dakota could have been targeted. There are so many ways, it seems impossible to follow up on them all.”
“Tell me about them,” Ron said. Tess sensed that he was trying to appease her, but she appreciate
d the opportunity to vent, and she took him through her thinking process, finally ending with Jeremy.
“How are you going to proceed, Ron?” she asked.
“There isn’t a lot to go on till we have a body, Tess. We always start with the forensics. That’s how most crimes are solved if there’s no confession. Eventually the killer slips up. Often something small. But it’s enough.”
“Are you going to question Dakota’s friends? Go after this Jeremy? Maybe he’s the killer, or it has something to do with him?”
“Of course we’ll take a hard look at him, Tess. But it’s too early to make any determinations. We can’t really go after him, demanding an alibi, if we don’t even know when Dakota…if we can’t get a time frame for the crime. That’s why we have to wait and not go off half-cocked.”
“But you can interview her friends in the meantime.”
“And we will, Tess. Trust me on that. But there’s a system to investigating a crime, and it’s best to follow it if you want the case to stand up in court. It’s like building a skyscraper – you don’t just start at the tenth floor, you lay a firm foundation and build your case, level by level. Otherwise a good lawyer will get him off, and nobody wants that.”
She stared away. “Like your hobo killers.”
“That was actually a different problem – a jury issue. Like with the OJ case, sometimes you present all the evidence, it says the perp’s guilty as Hitler, yet a jury decides to let them go in spite of everything. It’s frustrating when that happens, but it’s the system, and you learn to live with it.”
“When you figure out who killed Dakota, you should shoot him. I couldn’t live in a world where scum like that get off.”
Ron didn’t say anything. That the same thought occurred to him on almost every case was his darkest secret – that as a functionary of the justice system, the best use of his time would be to put a bullet in the sick bastards’ heads and save everyone millions in trial expenses and heartbreak – was a truth he couldn’t state out loud, lest voicing the idea eventually made it impossible to resist.
After a long pause, he sighed. “I’d love to play god, Tess, but then I wouldn’t be much better than the ones I hunt.”
“Of course you would be. You’d be bringing justice home. An eye for an eye,” she countered, her tone hard.
“Believe me, if they change the law so that’s my new job description, I’d be the first to celebrate. But for now, I have to work within the lines, Tess. Frustrating as that is.”
“It’s stupid,” she spat, her lips clamped tight.
“Many things about what I do are. But let’s go back to the boyfriend. Tell me everything you know – we could start there, for lack of anywhere better.”
“Like I said, his name’s Jeremy. They were going out for about eight weeks. She was kind of head over heels for him, although the last time I saw her she seemed troubled…”
“Troubled?”
“Like relationship problems, maybe? I’m guessing. And I don’t want to project. I realize that the chances that he’s the killer are pretty slim. But I want someone to hate, and he’s as good as anyone,” she said flatly.
“I understand, Tess. Maybe you can come down to the station and sit down with an artist for a few hours? Describe him?”
“Sure. Whatever you think is best.”
He glanced around the room. “How about some food?”
“I can’t eat, Ron. Probably won’t be able to for a long time.”
“A little wine?”
“I might not be able to stop.”
Ron offered a sad smile. “I’ll act as your chaperone. Tell the desk to cut you off after the first bottle.”
“What about you?”
“I’ll order a sandwich or something. Maybe you’ll want some of it. Never know.”
“Ever the optimist, huh?”
“With what I do for a living, I couldn’t get out of bed every day if I wasn’t.”
Ron read the room service menu and tried a grin on her. “I may need to take out a loan to afford this place, but it’s my treat.”
“Don’t worry about it. I have a feeling my wine will cost a lot more than your BLT.”
He phoned in the order and then eyed the TV. “Not much on the early news, huh?”
“No. Just that there would be more on the late edition.”
“They won’t be releasing much, Tess. At least not for now. It’s an open homicide investigation, so they should play ball.”
“They said they’d be showing part of the tape.”
Ron nodded. “The bastards want ratings.”
“Someone will recognize Dakota.”
“I have no control over this, Tess.”
“The killer could bolt.”
He shook his head. “He hasn’t so far. No, this guy’s going to continue until he’s stopped. I can feel it in my bones.”
Room service arrived with a bottle of passable chardonnay and a French dip sandwich and diet soda for Ron. He picked at the fries while Tess downed her first glass of wine in a few gulps, and was preparing to take a bite of his sandwich when his cell phone rang. He retrieved it and thumbed the line to life.
“Stanford.”
“Ron, it’s Shelly. You busy?”
“Not for you. What have you got?”
“Turns out your boy DJ Endo is supposed to be working a kink party we heard about, down in SoHo.”
“When?”
“Tonight. It’s probably already started.”
“Shit. Where are you?”
“At the precinct. You can come with me, but you have to dress like a civilian, not Columbo. And you can’t bring your piece or your badge. There will be metal detectors.” Shelly paused. “A word of warning, Ron. We’re going in soft. There’s no evidence of any criminal activity, so this is more as a favor to you. We’ve been watching this particular group for drug and prostitution violations, but the case isn’t made yet, so we can’t have you playing cowboy and lousing it up.”
“It’ll take me about twenty minutes to hit my place and change, and another twenty to get to the precinct. What should I wear?”
“You have leather hot pants and nipple clamps?”
“Jeans and a concert T-shirt do?”
“I wouldn’t have called if I’d known you would be so serious.”
“Wait for me. I’m on my way.”
Ron hung up. Tess was slowing down on the wine, but half the bottle had vanished. Ron laid a hand on her shoulder. “I’ve got to go. A possible break in the case.”
“Really? Dakota?”
He shook his head. “No. One of the earlier victims. But whatever road leads home, is my motto.” He leaned into her and planted a soft kiss on her mouth. “I don’t know how late this will run.”
“Don’t worry about me. I’ve got my buddy Kendall-Jackson here, and I have a feeling if I get lonely, his friends Jim Beam or Jack Daniel’s might show up.”
“If it’s not too late, I’ll call.”
“Go do what you have to do, Ron. Catch him. That’s all I ask.”
He nodded grimly and patted his shoulder-holstered pistol unconsciously. “I will.”
Chapter 20
Ron arrived at the precinct in a pair of distressed jeans, construction boots, and a black hoodie over a Wine Dogs concert T-shirt. Shelly was waiting for him when he arrived, her black vinyl pants and gold sequined top leaving little to the imagination. Ron remembered her as a fitness enthusiast, but any doubts he might have had were banished at the sight of her flat stomach and defined muscles.
“You can put your eyes back in your head now,” she said, her voice typically dry.
“I was just admiring your outfit.”
“Point is to dress like one of the talent. Men never suspect a scantily clad female. Gets ’em every time.”
“I’ll have to remember that if I ever go into the bank robbery game.”
“Let me know. Anything’s got to pay better than this gig.”
“We’ve been investigating a group of Russian mob-affiliated ecstasy dealers, who are supposed to have a white slavery sideline going, but we’ve been unable to get enough evidence to pop them. Ordinarily I’d be going in with my partner, posing as a curious husband and wife, but since you’re after Endo, and he’s DJing the party…well, if you think you can manage acting like a reluctant swinger, the job’s yours.”
“What kind of party is it, exactly?”
“Nothing too extreme. That stuff, we never really hear about until after it’s happened. This is more group sex, orgy fare. Glory holes, man-on-woman, man-on-man, whatever,” she said, as though discussing which viscosity oil she preferred for her car.
“Oh, so just my usual Friday night,” he joked.
She gave him a long, appraising glance. “I hope you’ve got a better poker face than that.”
“Pun intended?”
Shelly dropped a tiny cell phone into her clutch and snapped it closed. “You don’t have anything on you that will get picked up by a metal detector, do you?”
“Just my keys.” He paused. “How do we get him out of the place if we don’t have badges?”
“That’s kind of up to you. Remember, we’re not even sure he’s going to be there. It’s all rumor at this point.”
“Shelly, if he is, we’re going to have to raid the place. No way can I chance losing him.”
She shook her head. “Then you’re not going in. Too much time’s gone into this to blow it, Ron.”
“I understand. But I’m going to have to pull rank. This guy’s instrumental in the Rose Killer investigation, Shelly. That trumps a vice bust, I think you’ll agree.”
“Go screw yourself, Stanford. Deal’s off,” she snapped, obviously angry.
“If I have to, I’ll call the captain into it, Shelly. I don’t want to, but I need the DJ.”
She regarded him with barely concealed fury. “You sucker-punched me, Ron. Good luck ever having anyone in vice cooperate with you again.”
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