by Dan Ames
Whidby stood. “So what do you want from me?”
“We need this case given top priority,” Reznor said. “We need people to pore over the crime reports, compare them to some of the other cases Mack was working on-“
“Are you out of your minds?” Whidby said. “You’ve got nothing. No witnesses. Only two cases that have flimsy links to two other cases. The other four have nothing. This is another Wallace Mack pipe dream.”
He walked to the door. “And now you’ve made me late.”
Mack stood, raised his voice. “There are going to be more killings,” Mack said. “A lot more.”
Whidby looked over his shoulder at Mack and Reznor as he walked out of the room.
“Prove it.”
CHAPTER SIXTY-SIX
The Commissioner
He loved that a serial killer like Leonard Goldberg would be willing to follow his instruction so implicitly. They were already a half mile from the prison, and the escaped convict stayed beneath the towels in the laundry hamper, unwilling to risk even a peek. As he had been instructed.
The Commissioner turned onto a lesser used highway, and followed it to an even more remote dirt road.
It made him chuckle. A serial killer following his rules. Just like the rest of them. It was funny. A bunch of maladapted psychopaths who refused to follow any kind of laws, whether they be society’s laws or moral laws.
But they obeyed his laws, to the letter. He was fairly certain that most of them back at the Holiday Inn in Omaha had believed that the cheesy actor he’d hired to play the part of “The Commissioner” was actually him.
More than outsmarting his contestants, he loved the control. The challenge to exert and maintain power over this pack of soulless jackals.
Take Goldberg, for instance. The guy had raped and tortured children. The crazy fucker had built a rack, staked the kids to it, then slowly torn them apart, all while jacking off on them every hour on the hour.
It was partly why he’d chosen Goldberg for his Round One target. He just didn’t like the little bastard. But also, this one was the toughest of all the targets. He had given himself the most difficult assignment in Round One, but that only seemed fair. None of the others had the means to figure out how to get this turd out of prison to kill him.
But he, the Commissioner, knew he would find a way. And he did.
An intersection appeared ahead. Calling it an intersection was really an exaggeration. A two-track crossed the dirt road so he turned left onto the two-track until he was hidden in a depression between two small hills.
He killed the engine, got out, shut the door and went around back.
He lifted the truck’s big roller door and stepped back.
“Come out, come out, little piggie,” he said.
The sheets were thrown back and Leonard Goldberg emerged from the laundry hamper, the look of fear on his face. He wasn’t sure if he should run or fight for his life.
“Where are we?” he said.
“We are in the land of freedom,” the Commissioner said.
Goldberg stepped out of the hamper, and came to the edge of the truck’s bed. He walked unsteadily, his arms out to the sides of the truck for support.
“Who are you?” he said. “Why are you doing this?”
“I told you, I’m the Commissioner.”
“Of what?” Goldberg said.
“The Killing League.”
“What the fuck is that?”
The Commissioner smiled. “A little competition among friendly rivals.”
Goldberg looked over the Commissioner’s shoulder. His tiny head swiveled on his long neck.
“So what now?” he said.
“Now?” the Commissioner said. “Now, I have some very bad news.”
He drew the gun and fired once, the bullet entering Goldberg’s left eye and exiting the back of his head, carrying with it a good portion of the convict’s brain. Goldberg’s body landed in a heap on the truck’s floor.
The Commissioner walked away from the truck to a small stand of trees. He pulled branches away to reveal a late-model Chevy Caprice.
He got in and drove away.
CHAPTER SIXTY-SEVEN
Mack
THEY REGROUPED at a coffee shop not far from FBI headquarters. Mack took a large black coffee, Reznor some frothy iced drink. She held up her drink.
“As long as the calories have caffeine, I don’t consider them ‘empty,’” she said.
Mack smiled. “That was fun. Some things never change, do they?”
Reznor sucked from the big green straw buried in her iced coffee. She pulled the drink away from her mouth and swallowed. “All that tension. It reminded me of just about every waking minute of my marriage.”
Mack waved away the comment like it was drifting cigar smoke. She never talked about that particular relationship. He knew she was trying to cheer him up.
“It was worse than I expected,” he said. “But the general attitude was the same,” he said, pulling out a notepad and pen.
He took a drink from his coffee. “This fucker was using my computer, and maybe other ones, to monitor big, unsolved multiple murder cases across the country. Of the serial variety.”
“Right,” Reznor said.
“But Part Two of this case demonstrates that he’s more than that.”
“Way more,” Reznor said.
“He is somehow getting information only we know, and then using that information.”
“Probably blackmail,” Reznor said. “Let’s just say he used your investigative notes in the Charleston Hospital case. He deleted your request, did some digging of his own.”
“Maybe the illegal kind,” Mack said. “He obviously is willing to go to extremes. Maybe he went to Charleston. Broke into the homes of the people I profiled. It’d be easy to figure out who a serial killer is if you don’t have to play by the rules.”
Reznor nodded. “They fucking suspected John Wayne Gacy for like, years, before they finally got a warrant to search his place.”
“So he figures out who they are…” Mack said.
“And then he blackmails them. Tells them they can play his game or he’ll turn them into the cops. Play or pay.”
“It means he has access to everything we do,” Mack said. “Probably more than just what was on my computer. He would want to access the case information located on VICAP, and in order to research those cases…”
Reznor finished the thought. “If we compare the access logs to all these different cases, there should be only a small handful of people who have looked at them all,” she said.
Mack said, “Even if he hacked his way in, he had to leave some kind of trail.”
Reznor sucked the last of her iced drink. Several people seated near them looked at her. She slammed her empty plastic cup down on the table.
“I know just who can help us,” she said.
CHAPTER SIXTY-EIGHT
The Commissioner
HE LOOKED over the Round One results. All of his players had succeeded. He was pleasantly surprised by their victories. He had guessed there might be one hiccup. Despite his providing flawless intelligence, money and opportunity, there could have been a wild card somewhere.
But Round One was complete and everyone had eliminated their target.
He knew better than anyone how easy it was to kill someone. Anyone can be killed. Sure, political leaders are difficult. Movie stars. Professional athletes. The extremely wealthy. But even they can be killed without too much effort. In those cases, the killing is easy. It’s the getting away with it that’s a bit more problematic.
But the average, unsuspecting citizen?
Ungodly easy. Fish-in-a-barrel easy.
His players had just proven that, beyond that shadow of a doubt.
Using his encrypted laptop, he updated the "scores" on his electronic ledger. He analyzed the murders, having received full reports from the parties involved, and adjusted the odds, only slightly.
; He then saved the results and sent the new statistics out to the gambling sites and administrators. He checked the gambling boards and fan websites.
The Killing League was getting some serious buzz.
Not only in Vegas, but he suspected there was some serious attention being paid in the halls of the FBI, or at least, in Wallace Mack’s world.
The Commissioner figured Mack had at least sniffed out a part of what was going on. God, he hoped so. He couldn’t wait to rip Mack’s life apart, one more time.
The Killing League would be his masterpiece. Right now, it reminded him of the first round of any major sports tournament, where there are no upsets, and the higher seeded teams crush the lower seeded teams. It was always the next stage where things really got interesting.
He clapped his hands together.
He couldn't wait for Round Two.
CHAPTER SIXTY-NINE
Vegas
THE LIGHTS on the Vegas board blinked rapidly. Small groups of people sitting at tables glanced up at the big board and watched as the numbers changed.
THE KILLING LEAGUE
FLORENCE NIGHTMARE. 10-1.
Truck Drivin’ Man. 15-1.
The Butcher. 30-1.
Family Man. 15-1.
Lady of the Evening. 7-1.
Blue Blood. 5-1
The Messiah. 5-1
The Commissioner. 3-1.
ELIMINATION ROUND TWO
CHAPTER SEVENTY
Florence Nightmare
RUTH DYKSTRA WAS LOST in one of her paintings. She listened to the men playing bocce in front of her, heard the chatter of men and women speaking Italian, smelled the sizzle of sausage, peppers and onions grilling in the big outdoor kitchen.
She didn’t like this loud Italian festival where her target had chosen to spend his afternoon. So she went back to her living room and her canvases. She could almost feel the brush in her hand. She saw a thick ribbon of vermillion red laid onto the canvas, then a pallet knife smearing it in a ragged streak across a dark umber sky. Ruth closed her eyes. The colors and textures were like waves to her, the kind she vaguely remembered floating on in the ocean, that one time her father took her to the beach. Ruth rode the paint, felt its dark swirls comfort her.
“Oh!” she heard a bunch of the old Italian men exclaim. She wrenched her internal vision away from the mental canvas and looked at the bocce court.
“Hey, you finally won one,” said a short guy with spray paint black hair, black clothes and a thick gold chain around his bright red neck.
“Get used to it, Tommy,” a tall guy in dress pants said.
The men shook hands and started packing up the bocce equipment.
Ruth turned back to the long cafeteria-style table and looked at the crowd before her. There were all shapes and sizes of people lined up for pizza, gelato, or bowls of tripe swimming in red sauce. The crowd was loud, boisterous and ugly. She felt affronted by the crude faces that slurped up pasta and drank red wine from little plastic cups.
Ruth drank from her Styrofoam cup of coffee. She didn’t really drink it, she sipped, barely wetting her lips. She hated coffee, hated the way it made her feel jittery. But she needed to be doing something.
She watched with her peripheral vision as the tall man wearing dress pants strolled from the bocce court to the line in front of the beverage counter. Most of the players were getting plastic cups filled with beer.
It was time.
Ruth stood and held her cup of coffee in her left hand. She circled the table, and walked toward the line of men waiting to get their beer.
In her right hand was the syringe, no bigger than a thimble. It was hooked onto a small circle of metal that went around her finger. From the back of the hand, it looked like a simple eternity band. But the syringe’s capsule and needle were laid flat against the inside of her palm. She simply had to spread her fingers wide to straighten the needle. She could then plunge it into a body part, squeezing her fingers together to hold the ring in place.
When she was even with the tall bocce player, she tripped and her scalding hot coffee poured directly onto the back left pocket of the man’s pants, followed by Ruth’s right hand which drove the needle directly into his buttocks. The man jumped and swore, turning to face Ruth. She turned to look back at the nonexistent crack that had tripped her up.
“I’m so sorry, sir,” she said, and rushed to grab a napkin from the table, her face still turned away from the line of men who were talking in loud voices.
Ruth reached the end of the drink counter where the napkins were and continued right around it and disappeared behind the makeshift wall of the temporary bar.
She walked quickly away as she heard the men’s voices change. Someone shouted and cursed.
Ruth smiled and pictured the painting in her head. A thick line of red shot across the expanse of the composition, electrifying it. The image sent a shiver of pleasure up and down her entire body.
CHAPTER SEVENTY-ONE
Mack
THE TECHNOLOGY and Information division within the FBI is located on the seventh floor of the Hoover building. Reznor called ahead and less than an hour later, she and Mack were back inside the building.
They sat down across from Agent Wanda Fillmore, a deathly pale and slightly overweight woman with enormous black eyes that reminded Mack of drawings of Emily Dickinson.
Reznor had told Mack that Fillmore owed her a favor. Apparently, Reznor had protected the young computer expert from an internal character assassination levied by a co-worker jealous of Fillmore’s virtuoso skills on the computer.
“Agent Fillmore is the one who discovered the shadow program on your computer,” Reznor said.
Mack nodded, wondering briefly if she had looked at everything on his computer, including his personal files.
“So tell me what you’re looking for,” Fillmore said. Her voice was surprisingly high and soft. Almost like a child’s voice.
Reznor briefly outlined the problem to her and she looked from Reznor back to Mack.
“Do you really think he went in through the official access portals?” she said.
Mack shook his head. “No, probably not,” he said. “We figure this guy is a pro. He most likely figured out a way to either get around the official entry, or he somehow created a fake profile.”
“But you’re the best, Wanda, and we figured you might take this as a challenge,” Reznor said.
Mack saw the color red flash through Fillmore’s pale cheeks. He figured the young woman didn’t get too many compliments.
“I’ll see what I can do,” she said.
“You can do it, Wanda,” Reznor said.
Mack hoped she was right.
CHAPTER SEVENTY-TWO
Truck Drivin’ Man
IT WAS the sound that startled Roger Dawson.
He had waited outside the redneck bar where his target, a prison guard, got plastered every night. Dawson couldn’t blame him. If he had a job in this jerkwater part of Michigan, he’d be knocking back beers and whiskeys every goddamned night, too.
When his assignment got to his car and fumbled for his keys, Dawson stepped from behind a truck parked next to him and swung.
But it didn’t sound right.
He had expected a thud when he drove the aluminum baseball bat into the lower back of his target. Instead of the sound of a wallop of metal applied to the muscle and bone of an unsuspecting man, the telltale sound of metal hitting metal filled the air.
Dawson felt the vibration run up his hands and he winced.
The man was pushed forward by the force of the blow. He bounced against his car and landed on his back.
Dawson tightened his grip on the bat and saw with pleasure that the man was reaching for his lower back, a look of pain and horror on his face. Yeah, did you feel that, buddy? Dawson thought. Get ready for more.
Dawson stepped up, brought the bat back, the man’s
head a big soft target for the pain he was about to unleash. Jus
t like that woman in the parking garage in San Francisco.
He’d knocked that one out of the fucking park.
Dawson grinned at his own wit and his biceps bulged. His forearm muscles stood out in stark animal rage as he reared back. The smile left his face and he gritted his teeth, relishing the horror he was about to deliver.
The man’s hand reappeared from the small of his back and Dawson spotted the gun. He had hit a goddamned gun.
Dawson swung, trying to beat what he knew was coming. Bullet proved faster than bat. The shot sounded a millisecond before Dawson completed his swing. It straightened him and the crack of the bat against his victim’s skull sounded weak.
A searing pain shot through Dawson’s shoulder and he felt the bat fly from his hands. He staggered back, noting with satisfaction that even with a half-assed swing the bastard’s head was dented in and that he’d flopped back onto the pavement, blood draining from his right ear.
Dawson’s head spun. Blood poured down his left arm. He had to get away.
He staggered to his feet, heard the door to the bar open behind him. Country music spilled out into the night air. He would have to run for it. He took a deep breath and stepped forward just as something hard hit him in the back of the head.
Dawson stumbled forward and felt his face slam into the pavement.
Not good, he thought.
CHAPTER SEVENTY-THREE
Nicole
SHE DOUBLE CHECKED the address given to her by Mary Cooper, the private investigator. It was a residential neighborhood, just north of Los Angeles proper.
Nicole pulled the Acura to a stop kitty-corner from the house where “Kurt” supposedly lived.
She took a deep breath. A part of her had wanted to forget it, just move on and ignore him. But Nicole had learned the hard way that sometimes it was better to initiate the confrontation on your own terms, at your own time. Yeah, she could talk to him at class, but then he would be prepared, he would expect to see her there. Now, she could catch him off guard, hopefully surprise him into telling the real truth.