Not an inch.
Sure, there were prints, genetic profiles, statistical profiles, suggested car sightings, and suchlike. But nothing that could lead them to a prime suspect. And without a suspect, they had jack shit. Data was great if your perp was already a convicted felon, but if he'd never been written up, then it wasn't worth a dime.
With all that in mind, Howie decided to go back to basics. He was determined to take a helicopter view, to try to avoid the forest of information and concentrate on the big chunky black trees that stood out like storm-blasted oaks at the centre of it all. To do that, he knew he had to start all over again, look at the mass of evidence as though it was the first time he'd seen it.
Some things were obvious. The twenty-year time span between the first accredited murder and his last killing meant the guy was at least middle-aged by now. More interestingly, that span meant that he'd killed throughout his most sexually active years and had carried on. A sure sign that he was more than a sexually motivated murderer and that he would never stop. There would be an end to it only when he was caught, or when he died.
All the murder victims were white women, and statistics showed that this meant he was probably also white. The spread of bodies was vast and covered more areas of the United States than the press had ever been told. BRK got his tag from the cluster of killings around the Black River in South Carolina, but the truth was that this guy had been killing all along the Atlantic coastline. Body parts had washed up in Jacksonville, Swan Quarter, Hertford and even Hampton. There had been discoveries as far north as the Canadian border, down to the Miami coast, and even out towards Mexico. There had been such a spread of abduction and disposal sites that detectives reasoned that BRK was the sole master of his own life, a single man, either unemployed or wealthy, who was able to go freely wherever and whenever he wanted, without being accountable to anyone. Howie put down the basics:
White
Middle-aged
No criminal record
Driver's licence
Good geographic knowledge
Unemployed/Self-sufficient
Free to travel around
Single
No dependants
'Great!' he said, throwing his arms open with mock enthusiasm. 'Guess that narrows things down to a mere sixty million white American males.'
Howie knew the crime stats backwards, and remembering them never made him feel better. About seventeen thousand people are murdered each year in America, fewer than six killings per hundred thousand of the population. But most murders are easy-solves, domestics that go wrong, drug grudges, gang warfare fought out in the streets with more spectators than a ball game. Most homicides were the work of 'amateurs', first-timers who panicked after the kill and ran for cover, desperate to dump the victim and get as far away as possible, as quickly as possible. They weren't like BRK.
This perp, or 'this fucking weird sicko fruitcake' as Howie called him, wanted to hold on to the bodies as long as he could. There could be several reasons why. Profilers believed BRK was highly intelligent and knew that by moving the body away from the abduction scene he made things doubly difficult for any investigation. First off, no enquiry really starts until the body is found. A missing person's hunt attracts only a fraction of the police resources and press coverage of a murder hunt. When the corpse is removed from the abduction site, this critical crime scene gets rained on, trampled on by people and pissed on by dogs. In short, crucial evidence is destroyed. The next complication is jurisdiction. A well-placed body can have the FBI, the city cops and the sheriff's office rolling up their sleeves to slug it out for the right to run the investigation (or, in some cases that Howie's known, to avoid running it). Finally, the big humdinger. If a serial killer can lure his prey away, and kill in a closed and controlled environment in which he won't make evidential mistakes and can clean up after himself, then the CSI teams don't even have a death scene to investigate.
Most of the profilers reckoned this last factor was the real reason BRK kept his bodies. But not Jack. Jack had often gone against the wisdom of the crowd. He reckoned there were other, much simpler reasons. As Howie picked up his coffee again, his old buddy's words came rolling back to him: 'He just can't bear to let his victims go. He wants to keep them for ever. Dead bodies can't run out on you. He's killing for companionship.'
Howie swallowed the bitter black coffee and considered how much better it would taste with another doughnut, especially a chocolate one. Right now he could do with food to aid his troubled thoughts.
The only real clue this guy gives us is how he disposes of the bodies.
He chops them up and spreads them all over the place.
He drives to rivers, swamps, estuaries, wherever there's deep water, and tosses the body parts in.
What does all that tell us?
Jack had asked the question many times and they'd come up with dozens of theories. He was drawn to water; he was a fisherman; he was brought up by a river; or maybe he saw his father use the river as a garbage chute. Maybe he was a sailor, perhaps he knew the local ports and used them to come and go, before and after the killings. The FBI had checked it all out, even double-checked some of it. Perhaps Jack's simple explanation had been right all along.
'I'll tell you what it is, Howie; next to fire, water is the best way to get rid of a corpse. Three-quarters of our planet is covered in water; that's a big place to hide bodies. Bury a corpse and you can almost always see the soil's been disturbed; people walk by, animals dig it up, before you know it there's a 911 being rung in. But weigh down body parts, then drop them in deep water and for a long time no one but Davy Jones will find out what you've done. When something eventually does come to the surface, it's stripped barer than a KFC drumstick during a Superbowl. Trust me, Howie, the only fixation this guy has with water is that it's a tool to help him. If he can find a better tool, then he'll switch from water in a shot.'
Howie went back to his profile and added:
Organized
Careful
Intelligent
Ruthless
Meticulous
He almost also wrote down 'pancakes, ham and fresh coffee'; because they were on his mind as he fought back another pre-breakfast grumble around his bulging belt-line.
If he had to describe the killer right now, he'd say he was looking at a white male, of above average intelligence, aged about forty-five, with no previous criminal record, who was financially independent, drove an unexceptional vehicle and probably didn't even have a parking ticket to his name. He wasn't a risk-taker; he was a grey type of fella who blended in with whatever was going on and never stood out from the crowd. He was single, most likely never married and was – was what? Howie paused as he considered his sexuality. Was he homosexual? Were they homosexual attacks on pretty heterosexual women? He didn't think so. Why should they be? Howie crossed it off his mental list. Were they heterosexual lust murders? Maybe. Perhaps the dismemberment was disguising something that he did to the corpse, something so depraved that he didn't want another living soul to discover what he'd done. It was a possibility. But there was no real trace evidence to support it. No semen on the bodies, or in body wounds, no sign of anything being rammed, jammed or slammed into any orifice. There had been some markings on the wrist and shin bones, possibly fetishist restraints, but more likely just the work of a methodical jailer making sure his prisoner didn't escape. He wished again that Jack was there to help him. Serial sex crimes had been his buddy's speciality. There had been no one better in the business.
'Remember, Howie, the primary sexual organ of the male and the female is not the genitals, it's the brain. Fantasy and planning happen in your head, not in your pants. Whatever these goons physically act out is merely a manifestation of what they mentally crave.'
Howie still didn't know whether to write homosexual or heterosexual. He just couldn't figure out what turned this weirdo on. And then he found the word he was searching for. Underneath Intelligent, Ruthless
and Meticulous, he wrote a word he'd never written before:
Necrophile
Death was just the start of the killer's turn-on.
27
Siena, Tuscany Jack's heart sank as his train arrived in Siena. The station was swarming with tourists and he suddenly remembered why: it was Palio day.
Jack and Nancy had never been to the famous Palio alla Tonda horse race through the streets of the city, but they'd heard all about it. Paolo had urged them to go, but Carlo, their quiet and far more conservative hotel manager, had begged them not to. The differing opinions pretty much coincided with how most of Italy viewed the controversial and highly dangerous spectacle. Some people loved the sense of tradition. It dated back to the mid seventeenth century and had historic echoes of the traditional Roman games of archery, fighting and racing. Others simply hated the fact that the horses often got badly injured and sometimes even had to be destroyed. Carlo had told them that years earlier one of the ten competing horses, each representing a local ward, fell and was trampled to death while the race was allowed to carry on. After that, he vowed he would never let his family watch the Palio again.
Outside the station, Jack could already hear the clop of horses' hooves as several members of the carabinieri trotted past. He guessed they were heading off for a rehearsal of the dramatic sword-wielding charge that they would stage in the pageant at the Piazza del Campo. Jack could also spot bookmakers on the pavements, pocketing fistfuls of euros as the betting built up for the big event.
With traffic virtually banned from the entire city, getting a taxi was even more difficult and pricey than usual. Finally, Jack collapsed into the back of an old Renault Megane that seemed to be missing certain luxuries, such as rear suspension or a window that would roll down. Somewhere on the outskirts of Siena he fell asleep and was pleasantly surprised to wake as the taxi pulled up noisily on the gravel outside La Casa Strada in San Quirico.
As they rounded the side of the hotel, his heart lifted when little Zack clambered off his pedal trike and dashed towards him with open arms, shouting, 'Daddy, Daddy!'
'Hello, tiger, come here and give your old man a kiss,' said Jack, sweeping the toddler up into his arms and kissing his beautifully smooth face. 'You been good for Mommy?' he asked, walking towards Nancy, who was sitting on the patio with paperwork spread out over a metal garden table.
'Hi there, stranger,' she called from her chair, holding down some papers as a surprise gust of wind threatened to blow them away.
'Hi, hon,' said Jack, bending down to kiss her, Zack still tucked under his right arm, as though he were a football.
'Down, Daddy, down!' urged the youngster.
'How was the train?' asked Nancy, slipping off her sunglasses to take a closer look at him.
Jack swung his son down and felt a warm glow as he watched the youngster dash back to his trike. He sat on the chair opposite his wife, tucking the plastic bags containing her presents surreptitiously beneath his seat. 'Palio day in Siena. It was so crazy there; I had to walk miles to get a cab.' He pinched an olive from a round, white dish on the table. 'I know what Carlo said, but I think I'd like to go see it some day.'
'Maybe,' said Nancy cautiously. Her mind was on other things. 'What about the case? You done with it? Everything finished? Or is that too much to hope for?'
Jack let out a noise somewhere between a laugh and a sigh. 'Sheeesh, Nancy, am I that easy to read?'
She nodded.
'They've got something they really want me to look at.'
Nancy frowned. 'That girl, Olivetta, or whatever her name is?'
'Orsetta,' he said, noting her sensitivity. 'No, not her, Massimo.'
Nancy's eyes lit up a little. 'You spoke to Mass? He say how Benny and the kids are?'
'No, we didn't have time to talk about that,' said Jack, remembering how well Nancy and Mass's wife Benedetta had got on when they'd met in Rome. Benny had shown her all the tourist sites, while he and Mass worked long hours together. 'I'm going to call him back in a minute, when I've freshened up and maybe grabbed a coffee.'
'I'll get the kitchen to send one up for you. You want anything to eat?'
'Yeah, could they do a panini of some kind?' he said, gathering the bags and getting ready to walk away.
'They're chefs, honey; they could do you a six-course lunch if you want.'
'Mozzarella and some salad would be just fine.' Jack pushed his chair back under the table and was about to leave when he caught the expression on his wife's face. 'You look like you're fit to burst, Nancy. You want to tell me what's eating you?'
Nancy took a deep breath. She'd have preferred to have this conversation later, in the cool of the evening when she could control their moods and there was nothing else to distract them. 'I don't want you to do this. I know it's probably connected to the murder of that young woman that's been in the news, and you feel that you should get involved, but you shouldn't, it's not going to be good for you.'
'Say all that again,' said Jack, a little crisper than he intended.
'It's all starting up again, isn't it?' said Nancy, knowing the day was about to be ruined.
Jack twisted his shoulders away from her, as he always did when he tried to show her he was exasperated and she'd got everything out of proportion. 'Honey, I'm going to look at some papers and photographs, see some maps and reports, and give some advice, that's all.'
She looked at him distrustfully and rolled her tongue over the front of her teeth, one of the traits Jack always recognized as a sign that she was holding out on him. 'What else?' he said in the tone he usually reserved for suspects in an interview room.
'Howie called from New York.' She studied his face for a reaction, before adding with a sigh of resignation, 'Something's happened over there. He wouldn't tell me much but he mentioned BRK, said they were reopening the case.'
'He say why?' asked Jack, his pulse quickening.
'Like I said, he wouldn't tell me much. Just that the press were going to be all over it again, probably all over you too.' She took hold of his hand. 'Honey, we don't need this.' Her voice hardened. 'Actually, this is the very stuff that we came all the way here to get away from.' She looked to her left and then to her right, taking in the peace of the garden and the beauty of the view across the hills. 'Please don't put it all at risk, Jack, don't get drawn in again.'
Jack leant across the table, trying to make a connection. His face was uncompromising, but to the trained eye of his wife it betrayed vulnerability as well. 'Nancy, this man might be killing again. He may already have taken at least one young woman's life, right here in Italy, maybe the girl you referred to, and from the sound of what you've just said, he could well be active again back home.' Jack reached across and took hold of her other hand as well. 'I can't keep running away. The impotency of doing nothing is driving me crazy. I have to try to stop him.'
'Even if it hurts you?' said Nancy, feeling that this was a conversation she'd had over and over again. 'Even if it hurts us?'
Jack said nothing but Nancy could read the answer on his face. She pulled her hands free of his. 'I've got to see Paolo in the kitchen. I'll have him send some food over to you.'
Jack stood motionless as she pushed her chair away from the table so hard that it clattered on to the patio. He bent over and picked it up, then watched her walk quickly towards the restaurant. He knew from the shape of her back that her arms were up at her face and she was crying. And he knew that there was nothing in the world he could do to stop it.
28
Marine Park, Brooklyn, New York Lu Zagalsky is in a shallow, fitful sleep when Spider slips off the gag and slams the needle of undiluted bleach directly into her voice box. The chemical will burn out her vocal cords and render her incapable of a squeak, let alone ascream. Keeping the gagon would be to run the risk of her choking on her own vomit, and he doesn't want her to die. At least, not just yet.
'Shh, shh, don't struggle,' says Spider, dropping the needle and holding down her
shoulders.
The wrist-chain has worked a notch loose on her right-hand side and Lu instinctively tries to punch him. The metal links snap tight and nearly dislocate her arm.
'Stop it! Stop it now!' he shouts, quickly putting his right hand around her neck. His fingers are steely strong and they stab like knives into her throat. Spider feels enraged and aroused. His vice-like grip tightens around the tender tissue where the bleach is already eating through her larynx.
Lu thinks she's going to die. It's now! He's going to kill you right now! There'll be no Ramzan, no life outside the Beach, nothing more than this.
Despite the agonizing pain she manages to bend her neck and snake her mouth round his hand just enough to bite him.
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