“Daddy!” the boy squealed. “Please Daddy! Please, no!”
Only after he spanked the kid a third time did he finally turn to look out into the black river, squinting hard to see what had spooked his child.
He stilled, except for the tick at his temple he couldn’t quite control.
The dad’s sight was compromised, having stared too long into the bright work lights. Satisfied that he was in the right, and his son was in the wrong, he turned and shook a finger at his frightened boy. “Stay right here! Don’t make me tell you again! You’re going to get us both killed!”
No, just one of them.
He wanted the boy.
Desperately.
He could almost taste his purity.
He waded closer as the father sauntered back to his stage without looking back. The little boy peered out into the river, his face frozen in a cry that wanted desperately to escape.
“Daddy,” he whined.
“No, Tommy!” the dad said firmly without looking back. And then, feeling guilty maybe, added, “I just have to get this done, then I’ll take you to get an ice cream, okay?”
The child was frozen, those big round eyes staring directly into his . . . the little chest hiccupping with emotion, and in that moment, he sensed a kindred spirit.
They were the same.
That’s where he had begun . . . staring straight into the eyes of the beast.
“Da-d-dy,” the boy whimpered—too softly to be heard, but the dad peered up just as the first of his rockets exploded into the damp night sky.
The sound of the rocket’s ascent stopped him cold in the water and he paddled backward, farther back to watch from a safe distance as the rocket burst into a thousand bright pinpoints of light, illuminating a park that was half submerged.
He retreated far enough back that you could no longer hear the child’s sniffles, and he watched the scene unfold under a brilliant explosion of color. One by one the rockets launched after the first one, and the sky flashed from light to dark and back again.
On the stage, the father turned and froze at a glimpse of the night’s handiwork. He slowly turned his spotlight.
The girl’s body lay not twenty feet from the stage, on a slip of higher ground where the water had begun to recede. She lay with her hands bound together prayerfully . . . much the way she had died . . . begging for her life through bulging, terror-filled eyes because her mouth could no longer plead.
Beyond the stage, beyond the park, the police station glowed across the street.
The frogman smiled, inhaled a breath of watery air and dove soundlessly down into the black water.
Caroline peered out of her bedroom window, watching the raindrops slide down the outside windowpane. The property was puddled, otherwise undamaged, and she wondered how Sadie’s house had fared with water up to nine feet higher than flood level.
Finally, the rain was subsiding and she was glad, because Augusta—stubborn hellion that she was—was out there in it . . . somewhere.
Tango watched as she moved away from the window, his tail wagging halfheartedly when she made eye contact with him. Caroline grabbed her cell phone from the dresser and dialed Frank’s number, hoping to get some information before Augusta returned home. She had already tried calling Pam to no avail.
Knowing her sister, she would hold off just so long before impatience set her on a forward trajectory, and then she would become an irresistible force. It was in everyone’s best interest not to wait it out, hoping she’d just go away. That wouldn’t happen.
Caroline and Bonneau had already agreed that if Daniel gave them the go-ahead, Pam should write up the reward story. Because she’d written the majority of the articles about Patterson, Frank thought her reporting could use a little more balance.
Despite the flooded streets, Frank was still at the office and Caroline was beginning to wonder if the man had any life at all outside of the Tribune. “Any word?”
“No,” he said. “Daniel doesn’t seem to be returning phone calls. For that matter, neither is Pam.”
“I was hoping to be able to give Augusta a thumbs-up today.”
“I haven’t heard from Pam at all—neither yesterday nor today. In all the confusion, I assumed you told her not to come in. She hasn’t checked in with me.”
“No. I didn’t,” Caroline assured him. “When was the last you talked to her?”
“Friday.”
“Damn,” Caroline said, and she had a sudden, icy feeling in the pit of her stomach. “Do you have her number on you?”
“In my office, but if you hang on, I’ll grab it for you.”
“Thank you, Frank. I’ll talk to her first thing tomorrow morning—everyone in fact. I’ll make it clear that if they aren’t coming in for whatever reason, they are to discuss it with you. You’re their boss.”
There was silence on the other end of the phone, and then he said, “I appreciate that.”
But Caroline thought she sensed a smile.
“No problem.
“Okay, ready?”
“Shoot . . .”
Caroline snagged a pen from inside the drawer of her mother’s nightstand and he rattled off Pam’s number. “Thank you, Frank,” she said, and hung up, realizing only as she dialed the number and it began to ring that she already had Pam’s number in her contacts.
The call went straight to voice mail.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Jack waited to leave the station, just in case there were folks willing to brave the receding floodwaters to come see fireworks. Thankfully, people used their brains and stayed home.
For the first time in a long time, he was feeling frisky.
Maybe it was because of the slightly cooler air, or maybe it was the fact that, after all this time, the crushing sense of dread he’d been feeling was beginning to lighten up.
Or maybe it was the simple fact that he’d enjoyed at least a dozen hard-ons during the day, just thinking about Caroline’s ass in his hands.
Whatever it was that was responsible for his mood, he didn’t fight it.
When his phone rang, he hoped it would be Caroline, so he could play hard to get for all of two full seconds before veering his car in the direction of the Aldridge estate. If nothing else, he could talk her into making out on their porch like they had when they were teenagers. His partner’s voice on the other end of the line had the effect of a finger-thump to his dick. “Hey, Jack.”
“What’s up, Don?”
Garrison seemed to trip over his words, uncertain how to say whatever it was he was trying to spit out of his mouth. Finally, he said, “Jack, listen . . . I know you just left, man . . . but you’ve gotta come back . . . now.”
A bad feeling settled in Jack’s gut at the bleak sound of his voice. “What is it, Don?”
“There’s . . . another body,” he said, but there was something about the way he partitioned the words that made Jack’s stomach wrench a little tighter.
He turned the car around immediately.
She felt like a criminal, hiding and checking over her shoulder repeatedly to see if anyone was following her. That annoyed Augusta, because she didn’t feel as though she was doing anything wrong.
She just had this feeling about Patterson.
However, she wasn’t stupid enough to meet him at his house. She chose a public place, the only place she really felt at home here—the Windjammer on the Isle of Palms. Although the new construction was nothing like the one-story building that had been there originally, with the volleyball nets tangled out back, it was still the one place she knew where she could escape the scent of mothball-permeated Confederate uniforms and the sweating crush of tourists, even if the one thing the ’Jammer saw in plenty during the summer was people.
Parking was ridiculous, especially in her mother’s boat of a car, but once she made it inside, she went straight for the bar, grabbed herself a beer and walked outside to watch the volleyballers and wait. It was ten-fifteen. He was lat
e.
Once back at the station, nobody seemed inclined to tell him anything.
Apparently, they had already called in SLED—the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division—along with the sheriff ’s office, and now they were waiting for the chief to return from across the street, where it seemed he was hijacking Jack’s investigation. At this point, all Jack knew was that it was a woman they’d discovered and he knew the M.O. was similar to the Jones case, but that’s all they seemed inclined to reveal.
Finally, tired of the hemming and hawing, he grabbed Garrison and pulled him out the door, urging him toward the street, toward the park. “Who found her?” Jack demanded.
Garrison wouldn’t look at him. “Some kid and his dad.”
“Where are they now?”
“Inside. Waiting for an interview.” And then he added, “I’m real sorry, Jack.”
The knot in Jack’s stomach grew.
Caroline was the first person who popped into his mind. He hadn’t talked to her at all today and his stomach threatened to empty its contents right there in the street. They crossed into the park, where uniforms were already scouring the perimeter.
The fireworks stage sat on higher ground and the spotlights were still on, but no longer aimed at the equipment itself. Harsh light spilled across the half-submerged park, toward a twisted form by the water’s edge.
As Jack neared, he could begin to make her out, and the pit of his stomach turned violently.
The girl’s long wet blond locks pooled onto the ground around her face. Her body was completely bare, her naked breasts pointed skyward, feet and hands bound. Her body was draped, like a sacrifice over a boulder. He recognized the bags on her waterlogged hands as their own. They lay positioned on her chest in prayerful repose . . . like Amy Jones.
It wasn’t Caroline.
He felt vomit rise up into his throat.
He forced himself not to look away, to go straight to the body and look down on that face he had looked at a hundred times before. Only now her skin would be cold to the touch. She was pale and waterlogged and if he turned her over, postmortem lividity would have begun to stain her perfect white skin. Her mouth was covered with tape, but it was, beyond a shadow of doubt, Kelly Banks.
Her blue eyes stared up at him, unseeing. The whites of her eyes stained with broken vessels spinning veiny webs into her sockets.
He stared down at her a long moment and then walked away and did something he hadn’t done since the early days of his career. He puked in the bushes.
Chapter Thirty-Three
Knowing Gormley Sr. was waiting in the interview room with his son, Jack returned to the station and took a moment to get his head straight.
He’d seen a lot of dead bodies during his years as a cop—though some of them might not even qualify for the term because they were in such a state—but this was the first time since his mother’s death that he had looked into a face he’d wanted desperately to love and found nothing but vacant space staring back.
How the hell did one interview a four-year-old who might possibly be the sole witness in the entire case?
He thought about Kelly’s mother and groaned, burying his face in his hands. Out of everyone he knew, Kelly had had the most loving, healthy relationship with her parents. Jack would have to be the one to tell them, but what would he say? How did you tell a mother who still brought her daughter bagged lunches to work that her baby girl was dead?
Murdered.
Tortured.
The last time he’d talked to her, he had been cold and distant. He was trying to be kind by yanking off the Band-Aid, but now that dejected look in her eyes would haunt him forever.
Josh had said she was working on something for him. Was she dead because of that? Or was she just unlucky enough to be in the wrong place at the wrong time? Could this be aimed at Jack . . . as the investigator in charge? The police in general? Or was Jack just the lucky dude picked to play the game?
Now Kelly was dead.
Was it a coincidence she was connected to Jack? A warning? A challenge? How many more innocent women would die? How many missing persons were already notches on this killer’s belt? Had Kelly figured that out?
Chief Condon came in while Jack was mentally preparing himself for the interview. Leaving the crime unit to finish up the scene investigation and wait for SLED, he sat down in the seat facing Jack, his expression sober. “Jack,” he began.
Jack knew where he was going before he said another word.
“I can’t let you keep the case,” he said.
“I can handle it!”
Condon shook his head. “I looked the other way with the whole media leak bullshit, because I trust you to do what it takes to get the job done, but this is different. I can’t let you work this case now that Kelly is involved. We can’t risk it, Jack. ”
Jack’s jaw worked. He stared down at the floor, his eyes burning.
“As it is, I heard from the DA’s office that you may have compromised evidence—”
Jack’s gaze shot up, fury surging through his veins. “Childres told you that?”
Condon shook his head. “It doesn’t matter who told me what. I defended your actions and reminded them as long as you had that piece of evidence in your sight at all times before checking it in, it’s all good. You’re a good enough cop to know when not to break the rules.”
“But?”
“This is Kelly, man.”
“I know who the hell is out there!” Jack assured him. “Please, Bill, at least let me do the interview with the kid.”
Condon shook his head, his mind made up.
“But he’s our only witness!”
“Listen to me, Jack. Anything you do on this case at this point could damage the county solicitor’s case. I can’t risk it.”
Jack wanted a cigarette. He wanted to get up and grab his chair and smash the entire room to shreds. He wanted to catch the son of a bitch and strangle him with his bare hands. That would be justice, right?
“You can watch,” Condon conceded.
Somewhere in the rational part of Jack’s brain, he understood that Condon was doing the only thing he could do, but the idea of losing control of this case made him potentially violent.
On top of that, now that he was taking Jack off the case, he was giving the go-ahead to pursue it as a serial homicide. With two bodies that might or might not be connected, they still couldn’t technically classify it as a serial killing, but Condon was willing to trust Jack’s intuition, if not his police work—even if it meant taking a stand publicly. Kelly was one of their own and her murder was clearly a gauntlet tossed down.
“I’m just supposed to stand by and just let someone else work this?”
“I’ll leave Garrison on it.”
“He doesn’t have the experience!”
“Listen to me, Jack. It doesn’t matter. I can’t leave you on this case. They’ll say I did it out of friendship and neither of us can afford that. You can consult so long as you stay out of sight.”
Jack shook his head, unwilling to accept that he was expected to walk away now—especially with so much of his life at stake. He had the awful feeling that they had a narrow window to nab the guy.
Jack was the best DT on the force—no hubris there—his record spoke for itself—especially since his arrests never ended up going free on a mere technicality. That’s what galled him most about Childres’s accusation.
He knew it was Childres who’d blabbed. Who wouldn’t that asshole throw under the bus for political gain?
He tried to see it from Childres’s perspective—knew the guy wanted to land the mayor’s desk, and Jack understood that anything that threatened his reputation or any case he was working on undermined his political ambitions. He understood all that, but it angered him that Josh would take unfounded complaints to Condon.
He felt as tightly wound as a Swiss watch. What if they missed something?
Condon sensed his thoughts. “Our crime
scene unit is as good as it gets, Jack. They’ll look at every inch of that park under a magnifying glass and every wrinkle on Kelly’s body. If there’s a pube on her that isn’t hers, we’ll know about it.”
Jack was forced to concede.
After Condon left, he purposely didn’t call Caroline, uncertain how to tell her the news and dreading the wedge it was bound to put between them.
At all costs, they had to find this guy—as much for Caroline’s sake as anyone else’s—but she wasn’t going to deal well with the fact that he would rather have his nuts placed in a crab cracker than compromise the investigation further. Trusting her had probably cost him the case. From now on, he couldn’t treat her any differently than he would treat someone from the Post. She would find out soon enough.
Thirty minutes into the interview the Gormley kid hit the wall. He was tired and wanted to go home and answered every question posed with a firm shake of his head.
The father grew agitated. “I gave a statement earlier. Can we please come back tomorrow?”
Jack held his breath.
Garrison acknowledged the request, but didn’t give him a verbal answer. He asked the kid yet another question that the boy stonewalled.
The father was about two minutes away from taking his kid home and refusing further cooperation, but if he went home now, a night of bad dreams could wipe away any and all important details from his memory.
Jack paced the observation room, watching Garrison lose his only witness until he tried a different tack. “Dude . . . I heard you saw a frogman tonight?”
Watching through the glass, Jack held his breath while the kid thought about it. He didn’t deny it, but he didn’t respond either, except to kick angrily at the air beneath the table.
Progress . . . maybe.
“I saw Spiderman once, but no one believed me.”
Tommy glanced up at Garrison, probably wondering if he was telling the truth.
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