The Eleventh Victim

by Nancy Grace

  So her pen had turned up after all this time…under Hayden’s body. In a single thoughtless boast, Kolker had given away a major prosecution strategy. Now she knew the strategic significance of the pen, where they’d found it, how they planned to use it against her, and, significantly, exactly who had picked it up. She knew about the hair, the article, the timing of the murders…it was no small amount of evidence…and this was just the beginning of the investigation.

  Mustering every ounce of technique left in her body, she managed to keep a stoic mask in place. But now she understood the State’s case, what tied her to Hayden’s murder and, connecting the dots, to Melissa’s as well. Now she had the ammunition she needed to fight back.

  But she had no choice. It would mean lying to the police. She wanted desperately to tell the truth but…they’d never believe the truth about the pen disappearing. It was a major gamble because if she were caught lying, she’d look guilty as hell. But tonight, there was no other way out. She reminded herself that Kolker couldn’t possibly know the history behind the pen. She swallowed hard and it hurt her throat.

  “Hey…I’ve been looking for that. It’s my favorite. But Kolker, even coming from you, I’m shocked. This can only mean you searched my office without a warrant. I haven’t seen my pen since Hayden’s last visit. She was twisting the cord, wrapping and rewrapping the silk portion between her fingers while she talked. She played with it nearly the entire session. So it was there, in the office, but then…you came by…Kolker…did you take the pen from my office?”

  The words were poison to any major investigation, accusing the cops of planting evidence, and they hung, foul-smelling in the close quarters of the interrogation room.

  He was speechless. In one minute, the momentum shifted.

  Realizing she had a tiny advantage, Hailey pressed on.

  “Kolker, is that the only way you can crack a case, planting the pen as evidence? Even coming from you, I’m shocked.”

  Sensing that he was faltering, she leveled her eyes to his and put the accusatory shoe on the other foot. “Did you go in without a warrant? Did you find it, read the engraving, and place it there under her as she lay dead? You’re the one who’s sick, Kolker, not me. It’s so much more sensational to try and pin this on me, isn’t it? A regular street thug wouldn’t do, would it? Just how far will you go to make a name for yourself?”

  “I didn’t—”

  Suddenly, Kolker was keenly aware that his colleagues and superiors behind the mirrored wall were watching him.

  All right, Hailey, that’s enough. Keep it simple, she warned herself.

  How many times had liars done themselves in by creating an elaborate story that could be attacked from countless angles?

  Learn from their mistakes…say no more…see where he goes with it.

  She could see the wheels turning as it slowly started to dawn on him that the discovery of the pen wasn’t exactly the airtight piece of evidence that would clinch the case for him. In fact, there were any number of explanations why Hayden may have had the pen. She could have borrowed it, swiped it, used it, and then, unthinking, dropped it into her artist’s notebook.

  “You mean that’s it? This pen is why you’re holding me? And the fact I was trying to help Melissa and Hayden?

  “The kinky journal entries, as you so eloquently put it, Kolker, is research I’ve been doing for over a year on the psychopathy of serial killers. All of them, Gacy, Bundy, Zodiac, Boston Strangler, BTK…the notes weren’t about my patients at all, and I’ve sent the theory to over a dozen psych journals to see if they’d be interested in publishing. There are records. Try that on at trial. Oh, and they’d never get in at trial anyway because they weren’t in plain view on my desk, they were in a file drawer beside my desk. You searched without a warrant…. I knew it.”

  She looked him square in the face, unrelenting. “Oh…and the hair…your big forensic evidence. It means nothing. I hug nearly every patient when they leave each session, Kolker. I’ll have a string of patients testify to that at trial, so dig in, Kolker. They’re transfers from me to them. Or maybe they caught a hand in my barrette or touched my shoulder.”

  He had lapsed into silence. Hailey didn’t let up.

  “But she was clutching it…her hand was in a fist!” Kolker was limping now.

  “Says you. By the time my lawyers and experts finish with your so-called crime tech, the jury will think you planted the hair just like you did the pen. That is, if they don’t see the obvious, that it’s a simple transfer. It’s not enough. And Kolker, the word ‘mitochondrial’ doesn’t scare me. It simply means DNA without skin, without the nucleus, the root attached to the hair. Big deal. Even if you have nuclear DNA with the root…so what? If a few hairs were torn from my scalp when one of them pulled away from a hug or when I pulled a sweatshirt off my head and it transferred to them…I never even felt it. Struggle? There was no struggle. It proves nothing…nothing, Kolker.”

  She could see the wheels turning, that the magnificent dream he’d nurtured for days on end was fading. He hadn’t cracked a serial-murder case after all, not yet, anyway. He was not headed for a promotion and could forget being heralded in the press.

  “You kept mementoes of the murders. I found Hayden’s poems in your office like the ones that were in her backpack the night she was murdered, and a photo of Melissa. Just like Gacy kept underwear and driver’s licenses off his victims. Killers keep them like normal people keep ticket stubs and photo albums. Explain that!”

  Without a pause, she spoke evenly. “So you did search without a warrant. I thought so before, now I know for sure. Hayden gave me a stack of her poetry to show to a publisher who lives in my building. And Melissa showed me that photo because it pictured her with her sister. She left it at my office on the coffee table and I put it in her folder to give back.

  “Kolker…this isn’t a murder investigation,” she said, “it’s a frame-up so you can claim you cracked the case. Just a grab for headlines. The whole thing makes me sick. Two innocent women, murdered brutally in your own backyard, Kolker, and I’m the best you can do? Wait until the papers hear that you arrested a woman even though the victims may have been molested.”

  She got him again, on pure speculation. Instead of protecting the case, he protected himself and blurted a retort.

  “But there wasn’t any sperm! We don’t know if the molestations were premortem or post-, whether the attacker was a man or woman.”

  “You’re not even sure there was a molestation…are you? A partially clad victim doesn’t equal rape, Kolker.”

  As he started wildly searching through his papers, she dropped the bombshell.

  “I refuse to be questioned any further. I want to call a lawyer…now. When I thought you were actually investigating the murders, I wanted to help, but now…” She closed in for the kill. “And I want Rube Garland.”

  She had never even met Garland, but she saw his name in a news article when she Googled Kolker’s name after he showed up in her hospital room.

  The story detailed Garland’s client who walked free on a murder rap because of a legal loophole. It was Jack Kolker…then just a beat cop…who had neglected to sign his name on a bag of evidence.

  That bag contained hair samples taken from the victim’s bedroom, the murder scene. The DNA just so happened to match up with Garland’s client’s. The paper’s front page had a shot of Kolker storming out of the courtroom, an angry snarl on his face.

  The photo was accompanied with an interview with the defense attorney, Rube Garland, in which Garland gloated over NYPD’s failure to protect the chain of custody, leaving a hole in the case and making it ripe for a defense claim of planted evidence. Hailey insinuated now, as then, Kolker screwed up DNA hair evidence.

  Before Kolker could utter another word, the door to the interrogation room burst open.

  Two cops, both wearing suits, walked into the room. One was short, gray, and pensive…the other tall, dark, and looking
incredibly angry.

  “Kolker, you’re needed upstairs.” The little gray one spoke.

  Without another word, Kolker gathered his papers and left the room, throwing one last glance over his shoulder at Hailey as he left.

  It was a look of unmistakable hatred, pure loathing. She had totally humiliated him in front of his whole team, the brass, too.

  But it didn’t matter now. Hailey sensed it. She was headed home.

  It was over…at least for now.

  The two detectives handcuffed her to the table, which was bolted to the floor.

  “Wait here,” the short, gray cop said, and the two of them left her there alone, unattended.

  Fully aware that others might still be seated in the observation room, she said nothing and remained expressionless.

  After another long wait alone, they returned.

  As the taller one jangled keys and reached for her handcuffs, she saw that the short cop was holding a large plastic garbage bag containing her empty purse, wallet, cell phone, and pager. All the wallet and purse contents were loose in the bag, having been searched thoroughly.

  Hailey’s ribs ached as she stood.

  “Ms. Dean, you may be required to return to headquarters for questioning.” The little gray one again, short but not curt, giving no explanation as to her detainment or her release.

  She expected neither.

  Nobody needed to tell her why she suddenly was being released. Kolker’s interrogation had bombed miserably. The department had obviously pinned their hopes on his theory, and with the discovery of Hailey’s pen at the second murder scene, the interrogation of Hailey Dean should have been the icing on the cake…case closed.

  In their plans, the evening would have ended with drinks all around at the Irish pub around the corner, and tomorrow morning, a front-page story in the Post listing all their names, describing them as the elite force that stopped a cunning serial murderer who turned out to be none other than a beautiful criminal lawyer-turned-psychologist. Of course, no front-page story would be complete without photos of themselves.

  But it hadn’t turned out that way.

  “I’m happy to do whatever will help with the case.” They began the circuitous route out through the bowels of the building, the detectives leading the way. Once on the ground floor, the short gray one pointed toward the imposing front entry.

  “A right, then a left. It’ll take you straight to the front exit. Good-night.”

  She continued walking down the corridor, fighting the impulse to turn back. Just as she made the first turn to the right, she glanced quickly sideways to see them still standing there in the middle of the hallway, staring at her, clearly unhappy at the sudden turn of events during the interrogation. She turned the corner and they were out of view.

  Hailey made the rest of the walk alone.

  Pushing the heavy doors forward, she stepped outside. The night was dark and fresh. Lights were beginning to twinkle in thousands of buildings across the city. It was biting cold; the wind whipped around her legs and blew blonde hair away from her face.

  She was out, true. But for how long? She braced her body against the cold. And it wasn’t just the freezing wind howling up the street that made her shiver.

  Somewhere out there in the city, blended in with nearly eight million other people, there was someone willing to wrap his hands around the necks of two young women and strangle the life from their bodies…to pierce their backs with a four-pronged murder weapon jutting from the spine all the way through their lungs…all in a twisted effort to frame Hailey for double murder.

  Her silver pen was the key. The realization sunk in slow and heavy as she stood there on the top step of the jail. Two women were already dead at the hands of someone targeting not them, but Hailey. Would there be more? She had lied, true…but if she told Kolker the truth about the pen, she’d still be in the interrogation room instead of on the street.

  Police were no help to her now; they wouldn’t accept defeat. An invisible weight settled on Hailey’s shoulders as the lights continued to blink through the misty darkness settling over the city. One thought burned into her consciousness.

  Who planted the pen?

  61

  St. Simons Island, Georgia

  VIRGINIA UNLOCKED THE WOODEN DOOR THAT WAS PART OF THE tall, weathered fence surrounding her house, and stepped into the yard. It was all grass, sea oats, and scrub pines growing wild and unmanicured, still wet from morning dew and sea mist.

  As she approached the front door, she could hear tiny yelps and barks as the dogs hurled themselves at the door to welcome her back, their little doggie toenails digging at the bottom. When she pried through the tiniest possible opening so as not to let them escape, they leaped on her, all tongues and fur.

  First, treats, and then, the guerrillas. With Sidney curled in her lap, she took out her old address book, BlackBerry be damned, and started dialing.

  “Good afternoon, Radio Shack.”

  “Yes, may I please speak to Ken?”

  She was on hold for the duration of a Britney Spears song until, finally, she got her first lieutenant, Ken, on the other end. They spoke in agreed-upon code.

  “The beach is hot. We need to cool off.”

  The undercover talk thrilled Ken no end.

  “When?” he whispered into the phone, and Virginia could just see him, turned away from the others and being all Barney Fife.

  “Nighttime, and we go by boat. Call me tonight but start the chain.”

  “Chain commenced. Over and out.”

  The phone clicked off and the gig was on.

  The other dogs were all sacked out on the den furniture, sleepy after their treats. Virginia pulled herself out of the chair, depositing Sidney on his paws, and started upstairs to make the bed and take a shower.

  After that, she’d head back to Larry’s. She had to locate some sort of a boat they could take around the bend of the Island. Shouldn’t be hard, no water patrol that time of night. It would have to be large enough to carry the shovels and hedge-clippers they’d need to tear apart the layout.

  In the back of her head, somewhere remote and tucked away, she knew it was all temporary. The money man would find a way to lay the foundation regardless of their attacks on the work site.

  And then what? Chain herself to the site’s chain-link fence? Mount another petition of Islanders that opposed development?

  That was beginning to wear thin as more and more Islanders got paychecks from developers.

  It would be a long war, and this was simply one battle.

  At the top of the stairs, Virginia turned right into her bedroom. She opened the curtains and looked out at the waves rolling in one after the next after the next.

  It was beautiful and hypnotizing and worth fighting for.

  “That’s what it’s all about,” she whispered to nobody. She would find a way.

  A thump at the front door snapped her out of her daze.

  The damn paperboy. She’d told him a million times, don’t hit the door. It would throw the dogs into a fit. But luckily, they continued to snooze off the treats.

  She bent to pick up a pillow off the floor, then stood up straight, eyes wide, locked on the window.

  The paper had already come.

  Something wasn’t right. All at once, Virginia could feel it.

  She stood absolutely still, listening.

  For a moment, all she could hear was the distant sound of the ocean and her own breathing.

  Then, the faint but unmistakable sound of a footstep creaking on the stairs.

  She was no longer alone in the house.

  Panic washed over her and she looked around for a place to hide. Knowing she was trapped, she made a futile move toward the closet.

  Just before she reached it, she glimpsed, through the corner of her eye, movement in the doorway.

  It was too late.

  She turned around.

  Two of the most massive men she’d ever seen l
ooked back at her with flat gazes.

  “Who the hell are you and what the hell do you want? Get out of my house before I call the police!” She eyed the phone on the other side of the bed, and without waiting for an answer, she lunged for it.

  Diving across the bed, they tackled her. She hit the floor, her face sliding along the rug, burning. One of them kicked her hard in the backside when she tried to stand up.

  “Take it…my purse. It’s over there.” When she spoke her tongue tasted blood.

  The shorter one backhanded her and she flew against the wall.

  “Somebody likes the beach, doesn’t she?” The pointed toe of a snakeskin cowboy boot crashed into her ribs.

  The tall one yanked the neck of Virginia’s shirt and ripped it down around her hips. Her arms crossed her chest and she stayed flat on her stomach. One of them turned her over, but she couldn’t see which. A pain went crashing through her skull when a fist made contact with her jaw.

  Far away, she could hear the wild barking of her dogs…and then it faded into silence. The last thing Virginia saw was the carpet under her face on the floor.

  62

  New York City

  HE’D ALWAYS HAD EXCELLENT NIGHT VISION, EVEN AS A CHILD.

  The super-heightened sense, his uncanny ability to see in practically pitch-dark conditions, had served him well in the past. On the streets of Atlanta, he’d been able to spot the silhouette of a lone woman on a darkened sidewalk blocks away, even in shadowy pockets where the streetlights had been shot out for target practice.

  And then later, in the penitentiary, he would sit nightly, unmoving, in the dark of his cell, looking straight forward through the bars of his cell door, seeing yet not seeing.

  He always had the advantage at night, and tonight was no different. His eyes had been trained on the front entrance of the New York City Women’s Detention Center for nearly seven hours. As the daylight faded, he had to focus even more keenly as people came and went about their business. His back to a wall across the street, he continued staring, watching every single person who emerged.