The Eleventh Victim

by Nancy Grace

  Hanging the holster on the side of her bed, she closed the cabinet and secured the computer overlay. She slipped on the holster and weapon to keep her hands free. She walked, surefooted, gun at her side, into the kitchen and turned down the flame under the copper kettle.

  As she lifted it up and over, away from the flame, something caught her eye.

  There was light where there shouldn’t be: lamplight pouring from inside her home office, pooling outside the door.

  Hailey never, ever left any light on in the apartment while she was gone—nothing other than the stove hood, whose glow streamed into the entrance hall as she walked in each night.

  No other light, ever.

  Her thoughts whirled back over the last twenty-four hours. She remembered packing up a stack of files. She remembered noting that the plants were green and growing in spite of the cold, straining toward the winter sun at the window.

  She remembered checking the lock on her patient file cabinet, pulling the office door almost closed, walking out through her kitchen, and leaving for the day.

  Same as every morning.

  But now the door leading into her home office was fully open…and were all the lights in the room on?

  Someone had been here while she was gone. They could still be here. Or out there, somewhere, watching her.

  As Hailey stood there at the stove, hand on the kettle, trying to grasp what had happened, she became acutely aware that every window in her apartment was in plain view. All the shades were up their highest to let in as much daylight as possible when she was there each morning.

  But now, in the dark outside, the Manhattan skyline was a million pinpoints of light, each one representing a person’s apartment or office, suspended in the night air.

  If she could see them, they could see her.

  Hailey gently placed the kettle on a cool burner and reached for the .38 with her trigger hand. Pulling it, she held it down against her right side, the stovetop island protecting her maneuver from prying eyes in the night. Gripping the .38, she backed up against the sink and counter and began making her way toward her office. The handgun was now clutched firmly with both her hands, right index on the trigger, pointing down.

  Keeping her back to the kitchen counters, she walked sideways across the expanse of slate. Beyond the folding doors, she could see the floor lamps on, as well as the desk lamp. The wooden cabinets discreetly concealing hundreds of patient files, as well as all her old trial files, stood there. Their drawers were ajar.

  The room was empty. She couldn’t just see it, she could feel it; she knew no one was concealed in the shadows, watching her. Still, she checked. Just to be sure.

  Whoever had come into her apartment was gone, leaving only the trace of lights on and cabinet door ajar.

  Keeping the gun firmly in her hand and her back to the walls of the room, Hailey pulled the cabinet doors open wide. What were they looking for?

  And why not ransack the apartment in the search?

  She glanced at the window that faced the apartment buildings next door, with terraces growing trees some twenty floors above the earth. She could see people in lamplit windows, going about their business cooking, reading, watching TV.

  Keeping the gun firmly in her right hand, Hailey reached up with her left to close the shades.

  She turned back to the cabinet, where her trial files were arranged alphabetically in rows of precise horizontal lines across the first three upper shelves. On the top shelf, a few of the files appeared slightly pulled forward from the rest.

  Heart pounding now, she put the gun down and began sorting through the folders, fingering back the tabs on which she had handwritten defendants’ names and charges: Clay Rape Trial, Clemmons Drug Trafficking, Collins Arson, Cook Domestic Homicide, Dixon Weapons Violations…

  Her mind was spinning, calculating rapidly.

  Something was missing. What was it?

  Hailey closed her eyes and visualized the rows of files.

  Then her right hand went instinctively to her throat, where the silver pen had once hung from its silken cord.

  Her eyes flew open, and she felt a flash go through her body.

  She knew, even before she looked…it was her last death penalty trial folder. It was gone.

  The Clint Burrell Cruise file was gone.

  The realization came in a sickening gush. In her mind’s eye, she again saw her attacker walk by her as she lay there on the rug, blood oozing down her temple, across her cheek, and into her mouth.

  The man who beat her unconscious in her office, who crushed her ribs with the toe of his boot, kicking her over and over until a dark gray film rolled in around her…

  A limp.

  It was years ago, on local Atlanta Channel Eleven News. She’d noticed it first when the press closed in on the all-important perp-walk from the back of a squad car into the precinct station the night of the arrest. When she went to the jail to draw additional blood for a second DNA match, it was there. And later, she’d seen it in court when he walked in and out, surrounded by armed sheriffs.

  He walked with a limp. Clint Burrell Cruise. The killer.

  She felt it in her bones. He was here. Here in the city.

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  Atlanta, Georgia

  “…SOON AS I GET THE LAST PAYMENT, THEY’RE ALL YOURS. NEGATIVES included as promised.”

  Eugene deleted the message and hung up the phone after listening to Hadden’s message.

  Hadden…another pawn. It all fit together like he had planned. He had known it would work out from the get-go, ever since C.C. wanted to take a cart at Augusta. From there on in, it was like shooting fish in a barrel.

  Next the glossies would be mailed and the dominoes would begin to topple one by one. The race for governor would be back to normal.

  The Cruise death penalty had been reversed and the federal grant money was headed back into the pockets of his partners at the defense firm. They had already gotten the beach vote through…the reps on the floor at the Georgia House and Senate had been herded like sheep. Not one of them had bothered to ask the significance of the definition of “tree,” as in the “first tree on the beach.”

  Maneuvering the change in how “tree” was defined by the Georgia Code would pocket Eugene millions of pure profit by the time the last condo sold.

  It all went down smooth as silk.

  Now all he had to do was wait.

  Within a matter of days, if not hours, the glossies would be in the mail and on their way.

  He looked out over the city from his office chair, smoothing down the crease in his cashmere pants with his hands, staring into the dark, a thousand lights blanketing the city.

  There was still the matter, though, of Virginia Gunn.

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  New York City

  SOMEONE WAS OUT THERE; SOMEONE WHO WANTED TO HURT HER.

  She had to be wrong. It couldn’t be Cruise. He was in prison. On death row.

  Her mother’s voice echoed back…something she’d said when they were talking on the phone one night.

  “They’re saying he’s still trying to appeal, but the Georgia courts would never let that happen.”

  They wouldn’t…would they?

  Surely she would know, though, if Cruise had won his appeal by some miracle and been released. Surely she would have been warned….

  By whom, though?

  She picked up the telephone and dialed her parents.

  “You’ve reached Mac and Elizabeth Dean. We’re not home right now, but leave us a message and we’ll get back with you.”

  No, Hailey realized with a sinking heart, they wouldn’t. They were on Cumberland.

  And Fincher was on the other side of the world in Iraq.

  Heart pounding Hailey fired up her computer and went to the Georgia Corrections Web site.

  Clint Burrell Cruise.

  She had long railed against a system that didn’t warn victims of violent crime when perps were paroled. She’d even testi
fied before the Georgia Senate to demand a change in the law as part of the Victims’ Bill of Rights. Since a large percentage of the Georgia Legislature was made up of defense attorneys, it failed. Victims of rape, robbery, assault, even murder victims’ families were never warned…much less former prosecutors who had left the job and moved hundreds of miles away. And any press about it would have been local. How often did headlines in the morning papers deal with parole releases from another state? Never. Nothing within the law required that she be notified. And victims and their families had no rights under the Constitution. She’d learned that when Will was murdered.

  Within seconds, her worst fears had been confirmed.

  He was out.

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  St. Simons Island, Georgia

  WHEN VIRGINIA’S HEAD FINALLY CLEARED, SHE WAS LYING ON her back on her own bed. She opened her eyes slowly, prepared to see the two no-necks towering over her. Instead, she looked directly into the eyes of Larry.

  It was clear he’d been crying.

  “My God, V.G., what happened to you? Who did this?”

  She was alive. Lying in her own bed. With Sidney, wagging his furry little stub of a tail. And Larry was here.

  She was alive.

  Her throat aching from an earlier blow near her trachea that sliced under her chin, she struggled to speak.

  “V.G., say something. Anything. Just let me know you’re okay.”

  “Get the vodka. And Diet Coke. On ice. Hurry.”

  Larry stood up and turned. Just as he turned through the bedroom door into the hall, she added, “And the cigarettes.”

  She was alive all right.

  Hours later, Virginia sat propped on one of the kitchen bar stools, the hushed group of eco-guerrillas gathered around.

  No chips and dip, no cheese and crackers today. No whirring blender churning mushy frozen drinks. No stereo playing Nina Simone on low in the background. No theorizing or pontificating.

  Virginia finished telling the story exactly as she remembered it, in detail, right down to the Diet Coke and vodka—which she sipped as she spoke. This was no time for her usual Amaretto. This was an emergency.

  The guerrillas couldn’t drag their eyes away from her face and she knew it wasn’t a pretty sight. She’d accidentally glimpsed herself in the bathroom mirror.

  Her eye was black and some of the blood from her mouth was still dried where it had trickled near her right ear, even after she rinsed her face at the sink. Along the bottom of her jaw, the skin was just beginning to bruise. Her gums were bloody and her arm was in a makeshift sling made of a cut-out section of fitted bedsheet, the elastic pucker still showing on one side. Her nails were torn down to the quick on one hand. Her wrists were both ringed with red welts that were beginning to turn deep blue in little dots across the red.

  But she didn’t dare go to the hospital, as Larry wanted her to do.

  “That would mean cops,” she told him. “And we don’t want that.”

  Larry didn’t want to leave her there for even a second, but she sent him to the liquor store for more booze. She didn’t want to scare the group with talk of hospitals and police. Plus, it was going to be a long night.

  The rest sat unmoving when he left through the sliding glass door and Virginia was met with stone silence now as the guerrillas either stared down at their Birkenstocks or gave her the “blink,” staring fixedly away while blinking rapidly. The silence spoke volumes.

  They were scared shitless…and they should be.

  “So do you really think this was because of what we did?” Dottie asked, unable to drag her eyes off the bloody quicks of Virginia’s fingernails.

  The tiny group was having a hard time accepting the truth…Virginia’s beating was because of Palmetto Dunes. Hell, it was just digging up wooden markers and plucking off orange plastic ties…just ripping out a little string…string that had been tied meticulously from marker to marker across hundreds of square feet of dunes, dunes flattened by giant industrial machine rollers. In fact, up until now, they hadn’t truly been convinced anyone had really noticed the late-night vandalism they’d taken such joy in.

  Virginia took stock of her ragtag warriors, all too meek to retort to nasty customers or refuse unreasonable shift demands. Teachers intimidated by pushy parents and school principals. Clerks who gave money returns to “customers” they knew had shoplifted. No receipt? No problem!

  They let soccer moms swipe parking spots they’d trolled for thirty minutes at Wal-Mart. They stood speechless when mall rats cut in front of them at Cinnabon. They endured protracted conversations with telemarketers at dinnertime. Sometimes, it was just easier to consolidate their debts or sign up for a new phone plan than argue into the phone or, God forbid, hang up.

  They were the tormented souls who were never chosen for the basketball team or cheerleading squad, football being totally out of the question. The last ones standing awkwardly between two schoolyard teams, the ones who walked away pretending they’d really rather stand on the sidelines. The ones who always got zonked first playing dodgeball.

  And now they were facing the prospect of physical pain in exchange for continued vandalism of somebody else’s beachfront property.

  This was not what they’d signed up for…but they all shrunk under Virginia’s gaze or, in the alternative, looked the other way.

  While Virginia hadn’t expected them to lead the battle like Eisenhower, she hadn’t expected this either—total silence and fear when faced with adversity. Virginia had given it her best, egging them on with a rousing pep talk. During the silence, she glanced over at the sofas gathered around the fireplace, the light pouring into the den. Even the wieners lie there lifeless, draped wheezing on the sofas and floor, like they, too, were too drained to fight the good fight any longer.

  Virginia cleared her throat, making the only sound other than nervous breathing coming from Kenny, who sounded extremely stopped-up. Head cold.

  She lit a cigarette and took a long, deep drag, exhaling through narrowed eyes to avoid her own smoke. “Okay, guys, you think about it and we’ll talk tomorrow?”

  “Fine…good…that’s a plan…okay…see you tomorrow…” They all murmured at once, blending soft voices nervously together into one low, quiet buzz while adroitly grabbing their things and shuffling past the wieners to the door.

  Virginia sat still on the bar stool until she heard the last of the cars crank up, twist in the gravel driveway, and motor off.

  The house was quiet and turning dark. She hadn’t turned on any lights yet. The dogs lay there forlornly, not even rousing to bark their heads off for dinner.

  For the first time ever, she hated their quiet.

  Walking out the back door onto the deck, Virginia stopped in her tracks, looking into the sky over the water. Dark, wet evening air was blowing off the Georgia coast. It was breathtaking.

  Her ribs ached and her fingers felt like they were broken. She could still wiggle them and they were currently curled around a drink, so they must be intact.

  The sea oats swayed on the dunes, and instinctively, she flipped off the patio’s outdoor lights so as not to disturb any sea turtles mating or burying eggs out in the sandy curves. The gestation, birth, and nurturing of the Coastal Sea Turtle was time-consuming and laborious, but what sea turtle wouldn’t be lured by a night like tonight?

  Staring out at the dunes, she pondered her next move against Palmetto.

  A fire? No, too destructive to the Island. A bomb? She didn’t know how to make one, although if that freak McVeigh could make one out of horse manure, she could do the same. There was plenty of dog poop around her house…the wieners had awful manners.

  Okay, she was not making a bomb out of wiener doo-doo. She snorted into her glass at the mere thought of it.

  But another day of construction had passed. The attack on Virginia had postponed the amphibious sneak attack. The high-rise was inching toward the moment when they could no longer sabotage it as easily as they had so
far. As soon as the cement foundation was poured, they would be at a loss.

  There had to be a way…. She had done it before. She, Virginia Gunn, had single-handedly stopped a gigantic new four-lane bridge from crossing the water from mainland to Island. It took all her skills and cunning.

  You did it, though, she reminded herself as she sipped her drink.

  But what about Palmetto Dunes? The County Commission had clearly been bought off. She could always file a lawsuit on behalf of the citizens, and as guardian protecting the sea turtles.

  But she knew that in the end she would lose in court and likely be outed as the midnight marauder at Palmetto Dunes. Then, one way or the other, the others would be dragged in and likely lose their jobs and what little money they made at the mall, the IHOP, the Radio Shack, and the local public schools. Jobs and money…maybe more.

  Virginia poured another drink and downed it. Why bother with the glass? It just slowed things down. She swigged straight from the bottle, hoping for inspiration. Sidney led the other wieners out onto the deck and they hopped up into her lap and nestled in.

  She needed a fresh idea. She’d wait until this time tomorrow night—no, a little later, when it was pitch black. A late-night drive out to the south beaches. She’d go back to the construction site alone to check it out. Maybe there was another angle she’d missed, something, somehow, some way they could put the skids on the high-rise again.

  Something short of a wiener-bomb.

  The water lapped up; she could hear but not see it. The spray blew across her face, not bracing, but in a gentle way instead. The Seven Sisters, the Cassiopeia constellation, smiled down at her. Over the dark curve of the ocean, on the other side of the stars, she saw a glow against the dark of the sky. Then she saw it in full. There was a new moon rising.

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