Death Fits Like A Glove
Page 5
his tools were on the wall behind him near the door. I
was left with a garden hose, paint cans, and serial
killer supplies of duct tape and trash bags.
“I know you have two children with serious
mental problems. Ray has been practicing to follow in
your footsteps.”
“You aren’t telling me anything new,” Samuel
said. “Randy, like his mother, is weak. I’m afraid
someday his weakness will do him in. Ray, on the
other hand, is strong. He knows what he wants and he
takes it. I’ve tried to hold him back, but he seems
driven. I’ve seen some of his trophies. He’s graduated
to cats now. I was afraid when we ran into you that it
meant trouble. I decided to give it some time to see if
you became a problem.”
“How would Randy’s weakness do him in?” I
asked.
Samuel sighed. “He knows I killed his mother, or
he wonders about it. She’s buried in the garden, by
the way. I told the kids she died of cancer. I poisoned
her over a period of time and told the kids I’d taken
her to the doctor for tests. In the end I cut her heart
out to see if she had one. We had a nice mock funeral
for her in the back yard. I brought home an urn filled
with ashes and we buried it. I thought I fooled them,
but with Randy’s penchant for burying animals, I’m
afraid he may have stumbled upon his mother.”
39
Don Weston
“Is that why he’s not allowed to bury them in the
back yard?” I asked.
“I noticed one of his graves in the backyard, and
when I dug it up I found strands of red hair in a shoe
box with a bird. It wasn’t his hair, you see. I think he
took it from his mother’s head.”
My stomach lurched and I fought to keep from
vomiting.
“After that little incident I forbade him from
planting any of his pets in the backyard,” Samuel
said. “You see, I still have hope for him to evolve.
Death fits this family like a glove.”
As Samuel talked, he took a pair of black leather
gloves from his pocket and began tugging them on his
hands. He laughed at his little joke and started toward
me.
“Oh we’re going to die. We’re going to die,”
Melissa whimpered. She went back to the bed and
started to climb into it, sobbing.
Samuel seemed pleased by the mental pain he
caused her.
“You’re responsible for the missing women on
the jogging trails,” I said.
He stopped cold. “How . . . ?”
“Melissa’s face is all over the news. You don’t
think I stumbled in here by accident, do you? I’ve
known since the first time we met. My story about
looking for missing pets was a ruse to meet your kids.
I watched Randy bury his friends one day and devised
a plan to get closer to him to learn about you.”
Stalling for time. Now he would have to stop and
think about who I might have told.
“What did he tell you?” Samuel said.
40
Death Fits Like A Glove
“Nothing yet.” I didn’t want to get him into
trouble if I couldn’t get out of this mess. “My plan
was to use him to meet you.”
“Who are you working with?” he said.
“The police asked me to look into your affairs,” I
said. “They had some suspicions, but nothing
concrete.”
“You’re lying,” he said. “They would never
approach a civilian, especially a P.I.”
“Normally that would be true,” I said. “But I’m a
former cop. I worked for the Portland Police Bureau
until a few years ago.”
“Shit,” he said. “This is all crap. I suppose you’re
going to tell me they know you’re here right now.
Maybe you’re wired too.”
“No, I’m here on my own. But if I disappear,
they’ll have a good idea where to look.”
He paced the floor, muttering to himself. I
reached for a gallon can of paint and hurled it at him.
He easily dodged it and took a knife from a pouch on
his belt.
“I may regret this, but I think you’re lying. If not,
I can make it very difficult for them to prove
anything.”
“I’ll make you regret it one way or another,” I
said. “I won’t go gentle into the night.”
As he stepped toward me, Randy scooted across
the floor with the hammer I used earlier and slammed
it down on his father’s foot. The big man cried out
and grabbed at his foot. Randy scooted back through
a crevice created by mismatched paneling and
disappeared.
41
Don Weston
I rushed Samuel and stiff-armed him. He
stumbled and his awkward momentum sent him to his
knees. I ran to the door and tried wretch it open but
the padlock held tight. I turned to see Samuel stagger
to his feet.
He was on me before I could react. We struggled,
his knife reaching for my throat. His hot breath
smelled like tobacco. One of his gloved hands
gripped my throat. I used my weight to maneuver him
toward the wall. He concentrated his knife at my
throat.
I wondered if Randy would be brave enough to
attack his father again. Out of the corner of my vision
I saw Melissa struggling to get out of the bed drawer
to help. My fist clutched the wrist that carried a knife
toward my throat. Inches now.
I remembered all of the weight training I had
done, in preparation for a moment like this. I heaved
myself into him and we collided with the metal
cabinet. I felt scuffling around my feet and heard the
hammer come down on Samuel’s foot again. He
yowled, but his adrenaline pushed the knife closer to
my throat.
Melissa jumped on his back and bit into his neck.
He flung her across the room like a rag doll with his
free hand. The distraction allowed me to reach into
the top of the tool cabinet I had maneuvered myself
near. To the only drawer Samuel neglected to lock.
The
drawer
holding
several
sharp
surgical
instruments.
As his knife touched my throat, I reached inside
the cabinet and gripped a blade, wincing as it sliced
into my own hand. Samuel seemed to notice and
42
Death Fits Like A Glove
pushed his knife with even more force. I held onto the
surgical blade, still cutting into my hand, and thrust it
hard into his neck.
Blood gushed everywhere. It spilled from my
hand and from Samuel’s throat and onto the concrete
floor. He stared at me, surprise in his eyes. He
staggered backward and reached for the shiny steel
dagger. Blood spilled from his jugular as he gurgled
one last sentence.
“So this is what it feels like.” He displayed
a
euphoric grin and fell to a heap on the floor, his hand
still on the knife in his throat.
Randy emerged from his hiding spot bawling and
wrapped his arms around my legs. I picked him up
and held him tight. Melissa stood over Samuel’s
grotesque body shaking her head.
“He’s dead,” she said. “I can’t believe it. He’s
dead, and I’m still alive.”
“I didn’t want him to kill you like he killed
mom,” Randy said, crying.
I reached into Samuel’s pocket for the key to the
padlocked door and got us out of the basement. At the
top of the stairs sat Ray, with his arms around his
legs, rocking back and forth.
“Is he dead?” he asked, in a shaky voice.
Yes,” I said. “You better not go down there. We
need to call the police.”
“I wanted to help you. I was afraid. Dad said
never to come in when he had company.”
“You knew what he was doing?” I said.
He nodded.
“Why didn’t you tell someone?”
“He would have killed us. . . like he did mom.”
43
Don Weston
Angel arrived at the office early the next day. I
called her, the previous evening after I called the
police, and she had come and soothed the boys.
“How are you feeling today, honey?” she asked.
“It still hurts like hell.” My hand was bandaged
with twenty-six stitches across my palm. I patted my
new dog gingerly on her tiny head, and she licked my
face. “She tried to warn me last night that Samuel was
coming.”
“The newspaper should cheer you up.” Angel
handed it to me over my morning coffee.
Serial Murderer Killed by Local Private
Investigator, the headline stated. I read it carefully
and it made me out to be somewhere between a nitwit
who stumbled into a hornet’s nest and a Good
Samaritan who rescued a bunch of animals and two
boys. I could live with that.
“What will happen to Randy and Ray,” Angel
said.
“From what I got from the cops, the boys will
move to the East Coast to live with a distant Aunt
Geraldine. Their mother, Linda, wasn’t close to
Geraldine after she married because Samuel made her
sever all ties. Geraldine is the only remaining family
member. Samuel told her about Linda’s death a few
months after she died. Geraldine didn’t suspect
anything because cancer ran in her family.”
“Looks like you have visitors,” Angel said.
Through the leaded glass front door to my office,
I spotted a mob of people coming up the steps. I
44
Death Fits Like A Glove
opened the door to a large contingent of neighbors
and Louise Parker.
“We don’t want to take up too much of your
time.” Louise stared at my bandaged hand. “We just
want you to know how appreciative we are of
everything you have done to protect us.”
Everybody nodded. Louise handed me a sheet of
parchment paper with a written statement and a long
list of signatures. It read: Let It Be Known: We, the
residents of Northwest Northrup Street, think of Billie
Bly as one of our own, and if at any time she needs
our help, we will be there for her. We thank her for
all her efforts on our behalf. I counted forty-two
signatures.
“How did you do this so quickly?” I asked. “It’s
eight in the morning.”
“We started last night right after the six o’clock
news story,” Louise said. “A serial killer right in our
own neighborhood. Thank God for you, Billie.”
A cheer went up from the group and finally I felt
accepted.
If you enjoyed this Billie Bly adventure, catch up on
her other exploits at donwestonmysteries.com and
find links to the full Billie Bly novels, Bleeding Blue
and The Facebook Killer . And be sure to watch for
Her next adventure, The Drone Murders coming out
soon.
45