“ I understand you’re upset because of my rate going up, but I guarantee your money is not ill invested.” For the past six months this lonely traveler had been all over the U.S, jumping from city to city, searching high and low for one soul that seemed to allude anyone that came after it. “ I’m doing my best as it is, just ran into a snag.” Joey King was the name of the man searching for this illusive soul whose tracks would run cold every time he was nearing the end of the road. He would spent nights wide awake thinking of where this person could have gone, how one person manage to stay hidden for so long. “ I’m getting closer, make no doubt about it,” He slammed his fist on the A/C in his beaten down Chevy truck, a little something he picked up from a friend in Jersey, he knew he’d have to upgrade soon enough, if you were to roam the streets of New York, you might as well do it in style. For now he just wanted some relief from this monstrous heatwave that was consuming this city. “ Yes, I understand your frustration.” He pulled the phone away from his ear as his client vented and screamed at him.
Tonight’s out and about wasn’t apart of his assignment, but he was damn sure making his client pay for it, tonight was about finding himself a little company on those lonely days. He cruised the streets of Harlem, passing by every street hooker he could find. He wasn’t one to fuck hooker after hooker each night, he enjoyed having one for each city, it gave him this false sense of entitlement of being in a somewhat committed relationship, he’d take them out to eat, catch a movie and even ask them to stay with him through out the night till the next morning just to talk. Some of the girls he paid for were freaked out by such demands, the rule on the streets was to never make any type of relationship with a client, others didn’t mind, they would tell him whatever he wanted to hear and believe as long as he was paying. That wasn’t an issue for King, his clients were picking up the tab after all. “ You know as well as I know, that I’m the best man fit for this job,” He paused for a moment as a purple headed girl caught his attention, she looked so pure with those baby doll eyes and a face you would could only slap on a girl exploring her sexuality for the first time. “ Sorry, I thought I was getting another call,” He cleared his throat and flashed his headlights at the girl. “ It’s your choice, you can walk away from it all and hire someone else who’ll have to start from the beginning or pay me what I’m asking for and let me end it here and now.” He slowly rolled down his window as he waited for his client to answer, in the end it always went according to plan. “ I knew you would see things my way. Call me back when you‘ve wired me the cash.” He hung up the phone and tossed it to the back seat as he drove near the girl. “ Looks cold, want a ride?” He said with a grin.
The purple haired girl looked too clean to be a hooker as he drove closer, not a bag under her eye, no bruises, no missing teeth, weight was average and no needle marks on her exposed body. If King didn’t know better, he’d finger her as an undercover cop, but an old friend of his working in the force recommend the East side of Harlem as the perfect spot to do his purchase, cops tended to stay away from this area, it was too much to deal with and busting one horny guy wasn’t going to end the prostitution ring in New York, not with Hector Pardo around. So he had no reason to believe his dear friend had steered him wrong.
“ Nice shades.” The girl pointed to his thick rim glasses, as she leaned in through the window.
“ You looking to make some cash?” He said to her.
“ That depends.” She said. “ Do I have to do anything weird?”
“ I’m on business, going to be a while. I want someone‘s company, you know, but not looking for that person to leave right away. . .” He was looking for the right way to phrase it as not too scare her off, but this purple hair vixen knew the game.
“ You’re looking for a girlfriend?” He nodded his head. “ If that‘s your thing, who am I to judge, but the pay better be good.” He tossed the girl a few rolled up hundred bucks, she smirked as she began to count. “ You’ve done this before?” She said with a chuckle.
King didn’t answer that question. “ What’s your name?”
“ Jasmine.”
Chapter 15
Connecting the dots
Karen’s entire bedroom wall was covered with pictures of all the suspected victims Peewee had pin together, with the most recent identified victim in the center of the pack, “ Angela Dennings” Twenty-six years old, Italian descent, worked as a sales associate for Victoria Secret, no criminal record, no enemies at work, the most lovable girl you could find. Every old picture of her told a story of a happy go lucky girl, that couldn‘t harm a fly. “ Who did you meet, you silly girl.” Karen whispered to the photo, looking lost in all this, wondering if she was doing the right thing.
“ You‘re never really there are you, Karen?” She could hear Jamie’s voice whispering inside her skull. “ All of this is what keeps you together, what happens when this is gone, what happens to us?” She shivered as those words crept up, she pulled her attention back to the other girls, anything to silence that voice.
Peewee sat in her bed going through everything he had on Angela on his laptop. He rubbed his eyes in frustration, he wanted to make the connection to this newest murder, give his hunch some legs, get Karen on his side and stop whoever was doing this. It scared him to think he might be right, that they could be dealing with a serial killer, what actions would they take once they knew his identity, call the cops or try to apprehend this person by themselves. He knew he was getting ahead of himself, first they needed to make the connection. “ Everywhere I look, there doesn’t seem any reason for her death, her Facebook is filled with lovey-dovey quotes with the hashtag write to inspire, she was like Mother Teresa. So, yes it rules out death by someone with a grudge, but our charming man feeds off women like this.”
Karen scanned the photos carefully. “ Anything about her falling in love?” Peewee gave the thumbs down. “ Then it’s a safe bet this isn’t connected anyway at all.”
Peewee jumped quickly to defend . “ No, I know for a fact it is.”
Karen shook her head. “ You have three girls connected to Lisa Donner, not a single one turned up dead.”
“ Maybe someone saw him, didn‘t give him enough time to dispose of the body, could be why he dropped it in the middle of Harlem.” Peewee said.
“ Not enough time?” Karen chuckled. “ He had enough time to gouge her eyes out and put enough of his man juice into each socket.” Peewee hung his head down in defeat. “ If we’re still pinning this person as your, “ Karen did air quotations. “ serial killer, then he did this for a reason.”
“ That’s so stupid,” Peewee shot back in anger. “ what reason would that be, his DNA is all over the girl…” That was enough to let it dawn on him.
“ You see what I’m saying,” Karen took a spot near Peewee to lay down and stare at the ceiling. “ your man, has crafted everything on being careful.” Karen chewed on her lip as she replayed the evidence in her mind. “ What’s not to say he lost his cool, did something holy outside the moment.”
Peewee did a double take as Karen spoke. “ Angela did something to set him off, and he takes out his anger on her?”
Karen didn’t respond, something inside her mind had clicked. “ What are the name of the girls missing you suspect to be tied with your charming man?” She snapped her fingers at him to answer quickly.
Peewee pulled up the file on screen. “ Bridget Ramirez, Debbie Smith, Jessica Bishop, Winnie Lee, Liz Clinton, Holly Dixon, Cindy Hall, Jen Stipe , Dolly Paxton, Lulu Ortiz, Sarah Fairfield and Wendy Cooper.” He was trying to catch his breath after such a fast read.
Karen moved over to the other three photos Peewee claimed to have the same M.O as Lisa, his Seventy to seventy-nine percent victims tie to the same man. “ Lucy Daniels, Barbra Vargas and Linda Rogers.” She tapped her finger on each photo.
“ Three girls who went missing in the span of weeks from each other, they came before Lisa. It was a warning of things to co
me, I guess.” Peewee said in a sadden voice.
Karen cleared her throat and asked a question to bring him back to the present. “ You know everything about Lisa, right?” He nodded his head. “ Tell me about her.”
“ She was friendly, kind, everyone liked her.” Peewee said.
“ Don’t focus on the positives,” She told him. “ tell me about the negatives in her life, things she would never tell anyone.”
Peewee fumbled through his mind to think back what Maggie had told him. “ She was really distant when it came to looking for love.”
“ Why?” Karen asked.
“ She was bitter with her past boyfriends, had some abusive and downright assholes for lovers .”
“ There!” She shouted, rising out from the bed, sending Peewee into shock as she did. “He has a type, people he relates to, people he’s able to embed himself in, it has nothing to do with finding Ms. Right, it’s all about finding the broken.” She refused to let up, her mind was working faster then it had before. “ You run the names of all them, try to find something that has to do with abuse or a broken family and you’ll have your connection or at least something to work with.”
“ Damn,” Peewee wasn’t sure what to say. “ I might have to give Carl a buzz about this, see if he can help me dig something up on his free time.”
Karen was taken back, this was her first time hearing that name. “ Who the hell is Carl?” She asked.
“ He’s the office clerk in NYPD homicide. He fills me in on anything interesting going down and also browses through the data base to find me some info.” He checked his watch. “ We should head down to Rusty Chicken Shack before he goes to get his grease fix.”
Karen couldn’t help but be proud of Peewee, he managed to do something they never could in their lives. “ How did you manage to get a mole inside?” She asked.
“ I have my ways.” Peewee pulled a pair of sunglasses and placed them on smoothly, adding to his master of secrets persona.
Sadly Karen knew his secret already, it didn‘t take a genius, if this person was willing to be a buddy to Peewee, it only meant one thing. “ You’re supplying free porn to this guy?”
“ My dear, we all have needs, even fat obese desk jockeys.”
“ So, he hasn’t discovered internet porn yet?”
Peewee slowly pulled off the sun glasses. “ He did, but his mom caught him whacking off in the living room.”
“ Eww.” Karen could see the image already.
“ He swears his mom lost ten years of her life, can’t blame her, when you see a huge black guy just ripping granny apart, and see your own son just pounding his own meat, that’s got to do some psychological problems. Anyway, he‘s back to old fashion DVD, this way he gets to whack off in his bedroom. That‘s the only place his mother won‘t look.”
“ Oh my God, how do you meet these people.” She couldn’t help but chuckle.
“ I don’t know, but when I had to erase the stuff on that PC, my lord.”
“ That bad?” She asked only to learn perhaps asking wasn’t the best choice.
“ You never look at a horse the same, after seeing what it's capable of doing to a small Asian woman‘s …”
“ Stop, that’s enough.” The last thing she wanted was nightmares. “ So, did you bring your porno tapes to bribe this guy?” Karen reached out for her leather jacket and keys.
“I got something better than that this time.” Peewee said.
Chapter 16
Whispers
“ They were scared, they never want to do anything like that again.” He listened carefully, fighting the urge so deeply to hang-up as his lovers called out to him. “ What do you want me to do?”
“ Nothing. They'll remain, they're not hard to predict.” He simply said to her.
“ Can we talk about him?” Her voiced cried out in pain.
“ Another time.”
“ I understand.” He could tell that he upset her, but there was no time for them, he had pressing issues to deal with.
“ I need to be alone for now. I shall contact you later.” He hung up his phone, opened the window to let the hot muggy air out from his apartment. He could hear their voices calling out through night, each one thanking and praising him for making them apart of something so divine and beautiful. They whispered into his ear how they wanted to please him sexually, as a reward for his good deed. They kept asking to find their next sister, the one who would join in the orgy of love.
He could feel the bulge poking under his shorts, he knew he had to find the others before any pleasure could be released. He sniff the air smelling his lost love scent from miles away. She was calling out to him, now he needed to find her. “ We’ll be together, I promise.”
Chapter 17
DEEPER INTO THE RABBIT HOLE
“ I wasn‘t like this you know,” Twenty years to the date and Klecko could still remember every word that was said. “ I was a catholic boy, always said his prayers, always did as the good lord demanded. But then you just get tired of it, you want to know how the devil’s fruit tastes like, no matter how wrong it might seem. My first time was amazing.”
“ Bryan Thompson, Dorchester, age four, skull cracked in with a rock, semen found in his mouth, that turned out to be a sort sick and perverse calling card for you, didn‘t it?” His voice was young then, still green, learning the ropes but ahead of the curb when it came to finding people like Alan Smith, a repeated child molester/serial killer.
“ You know everything about me, don’t you, I’m flattered. I really am.” His god awful laugh forever stuck in the cracks of time. “So, tell me son, what’s your name?”
* * * *
Child porn blasted on the television screen in a run down basement, the voice behind the camera order the young girls to take off their clothes, to lay in bed together naked and they did so without fighting back. Every officer in the house paid no attention to it; they were all too preoccupied with the matters at hand. Klecko was the only one staring aimlessly at the screen, his mind drifting to another time and place, the moment that made his career and opened his eyes to the dangers lurking around this world.
“Poor kid. “ Officers hovered over the six year old girl’s dead body, that was lying on the floor with her neck slit from ear to ear. Leaving the flap of her neck looking like gills. She had been chained up in the basement for the past two weeks, sexually abused and tortured until her captor felt it fit to end her life. The person who did this was a sixty-five year old man name Timothy Cartwright. The outstanding citizen in the block, who never raised his voice or caused problems. Perfect in every way, until neighbors heard strange noises coming out from his home in the middle of the morning. They immediately called the police, when the officers responded; they found his front door open, walking in to find him sitting on his old worn out reclining chair fast asleep, with blood all over his shirt. When he heard the squeaking of the officer’s footsteps on the wooden floor, all he could say was “I’m sorry, I couldn’t help myself, I just couldn’t.”
His entire basement was littered with child pornography, his own homemade video tapes of his crime, all label with titles he bestowed upon them. “ Debbie Does Me, Young Slut, Bad Lola and Her First Backdoor Experience #1.” just hours of him making the victim perform sexual acts on him finding obscene ways for the young girl to humiliate herself. His idea of paradise and heaven for his deranged mind. “She wanted me to do this to her, she would always be playing in the park with her legs spread apart, I knew what she wanted, she loved me.” Cartwright believed those words to be true more than anyone else did, he felt he did no wrong.
He claim to never harm a child in his life, until now, he felt the hunger and need to carry out his lust before his time on earth ended. “ I couldn’t live without knowing how it felt, you understand me don’t you?” His eyes darted around the officers hoping to find someone that could relate to him. Klecko could only stare at the old man as he ranted and pleaded before they hau
led him off, for a second he could have sworn he heard Alan’s laughter as they drove him away.
In every case Klecko had been apart, most of the murders felt no regret. They stood there and justified their actions; they never seem to notice the problem with the carnage and death they caused. It puzzled him, what was there thought process through it all. They must know right from wrong, he knew it as a child. Were they born that way, or did society shape them into the monster they became, if so, then who among society would be the next mental case he would have to chase down? “I felt so alive, I feel closer to you, father!”
“Detective?” A young female officer tugged on his black trench coat. Snapping Klecko out of his daze. It took a moment to gather his surroundings, he was standing in front of the T.V; with the video tape still rolling. He looked around the room wondering where those last words had come from, he turned to his side to see a young officer standing right beside him waiting for him to answer. He brushed back his black slick hair and just tried to shake the images of the children out of his mind.
“Turn this crap off and tell someone to take all his shit into evidence.” Klecko barked in a daze.
“Yes, sir.” The female officer said. “I just wanted to inform you that Harkness needs to speak to you.”
“About what?” He made his way up towards the stairs.
“It’s the Angela Denning’s case, sir, they found the man responsible.” Klecko stop dead in his tracks, turned to face the officer, almost colliding into one another. “He’s outside waiting to drive you over to the scene.”
Chapter 18
New Lead
Karen and Peewee leaned on the old mustang as they stood outside Rusty’s Chicken Shack, the most notorious fast food joint that was clogging America’s arteries with it's chemically injected product and welcoming a new era of obese children to the world since 1985. Only place where you could buy three piece of greasy chicken for three dollars, who was going to argue.
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