The Woman in Darkness

by Charlie Donlea

  Ever since rushing from the warehouse to pore through microfilm at the library, the entire time she was creating her documents and graphs and working out her theory about Leonard Williams, all through the night and up until this morning when she arrived at Catherine’s house, that soft whisper in her mind nagged and annoyed. Angela never stopped her work to listen, and feared the voice that was calling her was a side effect of the Valium, which she was swallowing at an alarming rate. Or it was the logical and reasonable part of her mind working to be heard, trying to tell her that she was overmedicating herself and that her ideas about the missing women were ridiculous.

  She sat at Catherine’s kitchen table now, pushed the whisper of that voice away, and showed her work to her friend. Catherine sat patiently and listened to Angela tell the story of her trip to the warehouse, her discovery that Leonard Williams lived so close to where Samantha Rodgers’s body had been found, that of the women who had been killed and who matched the description of the missing women from this summer—all had been strangled. And finally she showed Catherine the bizarre image she had drawn of the dual noose contraption.

  Catherine took a sip of coffee when Angela finally looked at her. “You know I always support you,” Catherine said. “But …”

  “But what?” Angela asked.

  “I think everything that’s going on this summer has set you off.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I think you’re very nervous about what’s going on. So am I. But I think you feel like it’s your responsibility to figure this out, and, Angela, some of what you’re showing me is …”

  “Is what?”

  “It’s hard to digest. All the research you’ve done on the missing women, and how they might be connected to a decadelong string of murder.”

  “I think they are.”

  “But now you’re telling me you think you know who did this, and that it’s a man who works for Bill and Thomas.”

  Angela looked away from Catherine and back to her notes, her cheeks suddenly red and searing. She gathered the papers and stuffed them into the file folder. Her research and her theories, all contained in the file folder, sat on the kitchen table like some foreign and unwanted artifact found in the wild. Neither knew quite what to do with it or how to handle it—if it were worth anything at all, or just a useless bit of something unearthed and dragged inside.

  “I think Leonard Williams scared you in the alley,” Catherine finally said, placing her hand on Angela’s. “And I think that’s made you look at him in a way that most wouldn’t see him. From what I know, he’s a family man. He’s got a wife and kids, Angela. He’s not some deranged serial killer. I don’t think you’ve done anything foolish, let me be clear. But reasonably looking at all of this, I don’t know that I totally agree with everything you’re suggesting. Angela, I’m not sure … I’m not sure I totally believe all of this.”

  Angela swallowed hard at the rejection. Her surroundings faded as memories of her childhood flooded her mind. Her teachers’ disparaging comments anytime Angela made a remark in school, her parents’ constant refusal to listen to Angela’s reasoning on any subject, her psychiatrist’s outright dismissal of her pleas for help when the lithium drew wild hallucinations in her vision. All the images from her childhood carried her away, and only when she heard talking did she come back to the present. When she did, she found Bill Blackwell standing next to Catherine.

  There was a far-off echo. Angela tried to hear it, but it was hollow and muted. She saw Bill’s lips moving and realized the man was speaking to her. She blinked her eyes.

  “The second time in a week that I come home to a surprise,” she heard Bill say. “Is Thomas back from Indiana yet?”

  Angela focused her eyes on the bandana around Catherine’s husband’s neck. She realized the soft echoing voice she had heard a moment before was not that of Bill Blackwell, but instead the whispered voice she had been hearing since her visit to the Kenosha warehouse. It was finally loud enough to decipher. It was screaming, in fact, as she stared at the man in front of her. Angela’s mind flashed to the night they all ate dinner in her home. She remembered Bill’s red neck, explained then as an allergic reaction to insect repellent and the remnants of mosquito bites. She remembered his bandana from the last time she sat in this kitchen with Catherine. And now today, she looked at his bandana-covered neck to see deep red marks on his skin. Marks that could come from a noose.

  Angela stood quickly. The kitchen chair toppled backward and ricocheted off the kitchen floor. She backed away and, without saying a word, turned and hurried out the front door. Her thick file folder remained on the table.

  CHAPTER 15

  Chicago, October 25, 2019

  RORY MADE IT THROUGH THE SCREENING PROCESS AGAIN AND ENTERED the judge’s chambers after the security guard had escorted her through the hallways. Now she sat, just like she had at their original meeting, in front of the desk while the judge took to his throne behind it, the high-back leather chair rising well above his head as he sat.

  “Lots to cover,” Judge Boyle said. “Have you made yourself familiar with your client?”

  “Your client.” The sound of it bothered Rory in many ways. She didn’t have “clients.” Her life revolved around “cases.” Her life revolved around helping victims, not the men accused of killing them. An acidic burn rose up her esophagus and settled in the back of her throat. But Rory swallowed it down. Her interest in Angela Mitchell was stronger than her GERD, and her father’s mysterious role in The Thief’s life had won a spot in her psyche. She knew she couldn’t dump this case until she learned what, exactly, her father had been doing with this man for all these years.

  “Yes, sir,” Rory finally said.

  “Excellent. Your father and I had worked out many of the stipulations relating to this man’s release. Here are a few of them.”

  Judge Boyle handed a single piece of paper across his desk. On it was a long list of bullet points. He read from his own copy.

  “There was a request to forgo a halfway house as a living requirement. Considering your client’s notoriety, his age, and his financial means, I’ve agreed to this request. He is required to stay in Illinois for twenty-four months, however. Your client owns a home in the state, out near Starved Rock State Park. It’s about an hour outside of the city. Frank had requested that your client be allowed to keep this as his residence, and I’ve agreed. However, there is a list of stipulations that will need to be met. You and the social worker, as well as your client’s assigned parole officer, will need to visit the property ahead of time and make certain it meets the requirements.”

  “What requirements, sir?”

  Judge Boyle pushed another sheet of paper across his desk.

  “It needs to have a landline for phone, as your client will be required to check in daily with his parole officer for the first three months. Internet access is not mandatory, but suggested. The property needs to have a USPS mailing address. POB addresses are not allowed. Photos of the home will also need to be taken and placed in the formal file. Your trip to the home should be scheduled this week. You’ll coordinate it with Naomi Brown, the social worker?”

  The judge posed the statement as a question, but Rory understood his tone to be less of a request than an order. She nodded.

  “There is a substantial sum of money that your client will have access to upon his release. Your father had financial power of attorney for the last four decades. Now that Frank is gone, the money will be handled exclusively by your client. That’s over eight hundred thousand dollars, counselor. He’s never been in this new world of digital banking. He’ll need some help getting settled. So, of course, release the funds to him, but I’ll expect you to be his steward. For the first eighteen months after his release, you’ll be required to provide me with financial updates to prove that he will not squander his fortune or become”—the judge paused—“a victim … of financial predators looking to take advantage of him. The State of Ill
inois has spent enough money on this man. I’d like to make sure we spend no more after he is released.”

  Rory made notes.

  “Finally,” the judge said, “he is sixty-eight years old. He obviously has the means not to work, and his notoriety prevents him from meaningful employment. It’s best for now that your client disappear for a while. Maybe forever. The property near Starved Rock has been held in a trust, so his name is not attached to it. He will be difficult to track down after release. Of course, everyone in authority who needs to find him will have easy access. But the trolls will be looking for him, and it’s up to you to help him stay anonymous. Your father had done a lot of work, to this end.”

  The judge closed the file and stood, as if he had even more pressing issues to attend to. “Is there anything else?”

  “Yes,” Rory said. She swallowed down the acid again. “I’ll have to see him before the formal parole hearing to go over a few other things. To my knowledge, he doesn’t even know his attorney has died.”

  The circumstance of seeing a stranger in the close quarters of a visitation room, of having to look him in the eye and explain that she was his new attorney, was something Rory would have normally run from. Typically, she’d have done anything to avoid such a thing, arms up and slithering from its hold like a child escaping her mother’s grip. But Rory was after something. She didn’t give a shit about the man they called The Thief. She wanted to know what her father was doing for him, because she knew damn well it wasn’t simply tending to his legal needs.

  “That can be arranged,” Judge Boyle said. “I’ll put in the request so that it’s expedited.”

  CHICAGO

  August 1979

  ANGELA’S BIRTHDAY FELL ON TUESDAY, TWO DAYS AFTER CATHERINE had rejected her, the way everyone from Angela’s adolescence had done. Two days after she saw Bill Blackwell’s neck, and the ugly red gouges he hid with a bandana. Two days since Angela had put all the haunting pieces to this summer together. Two full days, and she had done nothing. It had been two days of very little sleep, her mind allowing only thoughts about the missing women, and questioning her belief that Bill Blackwell was part of it all. That the peculiar practice of dual hanging was the method he had used to kill the women. Two days of questioning her theory that the disappearances were part of a much broader string of homicides, which dated back an entire decade. Two days of panic and doubt. And if Angela doubted herself, she couldn’t blame Catherine for rebuking her.

  “Is the wine okay?” Thomas asked, bringing Angela back from her thoughts.

  Knowing she didn’t like crowds, Thomas made early dinner reservations. Now, on her birthday, they sat at a candlelit table, sipping red wine, while the restaurant was only sparsely occupied. Angela did her best with the acidic cabernet that was upsetting her frail stomach.

  She smiled. “It’s good.”

  She had been close to confessing everything to Thomas when he arrived home on Sunday night. But instead, she kept things bottled up, allowing her mind to run wild. She had, Angela knew, lost all control of her thoughts. Not even the Valium was able to corral her psyche. The lack of sleep had her ragged and on edge.

  She wrestled with her uneasy stomach through dinner, and then declined dessert.

  “You don’t want dessert on your birthday?” Thomas asked.

  “I’m not in the mood for sweets. But you go ahead.”

  “No, we’ll skip it tonight. I have something for you,” Thomas said, producing a small wrapped present from the breast pocket of his jacket.

  Everything that had transpired since that day in the garage when Angela had attempted to move the old couch out to the alley for trash pickup—her encounter with Leonard Williams, her overwhelming bout of obsessive compulsion that had stolen an entire week, the forming of her theory about the missing women dating back for a decade, the report of Samantha Rodgers’s body being found, and, most recently, her bizarre discovery in the warehouse, her research about the disturbing practice of dual asphyxiation and thoughts of Bill Blackwell being involved in all of it—had caused Angela to forget about the necklace she found in the old picnic basket.

  The events of the past week had nearly caused her to forget her birthday altogether. Now, as she sat with the gift in front of her, she was grateful for having forgotten about the necklace. Had it been present in her mind, she wouldn’t have been able to play off being surprised.

  “Can I open it?” she asked.

  “Of course,” Thomas said.

  Angela pulled the wrapped box in front of her. She carefully tore away the paper and opened the top of the small box. She squinted her eyes at the diamond earrings that rested on the felt interior, with no attempt to hide her confusion.

  “You don’t like them?” Thomas asked.

  She looked up at her husband, who was staring with a confused look on his face that matched Angela’s.

  “No, no,” she quickly said. “I love them. I just …” She shook her head. “They’re beautiful.”

  “We can exchange them if they’re not what you like. You pointed them out a few months ago when we were shopping. I thought they’d make the perfect surprise.”

  Angela nodded. “They do. They’re perfect.”

  As she slipped the diamonds through the piercings in her ear-lobes, her mind could think of nothing but the necklace she had found hidden at the bottom of the picnic basket in her garage.

  Angela lay in bed pretending to enjoy her husband’s attention. Although their sex life had never been passionate, she and Thomas shared chemistry in the bedroom and their lovemaking had always been enjoyable. But tonight, her mind was elsewhere. When he rolled off her, she lay with her head on his shoulder until she was certain he was sleeping. Then, to the sounds of his rhythmic breathing, Angela slipped out of bed. She pulled on her robe and sunk her feet into stockings. It was just past eleven, a time of night she would never typically consider venturing outside. The thought of making the journey to the garage in the dead of night had her fingertips tingling and the scabs on her shoulders begging to be ruptured. But another urge overshadowed her fear and trumped even the strongest pull from the self-destructive parts of her mind—curiosity.

  She knew sleep would never come, even with the liberal use of Valium, until she understood the mystery of the necklace. Angela avoided the light switches until she made it to the kitchen, where she turned on the dim light over the stove. She felt the flush in her cheeks and the familiar queasiness in her stomach as she looked through the kitchen window to the garage. Her pounding pulse and the audible rush of blood through the vessels of her head were her body’s way of begging Angela to wait until morning, but she could not.

  Unlatching the back door, she stepped out into the night. The sweltering summer heat relinquished none of its power even this late, and Angela felt the humid air dampen her face. The neighborhood was quiet. She kept the patio light extinguished and carried a small flashlight with her. An impending panic attack made her breathing shallow. She hurried to the utility door at the back of the garage and ducked inside, bringing the interior to life with her flashlight.

  The dirty couch was still against the wall. She turned her attention to the cluttered shelves and found the picnic basket. Pulling it from its spot, she opened the top and shined her light inside. The thin necklace box remained just where she had left it. Angela reached into the basket and pulled it out. Opening the box, she found the necklace as it reflected the flashlight’s brightness.

  In the darkened garage, she reached up to pinch the dangling earrings that hung from her lobes. She swallowed a sudden bolus of saliva that had formed in the back of her throat as she contemplated what it could mean. Thomas had been working late this summer, at least two or three nights a week. She remembered a string of phone calls last month when no one spoke after Angela had answered. A few times the caller had hung up just after Angela had uttered the word “hello.” She knew he’d hired a new secretary that summer. Now, as Angela stood in the darkened gar
age, she fought against the screams of her mind that told her Thomas was having an affair. The nausea returned and her stomach rolled. She retched once, then quickly dropped the necklace back into the basket and replaced it on the shelf. She raced through the utility door and vomited onto a small patch of grass in the backyard.

  Breathing heavily, she gulped the sticky summer air until a second wave of nausea passed. Then she hustled back into the house. She closed and locked the kitchen door just as the lights flashed on. When Angela turned around, Thomas stood in the kitchen, wearing only his boxer shorts.

  “What’s going on?” he asked.

  Angela patted her nightgown, a nervous reaction to hide her confusion. It did just the opposite. “I thought I heard the trashcans rattling again. The top had fallen off,” she said, immediately judging her lie to be somewhere between awful and completely unbelievable.

  “Why didn’t you wake me?” he asked.

  “I just … didn’t want the neighbors to hear it. Mr. Peterson has been edgy since I blocked the driveway with the couch.”

  Thomas walked to the back door and pulled the curtains to the side.

  “The utility door to the garage is open,” he said, looking at her.

  “Is it? I hadn’t noticed.” Angela felt her stomach roiling again.

  Thomas unlocked the kitchen door and walked out to the garage. The sticky night air drifted into the house as Angela watched him enter the garage and turn on the lights. He disappeared out of sight for a full minute, during which the knot in her stomach tightened and pulled her to the washroom. She vomited again before steadying herself against the wall and resting her forehead on the back of her hand. She heard the floorboards squeak and, through watery eyes, saw Thomas standing in the bathroom doorway.

  “Are you all right?” he asked.

  “Not feeling well again.”