by Daniel Jeudy
Collins shrugged. When the silence went on for longer than anticipated, he rolled his hands to encourage Addison on to the point.
“We need to be thinking about more than just finding chemicals, is all.”
Collins smiled and clapped Addison on the shoulder. “All right, then, Mowbray. You boys come and see me when you’re both finished here and give me everything you’ve got.”
“I just did,” he replied.
Collins winked intuitively and began slowly shaking his head. “Just come and see me when you’re done,” he reiterated evenly before turning on his heel to begin making his way back to Jennifer Hill’s blue Honda.
Addison faced his partner. “Thanks for the input.”
“Trust me, Ad, I could sense him waiting for a chance to rip my ass.”
His partner’s intuition was superb; he usually read most situations like a book.
“Yeah, you’re probably right,” Addison agreed, reaching for his cigarettes.
He began wishing for a breakthrough development—for anything to make him feel like they’d found a way into the game.
Fourteen
Paige Harding sat in a Bladen recliner chair inside her Huntington Beach villa, rubbing moisturizer onto her freshly shaved legs. She decided to skip her afternoon exercise class and was watching an update on the latest abduction by the Hollywood Hills serial killer. Her boyfriend had called from the office half an hour earlier to make sure she felt safe being at home alone. Greg was an on-the-rise business developer for a sports agent who specialized in promoting college football stars. He was concerned by the notion Paige fit the profile of the women being targeted. It was a charming gesture, a little unnecessary perhaps, but sweet just the same.
She met Greg at a Pomona College bar in the fall, and they moved in together six weeks later. Paige wouldn’t necessarily say she was head over heels in love with him, although his good looks and incredible body were easy to embrace. Paige’s parents couldn’t deal with the reality that Greg was thirty-five years old and didn’t belong to a church. They expected her to date someone with a college education who loved the Lord. Her mom had attempted to sabotage the relationship at every turn. Consequently, she hadn’t spoken with her much of late.
Even though Paige was raised in a Christian home, her faith only existed as fleeting interludes in neglected corners of her mind. There were too many self-righteous hypocrites in the church—too many judgmental people like her folks who looked down their noses at someone just because they didn’t have a tertiary qualification.
She placed the lotion down by the side of her chair and raised the volume on the TV. A correspondent was speaking grievously about the unfolding situation outside a parking station on Sunset Boulevard. The missing person was a woman named Jennifer Hill, an attractive blonde who was abducted after her yoga class on Tuesday afternoon.
Maybe Greg was right in believing she needed to be more careful. Still, California provided an endless assembly line of beautiful blondes, and Paige didn’t consider herself to be overly attractive anyway.
She watched a swarm of media descend upon a couple of detectives as they exited the parking station to begin making their way up the street. One of the cops was a middle-aged, rugged-looking man with a thick mop of brown hair and a weary face. The other was blond, sun-kissed, and sexier than Brad Pitt in Legends of the Fall.
“Talk about making a girl consider breaking the law,” Paige uttered, observing while the detectives hurried away from the cameras, displaying an intense loathing for all to see.
A female reporter from Fox chased after them, firing multiple questions as her crew struggled behind. Paige wasn’t disappointed when the younger detective turned to face her. “God damn it, lady, you need to back the hell up. People are grieving right now, and all you care about is making sure you get your cutesy face on the tube tonight. How many ways do you want to ask us the same freakin’ thing anyway?”
The plastic-faced correspondent appeared stunned as the detectives crossed to the other side of the road without looking back, weighed down by the mounting pressure to apprehend the monster they were hunting.
Paige flicked the channel over to MTV, searching for something less intense, surprised to discover an old INXS concert at Wembley Stadium from the nineties.
Greg was taking her to Santa Monica for shrimp and steak later tonight, and then they were heading to the rooftop Standard Bar in the city for drinks with a few of their friends. The summer break had been tedious after her best friend abandoned her by taking a vacation to the French ski fields. Paige’s ongoing problems with her folks had made the holidays forgettable, not to mention the fact they had stopped her allowance.
Greg was on a very decent salary, but he already paid the rent and supported them both, so she hated asking him for money. Nevertheless, she was due to have herself some fun, and for whatever reason, sensed good vibrations for this coming weekend.
The least she could do was see to it that her appearance might take his breath away. Paige slipped off the recliner and removed her panties while she padded her way toward the bathroom. She needed to finish preparing her body for their big night on the town.
Fifteen
The activity inside the office had subsided as Addison tried to take advantage of the lull by realigning his focus. He’d been going over the video from the parking station all afternoon and was still no closer to any kind of a breakthrough. Documents formed a pile on his desk, and the time on his computer confirmed his shift had ended an hour ago. His brain felt murky as he attempted to push past another headache that branched down the sides of his neck.
Their meeting with Collins had mainly been a revision of the conversation from earlier in the morning. However, Jed still managed to annoy the man by suggesting that the chemicals search was a waste of everyone’s time. The lieutenant had insisted they keep the inverted cross out of the media, and it wasn’t hard to understand his reasons for doing so.
If the press indicated the murders contained a satanic undertone, it might generate spot fires of unnecessary paranoia to drag the investigation off course. Those kinds of details would fuel the madness by stirring people into panic as they became uneasy about anybody who happened to be even vaguely peculiar. Although, a red flag would arise if any information referenced satanism or the occult.
Jed had spent the afternoon reading through the statement provided by Jennifer Hill’s roommate before starting a chronological chart from her last known location. They needed to establish whether the girls were being stalked in the days leading to their abductions or happened to be in the wrong place at the very worst moment.
Addison had told his partner to head home at the end of their shift after noticing how tired he appeared. Fatigued cops had the propensity to make bad choices. Besides, he wasn’t a believer in driving people beyond their limit unless it was essential, and Jed was already displaying signs of being gassed by lunch.
The CCTV footage on his computer screen was a window into the working practices of an active psychopath, and he remained hopeful of seeing things with a fresh perspective. Addison leaned back in his chair and stretched his neck to ease the buildup of tension in his shoulders. He rubbed at the dryness in his eyes, thinking how essential it was that he found a way to get some rest later tonight.
There was an arrogance to the manner in which the perp offended, but his actions didn’t come across as spontaneous. Addison took the video back to where the girl was fumbling for car keys in her bag while he swallowed a mouthful of soda. He must have already examined the footage forty times and still wanted to scream out “Turn around!” on each occasion.
The perpetrator moved in swiftly as Jennifer remained oblivious to the danger until he coiled his arm around her neck. She struggled hard in a spirited attempt to break loose, but his biceps were inflexible, and she soon lost consciousness after he smothered her face with a rag.
It took him twenty-seven seconds to incapacitate her and an additiona
l thirty to drag her limp body across to his white GMC van. The perp appeared on the footage one final time when he gathered Jennifer’s bag, then he climbed into the vehicle and drove up the exit ramp onto Sunset Boulevard. His features were concealed by a bandana on the lower half of his face and a trucker cap pulled down over his forehead. He wore workman’s overalls with sleeves, and besides his average height, there was nothing that could help identify him.
Addison considered whether the woman might have detected something of what was waiting for her inside the parking lot. A thread of hesitation leading up to a moment where she found herself becoming afraid for no apparent reason.
There’d certainly been times when Addison had sensed an impending threat before it materialized. He was able to feel the danger among the cords of uneasiness that began weaving through his gut to form a blend of tension that stood out from his everyday anxieties.
His mom attempted to teach him how best to stand against badness soon after his father’s murder. She believed there were only two ways a person could react when darkness came knocking on the door. They either chose to confront the wickedness and endured the inevitable pain that followed, holding firm while they waited for their wound to be transformed into a scar. Or they ran away to spend the rest of their life jumping in the shadows. Irrespective, the unrepentant nature of genuine evil always demanded more from its victims than they were comfortably able to give.
Addison’s contemplation ended when he heard the lieutenant’s influential voice coming from the other side of the office. He was communicating with a new detective, and his tone suggested he remained very much on edge.
When Collins finished talking, he began striding toward Addison, who turned in his chair, believing it best to preempt the man’s interest right now. It sometimes felt as if he expected everybody to have a telepathic connection to his presence. Still, Addison wasn’t in the mood for his impatience and hoped any discussion would be brief.
Collins pulled up uncomfortably close before launching into a monologue.
“I’ve just received confirmation that the plates on the van were stolen out of Bakersfield in October 2015. The tech team is in the process of viewing CCTV footage from every camera they can gain access to, but so far, there’s been nothing from any of the main arteries out of the city. My guess is he’s probably switched his van someplace nearby. The captain has insisted that we continue our efforts at finding where he’s getting the ketamine from, so fingers crossed we get a bite soon.”
Addison’s work cube was hardly expansive at the best of times, and the lieutenant’s enormous frame made him feel like he was stuck inside a matchbox.
“And as far as calling him out through the media is concerned, there’s no way I’m prepared to sign off on that,” Collins said before bending down to look at the image on Addison’s computer screen. “If we go firing off an antagonistic remark before Jennifer Hill’s body shows up, it’s only going to encourage the press to ridicule us when it eventually does. Then I’ll be the one left standing in front of the brass while they question me on whether our approach contributed to a young lady getting cut into pieces. The last thing I need is for them to start accusing us of inspiring a psychopath.”
Lyn Holbrook was the one who had advocated the oblique tactic of calling out the killer on national television. Addison considered it a ridiculous suggestion that would only give the impression they’d run out of ideas, yet Collins was rambling as if he were responsible for the proposition. He flirted with the notion of correcting him but decided to let it slide. Collins’s agitation would intensify with each new victim, and every detective in homicide had made peace with the reality that Jennifer Hill was already dead.
The lieutenant was staring at Addison as he awaited a reply.
“Well, I can’t see how this will end with the girl breathing. Not unless the perp makes a mistake, and so far, everything points to him not being the screwing-up kind of lunatic.”
Collins appeared nonplussed. “So you keep on saying.”
“Jed and I want to dig around to see if we can locate any practitioners of satanism in the county who might be willing to give an opinion on matters. Surely there’s gotta be someone who knows something about what’s going down, and people who play around with voodoo often network in groups.”
Collins’s bland expression communicated a desire for Addison to be more expansive.
“Look, I don’t want to keep going on with the same old stuff, but there are multiple aspects to suggest these murders have an occultic connection … I’m thinking Ramirez, but with more direction.”
“You know I trust your instincts, Mowbray, and I’m not implying you’re off the mark. So, do whatever you must but be sure you do it fast. I don’t need people to start suggesting my lead detectives have gone running down some fucking rabbit hole in pursuit of imaginary monsters. Agreed?”
Addison nodded as Collins looked at his wristwatch and began rolling his shoulders.
“Where’s boy wonder?” he asked.
“I sent him out to do something earlier and told him to head on home when he was done. I need him sharp,” Addison emphasized.
He didn’t feel like watching Collins work himself up over Jed, and he sure as hell didn’t want the kid to start kicking stones, but it was easy enough to comprehend why the man might be looking for an ass to chew, and his partner always made for a ready target.
“How much longer you plan on being here, Mowbray?”
“I’m going to run through the footage of the abduction a couple more times, and then I’ll call it a day. You had any success finding a college that’s down on some chloroform?” he asked disingenuously to get Collins thinking of something other than how much longer he intended to stick around.
“Have you been listening to a word I’ve said? I just finished telling you I’ll be persisting in our endeavor to locate where he’s getting those chemicals. Besides, you got any idea how many college laboratories there are in the state of California?”
Addison hoped Collins would ease up. The day had dragged on, and he still needed to stop for some Buckeye on the way home. His hands had started shaking again an hour earlier, and his belly was protesting his decision to skip lunch. He wanted to heat lasagna and kick back on the sofa while he watched sports. Have a quiet moment where he got to think about something other than dead girls with missing body parts.
“You spoke to your kid lately?” Collins inquired.
“Nope, not since last week.”
“Don’t let it get you down. You know how kids can be; they sure are difficult to figure out at times. As you’re aware, mine are all grown up and moved on, but the way they relate to me is always changing. I quit trying to figure it out years ago and just try to make them understand they can always come to me.”
Addison nodded before allowing the comment to hang in the air. He didn’t feel like discussing his kid or the concerns he had that the boy might stop taking his calls altogether.
Collins picked up on the feeling their conversation had reached its end and began to withdraw. His perception wasn’t surprising; after all, the man was a detective, and cops are usually switched on to the things left unspoken.
“You have yourself a good evening, Mowbray, and try to get a little rest because you don’t know when your phone is going to start ringing.”
Addison smiled uneasily.
“I’ll sure try, Jevonte.”
Collins took a final glimpse at his computer screen then began moving away in his unmistakable stride, ostensibly fixated upon whoever happened to be his next port of call.
Addison leaned back into his chair to shake out the tremors from his hands. He planned on having enough whiskey to get himself a decent sleep but would have to remain vigilant about not going over the top. Collins was right in saying a call was coming. If not tonight, then perhaps tomorrow, or the day after. Which meant the option of drinking himself into a coma was very much off the table.
Sixteen
Narek listened to the muffled sounds filtering in from the dining room as he sat inside the kitchen of his cousin’s restaurant eating porridge. He was in a shitty mood by the time he’d finished scrubbing out the trunk of his Buick at the boss’s warehouse. The task of making a couple of bodies disappear was no picnic lunch and not anything a sound-minded person would decide on doing in their spare time.
Davit’s mincer made things easier, but the stench of mashed innards might be the worst smell a person could encounter. Like always, the two of them had grit their teeth until the job was complete. They occasionally got lucky whereby the stiff’s bowels weren’t clogged with shit, though that only occurred every blue moon.
It wasn’t like he’d been expecting the Boogie brothers to smell like fuckin’ roses, but their stink turned out to be exceptionally rotten, probably from all the fried chicken, hush puppies, and grease that they ate.
Bedros’s incessant gorging had combined with the terrible odor to put Narek off his food, which resulted in him turning his nose up at Anna’s breakfast when he arrived home. There must have been something about the way he slid his plate across the table that got her pissed. She’d started bitching at him like a whiny dog.
His wife had been fortunate he was feeling exhausted at the time and just decided to allow her complaints to pass by. Nevertheless, she knew when to quit being lippy and quickly moved out to the living room to mope silently in front of the TV.
Narek provided her with many beatings over the years. His brutal floggings left her curled into a fetal position on the floor. She somehow always managed to crawl back to their bedroom eventually, where she’d lay beneath the sheets, pissing blood and trembling in darkness with the curtains closed. Anna could be a stubborn little bitch whenever she got backed into a corner, and Narek had needed to whack the defiance out of her during the early period of their marriage. Most women came to realize which side of their bread gets buttered, and his wife was no different. She mainly was compliant these days, though he still surprised her with a good sucker punch every few weeks to maintain his authority.