The Finders

by Jeffrey B. Burton

  Turned out I’d been right about Detective Hanson. He’d been divorced for three years and, after I shared a bit about my marital situation, he looked at me and said, “If you didn’t want the split, it never heals.”

  I already had enough things to worry about and I hoped Hanson had been speaking more to himself than to me.

  What I’d kept from Detective Hanson—we’d been chummy, but I didn’t know him that well—was my observation that he was already in another marriage of a sort. The bond he had with his partner was palpable. If anyone messed with Detective Marr, they’d best be prepared to deal with Hanson, and if anyone messed with Hanson … well, vice versa.

  To me, that’s as good a definition of marriage as any.

  I knew the detectives were trying to lighten my mood with the nightly visits and updates, and I enjoyed watching as Hanson and Marr jostled and ribbed and gave each other shit. And, unless I find myself on the wrong side of the grass in the impending weeks, I assume the partners do good work.

  “I’ll be pissed at you two if I wind up a statistic in a documentary on NBC or some cable channel,” I said. “You know—back after commercial, we’ll tell you where they found the charred remains of Mason Reid.”

  Marr grinned and said, “Don’t worry; we’ll say nice things about you in the interview.”

  “Too bad the killer followed us from the station to Reid’s safe house,” Hanson said as though he were in front of a row of microphones. “In hindsight, we’d have done things differently.”

  Marr grinned again and said, “When are your cop friends going to get here and what the hell do they want from us?”

  Since all of my left arm’s toil had been reallocated, I glanced at the watch on my right wrist. “Any minute now. Kippy’s done some research and would like to bounce it off you two.”

  Of course there was more to it than that—much more—but I’d wait till the gang got here so we could all team up and make our case.

  The safe house was killing me.

  If I get a flat tire, I change it. If my roof leaks, I patch it. If my dog catches a serial killer and winds up on death row, I’ll do whatever it takes to save her. But this waiting around shit was driving me crazy. I’m not wired to lounge about all day, sitting on the couch, eating bonbons, and getting hooked on afternoon soap operas. It’s not in my DNA. I’d read somewhere that sharks must remain in constant motion or they’ll die. And I’m beginning to understand how they feel.

  I’d passed from denial to acceptance in about fifteen minutes. I’d accepted the fact that an unknown stranger—a cold-blooded killer—wanted me dead. Okay, not necessarily where I’d pictured myself at this juncture in my life, but I’d hurdled acceptance and was now onto the final stage in my development … the pissed-off-what-can-I-do stage?

  Sure, shrinks might insist I’d never left the anger phase; but, not wanting to quibble with the American Psychiatric Association, both anger and what-can-I-do led us to the real purpose of tonight’s meeting.

  “You keep grimacing, kid,” Hanson said. “How’s the arm?”

  Five days had passed since the incident at Gomsrud Park and my pain management was down to acetaminophen and beer.

  “Healing, I suppose. Sure wish it were a month from now.”

  “Just say the word and I’ll see if I can scrounge up some fentanyl from the evidence locker.”

  “Good to know.”

  “Seriously, kid. You look like all your dogs ran away from home,” Hanson said. “Anything we can we do to cheer you up?”

  I glanced at the detective and said, “A pepperoni with black olives.”

  CHAPTER 38

  “Generally speaking, we think of serial killers as lone psychopaths, outcasts driven by an unquenchable thirst to make their twisted fantasies come true,” Kippy said and held up a folder stuffed with papers. She’d come prepared. “However, studies have indicated that upward of twenty percent of serial killers, and maybe even higher, hunt in pairs. That’s more than a fifth.”

  “Think about it,” Detective Hanson chimed in. “For every four Dahmers, you get a couple of assholes like the Speed Freak Killers.”

  Both detectives were playing nice; egos had been kept in check. Either that or the two were busy with the twelve-pack of Heineken Wabiszewski had handed off to them upon entering the safe house.

  “History provides countless examples of murderers working together as teams—Leopold and Loeb, Bonnie and Clyde,” Kippy continued. “Leonard Lake and Charles Ng—the Operation Miranda Killers—collected women as sex slaves before killing them. Angelo Buono and Kenneth Bianchi—cousins for crying out loud—stalked LA as the Hillside Strangler. Bianchi even wanted to become a police officer, but, thankfully, got tossed on his ear by the local sheriff’s office.”

  Kippy had handed out photocopies of her research. While the others followed along on their hard copies I enjoyed watching her present. I got the sense that fellow students would have loved to crib Kippy’s notes in high school.

  Something I never had to worry about.

  “There are even a number of duo-sex teams. You’ve all no doubt heard of Charles Starkweather and the killing spree he went on with his fourteen-year-old girlfriend Caril Ann Fugate. Another couple, Paul Bernardo and Karla Homolka, were quite the match—abducting teenage girls, taking sexual turns with them, killing them.” Kippy glanced down at her handout, frowned, but continued, “This next one’s a hometown story—a guy by the name of Robin Gecht who, along with his several accomplices, were known as the Chicago Rippers as they raped, tortured, and murdered prostitutes, other single women, housewives. I only bring them up to point out how killing partners can go beyond pairs.”

  “Gecht and his asshole friends were part of a satanic cult,” Detective Marr piped in this time. “I imagine like Manson, Gecht was able to bend others to his will.”

  Kippy nodded. “Now in the case of the Velvet Choker Killer, we know all about Nicky Champine and his son by incest, but what if there was a third killing partner in the mix?” Kippy cut to the heart of the matter. “What if this third partner is the one who laid the trap for Reid at Gomsrud Park?”

  “But Champine and his kid seem so low-rent,” Wabiszewski said. “Gruesome to read about, like Jeffrey Dahmer, but Nicky Champine hardly seems to be able to bend others to his will.”

  “Think the other way around,” Hanson rose and stood next to Kippy—Heineken in hand, a most-contented professor—and faced the room. “In terms of these teams of killing partners, let’s also talk about what we call the dominant predator. These dominant predators have an uncanny eye for recruitment, and for grooming potential accomplices. They’re able to recognize certain traits—say young, needy, extremely insecure, mentally unstable, low intelligence—and work these individuals, manipulate them, wrap them around their little finger, and train them as co-conspirators.”

  “So what if there’s a dominant predator hiding in the weeds?” Kippy got the last word. “And what if he’s got it in for Mace?”

  I carried out a one-handed battle with the bottle of Tylenol—damn those childproof caps—and eventually shook two extra-strength tablets onto my plate and looked at Hanson and Marr. “Can I ask you guys a big favor?”

  “You can ask.”

  “I know you’ve already grilled him,” I said to the detectives. “But can you set up another meeting with Nicky Champine?”

  CHAPTER 39

  The main ground rule was that there would be no questions of any kind regarding any of the charges the State had already brought against Nicky Champine. The Velvet Choker Killer had been charged with four counts of first-degree murder, four counts of kidnapping resulting in death, and sexual assault. Compliments of the Illinois Department of Corrections, Champine was being held in remand—in detention—at Stateville Correctional Center.

  It had been a no-brainer for the presiding judge; Nicky Champine had been denied bail.

  And no matter what Champine said or did today—even if h
e coughed up the name, address, and golf handicap of the man who murdered Weston Davies, Lansing police officer Rod Ennis, and then attempted to kill me—Champine could have no plea bargain with the prosecutor. In fact, the only reason Detective Hanson figured that Champine agreed to talk to us at all was to score a short outing from his cell at the correctional center in Crest Hill.

  The detective had provided me with my own personal set of ground rules. I was to sit in a chair on the side of the room and shut the hell up. It had been a massive step forward from Hanson’s initial reaction to my request to hold palaver with the Velvet Choker Killer. The detective’s initial reaction had been a loud, “You have got to be fucking kidding me.”

  We’d gone round and round until Kippy dropped the bomb, “Nicky Champine might react differently with a woman in the room.”

  “That’s fucking insulting.” Hanson opened his mouth to add more but stopped, took a step back, took another sip from his bottle of Heineken, and looked at Kippy as though she were a long-lost relative. Wheels began to spin, gears began to shift. “Can you wear your hair down, Officer Gimm?”

  “Of course,” Kippy said. “I can also tinker with lipstick and makeup, maybe get a skirt at Hollister.”

  “You don’t need to go Pippi Longstocking, but … yes,” Hanson said. “Central casting—girl-next-door meets college freshman.”

  Although the pictures of Nicky Champine’s late sister showed her to be one part plain Jane, one part homely, and one part overweight, Champine had set his sights higher when he began the abductions.

  The detective looked at his partner. Marr gave an almost-imperceptible nod.

  That was the moment I knew it was a go. The detectives had initially returned from Crest Hill empty-handed. Hanson told me Nicky Champine muttered nothing of help when he felt the need to mutter anything at all. The Velvet Choker Killer had an interest in what occurred at Gomsrud Park, a passing curiosity he claimed, wanting to hear anything that went beyond the nightly headlines on the local channels. But Champine had played coy, uncommunicative, as the detectives peppered him with queries about any friends—old or new; colleagues—pizza delivery or bus drivers; neighbors or general acquaintances.

  Ultimately, Nicky Champine turned to his lawyer and asked if he could return to his cell for an afternoon nap.

  Kippy knew I was restless. All of our conversations spun around our conviction that Nicky Champine damn well knew who was behind the Gomsrud Park ambush. My name hadn’t made the papers, so I was a nobody. But suddenly, out of a clear blue sky, someone wanted to take vengeance—wanted to kill me.

  It made zero sense, as Detective Hanson had first told me that night at the hospital.

  None of us, as Wabiszewski had opined, believed Champine to be some kind of charismatic leader able to bend others to do his will. No way in hell. Nevertheless, Nicky Champine—the Velvet Choker Killer—had to be the link.

  Kippy had stopped by after her shift last night. We’d been nibbling cold pizza, chatting again about the case as I scrolled down articles on Nicky Champine for the millionth time. An account in the online version of the Chicago Tribune contained pictures of Champine’s four victims, all young—high school, early college—and certainly attractive.

  “Five years younger and you’d have fit Champine’s bill,” I mumbled aloud, regretting it instantly.

  “Really,” Kippy said instead of tossing a piece of crust my way. She took the kitchen chair next to me, hijacked my laptop, browsed through the article, taking lengthy looks at each and every photograph.

  That’s when we hatched our scheme.

  Kippy and I discussed being subtle with the detectives, let Hanson and Marr, over the course of the conversation, think they’d come up with the bright idea, but, as they say, no battle plan survives first contact with the enemy. Realizing subtlety was getting us nowhere, Kippy switched gears—went heavy-handed—and hit Hanson over the head with it.

  But I credit the CPD detective with how quickly he came around … and adapted. Perhaps having a young woman in the room, perhaps dangling a pretty of the opposite sex in front of Nicky Champine, a woman who roughly fit his pattern, with the assistance of hairstyle and makeup and youthful attire, might get him to open up—essentially, per Marr, make the sad sack of shit more talkative.

  I, on the other hand, wasn’t expected to undergo a makeover or even tease my hair. My entire job, as Detective Hanson made abundantly clear, repeatedly, on the ride to Crest Hill was to sit in a chair on the side of the room and shut the hell up. I had the back seat of Hanson’s unmarked Chevy Impala all to myself as Detective Marr was sitting out round two with the Velvet Choker Killer. Marr didn’t want too many people flooding the interrogation room; he didn’t want to intimidate or swamp Nicky Champine into silence. So I listened from the back of the Impala while the adults spoke cop lingo and plotted strategy as we took I-55 south on our field trip to the Stateville Correctional Center.

  Perhaps somewhere along the way they’d stop and pick me up a Happy Meal or kiddie cone.

  I’d read online that Stateville sits on over twenty-two hundred acres, has an operational capacity of almost thirty-eight hundred with about twelve hundred dubious souls in maximum security. SCC’s maximum-security facility houses general population, segregation, protective custody, and temporary writ inmates—whatever the hell that term signified. But all of these facts and figures meant nothing until we began our approach and I spotted the thirty-three-foot wall studded with guard towers.

  Suddenly it got real.

  “If I ever got sent up here,” I said, reminding the two police officers that someone was in the back seat, “I’d own the place in a month.”

  I tend to make bad jokes when I’m nervous, still I felt a bit insulted at how hard the two cops chuckled.

  “Maybe if you had Vira,” Kippy said after she’d finished guffawing.

  Though maximum-security visits ended at two-thirty p.m., we were at SCC on official police business. Nevertheless, it took us fifteen minutes, four sets of harsh eyes, one metal detector to pass through, and, in my case, two forms of ID to get in. Once inside we were taken down an unoccupied hallway in the opposite direction of the family visitation wing. Eventually, our guide—an aloof corrections officer with a name tag that identified the wearer as Kent Hall—opened a door and deposited us into the windowless interrogation room we’d be using for today’s meeting.

  Kippy and Detective Hanson got set up at the table and, sure enough, there was a wooden chair, no cushion, along the far wall—the parking stall for yours truly. Hanson even pointed me toward it as though I’d forgotten my lot in life on the trek inside.

  A few minutes later the door opened and Corrections Officer Hall ushered in another attendee—Nicky Champine’s attorney. Upon arrest, Champine had obtained a court-appointed public defender, which he had for about fifteen minutes before J. Sidney Rice—already well known on the Chicago legal circuit—had swooped in and taken over the Velvet Choker Killer’s defense. Rice sat opposite Detective Hanson, who, in turn, introduced Officer Kippy Gimm. As an afterthought, Hanson looked my way, said I was a contractor on the case, and, no kidding, muttered my name as Masonry—like the stonework—instead of Mason Reid.

  I suspect the detective did it on purpose.

  From my remote island along the side of the room, I watched their interactions. I don’t imagine there’s a great deal of love lost between Detective Hanson and Defense Attorney Rice. J. Sidney Rice had been a constant fixture on local TV, but never there to say terribly pleasant things about the actions and motivations of the Chicago Police Department. He even screamed to the media about how the search of Nicky Champine’s Pontiac was illegal and how it spit in the face of Champine’s Fourth Amendment rights. But maybe it was all a game. Hanson had told me that Nicky Champine was going down no matter what tricks J. Sidney pulled from thin air or out of his headline-hungry ass. Any judge that let the Velvet Choker Killer free on some bullshit technicality would soon fin
d himself friendless, unemployed, and possibly tarred and feathered.

  I wanted to ask J. Sidney what the “J” stood for, but knew it would fly in the face of my assigned ground rule of shutting the hell up. Since he went by the initial, I imagined it was something mundane like John or Jim. Detective Hanson had told me Rice wore these thousand-dollar suits, but I wasn’t urbane enough to tell the difference between the dark suit Rice currently wore and what you’d walk out with at the Men’s Wearhouse during their two-for-one sale. And if he made that kind of dough practicing criminal defense, how come he had a toupee that looked like something Howard Cosell had discarded back in the seventies? Rice seemed to be in his early sixties, but the thing on his head was as black as Poe’s raven and made it look as though his hairline began a half-inch up from his eyebrows.

  “Twice in a week, Detective,” Rice said after the introductions were complete. “You’re adding a great deal of wear and tear to my Mercedes.”

  “Don’t you have a few dozen other clients you can visit as long as you’re up here?” Hanson replied.

  “If they’re at Stateville on a permanent basis, I can’t imagine they’d be happy to see me.”

  The two men laughed and I tried to make sense of our legal system. J. Sidney Rice was representing Nicky Champine on a pro bono basis, but it wasn’t as altruistic as that may sound. Rice was no Atticus Finch, and that had been Gregory Peck’s real hair. Sure, J. Sidney would pound on the table and scream about illegal searches and seizures, and Champine would still get about a dozen life sentences. But Rice was media savvy; he gained a boatload of free publicity from a high-profile case such as this one. It cemented his celebrity status and, as Detective Hanson mentioned on the ride to Stateville, Rice would probably walk away from this one with some kind of book deal.

  And this offshoot of the Velvet Choker Killer’s case—involving the murders at Gomsrud Park—would add an extra twist and turn to Rice’s supposed nonfiction.