“It’s … beautiful. All of it.” I glanced to our right at two perpendicular leather couches. Between them sat a coffee table fashioned from an enormous piece of driftwood topped with a carved chess set, the pieces arranged haphazardly on the top.
“You play chess?” I asked.
“No.”
“But—”
“It was my mother’s.”
“Sorry. It looked like you were in the middle of a game.”
“We were. That was the last move she made.” He touched a pawn. “I was six. Cancer. My father died of cancer also, just a few years ago. He went quickly, in line with his wishes. He believed that pain was not an acceptable end to a life well-lived.”
“Dominic, I’m so—”
He continued as if he hadn’t heard me. “My mother loved chess because it was full of possibilities. The plays themselves may not fall the way you think they will, but they always work out the way they should, especially if you’re paying attention.” He straightened. “I’ve always thought that this still board is like a version of the end in and of itself. No one else will ever play on it, but all the pieces are where they should be if you just accept them.”
Acceptance. Healing. His parents had taught him well. And now he was teaching me.
He walked to the bookcases that covered the back wall and pulled a book off a shelf. “How do you feel about Rabindranath Tagore?”
I raised my eyebrows. “Who the what now?”
He smiled and sat with me on the couch. I relaxed into his chest, feeling his heart as if it were mine, matching his breath, inhaling the earthy scent of good leather and wood.
His voice vibrated through me as he read:
“I seem to have loved you in numberless forms, numberless times …
In life after life, in age after age, forever.
My spellbound heart has made and remade the necklace of songs,
That you take as a gift, wear round your neck in your many forms,
In life after life, in age after age, forever …”
He loves me. He’ll protect me. My breathing deepened.
“You and I have floated here on the stream that brings from the fount.
At the heart of time, love of one for another.
We have played alongside millions of lovers, shared in the same
Shy sweetness of meeting, the same distressful tears of farewell-
Old love but in shapes that renew and renew forever.”
I closed my eyes, hoping against all hope that I could stay here forever, relishing the heavy peace that had finally, finally settled in my chest.
I love you. I allowed sleep to envelop me before I could dare to say it out loud.
Thursday, November 26th
Timmy sat on the ground behind a huge tree stump, the only one on the dark, abandoned playground. He ran his finger over initials someone had cut into the wood and peered into the night. The tree shouldn’t have been there, surrounded by concrete.
He shouldn’t be there either.
He leaned against the trunk while his mother finished her business behind the wall to the side of the old school playground. If only the school behind him was still full of students, with other kids just like him. He would go every day if he could. He pictured walking to school, hair spiked and gelled, backpack slung over one shoulder the way the cool kids did it on television.
Hey, Timmy! they would call, smiling at him as he walked by.
Want to come over tomorrow? they would ask.
He covered his ears in case she made any noises—he always felt dirty for even hearing them. And he wouldn’t need to listen for her calling him. She had given him the same old speech: “I’ll be right back, honey, okay? Don’t talk to anyone and don’t move. I’ll come back for you when we have enough for groceries.”
He crossed his legs on the frozen ground like the good boy he was.
Hey, Tim! Will you play with me at recess?
Hey, Tim, let’s swing together!
He took his hands off his head. It was suddenly quiet—too quiet. A chill ran through the puffy coat he wore. He grabbed the blanket his mother had left with him, climbed to his feet and cocked his head, listening.
Nothing but the wind.
“Mom?” he called softly. Maybe she was finished working and was waiting for him. His stomach grumbled. He was ready to go too.
He squinted into the blackness.
“Mom?” he called, a little louder. His heart beat faster as he took a few sneaky steps, knowing he wasn’t supposed to bother her while she was working. The wind whistled around him, bit at his numb hands and froze the tip of his nose. The building loomed above him.
She wasn’t done, or she would have come to get him. They probably went in to get out of the cold, he thought, congratulating himself on solving the puzzle. He braced himself against the bitter wind and crept toward the old school to warm up while he waited. If he was quiet, they would never even know he was there.
Thursday, November 26th
He had strapped her down on an old cafeteria table. Though convenient this time, it wasn’t his favorite type of work surface; the metal grooves in the table collected the gore and made everything slippery. Not that she’d minded. Or even noticed.
He watched the cockroach wriggle inside the sheath of her stomach, its legs twitching as it fought to survive in her meager juices. Even after thirty minutes and twelve seconds, the bug still lived.
These fuckers will outlast us all. He touched it with the point of the scalpel and the bug writhed away from him, perhaps alarmed.
Creak.
He turned around. A blanket dropped to the floor as the boy hiding behind it stared, open-mouthed, brown eyes wide.
“Momma?”
In two strides he was upon the child, slicing through fascia and muscle along the front of the boy’s throat. The hole in the child’s neck gurgled, a last attempt to suck air though a severed windpipe. A waterfall of life spurted down the child’s jacket. Then the eyes closed and the boy collapsed backwards. A tear drop peeked from under one dead lid like a single cell trying to escape demise.
He removed the boy’s jacket, tossed it aside and carried him to the table. The cockroach stuck in the woman’s body was still struggling, but slower, sluggish. Perhaps the boy’s stomach acid would be more robust, paralyzing the bug in moments if he were to place it directly into the child’s gut.
He glanced at his watch. No time. But there was always another boy, another day.
He arranged the child on top of the woman, snuggling his lower half among her disordered intestines as if she were trying to pull him into the gaping hole.
Back from whence you came.
He positioned the boy’s head on her chest, between the two abominable bluebird tattoos near the front of her shoulders. The birds appeared to be flying headlong into the child’s hair.
He dropped the bloody scalpel into a plastic bag, an inconvenience but a necessary one. The police would be getting closer now.
The wind howled through the silent building. He dipped a latexed finger into the gore that had settled in the metal grooves on the table top and scrawled bloody calligraphy along the bench.
In a Wonderland they lie,
Dreaming as the days go by,
Dreaming as the summers die:
His work complete, he walked out listening to the wind singing an eerie lullaby to the boy nestled peacefully in his mother’s final embrace.
Friday, November 27th
I cut another slice of turkey for the women in the shelter dining room and grinned at the plates like a sappy idiot. Apparently, nothing made me giddy like a good night’s rest and a morning eating Dominic’s leftover turkey, mashed potatoes, and pie.
Pie made everything more awesome. And the way Dominic had woken me up wasn’t half bad either.
I flushed and glanced at Ms. LaPorte, who was faring less well. She slumped and shuffled, head hung low as she slopped potatoes on the plates, like so
meone had sucked all the energy from her bones. Holidays did that to you. I didn’t usually make coffee this late in the afternoon, but there might not be a choice if I wanted her to make it through dinner.
“Are you okay?” I set the last plate down and laid my hand on her arm.
She turned to me, her eyes watery and bloodshot.
Oh shit.
“I knew she had some trouble, but that boy … that poor boy.” She wiped a tear with the back of her hand.
My chest, my throat, everything constricted. Another murder? “Ms. LaPorte? What happened?” Please let it be something else. Anything else.
Her eyes widened. “Hannah, have you not been watching the news?”
My mouth was too dry to speak. I’d been avoiding the news, avoiding all the sadness and the hurt out there.
“Do you remember Antoinette? Her little boy Tim?”
Ms. LaPorte grabbed my hands as realization sank into my stomach like a knife. I shook my head in disbelief.
“Hannah, I know you’ve been through a lot lately. If you don’t want to know—”
“Please … what happened?” My voice had gone shrill and my heart was hammering so loudly I worried I might not be able to hear her. I gripped her hands to steady myself but it didn’t stop the trembling in my legs.
She leaned close to me. “Someone came here this morning, looking for Tim after he missed a visit with his social worker. They were only here for a few minutes. And then we heard the sirens at the school across the street, and I looked out the window—” she choked back a sob. “It was just horrible. Those black bags …”
I shivered. Cold. I was so cold.
He’s a good kid.
Momma, can I have another hot dog?
I sucked air through my nose, my mouth, but there wasn’t enough oxygen in the room.
That poor kid.
I let go of Ms. LaPorte, grabbed the serving dishes from the counter, and retreated to the sink.
Ms. LaPorte followed me. “You look a little pale, dear. Maybe you should take off.” She blew her nose on a paper towel.
I shook my head. “No, I want to be here. To help you. I … just can’t believe it.”
“Me either, dear. And to think all these killings have something to do with girls from our shelter.”
“Did the police say that?” My voice was hoarse. My nerves vibrated.
Dominic will protect me.
“No, but they implied it. Told me to watch out here. Be careful leaving.”
This has nothing to do with me. Nothing at all. It’s just a terrible coincidence. But—
I couldn’t be here. But I had to be here. Maybe I’d take Dominic up on that private bodyguard thing.
“I think we need to shut our doors for a few weeks,” Ms. LaPorte said.
“You’re sure?” Thank goodness.
She held up a hand. “I know; they need us. But if someone is taking these women from here, like the police seem to think, I don’t want to put them in harm’s way. I already told Brandy she could stay with me for the time being.”
Relief. Guilt at the relief. I nodded, mute.
“Will you be okay, Hannah?”
“Yeah, I just need … I don’t know what I need.” A baseball bat. A place to hide. Something to whack a killer in the balls.
I need to call Dominic.
Petrosky grabbed an antacid from the roll on his desk and chewed it slowly. His hands shook. It was probably from too much coffee. He worried it was from not enough booze.
Another one from the shelter. The scene had been horrific, but the aftermath was making him even more anxious than standing in that empty school cafeteria, the tinny scent of blood and human waste hanging in the air like thick perfume.
And that kid—
He ground his teeth. She had been another hooker, one that fit the victim profile to a T. But this time, there had been two victims. At least this time he had found out about the scene before the bodies were put in bags.
Ms. Montgomery would be frightened; she had been scared the first time. And maybe she should be.
Petrosky slammed his desk drawer closed and walked down the hall to the conference room. Graves stood looking out the window, still apparently waiting for their killer to come to them. Outside, snowflakes melted to slush in the salted parking lot.
“Sir?”
Graves turned.
“I have a bad feeling about this one.”
“A bad feeling about a dead woman and her kid, huh? Go figure.”
Petrosky could feel the irritation building in the pit of his stomach. “Is there any way to increase the presence around Ms. Montgomery?”
“We’ve already surveilled her, and she’s alibied on the nights in question. We don’t have the manpower to keep following a suspect who we know isn’t one.”
Petrosky frowned. “I’m more concerned that she’s a target.”
“I doubt that. And anyways”—Graves shook his head—”we’ve already freaked her out enough.”
What the fuck? Petrosky raised his eyebrows.
“One of your officers decided to go rogue and search her car while she was at work. She saw him, but—” Graves sighed. “We don’t need the illegal actions of one force member compromising the integrity of the entire case.” His eye twitched.
Liar. It had probably been one of Graves’s agents who’d broken into her car. Maybe Graves had even put the guy up to it.
“Dammit, we have to do something! What about the poems? There’s only one more verse.”
“We have nothing to indicate that Ms. Montgomery is in danger at all. If anything, she’s an unlikely target: employed, no children, no history of drug use or prostitution. Yes, half of the victims happened to spend time at the shelter she volunteers at, but there aren’t that many domestic violence shelters around. And the other victims frequented shelters that are completely unconnected to her.”
“What about her boyfriend?”
“Maybe Campbell’s secret fuck buddy was one of the other victims and he knew something about her killer. We’ve got men on it now.” Graves’s jaw was set. “We just can’t afford any more bad publicity on this.”
“Wouldn’t it be worse publicity if she dies?”
Footsteps approached. Graves broke eye contact and nodded to someone behind Petrosky.
Petrosky’s phone buzzed in his pocket.
“Paulson, expand the library record searches on that book to cover fifty more miles. It’s a stretch, but this guy likes to play. I want every copy back here and checked for markings, notes, anything. Then take a partner and see if you can find any links to other women’s shelters.”
Graves was grasping at straws. Wasting time. Petrosky’s phone buzzed again.
“Yes, sir,” Paulson said.
No one acknowledged Petrosky as he walked out and mashed his phone to his ear. “Petrosky,” he snapped.
“It’s Shannon.”
“What are you doing working the day after Thanksgiving?”
“Why, is it a holiday or something?”
“Not around here.” Petrosky glanced back toward the conference room door but no one emerged. Graves and Paulson were probably both staring at the parking lot like a couple of fuck sticks. “So what’d I do this time, Taylor?”
“Nothing.”
“How’d you get this number?”
“Morrison.”
“You calling my rookie in your off hours?”
“That’s not your business, Petrosky. What is your business is the tip I’m about to give you on your serial.”
Petrosky accelerated his pace down the hall. “I’m sure you heard the Feds are on it now, Taylor,” he said. “Why’d you call me instead of Graves?”
The phone crackled. “Everyone over here has been pretty pissed about how it was handled. And Graves is a piece of work in his own right. I heard two of his last three cases were solved at the expense of some uncooperative witnesses who turned at the last minute, testifying with inform
ation that put them in danger one way or another. Pretty convenient, if you ask me.”
Pretty convenient, indeed. Maybe those witnesses had even had someone break into their car.
“Either way, I trust you. I might have to call him eventually but I can plead busy for a few more hours. Actually, fuck it, you tell him if you want him to know.”
Petrosky entered the bullpen and yanked a pad of paper from his desk. “Hang on.” He ignored Morrison’s raised brow across the aisle and dropped into the chair. “Okay, I’m listening.”
“Got a colleague prosecuting a Xavier Kroll, K-R-O-L-L, heroin addict, small-time crook. Kroll apparently knew Antoinette and Timothy Michaels. Says he lived with a woman who was friends with Antoinette’s mother.”
Petrosky scrawled the name. “Interesting.”
“Kroll says Antoinette lived at his girlfriend’s house with the kid. Off and on, never for longer than a few months, but she was there recently. I doubt you’ll see that address on any forms.”
“Where’s it at?”
“Chapman. 4587.” She paused. “The guy might be full of shit, trying to swing a plea, but the prosecutor was going to follow up anyway. I convinced him to wait until after you checked it out.”
“Why’d he agree?”
“He’s friends with Morrison too.”
“California, huh? The boy gets around,” Petrosky said as Morrison approached his desk.
“Don’t we all?”
“Thanks, Taylor. Give me a few hours.”
“No problem. Tell Detective Morrison I said hello. And tell him I saved him some of yesterday’s pumpkin pie if he can get free for dinner.”
Petrosky glanced at Morrison. Morrison grinned.
“Tell him yourself, Taylor. I’ll keep you posted.” He pocketed the phone and stood. “Got a lead, ten minutes out. I’ll call you with whatever she gives me and get you to run it from here. In the meantime, get me a background on Xavier Kroll.”
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