‘I don’t have time to argue with you Barbara. There have been developments. Frusco needs the diary and Anna to translate.’
‘But the deal was I’d get the scoop. So far that amounts to squat.’
Georgina opened the rear passenger door and manhandled Anna into the car before jumping in to the driver’s seat, leaving Barbara standing breathing in the fumes from the over rich petrol mix of the car. As Georgina drove up and out of the basement she apologised to Anna.
‘I’m sorry to treat you like this.’
Anna looked on bewildered from the rear seat.
John Keller caught up with Barbara in the basement car park. His camera was in the carry bag over his shoulder.
‘I don’t care what you do John, just get me to the police station faster than yesterday.’
Keller opened the door to the Cherokee jeep, and they climbed in.
‘Did you hear those passages relating to England, Fleisher and Rick?’ Keller asked.
‘O’Neil’s a cool cookie. I am sure she made the connection.’ Dace smiled.
Before she had buckled up, Keller had the car in drive and was up into the drizzly night and the evening rush hour traffic. Barbara looked for Georgina O’Neil's taillights. The Cherokee zipped through the traffic, handled with consummate ease by Keller. Dace switched on her cell phone then dialled the TV station.
‘Jenny, it's Barbara, put me through to Chris.’ She cupped the mouthpiece as she began to explain what was happening to her cameraman. ‘Securing a slot for the ten o' clock bulletin. I think this is about to blow big time.’
‘Jesus, Barbara where the hell have you been?’ The urgency in her boss’s voice told her news was breaking at the station as well as with her.
‘Got a potential scoop here Chris, to do with the Montoya kidnapping. We need an eight-minute slot.’
Keller turned his head and mouthed eight minutes' in surprise. Knowing that at the moment they barely had enough new material to cover two minutes.
‘Never mind. Get back here as soon as you can.’
‘But I'm....’
‘The killer's gone online and wants to talk with you at 8pm sharp over the Internet. Can you believe this, his agent…you heard me right, his agent just rang to arrange the interview.’
Barbara looked at the clock inset on the Jeep’s consol. 7-37pm. She felt her heart turn. ‘Leave O’Neil, John. Get back to the TV station, NOW.’ Keller screeched the jeep to a halt, looked over his shoulder and swung the car left onto the opposite carriageway as soon as there was a clearing in the traffic.
‘Read some more from the diary.’ Georgina passed the book over her shoulder to Anna. She was focused on the road ahead, but her mind listened with intent to every word from Anna.
‘Sunday18th May. The barbeque was great fun. We had a basketball match. The women verse the men. We won. Thanks to the FBI agent that is working with Mr Montoya. Her name is Georgina.’
Anna began to falter as her eyes raced ahead reading the next couple of lines.
‘She is quite beautiful. It was a shame that they had to race away. Mr Montoya did not return home Saturday. The arguments seem to be getting worse. They were talking about the man who called on Wednesday. The voices were angry, and his name bounced from both sets of lips as a tennis ball. Charles.
Monday 19th May. Jo-Lynn has shocked me today. She confided in me that she was thinking of getting a divorce. She seemed very upset.’
Georgina continued to drive, taking mental notes. She wasn't surprised to hear that the Montoya's marriage was going through a rough patch. She remembered Jo-Lynn's remarks by the hole in the ground that was going to be the swimming pool. Between Rick's job, the death of a child and her own time-consuming career, Georgina had figured that something would give. What concerned her though was the remark's linking them to Charles. She wondered if it was Charles Fleisher or some other person named Charles. Could it be co-incidence? But co-incidence was a phenomenon she placed just above religion in the believability stakes. The large police precinct appeared in view as she turned the car into Biston Boulevard. She slowed down on the approach to the underground car park and swiped her pass card through the reader. The barrier waited for the electronic instruction to be issued before rising.
Anna continued reading.
‘May 20th. It would seem that Mr Montoya and the FBI Agent have caught the Turtle Island killer. There have been a lot of TV cameras here today. It feels like a dark cloud has lifted from the island.
The car stopped.
Georgina turned. ‘We're here.’
Thirty-Three
Jo-Lynn tried to keep moving to stay warm but the skin on the soles of her feet were soft and splitting from over-exposure to the water, making walking painful. She hobbled up the short set of steps and sat near the top by the locked door. At least it was dry there. Her eyes scanned the room, three chairs, water and a strip light. The Grand Floridian it wasn’t.
Her mind was working, trying to fathom a way out, wondering what had happened to her husband, trying to come to terms with what she had done to deserve this predicament. He had not visited her for a long time. She couldn’t judge how long, a day, sixteen hours…eight hours? Bouts of sleep had come in-between, disturbing any accurate estimate. She tried to comfort herself with the thought that maybe her husband and son were being held somewhere dry and warm. She pulled her legs up to her chest to try and gain extra warmth from them. The soles of her feet scraped against the rough surface, leaving a smear of blood from the split skin. She looked around at the door behind her. A flat metal panel faced her, secured to the frame of the door with rivets. There was no visible lock or handle and less than a five-millimetre gap between the door and the frame. No way out. She sighed. Near the top of the wall directly opposite where she sat, about eight feet from the ground was a metal grill. Too small for a body, it fed the room with its supply of fresh air. To the left was a standpipe with tap attached. There seemed to be no way out other than through the door. Jo-Lynn shivered, cold air danced over her spine, chilling her.
7-52pm. Barbara Dace ran up the stairs to the third floor and along the slim corridor. Her breathing laboured as she cursed her twenty a day habit. Two clear glass doors lay ahead; she pushed through one and entered the open office. Small blocks of desks, or working units as they were known in management speak, occupied virtually every available space, leaving small paths in-between to walk from A to B. On each desk was at least one computer monitor. The room was alive, a hubbub of activity and noise. The air bristled with excitement; it virtually jumped off the walls like forked lightning ricocheting in a box.
Chris Hurley was the first to notice her arrival.
‘Thank God you’re here.’ Hurley ran across the room to greet her. He pulled her along to her workstation and sat her down behind her already glowing PC.
‘How long we got?’ Barbara asked. It was a general question, which somehow in the melee obtained an answer.
‘Seven minutes.’ Hurley’s personal assistant answered. He was at another computer with a large group gathered around.
Hurley bit into his lip. ‘Shit. Not long. Right, listen Barbara; this is what’s happening. We got E-Mail earlier today; at first, we thought it was from some crank. He said he was the Turtle Island killer’s agent and that his client wanted an interview with you tonight. We were going to dismiss it, but he gave us a web site to check out.’ Hurley shivered as the image of its contents replayed in his head. ‘What you can see on the screen at the moment are some link pages from the site.’
Barbara looked at the screen. ‘His agent?’ She said incredulously.
‘I know. Wesley Timms. Apparently, he doesn’t know where this psycho is, but has made contact via the Internet. Our lawyers inform us that he hasn’t even broken the law.’
‘Glory be the new revolution.’
The Death cam page had been accessed. The live feed showed a woman, partially clothed, crouched on a set of stairs asleep. Barbara turn
ed.
‘That's...’
‘Jo-Lynn Montoya.’ Hurley interjected. ‘And there's worse to come.’
He scrolled up the page to the hit counters and the pictures of Rick, Jo-Lynn and Ray. Under Jo-Lynn’s name was a figure of one hundred and eighty thousand, three hundred and thirty-four followed by a button that read YES. Barbara quickly read the page.
‘Four minutes.’ Hurley's PA shouted.
‘On some of the other pages there are short films of him torturing and killing some of his victims. He's somehow set up a whole site dedicated to his crimes and managed to get it on search engines and linked to various other sites, Christ he’s even got sponsors. The count under Jo-Lynn's name has increased by over fifteen thousand in the past half hour.’ Hurley leaned over Barbara's shoulder, moved the mouse pointer onto the file heading marked open and clicked. A small box appeared on the screen. Reading from a printed piece of paper he copy typed a web address and clicked Okay.
‘Two and a half minutes.’
‘Is this thing set up properly?’ Hurley asked. His question aimed at the desk with his PA.
‘It's working fine.’
Barbara noticed for the first time the small triangular object on top of her PC. A small lens in the centre reflected light in a multitude of subdued colours. For someone who spent most of her working day staring in to a lens, Barbara felt distinctly uncomfortable.
‘Is this what I think it is?’
‘He only wants to speak to you. This is going to be the biggest thing that has happened to this station since....’ Hurley was lost for a comparison.
‘One minute.’
The computer linked to the web address. The title 'DEATHCAM' confirmed the location. A small orange highlighted box stood out from the black background. Static fuzz filled the box.
‘Thirty seconds.’
‘Why has he chosen me?’
‘Who knows? You're a local media celeb. Maybe he’s very parochial.’
Barbara laughed blackly.
‘Ten seconds.’ Hurley’s PA began a countdown.
Barbara took a gulp of water from a plastic cup, which had thoughtfully been placed by her computer. From the corner of her eye she could see John Keller moving closer. His camera perched on his shoulder to record the event.
‘Five...four...three...two...one.’
Barbara drew on her breath to steady her nerves. She knew that this was the opportunity of a lifetime, possibly an award-winning opportunity. Reporter of the year had been awarded for less. She stared at the small static area on the computer monitor.
‘Maybe he doesn't keep eastern time.’ Hurley’s PA quipped.
The foggy dancing white balls of interference suddenly cleared, and an image began to form. Barbara could feel the nerves in the pit of her stomach jumping and pulsing. The picture became clear though it was like watching an old silent movie. He was sitting in a chair. The light around him was dull. When he moved forward the image on Barbara's monitor jerked as the processor struggled to assimilate all the information. He was wearing a black ski mask. The whites of his eyes shone through the darkness, staring and intense. The resolution of the image was too poor to see eye colour, but they appeared to be dark, almost black.
‘Hello, Mrs Dace. I'm glad you could make it.’ His voice was going through some sort of processor, distorting it; the hairs on the back of Barbara's neck began to rise. ‘I'm a big fan of yours.’
Barbara wondered what sort of reply he was expecting. Thanks, reverential gratitude, respect. He didn’t give her a chance to think of a reply.
‘I assume you have had a chance to see my work. Are you a fan of mine? Don’t worry that’s a rhetorical question.’ All the time he was staring fixedly in to the camera, his eyes unblinking, compelling. He was sucking her in with his intensity. ‘Some of my best work for the whole world to see, and tomorrow, Mrs Dace, I'm giving America the chance to witness my art, live. Imagine that? Imagine the thrill of letting the world see.’ His voice hissed and crackled.
‘Why do you want to speak to me?’ Barbara asked, wanting to gain some control over the situation. Taking the focus away from his self-massaging ego.
‘Do you mean, what is the purpose of my contacting you, or, why did I pick you? There are different answers to both, and I wouldn't want to disappoint you.’
Even though they were only connected via a USB cable, Barbara felt the link with the killer to be tangible. She felt uneasy with the fact that he was replying to her, her questions, and the words that came from her mouth. As much as it was anathema to her Barbara had to keep him on her side. She knew she had to placate him without patronising him.
‘I was wondering what the reason was for your contacting me now, at this present time, but the answer as to why you picked me would also be interesting?’
‘I have contacted you before Mrs Dace. Remember the video? You made me a star then, so I figured that I should repay the compliment and make you a star, in turn by telling the world of my accomplishments I will achieve what I want. You see, I'm killing two birds with one stone.’
‘And what is it you want to achieve?’ Barbara asked picking up on the inflection that he put on the latter half of the sentence. ‘Is it just notoriety?’
‘I could say fame, but that would be a lie. Anyway, by the time this hits the news tonight, you will have done that for me. No, what I want is justice?’
‘Justice for what?’
‘Oh, I can't give away the ending. That's going to be the fun part.’ He laughed, inhaling at the same time, producing a high-pitched squeal. The laughed cut into Barbara's nerves the way the sound of fingernails being scrapped down a blackboard does. ‘You have seen my web site. Quite a piece of work. The site has been submitted to all the major search engines. As you can see from the amount of people visiting it, word is already spreading. Word spreads like a virus on the net. Words become a plague when something is hot. I have e-mailed every major TV station in America, Europe and the Far East. They're starting to run this story. And they will all be heading for this tiny little Island, as they do the count goes up from the little people, the people who have a dark streak, my supporters. The count goes up and the fate of the Montoya family is decided. I promise you now; I will kill only one, the person with the highest vote. Tonight, America votes.’
‘Wha...’
The screen in front of Barbara went blank before she could finish her first word.
Hurley leaned forward. ‘Okay, Barbara?’
She nodded.
‘Right, let's get this report up and ready. We're going to cut in on the movie with a newsflash and run a trailer for the full interview for the ten o'clock. Come on people, let’s get to it.’ Hurley clapped his hands, snapping his dazed staff out of their bewilderment.
Georgina sat alone in the office. She watched the Videotape of Max Dalton’s torture. She compared it with the film footage of the web site. Her eyes ached and her head was less than one hundred metres behind but closing fast. She had reached the point where all she could do was replay the evidence over and over, but the thought process was too exhausted to start gelling anomalies or adding coincidences and compiling facts. It seemed as if there was suddenly too much evidence, too much to compile and make sense of.
Captain Frusco made his way to the TV studio. The whole case unsettled him. Evidence of Rick Montoya’s meetings with Charles Fleisher and Stephen England had opened un-thought of, unspoken implications. The counter under the names of Rick Montoya, Jo-Lynn Montoya and Ray were increasing, like a time bomb ticking away. In the last hour eighty thousand visits had been made to the site, word was getting out. The small Island was rapidly becoming global.
The prospect of sleep, even an hour’s break was somewhere on par with holding a winning lottery ticket. The computer clock on the bottom right hand side of Georgina’s screen ticked over another minute but somewhere between glances an hour had elapsed. It now said 21-57. Her mind kept coming back to the tooth that was left in h
er car, the child’s tooth. Jordan Montoya’s tooth. Why her...Why the Montoya’s? The questions kept invading her thought process. The door to her right opened, Leroy struggled in holding a tray with a flat square box and two polystyrene cups of coffee.
‘Great Pizza...again.’ Georgina sighed.
‘Gotta keep the cholesterol level up.’ Leroy placed the tray down and patted his stomach, which was a tribute to the lifestyle that being in the homicide department affords.
‘You know this is the first case I’ve worked on where I’ve actually put weight on. Two pounds.’
Leroy flipped open the box to a less than enthusiastic fanfare. ‘Ta-da.’
‘Pepperoni and Chilli?’ Georgina said looking at the pizza.
‘With anchovies and mushrooms.’ Leroy added
‘May I ask you a question, Leroy?’
‘Yeah, sure.’
‘Are you pregnant? Because that is the most disgusting combination.’
Leroy pulled a triangle of pizza free from the box. The molten cheese stretched, refusing to break it umbilical link with the rest of the Pizza. He moved the box to one side to reveal a second box, which he handed to Georgina.
‘Here you are.’ He scooped a hot stringy piece of cheese, which was welding to his lip, and placed it inside his mouth. ‘As ordered, one regular cheese and tomato with bacon’
Georgina licked her lips in fake expectation. ‘Mmmn.’ She took a bite from the pizza and mumbled through the masticated food. ‘The ten’ o’clock bulletin.’ She was pointing to the dead TV screen sitting on a shelf snuggled between piles of books and papers.
Leroy leaned forward and through a scattering of coffee cups, pizza boxes and reports, located the remote control. His index finger found the on button with automated efficiency. They watched the ads roll by, before a warning was aired about the content of the news bulletin ‘which many people may find distressing’.
‘How’s Anna?’ Georgina asked.
Turtle Island: 20th Anniversary Edition (Georgina O'Neil Book 1) Page 22