by Dana Killion
“Forgive me, I didn’t explain myself properly. This is in regards to the death of Elyse Wright and Skylar Hayes,” I said. She stopped and waited for me to continue. “I don’t know if you were involved with their cases, but I’m sure you’re aware of their murders. Marcus Bennett attacked me and has threatened my life. I understand that both Bennett and Rutkowski were involved with the work in these two cases, and both shared a rather disturbing trait. Their hatred of women. I’d appreciate it if you would talk to me about your experience. It might help solve the murders.”
Catherine reacted visibly, drawing in a breath and bringing a hand to her mouth. I took that as permission to continue.
“I understand from Nancy that she witnessed Rutkowski displaying aggressive tendencies toward you,” I said. “And I’m trying to find out—”
“You think he was involved in their deaths?” she jumped in.
“I don’t know that, but he is one of the connections between the women. I thought it was worth speaking to you. I want to understand more about how he operates, what he does with that hatred. So, long story, but that’s why I’m here. I’m just trying to uncover what I can and see where it leads.”
“Okay, let’s sit. I could never live with myself if someone else died.”
Or was she at risk herself? I didn’t want to scare her, but she would likely draw her own conclusions. We took a seat on a bench outside the courtroom.
“I’m going to assume Nancy filled you in on what she witnessed when he asked me out,” she said, removing the wire-rimmed glasses she wore.
“Yes, I’ve got the basics. What happened after you rejected him?”
“It started out pretty childish. He’d mutter things under his breath, derogatory things, called me names. Usually something related to my ‘snobby’ attitude. He was never loud enough for anyone else to hear. He’s one of those guys who seems to feel women owe him something.” She shrugged.
“Anyway, I pulled him aside one day after this had been going on for nearly a month. I told him to knock it off. That he was being unprofessional. That he needed to stop or I would have to have a conversation with Mr. Kirkland. He was making my work environment a problem, and I was tired of avoiding the guy. There’s enough to do around here without his childish male ego in the way.”
“And how did he respond?”
“The way guys like this always do. He called me a frigid bitch and stormed out. But he stopped saying things when others were around.”
“But he didn’t stop altogether?”
“Even though he stopped the name-calling, there’s been this underlying hostility. I feel it anytime he looks at me. I’ve done everything I can to avoid him.”
“So, he had a tantrum and now he’s pouting, but he’s basically left you alone.”
“Not exactly. I can’t prove this, but right around then, I started getting some really ugly stuff on my Twitter feed. I don’t know that it’s him, and if it weren’t for the murders, I wouldn’t mention it at all, but I do think Rutkowski was probably the one posting.”
“By ugly stuff, what do you mean?”
“Whoever posted, it was whacked-out women-hate rhetoric. He blamed women for his inability to get a date. Describes himself as an incel, involuntarily celibate. I guess it’s a thing. Creepy guys who hate women because they can’t get laid. He even used language that said women should be assigned. Like a charity handout to the needy, if you can believe that. In their warped minds, it’s some weird entitlement program. It’s totally sick stuff. I blocked the guy after the first few ugly tweets, but more have popped up. Look, I don’t know for certain that it was Rutkowski who started it. It could just be that the Twittersphere has attracted other idiots, or maybe it’s the same guy who’s changed his handle and keeps coming at me. I don’t know. I just keep blocking the assholes.”
“Do you remember the initial Twitter handle?”
“I’ll never forget it. It’s @mstrxxx.”
38
One of these two men was the killer. I was certain of it.
I sat on my sofa, a second glass of Cabernet in hand, trying to sort through the information. My notes were spread out on the coffee table in front of me, and I picked up piece after piece, struggling to find something I had missed, an approach that I hadn’t yet thought of.
Walter, of course, sprawled in the middle of it all, desperate to be included, the way only a cat could. I lifted one of his paws and slid out a legal pad.
After speaking with Catherine, Brynn and I had done a dive into the concept of incels, finding an online group of men who’d branded themselves with the handle. Involuntarily celibate men who were not having sex because women constantly rebuffed their advances. Warped though the thinking was, they blamed women rather than looking at their own attitudes and approaches. We’d found documented cases of these self-described incels taking out their anger and exerting revenge violently on women. Was Leon Rutkowski such a man?
Bennett was married, but his hatred wasn’t rooted in sexual rejection; it was rooted in a worldview that defined women essentially as property. I knew that he resented women who earned more, achieved more, and were more socially superior to men. Had he extracted some misguided revenge because these two women had dared to expose the flaws in their husbands? Because they had extracted their own version of justice by assisting in their prosecution versus hiding behind and blindly supporting them the way Jill Bennett had done?
As I thought about it, either scenario was possible. As was the possibility that the two men together were responsible. But I needed evidence. And I didn’t have it.
I took another sip of my wine and drummed my pencil on my notepad, hoping for inspiration, while Walter stared at me, eyes half-closed, purring.
My cell phone rang. The front desk.
“Ms. Kellner, we have a flower delivery. Would you like me to send them up?”
“Yes, go ahead.” It was rather late for a delivery, but given our recent tension, I assumed Michael was sending a bouquet. Thrilled with the thought, I got up, grabbed tip money, and went to the door.
As the elevator opened, a woman in a dark coat and knit hat exited, a glass vase of red roses in hand.
She mumbled hello and handed me the flowers.
“Just a second, let me put this down.” I took the package from her hands and stepped inside to place it on the console table near the door, then pulled the tip money out of my pocket. When I turned, she had followed me in and was closing the door.
I paused for a moment, confused by her behavior, then reached out to give her the tip. Perhaps she’d been worried about Walter escaping? She ignored the money in my hand and instead looked around the apartment as she stepped inside further.
“I’m sorry, is there something else?” I asked, her brazenness raising the hair on the back of my neck.
She pulled off her cap, shoved it in her coat pocket, then unzipped her bulky coat.
“This is an awfully large apartment for one woman. Are you barren?”
I stared back into Jill Bennett’s eyes.
What was going on? I said nothing, wanting a moment to figure out why she was here, but my mind was locked in a loop. Was this about her husband’s termination? She calmly stepped further into the living room, removed her coat, and laid it on the back of a chair as if invited. Gone was the sweet floral dress I’d last seen her in, replaced by a bulky sweater, jeans, and snow boots.
“I asked you a question. Are you barren?” Her tone had grown harsh, as had the look in her eyes.
“That’s hardly any of your business. What do you want? If you’re here to ask me to help your husband get his job back, I’m not going to do that. His behavior was appalling and public.”
She walked around the room slowly, looking at every item, stopping to run her hand over the upholstery as if evaluating my choices.
“I wanted to see how you lived. To see the emptiness of a life alone and unloved. It’s as hollow as I expected it to be. You have
all of this and no one to share it with. No one to cook for, to care for.” She turned hate-filled eyes back to me. “Yet you think nothing of those that do. You live your life selfish, destroying the fabric of our society, destroying the true nature of women. I came to see your empty, selfish life.”
“I’d like you to leave,” I said, sensing rage under the surface of her controlled tone. She said the words without inflection, as if reading from a script, but her eyes were filled with loathing. “How I live my life is none of your concern. And yours is none of mine, so please leave, or I’ll be forced to call the police.”
My threat seemed to have no impact, and her preaching continued unabated.
“Perhaps you hate men? Are you one of those lesbians? Are you perverted and unholy? God’s way is clear. Women exist to serve our husbands. Our job, our fulfillment, is bearing children, yet you have neither.”
“I said, I’d like you to leave.” I stepped forward and picked my phone up from the coffee table.
She matched my pace, knocking the phone from my hand. Walter ran, frightened by the noise.
“Jill, calm down.” I opened my mouth to say more, but the jingle of a bracelet around her wrist caught my attention. I looked down. Then up at her neck.
No.
My breath caught in my throat.
“Good, I see you noticed my jewelry,” Jill said. “They really weren’t worthy of such nice things. They were harlots. They didn’t know their place in the world. Just like you don’t know yours.”
She reached into the back of her jeans, and when her arm came out, I saw the knife.
She thrust forward at my stomach in a rage, but I was faster, knocking away her blow. She spun, unsteady in her footing, but didn’t lose her grip on the knife. I lunged again for my phone, now lying on the floor, but she kicked it out of the way, thrusting again, this time making contact with my side. As I yelped in pain and doubled over, she came at me. I threw my right shoulder into hers with everything I had, knocked her sideways, then kicked at her as she wobbled. The knife clattered to the floor.
I dove, the pain in my side forgotten with the adrenaline, reaching for the handle, feeling my hands flail against the edge but not quite touching it. Jill came at me, grabbing for the knife, pushing my hands out of range.
I kicked my legs wildly at her, doing anything I could to make contact, anything to get free and recover the knife as she towered over me, delivering blows to my legs and trapping me on the floor. As I stretched my fingers forward, I kicked at her knees feeling her buckle. As she struggled to maintain her footing, she let loose, jamming her boot into my wound.
As I screamed in pain from the impact, my fingertips felt the hilt of the knife.
She came at me again, outraged, flailing, kicking, screaming, pummeling me any way she could as I tried to get a grip on the knife. Filled with adrenaline, I inched myself forward as her blows continued. Getting my hands on the hilt, I turned onto my back, gripping the knife with both hands, knowing my life depended on it.
She lunged again, and with every ounce of strength I could muster, I kicked again at her legs. Felt her stumble and fall on top of me, an elbow jamming into my throat. I pushed her off, instinctively pulling away and coughing as I tried to regain my breath, but the only sound I heard from her was the gurgle of blood as it pooled in her mouth.
She lay on her side. Her eyes wide, pleading, terrified. And the knife was buried firmly in her chest.
As I struggled to sit up, I watched the last bit of light fade from her eyes.
39
My body shook uncontrollably as exhaustion and adrenaline flooded my veins, and I could do nothing to control it.
I lay in a hospital bed at Northwestern, twenty-five stitches in my left side, pillows cradling my head, and ice packs across my incision. My wound was just a low throb at the moment, but that would change soon enough as the pain meds wore off.
Michael appeared in the doorway. I gave him a half-smile, which was the best I could manage, given the drugs. He pulled a chair over to the side of the bed and clasped my hand.
“What do you need? A drink? Another pillow?”
“Can you find me another blanket?”
He stepped out for a moment, then returned with a nurse who had bedding in her arms. Michael gently wrapped the blanket around my shoulders, tucking it under my chin, cocooning me in the scratchy acrylic as if I were an infant needing to feel safe. He wasn’t far off.
I wrestled a hand out of the covers, took his, and brought it to my mouth for a kiss.
“I’m glad you’re here.”
“I wouldn’t be anywhere else.”
We sat this way, inches apart, our eyes saying everything that needed to be said, until Janek arrived, bringing reality with him. Michael sat up but didn’t let go of my hand.
“She’s dead, isn’t she?” I asked, looking at Janek’s steely eyes, knowing it was true but needing him to say it.
“The knife pierced her liver,” he said, nodding. “She didn’t have a chance.”
“Irony, isn’t it?” I said, not expecting an answer. “The same fatal blow she delivered to Elyse and Skylar.”
The look in Elyse’s eyes as she lay dying came back into my mind. Had she and Jill shared the same last thoughts?
“What happens now?” I asked.
“We’ll confirm everything you described, of course, and Marcus Bennett is going to face some difficult questions, but unless there are surprises, this case is over,” Janek said, allowing a hint of satisfaction to cross his face. One more bad guy off the streets.
“Murder charges against Gavin Wright have been dropped,” Michael added. “We’ve traced the emails discussing the contract hit to some gangbanger in Gary, Indiana. He followed Elyse a few times, just to get a handle on her schedule and figure out his bid. She seemed on to him, so he got scared and walked. We’re continuing to watch the guy, but it seems both of these schmucks were new to the game and got cold feet.”
“And Elyse assumed, correctly, that Gavin was behind it and started her own surveillance,” I said, the missing piece falling into place. “Well, Gavin’s still facing a class-one felony for embezzlement, which could mean as much as thirty years behind bars, even if he didn’t follow through on her murder. And what about Bennett and Rutkowski? What happens to them?” I asked, uncertain of how to feel. They hadn’t been directly responsible for Jill’s actions. Legally they would suffer no consequences, but what was the role of environment?
“Bennett still has to face the outstanding assault charges against you,” Janek said. “But unless we discover that he had advance knowledge or something else we didn’t expect, that will be the end of it. You can’t prosecute someone for creating an environment of hate.”
“No, of course not,” I said. “It’s hard to grasp that there are men with such hate for women roaming freely in the world.” I paused for a moment, sorting through my emotions, wondering how many men in these online groups would eagerly turn violent for their cause.
“I’d like to drop the charges against Bennett,” I said. “His children need their father now.”
“Are you sure?” Michael asked, squeezing my hand, his face again twisted with concern. “He threatened you, he assaulted you. Why would you let him off?”
“Because his wife’s actions are the consequence of his hate,” I said, looking into Michael’s eyes. “Being a single parent is the penalty he must suffer, and he has a tough lesson in gender roles ahead of him as he has to be both mom and dad to his kids. It’s wishful thinking, but perhaps in time he’ll come to appreciate a new vision of family and throw out some of those arcane views. Perhaps the cycle of misogyny will end when dad has to also be mom.”
A week after Jill Bennett died, I walked back into my office at Link-Media. My wound was still sore when the muscles were stressed, but it had been my psyche that needed the additional healing. During my recovery, I had realized how tired I’d become of living unsettled. My home was a jumble o
f boxes and empty spaces I hadn’t yet furnished. First it had been the divorce, then the remodeling; I was living as if every tomorrow would bring another uncertainty, another reason not to make plans.
My office was no different—worse, perhaps, because I’d felt like an imposter in it. Initially I told myself it was because I was new in the career, then because I hadn’t earned my ownership of the company. The net result was that I’d treated the space as if it were nothing more than a functional room, disconnected from my mood and who I was as a human being, certain to disappear or change like so much else over the past few years. I’d put off bringing in items to warm it up, to make it more personal, afraid that it was simply a matter of time before I would be gone.
Vowing to find my footing, I’d reveled in the ease of internet shopping over the past week and had begun working on my want list. I’d filled a bag of new acquisitions to bring with me to the office.
I set down my travel mug of tea, hung my coat, and then opened the suitcase. As I arranged small pieces of framed art on my bookshelf, Borkowski walked in.
“Nice touch,” he said. “It’s good to have you back.” He looked at me as if he wanted to say more or simply expected me to infer by his pregnant pause that our past tension was water under the bridge.
“Is it?” I picked up my tea and sat on the edge of my desk, waiting for a reaction. This one he’d actually have to say out loud.
“I suppose I deserve that,” he said, then closed the door. “I wanted to talk to you last week but…” He trailed off. “You had enough to worry about. Anyway, it’s taken me a while to understand, but it seems Ramelli and Molina have got something cooked up. Some secret business entity. This consulting thing, it’s not about efficiency or restructuring. They’re trying to take over. They’ve got a plan to force you out and have been lying the whole time. Manipulating the both of us.” He shook his head and let out a breath. “I feel like an idiot for trusting Ramelli, but he was always loyal to Erik. It just didn’t cross my mind that he would try to stab you in the back.”