by Tammy Bird
“I’ll get that after I calm the beast.” Katia motioned toward Marco, who was mid-snap of a great picture of the doorknob leading to the garage. “And there you have it, ladies and gentlemen,” she said in her best announcer voice. “Marco’s doorknob masterpiece.” She shook her head. “I’m not convinced the pictures can tell us a thing, but at least they’re calming him down.”
Chapter Fourteen
Friday, November 23, 2018
Zahra arrived at the large, brick building that housed the office of Dr. Harper Iacovelli. She used to love to visit here. Now it was a place to explore the psychological workings of a serial killer on the loose in Buxton—nothing more. Try as she might to avoid it, Zahra was falling for a certain tomboy Latina in a big way. When this was behind them, she planned to tell Katia that she couldn’t think of being with anyone else, not even Harper.
In the five years since Harper kicked Zahra to the curb, the two women spent eight nights tangled in what Harper called “comfort sex.” Zahra knew Harper had no idea how many nights they spent together. It meant no more to her than exactly what she called it: comfort. For Zahra it signified hope that the two of them would eventually find their way back to one another, at least it did until Zahra reunited with Katia at The Pink Clover.
As she stood in front of the red bricks, Zahra realized she hadn’t spoken to Harper since the first night she spent with Katia. Now she needed to get up the courage to face Harper. She looked straight up the wall of the old building and back down to the glass doors. Butterflies be damned.
Harper’s office was tastefully decorated with a deep-chocolate, wood desk and matching round table. In the table’s exact center was a decorative, black, square bowl swirled with reds and tans. Zahra silently counted her steps until she was close enough to touch the fresh fruit that filled the bowl. “Thanks for agreeing to see me.” She waited for the woman in the black pantsuit, white button-down shirt, and red skinny tie to ask her to sit.
“Hi, Zahra. Sit down.” Harper motioned to one of the chairs that faced her desk.
“Thanks.” Zahra glanced at the large piece of contemporary art that hung behind Harper’s desk. The four women—almost caricature, almost real—danced in a whirl of reds and blues.
Harper would have been at home with the women in the picture.
“I have a class at 11:15,” Harper said. “Until then, I’m yours. It’s good to see you. Are you doing okay?”
Harper’s red lips formed perfect words. Zahra willed herself to look at the fruit instead.
“I cannot even imagine what it must be like to have that many decedents at once. I bet Dr. Webb is exhausted. And of course, you, too.”
“I’m okay,” Zahra replied. “Doc and I worked some in Greenville. He made me take today off. Forensic anthropologists are all over. I think a crime scene investigator from a small town is just in the way.”
“Does that make you angry?” Harper asked. “You sound irritated.”
“Just aggravating to have so many people around. Can’t keep up with what’s happening. This is our fu…” Zahra caught herself. Harper didn’t curse. She didn’t tolerate it in her office. “Sorry. My bad. It’s just frustrating to not be in control of the room. That’s all.”
“So. You indicated you wanted to bounce some ideas off of me.”
Zahra nodded.
Harper opened a drawer of her desk and pulled out two waters. She put one in front of Zahra. “You cannot take what I say as gospel. Just because I teach classes on profiling does not mean anybody in your world wants to hear me tell it.”
Harper also refused to use contractions, which made Zahra feel as if conversations took twice as long, and like Harper tormented her on purpose.
“I know,” Zahra said. “I just want to get an idea about the organization of the killer. The reports we created from what we know so far show a thirty-year span of time with large intervals.”
“He’s organized. He isn’t impulsive or haphazard. Thirty years is a long time for someone to kill in a small place like Buxton. It is an even longer time to do so without being apprehended. What are the intervals? Do you have a timeline?”
Zahra looked at Harper’s hands as they rested, entwined, on her desk. Thumbs up and touching at the tips, glossy red to glossy red. Her long, honey-colored waves of perfectly groomed hair framed her slender face, and her emerald eyes had the darkest orbs at their center Zahra had ever seen. She was breathtakingly debonair. No one could deny that.
Zahra was a struggling student when they met, and she wasn’t then or now what anyone would call debonair. She loved to let her bouncy, umber coils puff out naturally around her face, and though quite feminine in looks and actions, she preferred her nails short and her clothes comfy.
She pulled the timeline information from her bag and put it on the tidy desk.
Harper let out a low whistle as she ran her finger down the page. “Fourteen people over thirty years without being seen, without leaving telltale clues, without making mistakes. That is impressive.”
“Truth.” Zahra nodded. “Do you think it has to be a Buxton resident? I think it must. How else could he get away with it?”
“If not Buxton, I would say Hatteras Island. It is someone who blends in, leads a seemingly stable life. Someone methodical and intelligent.” She studied the timeline for several minutes.
Zahra already knew it by heart. She was the one to painstakingly add the information to the computer as it was determined.
Harper started thinking aloud. “Let us go with thirty years for the first kill, subject to adjustment later. Based on how well we can determine time with today’s technology, let us assume the gap time is correct. Something happened to pull his attention away from his surroundings and help him redirect. A marriage. Returning to school. Perhaps moving away for a while.”
That was something Zahra hadn’t really thought about. Shit. There could be other bodies in other places anywhere. “Do you think we should be looking in other places?”
“I am sure the FBI’s profilers are coming to the same conclusion. They will likely do something to rule that out.”
“Or not.” Zahra let out a breath and shook her head.
“Yes. Or not.” Harper continued. “All but one of the victims is female. All of them are Caucasian. He is likely seeing them as resembling someone who has harmed him in his youth, someone who has the same traits as that person.”
“Someone with a mom complex? He’s killing his mom over and over again?” Zahra leaned forward in her chair. Harper did know how to weave intrigue.
“It is hard to say, based on the decomp and incomplete data. I would lean more toward it being about a particular act rather than the actual person. According to this, each decedent already identified is different.” Harper ran her bright red nail across the pages on her desk. She leaned back in her chair. “Here is the thing that stands out to me. There are varying ages, different hair color, length. And there is the boy, which adds an interesting element. He was buried with the teacher. Perhaps he was in the wrong place at the wrong time, but I doubt it. He will likely prove to be a huge clue to the solving of this.”
“Like the boy could be a representative of someone or something?” Zahra’s mind was racing. This was exactly what had drawn her to Harper.
“I would say quite possibly a representative of himself. He was likely an older teen the first time he killed.”
Zahra didn’t mention the knife found with the first victim. She debated with herself as to whether or not she should. Harper was trustworthy with any information shared and she wouldn’t breathe a word of it outside of this room. Zahra decided it was worth the risk to see where it would lead them. “The first victim, the one from thirty years ago. We uncovered a knife with her body. No one else had that, not that we’ve found anyway, and Paige and Bob’s pup was all over that strip of sand.”
Harper didn’t answer. She just let that information sit in the
air between them.
Zahra looked at the swirls on the bowl and in the picture and back at Harper. She played with the hem of her shirt and thought about all of the forty-plus men she knew across the islands that made up Hatteras. The area was small, relatively speaking, but that was still a shit load of men. And then there was Katia, the woman she crushed on since high school. What part did she play? Why Gina? Why was Elizabeth missing now? How did they all connect to a death thirty or more years ago?
Harper leaned over the pages on her desk, still quiet. Zahra could almost hear the wheels turning in the older woman’s head. Finally, Harper looked directly at Zahra. Her words were calculated. “The last body, Gina’s body, was in the dune for approximately two weeks.”
Zahra nodded.
“It is November. It is a time when the beaches are bare save the fishermen and women at particular times of the day and the occasional bonfire and volleyball game.” Harper paused.
“What does that have to do with the knife?” Zahra’s hands rested on her knees, now, and her full attention was on Harper.
“Maybe nothing. But I can tell you this. Your guy likely kills at the same time of year unless provoked in some way. The same time he killed the first time. Reliving the kill. He is likely a survivor of abuse. And your first victim is likely his abuser. As for the knife? My best guess is that, as a teenager, he felt he could not keep it.”
****
Paige awoke to the wet tongue of Frankie on her hand. It had been over a year since she had a dog in the house. The German shepherds she trained and used in her work weren’t allowed inside her home. They stayed in the training facility. “Are you hungry, little fella?” She moved her hand around to the small mutt’s head and scratched behind his ears, which perked up at the sound of her voice.
She picked her smart watch from its charger, attached it around her wrist, and tapped the face. 5:17 flashed on the screen. “I wouldn’t mind having you around all the time,” Paige said. “But you would need to learn the days of the week.” She pulled him in for a squeeze. “Adulting doesn’t start as early on the weekend.”
Frankie gave her a few seconds and then wiggled free, jumped to the ground, and headed toward the bedroom window. He looked back at Paige and barked.
“What is it, boy? Do you hear the shepherds in the facility? They can’t tell time, either, can they?”
Frankie took a few steps toward the bed and then back toward the window, repeating the action several times. “Come on, Frankie. It’s too early. There’s nothing out there you need.”
Frankie whined his response.
Oh well. Paige stretched and moved around to get her blood flowing. “Fine,” she said. “I’m up. I’ll take you out in two minutes.” She stretched one last time and headed to the bathroom.
She sipped iced tea on her small, enclosed porch and browsed her notes from the work on Buxton Beach. Her copy of the recordings and the painstakingly accurate transcriptions helped her deconstruct each scene, each move she and the dog made, each command given, and how it was followed. In turn, this helped her create the best facility on the East Coast.
She drained the last of the tea from her cup and sat her pen on top of the notes on the small wicker table next to her rocker. She thought about Frankie’s reaction to the noise in the training facility. In addition to the three dogs she and Bob were currently training for a police facility in Tennessee, they had three dogs they used for search and rescue missions.
Derrida was the oldest and semi-retired. She named him after the writer of Cogito and the History of Madness. Jacques Derrida was a philosopher whose work was cerebral and difficult, much like the work of a cadaver dog.
Voltaire came to her by way of a breeder in South Carolina who said he was too difficult to train as a cadaver dog. She took him anyway. She chose to name him after the great philosopher who spent much time in exile.
The youngest of the trio was Nietzsche. He was her favorite. The gorgeous, large, black-and-tan German shepherd who worked tirelessly for two days on the beach was named after a man known for his tenacity and intellectual prowess, traits also seen in the four-legged namesake.
Paige picked the pen and pages back up. She could spend thirty more minutes with the transcripts before she needed to head to the facility. The farther into the retracing of steps, of terrain, the more Paige found herself making the same notes: “Area of sand between dune and sand wall, area of sand between two dunes with a fence to the right, area of sand shows signs of depression behind long stretch of dunes.” In every instance of a burial, there was an area where someone could have easily gone unnoticed by anyone passing by. In every single instance.
Paige had no idea whether or not this information was of any importance, and she suspected the police and FBI already noted it, but she would reach out to Zahra with the information, just in case.
She looked over at Frankie, who repeatedly picked a piece of food out of his bowl, carried it to the feet of his current master, chewed loudly, and repeated the ritual. “You’re a strange sort, Frankie,” she said. “Cheap amusement. I like that. Wonder what your new momma is up to? Shall we text her? Perhaps she’s still sleeping since she doesn’t have a small yippee alarm clock.” She looked at her watch. 6:50. Before she could decide if it was too early to call, her arm vibrated and her phone lit up with her brother’s smiling face.
“Hey. What’s up?”
“Come down to the training facility,” Bob said. “Someone’s been here and our records and transcripts are all over the place.”
Paige heard something else in his voice. A shiver moved through her skin. “What aren’t you saying?”
“Voltaire’s dead.”
Paige felt her heart drop to her feet. Voltaire had a cold. She had put him in the main facility last night to keep him away from the other animals. “Dead? How? It was just a cold.” The reality of what her brother was saying wasn’t sinking into her morning brain.
“There’s blood everywhere,” Bob replied. His voice sounded frantic, filled with pain. “I didn’t hear anything until the other dogs started barking. Thought it was a rabbit or something poking around their cages. Took my time. Fuck, Paige. I took my time.”
“Don’t touch anything.” Paige was already standing. She debated on whether or not to leave the current transcripts spread across the table. Decided against it in case whoever did this was still close. She looked down at Frankie. “Is that what you heard, boy? Were they outside?”
In the time it took her to slide her feet into her boots and run the distance between her home and the facility, she had played a multitude of scenarios through her mind. None of them prepared her for what she found when she made her way through the animal obstacle course and to the office door. Pieces of paper were strewn from wall to wall, wall to door, across the small desk. One of three filing cabinets laid on its side next to the phone, which was ripped from the wall and shattered, its insides spilling across the cement floor. In the middle lay Voltaire, his coat now a crimson red. Paige knelt next to her beloved pet. Tears dripped from her chin and landed on his sweet face. She slid her hand under his head, lifted gently, kissed his nose. The smell of blood almost overpowered her senses. “I love you, old man.” She kissed his snout and eased his head back to the ground, careful to keep her knee and foot out of the pool of red.
Bob stood off to the side. “Looks like his throat was slit wide open.” He stood with his arms crossed over his chest. His fingers massaged his triceps.
“Who would do this? Why?” She couldn’t think clearly.
“They wanted something. Voltaire obviously startled whoever it was. Best I can tell they didn’t take anything.”
Brother and sister remained still as the sound of sirens drew near.
****
“I’m going to kill you now, Elizabeth.” His words were said with little enthusiasm. He was tired. Death took massive amounts of planning, sometimes years. Gina Dahl’s death wa
s seven years in the making: seven years of thought; seven years of watching. Hers was the longest. Of the more than twenty women and one boy he killed, she was the most time consuming. It wasn’t because she deserved the extra years to live and pretend, but because she was the most visible in the community, the most vocal at events, the most easily missed. Thinking about it now was tiring. “I’m sorry it won’t be a more appropriate death. I do like to enjoy them. Your mom has ruined that for us, though, showing up so soon.” He moved the blade in his hand and watched the starburst play across her neck, trying to position it at the exact spot where he would slice.
Elizabeth stayed quiet.
They often said nothing when they knew it was time.
He stood a foot in front of her and waited. The room smelled like fear and urine and blood. It seeped out of the pores of the walls. He breathed deeply. “The paper said fourteen.” He spoke in Elizabeth’s direction but not really to her. “There are more, you know. Not all here. Fifteen here. You’ll make sixteen. Well, seventeen, if you count the goddamn dog I killed this morning. Stupid creatures. Noses that won’t stop. Bark at everything.” His eyes met hers. Hers looked to be filled with so much anger. “Are you angry, Elizabeth? You should be. Angry at her.” He paused. “I wonder who they missed?”
Sandman pondered his latest adventure. He had traveled into Manteo, to the edge of the property owned by ancestors of Paige and Bob Johnston. He walked from a half mile out in order to go unnoticed. Getting in was effortless. He easily jimmied the door, and the file cabinets were unlocked behind what the idiot brother and sister assumed was the safety of the office door.
“I went in search of a file this morning. And the damn file wasn’t there. Not mine. Not the one detailing my hard work. All I found was an obnoxious dog.”
Elizabeth visibly shivered. He smiled.
“The dog was a surprise. I didn’t see that coming. Course, he didn’t see this, either.” He held the sharp blade up high so the light brought it more clearly into focus. “Thought the fur and thick skin might make it harder. It didn’t.” He pulled the knife through the air quickly, making a “fwoosh” sound through his teeth. “Like slicing through butter.”
