Profile of the Gemini Serial Killer
Detective Jonathon Cratick Series
Michael Rawding
This novel is dedicated to all of my friends and family.
Thank you for the encouragement.
A special thanks to Talia-Cote Vonau.
For the love of reading.
M.D.R.
Table of Contents
Chapter 1…..Page.4
Chapter 2…..Page.13
Chapter 3…..Page.20
Chapter 4…..Page.31
Chapter 5…..Page.39
Chapter 6…..Page.49
Chapter 7…..Page.62
Chapter 8…..Page.82
Chapter 9…..Page.91
Chapter 10…..Page.117
Chapter 11…..Page.137
Chapter 12…..Page.154
Chapter 13…..Page.165
Chapter 14…..Page.178
Chapter 15…..Page.195
Chapter 1
Jonathon Cratick reached for his jacket that was hanging loosely over the back of his chair as he rubbed his weary tired eyes. He glanced at his watch, it was five am. He was overtired from the night before. Jonathon’s one bedroom apartment was not what you would call spectacularly clean. There was laundry piled over the hamper and clothes hanging off his couch. The take out menus and Styrofoam food trays were scattered about on the kitchen counter. Pictures of brutal murder victims were sprawled over the table, with files cluttering over the floor. He had been staring at this case for fifteen years. Fifteen long years of going over the statements, the murder victims, staring into their lifeless eyes wondering why? The blood stained carpet from the stab wounds, with the broken vase of lupine flowers lying beside their heads. He solved many cases in his nineteen years on the police force, but this case always bothered him. It was back when he first made detective in homicide fifteen years ago that he landed this particular case. This particular murder of this family was gruesome. They were slaughtered in their sleep. The children, the mother and lastly the father. On nights when he couldn’t sleep he would always pull out the files and rack his brain, trying to put the pieces of the puzzle together. Wondering how something like this could happen. Every night he would pour himself a stiff drink from a bottle of Jack and just stare at the case files. That particular year was the most difficult for so many reasons.
He got a phone call earlier that morning at three am. Another detective wanted him to go downtown to interrogate a suspect for a murder that took place just outside of the inner city in the burbs. No sleep never any sleep. It’s how it always goes. He shot back the rest of the Jack from his glass and snuffed out his cigarette into the ashtray beside him. He then took a bite out of the half eaten grilled cheese sandwich he made hours ago. Jon scurried about his apartment grabbing his car keys, badge, cigarettes and wallet. As he was heading out the door he took one last sweep of the messy apartment. Satisfied he had gathered everything, he shut the door behind him.
The night air hit his face that immediately made his skin begin to sweat. It was humid and just before summer. Jon eased his way into the driver seat, turning on the ignition. The engine took a few pumps from the gas and then fired up sounding like a monster coming to life. Jon rubbed his eyes with his index finger, shaking his head trying to wake up. “What a miserable morning.” He thought to himself. Jon turned up his air conditioning to get the condensation off of the windshield. He felt this uneasy feeling as the windshield started to clear giving him visual of the empty street. He pulled out of the driveway and made a right towards downtown.
Jon walked into the downtown prescient making his way through the long corridor. There were only a couple of police officers walking down the hall giving him the nod. A man in uniform was waiting for him at the end of the hall. He said,
“I assume you must be Detective Jonathon Cratick?”
Jon held out his hand to greet the man as he said,
“Yup that’s me, what do we got?”
The officer was holding a brown folder with some papers, he shook Jon’s hand replying,
“Well we have the suspect in custody holding him in the interrogation room. He’s been in there for over an hour now.”
He opened the folder in his other hand and began to read to Jon out loud,
“His name is Steven Willis. Got a phone call from 92 walnut lane. Witness named Lyla Rose dialed 911 claiming she heard a noise at 2:00 am and saw a strange man dragging three bloody garbage bags into the trunk of a ninety-four cavalier with the garage door wide open. Witness claims that she was alarmed because she didn’t recognize the man with the garbage bags and knew the car belonged to her neighbor. We arrested the suspect on site. The garbage bags contained the chopped up body of the home owner, Veronica Stanfield. We were ordered not to speak to Steven Willis until you arrived. Now I understand that you’re a detective but my men got this. Now if you want to sit in and listen, be my guest but this is our guy, our case. We don’t need whatever the hell you are to handle this one.”
Jonathon smirked at the man as he went to open the door to the room and said,
“Oh don’t worry, I don’t plan to get involved. By the way I didn’t catch your name?”
The policeman’s face turned red as he responded,
“Ponce, Chief Ponce.”
“Well Chief Ponce I really don’t give two shits what you do. If I offended you in any way I really don’t give two shits about that either. See the reason they told you to wait for me to get here is because I’m not just FBI you dipshit. “
Jon reached into his coat grabbing his credentials and held them up in the Chief’s face.
“FBI Quantico to be specific, in your case here you guys usually refer to us as Criminal Investigative Analysis, which is CIA. I have seen and worked more homicide cases than anyone in this whole department combined. Now I really don’t care about sitting in, watching you interrogate whatever sick prick you have in custody right now, but don’t try to muscle me around. One quick phone call and I’ll have you running down parking meters, you got that?”
Chief Ponce squinted his eyes at Jon as he opened the door, waving his arm in a sarcastic manner he replied,
“Sorry about that, I didn’t mean to offend you sir. Can I do anything else for you…sir?”
Detective Cratick gave a condescending smirk as he walked past without looking back at him and said,
“Yeah sure, get me a damn coffee, black, and send me in one of your best detectives while you’re at it.”
Chief Ponce rolled his eyes. He motioned to another officer and said,
“Officer Brandon, get on that coffee.”
Jonathon made his way into the dark room. There were four other officers standing by the two way mirror and a woman was setting up the camera equipment. She glanced up at Jon, her eyes filled with wonderment. She immediately recognized who he was from the media coverage over the years. He was a conventionally good looking man. Besides the fact he had bags under his eyes and looked like he was on a two week drinking bender. He had dark thick black hair, brown eyes that pierced like a wolf under his brow. His slender face unshaved with the under shadow of black stubble. He was shorter than he looked on television she thought to herself. He stood at maybe five foot ten. His white striped dress shirt was stained, unbuttoned at the top covering his body that most men don’t have at forty. He was in pretty good shape all considering. He fit the bill like any other police officer. Probably never married or probably divorced, just that same over tired look that eventually takes its toll with the job.
Jon slung his jacket over the back of the chair and slid down folding his hands as he stared at the suspect through the window in
the room. One of the other police officers piped up and said,
“So is this the guy we are waiting for?”
The woman who was admiring Jon quickly stood up and shot back a dirty look at the officer as she said,
“Yes this is the guy we are waiting for. Don’t you ever watch the news? This man has closed some of the biggest cases in U.S. and Canadian history of serial killers.”
The officer rolled his eyes looking at another officer sitting beside him. He replied in a sarcastic manner saying,
“Sorry I guess I didn’t know we had a Mr. Big celebrity among us. I am usually too busy doing real police work instead of catching up on the news.”
The rest of the prescient let out a chuckle as the other officers laughed, giving him high fives. She rolled her eyes as she was making her way over to Jonathon and outstretched her hand saying,
“Detective Cassandra Parsons. I have been following your work since I entered the force. You nabbed that child serial killer just outside of Massachusetts last April. How did you know where he was?”
Jon sighed lifting his hands in the air with his palms spread out and said,
“Profiling is my job, just wish I would’ve got to him sooner.”
One of the officers who was still chuckling stood up placing his hands upon his hips as he said,
“What the hell is a profiler?”
Cassandra cut off Jon before he could reply and said,
“He tracks down serial killers with only the crime scene to go on. He can tell by the layout of the crime scene depicting the murder victim and compiled evidence a detailed description of what the UNSUB (unidentified subject) killer and the MO (Motivation) is for the particular murder. From the forensic evidence and his past experience with working many homicide cases, he can usually determine the UNSUB’s profile. This profile from the compiled evidence entails physical descriptions of the UNSUB’s age, what they wear, even what kind of car they drive. Also coming up with the psychological profile on how the killer thinks based from the case evidence. It’s quite astonishing really, only a handful of graduates from Quantico can do what these profilers do.”
The officer folded his arms across his chest looking back at Jon. He straightened up and said,
“Is that so? Well we already have our guy caught red handed. So what the hell is he doing here?”
Jon looked up from his chair flashing a grin as he sarcastically exclaimed,
“I was just called to sit in and watch the interrogation. I had to be pried away from the media cameras when I am not doing real police work, just like you.”
Officer Brandon came back into the room with a Styrofoam cup of coffee in hand and gave it to Jon. Chief Ponce held up his hands and said,
“Okay, okay now that you know who this profiler is and had your introductions. We were specifically instructed to bring him in by the higher ups. He’s just here to overlook the investigation and interrogation. Now I want Officer Brandon to take the lead in getting a detailed confession out of this Steven Willis.”
Brandon nodded with acceptance. He made his way into the interrogation room. Steven Willis was sitting in the white room lit up by bright florescent lights. It took Officer Brandon a moment for his eyes to adjust to the brightness compared to the dark room. The room had a steel table with chairs on both sides. There was a camera on the top left hand corner on record. Steven was hand cuffed to the table with a chain; both hands outward, his ankles were also shackled to the table.
He had this blank look on his face. Steven seemed unnerved by the situation he was in. His head staring downward; it looked as if he was day dreaming. Officer Brandon approached the table meticulously spreading out the photos from the murder scene that took place only hours ago and said,
“Steven Willis I’m Officer Brandon. We have quite the predicament here don’t we Mr. Willis? Can you tell me what happened early at two am this morning at Veronica Stanfield’s home?”
Steven didn’t flinch, not even an upward glance at Brandon. He just stared downward at the steel table not even looking at the photos. He seemed to be lost in his own world. Officer Brandon looked back at the two way mirror with a look of concern. He then looked back to Steven and proceeded,
“Mr. Willis we have you at the crime scene. We have a witness that you were dragging her dismembered body parts in large black garbage bags, loading them into the back of Ms. Veronica Stanfield’s car. Now you have the right to the power of an attorney but when you were arrested on site you refused one. So here we are. So just go ahead and tell me what happened?”
Steven kept staring at the table. He didn’t move, no emotion came across his stern face. Nothing but silence filled the room. Brandon looked back, at the two way mirror shrugging his shoulders. He looked back at Steven once again and repeated the question,
“What happened in the garage Steven?”
Steven still didn’t say a word or make a move. Officer Brandon started yelling at him, poking his finger at Steven and back to the gruesome photographs of the victim. Officer Brandon was to the point where a vein was sticking out the side of his forehead. He was clearly upset that Steven didn’t seem to care what he was saying or doing. He shouted,
“Are you going to say anything about what you did?”
Steven then moved for the first time since he was brought to the police station. With the slightest motion of his head, he tilted it sideways towards the two way mirror and stared while Officer Brandon was ranting and raving. Steven waited for a moment after the berated questions and said in a calm voice,
“Yes I have come for my confession but it is the wrong man that you have brought me to talk to. I want to speak to Detective Jonathan Cratick.”
Officer Brandon’s eyes widened as he glanced back at the window. Jon’s heart was pounding a million miles per minute. He leaned in closer to the two way mirror completely caught off guard and enthralled. How did he know who he was? Or for that matter, how did he even know he was in the police station? There was no way this man could possibly even know any of this. Steven then spoke once again with that slow, slick, voice that had a southern accent to it. He said,
“Oh don’t make me ask twice. I know you’re there Jon. You watching me, me watching you. I don’t mean to be a pest but I think we have a lot to discuss wouldn’t you say detective? I mean fifteen years is a long time without sleep. You do want to sleep at some point in this life time don’t you Jon?”
Jon froze in his chair staring at Steven Willis through the glass. He didn’t know if he just heard him say that correctly. Fifteen years? Fifteen years of what? Fifteen years since he became a Profiler in Quantico? Jon’s eyebrows slowly raised up as the realization of what Steven was referring to sunk in. It’s been fifteen years since he took his first homicide case as a Profiler and most nights he did have difficulty sleeping without the aid of alcohol. Jon was astonished, curious and scared. His anxiety circled and swirled in the pit of his stomach. He just kept staring through the glass at Steven, wondering where this man came from. Officer Brandon interrupted Jon’s trance like state of shock as he said,
“Chief? Chief? What do I do? He wants to speak with Jon?”
Jon quickly reached for a glass of water from a cooler that was beside him and downed the liquid eagerly into his parched dry throat. He felt like he could barely breathe. Was this the guy he was looking for so long? Could this really be the psychopath that killed that family so long ago? Whoever this Steven Willis was, he had answers, and he was knocking on the wrong door. The Chief looked back at Jon and nodded to the rest of the crew. They grabbed a tape recorder and a blank tape handing it to Detective Cratick. Chief Ponce turned to Jon and said,
“Whatever reason this is, I want to know everything Jon. For some reason this psycho knows you are here and wants to talk to you. Just make sure you get him saying that he actually killed Veronica Stanfield and we can all be out of here by lunch.”
Jon looked back at the two way mirror at Steven. Steven Willis was
still staring at him. Even though he knew it was impossible that he could possibly see him through the mirror, it felt as though he was glaring right at him. His eyes fixated on the ice blue irises of the killer. For the first time there seemed to be emotion on Steven Willis’s face. His pupils dilated into large black circles. A sadistic grin crept across; raising his sullen cheek bones as he hissed,
“Well Jonny boy? What’s it going to be?”
Chapter 2
Jon walked over to the door, gripping the handle firmly as he gave a wayward smirk to the other officers. He then entered the room with the same smirk still on his face and said,
“Hello Steven Willis, I understand you wanted to see me? My name is Detective Jonathan Cratick and I will be taking your confession today. Now when did you say the time it was when you entered Veronica’s Stanfield’s residence?”
Steven then rearranged himself on the chair and pushed his one leg out from underneath him, crossing them over his ankles. He was now sitting in a slightly slouched position. Jon placed the tape recorder carefully in front of them on the table and hit the play plus red record button simultaneously. Steven looked down at the tape with a grin. His ice blue eyes shot back up at Jon as he began to speak with such finesse, vulgarity and sincerity all at the same time as he said,
“My, my, my, what a surprise. The great serial killer profiler Detective Jonathan Cratick here at my disposal. Came all that way from that little two way mirror dark room just to talk to little old me. Wow I must admit I am quite impressed.”
“Impressed about what Steven? We have you picked up at the crime scene with tones of evidence. Your fingerprints, blood samples, an eyewitness of you moving the body bags of the dismembered victim into the trunk of the car. There is so much we can nail you on that it isn’t even comical to even chuckle at anymore. Murder in the first degree is what you are being charged with. Now in my experience going by what the judge is probably going to give you is a maximum sentence based on the gruesome way you hacked up Veronica Stanfield. What all of that means Steven is that you bought yourself a one way ticket to life in prison my friend.
Profile of the Gemini Serial Killer Page 1
