Sauk Valley Killer

by KJ Kalis

  “And what’s that?” Kat asked.

  “Do the next thing.” The words settled over the kitchen.

  “And what would that be?” Most of the time, Kat loved it when Van could break things down into their most simple components. But today, with how complicated the case was, she wondered if he was being naïve.

  “Call Dawson. Have him send over the video from the office building. See what you can see. You are the one, after all, who figured out that this murderer is grabbing people based on their last names. There has to be something more. You’ll find it, I’m confident of that.” Van glanced behind him, “I’m going upstairs to make sure Jack is actually doing his biology homework. You know, with TJ around, he’s probably slacking off.”

  Kat smiled. Van was right. Again.

  Kat sat back down at the kitchen table, sweeping pizza crust crumbs off onto the floor. The dogs would enjoy finding them and cleaning up. She pulled her cell phone out of her pocket and dialed Dawson.

  “Kat? I thought I gave you the night off.”

  “No rest for the weary, Detective. Any chance Van and I could have a look at the video from the office building you mentioned?”

  There was a pause and a rustling of papers. “Sure, I’m still at the office. I’ll see if I can get Cheryl to email it over to you. I’m no good with technology.”

  “Thanks. I’ll let you know if we see anything. Anything else we can do to help?”

  “Naw, I’ll let you know. Those letters you got us today, those were a big deal. Thanks.”

  Thank you was the one phrase she never thought she would hear coming out of Detective Dawson’s mouth given how they had started their relationship. She was glad that things were better, at least for now…

  32

  By the time Dawson got off the phone with Kat, Cheryl Morris had already left for the day. Dawson leaned his round chest over the duty officer’s desk. “Any chance you can send an email for me?”

  The duty officer, a young man that looked like he was barely out of high school, furrowed his eyebrows. “An email? You don’t know how to send an email?”

  “I can send an email. I just can’t send an email with the video attached. Think you can handle that, rookie?” He knew the comment about being a rookie would put the kid back in his place. It worked with all of their new hires, at least until the rookies decided they weren’t rookies anymore. That seemed to happen much faster now than it did in the old days.

  The old days. Life was much simpler then, Dawson thought. He gave the instructions to the duty officer and stood at the desk for a moment while the video was sent. “Should be all good now, Detective,” the officer said. “Any other technological issues I can solve for you today?”

  “No. That will be all,” Dawson snapped, turning away.

  This case was getting out of control, Dawson thought, as he walked out to his unmarked sedan. As much as he would have liked to head home, he knew he needed to go to the scene where the latest two people had been snatched to see what happened. He had delayed long enough. The sergeant keeping everything under control had called three times, wondering where he was. Dawson pulled his cell phone out of his jacket pocket and called him back. “I’m on my way now,” he said.

  “About time. We’ve been here for two hours waiting for you.”

  Dawson just hung up, not wanting to deal with any more sarcasm. As he started the dark gray sedan, he opened the glove compartment, reaching for a bottle of antacids. His heartburn had never been so bad. It’s not like he had time to eat, either. I’ve got to see the doctor before the acid in my stomach eats through the rest of me, he thought.

  Traffic was clotted on the roads by the time Dawson got out of the station. His dawdling had caused him to be stuck with all the other people that were leaving work in a hurry to get home. He couldn’t decide if he was frustrated or if he was happy that he had a break, even if it was on the way to another scene. A red light stopped his progress, one of many that peppered the roads in California. He saw a woman stopped in the lane next to him. She was pretty, or at least from what he could tell, she was. Jet black hair past her shoulders, some sort of red shirt or jacket lighting up her skin. She was turned away from him, probably fumbling in her purse or looking at her phone. For a minute, he wondered where she was going. Did she have a family to go home to? Was she the kind of person the serial killer was looking for? Dawson heard a beep behind him. He lost track of the fact that the light had turned green. If he’d been in a cruiser, no one would have honked, but the unmarked sedan made him look like every other traveler on the road. He sighed, moved his foot from the brake to the gas, and gave the person behind him a polite wave. He didn’t have the energy to get mad.

  The snarls in traffic made what should have been a twenty-five-minute drive a forty-five-minute drive. The office building where the serial killer’s two newest victims had been abducted, or at least that’s what he was assuming, was a rectangular shape, wider across the front than on the sides. It wasn’t what Dawson would consider a skyscraper, not by a long shot. Probably had about twelve floors, he thought, glancing up as he looked for the entrance to the parking garage, the higher levels reserved for the most prestigious tenants, he was sure. The sedan thumped over the speed bumps as he pulled into the parking garage, the maximum height signage looking like it would scrape the top of his car. It never did.

  Up ahead, he saw three cruisers. By now, he was sure the officers were bored and chatting about their weekend plans, the girl they were hoping to snag a date with, or the latest sporting events. So many people thought police work was all about the chase, adrenaline pumping, lights flashing, sirens blaring. That was not the case, not by a long shot. Most of the officers that Dawson had worked with throughout his career much preferred a quiet cruise through the city than having to respond to a crisis. Most had never even drawn their gun out of the holster. The work was hard on them as, not to mention their families. Dawson briefly thought about his ex-wife. When they had gotten divorced, he wasn’t surprised. The divorce rate in law enforcement was well above the national average, pushing towards seventy percent. The shifts, the stress, the missed holidays — it was hard on a family. It took a special kind of woman to manage a family around that. He hadn’t found someone like that yet. Pressing his lips together, he realized he probably never would.

  The slamming of his car door echoed throughout the concrete parking garage. He opened the rear seat, scrounging around for his notebook and pen. Before he stood up, he heard a voice behind him, “Nice of you to join us.”

  Dawson closed the rear car door, another round of echoes bouncing off the concrete. The sergeant, a small man, not more than five feet tall, with a shock of red hair, had crept up on him. “Got stuck in traffic,” Dawson quipped. He wasn’t about to get sucked into an argument. Fred McGinty was known for his sharp tongue. Behind his back, everyone called him “The Leprechaun.” It wasn’t that original of a nickname, although when you looked at him, he did resemble the mascot for Notre Dame. For a second, Dawson imagined him dressed in the mascot uniform, the one he saw watching football on Saturday afternoons. He stifled a laugh. Laughing probably wasn’t appropriate, given what he was about to look at, but it was how he and many other police officers got through every single day.

  McGinty narrowed his eyes when Dawson mentioned the traffic. “Yeah, I’m sure.” McGinty pointed to the corner of the garage, “Let me show you what we’ve got, and I’ll introduce you to the security officer for the complex, and then I gotta get outta here.”

  “Hot date?” Dawson said. He knew full well that McGinty was married, one of the few to have the same wife for his entire career.

  “Very funny. Two of my kids have volleyball tonight.”

  Dawson nodded. In addition to McGinty’s wife, he also had five kids. How he made it work on a law enforcement salary, Dawson wasn’t sure. But that wasn’t important, at least not now. “Okay. Give me the rundown.”

  McGinty took off at a fas
t clip, walking toward the corner of the level they were on. “That’s Layne Clark’s car over there,” he pointed. Yellow police tape had been wrapped around it, tied from the rail on the outside of the garage around the back of her bumper to a doorknob for a service door on the other side. Dawson walked closer and then squatted down. He could see a cluster of papers that had tumbled into the corner of the structure, shadowed by the bumper of the car. “Are those the papers you told me about?”

  McGinty nodded. “The first hint there was something wrong was that someone who parked their car nearby saw papers fluttering around and figured they were important. They took them upstairs to her office. That set off alarm bells. I guess they were confidential. Somebody said she’s a tax accountant.”

  Dawson stood up and circled the car. He didn’t see anything that looked out of order, save the scattered work. Her name was emblazoned in front of her space, a large enough sign that anyone could have read it. He looked back towards McGinty. “The second abduction?”

  McGinty motioned for him to follow and they turned to the left, following the bend of the parking garage as it gently sloped down. They circled to nearly the same spot one level below. As they walked, Dawson took in the parking garage, not that there was a lot to see. Whoever owned the building had taken the time to install quite a few surveillance cameras. That was a good thing. Whether they all worked or not, that would be the question. There was a wide range of cars parked in the lot, some of the spaces already empty. Audis, BMWs, Fords… they were all there. It looked like a used car parking lot. Each spot had a nameplate attached. He frowned. “Kind of strange that the spots have names attached to them, don’t you think?”

  “Yeah, I kinda wondered about that myself. Wouldn’t you think they would just use some numbers or letters to give people their spots?” He slowed down for a moment and then stopped, pointing to another spot, “I asked the security guy about it, just out of curiosity, of course. Not trying to do your job or anything…”

  Dawson narrowed his eyes. McGinty had been passed over for a promotion into the detective bureau on more than one occasion. All the detectives knew that he wouldn’t miss an opportunity to give them a zinger about it. He decided to ignore the comment. “What did the security guy say?”

  “He said it’s some sort of perk for the people that work here. These two levels are reserved for people who are either on the fast track or who are already senior in their firms.”

  Dawson furrowed his eyebrows. “The girl that was snatched, she’s pretty high up in her job, isn’t she? What about this guy?”

  McGinty shook his head, “Evan Chapman is barely out of college. Initial information puts him at about twenty-five years old.” He looked around for a second and then right at Dawson, “His old man was down here a little while ago. I sent him back up to his office. Turns out his father owns the company he works for.”

  If Evan Chapman’s father owned the company, then getting a lacquered sign on his parking spot was probably part of his graduation present along with a do-nothing job with a hefty salary. Dawson shook his head. “Whatever happened to working hard for a living?”

  “I’ve got no idea.” McGinty checked his watch, “The security guy’s waiting for you in his office. I’ll tell the officers to stay here until you release them. They can get some overtime while you decide how much of the scene you want secured. Evan’s dad is in his office if you want to talk to him. Other than that, I gotta go. If I’m late again, my wife is going to kill me.”

  Dawson nodded, “Thanks. I’ll take it from here.”

  As McGinty walked off, the specter of his red hair getting smaller and disappearing around the corner to the level above, the parking garage was eerily silent. Dawson could only hear the occasional squeal of tires turning tight corners on a level above, the sound echoing out over the rails and back into the building. On the level where Evan Chapman parked his car, there was no sunlight. It was below ground and lit with harsh fluorescent lights, not unlike the ones they used in their conference rooms back at the station. Having a moment of quiet was nice, Dawson thought. Even though he was doing an investigation, there was always noise and chatter, radios and cell phones chirping. It hardly gave him time to think. He stared at the placard that read Evan Chapman in front of him and then started to walk around his car. Evan drove a souped-up Toyota, with blackened windows and a racing stripe down the side. Fat exhaust pipes stuck out from below the bumper. Dawson knew the type just by looking at his car. Cocky. Self-assured. He tried to imagine the altercation between the serial killer and Evan Chapman, if that was who had him. Dawson reminded himself to keep that as an option. At this point, there was little evidence except for the fact that two people were missing and there was a report of a video with a van in it. He couldn’t take anything for granted. He stopped for a second, realizing there was nothing for him to learn by looking at Evan Chapman’s car. Nothing had been dropped on the ground, nothing was out of place. The video cameras bolted to the ceiling above might be the only evidence they had that Evan was even missing this soon after his abduction. To that degree, the family was lucky. How lucky, time would tell.

  Dawson turned and walked back up the incline toward Layne Chapman’s car, the incline making his lungs burn. The two officers that McGinty had left behind were standing together, leaning on one of the cruisers. Dawson pointed to one of them, “Go get an evidence bag and put on some gloves. Let’s get those papers picked up.” He nodded at the other officer, “Go take some pictures, okay?”

  Dawson didn’t know their names. The department had brought in so many new rookies in the last class that he wasn’t sure he’d even met them all. A decade before, Dawson would’ve made it a point to get to know everyone. Now, he just wanted to get through his work and go home. He called to the officers, “Which way to the security office?”

  The taller one pointed, “Through that door, sir. It’ll be on your right.” Dawson gave a nod of thanks and walked away. Those were definitely rookies, he thought.

  The door from the parking garage into the building squeaked as he pushed it open, the door sticking a touch. As he stepped inside, his eyes adjusted to the light. It was dim in the hallway. He walked forward a few steps and saw the bright glow of light coming out of what looked to be a window encased in a door to his right. The glass panel on the door, frosted, had the words “Security Office” painted on it. He turned the handle and walked in. A large man sat inside, almost looking like he was too big to fit behind the small desk and chair. “I’m Detective Dawson. I was told you have a video to show me?”

  Dawson had already seen the first view of the video when he was at the office. It was the same one he had the duty officer send over to Kat and Van. It wouldn’t hurt to go look at it in the security office just to make sure he had everything. He shook his head, biting his lip. This case was so serious that he couldn’t afford to skip any steps in the investigation. If some defense attorney heard that he only watched a video that had been emailed to him and hadn’t gotten it from the security office, they’d roast him on the stand and probably throw out the video evidence. That was if it was helpful.

  The man stood up, unfolding himself from the minuscule desk and chair. “Nice to meet you. I’m Sam.” He pointed to a monitor that was perched on the corner of his desk. “I have it all ready for you. Just tell me when you want me to stop or go forward.”

  Dawson nodded, giving Sam the signal to go ahead and start the video. On the screen were six views, arranged three across the top and two deep. Dawson knew there were more than six video cameras just in the parking area that he had walked through. He guessed that Sam could switch from view to view. He was grateful for whoever decided to spend the money on the surveillance. Sam’s voice interrupted his thoughts, “What you will see here is the van first.” Sam pointed to the screen as a late-model van nosed into the frame. “Keep watching. You’ll see the lady in just a second.”

  Dawson kept his eyes focused on the screen. The van seeme
d to cycle past the security camera and then disappear. A few seconds later, Sam running the video at times two speed, he saw a woman walk by. The resolution was certainly better in quality than the one they had seen from the apartment building, but not by much. It was still grainy and black-and-white. Nevertheless, he could tell the woman seemed to be in a hurry, laden down with a briefcase, a purse, and a stack of files cradled in her right arm. Her body tilted under the load as she walked by the camera, her hair pulled back off her face, her face down.

  Sam was quiet. Dawson kept watching as Layne Clark got to her car, the files spilling out of her arms, papers getting picked up by the wind, tumbling under her vehicle and her feet. She knelt down, scrambling to gather up the sheets before they got out of reach. The nose of the van came into view. From the driver’s side, Dawson saw a man get out. “It’s only the back of him at least on this view,” Sam said. “I’ve been watching the videos for the last couple of hours.” Dawson nodded, never taking his eyes off the screen. As the video continued, the man approached the woman and started a conversation with her. “She doesn’t seem nervous to be around him at all,” Sam said. Dawson shook his head in agreement.

  It was just moments later, as the wind picked up a few more of the papers, blowing them out of reach, that the man pulled something out of his pocket and wrapped it over Layne’s face. Her knees buckled, her ankles both drooping to the left. The man wrapped his arm around her waist and pulled her backward, out of view. Dawson waited for another moment. The driver got back in the car, his face still obscured from the view of the camera, got in the van, and drove off.

  A pit formed in Dawson’s stomach. “Well, there’s no question she was abducted. Do you know this woman? Ever meet her?”

  Sam shook his enormous head left and right, “No. There are so many people going in and out of this building every single day, I can’t keep track of them all. I just wish I had been out there. Maybe I could have done something.”