The Killing Moon

by Dan Padavona

  Naomi bit her lip.

  “I’ll speak to him. Why don’t you shut the computer down and go back to the house? Jack can hang out with us until Thomas returns.”

  Scout pushed the mouse back and forth.

  “I guess so.”

  “You did an outstanding job today, hon. Because of you, the sheriff’s department linked Valerie Leonard to the Violet Lyon podcast.”

  “What good did that do?”

  “Someone murdered her friend, so your discovery is a big deal.”

  “Until I find the killer, Thomas can’t protect her.”

  Naomi held Scout’s hand.

  “Thomas Shepherd is a smart man. Let his department find the killer. Don’t place the responsibility on your shoulders.”

  “You’re probably right. It’s just that—”

  Scout’s brow narrowed.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “The killer. He lives in Barton Falls with Valerie, right? The creep might even be a friend.”

  “That’s a frightening thought. Have you checked Valerie Leonard’s social media accounts?”

  “She doesn’t have a social media account. Which is weird. Anyone who spends as much time on internet forums as Valerie should have a Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter account.” Scout drummed her fingers on the desk. “Usually, when a girl who’s active on the internet shuts down her social media accounts, she’s avoiding someone.”

  “Like an overbearing guy.”

  “Could be.”

  Scout flicked the monitor on and chose an application from the Windows menu.

  “Now what are you doing?”

  “Facial recognition software. Remember last spring when I taught Thomas how to find similar images on the internet?”

  “That’s how you traced Jeremy Hyde’s accounts.”

  “I can use the same technology to catalog every picture of Valerie Leonard in the Barton Falls yearbook. Watch this.”

  Scout called up Valerie’s yearbook photograph and drew a box around the girl’s face. Next, she dragged the cropped image into the application and searched for similar images in the yearbook. Dozens of photographs filled the screen.

  Naomi slid into a chair beside Scout and scanned the monitor.

  “These are all pictures of Valerie.”

  “Right.”

  “How does that help us?”

  “We’re not interested in Valerie. We’re interested in who her friends are.”

  Scout examined the media club photograph. Nobody in the picture jumped out at her. Sifting through candids, she stopped on a picture of Valerie with several friends in the library. She recognized one boy—Derek Jordan, the teenager on the news. But it was the boy standing off to the side, almost as if the others didn’t want him in the photograph, that drew Scout’s eyes. Her heart quickened. While everybody else in the picture smiled at the camera, this boy stared at Valerie. Scout’s eyes dropped to the boy’s T-shirt. Freddy Krueger with knives for fingers.

  “Krueger31,” Scout muttered.

  Naomi straightened her back.

  “You found him?”

  Though the application had pulled images of Valerie Leonard, it didn’t include captions. Scout needed to sift through the entire yearbook again. Her hand trembled on the mouse as she raced against time. Halfway through the yearbook, she located the library picture.

  “Gardner Raimi,” Scout said, reading the names. “Can you give me my phone, Mom? It’s on the card table.”

  Naomi covered her mouth.

  “He’s the boy stalking Valerie on the internet?”

  “It has to be him.”

  Naomi removed her phone from her pocket.

  “I’ll call Thomas.”

  Scout chewed a nail.

  “Hurry, Mom. I think he plans to kill Valerie tonight.”

  CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

  October 31st

  9:10 p.m.

  “Raven, are you home?”

  Serena yawned into her hand as sleep hung heavy on her shoulders. She hadn’t noticed her daughter’s Rogue in the driveway. Then again, she’d been too tired to search for the vehicle. A light shone over the kitchen counter. Otherwise, the house was as dark as a tomb. She pressed the wall switch and flooded the living room with light. Some kid had plastered the window with eggs. Probably a disgruntled trick-or-treater. Serena snickered to herself, remembering Halloween mischief from her teenage years. Tomorrow, she’d clean the window before the yolk solidified.

  She plopped her bag on the end table and shuffled to the couch. Recalling Naomi’s request for Serena to call, she dialed her friend’s phone. Strange. Serena dropped into Naomi’s voice-mail. Figuring Naomi must be on the phone, Serena left a message and promised to check in tomorrow morning.

  Aiming the remote at the television, she scowled at the horror movie. Too much blood and gore. If she watched a scary movie, she’d be up all night. With a moan, she turned off the television and padded to the kitchen. As tired as she was, she craved a snack before bed. After popping a slice of bread into the toaster, she leaned against the counter and checked her messages. Raven had written a half-hour ago to check on her. LeVar wrote ten minutes later. Neither expected to finish work before sunrise. Guess she had the house to herself tonight.

  Serena set the phone on the kitchen table and sifted through the mail while she waited for the bread to toast. Nothing but junk mail and bills. She jumped when the bread popped up. After she plucked the snack out of the toaster, she wandered in an exhausted daze toward the bedroom, wondering how Scout’s investigation was going. How that girl worked all day and night without adequate sleep boggled Serena’s mind.

  As she opened the bedroom door, gravel crunched in the driveway. Someone was outside.

  She set the toast on the nightstand and listened. It might be a last-second trick-or-treater. Nobody rang the doorbell. Buck, the jerk who lived down the road, came to mind. He flew a confederate flag on his truck and blasted his music at all hours of the night. But he never bothered Serena and Raven, and Serena saw no reason for Buck to harass her tonight.

  The night turned quiet again, except for the infernal wind whipping the lake into a frenzy. Serena swallowed the rest of her snack and pulled the sheets back. She kept a Kindle beside the bed, and a mystery novel awaited her. The moment after she opened the Kindle and turned off the bedside lamp, the front door opened.

  Something tightened in her chest. Her heart closing into a fist.

  As she lay paralyzed, praying LeVar or Raven had stopped home, the floorboards groaned in the living room.

  Serena swung her legs off the bed and shut down the Kindle. She sat in complete darkness, as a sliver of light burned beneath the door. Footsteps trailed through the house. Searching. Hunting.

  She reached for her phone and remembered she’d left it on the kitchen table. Now what? She couldn’t give herself away and alert the intruder she was inside the house.

  No weapon, no means to defend herself.

  The footsteps drew closer. As she crept toward the door, a shadow interrupted the light spilling beneath the threshold. He was outside her bedroom door. She knew it was Mark Benson, the escaped convict. Raven had warned her, and Serena hadn’t listened. If he twisted the doorknob, he’d find her alone in the bedroom.

  The shadow loomed outside her door. Patient. Listening. The bedroom door had a twist lock that guaranteed privacy, but wouldn’t stop a grown man from breaking inside. She didn’t dare engage the lock with Benson in the hallway.

  When she was certain he’d open the door and catch her, he stepped down the hallway. Heading toward Raven’s bedroom.

  Serena whirled around and considered her options. The window was painted shut. No chance she could open the pane without drawing Benson’s attention.

  The crawlspace.

  Her bedroom closet included a panel in the ceiling. The panel opened to an attic crawlspace.

  She still couldn’t see inside the bedroom. With her heart in her th
roat, Serena rounded the bed and swiped the curtains aside on the window. Moonlight revealed the desk and chair across the room. Down the hall, Raven’s door creaked open. Serena thanked God her daughter wasn’t home.

  As Benson crept through the house, Serena carried the chair to the closet. She gritted her teeth when the chair leg banged against the jamb. Sudden quiet enveloped the house. Benson must have heard.

  Pulling the chair inside the closet, she edged the door shut and stood upon the seat. Cautious footsteps approached through the hallway. Then Serena’s door opened, inviting ambient light from the kitchen into the bedroom. She’d turned down the sheets and crawled into bed a moment before Benson broke into the house. Would he notice the bed sheets?

  Blind inside the closet, she stood on tiptoe and moved her hands over the ceiling. Where was the panel?

  The floor moaned outside the closet. She froze and held her breath. The knob turned.

  Crawling off the chair, Serena ducked into the corner and hid behind three dresses dangling off hangers. A whoosh of air touched her bare feet when the closet door opened. He breathed in the doorway, knowing someone was inside the house with him. Reaching up, she snatched a loose coat hanger and clutched it against her chest. Straightening the tip, she fashioned a weapon. It wasn’t much. But if he drew the dresses aside and discovered her, she’d jam the tip into his eye.

  Each second lasted a lifetime. She sensed his presence towering above her. At any moment, he’d grab her by the neck.

  Then the door eased shut. He gave up and left to search the rest of the house.

  Or had he?

  She imagined him standing in the darkness, inches from her. Holding his breath to fool her. A Cheshire cat’s grin on his face.

  Serena held her breath too. Working up the courage, she parted the dresses and stared into infinite blackness. Benson might be looming over her with a knife. She couldn’t see.

  Poking her foot out, she swept it across the floor and hissed when she struck a solid object. A shoe rack in the corner.

  She breathed again. A moment later, another door opened inside the house.

  This was her chance. She pulled herself up and stood on the chair. Then she groped at the ceiling, feeling for the panel. She found it.

  Pushing the panel aside, she gripped the cold, splintered floor of the crawlspace. Winter’s breath poured through the opening and rippled her skin with goosebumps. With a grunt, she hauled herself into the crawlspace, careful not to bang her head on the low ceiling. Nails jutted from the woodwork like deadly stalactites.

  On her hands and knees, Serena set the panel in place and walled herself off from humanity. She might have crouched within a black hole in outer space, she felt so disconnected from the house. The ghostly wind keened over her, the joists creaking with each gust.

  Serena didn’t know how long she hid inside the crawlspace. Minutes, hours. Time held no meaning inside that frigid nothingness.

  When she finally crept down, her lips were blue, body trembling, fingers and toes numb. She listened at the closet door before pushing it open.

  Benson had left the house to stalk Raven.

  Serena needed to warn her daughter.

  CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

  October 31st

  9:15 p.m.

  Thomas leaned over Detective Presley’s shoulder and scanned her computer monitor. The Facebook profile for Gardner Raimi filled the screen. The teenage boy hadn’t posted in nine months, not since the messy breakup with Valerie Leonard. Pictures of Valerie and Gardner dominated his profile. Friends wished him well and urged him to move on. Gardner responded, “We’re friends now. It’s all good.”

  Presley crossed her arms.

  “This isn’t much to go on. I can’t move Gardner Raimi to the top of my suspect list because Valerie broke up with him last January.”

  “Yet he had motivation and opportunity.”

  “This teenage girl, Scout. I appreciate she’s your friend and neighbor. But why would you seek her advice during a murder investigation?”

  “Because I know her, and she’s stayed two steps ahead of us all day. The geolocation tags prove the killer lives in Barton Falls.”

  Presley waved her hands.

  “No, it suggests a poster named Krueger31 lives in Barton Falls. We can’t prove he’s a killer.”

  “We have a photograph of Gardner Raimi wearing a Nightmare on Elm Street T-shirt. It appears he’s obsessed with Freddy Krueger's character. And we found his Facebook profile. He dated Valerie Leonard and suffered through the breakup. I admit, the evidence is circumstantial. But it all adds up.”

  “Still, I can’t alter the trajectory of our investigation based on a teenage girl I’ve never met.”

  “I’ll vouch for Scout. She helped me catch Jeremy Hyde.”

  Presley dropped her face into her hands and clutched her hair. Beyond the bullpen’s windows, Theo Pierpoint slumped in a chair inside the conference room with a blanket wrapped around his body. He’d given a second interview to Officer Stanton, and a psychologist was en route to evaluate Pierpoint. As far as Thomas could determine, Derek Jordan’s death had caused Pierpoint to have a nervous breakdown. Was he a danger to himself? Or was the teacher a wolf in sheep’s clothing?

  “This is crazy,” Presley said, pulling Thomas out of his thoughts. “Gardner Raimi is still friends with Valerie Leonard and Leland Trivett.”

  “Gardner wanted more than a friendship with Valerie,” Thomas said. “We should have interviewed Gardner after we met with Leland.”

  “We didn’t have a reason to suspect Gardner this afternoon.” Presley tossed a pen across her desk in frustration. “If I go out on a limb for you, and the investigation goes south, it will be my ass on the line.”

  “I’ll take full responsibility. If the chief asks why we suspected Gardner Raimi, I’ll tell him I strong-armed you.”

  “I don’t know about this.”

  “Trust me, Detective. Scout never steered me in the wrong direction.”

  Presley rolled the cruiser’s keys in her palm.

  “What do you suggest?”

  “I say we drive to the Raimi residence and knock on the door. At least determine if the kid has alibis for the attacks on Derek Jordan and Leland Trivett.”

  Presley chewed on the suggestion.

  “All right. But I’m keeping Valerie Leonard on my suspect list. Between the sick infatuation with gory movies and the murder—which mimicked the legend she created—it’s possible she’s our killer.” Thomas turned his head away to hide his frustration. “What if Raimi has alibis?”

  “Then I’ll admit I’m wrong, and we’ll turn the spotlight on Derek Jordan’s stepfather, Valerie Leonard, and Valerie’s father.”

  Thomas rode shotgun in Presley’s cruiser. During the drive into Barton Falls, he wished he’d driven his own vehicle. He couldn’t lead the investigation as a passenger, and he feared Detective Presley’s insistence that Valerie Leonard was the killer would derail the case. She refused to speak until they reached the town’s outskirts. Her jaw set with indignation, Presley pulled to the curb outside the Raimi residence.

  Gardner Raimi lived with his parents on Baldwin Street in a two-story Cape Cod with beige siding. Decorative spiderwebs trailed along the porch, and a candle burned inside a pumpkin on the top step. The lights were out inside the house, while a television flickered from the living room.

  Presley hopped out of the cruiser and marched toward the steps. Thomas grabbed the detective’s arm and pulled her back.

  “What?”

  “Something is wrong,” he said, drawing a confused glare from the detective.

  Thomas removed the gun from his holster. Her eyes widened.

  “Is that necessary?”

  He moved in front of Presley and ascended the steps. The front door stood open to the screen, allowing the October chill to flow unimpeded through the downstairs. Papers flitted back and forth over the hardwood floor.

  “The door is
open,” he said.

  “Might be because a kid just knocked, begging for candy. God, I hate this stupid holiday.”

  But Thomas didn’t see a bowl of candy inside the doorway. And nobody in their right mind would leave the door open on a night this cold. With the gun at his side, he rapped his knuckles against the screen door. It sounded like someone banged on a snare drum.

  “Mr. and Mrs. Raimi? Nightshade County Sheriff’s Department.”

  No answer. A scream came from inside the living room. Presley met his eyes.

  “Tell me that was the television.”

  “If they’re expecting trick-or-treaters, why haven’t they answered?”

  A vein pulsed in the detective’s neck as her hand drifted toward her weapon. The wind abated, and Thomas caught scent of the metallic, coppery stench rolling through the screen. His eyes swung toward the source. A heeled foot poked out from behind the sofa as blood seeped into the hardwood.

  Thomas yanked the screen door open and led Presley into the entryway. He swung his weapon around the corner.

  “Clear.”

  His voice knocked Presley out of her daze. She covered his back as Thomas hurried to aid the victim.

  He rounded the couch and pulled up, one hand over his mouth, holding back a wretch. Mrs. Raimi lay beside her husband, her throat slit ear-to-ear. A waterfall of lifeblood soaked her clothes, pooling into a macabre lake on the floor. Stab wounds punctured the father’s chest, a carbon copy of Derek Jordan’s murder. And blood continued to drip…drip…drip through the floor slats.

  “Jesus,” Presley said behind him, drawing a breath.

  She radioed for an ambulance as Thomas checked each victim for a pulse. Nothing.

  “No heartbeats.”

  With backup on the way, Presley checked the downstairs while Thomas raced up the staircase. The first bedroom belonged to the parents. The room at the end of the hallway stood open. Thomas swung around the doorway and froze.

  The Halloween Man glared from the far corner. The figure stood over six feet tall, a butcher’s knife clutched in one hand. A pumpkin mask concealed his face. Thomas fixed his weapon on the mythical serial killer before he realized it was a dummy. Gardner Raimi’s obsession seemed boundless. On the desk, the teenager had written the names of his parents, Derek Jordan, Leland Trivett, and Valerie Leonard on a sheet of paper. All but the last were crossed out.