The walls were covered with the flayed skins of animals, so many of them that they overlapped like a macabre patchwork quilt. Some still had their skulls attached, like the squirrels with their mouths wide open, their pointy little teeth frozen in time.
One side of the wall had a huge black bear skin surrounded by silver and red foxes, hare, even a coyote. There were the pelts of some deer and some other, smaller animals I couldn’t even identify. In the middle of the room was a huge work bench, covered in DiMarco’s tools: knives of different sizes, a rifle, old fashioned metal snares, jars of ointment and solutions.
“This one right here,” DiMarco moved towards his tools and picked up the recently skinned pelt of a raccoon, wet with brown liquid, “this is what I’ve spent the last week working on. She’s a beauty and it takes some time to achieve a flawless product.”
“Handy with a gun then?” I asked, eyes still roaming around the room, taking it all in.
“It’s one of my greatest talents, passed on by my father. A tradition I carry on gladly. As a cop, I was always happy to use my weapon. Then, they shifted me to the head office, and I had to get those thrills elsewhere.”
I turned my back on DiMarco for a moment, making eye contact with Casey and mouthed, ‘whack job’ to her subtly. She gave a twitch of a nod and then moved closer to the walls, reaching tentatively out to touch the cold, grey fur of a rabbit.
“I try to shoot my prey. I find that it’s a demonstration of my power. Their deaths are painless.” He picked up a rifle from the bench. “Usually.”
In an instant of instinct, Casey’s hand went to the Smith and Wesson at her hip, adrenalin speeding up her heart rate and pushing her blood through her veins at high velocity. DiMarco placed the rifle down with a metal clank and she relaxed, catching my eye.
“I feel that if I take their life, I have that closeness with them and I thank them for the part they’ve played. You can see what I mean about balance, can’t you? With his own hands and his own actions, a man can determine not only the outcome of his own life, but the lives of others. It’s when we forget this, when we start to make decisions without understanding the power we have, that humans become no better than animals with no sense of right and wrong. We lose our sense of justice.”
“So that’s why you killed Anthony Waltz then? You felt he needed some justice dealt to him?” Casey challenged.
“Oh you just don’t get it, do you? You naïve little girl.”
Casey’s head whipped up and I threw out an arm to keep her back just as she lunged forward towards him.
DiMarco threw his head back and laughed, “Of course I didn’t kill him. Yes, I was hoping for karma for Anthony Waltz, but I didn’t do it myself.” He walked over to a wall and leaned his head against the skin and fur and inhaled deeply. “We’re at the top of the food chain. A man taking another man’s life is never going to restore balance. It makes the levels of power tip. It threatens everything.”
DiMarco seemed calmer now, in amongst the trophies of death. He seemed lulled into a state of euphoria at the power he’d asserted over the creatures that adorned the basement walls. He suddenly picked up the thread of the conversation from the drawing room.
“Years ago, while I was a police captain, I was accused of the aggravated assault of the attendant at my local liquor store. I’d lost my second wife and I’d taken to easing my suffering with a combination of bad alcohol and bad friends. I was so lost in my grief and my anger and my inebriation that I couldn’t piece together an alibi for the night. An hour before he was beaten to within an inch of his life, I’d been seen arguing with the shop attendant because he’d refused me service on the grounds of intoxication. I told the investigating detectives that I did it.” DiMarco’s eyes had closed, he seemed to be contentedly reliving his past anguish.
“You hate defense lawyers even though you benefited from them?
“At the time, I felt it was wrong, but I wasn’t going to go to prison and there was nothing on my record. I even said to my lawyer that I didn’t feel right walking away without any charges, but he dismissed me. He said his job was to get me the best outcome. And he did. He showed that the internal affairs detectives used an illegal tactic to draw out my confession and then all the charges were dropped. I beat a man within an inch of his life, smashed his skull with my fists, and I walked away without retribution. Can you believe that? I sobered up after that.” He shook his head. “Per the contract with the lawyer, I paid him a $50,000 bonus if I walked away without any charges. Even though I told this lawyer that I was guilty, his need for the money was greater than his commitment to the system. His need for justice wasn’t real.”
“That’s one defense lawyer.”
“It’s not. It’s all of them. They’re not driven by the purity of integrity and righteousness. He just had a need to sweep me aside, and move on to the next case. I went straight back to work in the department. I almost beat a guy to death, and I get to go back to work as a cop? Ten years later, I started to reflect on my experience. Some may have seen this episode as something to be thankful for. I didn’t. It felt wrong. And then I discovered it gave me a purpose, it gave me a fight to fight.” He smiled warmly at us. “Shall we go back upstairs for more coffee?”
Chapter 5
“So, your creep-o-meter officially sky rocketed, right?” Casey leaned back in the truck seat and sighed loudly, pleased to be leaving the man, the house, the garden and, above all, the basement in her wake.
She lowered the window and received a cold blast of spring air, still with the bitterness of winter driving it. I rolled my truck down the gravel driveway, looking at DiMarco’s home in my rear-view mirror. He was standing on the top step, watching as we drove past the gates.
“I’m going to say he’s a little left of center.”
“Left of center? That man has lost the plot. Absolutely lost the plot. There were dings galore on my fruity radar. I’m going to go right out there and say it—Jonathon DiMarco has lost his marbles. The weird fireplace chat, the eerie vibe, the fire in his eyes… and then there’s the whole cuddly bunny massacre room,” she shivered. “That’s not normal, is it? I mean guys don’t get to sixty-five and turn into sadistic killers, do they?”
“I hope not.”
“So, what’s your take then?” Casey asked.
“My gut says he’s a loose cannon with the skills to shoot a guy in the neck and make it look like suicide, but we need proof. We can’t go after a guy like DiMarco without evidence. We wouldn’t want him to run now that he knows that we’re onto him. We need to find proof before he shoots through on this one… Get it?”
Casey gave me a steady stare, without blinking.
“Too soon?”
“Way too soon.” She shifted her eyes to the road ahead of us again. “If Waltz didn’t do it himself, then I think DiMarco’s good for it.” Casey sniffed at her clothing, still covered in the smell of the cleaning products. She pulled out her cell phone and tried to clear the image of the basement from her mind. “I mean, I know we called the creepy thing early, but did you expect that?”
“No one in their right mind ever expects a room full of road-kill and a complete load of BS about justice and power and killing for balance.” I glanced at her, eyebrows raised, running one hand through my short dark hair. “He’s a killer. That’s clear. Being a cop meant that he could do it during his work hours, but since he’s retired, he turns to a new outlet for it.”
“The question is whether he killed Waltz,” Casey said. “That was a pretty crazy story. About his guilt, I mean. I didn’t expect that. He said that years ago, he got off assault charges because he had a good defense lawyer. Then he goes on to work for another ten years, before retiring. He’s had the benefit of a good defense lawyer, and now he doesn’t want anyone else to have the privilege. Do you agree with him? About the defense lawyers, I mean?”
“They have a role to play. They have to be that brick wall for the justice system, otherwise
it opens the cops and the prosecution up to even further corruption. The defense lawyers have to do their best for their clients. If they don’t, the system falls apart.” I sighed. “And we live in a capitalist society. If people see an opportunity to make money, they’ll exploit it. Lawyers aren’t immune to that desire. It’s the way of the world.”
“Do they have an oath, like doctors do? The Hippocratic oath says that doctors have to use their skills to help anyone, no matter the circumstances.”
“Lawyers have an oath. To be admitted to the bar, they have to swear to promote, uphold and protect the Constitution of the United States.”
“Words only mean so much.” Casey returned to staring out the window along the Interstate, watching the world fly past. I could almost hear the thoughts clunk in her mind. She typed a few more commands into her phone and then turned back to me. “So, what next?”
“We’ll swing past the State’s Attorney’s office. Find out who was the prosecutor on the cases of our dead lawyers. We need to try and make a link between Anthony Waltz and Jeffery Stone. My gut feeling is, once we find the connection, we find the motive. And from there it’s all blue skies and solved cases.”
Casey rolled her eyes at my easy-going attitude but I could tell that a part of her wished she could be a little more relaxed. She found it difficult not to let casework consume her every thought, to the point that she often struggled to exist in her world outside of work. No wonder she couldn’t hold down a steady relationship for more than five months. Not many men understood the effects of dealing with the darkest side of humanity.
Casey moved her focus back to her cell. “Ok, I just got an email from our client, Kenneth Daley. He’s managed to get the forensics report from the police. No obvious signs of DNA, no discernable fingerprints, and the only fingerprints on the gun were Waltz’s. The gun is registered to Waltz, so it looks like it may have been in the safe. And it looks like the bullet is a match, but we have to wait for the ballistics report to confirm. So, basically, a whole lot of sweet nothing.”
“Nothing ‘sweet’ about it. Disappointing, but not altogether unexpected.”
After a few moments of driving in silence, my mind drifted away from the room full of dead animals.
“Damn it,” I muttered under my breath.
“What?” Casey asked, still scrolling through the emails on her phone.
“Nothing. Doesn’t matter. I told someone I’d try and be somewhere this afternoon. That was obviously before I realized I had to strap on my cape and chase down a serial killer. At least I’ve got my trusty sidekick to help me.”
I gave Casey my cheekiest smile and for a moment she was surprised, but then she punched my arm. Hard.
“Hey, watch it. I’m trying to drive here. The last thing we need is me out of action and you behind the wheel. The good people of this city are not ready for the Dakar Rally on their streets.”
She flipped her middle finger up at me and then turned to face the front again, happy to be back to seeing me as a pretentious pain in her ass. “You’re hilarious, Jack.”
“I know, just another one of my many charms. Now, seeing as though I’m setting a good example for investigators everywhere, can you grab my cell and send a quick message?”
“Oh sure, how many kisses and hugs should I put at the end? And do I call her Blondie, or does she have a name?”
“I actually need you to send a text to Mick. Tell him I’m sorry I can’t make it to the game, but I’ll try my hardest to be at practice on Friday. And wish him good luck.”
“Who’s Mick?”
“Just a kid I know. He’s got his second game of basketball today and he was feeling pretty anxious. Told him I’d try and be there.”
“A kid you know? What do you mean?”
“Doesn’t matter. Are you going to send the text?” My defenses were up, but it wasn’t new for Casey to see me so guarded. Ever since my wife was murdered almost five years ago, I’ve avoided any deep relationships, or anything that made me feel any emotions at all.
“Relax ya slacks there. I’m on it.” I handed her my phone and there was silence while she tapped out the text and hit the Send button. The cold, clear sky had clouds beginning to knit together and I briefly wondered if I checked the weather today. Then I remembered—rain and cold were coming back, another taste of winter, just when we thought we’d left it behind.
“What’s the big secret, huh? Why won’t you tell me?”
“Maybe because we have so many other important things to talk about. Like how can theme parks take a crystal-clear picture of you speeding on a roller coaster, but bank cameras can't get a clear shot of a robber standing still.”
Casey shook her head, not pushing the point. “Please spare me your old man thoughts.”
“Alright alright. Ok, enough about me, we’ve got work to do. Call Sarah, our contact in the State’s Attorney’s office. We’ll go there first, it’s almost six o’clock now, but I think she’ll be working late. We need to look further into Anthony Waltz’s last big case. We need to talk to the victim of the sexual assault, because I can tell you, if Chesterfield wasn’t innocent, then getting a rapist off scot free is a very reasonable motive for murder.”
“Agreed.” Casey typed into her phone, searching the internet for information. Within five minutes, she had everything we needed. “Chesterfield’s victim was a girl named Jenny Carpenter. 25 years old. Engaged to a cop in Buffalo Grove.”
“Find me an address,” I took the ramp off the Interstate. “And then let the State’s Attorney’s office know that we’re on our way.”
Chapter 6
“Thanks for seeing us so late, Sarah.” I greeted Sarah Kingston with my best smile. “We’ll make this quick.”
“It’d better be. I have to be out that door in ten minutes flat.” Sarah Kingston, assistant to the State’s Attorney, smoothed her skirt before she sat behind her desk, a stack of files in front of her. She was immaculately dressed, with not a strand of hair out of place, and Casey automatically reached up and tried to fix her messy ponytail. Her small office seemed to have little protection from a cold draft sweeping through the building. The walls were brown and dull, the small window behind her desk was covered with faded blinds, and the lighting was dim. This was a place to work, to focus, and to tear apart every last piece of evidence.
Sarah Kingston was strong, smart, and undeniably attractive. Casey had begged me earlier not to completely ruin any positive relationship we had with her department as I had a history of destroying connections with my act now-think later attitude, but the State’s Attorney’s office still owed me a number of favors. I’d saved cases for them more times than I cared to count, and the department made sure they kept me on their good side. It was give and take. If they needed information about a case I had worked on, I was expected to point them in the right direction to find the evidence, and if I needed information for a case, I expected them to hint where I could find it.
“I’ve been told that I can give you an overview of the cases you sent through. I can tell you things that are publicly available but nothing more.” She rummaged through the files on her desk. “I need to be in a meeting at 7pm. So, you want to know who was really innocent and who just filled the court with enough believable stories to get them on the first train ride home?”
Sarah pulled two files off the pile and threw one across the desk. It landed just in front of Casey. Casey picked it up and began paging through its contents. Somehow the folders always seemed to open directly to the photos, almost like the universe had a way of pulling people towards the darkest, dirtiest moments of carnage, and this time was no different.
Casey tried not to see the picture of a small child, maybe five-years-old, her pink and white polka dot dress ripped and shredded from the scissors that had been continually smashed into her chest, but she couldn’t help it—her eyes pulled the information into her brain in a rush. It was difficult to know how many times the tiny girl had been s
tabbed. And it was impossible to know how someone could ever do it.
Casey flipped quickly over to the witness statements and glanced up at Sarah, nodding at her to continue.
“Jeffery Stone’s last client had rape and then homicide charges thrown out. Jeffery Stone used a loophole and had all the major evidence dismissed. Was the client guilty? Most likely, almost certainly, but the courts couldn’t prove it without the five main pieces of evidence. It was a disaster from the start.” She picked up the next file and threw it over to me. “This is Jeffery Stone’s second to last case. Another child abuse case, and another monumental mistake. This case was thrown out because a key witness changed their story midway through the trial. We suspect that the defense team had a hand in convincing the witness to change their story, but we couldn’t prove a thing. Unsurprisingly, the witness was able to purchase a nice holiday to the Caribbean a week after she changed her story.”
She picked up one last folder, paused for a moment and felt its weight, hesitating before finally tossing it over.
“Anthony Waltz defended David Chesterfield in a sexual assault case. Chesterfield was a scumbag and was as guilty as they come. The fact that he walked was a disgrace, an embarrassment for our department. Just one terrible mistake after another, basically. The feeling in the whole office was horrible after that case. No one looked each other in the eye, nobody said hello in the mornings, and there was so much yelling in the halls. How could we mess that one up so bad? I’ll tell you how—the damn lawyer Waltz tricked our investigator. Nobody wants to admit it, but he outplayed us. It was as simple as that.”
Casey handed me the folder and I began idly glancing at the court documents. “Can you tell us anything about the victim, Jenny Carpenter?”
“Poor Jenny. Only twenty-five. I felt so terrible for her. She’d already been through enough in her life, and then she was raped by Chesterfield. Our office worked so hard to get her to testify and then to have the case thrown out part way through the trial… well, that was heartbreaking for everyone. We all lost sleep about her case.”
The Shooter Page 4
