Killing Fear pb-1

by Allison Brennan

  “What?” Carina asked.

  “I don’t know. A feeling. Let’s try to find a physical address for Ms. Lorenz. We may be able to get one off the number.”

  “Unless it’s a pay-as-you-go plan,” Carina said.

  “Maybe she used a credit card. We need a break somewhere. And if she didn’t use a credit card, why? Why would she need a cash phone?”

  “Got me there.”

  “If she’s the one Glenn’s using,” Will said, “I don’t want to give her a warning that we’re coming. Let’s get this info to the Feds, see what Diaz learned, and regroup. No sign of Glenn for thirty-six hours. I’m getting antsy. He probably is, too.”

  “So who’s next?”

  “I wish I knew, but I’m sure as hell glad Julia Chandler is out of town. No doubt she’d be high up on Mr. Charming’s list.”

  Theodore Glenn had parked down the hill from Julia Chandler’s pricey house on a cliff near the coast and walked, keeping to the shadows. He didn’t see a patrol car, nor any added security.

  Something wasn’t right.

  He approached her house from the back. The sun was setting, but the beauty of the moment was lost on him. No lights were on inside, the only illumination a porch light.

  When he was confident no one was patrolling the grounds, he approached the house casually, in case anyone was watching. From a distance, his disguise would work, but close up D.D.A. Chandler would ID him.

  The gun fit comfortably in his hand.

  He walked up the porch steps, then around the outside of the house, looking in windows that were only partially draped. The blink of an alarm panel caught him off guard, but he watched it closely and it didn’t appear to change. Probably the doors and windows were wired.

  It quickly became evident that no one was home. Had she run, scared he would come to kill her?

  Smart woman, that was exactly what he’d planned to do. But why he wanted to kill her was completely different than she might think. As if her doing her job would have ranked her high on his list.

  Sherry deserved to die because she betrayed him in court. The cop deserved to die because he was a fool, and Theodore despised fools. Theodore would have killed the judge who allowed Robin’s testimony to stand, except that he was already dead. Heart attack, he’d read in the online newspaper archives.

  Theodore had considered blowing up the crime lab where those idiots who had gathered evidence claimed they had found his DNA on Anna’s body. They very well may have, but someone had planted it, and if they were so stupid not to see that, then they too deserved to die. Especially that arrogant director Jim Gage.

  Blowing up the crime lab meant getting too close to the police department, since the buildings were attached. Glenn wasn’t confident he’d be able to pull it off, but he was thinking about it. He would most certainly be able to make the bomb, it was access he questioned.

  William Hooper would die. For arresting him. For looking at him as if he were dog shit on his new Nikes. For screwing Robin.

  And Robin let him. Robin had let that asshole cop touch her perfect body. Intimately. She stripped for him, came for him, let him fuck her.

  The box in Theodore’s hand crunched and he looked down, blinking at the depth of his rage. He didn’t have emotions like this. He was always in control of them, because they were so few, so rare. But Robin brought them out, Robin brought out this passionate, all-consuming need to just see her.

  He’d been thinking a lot about how to punish Robin for hating him. For testifying against him, for not liking him, for not letting him touch her. She was a fucking stripper! Yet she looked down her nose at him!

  William and Robin may no longer be screwing each other, but there was still something there. Theodore read people very well. In the courtroom, William had definitely been protective of her. And he was a cop, someone who took pride in his job to “protect and serve.” Honorable. Dutiful.

  William, William, William…Shakespeare.

  Theodore smiled. Romeo and Juliet. Star-crossed lovers. Romeo believed Juliet was dead and killed himself. Juliet awoke, saw Romeo dead, then stabbed herself.

  If William thought Robin was dead, he would act irrationally. Perhaps recklessly.

  Or maybe if Robin thought William were dead, or injured, Theodore could more easily get to her.

  Oh, the possibilities! It made his present to William all that much more sweet.

  Theodore kicked Julia Chandler’s door. He’d planned on shooting her and leaving the box on her body, but this would have to suffice. Her life didn’t hold much allure for him, she had never personally slighted him.

  The alarm panel started blinking rapidly. A phone rang.

  Someone would be here soon.

  Theodore put the box on the kitchen table, then left, jogging down the winding hill, sticking to the ravine, watchful of cars on the road. He was nearly to his car when he heard sirens.

  He stayed hidden until the police car passed, then sprinted the last two hundred yards and left the scene, the adrenaline rush making him smile.

  He slammed his hand on the steering wheel and bounced in the driver’s seat, grinning, forcing himself to keep to the speed limit.

  He wished he could see the look on William Hooper’s face when he saw the contents of that box.

  TWENTY-ONE

  Will and Carina arrived at Julia Chandler’s house less than twenty minutes after the first officers arrived on scene. Will was walking up the porch steps when Agent Hans Vigo drove up. Impatiently, he waited for the Fed to catch up with them.

  As soon as he’d heard there was a box inside with his name on it, Will knew Theodore Glenn had broken into Julia’s house.

  “Did you say that the D.D.A. left town?” Hans asked Will.

  “Her boyfriend, an ex-cop, took her and her niece somewhere,” Will said.

  “Montana,” Carina said. “My fiance owns property in Bozeman and they left yesterday morning.” She looked a little unnerved, and Will didn’t blame her. Julia was her future sister-in-law, and her brother Connor could easily have been here when Glenn showed up. The thought gave her chills. Glenn would have no qualms about killing “innocent” people-those innocent to his twisted mind-to make his point.

  “The box is on the kitchen table,” the responding officer said. “Chief Causey said no one could touch it until the bomb squad checked it out. They’re in there now.”

  “Bomb? Doesn’t seem like Glenn’s style,” Will said.

  “I agree,” Hans concurred, “unless it was a bigger target, something that would cause mass devastation. Where he’d get a thrill out of being bold. By the way, we found Jenny Olsen’s Acura, abandoned, at the San Diego Public Library downtown. It had been left in the lot overnight and the security guard called for it to be towed. The impound lot ran the tags. Olsen admitted she let Glenn borrow the car.”

  Will glanced at his watch. “If we leave now, we can make it to Anaheim by midnight.”

  “I talked to Chief Causey and he agreed to allow an agent from the FBI’s Orange County field office interview her. Personally, I think he used her and left with her car-one that we wouldn’t be alerted to. And he dumped it when he picked up a safer ride.”

  “He wouldn’t have told her anything important,” Will said. “He doesn’t trust women, and he’s too smart to trust a woman who struck up a letter-writing campaign with him in prison.” He frowned. “Unless there was something the woman could do for him, something he couldn’t do himself…Any word on Sara Lorenz? Where she works?”

  Hans shook his head. “Between our two offices something is bound to break sooner rather than later. But she’s definitely a red flag. She’s the only one of the nineteen women in San Diego County we haven’t made contact with.”

  “Did you get the phone number I left on your voice mail earlier?”

  “Cash phone, pay-as-you-go. We did learn it was bought at Wal-Mart, and the merchandising manager is looking at which specific store it was purchased at, tho
ugh I don’t think that’s going to do us any good.”

  “Why?”

  “It was bought eighteen months ago.”

  “Where does she refill it?”

  “She doesn’t.”

  “If she uses it she’d have to put minutes on it.”

  “She bought one thousand minutes. Only four hundred and seventeen have been used.”

  “And the phone numbers?”

  “Impossible to trace. There are no records kept.”

  “All clear,” the bomb squad reported, coming out to the porch. “We opened the box, but didn’t touch anything inside.”

  “Thanks, guys,” Will said, striding into the house.

  He stared at the box, his heart rising in his throat.

  It was a small, generic pink donut box. Inside was a bird. A robin.

  Dead.

  “Interesting,” Hans said.

  Will spun around. “Interesting? This is a threat against Robin McKenna.”

  “What I find interesting is that he came up here to deliver it. And he didn’t seem to be overly irritated that Ms. Chandler wasn’t around. But even more interesting is that I doubt it was easy to find a robin in February. A simple examination should determine if the bird has been frozen.”

  That sunk in. “Which means someone kept a dead robin for him since last spring?”

  Carina frowned. “What I don’t get is how could he have planned all this? Like Will and I talked about before, he couldn’t have planned for the earthquake. And even if he planned an escape during his next appeal, there was no guarantee he’d be successful.”

  Vigo nodded. “I think it’s Glenn’s way of making his time in prison bearable. San Quentin is filled with men of low to average intelligence. Someone with Glenn’s IQ and background would have a difficult time of it, at least mentally. And even though loss of freedom is a huge problem in the psyche of the average prisoner, for someone like Glenn it would be devastating. He fixated on Robin to keep his mind focused. While he may have had an obsession with her before, it intensified while he was away.”

  Will’s gut twisted. “Then why hasn’t he just gone after her?”

  “Because he’s shrewd. He knows you have cops on her house and business. He may even suspect that she would hire a bodyguard. He’s going to wait until he’s confident he can get to her. He doesn’t want to go back to prison, but I think that his ego would demand that he take her out even if that means he dies, too.”

  “He has nothing to lose.” Will realized for the first time. “He’s having fun with this.”

  “That he is,” Hans agreed.

  “There’s a letter here,” Carina reminded him. “Addressed to you, Will.”

  Will put on gloves and picked up the #10 white envelope.

  WILLIAM

  Will carefully opened the envelope and unfolded the single sheet of paper.

  It began: William:

  The first two sentences had been crossed out. They were: I’m truly sorry I had to kill Julia Chandler. She really was just a puppet of the prosecution, hardly more to blame than an enlisted soldier during war.

  After scratching them out, Theodore had scrawled on the side: You win this one. Julia is a smart woman, I hope she’s enjoying her vacation. I’m sure her door can be fixed.

  The letter continued. He’d obviously written it before he arrived at Julia’s house.

  Julia Chandler was never the problem. It was the asshole she worked for. I will admit I enjoyed seeing Bryce Descario skewered in the media during his failed reelection. But public embarrassment isn’t quite the same thing as death, is it?

  I am tiring of the game, William. I may leave for a while. Or not. Does that scare you? I doubt it. You don’t scare easily. The only time you were really scared was when you thought Robin was dead. Those were the days.

  Do you really think that the bodyguard, the police, you, or Robin’s pathetic attempt to protect herself with a gun will keep me from her? Lock her up tight. You can’t keep her from me forever.

  Sooner or later I will kill her. And I promise you, William, it will hurt.

  Maybe I’ll even let you watch.

  Carina carefully extracted the paper from his hands as Will’s fists clenched, wrinkling the evidence. “He’s doing this to get to you.”

  “He got to me, dammit.” He breathed deeply. It would do Robin no good if he lost his focus. The anger was still there, but contained.

  “Descario,” he said.

  “What about him?” Carina asked.

  “Chief Causey called him after Glenn’s escape, then again after he made that big spectacle in front of the press. He’s retired, but still has a confidential address.”

  “Glenn couldn’t get it.”

  “He shouldn’t have been able to get Julia’s, either, but he did. And how did he find Frank Sturgeon? What about Trinity Lange?”

  “Followed her,” Carina guessed.

  “That’s the only thing that makes sense.” Will glanced at Hans. “Theodore Glenn is making all of us look like fools.”

  “I think he has an accomplice,” Hans said. “Someone who is helping him. Someone nondescript or nonthreatening.”

  Will had a patrol watching Ms. Plummer. Some of her answers had bothered him. “He must be using a woman like Jane Plummer or the elusive Sara Lorenz.”

  “Exactly.”

  Will called the crime scene techs and ordered the uniforms to stand guard until someone from Gage’s staff arrived to process the scene.

  “We need to talk to Descario, make sure he’s covered,” Will said as he, Carina, and Hans left. “Want to ride with us?” he asked the Fed.

  “Thanks.”

  Hans got in the back and Will made a call to Mario.

  “Medina Security.”

  “Mario, it’s Will Hooper.”

  “Whatcha need?”

  “Is she okay?”

  “Locked up tight. I’m right outside her door. No other way in or out, except the fire escape, and I checked it top and bottom. No way for it to be lowered except from her loft, and it’s secured. What happened?”

  Will told him about the dead robin at Julia’s house. “Don’t tell Robin. I’ll come by later. We have a stop to make first.”

  The hot shower burned the tension from Robin’s muscles. It distracted her from the gnawing fear that was eating her alive. She might as well have been a prisoner, bolted in her loft, a guard at her door. Her home had never felt so small. But finally, she stretched and relaxed and after days of jumping at the slightest sound, Robin almost felt normal.

  She heated some leftover minestrone soup and sat down at the kitchen counter for a late supper. When her grandmother had been alive, the two of them would cook together. Robin missed that time with her grandma. It had been the only real stability in her life. Robin didn’t cook much anymore-why when she lived alone and had few friends? — but cooking brought her back to her roots, to her grandmother, the one person in the world who had unconditionally loved her.

  Robin shook off her frustration and regret and ate more from habit than because she was hungry. She noticed the mail she’d picked up when Mario brought her home earlier. Absently she went through it, tossing the junk right into the trash can at the end of the counter. Junk, junk, junk, bill, junk, ju-

  She stared at the envelope. It was blank. No return address, no stamp, no postal insignia whatsoever.

  The handwriting made her hands shake. Sweat broke out on her forehead. It was Theodore Glenn, no doubt about it. She’d burned dozens of unopened letters he’d sent her from prison. But they’d all been sent to the Sin. She’d always taken some comfort that he didn’t know where she lived.

  Not anymore.

  How had Theodore Glenn gotten past security? How had he put a letter in her box with no one seeing him?

  She pushed the soup away, bile rising up her throat. In the back of her mind, she knew she should call 911 right now, not even open the letter. But what if she was wrong? What if it was
n’t Theodore Glenn’s handwriting? What if she was overreacting out of lack of sleep and fear?

  Holding the envelope only with her fingernails, she carefully slit it open with a sharp knife from the butcher block next to the stove. Hands shaking, she extracted a single sheet of paper. In small, perfect handwriting, it read:

  Robin:

  You are even more beautiful now than you were removing your clothes for me at RJ’s. But beauty doesn’t buy you a life.

  I know you’re working with the police. I could threaten anyone, and you would still go to them. Your mother? Pathetic woman. But it appears she’s not home. Another vacation? I know you drained your savings account to get her house out of foreclosure because she spends all her money shopping on television. You’d have been better off without her.

  Maybe you still would be.

  Your father? You never met him, but I did some research. It’s amazing what kind of access I had in prison. But if I killed him, you wouldn’t care. You have no attachment to him, he’s only a name on your birth certificate.

  And your friends, well, we all know what happens to people you care about, don’t we? Have you considered that your affection is toxic? That perhaps your tainted love kills? No matter, really, because I have been keeping tabs on you. I know you live alone with Anna’s cat. I know you have no friends. I know you still sleep with the lights on.

  But we both know that you’re a coldhearted bitch. You lied to put me in prison, and for that I will never forgive you. For that I will make you pay.

  I have always marveled at the word love. What does it mean? Truly, how can anyone care for anyone other than themselves? The pain, the betrayal, the suffering. For what? To live as a prisoner to another’s emotions?

  I would free you, but somehow I think your death would cause William far more anguish than his death would cause you. You lied. William was just doing his job.

  It’s a pity, because all you had to do was be nice to me and no one would be dead. How does it feel to know you’re culpable, Robin? How does it feel to know you could have stopped all of this if you’d simply fucked me?