“Melinda, it’s Kate Lange from LMB. John Lyons told me to call you about some information I need.”
“Of course. I was expecting your call. What can I do for you?” she asked cheerily.
“I’m going to need your procedures manuals.”
There was a pause. “All of them?” Her voice was a little less cheery.
“Yes.”
“Okay. Will do. I’ll have them couriered to you tomorrow.”
“Great.” Kate infused her voice with gratitude. “And one more thing…”
“Yes?” The enthusiasm was definitely muted now.
“I need to see the records that came with the tissue used to make Brad Gallivant’s and Denise Rogers’ knee filler. Denise Rogers is a new plaintiff,” Kate added. “In fact, I’d like the records for every batch that was made on the day their fillers were made.” That would rule out any screw ups before or after the filler was made that could have affected the quality.
“Um…I wasn’t told anything about that. I’ll have to check.”
“Please do. I need it ASAP.” The U.S. case had left a niggling fear.
“Okay, Ms. Lange. I’ll get right on it.” She didn’t sound too hopeful. “It’s just that those records are confidential. We have a duty to protect the donors, you know.”
“Yes. I understand. But all this information is protected by solicitor-client privilege. I won’t divulge it.”
“Oh, right.” Her voice had regained its perkiness. “I forgot about that. It shouldn’t be a problem, then.”
Kate hung up the phone. She stood, pacing to the window, then back to her desk. She wanted the records now. She wanted to get the case on track and leave the other parties in the dirt.
It was time to show Randall and John what she was made of.
Chapter 28
Thursday, May 10, 2:45 a.m.
He backed the car down the boat ramp until the rear was about five feet from the water’s edge. The Arm was flat, black. No moon lit its edges tonight.
He opened the door, then stopped. White lights flashed across his eyes. They settled around the periphery of his vision with comfortable familiarity. Everything he looked at was circled in pulsating dots. He blinked, his fingers massaging his temple.
Why was he here?
The white receded. He exhaled heavily and opened his eyes. His gaze fell to the dash. The clock spelled out the time in eerie fluorescent green: 2:45.
It had been 11:38 when she’d climbed into the passenger’s seat. At 11:59 her beseeching eyes had beseeched no longer.
He knew now why he was here.
He glanced around. It was such a pretty neighborhood. He liked to walk through here sometimes, choosing which house should be his. Sometimes he even sat on the wharf next to the boat ramp and stared across the water at the Armdale Yacht Club. The boats were so clean, so elegant, beautiful instruments of speed and precision.
He should have finished his residency this year. With a newly minted surgeon’s salary he would have been able to afford one of these gracious homes that lined the Arm. Instead, he was toiling away for Dr. K.
Pain acidulated his blood. He had been a star medical student. A star. Had earned a spot at a top surgical residency program.
He had proven his mother wrong.
And then it had been ripped away from him. He’d planned to appeal the committee’s decision, but his advisor warned him they were out for blood; there were suspicions he’d stolen fentanyl from the supplies room, he was told. There was the time he’d harassed one of the surgical nurses, he was reminded in a lowered voice. Then that little incident with the mentally challenged patient…and the drunk… The advisor shook his head. Don’t waste your time, he said. What he meant was: get lost. And good riddance.
His mother had laughed. Laughed in his face when she heard. “I always said you were a dirty little bastard,” she said. “Bet you couldn’t even say those long words without your tongue tripping over them.”
That’s when he picked up his first girl.
It took care of the urges for a while. Until he began working for Dr. K and took on new responsibilities. Then the urges began to flood him. Building and building until he could resist no more. But instead of breaking him down, it made him stronger. Powerful. In control.
He hurried around the car and opened the trunk. She lay there. Young, pretty enough in life if you liked the type. Too much makeup for his taste. So much more beautiful when the whiteness of her bones and the pinkness of her flesh were revealed.
He reached toward her.
He snatched his hands back.
His hands were bare. He had forgotten to glove his hands. Sweat broke out on his forehead, his bowels loosening at his close call.
How could he have forgotten that?
He rushed around to the driver’s side, snatching the pair of latex gloves that were tucked under his coffee holder. He had never, ever forgotten to glove before.
What was wrong with him?
He slid on the gloves, double-checking that they were a snug fit, and threw one last look around him. The street was still quiet. Not a soul stirred.
Especially hers.
He lifted her from the trunk and laid her carefully on the ramp. Blood trickled slowly down the slope. It slid into the black water.
She wasn’t quite straight. The slope made it difficult to position her. But he didn’t have time to fuss.
The white had slipped back. It pulsated in slow circles around his vision.
He put the car into Drive and eased up the ramp.
Fortunately, it wasn’t far to drive home.
* * *
“Hello?” Randall glanced blearily at the fluorescent blue numbers of his sleek clock radio: 3:46 glared at him.
“Randall?”
“Yes.” He sat up in bed. He recognized the voice and bit back a groan. Was this a bad dream? “Hope…I mean, Your Honor—”
A raspy laugh mocked his confusion. “For Chrissake take the stick out of your arse, Randall. Call me Hope.”
He blinked. She was drunk. Howling drunk. “Look, Hope, why are you calling me—?”
“Did you get the fucking notes?”
He lowered his voice. “Yes.” He put the thought of Kate’s accusing eyes in the elevator out of his head. He did what he had to do. But it had been harder than he thought.
“What did you do with them?”
“I shredded them.”
“At your office?” Her voice rose a notch.
He sighed. “No. At home.”
“Phew.” She suddenly laughed. “I knew I could count on you.”
His face twisted. He got Hope’s number loud and clear: single, newly bereaved and isolated by both her family and her profession. It wasn’t easy being a judge. You had to keep yourself above your former colleagues.
“Is that all, Hope?” he asked briskly.
“No. No, it ishn…isn’t.” She took in a gulping breath. “You know, you were a great fuck. Did I ever tell you that?”
“Yes.”
Her voice caught a little. “Was I?”
Randall squeezed his eyes shut. He hated the note of vulnerability in her voice. He needed to end this, now, before she lost her last remaining shred of dignity.
“You were amazing.” He said it softly, but there was no question of his sincerity. He meant it. She had been amazing in bed.
He felt her relax over the phone.
“Now.” He resumed his brisk tone. “It’s time for some sleep. I’ll bet you have a full docket tomorrow.” He hoped this would remind Hope of her chosen station in life. Of her need to be careful of her conduct.
“Yes.” She sounded suddenly deflated. “It is time for bed…” Her voice trailed off, then it strengthened. “I made it and I have to lie in it.”
The phone buzzed in Randall’s ear for a full minute before he placed it back on its cradle.
The tiger had turned on itself.
Chapter 29
Friday
, May 11, 7:00 a.m.
The discovery of a third victim threw public relations at the police department into full damage-control mode. The media wanted to know what the police were doing to find this sicko and why hadn’t they already caught him?
It was a nightmare for Deputy Chief Forrester. Which meant it was a nightmare for the criminal investigations unit. Reporters were violating the crime scene tape and trying to steal photos of the bloody trail leading into the Arm.
When Ethan saw photos of the latest anonymous young female victim he felt sick. Angry.
Wednesday had been a sunny day.
They thought they’d have more time. Brown had been assiduously following the weather forecasts while the team scrambled to follow the meager leads from the first two homicides.
It was now 7:00 a.m. More than twenty-four hours had passed since an early morning jogger had made the grisly discovery at the boat ramp on Jubilee Road.
He picked up the crime scene photos from the boardroom table. The dismemberment of the latest victim’s limbs was the same. But the rest was different. She had long, fine, pale brown—almost blond—hair. It was in a ponytail. Wisps hung around her face. She was heavier, much heavier than Lisa or Krissie, with large breasts, and a stomach that had several rolls of puppy fat. She had one of those dangly belly button rings that seemed to be a trend with teenage girls. Her face had been heavily made up. Now the mascara was smudged around her eyes, and several smears of black ran down her cheeks. Her pale silvery lip gloss was a bizarre contrast to her waxy skin and petechiae-marked flesh.
There was one more difference between the killer’s most recent victim and the last: her face showed more terror.
The killer was amping up his game.
Ferguson walked into the war room and stood at the front of the boardroom table. The team quickly took their seats. “Okay, we’ve got to put a stop to this guy,” she said, her voice brusque. “Brown, what have you come up with to profile this guy?”
Constable Liv “Copper” Brown was the resident profiler on the team. Before she’d joined the force, she’d done a master’s in behavioral sciences. At six-foot-one in her sock feet, with a lean physique and a coppery head of hair, Brown was used to commanding attention. She looked around the table. “All signs point to the usual basic profile for a serial killer—white male between the ages of twenty-five and thirty-four.”
Ethan thought of Judge Carson. “How can you be sure he is a man?”
“All the victims are young females. The first two even shared certain physical characteristics—slight build, longish hair. His fantasy is built around that.”
Unless the killer was one very sharp judge who knew that she could mask the killing of her daughter by choosing other victims like her. And that, by doing so, everyone would assume it was a guy who did it.
“Have you been able to pinpoint any habits we could use to find him?” Redding asked.
Brown grimaced. “None yet. He’s obviously highly intelligent. And highly organized.”
“And yet he picked a different physical type of victim this time…” Ferguson said. “Is he becoming less organized?”
“I think so. He also didn’t wait for the weather to turn, either. From the cases I’ve looked at, when the killer starts to deviate from his known M.O., it’s a sign the need to kill is driving his impulses.”
Everyone knew what that meant. They might finally get a break.
Ethan leaned forward. “What do you think is the killer’s fantasy?”
Lamond sniggered. “Why don’t you tell us yours and we’ll see if they match.”
Brown grinned, then said, “The victimology is crucial here. We need to know whether our guy is targeting certain physical types. So far we can see that he likes young women. But Lisa MacAdam and this unknown girl were very different physically.” She skimmed her notes. “This brings me back to the M.O.”
“They were the same,” Ethan said.
“And this is where our guy deviates from the typology.”
“In what way?” Ferguson asked.
“Normally, a power-control killer wants to inflict maximum fear and pain on his victims. He needs to magnify his self-worth by reducing the victim to worthlessness.”
Ethan nodded. “I know what you’re getting at. According to the medical examiner, the killer didn’t dismember the girls while they were alive. Nor were there any signs of torture on their heads or torsos.”
“So could the self-gratification come after death?” Ferguson asked.
“I suspect so.” Brown flipped her notepad closed. “And he’s using the LOL signature to send a message.”
“The last laugh,” Ethan muttered. “And it’s on us so far.”
Ferguson stood. “Right. So the killer doesn’t live in the south end. Maybe he works there?”
Brown nodded. “Yes.”
“At one of the hospitals?”
“Most likely.”
“Lamond, any success in IDing victim number three?” Ferguson asked.
Lamond shook his head. “No. No one’s called about her yet. Patrol’s been canvassing the neighborhood but Sergeant Wilkins says he needs to pull them in for foot patrol.”
Ethan glanced at Ferguson. They both knew the stress Wilkins was under. They needed patrol to do the canvassing, Wilkins needed more patrol to respond to the panic seizing the city. And not only to reassure citizens. Halifax’s criminal underbelly had seen the opportunity and had upped their game—there were several drug-related murders and an increase in vice activity since the first murder had splashed across the papers. As every cop knew, most crimes were ones of opportunity. And the opportunities had been huge these past two weeks.
“It’s been twenty-four hours.” Ferguson pressed her lips together. “She is probably another street kid. Walker, what did Vice have to report?”
“Vicky says she didn’t fit any of their kids, but these kids move around so much, she couldn’t be positive. The victim could be from out of town.”
Ferguson nodded. “We’ll have to wait it out. We can’t rule out that her family’s away.” She picked up her folder. “In the meantime, I want Walker and Redding to hit the streets. Warn all the regulars. There’s a pattern. They need to understand that they are at risk.” She turned to Ethan. “Any success with the ex-con lead?”
“Nothing yet. I’ve checked out eight suspects. None of them is capable of doing this. And all have alibis. Guess our halfway house system is working.” He smiled wryly.
“What about ex-cons who’ve been out for longer?”
“I’m getting to them next. I’ve got about five on my list.” Ethan pushed back his chair and stood.
“Let me know when you’ve tracked them all.”
“Right.” He left the station and got into his car. The list sat propped on his dashboard. Five more dead ends to go down. But, he knew—and Ferguson had reminded him—a good cop had to explore every avenue. Who knew what turd was going to be turned up in the process?
Chapter 30
Saturday, May 12, 8:00 a.m.
When news of the third victim was reported by the media on Friday, the city had reeled in shock. The police upped their foot patrols in the north and south ends; residents were being advised to use extreme caution. Early-morning joggers banded together into running groups. There was a feeling of joining forces in the face of adversity, like after Hurricane Juan devastated the city in ’03. Parents carpooled their kids home instead of letting them walk.
Kate skimmed the day-old paper. The headline was yet another dramatic eye-catcher: Rain or Shine, Body Butcher Strikes Again. Who got paid for those headlines? One of the articles about “protecting the children” caught her eye. She sipped her coffee. These kids weren’t the ones in danger in the first place. It was the other kids, the kids no one cared about, the kids who bummed money, used drugs, got kicked out of school and generally fell through the cracks. These were the ones being chosen by the killer.
Despite the theme of
strength in adversity that ran through the newspaper’s articles, it didn’t conceal the fear and anger. No one could believe that someone was getting away with ruthlessly picking girls off the street and brutalizing them. No one knew where a body would be left next. No one wanted to look out the window in the morning for fear of making a grisly discovery.
People were getting spooked.
Everyone had theories, and a lot of people thought they’d seen the guy—“he was in a big truck cruising down Barrington Street,” “he drove an old, broken-down Chevy…I saw him in the park,” “I think he’s a guy who used to work for the post office—he was really weird.”
If the newspaper was able to round up these witnesses, Kate could just imagine the number of people clogging the police hotline.
She wondered how Ethan was doing. This case was getting to him. She had seen it in his eyes. It almost made her forgive him for the way he treated her about the notes.
Alaska whined, pacing restlessly by the door. She put on her running shoes. It was time to take the new man in her life for a run. The problem was memories of the old one kept dogging her.
She ran for an hour. She was just returning to her house when a woman’s voice called, “Kate! Kate!” She threw a startled glance around her. From a sagging front porch, a woman waved her hand.
Kate smiled and tugged on Alaska’s leash to stop. “Hello, Enid,” she called from the sidewalk.
“Lovely morning, isn’t it?”
“Yes.” The sun had stroked silver on the water this morning.
Enid stepped toward her. “Why don’t you come in for a cup of tea?”
Kate hesitated. “I have Alaska with me.”
“Oh, tish, that’s no problem. I’ll keep the cats upstairs. He can come inside.”
“Well…” Kate thought of her empty house. All she had waiting for her was a vacuum cleaner and a duster. She smiled. “That’d be nice.”
“Oh! Lovely!” Enid said, sounding surprised.
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