Eyes Never Lie

by Tyler Porter

  Just as the realization hit me, I noticed a quick movement through the window at the back of the outbuilding. The team was all standing next to me, the person causing the movement wasn’t with us. I was closest to the door, and without causing a seen, I slowly stepped toward the opening drawing my Glock from the holster. I aimed it in front of me toward the door and inched my gaze to the crack where I could see outside. That was when I saw Frank Jarmin.

  Chapter 15: Back in the Game

  “He’s running!” I shouted as I busted out into the open.

  Jarmin was wearing a white tank top and tan cargo pants. He was making a break for the woods. I could hear the rest of the team scrambling through the door, but they were too far behind. Jarmin was fast, just not quite fast enough. I was gaining on him and as I did, I studied him. He was just as old and delicate as he looked in his photo. I knew I would catch up and have to tackle him, but part of me was afraid I might break every bone in his body if I did. It puzzled me. The body we found on his property was that of a man about my size. As I pictured it, I couldn’t imagine a man like Frank Jarmin being able to subdue someone of my size or strength. He ran through some thick bushes and I followed. It was only when I emerged on the other side that I saw the gun. Boom. Boom. Boom.

  I instinctively dove to the right and rolled behind a tree as the revolver cracked. He had fired three shots, three left to go. I drew my pistol, sixteen in the magazine and one in the chamber. Jarmin was significantly out gunned, but I didn’t want to kill him. As a cop, you almost never wanted to kill, even the worst criminals. Setting that fact aside, there could be more victims being held somewhere. We knew that he stalked and abducted his victims and, at least in Shelby’s case, he held them for up to weeks at a time. If he died here in the woods, there could be more who would never be found. I had to do my best to talk him down.

  “Frank Jarmin! I’m with Helena PD. You need to drop that gun and put your hands in the air,” I said.

  “You want me!? You’re gonna have to kill me!” Boom. He fired another round into the trunk of the tree I was taking cover behind.

  “I don’t want to do this Frank! I don’t want to kill you; I just want to talk to you.” I tried to keep my voice calm.

  “Fuck talking and fuck you!” Boom. A felt the tree shake as another bullet pierced its hide.

  So far, he’d fired five bullets. He only had one left in the chamber. There were a few ways this could go down, but a couple of them were already out of the running as one ended with Frank getting killed, and the other involved me being buried six feet under. Few options left. I could keep talking and maybe he would be stupid enough to fire his last bullet at the tree. Or, I could do something to make him fire directly at me to ensure he would be out of ammo, but again risking my own ass in the process. Some big decisions with very little time.

  “This is your last chance Jarmin. Drop the gun, or I’ll drop you.”

  There was a moment of silence.

  “Fine…it’s on the ground and my hands are in the air officer,” he said.

  I knew better, but I could use this against him. I quickly jutted my head out from behind the tree and then pulled it back immediately. It was just enough for him to get a glimpse of me coming out from behind the tree and by the time he realized I had pulled back; it was too late. Boom. My plan worked perfectly. I rolled out from behind the tree to find Jarmin looking at his revolver bewildered. By the time he looked up, I was diving through the air toward him. I tackled him to the ground and rolled him over onto his stomach, pinning his arms behind him. He let out a painful scream as I wrenched his limbs back.

  “Jarmin down!” I screamed into the woods.

  S.W.A.T. and the rest of my team were finally catching up, stumbling through the brush. They appeared in the clearing as I was securing Jarmin’s wrists in cuffs. Perez took him by the arm and led him back toward the house while he let him know his rights. Cooper took the revolver and placed it in an evidence bag. Hunt walked over and patted me on the shoulder.

  “You good?” he asked.

  “Yeah, I’m alright,” I said.

  “Not exactly ‘nice and easy’ but at least we got the son of a bitch. I’m just glad this thing is over with.”

  “I’m not sure it is over with,” I said.

  “What do you mean?” Hunt asked.

  “Too many things were different about this kill kid. Things serial killers don’t change.”

  “Maybe you are too close to this. Your judgement is clouded. We have our guy, he just got sloppy on this one. It’s not uncommon for them to make a mistake, that is how we catch them,” he replied.

  “I agree with you. It’s not uncommon for them to make a mistake, but this isn’t one mistake. We are talking about a change in gender, cause of death, signature, and location type. We are talking about a killer who, up to this point, has been flawless, and now all of a sudden he is changing everything?”

  He stared at me as I continued my rant.

  “And we just happened to get a tip from an anonymous source leading directly to him where we find him along with everything we need for a clear guilty verdict? Doesn’t that seem a little too easy?” I asked.

  “Sometimes it is easy Casey. We don’t always have to be Sherlock fucking Holmes. Sometimes it is just simple. You just never learned to appreciate the simple times because you’re too caught up in being the hero,” he accused.

  “And you’re obviously still too green to know that it is never that easy. I understand you’re the top dog now and you want to make a good show of this as your first big bust, but I promise you, this is not our guy, and if you take Jarmin as our killer and move on, a lot more people are going to die on your watch.”

  I walked away from him and back toward Jarmin’s property without another word. As I walked, I thought. Maybe he was right. Maybe I was just too caught up in all of this. This guy had called me out. He had killed Shelby just to get my attention. Pile on top of that the fact that I was technically retired, and that the thrill of the chase still hadn’t left me. Maybe I was too hell bent on taking this guy down. Maybe subconsciously I wanted there to big some big final showdown. Some sort of good versus evil event to end this thing. Maybe I was just ignoring the idea that it could have been just that easy.

  No. A few weeks away could not have destroyed thirty years of doing the job. I’d developed an instinct over the years, and I was rarely wrong. This was not our killer, and I was certain of it. Unfortunately, that wasn’t for me to say. I was here as a consultant and my place now was to consult. I could try to convince Hunt and the team to keep the case open, but if they decided against it, there wasn’t much I could do.

  When I emerged from the woods, more officers had arrived and were taping off the residence. The right killer or not, we still had a body and this was still a crime scene. I walked back into the house to do a secondary search of the rooms. There could still be more victims and there could be clues hidden in the house. I searched each room on the ground floor and then made my way, again to the second. I double-checked the bedrooms and bathroom upstairs as well. I was ready to head back outside and wait in the car when I noticed something that I hadn’t the first time I came upstairs.

  A door. What looked like a closet door with a padlock on the latch. How could I have missed that? The first time we had been up here, we had been filled with adrenaline. We were in pursuit of a killer and we all had our guns drawn. We weren’t looking for a small door, we were looking for Jarmin, the door would have been easy to miss. I walked over to it and gave the lock a tug.

  It held. I took out my Glock and flipped it so that the barrel was in my hand with the butt sticking out. I swung down and hit the lock with the butt of the gun. It gave. I opened the door, took one look around and headed back downstairs. As I arrived at the bottom, Hunt and the rest of the team were gathered in the entryway.

  “
Hunt,” I said.

  “What’s up?” he said, clearly acting as if the small confrontation in the woods never occurred.

  “Come upstairs, there is something you need to see,” I said.

  Before he had a chance to argue, I turned and started climbing back up the staircase. At first, I heard nothing, and I knew he was trying to think of a way to avoid following me, but at last I heard his footsteps as he too began the ascent. I waited for him at the top and then led him to the small door in the hallway stopping in front of it. He followed, stopped in front of the door and stared at it.

  “A closet? You dragged me up here to see a closet?” he asked.

  “No,” I said opening the door. “I dragged you up here to show you this.” I watched his eyes widen. “Still think it’s the same killer?”

  “Jesus Christ.”

  Chapter 16: The Optometrist

  The Optometrist. Jarmin was not our guy, but he certainly was a fan of our guy and he had given him a name, the Optometrist. The small closet was made up of three walls, two of which were covered, top to bottom, with pictures, news clippings, and articles that had come out regarding the recent string of murders. Along the floor there were books, piled neatly, against the walls. Jeffrey Dahmer, John Wayne Gacy, Jack the Ripper, Ted Bundy, Albert Fish, and Charles Manson. Biographies or manifestos on the most notorious serial killers in history.

  He’d been studying serial killers for a long time. Maybe it was our killer that had inspired him to finally make his assumed first kill, the guy in the outbuilding. We still had to identify him, which would prove difficult considering the fact that his head was bashed in. The baseball bat leaning in the corner of the closet was the prime suspect and it was taken for evidence. The closet was just big enough to stand in and I watched as Hunt took in each area. Finally, he turned to me and looked as if he had made a decision.

  “There is nothing here that says Jarmin isn’t the guy. The Optometrist could be a name he gave to himself,” he said.

  “What about the change in victim type? The kill style? The location? What about the fact that he didn’t leave this body for us to find? It was laying in some outbuilding rotting away. So much about this is different, you can’t possibly believe this is the same guy.”

  “Yes, there were a lot of differences but maybe he didn’t leave this one out in the open because he didn’t want it to be found. Maybe he was experimenting in private with some new tactics. We know that these types of killers are narcissistic so it would make sense that he is keeping news articles and clippings about his work. It would also make sense that is trying to give himself a name; all of the famous serial killers have them.”

  I couldn’t argue anymore. He had made up his mind and there was no changing it. I nodded my head and headed back downstairs. Our team’s work was done at the scene and we all made our way back to the station. Hunt and I were both silent during the ride. He was upset because he felt like I was babysitting him and doubting his abilities. I was upset because he couldn’t get past his tunnel vision. In a way, I was also upset with myself. It was my job to train him, to mold him and I had failed. I hadn’t trained him well enough to be able to see the obvious truth when it was right in front of him. Unfortunately, he was going to have to learn the hard way.

  We walked as a team through the front doors with Jarmin in the middle. Perez led him to be booked and the rest of the team retreated to the bullpen. I considered joining them, but somehow, it just no longer felt like my place. I was about to leave when Hunt began to speak.

  “Hey guys, good show today. Things went really smooth and precise, just the way it needed to be. This ones in the bag, get some rest tonight, because you all know how it goes. There will more than likely be another one on our desks tomorrow. For now though, enjoy the win.”

  “What win?” The team hadn’t noticed Captain Connors approaching.

  “We have Frank Jarmin in custody, Captain,” Hunt answered.

  “So it was a good tip? Huh, one in a million, but hell, we’ll take it! Good work team.” He turned and walked back toward his office.

  Once I was sure the rest of the team were not paying any attention to me, I followed him. “Captain,” I said from the doorway of his office as he sat down in his chair.

  “Oh Christ, what now? Can I just be rid of you already? You got what you wanted, alright? You came back and you helped take down the son of a bitch. Time to go back to your retirement now.”

  “Captain, I’m not convinced we did take down the son of a bitch,” I said.

  “What are you talking about? Hunt said you got the guy, he is in custody, and we have a body. This thing is done and over with.”

  “Look, there were things that we saw at that house that are not consistent with our killer. Not even close. Yes, we have a body, but at best this was a sick fan of our boy.”

  “Why are you telling me this? Why didn’t you tell the team? Isn’t that what you are here to do? Consult?” he asked.

  “I tried convincing Hunt, but he is set on Jarmin being the answer. He is too worried about impressing you with his first big case that he is completely missing what is right in front of him.”

  I filled Captain Connors in on what we found at the crime scene, and in the end he had to agree. He may not have spent much time working in the field, but he had been around long enough to know the things I was saying could not be ignored. We still had a killer on the loose. He left to go inform the team that the case would not be closed and that they were to continue working on it. I took a moment of rest in my old office in the meantime. That moment of rest last a very short time before Hunt came storming into the small space. He squared up to me and his face was so close to mine that I could feel the heat radiating off of him.

  “You went over my head?” he asked.

  “You weren’t listening.”

  “I don’t have to listen to you Norris! You’re not the boss anymore. I have to trust my instincts now, not yours!”

  “Trust them all you want, but your instincts were wrong on this one. You might be alright with letting more innocent people die, but I’m not and I’m not going to let your ego be the reason that they do.”

  He swung hard with his right hand. My jaw buckled and my mind buffered for a moment before I realized I was stumbling backward. I tripped on the chair and fell onto the ground. Shaking the cobwebs from my vision, I looked back up at him in disbelief. I saw something different in his eyes than I had ever seen before. Hatred.

  “From now on, keep your opinions to yourself and I am warning you right now…don’t you ever go over my fucking head again.”

  He left the office without another word and for an instant; I stayed where I was on the floor. One thing was certain, I wasn’t needed there anymore. My time had come and gone. Right, wrong, or indifferent, I had just gone on my last raid. I stood myself up and slowly walked out into the hallway closing the door behind me. I turned and looked at the space one last time. It was a great run. I patted the door twice before moving down the hall toward the entrance. I walked past the bullpen without looking at the team or saying anything. There was no need to cause another dramatic scene for my send off.

  I walked out the front doors and hopped in the Jeep. I headed toward my new home, and thoughts began to fill my head. If I was so great, I would have caught this guy in the beginning. Before…before he had a chance to get to Shelby. Shelby. I had worked hard not to think about her and getting re-involved in the case right after her death had kept my mind occupied, but now the pain was coming back to me. I thought about her as I drove. I thought about how scared she had to have been, about how she had to have been wondering where I was. Waiting for me to bust through the door and save her from that nightmare, but I never came.

  Warm liquid began to form in the corners of my eyes. She needed me, and I wasn’t there. I thought about the moment when she realized that I
wasn’t coming, that the warehouse he had her in would be the last thing she would ever see. Hot tears streaked down my face. I instinctively wanted to wipe them away, but I didn’t. I wanted to feel it. I wanted to let the pain in. She felt every bit of the pain, why should I get off the hook?

  I allowed my emotions to consume me as I maneuvered the country roads. I had always considered myself to be a strong man. A man who had seen things that most people couldn’t even imagine. A man with no fear, but as I drove, and as the pain grew deeper, my weakness showed its face. The weakness inside of me that would not let me feel and suffer. The overtaking urge to make it all stop, to make it all go away. I brought the Jeep to a stop in front of Vern’s and stared at the storefront.

  I had been to this point many times in my life. I knew, before I ever made the first move that it wouldn’t help, that it would only make things worse, but that wasn’t enough to stop me. Although I knew it wouldn’t help in the long run, I knew that it would bring me momentarily relief from the guilt and the stabbing ache in my heart. I walked into the store and within minutes was back in the Jeep. I pulled in the driveway and made my way into the house. It smelt stale, as if no one had set foot inside for centuries. It seemed dull and lifeless, which was fitting, because that is exactly how I wanted to feel. Dull. Nothing. Lifeless.

  I set the bag on the kitchen table and pulled out one of the bottles. I could feel the weight begin to lift off of me as the old, familiar sound of the seal cracking met my ears. I tossed the cap across the kitchen and slowly moved toward the recliner in the living room. I stared at the clear container and the amber tinted liquid that resided inside. For an instant, I considered changing my mind. I considered being stronger than the urge, but a consideration is just a thought and thoughts are often outweighed by habits. I had made it a habit of falling to the drink in times of pain, and this time would be no different.