The TAKEN! Series - Books 1-4 (Taken! Box Set)

by Remington Kane

  “The murders are happening at a rapid rate, what does that tell us about her?” Ramos said to Jessica.

  “It tells us that she’s coming apart. She’s blatant in her actions. She makes no attempt to hide her face from hotel security cameras and the coroner report shows that she never hesitates while using the knife. Each man’s throat was opened by a single deep slash, and yet, if you look at the security film, when she leaves the room her clothing is clean. She must be taking precautions so that no blood gets on her, but if I had to guess why, I’d say that it was due more to distaste for the uncleanliness of it, rather than an attempt to evade detection.”

  “Okay, so she’s organized,” Ramos said, “But why do you say that she’s coming apart?”

  Jessica rose from the conference table and stood in front of a huge video monitor. The monitor’s screen was divided into six separate displays, each one showing the killer leaving a different crime scene. She pointed to the top left corner of the screen.

  "This film was taken after the first murder. To look at her, you would never know that anything was wrong. Her hair is arranged perfectly and she’s well dressed and groomed. Now, take a look at her after murder number three, look at her blouse, it’s untucked and the pendent on her lapel is upside down. After the fifth murder, we see that her hair isn’t even combed, she just has it pulled back in a ponytail and although it’s a little hard to tell just by looking at this tape, I think she’s stopped wearing make-up. And after last night’s murder, I noticed this.”

  Jessica grabbed the remote and zoomed in on the area around the suspect’s feet.

  Ramos laughed.

  “Different shoes, she wearing two different shoes, wait, no, one’s a shoe and the other is a sneaker.”

  “She’s coming apart. This is no master criminal. This is a woman who has lost her mind and is acting out against those she holds to be guilty. When we find her, we’ll also find out that her husband or boyfriend cheated on her or left her for another woman. That’s her stressor, and it’s why she’s targeting cheaters.”

  Just then, Delaney’s phone rang. He answered it, and after talking for a few seconds, he looked around the conference room.

  “We got another one.”

  CHAPTER 16

  The newest victim’s name was Kenneth Stevens and he was in town on business from Boise. He was forty, married, and the father of three children.

  Dr. White and her husband rode along to the scene with Ramos and she and Jessica seemed to get along well. While stopped at a light, Ramos turned and looked at him, where he was seated in the back beside Jessica.

  “You know, I still tell people about how you caught Stiletto. That was nothing short of brilliant and it also showed that you had a lot of self-possession, and you were only seventeen, right?”

  “I got lucky; it was the first thing that came to my mind.”

  “That’s not luck, that’s natural ability, and look at you two now, still helping to catch the bad guys. Your father must be proud of you, Jessica.”

  “He is, but he also worries, he knows first-hand how dangerous chasing monsters can be.”

  “It is dangerous, but that’s why you can’t show any mercy. When you’re fighting monsters, you have to be as ruthless as they are, am I right?”

  Ramos was staring into his eyes as she said these words, and he knew by the intensity of her gaze that there was something more not being stated.

  A horn blew behind them, then two, then three, but Ramos kept staring.

  A moment later, she broke eye contact and sprinted the car back into the flow of traffic.

  “I think we’re almost there, hold on,”

  He turned his head to look at his wife and saw that Ramos behavior hadn’t gone unnoticed, but Jessica simply shrugged it off and then stared out the window.

  He also stared out the window, while making a mental note to find out more about Ramos.

  ***

  They arrived at the crime scene to find Delaney already on site. He was inside the hotel room, standing over the body while talking to a couple of Crime Scene Investigators. The room looked as if someone had sprayed it with blood and he wondered how anyone could remain unsoiled by such wanton bloodletting. It must be as his wife surmised, that the killer was organized. She must have brought protective coverings with her to each murder, so that she could escape being marked by the blood.

  Delaney met them in the hall.

  “We already checked their surveillance tapes, and yes, it’s the same woman. She doesn’t appear to give a damn about being caught, so unless we stop her she’s going to keep killing.”

  One of the lab techs tapped Delaney on his shoulder, and then he handed him something in a plastic bag, a business card, with numbers written on the back of it.

  Delaney studied the card for a moment and then let out a low whistle.

  “The old man is not going to like this.”

  “Old man?” Jessica said.

  Delaney smiled at the three of them.

  “How’d you like to meet a living legend?”

  ***

  The Caliber Detective Agency was housed on the top floor of a three-story building, while the bottom two floors were devoted to Caliber Investigations, a subsidiary.

  Dr. White and her husband rode up in the elevator with Ramos and Delaney, and when the doors opened, they were greeted by a beautiful redhead.

  “Hi Kelli, is the old man in?”

  “Sure, Lieutenant, but is something wrong; I’ve noticed that you brought along company.”

  Delaney made the introductions and then showed Kelli the business card.

  “Yes, that’s one of ours, and those numbers written on the back are a client number, if you give me a few moments I can get you the client’s name.”

  “All right, and while you’re doing that, we’ll go see the old man.”

  Kelli escorted them over to the door that led to an inner office; she gave a knock and then opened it to poke her head inside.

  “Mr. Caliber, Lieutenant Delaney is here to see you, with company.”

  “Send them in, doll,” came the reply from a gruff voice.

  The four of them entered the large inner office and he saw two men seated behind desks.

  The one by the window was the legendary Jake Caliber, the P.I. who, among many things, had once foiled a Presidential assassination by leaping in front of the would-be assassin’s bullet. On the left sat a man who must be Caliber's relation, because he resembled the older Caliber to a T. If not for the void of years between them, they might have passed for twins.

  The old man smiled at Delaney and then began taking in his other visitors one by one, and he noted that his eyes lingered on his wife in obvious admiration of her beauty, but then, the old man’s eyes fell upon him, and he watched as they filled with a mixture of confusion and hatred.

  The old man pointed at him.

  “Who the hell are you?”

  Delaney swiveled his head back and forth between them.

  “Uncle Jake, what’s wrong?”

  The old man came out from behind his desk and stood before him.

  “I said who the hell are you, mister?”

  He gave the old man his name and watched him get more aggravated.

  “That’s not your name; your name is Gant, isn’t it?”

  The old man’s certainty intrigued him.

  “Why do you say that?”

  “Because you’re the spitting image of a man named William Gant, and I mean the spitting image. If I didn’t know it was impossible, I’d say that you were him, you got those same eyes, hell, you even sound like him.”

  “Sir, I know nothing about my father, if you think that this Gant could be him, then please, tell me where I can find him.”

  “Bill Gant is six feet under boy, I know, because I put him there.”

  ***

  They were gathered around the old man’s desk when Kelli returned with the information about the card. As she walke
d over to hand it to Delaney, her mouth dropped open when she saw the old man typing into the keyboard of a laptop.

  “Mr. Caliber? When did you learn how to work a computer?”

  “Velma, the first Velma taught me years ago, but don’t you tell Gail, it would ruin me in her eyes.”

  Kelli giggled. “Yes sir.”

  Jake Caliber and his daughter-in-law Gail Caliber had been feuding for years, a fact well known throughout the company. It was also well known that she thought him to be hopelessly old-fashioned.

  The old man found what he was looking for and brought the image up on the screen.

  “That photo was taken by a newspaperman in the fifties.”

  The black & white picture showed two men climbing the steps of a precinct house. The first man was dressed in a trench coat and wore a fedora, he was Jake Caliber, the second man wore a bloody T-shirt and a pair of dark slacks, and was being dragged along by the handcuffs on his wrists. He was also a dead-ringer for Dr. White’s husband.

  Jessica straightened as she stared from the picture to her husband, and then looked over at Jake Caliber the Fifth.

  “If I didn’t know better, I’d say that this was a photo of you two.”

  “The resemblance is remarkable,” Ramos agreed.

  He stared at the old detective, and with a bit of hesitation, he asked a question.

  “Why was he being arrested?”

  “He had killed six women.”

  “He was a serial killer?”

  “Well, we didn’t call it that back then, but technically I don’t think it would apply anyway. He had killed them all while working an extortion racket, but I still think he enjoyed doing it.”

  “Do you really think that he could be my father?”

  “When were you born?”

  He told the old man and watched him nod.

  “It’s possible, he was still alive back then, but it’s more likely that you’re his grandson.”

  “William Gant had a son?”

  “Possibly, about ten years ago I got a call from a cousin of mine who was a Texas Ranger, he said he was looking into a string of murders when the name Gant came up, he said that Gant was also known by the name, Billy Jr.”

  “Did your cousin ever find this man?”

  “If he did, it was the death of him, my cousin, Blue Steele, has been missing ever since.”

  He and Jessica exchanged glances.

  “Did you say that your cousin was named Blue Steele?” Jessica asked. “We recently met a Texas woman by that name, a bounty hunter.”

  The old man grinned.

  “Yeah, Little Blue’s a bounty hunter, and that would have made her father proud.”

  “So, it’s possible that my father could be in Texas?”

  “Actually, Blue said he found a relative of Gant’s living in California, a little coastal town way up north called Bel Rey, but he went missing before he could check it out.”

  “Bel Rey...,” he whispered.

  The old man stared up at him from the desk and shook his head.

  “Let it go, son. Maybe you just look like them, and even if you are a Gant, believe me, you want nothing to do with them. They were all killers and psychopaths from the word go.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “The Gants and the Calibers go back a long way. My granddaddy, the first Jake Caliber, he had run ins with them while he was a still a Texas lawman, even then they were known for killing women, almost like it was in their blood. If there’s such a thing as a serial killer gene, they had it, just thank God that they didn’t pass it on to you.”

  He glanced over at Jessica.

  “Yes, thank God,”

  CHAPTER 17

  They left the Caliber building with a name. Caddy Smith. Mrs. Smith had gone to Caliber when she suspected her husband of cheating, and Caliber had assigned a B-Girl to her case.

  “What exactly is a B-Girl?” Jessica asked.

  “The B stands for bait,” Delaney said. “Caliber investigations send girls out to tempt any man suspected of cheating by his mate, and then they report back what happened.”

  “It sounds like entrapment,” Ramos said.

  “It probably is, but hey, if the guy’s not a cheater he’s got nothing to worry about.”

  Delaney’s phone beeped then and he looked at it.

  “It’s a text from Kelli; she says that the girl they assigned to bait Smith's husband was named Selina Clayton, and Selina says that he took the bait all right, in fact, she says that he approached her before she could approach him. Kelli also sent me a picture of Selina.”

  Delaney held up his phone so everyone could see. The woman in the photo was a blond and years younger than their killer.

  The phone rang again. Delaney listened for a moment, said a muffled curse, and then told them what he had just learned.

  “The Westchester County cops went to Caddy Smith’s house and found the front door sitting open and her husband in the living room, with his throat cut.”

  A second later, Ramos phone let out a sound.

  “There is no DMV photo of Caddy Smith, I guess she doesn’t drive, but my researcher found a photo of her that was taken at a charity auction last year, what do you think?”

  “That’s her,” Jessica said, after scrutinizing the picture on Ramos’ phone. “That’s our killer.”

  “But why would she drop this card?” Delaney said. “It led us right to her.”

  “You said it before; she doesn’t care if she gets caught." Ramos said. "She probably found out her husband was cheating and went off the deep end.”

  Delaney’s phone rang yet again. After a short conversation, he shook his head in wonder.

  “You’re not going to believe this.”

  ***

  Caddy Smith was down on her hands and knees, searching beneath the bed. The room she was in was the scene of her latest murder.

  The Crime Scene Investigator pointed in at her, as Jessica and her husband, along with Ramos and Delaney listened to him.

  “We were just about to put the tape across the door when she showed up. She said that she dropped something and has to find it. I think it’s that card I found.”

  Delaney cocked his head.

  “I’ve heard of criminals returning to the scene of a crime, but this is ridiculous.”

  Within the room, Caddy Smith crawled around amidst the still tacky blood, frantically searching, oblivious to anything else going on around her.

  “Call the boys in white,” Delaney told the investigator. “This lady is headed to the psych ward.”

  ***

  With the case concluded, Delaney said his goodbyes to Jessica and her husband and then left the Task Force command room.

  Jessica stared over at her husband.

  “You want to go to Bel Rey, don’t you?”

  “It may lead me to my father.”

  “Who may very well be a serial killer?”

  “Yes, but we’ve never run from the truth before. If there is such a thing as a ‘serial killer gene?’ Then I would say that it’s best we learn this now, before, before we have our own children.”

  Jessica walked over and hugged him.

  “Gene or no gene, I want to have a family with you. If there is a gene, it can be beat, you’ve proven that.”

  “I want to go to Bel Rey and find this relative of Gant’s. Maybe they can give us some answers.”

  Jessica nodded. “We’ll leave tomorrow.”

  ***

  Down the hall, Ramos swiveled in her seat and looked up at Delaney as he opened the office door and stuck his head in.

  “Agent Ramos, it’s been a pleasure, and good luck on your next assignment.”

  “Thanks Lieutenant and good luck to you too.”

  “Take care,”

  “You too,” Ramos said with a warm smile. Then, after Delaney left and the door was closed again, she hit the conference button on the desk phone, and went back to eavesdropping on Jessi
ca and her husband.

  PART FIVE – BURKE & RAMOS

  CHAPTER 18

  They were flying west, on a flight to northern California, with their eventual destination being the small coastal town of Bel Rey.

  Never a loquacious man by nature, Jessica still thought that her husband seemed less talkative than usual. As she began to ponder the reason for his silence, it caused her to worry, and when her anxiety was at its peak, she reached over and took his hand.

  “I want you to promise me something.”

  He turned and stared at her with a quizzical look.

  “What would that be?”

  “Promise me that you’ll never leave me. I know you. If we were to find out the worst here, in Bel Rey, if we were to discover that you came from a family of serial killers, you might think that it would be in my best interest to leave me, but you’d be wrong, your leaving me would destroy me, not save me.”

  He broke eye contact, but whispered a reply.

  “I promise.”

  “No, dammit, look me in the eye and tell me that you’ll never leave me.”

  He stared into her eyes.

  “I’ll never leave you, Jessica.”

  “Thank you, I so needed to hear you say that.”

  They grew quiet again, while still keeping their hands clasped together. A few moments later, he gave her hand a squeeze.

  “You give me too much credit.”

  “What do you mean?” she asked.

  “Leaving you, I might have considered it, but I don’t think that I could ever really do it.”

  “Because you love me?”

  “Yes, because I love you, but also because I need you.”

  “I need you too, and I love you more than life.”

  They kissed, and then he gestured out the window.

  “This trip to Bel Rey, it may just be a waste of time. Carly said that she couldn’t find anyone named Gant living in the area.”

  “But we both know that a lot of people live off the grid, so we go have a look.”

  “Yes, but I want you to know that I won’t obsess over this. My father, his family, whoever they are, they’re meaningless compared to you. When we’re done here, I’m done searching for them, my life is with you.”