The Ford Heights Murders: Your Friends Came to See Me Book 1

by DL Benning

  More than an hour later, Fred rose slowly, reluctantly. He dragged Julia’s body into the woods, covering her with wet leaves. As he turned to walk away, he noticed one of Julia’s arms was still exposed. When he pushed it under the leaves, her African beaded bracelet caught his eye. He snatched it off her wrist and shoved it into his pocket before driving away.

  Meanwhile at the boarding house, Mrs. W. was getting nervous. She hated when Julia walked home at night by herself. In the last year, two of her tenants had been murdered, leaving her on edge every night until the girls got home safely. At 9 o’clock, she called upstairs to ask the girls why Julia wasn’t home yet. The girls weren’t worried. They were still playing music and putting their hair in curlers.

  They giggled and yelled down, “She’ll be home soon. Julia is fine, Mrs. W.!”

  The next morning, with the radio on and the coffee brewing, Mrs. W. began serving breakfast. She asked the girls what time Julia had gotten in. The girls got nervous; they realized she hadn’t come home. Mrs. W. called Julia’s parents, hoping she had spent the night there. Julia’s parents said they had not seen nor heard from her in several days. Mrs. W. and Julia’s parents met at the police station to file a missing person’s report.

  The police took their statement and called in detectives to interview them. Julia was the third young woman that had gone missing from the area in the last two years. The detectives immediately drove out to Sauk Trail, the wooded area where the other two women’s bodies had been found. Rain from the night before made their search for clues more difficult. After hours of combing the woods, they were unable to find anything useful.

  The Head of Detectives, Tom Roman, thought of Fred right away. The circumstances were all too familiar: a single woman in her twenties who worked nearby and who lived on her own in the boarding house.

  Detective Roman drove straight to Fred’s house. Fred’s mother answered the door and acted very surprised by this unexpected visit. As before, Detective Roman asked to speak with Fred. As before, Fred’s mother said he was at work. Detective Roman believed Fred was the murderer, and he was determined to prove it. He suspected that Fred’s mother was lying for him.

  Tom Roman was a man of the law. He lived and breathed law and order. He wanted to bring justice for M and Carol. And now, for Julia. He took his work very seriously and felt he was failing. He had not apprehended this killer, and now another innocent young woman may have been murdered.

  Everyone in Ford Heights was on edge. Two women had been murdered, and another gone missing. All the women were single. All around the same age. All living on their own. The cases were eerily similar. The community was rocked and living in fear.

  Detective Roman waited at the local factory for Fred to finish his shift. He approached Fred carefully and asked for some time to talk to him. Fred was calm and collected. His eyes were black, with no expression. He still had Julia’s African bracelet in his pocket.

  Detective Roman played nice in the beginning, his tone matter of fact. He told Fred there had been another missing young woman reported in the area. Fred was uninterested in talking with the detective and turned toward his car.

  “Stop right there,” Detective Roman said. “I’m not finished talking to you.” Roman inquired about Fred’s whereabouts the last two days and showed him a picture of Julia. He could tell by Fred’s facial expression that Fred knew the missing woman.

  “It looks like you recognize her, Fred,” Roman said.

  Fred shook his head and smirked. “Nope, never seen her before.”

  Detective Roman reached his breaking point. “Fred, I can’t prove it, but I know you killed those two women and now possibly a third one,” he said. “Those two women were killed by the same person, and I think it was you. Mark my words, I will catch you. Maybe not today, and maybe not tomorrow, but I promise you, I will.”

  Fred walked away calmly, seemingly unbothered by the conversation. Something in him had shattered, giving way to a dark and sinister persona. There seemed to be two different sides of him, Fred thought to himself. He went home and had a late dinner with his mother. Fred told his mother about the detective’s inquiry after work. The conversation waned after that. Fred’s mother was in denial. She didn’t ask any questions; she didn’t want to know the answers. She did wonder, though—when that girl was found wrapped in one of her old blankets—whether her son was capable of something as horrendous as murder.

  When his mother went to bed, Fred snuck downstairs to the basement with a flashlight. He quietly made his way to the northwest corner. There, he moved a tall stack of grocery boxes out of the way. He pulled the bottom box from the stack and opened it. Fred sat down on the basement floor, smiling to himself. He examined his souvenirs: M’s locket, Carol’s name tag and framed photo, and now, Julia’s African bracelet. He carefully placed the women’s items back into the cigar box.

  “My treasures,” he whispered.

  Fred stacked the boxes back up and pushed them against the wall. He surveyed the area to make sure the boxes looked untouched, then quietly returned to his bedroom in the attic.

  That night, Fred could not sleep because he could feel Julia’s spirit sitting in the corner chair. He kept trying to close his eyes, and she kept smiling at him. He was terrified. This tortured him all night. He never slept at all.

  ***

  After some time had passed, Julia’s dad went to pick up her belongings at Mrs. W.’s boarding house. Mrs. W. admitted feeling like she failed. She had promised to look after these young women, and now two were dead and one missing. Julia’s dad wanted to comfort Mrs. W., but he had no emotion left. His family had just been devastated again.

  Detective Roman interviewed Julia’s family. He looked through her room, hoping to find clues to what had happened. He also went to the library. The librarians told him they hadn’t seen anything unusual. He showed the librarians a picture of Fred. They knew him, but they had not seen him the night of the Julia’s disappearance. Detective Roman asked whether they had ever seen him talking to Julia. The librarians said they saw Julia and Fred talking from time to time, but the two didn’t seem like friends.

  Detective Roman requested a list of all the books that Julia had checked out in the last year. He then asked to see Fred’s library card. There were some matches—books on Africa. The detective went back to Fred’s house and asked him about the African books. Fred was smooth, calm, and seemed not at all disturbed at being questioned about the missing woman. Detective Roman thought Fred was way too calm. Roman stole a glance around the living room of Fred’s mother’s house. He wondered why a young, healthy man was still living at home. Something just didn’t feel right there.

  Six months later, Julia’s body was discovered in the woods. She had also been strangled, her body hidden in Sauk Trail—the same as M and Carol. Detective Roman knew Fred was the killer. He just knew it. Unfortunately, he could never prove it. This was the singular regret of his career. Those unsolved cases haunted him until his death, many years later. Julia’s mother never fully recovered from her grief. The deaths of two daughters—Julia’s and the baby Paulette’s—left her emotionally devastated.

  —Chapter 7—

  Fred Enlists

  Fred was feeling pressure from Detective Roman. Several times a week, Roman would follow Fred home from work. The detective would pause in front of Fred’s mother’s house, wait for Fred to get out of his car, stare at him for a few uncomfortable moments, and drive away.

  This surveillance had started to grate on Fred’s nerves. He felt like there were others watching him, too. Whether they were other police officers, ghosts of his victims, or his own guilty conscience, Fred couldn’t be sure. But they were creating many sleepless nights and uncomfortable days for him.

  Fred’s mother had started to question him about where he was going whenever he left the house. While this had been their normal routine most of his life, her inquiries now felt more like interrogations. Since the night they had
first gone to the police station together, Fred suspected that his mother no longer trusted him.

  Feeling trapped, Fred decided he needed a change. He enlisted in the Air Force. He figured he would probably get drafted soon, anyway. Why not go on his own terms? He left the Air Force recruitment office with a renewed lease on life. He would leave for Texas in four weeks. Then, after eight weeks of basic training, he would be transferred to Germany. This would be a fresh start for Fred, and he was ready for it.

  As he drove home, his excitement started slipping away. How would he break the news to Mother? She would never understand why he was leaving her. He drove around town for hours before summoning the courage to go home.

  As soon as he walked in the back door, his mother jumped up out of her recliner. Fred had just taken off his coat and was about to hang it on the hook by the back door. He heard a shuffling noise behind him. When he turned around, there stood his mother with an angry expression.

  She began with her daily interrogation. Sternly, she scolded, “Fred, where have you been? Do you know how late it is? Where have you been all this time? I have been waiting up for you.”

  Even if Fred had wanted to answer her, he didn’t have a chance. Her questions came out in rapid succession. He pushed past her, calling out, “It’s none of your Goddamn business where I’ve been. Just leave me the hell alone!” All he wanted to do was get upstairs to his bedroom. He knew he was safe up there. His mother rarely came upstairs.

  Fred took some time to gather his thoughts. He knew that no matter what he said to her, it would be wrong. He slowly made his way downstairs to announce to his mother that he was enlisting in the Air Force.

  Fred’s mother was in the kitchen, heating up his dinner. He sat down at the kitchen table. As she set his plate on the table, Fred said, “Mother, I have made a big decision. I have enlisted in the Air Force, and I will be leaving in a month.”

  His mother said nothing. She poured him a glass of milk and sat down at the kitchen table. Fred wondered if she had heard him. He said, “Mother did you hear me, I am…”

  Before he could finish the sentence, his mother broke into tears. “Why, why would you do that? Why are you leaving me? How can you do that to me? First your father, and now you too.” Her emotions moved quickly into anger. “You, you are a bad son! You hear me? You are a horrible, selfish son! If you go, you will never be allowed back in this house. Do you understand me? Never!” With that, she left the room.

  Fred listened to her words quietly. He ate his dinner in silence. He had known his decision would not be received well. There was no good way to tell her. He needed to get out of town, and he felt this was his only way out. He also knew—or at least hoped—that, in time, his mother would get over it.

  The four weeks passed quickly. Fred had his papers in order, one packed suitcase, and his train ticket. His mother drove him to the train station in silence. He tried to hug and kiss her goodbye, but she pulled away from him. Fred was hurt by her rejection.

  Basic training was a blur of drills and marches. Before Fred could even settle into the routine, he was on his way to Germany. He did not speak the language, and he only knew a few guys from his unit. Fred was a loner in the service, too.

  As he adapted to his new life, he realized he needed a diversion to fill his free time. He saw a flyer for an Air Force boxing league. He had put on some muscle during basic training. He was in the best shape of his life, and he liked the way he looked and felt. Fred decided to sign up for the league. He knew nothing about boxing, but he had plenty of time, a willingness to learn, and an abundance of inner rage.

  Fred learned boxing very quickly. He loved the brutality of the sport. He soon became the lightweight champion in the league. The boxing ring provided an outlet for Fred’s anger. Fred won most of his fights, frequently by knocking out his opponents.

  By day, Fred worked at the base’s radio station. Most nights, he boxed. One night, his fellow servicemen were going off base to a local dance club. They invited him along. At first, Fred declined, but then decided to go with them. It had been nearly a year since he had been to a dance hall.

  Fred didn’t drink much, but his new buddies sure did. Over time, he learned to enjoy their company. Going out once a week became the norm. They had lots of laughs together. There were many pretty girls at the club, too, but Fred was still too shy to talk to any of them.

  One night at the club, a beautiful young woman approached Fred. She had long, wavy, black hair and bright red, full lips. She was sexy. Nothing like any of the girls Fred knew back home. She introduced herself as Serenita Bella. She had an Italian accent, and Fred liked the way she talked. Throughout their conversation, Fred seemed shy, but charming.

  Serenita was a stewardess. She traveled often and loved life. Fred was intrigued by Serenita’s beauty and her independence. Serenita liked Fred, too. They spent many evenings together at the dance club before Fred invited her one of his boxing matches.

  From the ring, Fred spotted Serenita in the middle of the crowd. He was so drawn to her. He could feel himself falling in love with her. But he couldn’t tell if Serenita shared these feelings. He suspected there were other men in her life, ones she found more attractive than Fred. Soon these suspicions were confirmed.

  In time, Serenita made herself less available to Fred. She stopped coming to see his fights and rarely showed up at the dance club. This made Fred very unhappy. Rejected once again, he felt angry and abandoned by Serenita. Why was she ignoring him? He wanted answers from her. He set out to get them.

  Fred left the Air Force base and went to Serenita’s apartment building. There were no lights on in the building when he got there. He found a large tree across the street where he could sit and wait. He was perfectly positioned to see the front door of the apartment building.

  Hours later, Fred heard Serenita’s laugh. He jumped up. Then he heard a man’s voice, too. Fred hid behind the tree. He watched the couple walk up the steps to the front door. Serenita attempted in vain to unlock the door. The man was kissing her neck, and she was giggling. She dropped her keys several times, which caused her to giggle even more. Fred was livid as he watched them carry on.

  Serenita and her male friend finally staggered into the apartment building. Fred watched in disbelief. She was cheating on him! How could she cheat on him? His anger had grown to jealous rage. Fred waited in the darkness, his temperature rising. A couple hours later, the apartment building door opened. The man came stumbling out. He stopped to adjust his clothes and regain his bearings. He seemed to be trying to figure out which direction he needed to take.

  As soon as the man walked away, Fred ran up to the apartment building. The door had not been pulled shut, and he entered easily. He didn’t know Serenita’s apartment number, so he crept down the hallway, hoping to hear her voice. About halfway down the hall, he heard her cough. He knocked quietly on the door. After a few moments, she answered the door, laughing and only half dressed. She was unsteady on her feet and braced herself against the door frame. Her head drooped noticeably. She appeared to be drunk and unable to stand. Fred grabbed her before she fell. He raised her head, forcing her to look at him. She gasped. Fred knew she was expecting someone else.

  He shoved her into the apartment, knocking her to the floor. They struggled. He started choking her, and she tried to fight him off. She screamed for help, but Fred covered her mouth to silence her screams. He pinned her to the ground, and she begged for him to stop.

  He was yelling at her over and over. “I thought you loved me! How could you cheat on me? How could you?” His free hand also reached for her throat. Serenita fought back, scratching his face.

  The tussle ended abruptly. A tall man—Serenita’s lover—grabbed Fred off Serenita and threw Fred to the ground. He punched Fred in the face and body repeatedly. Fred was bleeding badly, and his nose was broken. He struggled to stand up and stumbled out the door. Fred was gasping for air. The man lunged at him, and Fred ran off into the nig
ht.

  Fred returned to base as quickly as he could. He was dazed and badly wounded. The officer in charge saw him and rushed to help him into the barracks. He wanted to know what had happened to Fred. Fred quickly made up a story about two men jumping him in town. The officer sent Fred to the infirmary for medical care.

  Fred spent a month in the hospital. He was unconscious for several days. He had a broken nose, a badly broken arm, and six broken ribs. He was severely bruised over most of his body. At night, he struggled to sleep, both from the physical pain and from his memories of the women he had murdered in the States. He could see their faces and hear their voices.

  He remembered the warm autumn evening M had first caught his eye at the dance hall back home. How struck he was by her beauty. He reminded himself how much courage it had taken him to finally ask her to dance that night. He had fond memories of their time together. That was, until she started dating Clark. Fred wondered how she could cheat on him. How could she reject him, just cast him away like she had? She had to die. She had to be stopped. He smiled as he remembered first her begging for her life and then the power he felt when her life left her body.

  Then there was Carol. He could still see her beautiful red hair. How special he felt the night she smiled at him from across the dance hall. How excited he was to go on their first date. He thought how different things would have been if she had just married him and moved in with him and Mother. He could not understand why she wouldn’t marry him. Why did she choose George over him? Bad choice, Carol. Bad choice, he scolded her in his mind. He felt a rush of excitement at the memory of her pleading for her life as he strangled her to death.