by M. Z. Kelly
Bernie and I walked away to the protest of the now notorious Brown Cow bandit.
***
I decided to take Natalie up on her offer of a free massage at Buddha’s Bodyworks. I found her and Mo in the back of Karma’s modern day spa. Mo was in one of the therapy rooms with a technician, screaming.
“What’s going on?” I asked, rushing into the room.
The technician looked like someone at an accident scene. “She’s had a facial. I think she’ll be okay in a few minutes, after the toxins wear off.”
“I can’t feel my face, Kate,” Mo said, running her fingers across her cheeks. “I’m paralyzed. I can’t be paralyzed. What kind of a private dick has a frozen mug? I gotta interrogate people, intimidate them.”
“What kind of toxins?” I asked the technician.
“Snake venom,” the woman said. “It’s the latest thing, very therapeutic, like Botox, only better.”
“It’s rattlesnake venom,” Mo screamed, holding a mirror up to her face. “I’ve been snake bit. Look at my lips. I think I’m having a reaction. My lips are swelling up. I don’t need big lips. I already got big lips. Somebody get some Benadryl or one of them allergy pens. I think I’m going into shock.”
Someone brought over a pill and Mo swallowed it. Then Natalie came out of a back room and said, “Here’s a bag of ice, Mo. Lay down and put it on your face.”
Mo did as instructed, but continued to moan about needing an anti-venom treatment.
Natalie turned to me and said, “Just got out of the ice chamber.”
“The what?”
“They put you in something that looks like a big washing machine and freeze your body. It’s supposed to slow down your metabolism, prevent cellulite.” Natalie looked down. “I’m feeling kinda shriveled up down there. Hope it doesn’t ruin me sex organ. Don’t know what Clyde would do if his flute couldn’t play in the orchestra.”
While Mo continued to moan under her icepack, Natalie joined me in a nearby massage room where Bernie settled into a corner. As the technician worked on me, I again told Natalie how sorry I was about the loss of Clyde’s store and my apartment. Natalie and Clyde had come to the building in the middle of the night and Clyde was pretty upset.
“Not to worry. Clyde’s got more insurance than God. He’ll rebuild. Maybe you’ll end up with one of them glammed-out apartments like I’ve seen on those TV makeover shows.”
“I don’t know,” I said, feeling some of the day’s stress finally lifting as the technician kneaded my shoulder muscles. Then it suddenly hit me and I felt my stress coming back. I realized that I’d be living with my mother during the rebuilding process. I mentioned it to Natalie and moaned, “Maybe I’ll just go to a homeless shelter.”
“You can always stay with Mo and me,” Natalie said, clapping her hands. “We can watch each other’s backs.”
“Not a bad idea,” I said. I then told her about Earl blackmailing Karma. Natalie said something about not being surprised and then told me to be sure to stop by Voodoo Mama. I didn’t hear the rest of what she said because I drifted off to sleep, my fatigue finally catching up with me.
When I woke up, I found Natalie in the therapy room where Mo was still recovering from her snake venom facial.
“I think I’ll be okay,” Mo said, still studying herself in the hand mirror. “But I think my face looks a little lumpy.” She looked over at me. “Do I look lumpy to you?”
“You look fine,” I lied. She did look lumpy. I hoped her condition wasn’t permanent.
“Mr. Fredericks will be with you all in a moment,” the receptionist said, peeking into the room.
“Yippee!” Natalie said.
“Mr. Fredericks?” I asked.
“He’s the hair guy,” Mo reminded me. “Heard he’s pretty famous, even has a photographic collection of his make-overs at some studio over in France.”
“I wonder if he can do anything with my blow-out,” I said.
“He’s like a Picasso,” Mo explained. “He considers each customer his personal canvas.”
I tugged on wayward locks. “I could certainly use an artist.”
“Not to worry,” Natalie said. “Mr. Fredericks’ nickname is the Bikini Houdini.”
I stared at her in confusion. “Wait a minute. I thought you meant that Mr. Fredrick was a hairstylist?”
“He is,” Mo said. “He’s just working the other end of the canvas.”
“He’s a world famous waxer,” Natalie said. “Who knows, we might even end up on display in his Paris studio.” She paused, then added, “I wonder if he does butterflies or cartoon characters or…” Inspiration apparently struck. “I’ve always had this thing for bunnies.”
“He’d better not make me look like no jackrabbit or a snake,” Mo said, glancing in her mirror again. She looked over at us. “And he better not yank the carpet too hard. Last time I had me a wax’n it felt like someone used a cleaver on the beaver.”
I shook my head at my friends. “I just can’t see my nether region hanging in a studio somewhere. I’m out.”
“Come on, Kate,” Natalie said. “Mr. F is gay, so it’s nuth’n personal. It’s kinda like he’s groom’n a dog or something, but in an artistic sorta way.”
“I’m afraid I don’t…” I hesitated, searching for an excuse and trying to explain my predicament. “I’m afraid my garden is pretty well trimmed. There’s not much to work with down there.”
Natalie said something about the British taking pride in their hedges as the receptionist came in and announced, “Mr. Frederick is ready for you.”
I headed for the dressing room as Mo said to Natalie, “I better not end up looking like a reptile down there, or worse some kinda cartoon character. Lumpy’s one thing, but Bugs Bunny’s another. I got me enough problems.”
I turned back to my friends. They were greeted by a rotund little man who looked to be about sixty.
“I gotta big canvas, Mr. F,” I heard Mo say. “Just so you know, you’re gonna have to mow the pasture before you trim the garden.”
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Despite my massage and short nap, I was still exhausted by the time I arrived at HSS for the afternoon’s taskforce meeting. I took a seat between Charlie and Pearl. The same FBI players were settling in around the table, including Brian Dressler, the agency computer guru, and Fred Lundy, the cult expert on loan from NYPD. They were joined by some other agents recently assigned to the taskforce.
Kennedy and Baker were across from us, the younger of the two detectives chatting it up with Janice Taylor. The little detective was probably wondering what it would be like to get into a pair of special agent pants.
When Taylor finally took her seat, Baker came over. The little detective had a stupid grin on his face.
“Why the shit-eating grin?” I asked.
“Maybe I know things that you don’t,” Baker said.
I had no idea what he was talking about, but couldn’t resist the opening. “You’re not the only one who’s heard about Sunny Side Up.”
“What the hell is that?” Kennedy chimed in.
“New massage parlor on Sunset,” I said to Baker’s tubby companion. “Heard your partner got a grand opening special last night, something they created just for him called the short stack.”
After a couple more exchanges, one involving Baker and Kennedy trying a little too hard to be funny by telling me that since my apartment was destroyed maybe I should go live in the appliance section at Sears, the meeting got underway.
Skully, who gave me a Darth Vader death stare before the meeting began, updated us on a few things.
“As you all know, we’ve got an identity on the woman who was murdered in the office building yesterday. Rose Eileen Harris, age twenty-four. According to the coroner, Harris’ cause of death was asphyxiation. As you’ll see in a moment, her death occurred due to the intentional restriction of oxygen to the brain during sexual arousal.
“Harris had a similar backgrou
nd to Henna Patterson. She lived on the streets, had a couple of arrests for soliciting. We’re getting her mug out there today to see if we can tie her to Myra. She also had the same tattoo on her forearm that Patterson and Bryant had.”
Skully looked at Charlie. “You want to update us on the bodyguard?”
I noticed that Charlie’s dyed hair took on some red highlights in the florescent lighting. I made a mental note to tell him not to overdose on the Liquid Elvis.
“As you all know, Earl Conner is the head of security at Karma’s estate,” Charlie began, putting the remnants of a candy bar into its foil wrapper. “We learned during questioning of Karma today that he’s been blackmailing her, threatening to go to the tabloids about her being bisexual and having an affair with Vee Tomlinson.”
Charlie went back to the candy and continued, “When I questioned Conner at the station today, he admitted Karma’s helped him out financially over the past year, but denied any knowledge about her sexual orientation or making any threats to talk to the press. We also know that he’s been supplying some of the celebs at Karma’s estate with drugs for favors, but it’s small time, nothing that would warrant prosecution.”
My partner glanced over at me before telling the taskforce something that caught me unaware. “I got a call from Karma, this afternoon. She won’t cooperate with any prosecution of Conner and will deny any statements he makes to the press. Basically, she’s recanting what she’d said earlier. Based upon that, Conner will be cut loose.”
It didn’t surprise me that Karma had second thoughts about what she’d told us. The singer had been petrified over anyone finding out about her sexual preferences and probably thought that she could just deny anything Conner said to the press. Either that or she’d cut a deal involving more money for his silence.
“What about other players at the estate?” Baker asked the captain. “Can we get an update on anyone who might be a threat to Karma?”
Ellington took over and began running down a list. “We’ve done background checks and interviews with everyone who has regular access. Vee Tomlinson is Karma’s best friend and apparently her lover based upon what we learned today, but she doesn’t appear to have any reason to harm Karma.”
The head of the FBI’s side of the taskforce took a moment, shuffling through a stack of papers in front of him. “There’s also Karma’s driver, Bobby Collins, and his wife, Barbara, who’s Karma’s business manager. Both check out clean. Harley Porter, Trevon Jackson’s former manager, has been hanging around a lot. We think he’s working Karma, wanting a piece of her career, but we haven’t tied him to anything that looks suspicious. There’s a couple of maids, some hairstylists, a publicist, a doctor, and several other security people, but no one’s high on our radar as a suspect.”
“What about physical evidence?” Kennedy asked. “Any updates?”
“No matches on the fingerprints at the Bryant murder scene,” Skully said. “SID said one of the shoeprints at the Jackson and Bryant crime scenes is a match to Rose Harris. No hits on the DNA and nothing new on the fiber analysis.”
Ellington said, “I’m going to have Agent Dressler give us an update on the Internet side of things.”
The FBI computer wizard sat next to Fred Lundy. He stood up and flipped on the overhead projector. We saw a dark screen with some lighter areas that looked like the silhouette of some individuals.
“Our knowledge of the game that’s being played is changing rapidly,” Dressler began. “The screens we saw during our last meeting are inactive, but we’ve been able to use what we were given to follow the electronic breadcrumbs. We found some screens that we think Azazel didn’t intend for us to see.”
Dressler moved the cursor over the screen and clicked it. “This is one of those screens.”
The images of Myra and Rose Harris appeared. The two women were in bed, having sex. We watched, both in horror and fascination, as, after some sexual foreplay, Myra placed a noose around the young woman’s neck and slowly strangled the life out of her. When the scene was over, we watched as Myra smiled, walked over and turned off the camera.
As I’d watched the close-ups of Myra and remembered her attempt to kill me, there was something in her face that I hadn’t noticed before. Her profile seemed vaguely familiar, but the more I thought about it I decided that it was probably just my imagination working overtime.
“I guess those images speak for themselves,” Dressler said after he killed the video. “The good news is we now have some better images of Myra that we can distribute to the media. We also know from the video we’ve just seen that Myra has the same tattoo as all the other women involved.”
Dressler clicked his cursor and we saw a close-up of the now familiar tattoo on Myra’s arm.
“How were we able to get access to the computer screens we just saw?” Skully asked.
“Internet Service Providers are legally required to allow law enforcement agencies to monitor transmitted information,” Dressler explained. “A lot of what’s monitored involves the tracking of individuals who access illegal child porn sites. We were able to use similar software to backtrack anyone who has accessed the same sites that Azazel allowed us to see.
“Almost all the access was done via Internet cafés or public computers throughout the U.S. and in some foreign countries so that the viewers can remain anonymous. But we got lucky. One individual used a computer belonging to his grandson to access the sites. We arrested that subject this morning.”
Dressler nodded at Fred Lundy who clicked his cursor. We saw the image of a middle-aged man with thinning brown hair appear.
“This is Andrew Wilkerson of Duluth, Minnesota,” the cult expert explained. “Mr. Wilkerson owns a chain of hardware stores throughout the central United States. He’s very wealthy. He’s also one of twenty-four individuals who are playing an Internet game of murder with Azazel. As we said yesterday, there’s a name for these people.”
Lundy clicked the screen and a close up of Wilkerson emerged. “Meet one of the Predators.”
Chapter Forty
“We questioned Wilkerson for several hours last night and into this morning, before he finally broke and gave up a lot of information,” Special Agent Janice Taylor said, taking over for Lundy. “Our subject has several prior arrests for sexual assault and battery.”
I studied the face of the Predator, who looked like he could be your typical guy next door, as Taylor continued.
“Wilkerson told us that in recent years he became addicted to Internet porn. That addiction eventually led him into cybersex activities, including engaging in sexual roleplaying in various chat rooms. One night while he was in one of these chat rooms, he was introduced to the world of MMOGs or Massive Multiplayer On-line Games. Some of these games are dedicated to cybersex behaviors such as sexual role-playing and masturbation.”
Taylor turned to the overhead screen and clicked her cursor. “Wilkerson eventually ended up on this website. It’s a virtual world where players interface as avatars in a variety of sexual games.”
The FBI agent clicked on a menu and we watched as anatomically correct avatars met, exchanged desires via a menu of sexual behaviors, and then engaged in detailed, graphic sexual activity.
Taylor went on, “These avatars exist in a virtual world where they have roles within an on-line community. During one of Wilkerson’s sexual encounters, he told us he met an avatar named, Azazel.
“After a great deal of back and forth with Azazel, Wilkerson was told that he could buy his way into a game of sex and murder, a real game in which the actual murder of high profile individuals was promised in exchange for the buy-in price of three million dollars. Wilkerson paid the fee and became one of twenty-four Predators who entered Azazel’s Forbidden World.”
Fred Lundy came forward and said, “We are now all going to enter the Forbidden World.”
Lundy closed out the existing screens and in a moment we saw a virtual forest and then a castle appear. The cult expert nav
igated his way inside the castle where we saw graphic images of everything that had played out over the past several days, including the murders of Harriett Nordquist, Trevon Jackson, and the deadly game of sexual asphyxiation that Myra and Rose had engaged in. The final image on the screen said, Destination 10-31.
“Why are they called Predators?” Skully asked.
Dressler took over again. “As we said, the buy-in to this game involved a lot of money. Azazel promised all twenty-four players they could interface in chat rooms and make decisions about how the game progressed. While Azazel was the game controller and offered suggestions, the Predators made the actual decisions about who lived or died.
“According to Wilkerson, the murders of Harriett Nordquist and Trevon Jackson were decided by the Predators with Azazel carrying out their orders using Myra and the other cult members as proxies. But the game went wrong when Chloe Bryant refused to carry out Myra’s demands. We think Myra acted alone in torturing and killing Marilyn Bryant to try to get to Chloe.”
Dressler turned to me. “We believe that Myra also acted outside her scope of authority when she targeted Detective Sexton.”
“So the game has gone off the tracks?” Byron Ellington asked.
“Yes, we believe so,” Dressler said. “What we think was a planned series of murders that ultimately would end with the murder of Karma, became acts where Myra took things into her own hands.”
“Do we know anything more about the revenge angle?” Baker asked.
Dressler shook his head. “We can only speculate that somehow, somewhere, Karma and Myra crossed paths, but it’s just speculation. We have nothing that ties the two women together.”
“What about Azazel?” Pearl asked. “Was Wilkerson able to lead us any closer to him?”
“Azazel has never been seen, except as an Avatar. We’ve concluded that John Brighton is a fictitious name that Azazel used to set up his Internet business so that he could create the game for the band Fleshded. The original website was registered and hosted through a company in Eastern Europe. The website and mail drop used to establish it is inactive.
