Victim Six

by Gregg Olsen

  Midnight hung around the magazine and newspaper rack near the bathrooms. The racks were filled with brochures and flyers for getaways and activities that targeted the interests of the out-of-state traveler. There were also scads of publications with names like Coastal Homes and Saltwater Residences advertising the good life. Midnight sat across from the racks at a table bolted to the floor, prison-cafeteria style. The tops of her breasts and her pretty eyes were her calling card. She had the kind of emotional intellect that could determine who wanted to look and who wanted to touch. She laughed about it with her girlfriends.

  “To get a guy, all you have to do is look at his package, then flick your eyes to theirs,” she said. “And bam! If they look back at you, you’ve got a shot.”

  She’d give a nod, and the fellow with the lustful look in his eyes would slip into the bathroom. Making certain the room was empty, she’d follow. The stall next to the urinal trough was ideal. The engines below rumbled as they churned the water, obscuring the muffled moans of pleasure. She’d shut the door, turn the lock, and go to work.

  Her friends asked her how it was that the ferry crew, the skipper in particular, didn’t bust her or at the very least kick her off the boat, but she just laughed.

  “Who do you think Tasha’s daddy is?”

  That evening, work done, Midnight sat on a bench on the plaza near the ferry landing and watched a fountain that she thought spurted water like ejaculate: one pulse, then another, weaker one. She put on a pair of walking shoes and slipped the pumps she wore for most of her “shift” back into her oversize purse.

  “You look lonely,” a man’s voice said.

  “You look horny,” she shot back, after a quick check of his crotch.

  “I might be.”

  “You might be a horny cop too. Are you a cop?”

  “Nope.”

  “Then Midnight just might be able to take care of your problem.”

  The man flashed a smile, his teeth white and straight. He was clean-cut, and even from five feet away she could smell his cologne. He wasn’t some dirty, trashy john.

  “My car’s over there,” he said, indicating the parkade.

  “All right,” she said, glancing at her watch. A half hour until the last ferry took workers from Bremerton to Port Orchard. “Let’s get going. I have things do to.”

  He showed that big white smile again. “Me too.”

  Darrin Jones had answered service calls for Otis Elevators for twenty-seven years. It was a business, he unfailingly said whenever anyone inquired about the work he did, that had its “ups and downs.”

  The Monday morning he was called out to the Bremerton parkade was cool and breezy, with a band of silver clouds heading over the Olympics and on their way to bump into the Cascades. The parkade job was considered a low priority, as there were adequate stairways and reasonable access for disabled drivers on the first level. The call that the elevator had been jammed was ten hours old.

  Darrin pulled into the parkade, disturbing a couple of crows that had found the confines of the concrete structure, invited by its debris field of fast-food leavings. He parked his gray panel truck in front of the elevator and looked at his wristwatch. He’d made good enough time that he could kick back and smoke before getting to work, despite signs posted that admonished him not to light up. On the seat next to him was a folder holding the details of a Caribbean cruise that he and his wife, Lynnette, were scheduled to take the following Monday, the day he officially kicked off his retirement.

  Five workdays to freedom!

  Another car pulled in and drove up to the next level as he crushed out his cigarette and made his way toward the elevator doors. He noticed a thin brown smear two thirds of the way down at the point where the facing doors met one another.

  People are pigs, he thought.

  For a second his mind flashed on his retirement and how dealing with anyone he didn’t want to bother with was almost over.

  Darrin pushed the button, but the elevator didn’t respond. He checked the fuse box around the corner.

  Looks good. Damn thing’s just jammed.

  And then Darrin did what anyone in his position would do, despite hundreds of hours of training and being told that a “machine should never be forced” by the operator. He punched a slot-head screwdriver between the door gaskets and worked it like a lever. It was jammed, but not so much that he couldn’t wrestle it open as he’d done a thousand times before. He widened his stance, tucked his fingers into the opening, and grunted.

  The doors slowly moved, but the second he could see inside, Darrin Jones wished he’d bailed on that service call.

  The floor had a spray of blood.

  “Holy shit,” he said under his breath.

  He knew that he was required to call the police whenever there was anything suspicious to report. Company policy was precise on it. But he also knew that a call to the police would mean irritating discussion and paperwork.

  I’m going to the Caribbean, he thought. Lynnette and I don’t deserve this.

  Darrin looked around. It was quiet. He went back to his van and retrieved some rags and a canister of cleaning fluid. He hated the company. He hated the people who pissed, defecated, or bled in his elevators.

  He wasn’t going to call it in, and he sure wasn’t going to miss the rum punch he’d been dreaming about.

  Chapter Twelve

  April 10, 9 a.m.

  Port Orchard

  Evil can lodge in the psyche like a Partridge Family song that catches a clock radio listener off guard as they wake from a night of steady slumber. The words that spewed from the man who’d called Serenity to detail what he claimed he’d done to the dead woman in the bay were like that. She replayed his words as she showered, brushed her teeth, and dressed in her work uniform: a pair of black jeans and a white sweater. She grabbed her notebook, purse, and car keys. She skipped breakfast, not feeling hungry.

  She had a million more questions for the man, and she half hoped he’d call again, although the thought of it made her empty stomach turn. She wondered why he’d called her instead of another reporter for a bigger paper. The timbre of his voice had resonated in a strange way too. It wasn’t that he had an accent or anything distinguishable; it was kind of an average voice. Slightly mechanical, maybe.

  Charlie Keller met her by the office door.

  “I asked Josh Anderson to come up,” he said.

  Serenity rolled her eyes. “Great, Charlie. He’s always hitting on me.”

  Charlie lowered his voice as he led her into the conference room, “You’ll be sorry the day dirty old men don’t hit on you. But you’re too young to know that right now.”

  Josh was already ensconced in the boardroom/interview room. He had a Seahawks mug of burned-on-the-bottom-of-the-pot newsroom coffee and a rolled-up copy of the Seattle Times.

  “No mention of any missing girl,” he said, thumping the paper on the back of a chair.

  “Maybe no one knows she’s missing,” Serenity said, taking a seat across from the Kitsap County Sheriff’s Office detective. He was handsome, confident. Maybe a little too cocky, she thought. Her eyes landed on his open shirt collar, and she wondered why he felt compelled to expose that tuft of slightly graying chest hair.

  “Charlie says you got a nasty crank call,” he said, eyeing her.

  She nodded at the understatement. The call had been nasty indeed.

  “If it was a crank,” she said.

  “Tell the detective what he said to you.” Charlie fished a powdered donut from a box that Serenity suspected was left over from the day before, when the ad staff had brought in the fried pastries to kick off their “Donut Make Sense to Advertise” promotion. White confectioner’s sugar drifted like snow onto his robin’s-egg-blue tie, but Charlie didn’t appear to notice.

  “Look,” she said, “I’m really not comfortable relaying all of the disgusting things that creep said to me.”

  “I can take it,” Josh said. His tone was b
reezy, almost tauntingly so.

  Serenity let out a sigh. “Of course you can.”

  “Tell him,” Charlie finally said, dusting the sugar from his tie.

  She took out her notepad and hurled what that man had said to her across the table.

  Sex toy.

  Kitchen rolling pin.

  Duct tape.

  Wire restraints.

  Slice ’n dice.

  The last one caught the detective’s attention.

  “Sounds like a commercial on late-night cable.”

  “Yeah, if your channel is Hell TV. Seriously, Detective Anderson—”

  “Call me Josh,” he said.

  He was hitting on her again. Charlie winked at Serenity—at least, she thought he had.

  “Okay. Josh,” she said. “The man was a freak and enjoyed every minute of the call. I wouldn’t be surprised if he was masturbating while he talked.”

  “That wouldn’t surprise me, either. Get his number?”

  “Do you mean did I write it down so I could call him back for more of his vile talk?”

  Josh narrowed his brow. He seemed to almost enjoy making her squirm a little. “No, that’s not what I mean. On your cell phone. Did you capture his number?”

  “He called my landline. And no, there was no number. ‘Private caller’ was the designation that came up.”

  Serenity picked at a cinnamon twist but determined it was beyond stale. Almost petrified, she thought.

  “Did you notice anything about his voice—anything that might help ID him? You know, while the conversation is fresh.”

  Serenity thought for a moment while the two men looked on. “His voice was odd.”

  “Odd?” Josh asked.

  “Yes. Kind of bland.”

  The detective pressed her for details. “Old or young?”

  She studied him with a prolonged stare, in a manner that was meant to show she was doing so. “Old. About your age.”

  Charlie reached for another donut, an attempt to mitigate the tension in the room—or simply because those donuts were pretty tasty. Sugar and all.

  Josh’s face with a little red, but he tried not to let on that the insult had struck a nerve.

  Almost immediately, Serenity amended her answer.

  “I didn’t mean that he was an old man like you,” she said. “I mean mature. You know…someone middle-aged.”

  Josh Anderson grinned. The pretty young reporter had challenged him a little, and he liked it. If she was a little sorry that she hurt his feelings, that meant that she was interested.

  All the pretty girls were.

  “Every time I do this, I sound like Mickey Mouse,” Melody said, setting down the voice changer while her husband impatiently looked on. “I just can’t do it.”

  Sam took the device and moved the slide control, modulating timbre and pitch.

  “You can. And you will,” he said. “It just takes practice. First time I did it, I thought I sounded like Darth Vader.” He pushed the headset back at her, and she took it.

  “All right,” she said. “I’ll practice.” She dialed Sam’s cell number, and he answered.

  “Hi,” she said.

  “Slide the settings,” he said.

  “Okay. Here I am.”

  Her voice sounded unsure but more masculine. Not quite an automated digital tone but something less than human.

  “Lower,” he said. “But just a bit—don’t overdo it, babe.”

  Melody moved the control almost imperceptibly.

  “How’s this?” she asked in a voice that sounded distinctly completely male.

  “Love it,” he said. “Now, say what I want you to say.”

  She looked down at some notes that she’d written to remind her just how she was supposed to play it.

  “You’re a hot little bitch,” she said, hesitating.

  “Tell her,” he said.

  “I like that top you wore the other day. The one that showed off your body.”

  He looked at her from across the room. One hand was in his pants; the other clamped the phone to his ear.

  “Why are you doing this to me?” he asked.

  “Because you deserve it, bitch,” she said.

  “I’m going to hang up right now.”

  “Hang up on me, bitch, and you die.”

  He took his phone from his ear and motioned for her to come. Melody took off the headset and started toward him.

  “Pull off your panties,” he said. “You’re a very good student, and you need a reward. I got something for you.”

  Melody did what she was instructed. It wasn’t about being acquiescent or afraid. The fear just gave way to the thrill of what they did together. She didn’t think that what her husband was doing to her just then was any kind of a violation. It was a gift. She accepted him and whatever he put into her. She knew deep down what he wanted. He’d told her time and again.

  “You’re an obedient bitch, but you’re not as pretty as she is. And I’ll bet she’s a whole lot more fun in bed.”

  “All I want to do is please you,” she said, dropping to her knees.

  “Then shut up and suck. You talk too much.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  April 13, 4 p.m.

  Port Orchard

  Donna Solomon did not fit the profile of a mother of a prostitute. She had never had any problems with men, drugs, or the law. To look at her was to see the very image of professionalism and personal accountability. At fifty-two, Donna worked as a charge nurse in the maternity ward of Harrison Medical Center in Bremerton, a job she’d held for more than fifteen years. She was a round presence with stick legs and a slight bulge around her tummy and a butt far bigger than she wanted. Heredity, she figured, thinking of her own mother and the scourge of a large buttocks and piano legs. She worked out four days a week at the Port Orchard Curves, doing a mild weight circuit and twenty-five minutes of cardio to Moby songs. Her butt was always going to be big, but she didn’t think it had to get any bigger. And yet despite all the things she tried to do to better herself—Curves, continuing education classes at Olympic College that had nothing to do with nursing and the New York Times crossword puzzle online every day—she had her hard luck too.

  She divorced her husband, Zachary, after their adopted daughter, Marissa, put them through the wringer in ways that no parent could or should endure. Marissa had set a fire in the kitchen when she was six, run away from home at ten. By thirteen there was no more room for pretending that there was anything they could do to be the close family they had desired when they had brought her home in a private adoption from a Russian orphanage.

  Donna Solomon rarely spoke of Marissa, although hospital administrators and other nurses at Harrison would happily have lent a sympathetic ear. When Marissa, who stopped using her given name in favor of Midnight Cassava, was arrested in a Bremerton Police Department prostitution sting at a local park, she was given her second chance. It turned out she wasn’t the target of the sting, but a Bremerton cop had been. Midnight was one of the chief witnesses in a case and ended up with a lightning-fast plea deal.

  What should have been a gift was turned into a sense of invincibility. Midnight had convinced herself that she was able to do whatever she wanted. She continued working the streets, the ferry, wherever she could score a john, partying the money away and doing whatever it was she wanted. It was the ultimate F-U to her mother, of course. Donna accepted that the daughter she chose to love had abandoned her. She could not return any of the love she received. Everything was about money, blame, and the choices others made.

  When Midnight was seven months pregnant, she showed up at the nurses’ station looking for her mother. It was the first time she’d been to the hospital since she was a teen and was determined, it had seemed, to make her mother’s life as miserable as possible. She had left with a physician’s bag of drug samples. No charges were pressed because Donna was able to retrieve the missing samples. Donna had been pulling strings for Marissa sinc
e the day they brought her home from the agency.

  After Midnight’s return and the impending pregnancy, however, things started to change. It started with a few phone calls. Mother and daughter met for lunch a couple of times at a drive-through in Navy Yard City, on the edge of downtown Bremerton. By the time Tasha was born, her mother and grandmother had come to an understanding: if the little girl was to have any semblance of a home life, they’d have to work together.

  Donna never knew who the father was, and understood that it was probably something her daughter didn’t know for sure. She told herself that it didn’t matter. No man was needed. She’d help out however she could, and she’d be there whenever Midnight needed her, no matter the conditions. The terms, as she eventually learned, were to watch the baby on weekends and after shifts—but only when asked.

  “I’ll call you when I need you, Mother. Don’t think about interfering with my life or my daughter’s. As long as you get that, we’ll be fine.”

  Donna didn’t argue. She knew that Midnight had no real job. The money that she used to pay for her apartment over one of Port Orchard’s downtown junk shops was from prostitution. Or maybe selling drugs. Whatever it was, it was bad news. Over the first few months of Tasha’s life, Donna could see a change in her troubled daughter, and she held out hope that someday things would work out after all.

  Not only for the baby but for her own broken heart.

  It was Tuesday, and Donna Solomon hadn’t heard from her daughter since Saturday. She knew the rules. She knew that trying to involve herself in Tasha’s life was a risk. Too much interest might feel like a hard shove to a daughter whose love she wanted more than anything.