The Death Sculptor

by Chris Carter

  Ninety-One

  Captain Blake sat still for a while longer, her gaze fixed on the photographs on her desk. She knew that birthmarks were as unique as fingerprints. The odds of two people having the same exact birthmark were about one in sixty-four million. Not even identical twins share them. Two individuals having the exact same six birthmarks, in a small cluster like the one she was looking at, was virtually impossible.

  ‘So that means that this guy was . . .’ She stabbed her finger over the out-of-focus arm on the photo from Littlewood’s apartment.

  ‘Andrew Nashorn,’ Garcia said. ‘The killer’s second victim.’

  Her eyes glint with a new sparkle. ‘So they knew each other?’

  ‘It looks that way,’ Hunter said. ‘Or at least they did a long time ago.’

  She turned the picture over – nothing. ‘When was this taken?’

  ‘We can send it to the lab for analysis, but judging by how young Nathan Littlewood looks, and the fact that he got married twenty-seven years ago and in that photo he isn’t wearing a wedding ring, I’d say that picture is probably twenty-seven to thirty years old.’

  Garcia agreed.

  Captain Blake leaned back on her chair again, clearly running something over in her mind. She looked up, tilting her body to the right and looking past both detectives towards her office door. ‘Where’s the DA girl?’

  Garcia shrugged.

  ‘I haven’t seen her since this morning,’ Hunter said.

  ‘Well, it looks like she could be right.’ Captain Blake stood up. ‘This killer could have a set agenda. That was her reading of the shadow image cast by the sculpture found at the killer’s second crime scene, wasn’t it? Two victims claimed, two more to go.’ She moved around to the front of her rosewood desk. ‘Well, he’s now claimed his third one. We now know that two of them knew each other. Because of the nature of their jobs, I have no doubt Derek Nicholson and Andrew Nashorn were at least acquainted. Do we have any idea if Nicholson knew the third victim? Was he part of the same group of friends all those years ago?’

  Hunter brought his left hand up to his neck to massage it. ‘I just came across this information about an hour ago, Captain. I haven’t had time to do a lot of digging yet. But we’ll obviously be looking into that. I’ve got a box of old photographs upstairs that might still gives us something else. But we now have a whole new angle to look at.’

  ‘I’d say that’s definitely a sniff of something, Captain,’ Garcia said.

  The captain still looked ill at ease, but Garcia was right, they did have something new. She checked her watch and opened the door. ‘Well, get digging then, and let me know the moment you get anything. Right now, I’ve got to go talk to the Chief of Police and the Los Angeles District Attorney.’

  Ninety-Two

  Hunter spent most of the night going over every photograph inside that cardboard box. He found more wedding pictures, old holiday snapshots, several photographs of Nathan Littlewood with other friends and family, and a huge collection of photos of Harry, Littlewood’s only son – his birth, his first ever steps, his first day at school, his graduation, his first prom. Basically, every important occasion in his life until he left home. Littlewood was certainly a proud father.

  After hours of image searching, Hunter was sure that Andrew Nashorn appeared in none of those photographs. That was all they had – an out-of-focus arm at the edge of an old picture, identifiable only by the small cluster of birthmarks on his triceps.

  Hunter had examined every face in every snapshot with a magnifying glass. He was fairly certain that none of them was Derek Nicholson, but ‘fairly certain’ wasn’t certain enough. He would contact both of Nicholson’s daughters, Olivia and Allison, and check if they had any pictures of their father in his early twenties for comparison. Maybe Nicholson was one of those whose appearance drastically changed as they grew older.

  Hunter finally managed to fall asleep just before five in the morning. He woke up at 8:22 a.m. The scar on the back of his neck was itching like crazy. He had a long shower, hoping that the warm water he allowed to drum down on his nape for five solid minutes would soothe some of that itch.

  It didn’t work.

  When Hunter got to his office an hour later, Garcia was sitting at his desk, shoulders hunched over his keyboard, attentively reading something on his computer screen. He looked up as Hunter placed the box of photographs on his desk.

  ‘Anything?’ Garcia asked expectantly, nodding at the box.

  ‘Nope, that was it. I’ve been through every photograph, every face. That picture in the park is all we got. If Nathan Littlewood also knew Derek Nicholson, there’s no evidence of it in this box.’

  ‘Yeah, but that doesn’t mean that he didn’t. I’ve got four people on this, digging like demented moles, searching for anything that could link Nicholson to Littlewood, going back twenty-five to thirty years.’

  Hunter nodded.

  Garcia stood up and walked over to the coffee jug in the corner of the room. ‘Just to be one hundred per cent sure, I asked one of the image technicians to compare the birthmarks from the picture you got in Littlewood’s apartment and the ones on the autopsy photographs. There is no doubt. Dimensions, distance, pattern, everything, it’s all exactly the same. That’s Nashorn’s arm.’

  Garcia didn’t need to ask, he could see the lack of sleep in his partner’s face: he poured two cups of black coffee and handed one to Hunter.

  ‘Guess what,’ Alice said as she stepped through the door, a proud smile on her face.

  Hunter and Garcia turned at the same time to face her.

  ‘They knew each other.’

  Ninety-Three

  Despite the fresh makeup, the neatly combed hair, and the immaculately ironed skirt and blouse, Alice looked tired. Her eyes were what gave it away. The grit that came from lack of sleep was almost visible in them.

  Neither Hunter nor Garcia said a word.

  Alice placed her briefcase on her desk. ‘They knew each other,’ she repeated. ‘Andrew Nashorn and Nathan Littlewood knew each other.’

  Hunter hadn’t seen Alice since yesterday morning. She hadn’t come back to the office in the afternoon. He knew she hadn’t heard the news from him, and judging by how excited she sounded, and the fact that he and Garcia were her audience, it was obvious that she didn’t know a thing about the photograph he had found in Littlewood’s apartment.

  ‘We already . . .’ Garcia started saying, but Hunter interrupted him.

  ‘How do you know this?’

  Her proud smile stretched. Alice retrieved two sheets of paper from her briefcase. ‘This is part of Nathan Littlewood’s cellphone bill.’ She handed one of the sheets to Hunter. ‘They were delivered yesterday while both of you were out. This one . . .’ she passed him the second sheet, ‘. . . comes from the cellphone records we obtained from Andrew Nashorn.’

  Hunter didn’t have to search the lists. Alice had highlighted the numbers. The same exact phone number appeared three times in Nashorn’s records, and twice in Littlewood’s.

  ‘That’s the number for an escort girl. Independent, not an agency,’ Alice said. ‘They both used the same escort girl.’

  Doubt colored the face of both detectives.

  ‘Escort?’ Garcia asked.

  ‘That’s right. She calls herself Nicole.’ Alice paused and lifted her right index finger. ‘Let me rephrase that . . . “Submissive Nicole”. She caters for a specific type of clientele.’

  Garcia put down his coffee cup. ‘OK, I agree that finding out that Nashorn and Littlewood used the same call girl is something we definitely should look into, but that doesn’t necessarily mean they knew each other.’

  ‘She’s not a call girl,’ Alice corrected him. ‘She’s a submissive escort. She offers a very specialized service. Her words, not mine.’

  ‘You’ve talked to her?’ Garcia was genuinely surprised.

  ‘Last night.’ Alice nodded.

  Neither detective
was expecting that.

  ‘Look, I knew you were both out chasing new leads. I came across this information late yesterday, and decided to dig a little deeper instead of waiting. It so happened that I managed to meet up with her last night, and we talked.’

  ‘How did you manage to get her talking?’ Garcia knew from experience that getting anyone related to LA’s illegal sex trade to talk was no easy feat.

  ‘I proved to her I wasn’t a cop or a reporter, and guaranteed her that whatever information she gave me, it would never be detrimental to her.’

  ‘And that worked?’

  ‘Well, I also have different avenues open to me that you, as police officers, usually don’t.’

  ‘You paid her,’ Garcia concluded.

  ‘It works every time,’ Alice admitted. ‘How do you think the DA’s office keeps its informers, by giving them donuts and hot milk? She’s a submissive escort. She gets paid to do worse things than simply talk. Getting money in exchange for a conversation was probably her easiest ever job. Plus I gave her a free get-out-of-jail card. I told her to call me if she ever needed a lawyer, and in her profession that’s a very attractive proposition.’

  Garcia couldn’t argue. ‘So what did you talk about?’

  ‘You can hear it for yourself.’ Alice took a Dictaphone out of her briefcase and placed it on Hunter’s desk. ‘I’ve done this kind of thing before.’ She gave both detectives a quick wink.

  Surprised, Hunter and Garcia approached the desk.

  ‘It’s all cued up,’ Alice said. ‘I had just showed her Andrew Nashorn’s picture.’ She pressed the play button.

  ‘Oh yes, Paul, he’s pretty much a regular. I see him about once a month. Sometimes more, sometimes less.’

  The voice that came through the tiny speaker was very feminine and sensual, the voice of someone who was probably in her mid-twenties; but there was a hard edge to it, the kind you’d expect from a streetwise person.

  ‘Paul?’ Alice’s questioning voice came through the speakers.

  ‘That’s the name he uses. Look, I know that none of my clients use their real names. He told me his name was Paul, I call him Paul. That’s how it works, lady.’ There was a short pause. ‘He likes playing rough.’

  ‘Rough?’

  ‘Yep. He likes to tie me down, gag me, sometimes blindfold me, slap me about a little . . . you know, play the tough guy.’ Nicole chuckled. ‘It’s all right, I enjoy it too.’

  Hunter guessed that last comment was made because Alice had pulled a shocked face.

  ‘Did he come to you?’

  ‘Sometimes. Sometimes I went to his boat. Sometimes he hired a professional dungeon. There are a few scattered around LA. The equipment is better.’

  ‘And how long has he been a . . . client?’

  ‘A few years.’

  ‘When was the last time you saw him?’

  ‘Not so long ago.’

  ‘Could you be more specific?’

  There was a new short pause, soundtracked by the sound of objects being shuffled. Hunter presumed that Nicole had reached into a handbag or a drawer.

  ‘Just over five weeks ago, May 13th.’

  ‘OK, how about this guy?’

  Alice paused the recording. ‘Right then I showed her a picture of Nathan Littlewood,’ she clarified before letting it play on.

  ‘Yeah, I see him too . . . from time to time. Not as often as I see Paul, though. This one calls himself Woods.’ A more animated chuckle this time. ‘I wouldn’t quite put it that way, if you know what I mean, but that’s the name he likes, that’s the name I call him.’

  ‘Was he also . . . “rough”?’

  Nicole gave a dirty, full-throated laugh that sounded too old for her. ‘All my clients are rough in their own way, lady. That’s why they come to me and not some two-buck-an-hour ho from West Hollywood. They get what they pay for here.’

  In the office, Alice subtly shook her head, obviously failing to understand how any woman could subject herself to verbal and physical abuse and other humiliations for money.

  ‘And when did you see him last?’

  Some more pages flipping. ‘Right at the beginning of the month, June 2nd.’

  ‘Let me show you one more picture.’ Looking at Hunter and Garcia, Alice mouthed the words ‘Derek Nicholson’.

  ‘Umm, no. I’ve never seen him before.’

  ‘Are you sure?’

  Several silent seconds. ‘Yep, positive.’

  ‘So he wasn’t a client?’

  ‘That’s what I just said, lady.’

  ‘OK, just one more thing. Do you know if Paul and Woods knew each other? Have they ever done a session together with you, or something like that?’

  ‘No, I don’t do group sessions. Way too intense. And my clients are too greedy. When they book me, they want me all for themselves.’ Another throaty laugh. ‘But yes, they knew each other. That’s how Woods became a client. When Paul first started seeing me years ago, he said that he had a friend who would probably love to see me too. I told him to pass his friend my number. A week later Woods called me.’

  Ninety-Four

  When Alice turned the recording device off, Hunter brought her up to speed on what he’d found in Nathan Littlewood’s apartment the day before. She couldn’t hide her disappointment that her big discovery turned out to be not so big after all, but Hunter knew it was significant. What he’d found out from the picture he’d got from Littlewood’s apartment was that Andrew Nashorn and Nathan Littlewood knew each other about thirty years ago. What Alice had found out was that they had kept in touch ever since, which was a whole new discovery. Hunter knew it was easy to lose touch with old friends – people from school, college, neighborhood, or former workplace. Finding out that Nashorn and Littlewood spent an afternoon drinking beer in a park thirty years ago didn’t mean they were friends. Alice’s discovery had proved they had been and still were.

  ‘I went through all the phone records,’ Alice said. ‘There’s no direct contact between Nashorn and Littlewood. At least not through that phone. But as you know, many people have more than one cellphone, and sometimes their second phone is the untraceable kind.’

  ‘How about Derek Nicholson?’

  ‘I spent half of the night going over all the phone records we have for him,’ Alice said. ‘Going back six months prior to him being diagnosed with cancer. Neither Nashorn nor Littlewood’s cellphone numbers showed up. His number doesn’t show up on their bills either.’

  Towards the end of the afternoon, Garcia received a preliminary report from his digging team. So far they’d managed to check school and college records for the victims, together with early addresses. They’d found nothing to suggest that any of the three knew each other from either their neighborhoods or their learning institutions. Garcia told them to keep on digging – gym memberships, social clubs, anything that would’ve left behind a paper trail; but he understood that even if that paper trail existed at one time, today it would be almost impossible to find it.

  The sun had already set, and so had another day coated with frustration.

  Sitting at his desk, Hunter let out a weary sigh, placed his elbows on the desktop, and rested his forehead on the palms of his hands. He’d been going over all his notes and the crime-scene photographs for the zillionth time, and right now the puzzle seemed harder than ever. His head was throbbing with a pain that he knew wouldn’t go away easily. Questions kept colliding with each other inside his mind, but the answers simply weren’t there.

  What were they looking at? A coyote and a raven to signify a liar? A devil figure looking down at possible victims – four in total? Someone looking and pointing at someone else inside a box? Was that a coffin? Were those images supposed to represent a funeral? Was that why the next image they got looked like someone down on his knees, praying? Or was that a kid? And how in the world did they relate to each other?

  ‘Drink?’ Garcia said from his desk.

  ‘Umm?’ Hunter lift
ed his head and blinked a few times.

  ‘Let’s go for a drink.’ Garcia checked his watch, already getting up. ‘This office is claustrophobic, it’s hot as hell, and I swear I saw smoke coming out of your ears about two minutes ago. We both need a break. Let’s go get a drink, maybe some food, and definitely some rest. We can start again fresh tomorrow.’

  Hunter had no argument against that. If he’d had fuses in his brain, some of them would’ve burned out a long time ago. He shrugged and started powering down his computer.

  ‘Yep, a drink sounds like a great idea.’

  Ninety-Five

  With probably the tackiest décor in downtown Los Angeles, Bar 107 sat just a block away from the PAB. Sporting walls redder than Communist Russia, vinyl booths, and a shabby-chic garage-sale theme, the place was a four-room retro drinking spot favored by many for its huge range of cocktails and Scotch whiskies.

  Bar 107 was busy, but not excessively so. Hunter and Garcia sat at the far end of the long, varnished bar, and each ordered a shot of 10-year-old Aberlour.

  ‘Great choice,’ the female bartender said with an inviting smile. Her blonde hair was done up in a messy bun, but there was something very attractive about the way its edges fell down, caressing her naked neck.

  Hunter had a sip of his Scotch and let the dark liquid swoosh around in his mouth, fully enjoying the hint of sherry that had been infused into the Aberlour’s taste, enhancing it, but without letting the wine palate take over.

  In silence, Garcia watched a well-dressed couple come up to the bar and drink down two shots of tequila each in quick succession. The smile on their lips told him that they were celebrating something. The look on the man’s face told him that he really lusted after the woman, but she probably had never given in. Maybe tonight would be his lucky night.