"Did you have any plans to call in?" asked Bell.
"I couldn't."
"Couldn't or wouldn't? Everyone needs to pull their weight, Megan. I got the mayor, the city council, and all the fucking residents of this city breathing down my neck, and my partner, excuse me, is out getting new brakes. If you should need a manicure, please let me know so I can call a council meeting to brief them ahead of time. I wouldn't want anyone thinking we don't know what each of us is doing on this little ol' serial killer case you're supposed to be working on."
Megan closed her eyes to hold back the tears, but they came anyway. She shuddered, keeping a grip on the computer mouse and her face toward the screen.
Don't turn around.
Don't let him see.
She wanted to shout, Get the fuck away from me you fucking fat ass slob.
But she didn't. She couldn't. Not to him. And certainly not here. She swallowed, and took a deep breath, then said, "There's no coverage over there. I really need to find another place to get my car worked on, but I trust that guy so much. He's good."
Bell sniffed at the remark and let an I bet slip out of his mouth as he turned way and headed back inside his office, slamming the door behind him.
Megan just stared at her monitor, still straining to come to life after a full minute. They were working with six-year-old computers and the waiting was killing her now. The more time she spent waiting, the more time her mind had to wander, not knowing what to do next.
Her mind wasn't ready to turn off what she had seen at the bookstore, yet she couldn't sit there and do nothing. She needed something to get her going. Megan stood, grabbed her purse, and walked down the hall and into the bathroom. She dropped her purse on the counter and stared at herself in the mirror. She had to get out. She just had to get out. But how? How to escape. How to make it all go away.
She thought of John, wondering what he was doing right now. Probably back home. He must have looked at the book. He's not dumb. Why did she turn down that aisle? Why that one? It could have been any other aisle, any other topic. She was having so much fun with him…more than she'd had with any of the other guys. But it was more than that. He understood her. There was something between them that made her feel so much more comfortable with him. She couldn't point it out or give it a name, she just knew it was there and she wondered if he felt the same way. But now, after seeing the book, what would he do?
God don't let it be over.
Please, don't let it be over.
She flipped the cover of her purse over and dug her hand inside, pulling out her pill bottle. She popped open the top and poured two pills on to her palm, then popped them into her mouth, grabbed her hair with one hand, and dipped her head down to drink from the faucet. She would have to get things straight.
Focus time.
Do your job.
Find the killer.
That's job number one right now.
Find the killer.
Who is he?
Then what?
"Then what, Megan," she said.
It felt, at that very moment, as if the killer had been around for her entire career. Like she was going on year twenty chasing the Bedroom Killer, and in that time he'd killed fifty young girls in their beds. The weight. She tried to imagine the killer being caught. But what then? Would John still want to meet?
Not now Megan, she thought. Having the killer to track was her number one priority and she did very little else these days. This guy kept her on some sort of straight path…maybe not straight enough, but definitely on the road. Without him to concentrate on, she would go over the edge, and she knew it. She needed something to fixate on when she wasn't having casual sex with John or the three other guys on her short list. John didn't know about the others. But ever since John, there hadn't been any of the others. She was monogamous…for the time being. It's not as if no one else gets murdered and there are no other cases. But this one was different. She had never focused so strongly for such a long time as she had with this case.
But John changed everything.
"Focus Megan," she told herself.
She couldn't stop thinking about him. Without the case, and without John, there would only be…she didn't want to think about that. The door suddenly sprang open and caught Megan by surprise as if she were caught smoking in the high school bathroom instead of trying to figure out her life. The woman, a secretary from up front named Linda, nodded with a thin smile and entered a stall. Megan grabbed her purse and before walking out, she took one last look in the mirror, feeling that she had no connection with the woman staring back at her and not sure how she'd ever again find the one she once knew. She exited the bathroom and returned to her desk, where she found a file folder that someone had set on her keyboard.
"That's forensics on the hair we found on the bat. Eric says they're still working on DNA," Andy said from somewhere behind her. Megan turned to face him.
"Thanks," she said. But instead of continuing the conversation, she turned back around, opened the file folder, and began reading the report. Three hairs, one brown, two black, taken from the business end of the bat that was found in John's car. The brown hair was from John when Karen Sharp bludgeoned him through his car window, and the black ones were almost undoubtedly from the killer when Karen Sharp hit him from behind. She would make copies for John. Just because of what happened today didn't mean she was not going to still work with him and give him copies of the files. Besides, if the sex was over, this was the one way she could still be in his life, if he still wanted her or still wanted to be a part of the investigation. She hoped so…please God.
She grabbed the file and walked the twenty feet to the copy machine, pulled the six-page report out of the file, and set it in the tray. She pressed the green copy button and the machine hummed to life. It clicked and grabbed each sheet, one at a time, and sucked them in. The warm copies spit out the other side, and Megan reached for them. But Gerald’s hand got there first. Megan gasped and jumped back. Bell stood next to her, holding the copies, flicking his eyes from the copies to Megan and back again.
"Why do you need copies?"
"I always make copies."
"Why? Everything goes in the murder book or central files. That's where everything goes, you know that. Everything's in one place."
Megan snatched the copies from his hand and stalked past him saying, "I like having my own." Bell turned to follow her.
"In my office. Now!"
Megan stopped in her tracks. Bell walked past her without saying a word and without looking back. He entered his office, with its louvered windows, which he proceeded to twist shut. Megan set the file on her desk and shuffled into Bell's office. Bell closed the door behind her.
The entire scene was witnessed by Andy. Kennedy was out or he would have seen it too. There were others in the area, but not close enough and not as deeply involved in this homicide investigation. They were peripheral players. Seeing Detective Ash walk into Bell's office wouldn't mean a thing to them. But it did to Andy…which is why he stood up, grabbed some paperwork, his coat, stuffed his favorite pen into his shirt pocket, and left the station—and Megan, behind.
CHAPTER 46
The rain was back and beat hard on the unmarked detective cruiser as it glided down the fractured, oil-stained concrete road. This portion of Greenwood had never seen the kind of state bond money that commonly went to upgrading parks or repaving the main boulevard. And so the original concrete remained, tired and cracked, oily and faded. Megan kept her gaze out the right side window and tried to think about the case. She wasn't in Bell's office for more than a minute before he said, "Let's take a drive."
If only the baseball bat had caught the killer right across the top of the skull. Karen Sharp had said her first swing missed only because he'd heard her approach and jumped back at the last second. If it had landed square on the head, it would be a good bet the case would be over. If he hadn't been killed he would've at least been caught and in j
ail right now. Going through arraignment and talking with his defense attorney. But as she thought about the killer being caught, she also realized that if he'd been caught they would've also found John dead of a self-inflicted gunshot wound right outside Karen Sharp's home. They never would have made the connection unless John's friends Dr. Turner or Dr. Larson made it for them. And if he'd been caught, Megan wouldn't be here in this car, driving down this oh-so-familiar road, heading for an oh-so-familiar parking spot. Or would she?
If he'd been caught.
***
At 3:30 p.m. this place was a ghost town, and in Gerald’s mind, that's what made it such a good place. Even in the middle of the day there wasn't much business going on. Bell took a right turn down Cascade Street, a road that lead deeper into the industrial section of town. The street originated six miles north in a residential area and dead-ended here in the old Greenwood Industrial Park. The word "park" did not belong. This was no park. Most of the "factories" were half-dead carcasses of their former selves, with small shattered windows peppering the sides of the buildings—like matured, pockmarked skin—just small enough to make their repair not worth the time or money. Each building had its own history, its own youthful story. Stories rarely told now if for no other reason than there was no one left who cared to hear them.
Bell glanced over at Megan, her head turned away. It was a common sight to see. There was never idle chatter as they made these trips and Bell had asked himself more than once why he still made them. But he knew.
He had to. Especially after today.
It was a ritual that had to be kept. She needed to be reminded who was boss. Although things had seemed different as of late, Bell knew she would come around. Not that it happened every day, but it was like opening the shades to let in the sun, or stepping outside to get the morning newspaper. It was something they did and something they would continue to do. These trips helped keep the status quo, and now more than ever the status quo was paramount.
Bell had noticed her attention being drawn away by Dr. Randall. Too much so. Big deal—Mr. Emergency Room. Fuck him. He saved lives too. Detective Gerald Bell, the cop who pulled the crazy fucker from the school bus before he had a chance to drive away, with ten kids still on board. Goddamned right Gerald Bell saved lives. She knew the story and she knew him well, just as he knew her. Dr. Randall would not be a problem. He would make sure of that. One more short discussion would take care of it.
Real short.
To the point.
Maybe a punch in the gut too…for emphasis.
Randall wasn't looking for a new girl anyway; the man was fucked up in the head. He needed more therapy. Obviously, Dr. Larson wasn't doing the trick. Maybe Bell would mention that. The force had people too. He could get him a referral.
Here, Doc, go talk to this guy, he'll take care of you.
That's what he'd do. Then he'd mention Detective Ash again and make sure Randall knew his place. That's what he'd do. He made a mental note to talk to Caroline back at the office and get the psych sheet. He'd pick a name and number from the sheet and hand it off to Randall. That's what he'd do.
Bell slowed and pulled down C Street, turned into a parking lot at the back of the abandoned J.J. Kelmer Ceramics building, and eased under a long neglected tree with the low-hanging branches located in the back corner, next to the perimeter block wall.
***
The branches dragged against the car roof, caused Megan's body to tense from the fingernails-on-a-chalkboard sound. Bell threw the car into park and cut the engine.
The car was silent, except for the sound of dripping rainwater hitting the car roof. Then Bell let out a big sigh, reached down with his left hand, and adjusted his seat, reclining to a forty-five degree angle. Then he popped his seat belt loose and reached down with both hands and slipped his pants belt out of the clasp, yanked it tight to pop the prong out of the belt hole, then let it slip out of his hand. He unhooked the clasp on his slacks, and unzipped his pants. The belt, released from tension, slipped down and his belly roll grew upward like an expanding foil of a heated Jiffy Pop tin over a crackling campfire. He pulled out the tails of his dress shirt, unbuttoned the bottom buttons, and yanked each half to one side.
At this moment, he turned to his right and looked at the back of Megan's head. As he watched her, he reached down into his pants and pulled out his dick. He turned back to face the front. Then he exhaled loudly and his big frame sank deep into the car seat, as if fitting into a space that had been machined to fit his exact measurements. Then he sat completely still. It was deathly quiet except for raindrops dripping from the tree branches onto the car roof.
It was the exhale and the subsequent cessation of movement that triggered in Megan the conditioned response action—that was the audible signal, one of two signals, audible and visual, that she'd been conditioned to respond to. It held her prisoner, was her guard and warden, and it was once again commanding her. Demanding her. She dared not ignore it. Besides, she thought, she and John were over now, now that he knows. So she did as she had always done. She turned to her left, titled her head down, closed her eyes, and took him into her mouth.
CHAPTER 47
"How's the journal coming?" Dr. Larson said.
John heard the question but had to stop and think back to when he wrote last. He couldn't remember. Nearly all of his writing lately had been notes taken on the Bedroom Killer case. If he wasn't writing on the killer, he was reading about forensics and interrogation technique, or suspect identification. The truth was, John wasn't writing in his journal anymore.
"Um, okay. I actually haven't written too much lately."
"Is there a reason for that?"
"No excuse, really. I've been pretty busy on the Bedroom Killer case."
John had decided on his drive over that he was going to confess to Dr. Larson about his meeting Megan. He wanted to get the doctor's opinion on that, and he wanted to ask him about something else.
"What do you mean busy with the Bedroom Killer case? They don't still think you have anything to do with that, do they?" Dr. Larson said.
"No. That's not it. Remember the project I told you about last time?" John said.
"Yes, I remember."
"Well…I've been meeting with one of the detectives on the case. We struck up a friendship and…he's…he's teaching me about homicide investigation."
"Why would you want to learn about homicide investigation?" Dr. Larson said.
"It's very interesting," John said, feigning enthusiasm.
Dr. Larson set down his pencil and thought about John's words, seeming to mull over his response.
"How is it interesting?" Dr. Larson said.
"It's not so much that it's interesting…I just, I want to help catch this guy. I want to be a part of it. I am a part of it ever since that night," John said.
"And what is your role?"
"I'm asking questions. I'm reading about serial killers. I'm looking at the profile they have."
"You've seen their profile?"
"Oh yes…I've read the files. He…he showed them to me," John lied, not wanting Dr. Larson to suspect Detective Ash was his source.
"You're friend, the detective?"
"Yes."
"Isn't that against the law? Or some standard police procedure, at least?"
"Probably."
Dr. Larson scratched his chin and pinched his nose. John watched him, waiting to see if he would get a lecture.
"Well, don't get caught," Dr. Larson said. "I guess that's all I can say on that. I don't know how to advise you there. Do you see this as a permanent thing?"
"What, chasing killers?" John said.
"Yes."
"No. It's a one-time thing," John said, but then thought about Megan and wondered if she were a one-time thing.
"And after they catch the killer?" Dr. Larson said.
John heard the doctor's question and sat very still debating the answer. It was something he'd thought about, one of
the million things he'd thought about, in fact, since his life had taken yet another dramatic turn. He really didn't know, but this fact didn't bother him as much as he thought it might.
"I can't say," John said. "I've certainly thought about it, but I haven't made any sort of decision. I guess I'll address that when the day comes."
Dr. Larson wrote in his book.
"Dr. Larson," John said.
Dr. Larson set his pencil down and said, "Yes?"
"I have a question," John said, sitting up straight in his chair. "It's not about me. I'd like your opinion, or, I guess I could look it up, but I thought I would ask you today, see if you knew anything."
"Anything about what?" Dr. Larson said.
John steeled himself. Even though he was sitting safely in his psychiatrist's office, he was still nervous. Worried about what he might learn. He took a deep breath.
"Sex addiction." John said.
"Sex addiction?" Dr. Larson repeated.
"Yes."
"Well, I only know what I've read. Not that I've studied up on it. It's an affliction. Emotional mainly."
"Like trying to kill yourself is emotional?"
"I wouldn't put it in the same context," Dr. Larson said, using a somewhat exasperated tone, which John caught.
"Sorry, I didn't mean to be flippant," John said.
"Why do you ask?"
"I have a friend. I think…I think she might be afflicted."
"Well, you realize it's not about the sex. Right? Just like drug addiction is not about the drugs. There are outside issues and internal reasons as to why someone takes drugs, and the same goes with sex. It can be something that happened a long time ago. Something that just happened recently. There can be any number of reasons why someone turns to sex as a crutch. A feeling of power. A feeling of being loved. Self-loathing. But I'm really not an authority."
Dr. Larson stood and walked to his bookshelf on the far side of the office, scanning his titles until he came to the one he wanted. He pulled a softcover book off the shelf, walked back, and handed the book to John. "I'll let you borrow this." Then returned to his chair.
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