“She knows but—”
“But what?”
“She’s pregnant again.”
“Oh.” Her mind went blank for a second. “Is it money?”
Baxter shook his head. “Junior’s college tuition is covered and he’s raring to go.”
“Takes after his dad.”
“Yeah,” Baxter said with pride. “He’s already found an apartment to share with his buddies and a little part time job for extras. I’m not worried about him. Beth and Carla have years to wait yet. It’s not money.”
“I can always do with more money.”
“Me too, but this has nothing to do with that.”
She wasn’t sure she believed him. She would have a private chat with Mary Pat over the weekend. The barbecue would be crowded with all the guys and their families along. It shouldn’t be hard to spirit her away for a minute or two.
“You’re just feeling old, Dave. What you need is a snot-nosed kid for a partner, someone to make you run after him. That’ll get you back into condition.”
“Says you. I work out three times a week and my times are better than ever.”
“Still can’t shoot straight though.”
Baxter was frowning at the mirror again and didn’t seem to have heard her.
“I said you still can’t shoot straight.”
“Take the next right,” Baxter said in a distracted voice.
“Why?” she said, already making the turn.
Baxter was watching the mirror intently. “Change lanes.”
She did that while watching her own mirrors for manoeuvring cars. “Is it the black Ford?”
“Yeah. I think we have a tail. I saw him pull out after us when we left Central. Take a left.”
She did and was rewarded by a black Ford, the same one, following her. She tramped her foot on the brake and the car skidded to a stop. In a heartbeat, they were out of the car with their guns pointed at the Ford’s windscreen where it had skidded to a stop. Cars beeped horns at them and swung wide around the obstruction they caused.
“Get out of the damn road you freaks!” a driver yelled as he sped by, his engine roaring.
“—goddamn road hog!” another driver yelled leaning on his horn.
Chris ignored them. “Police! Hands… show me some hands… out the window! Do it now!”
A pair of hands appeared out of the driver’s window. Another pair appeared from the other side, but Baxter had that door covered. Chris eased forward. There were two men sitting in the front seats. The back of the car was empty. She kept her gun on the driver and worked the car’s door handle.
“Out slowly. Keep your hands where I can see them. No! Work the seatbelt with your other hand.”
“There’s no need for this, Detective,” the driver said. “I have my I.D in my pocket—”
“Freeze!” she snarled and nearly pulled the trigger.
The driver froze with his hand reaching into his inside jacket pocket. She could see the gun as plain as day.
“Gun here,” she called to Baxter who was covering the passenger. She reached into his coat and took the weapon—a K6 Remington stunner like hers. She was almost certain that she knew what she had here. Feds. The goddess be damned feds were tailing her. “Out!”
The driver glowered but complied and was careful to keep his hands out in the open. The passenger was receiving the same treatment from Baxter who had also found a K6. Baxter pushed the passenger against the fender of the car and searched him. Chris thought that was going just a little far until he came up with another gun. The hold out piece was an old 38 police special. Slug throwing boomers might be old fashioned, but they were still deadly. Baxter dropped it into his jacket pocket and shoved the passenger around the front of the car to join his partner.
“I.D now,” she said deciding not to push her luck with the driver by searching him. She was certain now. He was a fed. She flipped open the wallets they offered. “Well now Agent Barrows, Agent Feinstein. Would you care to explain why you were following us?”
“You know damn well why!” Feinstein snarled angrily taking back his wallet.
“My weapon?” Barrows said calmly ignoring his partner.
Chris holstered hers and handed the K6 back to him. Baxter reluctantly did the same with both of Feinstein’s guns. They quickly holstered them well aware of the scene they were causing. It wouldn’t be long before one of the bystanders called the cops.
“I want some answers.”
“Do you?” Barrows said. “And you think I’ll give them to you for the asking?”
“You’ll answer me, or it will be my captain and your department chief having this discussion.”
“And that will concern me because?”
“Don’t play games,” Chris said with a put upon sigh. “We both know you’re not here officially, tailing me I mean. The feds haven’t been called in on this case.”
“Yet!” Feinstein said and got a very annoyed look from his partner for his trouble.
“We’re within our authority, Detective.”
“To drive around the city? Sure you are, but obstructing a police investigation? I don’t think so. If you don’t want me to take this further, you had better tell me something I want to hear.”
Barrows glanced around. “A little public isn’t it?”
She shrugged. “Okay, we’ll wait for the black and whites,” she said and Barrow’s eyes tightened. He wasn’t as blasé as he wanted to appear. “Don’t like that huh? Tell me something.”
“I, we are investigating a case that might have links with yours.”
“You’re after my serial. The Ghost?” She wasn’t surprised, angry yes, but not surprised.
“Not him, but someone we think might be linked to him. Before you ask, no I won’t give you his name—it wouldn’t do you any good. He has dozens of aliases. He’s been on our books for a lot of years. He moves about, covers his tracks.”
“His crime?”
“Murder.”
“Serial?”
Barrows shook his head. “Not classic, but he’s wanted for multiple murders in half the states in the country. Mass murder on his scale doesn’t happen any more.”
“Really?” she said with scepticism heavy in her voice. “I have eight very dead people down at the morgue.”
“And the guy we’re after is responsible for more than eighty!” Feinstein snarled angrily.
“Oooh, theirs is bigger than yours, Chris,” Baxter said with a smirk.
She grinned and Feinstein’s face darkened. “You think I’ll lead you to him?”
“Your Ghost will find him, or he’ll find Ghost,” Baxter said with no doubt.
“Why would he do that?”
Barrows wasn’t willing to say apparently. He ignored the question. “When you find Ghost—”
“If she finds him,” Feinstein said.
Chris looked Feinstein up and down. “I don’t like you.”
Feinstein’s eyes popped wide. “You can kiss my arse!”
“Doug, shut your trap and get back in the car,” Barrows said.
“But she—”
“Now.”
Feinstein glared at Chris and got back in his car to sulk. He slammed the door. Barrows watched all this in silence.
“I don’t think he likes me,” she said with smirk.
“I don’t like you either. Have you got any friends at all? No matter. I don’t have to like you to use you. Find Ghost, Detective, and I’ll be a very happy man. Take too long, and I’ll have you removed from the case. Before you say anything, believe me that I do have influence enough to do it. I will have the case under federal authority if I must. I don’t particularly want to do that, but I will.” Barrows moved away to join his partner in the car as two black and whites arrived. “I’ll be watching.”
Chris and Baxter pulled out their badges and held them high as they slowly approached the patrol cars just then arriving on scene. Feinstein glared at her out of his window as Barr
ows pulled away and back into traffic.
They quickly dealt with the uniforms and tried to get back to work. The story would make the rounds back at Central, but there was nothing they could do about that. They decided between them to keep Barrows’ name and status as a feebie out of it. Cappy wouldn’t be too pleased to learn the FBI was sniffing about without informing him of its interest in Ghost.
“Whoa,” Chris said as she sat behind the wheel of her car and thought about the consequences. The puff of air between pursed lips blew a lock of hair aside. “That was interesting.”
“Interesting? Well yes you could say that. Barrows is after your butt. Maybe you shouldn’t have given him so much lip.”
“He doesn’t worry me.”
“I can see that,” Baxter said as they pulled back into traffic. “But he should.”
“I don’t see why. I’m doing my job, he’s doing his. As long as he doesn’t stick his nose where it doesn’t belong, I’ll leave him alone.”
“But will he leave you alone, that’s the question?”
She shrugged and concentrated upon her driving. Barrows didn’t worry her on a personal level, but his threat to take her case did. She knew his type. He would play by the rules and keep it professional as would she, but he knew how to play the system. He would use it to get what he saw as his job done. If he decided his job was to take hers away from her, he would do it. She could understand that. She knew how to play hardball too. He wouldn’t take the case easily. The rules were specific where federal jurisdiction was concerned. The feds had to be called in through proper channels.
The problem was the Chief. He was basically a paper tiger and would go whichever way the wind was blowing. At the moment, it was blowing strongly from the Mayor’s office. The newsies didn’t much like Mayor Richards, but maybe they could be encouraged to be nice to him if he could somehow clear up the little matter of bodies piling up in the morgue. Barrows must think that he had the juice to pressure the Chief into making an official request for assistance. Maybe he did. It wouldn’t take much to persuade the Mayor that a certain detective should be reassigned elsewhere. Eight bodies and the potential of losing popular support was a hell of a strong motivator.
“To hell with it. We have a job to do.”
“You still want to roust some hookers?” Baxter said.
“Why not, you only live once.”
Baxter grinned.
They parked the car in a no parking zone close to the alley where Karen Sykes said she was attacked. They walked the route the girl had taken along Union Avenue that night, and then down the alley. It was like hundreds of others; dark, smelly, and full of garbage where it had fallen out of the dumpsters or where careless people had tossed it.
“Pretty scary down here at night I bet,” Baxter said looking around and wrinkling his nose. “What time did you say she was attacked?”
“Late. After midnight she said.”
“She didn’t have her wristband on?”
“It was busted. Needed a new charm laid on it or something. Why?”
Baxter kicked aside some of the garbage to reveal blankets and a few trinkets. A couple of old cans held a cut throat razor and soap brush. They looked neglected and abandoned. The razor had begun to rust.
“Someone used to call this shit-hole home.”
Chris frowned at the items he’d discovered. “We talked to a couple of bums that heard screaming. They didn’t see anything. They were probably telling the truth. It was dark as hell that night. No moon. They spent part of it at a soup kitchen and wandered back here after they’d eaten. We checked and confirmed that side of their story.”
“Damn shame they’re not here. I’d ask who this belonged to and whether he was here that night. You’ve got to wonder when someone with nothing leaves behind his shaving kit. It might have been all he owned, yet here it sits.”
“Yeah. We could get it dusted for prints I guess. See if he has a record. We might even find him in the drunk tank.”
“It’s a thought,” Baxter said pulling on a pair of latex gloves and collecting the items. “Don’t get your hopes up though.”
No, she wouldn’t do that, but it was an indication of how desperate she was that she was even bothering with the items. Something like this was unlikely to go anywhere, but stranger things had happened, only not to her. They scouted around the alley familiarising themselves with it and its contents. Chris had done all this before with John, but for Baxter it was his first time on the case. Not that he hadn’t thought about how he would run it if it were given to him. He wouldn’t be much of a homicide cop if he hadn’t. Baxter asked questions, Chris answered, and spent most of her time watching him hoping that fresh eyes would turn something up.
“Nice quiet little spot for a murder,” Baxter mused. They had walked the entire length of the alley and he was studying the busy street that joined it. Nice and quiet it was not.
She snorted.
“He doesn’t give a rat’s tit for us or his victims,” Baxter said.
“Obviously.”
“Not so obvious as all that. Why does he bother taunting you with the messages he leaves behind if he doesn’t care what you think of him? Is it ego, a power trip of some kind? What did the profile say about his mental state?”
“That’s one thing the FBI is good for,” she said with grudging admiration. “Their Behavioural Analysis Unit came through with a profile for us. He has an above average IQ, thoughtful, deliberate, a planner. He has a college education and they think he might have gone to a Catholic school previous to that. Some of the writing he left behind has a religious significance, so they think he sees himself as a religious person. Maybe he does, but I’m not so sure on that part. What he writes doesn’t feel right to me, like back at the Sutton Hotel. It has links to religion, but not...” she shook her head feeling puzzled all over again. “Physically he’s big and imposing. We have that from Karen. He’s over six feet in height and strong with it. Very muscular, maybe that means his work involves heavy lifting, or maybe it did before he was turned if he’s a vamp. Karen had no doubt that he’s an albino. He chooses young blond women, pretty but not stunning; all of them working girls. He lacks confidence in his ability to attract women, probably the albino thing again. He has an inferiority complex and will probably seem awkward to a woman who meets him socially despite his size.”
Baxter nodded. “Okay, so we have an intelligent guy who is shy and awkward around women; a guy who probably can’t get a date so he has to pay for what he needs. That doesn’t sound like any vamp I’ve ever heard of, Chris. Vamps have that mental mojo that makes them attractive to anyone they want. I’m just thinking aloud here, so don’t bite my head off, but have you talked with the usual crowd about their customers?”
“Of course we did. That’s one thing that really pisses me off about all this. This guy can’t get laid without paying for it, so why doesn’t anyone recognise the description when I ask around?”
“104th Street?”
“I asked them myself. All of them.”
“Vermont?” Baxter offered.
“Yep.”
“Ashdown and Boulevard… both shifts?”
“All of them, Dave! We went through every hooker in town! No one knows him.”
Baxter shook his head. “He could be new in town then… from out of state even. You figure Barrows knows he’s from over the state line? Maybe that’s the connection.”
“I don’t know. I’m not sure Barrows isn’t really after Ghost. If he’s done this in other places—”
“That I don’t believe. We would’ve had a bulletin to keep an eye out for him. Besides, your case is big news. Someone would have called us by now.”
He was right. Someone would have made the connection and called with the information. It didn’t make sense that someone so recognisable could move about unseen.
“You’re right. Let’s check out some of the other locations.”
Baxter nodded and toget
her they made their way back to the car.
Patsy Jordan had been murdered near derelict buildings, but she wasn’t found inside the buildings themselves. Instead, she was discovered on waste ground adjoining the sites by a couple of kids who said they were just scoping out the construction site. They didn’t want to get in trouble and would Chris please not tell their moms? Apparently, both had been warned to stay out of the site because the buildings were being demolished and it was dangerous. Like all kids everywhere, they had taken no notice and found a way inside through a hole in the chain link fence surrounding the site.
Sheryl Adams was also found on waste ground. Not the same construction site where Patsy Jordan was found, but still in the same general area. A security firm had been employed to keep an eye on the place and one of its employees had found the body.
Baxter eyed the construction site with a vaguely puzzled look that she was coming to expect from everyone that came into contact with the case. “Is it just me, or does it seem really weird that a woman, hooker or not, would willingly come in here with a guy?”
“It’s just you,” Chris said dryly.
“Really?”
“No. I’m kidding.”
“I’m not laughing,” Baxter said with a glare.
“Who is these days? Patsy did fight, so maybe she didn’t come along willingly, but Sheryl didn’t. She just walked on in here happy as can be. There was no sign of a struggle.”
“I don’t get it then. What woman in her right mind would step through a chain link fence at night with a stranger? If the profile is right, he’s shy and awkward around women. He would never be able to persuade them to come in here.”
“But he did.”
“Yeah,” Baxter said looking around in puzzlement. “That’s what I can’t figure out. If he’s a vamp, he could make them do it, but then why did they struggle? If he glamoured them, they would have just stood there for him. If he had such control over them, why waste the blood? While we’re asking questions, why kill them at all? Vamps don’t usually kill, it brings unwanted attention. If he was super hungry, why not just snack and then again with another hooker?”
Chris had the same sort of questions rattling around in her head and no answers. Everyone knew there was a serial killer loose. Everyone knew from the description circulated via the media what he looked like, yet women were still going into questionable situations with him seemingly of their own volition, hence the vamp theory.
Shifter Legacies Special Edition: Books 1-2 Page 17
