by James O'Neal
Wilner stared in surprise.
“The new policy is to make it at least look more like regular police operations. They figure with more people, tax revenues will increase. They don’t want people scared off.”
Wilner said, “I’m gonna take a look around before I go search for the killer’s body.”
“You’re the detective on this so you can take charge. I’ll send Besslia and a couple of patrolmen to look for the body now.”
Wilner nodded and started to walk through the scene. It wasn’t like the crime scenes he had watched on old video broadcasts or movies. There was no yellow tape to keep people away. There were hardly any people to keep away. No one wanted to get mixed up in a UPF investigation and no one wanted a criminal mad that there might be a witness. There weren’t many cops either. They were spread too thin over an area that used to cover five counties and seven major cities. The climate change and a couple of terror attacks had shifted most of the population north. Away from the borders and as far from the dreadful Miami Quarantine Zone as possible.
The first thing he did was stoop and peek under the sheet at the woman who had flagged him down. She was about thirty, with a pretty face and short brown hair. He knew where the wound was. He touched her cheek and moved her head to see the single puncture wound in her neck. It had to go deep to kill her in those few seconds the killer had to act.
A patrolman stepped up behind him and said, “Did you get him?”
“We’ll know in a little bit.” The patrolman wasn’t squeamish seeing the dead woman. All of the UPF cops, even the women, had been in the service and most, like this guy, had seen combat. A single, clean corpse didn’t do much to spook him.
Wilner started checking for witnesses and other evidence inside the apartment building. He positioned a second patrolman at the front of the apartment, which held the first victim. Wilner took a few minutes to see if he could figure out why she was a victim. It looked like she lived alone. He found an identification card for the district hospital. She had been an emergency room nurse. Wilner looked at the photo and then stepped into the room to see her face. He recognized her. He’d seen her in the hospital several times over the last year and remembered her smiling, happy to see cops coming inside, a safety blanket added to the second-rate security guards.
Her sleek, pale, nude body held no clue to her bright personality. This was one of the few murder victims Wilner had ever known as a cop. The poor woman’s delicate face looked almost peaceful. Wilner wondered how she had been unlucky enough to fall victim to a killer like this. Had she known him? Where had she met him? Perhaps the hospital.
If Besslia found his body it wouldn’t matter, the case would be closed and he’d be told to move on to something else. But if his body wasn’t recovered Wilner needed someplace to start.
He gently pulled a comforter up over her body. The crime scene techs, if they showed, wouldn’t be too thorough. They wouldn’t care if he moved something like that. He just didn’t think it was right to leave her so exposed.
He looked through the rest of the apartment but found nothing. Just outside the door he saw the remains of the chair that the killer had almost managed to crush Wilner’s head with. He looked at the piece he had used to strike the killer. He bent down and picked it up. Even though DNA wasn’t used much anymore due to the cost and the degraded database, there might be a fingerprint or something they could use to identify the killer. It was all he had right now.
THREE
His whole body shook from the chill of the canal water. He was lucky he’d evaded the big, fast cop and the wild gunfire from the National Guardsmen on the bridge had not struck him. He had crossed from the Quarantine Zone over this same bridge, paying off the National Guardsmen in U.S. suds he’d won in the casino near the border. A casino that catered to residents of the district; a fact that only the guardsmen at the checkpoints seemed to appreciate. No one wanted to admit that illegal travel from the zone into the United States occurred every day, but it did. The army never thought to ask why none of the guardsmen wanted to be rotated out of an assignment in dreary, cold, damp Florida. They had no idea that most of them were getting rich just watching the checkpoints.
Now those same men had tried to shoot him. He was lucky he could hold his breath so long. He laid at the bottom of the fifteen-foot-deep canal, clutching the bumper of an abandoned car as the bullets popped on the water’s surface above him.
Now, as he waited for the three UPF patrolmen to move down the banks of the canal, his teeth began to chatter. Luckily they had been too lazy to get their feet wet and he had remained motionless here, hidden by vegetation hanging wild from the Quarantine Zone side of the bank.
Still, the trip back to his old stomping grounds had been worth it. If he hadn’t met the friendly little nurse at the casino and become enthralled by her he would have been content to stay in the lawless Quarantine Zone where no one worried about missing women. As the population shrank in most of Florida, the Quarantine Zone grew as more and more immigrants came from the decimated Caribbean Islands. Since tourism had virtually ceased and air travel was a thing of the past, the fragile economies of most of the islands had collapsed, bringing the governments with them.
Anything produced in those areas was being done cheaper by the Chinese, even rum. Gosling’s Rum was now manufactured in Beijing and exported to the United States. So was sugarcane, bananas and tank-raised lobster. Anarchy resulted in Jamaica, the Bahamas and even the Cayman Islands, which were now just an empty, burned-out shell of the former banker’s heaven.
He would’ve stayed on the streets of the zone if not for meeting the nurse. Her cute smile and weakness for blackjack had attracted him. But he had been unable to lure her to his spacious house a few miles from the border on the edge of the Everglades. It had used to be miles from the giant wetlands, but the swamp had been slowly regaining its territory for the past decade. He knew it was only a matter of time before he’d have to move closer to the zone population center.
Even now he didn’t regret his trip. The excitement would carry him for a while, even if he didn’t get to spend the time with his new love that he wanted to.
The other lady, the one out front who wouldn’t shut up, gave him no real satisfaction. He had stuck her in the neck to quiet her but couldn’t leave without placing her arms and legs in a comfortable position for her. She had technically still been alive when he did it, her mouth moving as she gasped and tried to say something.
It would be completely dark soon and he’d slip back into the zone. But he’d remember the big, plainclothes cop who he had tussled with. Something about the cop had interested him. He knew he’d have to do something about him.
Wilner returned to the canal about two hours after he had lost the killer. The crime scene had been processed—at least as much as two disgruntled crime scene techs, who weren’t getting a cash tip, felt like processing. He had given them the chair the killer had handled and they had photographed everything. They had followed him over to get fingerprints from the truck too.
Wilner knew they weren’t going to find the body. If they were it would’ve happened by now. His stomach tightened looking down at the murky water. The whole situation reminded him too much of Tiget Nadovich and the explosion that enveloped him. That was on the edge of the Everglades, but they never found his body in the long, swiftly moving current of the Zone River. No trace of the Serbian was ever found. Not much was ever found in the Zone River. At least not on the U.S. side of the border.
His whole life had changed during that time. He had faced the Serbian and his crazy family, met Shelby Hahn and learned the truth about the other hominoid race and the truth about his own children. Now, four months later, everything seemed to remind him of those troubling questions.
A small crowd had gathered a hundred yards back from the canal on the Quarantine Zone side. It wasn’t much different than what would happen on the U.S. side of the border if there were more people.
Wilner decided to take the opportunity to talk to them to see if anyone saw anything. He wouldn’t get another chance to gather potential witnesses. Not in the zone. But hardly anyone cared about the UPF or district problems.
As he turned away from the canal and started walking toward the crowd, several men broke from the group and hurried back into the zone, away from any possible conflict with an official from the United States.
Wilner was careful to walk slowly and ease up to the group.
“I’m Tom Wilner and we’re looking for someone.”
“You a cop?” came a male voice from the crowd.
“Unified Police Force.”
“That don’t mean shit over here.”
“I understand, but the man we’re looking for is a killer. He stabbed a nurse. You don’t want him to get loose in here.”
Another voice said, “We handle our own problems.”
Wilner could make out a few faces in the dim light. There were five women and eight or ten men. One of the larger men stepped forward. “We didn’t grant you permission to enter the zone.”
“I didn’t know you had the right to grant it.”
“You keep us out of the district.”
“That’s the government, not me.”
The big man stepped forward. “I’m the government here.” He started to reach for Wilner.
Wilner already had his hand resting on his stun baton. He yanked it from his rear pocket, flicked his wrist to extend it, then struck the man on the side with it. The pop as it sent a charge into the man made the others step back. The large man dropped to the ground, panting and moaning.
Wilner didn’t even look at him. “I don’t want to be here. But I don’t want this killer loose over here either. Did anyone see a man running this way?”
Now most of the crowd was backing away from Wilner. Two men grabbed their fallen buddy’s arms and dragged him away in the sand.
One woman stepped toward him. “Did the killer stab the victim in the neck?”
Wilner nodded. She had a slight Spanish accent. Her dark eyes caught the light from the checkpoint behind him.
“He has struck here in the zone but no one could do anything.”
“How many times?”
“I’ve heard of two. We nicknamed him ‘the Vampire.’”
“Did you see anyone fleeing tonight?”
She shook her head, her long black hair swaying as she did.
“I appreciate you talking to me.”
She smiled. “I’m Mari Saltis.”
“How long have you lived in the zone?”
“Twelve years. I wasn’t a citizen yet when they closed the border.”
“Where are you from?”
“Colombia.”
Wilner looked at her. “You don’t want to go back? Colombia has a working government. It’s secure.”
“It has no freedom. The secret police. Here, I’m needed.”
“What do you do?”
“I’m a teacher.” Now she looked at the surprise on Wilner’s face. “I know you don’t think of the zone as having any organization, but we do. And educating our young people is vital to our survival.”
“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to offend you.”
She smiled again. “It is nice to hear some manners.” She took out a pencil and scratched out a note then handed it to Wilner. “I live two blocks south of here. I run the school for girls a mile from here. Come and see me if you have any questions.”
Wilner nodded. “Thanks, Mari, I will.”
Ten minutes later he was back at the canal, the teacher’s pretty face still in his head.
He called out to Steve Besslia. “Anything at all?”
He shook his head.
Wilner shouted, “I’m gonna cross and check the bank on the other side.”
Besslia nodded and waved as Wilner slowly tromped through the mucky bank of the canal toward the checkpoint bridge to probe under some of the foliage that dipped down into the water.
He told the guardsmen what he intended and no one volunteered to come with him.
He didn’t think he’d find anything, so he didn’t mind going by himself.
He saw the big plainclothes cop walk up and yell to the patrolmen. Then the big cop crossed the bridge and started walking down this side of the canal. His heart started to race. He gripped the handle of his combat knife with the spike folded. Should he use the spike or the blade? He smiled at the idea of three in one day. This was definitely worth the trip.
In a way he was disappointed he wouldn’t get the chance to think about the big cop and enjoy the buildup. He had found as he got older that he enjoyed the buildup as much as actually seeing the life drain out of them. When he was young it was too fast. Sort of like sex was. Quick in and quick out, no appreciation or anticipation. Now he liked things to last.
He felt the heft of the good surplus German army knife in his hand. The gravity-operated blade was his best bet. He decided to wait until the cop was right next to him to open it so he wouldn’t tip off his position. The other three cops were down the canal all bunched together. He thought he might be able to stick the plainclothes cop in the neck, let him slip into the water and then be up over the bank and into the zone before anyone knew what had happened.
He might not enjoy it as much but he’d be safe and he’d have a hell of a memory.
He smiled, knowing that he had never taken any of it lightly. He remembered his first victim. It was more of an accident than intentional and he was so young he didn’t appreciate it until he was older. But it was one of his most precious memories.
This could be a good one.
FOUR
Steve Besslia wanted to impress these two new patrolmen as well as Tom Wilner. He had been through the academy with Wilner and had seen how good a cop he had become. He deserved his detective job. He’d saved Besslia’s ass on the force more than once. It’d be nice to do something for him for a change.
He glanced up and saw his friend now using a broken tree limb to poke though the thick brush on the zone side of the canal even though the body probably wouldn’t be over there. Not the way the current was running. He had watched the leaves and garbage drift to this side of the canal and away from the bridge.
He focused back on the water, hoping to do some good work today. He wanted to make an impression. The last good thing he had done involved the use of illegal flashers fighting some kooks who had threatened Wilner’s family. He and his partner prevailed, but they couldn’t tell their bosses exactly what had happened. He wasn’t sure he believed it himself. Today he could brag about his good work. If he found that damn body.
Tom Wilner was using a long, straight, solid tree limb that felt like it weighed a ton. But it was better than bending too far over and risk tumbling into the cold water of the canal. The canal had been the old county line back in the days when Florida was divided into counties. After Congress had declared all of Florida south of the old Broward County line as the Quarantine Zone, the canal had been widened, razor wire had been laid down and all the bridges sealed off in an effort to keep everyone south of the line from coming into the country. It took a permanent force of more than a thousand National Guardsmen to protect the border.
Those efforts to widen the canal made it harder to find the killer’s body. As he poked and moved along the bank, Wilner wondered what motivated the killer. He had a host of other unanswered questions such as: Who was he? Where had he come from? How many previous victims did he have? The woman he had just met, Mari, said she knew of two others in the zone. And that was just hearsay. There was no news broadcast in the zone. Things could happen without anyone but a few witnesses knowing of it.
Wilner found himself thinking about the Colombian teacher. Her rich black hair and dark, intelligent eyes reminded him a little of Svala. She obviously cared about others, having decided to live in the Quarantine Zone. He’d find a reason to talk to her again soon.
He went back to considering
the killer. This was his first serial case. The other murders he had investigated involved single or gang killings. There hadn’t been a report of a serial killer in Florida since the first of the Islamic terror attacks in Miami. The added law enforcement after the tanker bomb that took out three square blocks in the center of Miami and killed three thousand scared away a lot of the criminals. Then, when the anthrax was blown through the Dadeland Mall’s air-conditioning and caused sixty-five hundred people to die, the army was sent in. After the mass migration and fear of the bioplague, it was easier just to abandon the southern tip of Florida rather than save it.
Wilner didn’t intend that to happen to the Lawton District. This was his home now. He had a responsibility to his children. He didn’t want something like this to scare off the new arrivals. He looked ahead on the bank and continued to probe with his long tree limb.
He shivered from a combination of the cold water and his excitement as the big cop moved closer. He had the combat knife upside down, ready to let the blade drop open. The cop had a stick but was still leaning down toward the water slightly. He already had the plan to spring up, jab him in the throat and then pull him in as quietly as possible.
He looked back toward the bridge; the guardsmen were paying no attention. Two of them were talking to a man in an old Chevy who obviously was seeing if he could cross over into the zone.
The cop was now less than five feet away and the anticipation set his nerves on fire. His heart felt like it was shaking the water. He held a low, hanging branch and was ready to shoot up like a knife-tipped missile in the next few seconds.
Wilner had an uneasy feeling about this whole situation. This killer had been sharp and fast. Although the guardsmen had good firepower and poured it on quickly, he now doubted that the killer had been hit. He could be anywhere in the zone or the district. Hell, could he still be hiding nearby?
Wilner looked up at Besslia and the other patrolmen. Their side of the canal was cleared of brush and easy to search now that they were quite a way down the bank. He decided he’d check another fifty or so feet, then he had to get home. It was getting late and the new nanny didn’t live with him. She had her own life. After his experience with the last housekeeper, Mrs. Honzit, he didn’t think he could ever trust an outsider to live in the same house as him again.
