The Murder of Janessa Hennley

by Victor Methos

  “What the hell happened, Mickey? I got a report from that sheriff that you tried to apprehend someone at the funeral? Call me right now. I’m sending someone up from the Anchorage office if I don’t hear from you.”

  Another message, from Suzan.

  “Hey, just checking on you. Please give me a call at this number when you’re feeling up to it.”

  He placed the phone on the side table and lay back. Soon, Kyle would find out everything that happened and pull him from the field. If he opted for the ulcer surgery, that would buy him some time, but not much. His days in Kodiak Basin were numbered, but the last thing he wanted to do was leave. That old familiar feeling was back. Akin to running a race.

  The prey had revealed itself. It was a hunt, and he was the hunter.

  Maybe one of the men he’d talked to today, Jason or Nathan, attacked him. It wouldn’t take long to find out which. But discovering enough evidence to make an arrest seemed remote at this point.

  He’d been in this spot several times in the past, and it never bothered him. Some investigations panned out, while others led to dead ends. But that this man had been brazen enough to show up to the funeral, to attack him… Mickey didn’t think a man like that was afraid of getting caught.

  In the past he’d had help. The brilliant chief of Behavioral Science, Gillian Hanks, added much needed objectivity to investigations. He turned to her frequently, and her insights led to some breakthroughs in cases he thought were dead.

  But there was someone else.

  Jon Stanton, a former homicide detective with the San Diego Police Department, was similar to Gillian in that they both held PhD’s in psychology, though Stanton focused on personality theory and psychoanalysis, while Gillian had been a pure neuroscience researcher in graduate school. But the similarities ended there.

  Gillian’s cold detachment led her to see cases as puzzles to be solved. The end game was the completion of the puzzle, not the impact on communities or families. This brought her a certain gravitas and laser-focus that enabled her to look at the most horrific actions of men and view them as pieces to put together.

  Stanton, on the other hand, at least to Mickey, took every case personally. He tried not to. He tried desperately to detach himself, but he never could pull himself out of the mire. No doubt, the dead haunted him in those lonely moments at night, when he woke up in an empty room. Mickey felt sorry for him in a lot of ways. Even some in the Behavioral Science Unit felt Stanton’s gift might have had supernatural, rather than analytic, origins. Several articles written about Stanton having extrasensory perception and remote viewing capabilities were quickly dismissed as eccentric media outlets began exploring connections to CIA experiments and the KGB.

  But Mickey had seen him work, seen the leaps he took when no one else saw anything. He could fit into the minds of the most disturbed individuals and find his way back out again like a maze. Mickey’s fear was that Stanton would get lost in there one day. As far as the supernatural stuff, it was unverifiable and therefore not worthy of consideration.

  Mickey dialed Stanton’s cell phone and got voicemail.

  “Jon, this is Mickey Parsons. I have a case I’m stuck on and could really use your help. I heard you retired, and I’m sorry to bother you with this. Please call me back.”

  Mickey hung up and placed the phone back on the table. Though his nose was throbbing, he didn’t want to ask for any more meds. He closed his eyes. Focusing on his place of serenity, a trick taught in the Yoga for Healing classes he attended, he emptied his mind and concentrated on the one place in the world where he felt most safe, most at ease. For him, it was his home of twenty years in Arizona, sold after his wife passed away. He could still hear his daughter’s footsteps on the hardwood floors as she crossed on Christmas morning to try sneaking open some of her presents.

  As he drifted off to sleep, he smiled.

  20

  Mickey opened his eyes slowly, listening to ensure he’d actually heard noise and that it wasn’t just a dream. Moonlight reached through the only window in the room, and a breeze blew the curtains open. Though cold, it felt good on his skin, which burned with fever.

  The doctors and nurses had apparently let him sleep. He had no experience in small town courtesies. Back in DC, they would have kicked him out the second they reset his nose.

  He heard the sound again. Almost like a voice but not quite. Taking a deep breath, he swung his legs around on the bed. He put his bare feet on the cold linoleum and pushed his feet into slippers one at a time. He walked to the window and looked outside at the hospital parking lot. The nearest hospital to his home back in DC was crowded every time he’d been there, with a minimum two and a half-hour wait in the emergency room. Viewing the empty lot, he wondered why he hadn’t chosen to live in a small town sooner in his career. Why did he always choose crowded places? Perhaps he knew the reason: he was lonely. And in the midst of strangers that loneliness was alleviated, at least a little.

  The noise again, from out in the hall. He walked to the door. The hospital was quiet; he didn’t even hear any of the staff. He looked down both directions of the brightly lit corridor before seeing the sign for the bathroom at the west end.

  Another noise. Coming from behind the desk. It sounded almost like paper hitting a fan, or something sliding around on the floor.

  Mickey glanced around one more time. How many people were actually needed to staff an emergency room? No one was here, and it didn’t seem to be a big deal. Then he heard a familiar sound, though distant and barely audible: laughter. The staff in another room at the far end of the floor.

  The noise again. He made his way around the desk and looked down.

  An orderly lay on the ground. Blood pooled around him and soaked his scrubs a dark black. His throat had been slit, and he was trying to inhale, the incision in his neck making a wet sucking sound.

  Mickey instinctively reached for the sidearm he always kept with him but grabbed nothing but cloth.

  As he turned to get help, hot breath burned on the back of his neck.

  The man wore a mask. Mickey tried to go for his eyes, but he was quicker. The man ducked and pulled out a blade. He rose again just as Mickey jumped back, avoiding the blade by inches.

  Mickey kicked him in the groin, and then connected with a left to the jaw. Mickey ran toward the laughter down the hall. As he ran, a slash seared across his back, but he didn’t turn around.

  He pushed through the double doors and fell onto the linoleum in front of several people. Unsure exactly what they were seeing, they didn’t move at first, until one of the nurses ran to him.

  21

  The sheriff shut the door behind her. She sat down on a stool next to the hospital bed and waited a beat before speaking.

  “I’m having one of my officers posted outside this room at all times.”

  “I’d feel better if they hadn’t taken my sidearm.”

  “A man on painkillers with a gun probably isn’t a good combination.”

  “Did the orderly survive?”

  She played with a ring on one of her fingers. “He’s in critical condition. He lost a lot of blood.”

  “Tell me they have cameras here.”

  “No cameras except at the front entrance. I looked ’em over. We caught a man in a mask and hoodie walking into the hospital and then walking out about twenty minutes later. Did you see his face?”

  “No, he kept the mask on the entire time.”

  “Well, he’s clearly targeted you for some reason.”

  “At the funeral, after he’d hit me, he said he can see me.”

  She paused. “It’s him. It’s freaking him.” She took the ring off and rubbed it a few times before putting it back on. “What do you think that means?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe it means we’re his targets. Or maybe it’s nonsense. Someone this reckless has to be suffering from mental illness.”

  “Oh my gosh, don’t tell me you buy into all this garbage about p
eople being what they are because of how they were raised? We have responsibility for our own lives. He knows what he’s doing.”

  “The brain is a machine. Like any machine, it can malfunction. If your car malfunctions and you crash, we don’t blame you. It was inevitable.”

  “Don’t buy it. Sorry. Some people are good and some people are evil, and that’s all there is to it.” She hesitated a moment. “I got a mountain of paperwork. I better run. The deputy is outside your door. I’ll get your sidearm back to you. Do you need anything?”

  “I’m good. Thanks.”

  After she left, the doctor came back in.

  “Sheriff’s cute, isn’t she?” he said.

  Despite his age, Mickey felt himself blush. “Yeah, she’s a good woman.”

  “So, we have a decision yet on the surgery?”

  Mickey nodded. “I want to do it. As soon as we can.”

  The doctor jingled something in the pocket of his white coat. “I think it’s for the best. Just lay back and relax a bit; we’ll get everything set up.”

  That moment of consciousness just after surgery was the worst. The second he awoke, he braced himself for pain, because the anesthesiologists could never get the pain medication just quite right. Mickey felt burning down his throat all the way to his stomach and then a powerful churning in his gut, as though it were in a blender.

  “You’re up,” the nurse said from across the room.

  “It hurts.”

  She adjusted some knobs on a machine and increased the drip from an IV bag. “That should help.”

  “He didn’t make it seem like it would hurt this bad.”

  She grinned. “He does that. Says the anticipation of the pain is worse than the pain.” Adjusting his pillow, she said, “Get some sleep. You’ll only be here a day or so.”

  The day Mickey spent in the recovery unit was one of the longest in his life. He wasn’t allowed to eat and could only suck on ice chips. Tomorrow, they assured him, he could have some Gatorade, but today his stomach had to be empty while it healed.

  He tried to take his mind off the pain by watching television, but he could fit only so many hours of it into a day. Standing and sitting were extraordinarily painful, but he performed them dutifully and took short walks around the floor. A woman two rooms down said hello as he walked by, pulling his IV along.

  “You look as bad as I feel,” she said from her bed.

  “That sounds about right.”

  “What they got you in for?”

  He walked nearer to her door. “Stomach surgery. You?”

  “Cancer. Lung cancer. Twenty-two years of smoking. I’ve had three surgeries, and it keeps coming back. Damn thing just won’t leave me alone. You ever know anyone that had cancer?”

  He leaned against the frame of the door. “My wife passed from cancer.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  He shook his head. “It was a long time ago. You look like you’re holding strong.”

  “I am. Gotta keep positive and all that bullshit. I’m Kelly, by the way.”

  “Mickey.”

  “Mickey? Now there’s a name you don’t hear anymore.”

  “My father was a big fan of Mickey Pitts, a boxer from the fifties.”

  “Well Mickey, if you ever get bored you come on over, and we can watch some shows together.”

  “Thanks.”

  Mickey made a whole lap before going back to his room. A uniformed officer sat in a chair outside the room sipping an orange soda. He nodded to him as he entered.

  Mickey grabbed his phone and lay back on the bed. He had a missed call from Jon Stanton. He dialed his number, and Stanton answered on the third ring. The ocean roared behind him.

  “How’s it going, Mickey?”

  “Good. You at the beach?”

  “Yeah, just laying around with my boys. I got them both for a while.”

  “Really? What happened to the lone wolf?”

  “He got old and lonely.”

  “I can relate.” He hesitated. “Did you get my message earlier?”

  “I did. Sorry for not calling back.”

  “It’s okay. I was just hoping you might be able to help me out.”

  “With what?”

  “I don’t want you thinking about this stuff when you’re with your kids. Call me later when you get a second alone.”

  “Sure.”

  “Thanks, Jon. Talk to you soon.”

  Mickey hung up and groaned. The pain in his belly burned as if he’d swallowed hot stones. He pressed the button on the bed to call the nurse and closed his eyes.

  22

  The doctor kept him an extra day for observation. When he released Mickey, he gave him plenty of pain pills and some white fluid that was supposed to coat and soothe his stomach. They brought him outside in a wheelchair, and the sheriff was there with her Tahoe.

  “Need a ride?”

  “Looks like it.”

  “Where are you staying?”

  “Bed and breakfast in town. I can’t think of the name.”

  She opened the passenger side door. “I know the one, but you’re not going there. Give me your keys. I’m gonna get one of my deputies to go get your truck. You’re staying with me.”

  “I can’t impose like that, sheriff. Any hotel is fine.”

  “Nonsense. I got a huge house and just me to fill it. You’ll stay in the guest bedroom as long as you like.”

  “If you insist, I won’t say no.”

  She helped him get into the Tahoe. Pulling himself up into the passenger seat was an ordeal in itself. He had to lean the seat all the way back to avoid the crushing pain deep within his stomach. He started to put on his seatbelt but thought he would rather go through the windshield than have that thing suddenly jerk into his stomach, so he left it off.

  The house was as she’d described. It sat away from the street, separated by a massive lawn covered with apricot trees that had withered away. The large front porch held a swing-chair and couch. Suzan helped him up the steps and into the house.

  The home smelled like Mickey’s grandmother’s house when he was a kid. Somewhere between dust and plastic with patchouli in a bowl somewhere. The decoration appeared like his grandmother’s house as well, with old rugs, mirrors, and paintings of dim landscapes.

  “Not what I thought for you,” he said.

  “This place has been in my family for four generations. My great-grandfather built it with his own hands. It’s just passed down from one person to the next. I thought about getting a condo in town last year, but I just couldn’t leave the place. I mean, my mom was born in this house and died up in the bedroom. How can you sell something like that?”

  Mickey followed her through the kitchen and to a guest room at the rear. The bed was a king with several throw pillows, and the room had its own fireplace. He dropped his bag by the bed.

  “This is more than generous of you. Thank you.”

  She shrugged. “I feel responsible.”

  “Why would you feel responsible?”

  “We have only one hospital. Obviously he’d know that’s where you were. I should have had a deputy there.”

  Mickey sat down on the edge of the bed. It was soft and gave way easily. “You couldn’t have known he would do that. That move was unpredictable, which means we’re not dealing with someone who thinks rationally or linearly. You can’t guess his next moves, and you’re no more responsible for them than you are the weather.”

  “Well, I appreciate that, but I still feel responsible. Anyway, make yourself at home. I have to run back to the station, but if you need anything don’t hesitate to call me. You still got pain meds in your system, so I wouldn’t drive. Just call me, and if I can’t make it down I’ll send someone to drive you around.”

  “Again, thank you.”

  “Sure.”

  When she had left, Mickey looked out through the patio glass doors that led to a garden. Gray light seeped in and clouds covered the sun. He opened the
doors and let the cool air inside. A crow sat on the fence in the backyard. It didn’t move for a long while, and then it lifted into the air and was gone.

  23

  Mickey occupied himself by going into her family’s library and reading. Most of the books were first or second editions, coated in dust with gold speckled spines and worn leather covers. He read an old edition of Moby-Dick for most of the afternoon before he heard a key in the door. Suzan walked in carrying a brown paper bag. She glanced at him on her way to the kitchen.

  “Hey,” she said, “got some Chinese. Hope that’s okay.”

  “That sounds great.”

  She placed the bag down on a counter. “I got egg drop soup and sweet and sour pork for you.”

  He sat at the dining table. He could see words carved into the tabletop, names. The chicken scratch a child might carve waiting for breakfast. “You have kids?”

  “Oh, no. That table’s been here sixty years, at least. Been through a lot of kids, but not mine.”

  She laid the food out on the table and washed her hands. After sitting down, she folded her arms as he put his spoon in the soup.

  “Do you want to say grace?” she asked.

  He put the spoon down. “No, you go ahead.”

  “Dear Father in Heaven, please bless Mickey that he will heal quickly and that the pain will not bother him much. Please bless us that we will find the man we seek and have the strength to stop him. Grant comfort to those friends and family that aren’t here, and bless this food that it will nourish and strengthen our bodies. Amen.”

  “Amen,” Mickey said, forcing the word out.

  “That seemed hard for you.”

  He tasted the soup. It burned his throat going down. “I’m not very religious.”

  “I grew up with it. For every church sermon I attended, my mother would give me a dollar. Huge sum of money for a kid back then. There were some weeks I’d get two or three dollars. But the trick’s on me, because the sermons stuck.”