by Stacy Green
I watch her fat ass bounce as she walks ahead of me to the living room. Her robe doesn’t flatter her plushy shape. Her thighs rub together when she walks, like two big marshmallows fused together. At this point in her life, with her pot belly and jug thighs, men don’t notice her. At least men who aren’t just as fat and gross as she is. That’s probably why she suddenly became a lesbian. Women usually forgive because they understand the bullshit double standard females have to live with.
I let her talk for a minute, rattling about something I don’t give a shit about, and then I make my move. The fat woman’s eyes bulge when I punch her in the stomach, like a fat-ass doughboy getting the stuffing knocked out of him, and his eyes are the first orifice his innards can squeeze out of. Her eyes don’t pop out, but I would have laughed if they did. Maybe I would’ve stuffed them into her big, fat mouth.
She doubles over, sausage-fingers clutching her middle. I hit her again, this time in the left temple. She drops to her knees, squealing like a baby pig taken off its mama’s teat.
“What are you doing?”
She doesn’t sound so smart anymore. She sounds like a desperate woman who knows her time is up.
I kick her in the head, sending her overfed body flat to the floor. Her skull damn near smacks the fireplace.
I straddle her, my ass sinking into her thighs. “Tying up loose ends.”
The knife takes a lot longer to sink through her extra layers of skin and into her stomach. I should have kept the cleaver instead of sticking it in Bonnie’s well-used pussy. I shove as hard as I can, half-expecting to see yellow fat escaping from the wound. She screams something I can’t understand. Or maybe I’m not listening to the words. I am caught up in the feeling of her body collapsing on itself, of the sight of the blood spurting, and of the guttural fear in her voice.
“What’s it like to know you’re about to die?” I ask. “Are you scared? Do you think you’ll go to hell?”
She screams so loudly I hope the neighbors don’t hear. I should be cautious and cut her throat completely, but that takes all the fun out of it. And that’s not what Jack did, anyway.
She twists and jerks, trying to fight me off. I dig my knees into her sides, making sure to jam them up under her ribs, and hit her in the face again. Shock and being out of shape has fucked her chances of winning. I grip the knife with both hands and shove it deeper, jerking it toward her chest.
Her rolls bounce like a swollen Jell-O mold. This time, her eyes really do pop, at least to an extent. Red streaks burst across the left one as it hemorrhages from stress and pain. Glorious.
Blood gurgles from her wounds and then her mouth. I must have nicked something important. Anatomy isn’t my strong suit, but I know the basics.
She keeps bouncing, making me bounce. My work becomes uneven and not as accurate as I hope. Her eyes roll back in her head. If I don’t end it now, she’ll pass out. And I want to have the final decision.
I lean over and grab one of the decorative throw pillows off her ugly couch. Her rolling eyes refocus, and she raises her stumpy arms in a final attempt to fight me off. I smack them away and press the pillow over her face, putting all of my upper body weight on it.
“This is what you get for being a tattle-tale.”
Three damned days and nothing. No more calls from Mina and absolutely zero leads on anything. The paper found crumpled in Bonnie’s attic didn’t have a single print—bolstering Erin’s belief the killer deliberately left it. Erin and Beckett, with help from Fowler—who quickly volunteered for the task—had talked to every stripper at Sid’s. All liked Bonnie, and all expressed shock and grief.
All of the dancers described Tori as an older man with great makeup skills and nice clothes. He usually wore a dark, loose-fitting dress and a black wig cut in a stylish bob. He didn’t keep an account or tab with the club and always paid with cash. Bonnie’s disagreement with him surprised her coworkers, who considered Tori a perfect gentleman who happened to like wearing ladies clothes. Bonnie refused to discuss Tori, and her coworkers dropped the subject. No one knew his real name, or any Jane, Mina, or Charlie who might have been associated with Bonnie Archer.
Subsequent searches at neighboring bars and strip clubs came up empty with the exception of The Point. The low-key gay bar on the waterfront was a known favorite of the LGBT community, and several bartenders remembered Tori frequenting the establishment within the last two months, although he hadn’t been seen in a couple of weeks. All cash transactions and no decent images on the security footage meant yet another dead end.
Bonnie’s phone records proved useless. Calls to her work, to her parents, to Sarah and Will Merritt and to her school, as well as several calls to an unlisted number, probably a throwaway phone. Another dead end.
Brian Reese’s alibi checked out as expected. Ricky Stout skipped his night class. A trip to the shelter listed as his last address yielded exactly nothing. No one knew where he’d gone. The director was on vacation and was the only person who worked at the shelter when Ricky would have been living there. Erin left her card.
The Charlies with juvenile records went nowhere. The computer people had yet to hit on Bonnie’s porn videos—another job Fowler volunteered to help with until he needed to search for rape porn.
This world is full of sick fucks. Erin pulled up another site. The amount of pay-per-view porn sites on the dark web astounded her. New ones seemed to pop up overnight, and Erin couldn’t get in without giving her credit card information.
11:00 p.m. and she holed up in her room, half under the covers, watching the stuff of nightmares. Women tied up and screaming, begging for mercy. Fake and usually poorly acted, but cold sweat still soaked Erin’s nightshirt, and the memories still rushed back.
She hadn’t screamed. She let him do it because she thought fighting back would get her killed. Abby couldn’t grow up without her mother.
Rape crisis counseling helped her move on, at least to an extent. But she struggled with trusting men, with trusting her own judgment.
The thought made Bonnie Archer hard to feel sorry for. But then Erin remembered the cleaver sticking out of the girl’s destroyed body, and she pulled up another video.
Her ringing phone gave her a respite from the latest filth.
“It’s Sergeant Clark.”
Erin froze at the grave tenor of his voice. “It’s another body, right? It’s not Mina, is it?”
“Not a kid, thank God.”
“Is it a boy? Mina talked about Charlie taking care of her.”
“It’s a middle-aged female in Takoma Park.” Worry colored Clark’s baritone. “But Mitchell says it’s the same killer.”
Clark rattled off an address as Erin fumbled for paper and pen.
“Get over there ASAP. Beckett will meet you.”
* * *
Dawn hadn’t yet reached the horizon when Erin parked her car in front of the restored craftsman home in Takoma Park. Although she’d moved as quickly as possible, she still limped woefully behind. After waking her snoring brother and getting his assurance Abby would be taken care of for the day, she’d rushed to the car, still trying to wrap her mind around the sergeant’s words.
Not Mina or Charlie. Not another struggling young woman in a challenging neighborhood but nearly her polar opposite: a forty-something college professor in a middle-class suburb.
Takoma Park was trendy, fun, and loaded with security-cautious people who could afford to install alarm systems. People who noticed someone strange on their street and had no problem calling the police. So why would someone who so obviously planned his attacks risk coming to a place like Takoma Park? Did he need to up the thrill factor?
At least it’s not a kid.
Erin shut her car door, and gooseflesh immediately covered her arms despite her fleece jacket. The last week had brought nothing but gray skies and a dampness intent on leaching warmth from the skin. Death lingered everywhere: prickly brown grass, often swampy with rainwater; the brilliant
red and gold fall leaves turned putrid and crisp; perennials reduced to a tangle of stems. Erin would welcome an early snow just to cover the decay.
Headlights shined in her eyes. Erin shielded her face and then waited for Beckett to park his Prius behind her car. He unfolded his long form and emerged in khakis and a snug fleece jacket, looking fresher and more put together than Erin. She’d tugged on what she hoped were clean jeans and a long sleeved shirt, and she was pretty sure her socks didn’t match.
“I just got here,” she said by way of greeting. “I suppose you’ve heard the basics. This victim has nothing in common with Bonnie.”
“Sometimes the common denominator is the random selection.” Beckett followed her up the walk. They stood side by side at the base of the wide steps, both taking in the home.
“No sign of breaking and entering.” Erin studied the rectangular porch. She loved the house at first sight and took a brief moment to appreciate it. Like many of the revitalized homes in the area, the house looked as though it weathered the decades, soaked in the history of the city, and came out stronger. “So our victim knew the guy, just like Bonnie?”
“My gut says a preliminary yes. And who called in the body at this hour?” Beckett glanced around. “This isn’t exactly a night owl sort of neighborhood.”
“That’s one of the most interesting parts.” Sergeant Clark emerged from the shadows of the porch.
Erin jumped at the sound of his voice and hoped the men didn’t notice.
“The 9-1-1 call came from an untraceable number, probably another damned pay-as-you-go. We’re searching the property to see if the caller tossed it.”
“So the murderer called it in?” Erin hoped her voice sounded steady.
“Possibly, but not until about forty-five minutes ago. Mitchell puts preliminary time of death at, at least, eight hours ago. But the killer might have come back, admiring his work and all.” Clark shuddered. “You need to talk to Mitchell. We’ve got another message, but there’s more to this one.”
Erin hesitated on the wide front porch. The house’s blazing lights did nothing to shed the sensation of walking through the devil’s doorway. Her knees buckled, sweat beaded across her hairline. Her chest tightened.
Beckett stood somewhere behind her, patiently waiting. Did he sense it too? Did he feel the weird, baking humidity seeming to crawl out of the house?
Terror washed over Erin, but she had to get going. Another butchered woman waited for Erin and Beckett to stop the killing. Erin willed her feet to move forward.
The sharp, pungent odor of decay assaulted Erin and Beckett as soon as they entered the welcoming entryway. She covered her nose and tried to breathe through her mouth. Dan Mitchell and his assistant knelt in the large living room, positioned on either side of the body. Wide columns separated the living room from the entryway, and Erin couldn’t help but think she’d crossed into the threshold of hell when she saw the dead woman.
Virginia Walton lay spread-eagle in front of the fireplace, her pink robe and nightgown hiked up to her knees. Thankfully, it appeared the killer hadn’t stuck anything up her vagina.
Fuzzy slippers covered her feet. “No blood on the slippers,” Erin heard herself saying. “So he got her down to the floor before he ... started.”
Her gaze went to the mahogany fireplace mantle. Scrawled in dark blood were the words snitch and 1888 Hanbury Street. Beneath the address, the initials JTR.
“The second Ripper victim.” Erin forced the words out.
Copious amounts of blood saturated the carpet. Erin dug her toes into her shoes in an effort not to sway. Her breathing sounded ragged and fast. Beside her, Beckett sucked in a breath as raspy as hers. The noise somehow steadied Erin enough to take stock of what lay in front of her.
Virginia Walton’s left arm lay across her generous left breast, which had been sliced open to reveal yellow, fatty tissue. Her legs were drawn up with her feet resting on the carpet, the knees turned outward. It made Erin think of being stuck in the stirrups in the gynecologist’s office. Swollen and purple, the woman stared blankly at the fireplace. Blood crusted along the right side of her face and neck. Part of the right earlobe was missing.
“Did you find the earlobe?”
“Not yet,” Mitchell said softly.
Long, purplish, ropey strands extended from the vicious cuts to the abdomen.
He filleted her. Like the fish her father caught during one of the family vacations to the lake. Erin remembered standing at the doorway of the little building where the men went to cut the fish. The smell made her sick, but the way the helpless fish flopped while her father dragged the knife through it made her and Brad run screaming to their mother. Their older sister laughed.
That hateful laughter echoed through Erin’s head as she edged closer. “Those are her intestines.” Erin sounded as though she spoke into some kind of bell jar.
Dan Mitchell swiveled around on his toes and then pointed to Virginia’s pelvic region.
The blood prevented Erin from figuring out what Mitchell wanted her to see.
“He tried to cut her uterus out too. And her bladder. He either tired out or didn’t have a good enough knife. Or maybe he lost the nerve.”
Mitchell sounded like he might cry, or maybe, Erin just assumed the possibility given his Droopy-Dog face.
“Jack the Ripper cut off part of the right ear.” Beckett said.
“Catherine Eddows,” Erin said. “The fourth victim. Jack sliced her whole body up. Severe facial lacerations and part of her ear was missing. He destroyed her labia. This,” she pointed to Virginia Walton’s body, “isn’t as bad as that.”
“He’s inspired,” Beckett said. “But he’s trying to be original at the same time.”
“Obviously, you have the cleaver that killed Bonnie Archer,” Mitchell said. “These cuts were done by a long blade, at least six inches. Incredibly sharp to do all of this. But he still left something in her vaginal area.”
Sweat blistered on Erin’s face as Mitchell handed her a clear evidence bag containing a piece of college-ruled notebook paper covered with blood and bodily fluid. She could only make out a few words, once again written in modern black ink.
I no longer have control
Voices war
The demon blood.
—JTR
Tendrils of the same evil energy from Bonnie’s crime scene ghosted around Erin with the strength of an iron fist. If an act of cruelty left an imprint, surely this must be it. “I’ve spent the last few days digging into Ripper lore. I can’t find any letters matching any of the passages we’ve seen so far—not even the ones known to be fake.”
She handed the bag to Beckett with more force than intended as though the crux of evil rested in the handwriting itself. Erin hated the way the fear seeped into her voice. But the world seemed to be spiraling out of control, and she had no clue how to stop the bleeding. Literally.
Beckett cleared his throat. “She appears to have been smothered. Do you agree?”
Mitchell glanced down at the woman’s purple, swollen face. “Definitely. And then cutting started, based on the blood flow.”
Erin asked the question she wasn’t sure she wanted an answer to. “How similar to the second Ripper victim is this?”
“Very close.” Clark glared across the expanse, shaking his head. “The Ripper did worse things to Annie Chapman—the victim found at Hanbury Street—but we can’t deny the similarities.”
“I don’t understand it,” Erin said. “Our killer is inspired by the Ripper murders, but he’s not exactly copycatting them. Especially with these notes. So what’s the killer’s obsession about?”
And what about Jane—or Jill, as the lore called her? Erin didn’t say the name out loud, but it rested on the tip of her tongue, waiting for the right moment. What better role model for a killer than a woman who escaped justice—and history—for butchering at least five prostitutes?
“I don’t think it’s all about Jack.” Clark m
otioned for them to follow him back to the entryway. He lowered his voice. “We have to keep this information contained. Aside from us, Mitchell’s the only one who’s seen the body and the message. If the press gets wind we have two women killed by a nut job paying homage to Jack the Ripper, all hell will break loose. That doesn’t help us catch him. The Ripper stuff is all window dressing, same with the notes. Distractions.”
Beckett clearly agreed, his head bobbing up and down, his face passive and thoughtful as usual. “So we know why Bonnie is a whore. Why is the professor a snitch? Was she in the attic?”
“Surely not, or he would have killed her then. But there’s got to be a link between the two women. He chose them for specific reasons.” Clark looked down at his phone, his crooked index finger scrolling over the screen. “I need to notify next of kin.”
He pointed to the fireplace where several pictures of a thirty-something woman and a gap-toothed little girl held court. “I’m assuming that’s her daughter. We found her contact information in the professor’s cell. It lay on the dining room table with her purse. Wallet and credits cards still there.”
“Is the daughter local?” Erin’s heart beat a little bit faster. “If she’s got a child, maybe that’s Mina. Maybe she was too scared.”
Clark’s brow furrowed, his graying eyebrows knitting together. “Not sure, but I’ll find out. Although I can’t imagine a daughter orchestrating something like this for her own mother.”
“That doesn’t have to be it,” Erin said. “Maybe the daughter had a drug problem, and that’s the connection to Bonnie. An old friend from the past asks for help, and Bonnie agrees. The dealer tracks her down to Bonnie’s place, and then Bonnie gets it. Same thing happens here.” Reaching, but they needed to put this gruesome picture together before yet another woman died.
Beckett crossed his arms, looking between Erin and the sergeant. “I wouldn’t rule it out. But this seems way too bloody for something like that. You’ve worked a couple of drug homicides,” he said to Erin. “Doesn’t this feel like the opposite end of the spectrum?”
