The Rainy Day Killer

by Michael J. McCann

  “No one else was hanging around?”

  “No. People tend to stay away in bad weather. No money to be made. Maybe someone came after I left.”

  Hank brought out the composite drawing. “What about this guy? Ever see him around the mall?”

  Keyton studied the drawing. “I don’t know. Could be. Lot of guys like that around. I don’t pay attention to what people look like. I guess I should. That’s what you do, isn’t it? Facial recognition? Cops are supposed to be good at that.”

  “Most are,” Hank agreed.

  “I’m aurally-oriented. I have perfect pitch, and I can identify any sound I’ve heard before. Visually, I’m not very good. Guess that’s why I need glasses.”

  Hank put away the composite and closed his notebook. He slipped it into his jacket pocket with his pen and touched Keyton’s knee lightly with the heel of his fist. “Thanks, Tommy. I appreciate your help. I’m sorry for your loss.”

  Keyton raised his head and looked at him. “Thanks, man.”

  The young man’s damp cheeks told Hank that Liz Baskett would at least be missed by someone in this town.

  30

  Wednesday, May 22: early afternoon

  They gathered in Martinez’s board room to discuss the new shipment from the Rainy Day Killer, which an FBI team had processed after its arrival this morning. It included another cardboard carton tied with manila rope, and a guitar case containing a Ramirez six-string guitar in good condition. Everything had been fingerprinted and examined for hair samples, fibers, soil, and any other trace evidence. After the break with the eyelash hair, they were a little more optimistic this time around.

  The carton had contained a knapsack belonging to Liz Baskett, into which the Rainy Day Killer had stuffed the victim’s clothing and sneakers, a cheap turquoise ring, a silver chain, a Casio digital sports watch, her wallet, and a re-sealable plastic container holding her breasts and genital tissue. Under the knapsack, at the bottom of the carton, was another DVD.

  The evidence recovery team had duplicated the disc after processing it, and as Mickey Marcotte loaded the copy into the board room DVD player, he avoided eye contact with the others in the room. “I only watched the first few seconds. It’s really awful.”

  Martinez gestured to Karen. “Close the door, would you?”

  As Karen got up, Cassion frowned at Griffin. “Don’t you have somewhere else to be?”

  “Charmed, I’m sure,” the analyst replied.

  Karen closed the board room door and sat down next to Horvath.

  Hank pressed the green button on the remote.

  Unexpectedly, the video began with a shot of Liz Baskett’s naked body on a large metal table. Her arms were pulled up, tied at the wrists to the corners of the table, and her splayed legs were similarly bound. She was dead. A naked male appeared in the frame, visible from the waist up, his back to the camera. As they watched, he plunged a large KA-BAR knife into the abdomen of the body several times. He then approached her right breast, fondled it, and with practiced movements sliced it off from the bottom up.

  “My God,” Martinez said, her eyes moving involuntarily away from the television screen.

  Karen bared her teeth. Cassion paled, mouth open. Horvath raised a hand to his forehead and watched from beneath the protective canopy of his fingers. Marcotte kept his head down, staring sightlessly at his hands, folded in his lap.

  Martinez forced her eyes back to the screen as the killer removed the second breast and tossed it callously on the table next to the body. He stabbed the body, viciously, several more times, then circled it, like a predatory animal, before moving in on the exposed genital area.

  “I can’t watch this,” Martinez said.

  She did, nevertheless.

  They all did, except for Marcotte, because it was their job to watch it.

  At no time did the killer expose his face to the lens, nor did they see his body below the waist. No distinguishing features, such as scars or tattoos, were visible. After several more minutes with the knife, he walked out of the frame and the screen went blank.

  Two seconds later, a new image replaced it, one almost identical to what they’d seen in the previous video. Faint light from the top right-hand corner of the frame fell across the killer, who sat once again in a chair, facing the camera. The table on which the mutilated body lay was once more a dark shape at the left of the frame.

  “Hello, Hank,” the killer said. “I’m sorry for the outburst. I wanted you to see what happens when I’m disappointed. She deeply disappointed me by giving up far too early. At the same time, I’m disappointed in myself for having chosen her to begin with. I thought she was in better physical condition than that. Turns out she was slim because she was underfed and undernourished. I should have seen it a mile away. I wonder, though, if there was something wrong with her heart. Would you do me a favor? Find out from your medical examiner if she had some kind of heart defect, and let me know.

  “I’d love to talk to you about a lot of things. I admire you, and I hope you’ll understand me better than the others because we’re very much alike, you and I. Unfortunately, though, I have to cut this short. It ran very late—oh shit, I forgot to turn on the date and time stamp. I leave it off for my own filming and switch it on for you.” He paused for a moment. “Oops, shouldn’t have told you that, but you and Father Ed have probably already put two and two together. Whatever. Anyway, my point is, it’s late and I need to move her quickly before she stiffens up, so there isn’t a lot of time for conversation right now. We’ll have to wait for the next one.

  “And yes, as advertised, the next one’s going to be a cop. I’ve been teasing you about it, but I’ve decided it’s time to pull the trigger, figuratively speaking. Your challenge, should you choose to accept it, is to guess which cop I’m talking about. Is it the lovely Karen Stainer? The gorgeous Eleanor Montgomery? I’d definitely consider that new captain of yours, Helen Cassion, or the commander, who’s the hottest Latina in a uniform I’ve ever seen outside a porn film, but they’re not the Rainy Day Killer’s type, are they? Sorry, ladies. Maybe next time. No, our lovely blonde cops are the ladies in competition to become the Rainy Day Killer’s next luscious love.

  “So, gotta go. I’ll call you later. Bye for now.”

  The screen went blank again.

  There was silence in the room as they waited. When it was obvious there would be nothing more, Hank used the remote to shut it off.

  “He’s mine,” Karen said. “Just so we’re clear. The first shot takes his gonads, the next two kneecap him, and then he gets to beg for the kill shot.”

  “Stand in line, Stainer,” Cassion said, staring at the blank television screen. Tears ran down her cheeks, and her jaw was tightly clenched.

  “That’s enough,” Martinez said. She looked at Hank. “I want around-the-clock protection on both Stainer and Montgomery, starting immediately. Understood?”

  “Forget it,” Karen said. “If anybody needs protection, it’s that fucking mutt when I catch sight of him.”

  “You’re not leaving the building tonight without a protection detail,” Martinez said. “Understood?”

  “I’ll take care of it,” Hank said.

  “I want that captivity site found,” Martinez went on. “I’m going to talk to the chief and get an overtime budget for the districts to step up searches of these abandoned factories and warehouses until we find this place and cut him off. I will not allow him to do this to another woman.”

  She suddenly pounded the table three times with her fist, furiously.

  “NO! MORE! VICTIMS! Am I understood?”

  “Absolutely,” Hank said.

  She stood up abruptly and locked eyes with him.

  “Put an end to this. That’s an order.”

  31

  Thursday, May 23: late afternoon

  The following afternoon, a sharp-eyed patrol officer noticed a new-looking padlock on the side door of an abandoned warehouse belonging to
Helpern Logistics, a licensed and bonded freight shipping and trucking company. Helpern had been out of business for almost a decade, but their assets were still tied up in bankruptcy proceedings and had been sitting unused for a long time. The warehouse was a ramshackle brick building on Howson Street in South Shore West. Its windows were boarded up, the walls were decorated with graffiti, and the cracks in the pavement of the parking lot were sprouting thistles and quack grass.

  Howson Street ran north and south through the district, passing through block after block of neglected rowhouses, until it reached O’Connell Street, where a rail line running from the dockyards crossed it diagonally. On the other side of the tracks was an industrial area including a scrap metal yard, a chemical processing plant, a packaging factory, and the empty remains of Helpern Logistics. Directly across the street from the warehouse was an empty lot where another building had once stood.

  The police officer, whose name was Matt Valpone, sat on the passenger side of the cruiser while Jim Choi, his partner, drove. They were halfway through their shift, patrolling the residential portion of their beat north of O’Connell, when they decided to cross the tracks on this particular pass. The duty sergeant was badgering everyone to watch for any suspicious activity or signs of entry that might connect to the hunt for the Rainy Day Killer, and Valpone and Choi wanted to be able to say they had at least taken a look.

  It was a clear, windswept afternoon, a break from the rainy weather, but the temperature was unseasonably cool, and they both wore their jackets over their uniform shirts. The tires of the patrol car splashed through puddles left behind by the recent storm as Choi drove across the tracks. He rolled through the O’Connell Street intersection and continued down the next block.

  The Helpern warehouse crowded the sidewalk on the right side of the street. As they cruised alongside it, they listened to the usual chatter on the radio between Dispatch and other patrol cars in other neighborhoods. They were a little bored and a little distracted by the radio, but as they passed the employee entrance halfway up the side of the warehouse, Valpone’s eyes jumped.

  “Hey, stop for a minute.”

  Choi glanced in the rear view mirror, saw nothing behind them, and slowed to a stop.

  “The side door. Back up.”

  Choi backed up and stopped even with the door. It was a typical metal door, painted light green. The weather had darkened it with mildew. Rainwater leaking down from the lintel had left wide rust streaks on it. There were several dents in the door where someone had hammered on it with a baseball bat or tire iron, chipping the paint in the process and creating more rust marks. Even the gang tag spray-painted on the door with white paint was faded and streaked.

  A padlock had been attached to the door about a foot above the doorknob, probably when Helpern had gone into bankruptcy and the warehouse had become a seized asset. The hasp was rusted and scratched, but the padlock itself looked new and expensive, as though the original lock had been removed and replaced with this one. It was the sort of thing that would go unnoticed ninety-nine times out of a hundred, but as they’d rolled past the door, light from the setting sun had caught the shank of the padlock and flashed at Valpone like a signal.

  Looking at it again, he saw that his initial impression had been on the money—the padlock’s newness was out of synch with the general appearance of the rest of the door.

  Choi drove down to the entrance of the parking lot at the far end of the warehouse. The lot was big enough to accommodate two tractor trailers at the same time. Choi stopped a few yards short of the entrance, flipped on the cruiser’s light bar, and shifted into Park.

  The parking lot was empty of vehicles. There were two dumpsters on the far side against the chain link fence running along the back of the warehouse. Litter was packed against the fence like the remnants of last winter’s snow. The doors and windows of the main entrance of the building were boarded up and undisturbed.

  “Tracks,” Valpone said, pointing into the lot.

  Choi nodded, looking at parallel ribbons of grit and wetness that ran from the sidewalk to the closer of the two loading docks, where they could see another padlock securing the roll-up door. The tracks and the two padlocks made it obvious that the warehouse had seen some sort of recent activity.

  They called it in.

  When Tactical breached the building, they discovered that cheap alarms had been set up on the roll-up doors and all other street-level doors and windows. Fortunately, however, there were no explosive devices or other booby-traps. Inside, they found two different areas set up by the killer. One, just inside the loading dock, contained a metal butcher’s table, a plastic folding table holding jugs of industrial cleanser, a rubber hose attached to a water tap, three 1200-watt halogen portable lights on tripods, a portable generator and a gas can still one-third full of gas, extension cords, a wheelchair, and a hand truck. In what had once been the employee lunch room they found a double-size bed, manila rope, two more halogen lights on tripods, another portable generator, extension cords, another plastic folding table containing an assortment of syringes and ampoules, a stun gun, a mini-fridge, and a microwave oven.

  The district set up a perimeter at each end of the block and established a command post in the empty lot across the street as a staging area for the crime scene. Standing just out of earshot at the edge of the command post, Hank watched Turcotte and Byrne argue with FBI Special Agent Jack Carson, who was in charge of the evidence response team.

  Although the protocol had been in place for several weeks now and had been followed several times, Byrne and Turcotte both seemed to suffer from a pathological inability to get along with others, and their shared compulsion to make things difficult was now being exercised on Carson, who listened patiently to their criticisms and tried to say the right things. For someone like Butternut, who got along well with others, the situation was complicated but workable. For Byrne and Turcotte, however, it was a screw-up in the making.

  Hank was staying out of it. As lead investigator, he had the clout to intervene if he thought it necessary in order to straighten things out, but Butternut was working nicely with her Bureau counterpart in the parking lot across the road, which would shortly be cleared so that Karen and Horvath could go over for a closer look. The discussion in front of him, on the other hand, was like watching bighorn sheep butt heads on the Nature Channel while mindlessly obeying their territorial imperative. That kind of headache he didn’t need.

  “Uh oh,” Karen said. “Incoming.”

  Down at the intersection of O’Connell and Howson, an unmarked black Taurus passed through the barrier.

  “Martinez?” Griffin asked.

  Hank nodded. With Cassion in tow. He watched a uniformed officer direct Martinez to a parking area set up at the far edge of the empty lot in which they were standing.

  He felt a twinge of guilt as he saw Cassion get out of the car, slinging her handbag over her shoulder. He watched her adjust her sunglasses and say something to Martinez as the commander took out her cell phone and looked at it. The rank of captain was the highest in the department that was staffed by a competitive process, everything higher being staffed through appointment by the chief. At noon today, the deadline had passed for the process that would be used to fill several captains’ vacancies. Cassion had been bubbling for a week about it, having submitted her application the same day the process opened, and she was already talking about changes she intended to make when Homicide became hers on a permanent basis. More than once, Hank had been forced to take Belknap and Karen aside for a quiet word to calm them down. Surely to God, he kept telling them, she’ll end up somewhere else. Surely to God they’ll slot an experienced hand into Homicide.

  This morning at 11:51 a.m., Hank had gone up to the tenth floor and submitted his own application package to Human Resources. As they’d stamped and logged the envelope, he’d felt a small current of satisfaction that had surprised him.

  He wanted the job, after all.


  As he watched Cassion and Martinez pick their way across the cracked concrete toward the command post, his cell phone began to vibrate. He took it out of his pocket and looked at the call display:

  4:34 PM 5-23

  0-000-000-0000

  UNKNOWN NAME

  “Call Mickey,” he told Karen urgently, showing her the phone. “Get him on it.”

  She nodded, turning away to take out her own phone.

  “Donaghue,” he said, answering the call.

  “You guys are good,” said the Rainy Day Killer. “I’ll give you that.”

  “Where are you, Bill? Can I send someone to pick you up?”

  The killer laughed. “I haven’t had this much fun in a long time. I’m still riding the adrenaline.”

  “How close were we to nailing your ass?”

  “Very close, I don’t mind telling you. I was there to pick up some things, but I didn’t stay more than a few minutes. A gut feeling, Hank. A sense of alarm I’ve trained myself not to ignore. It’s almost like a sixth sense, really. When I get the jitters, I take off, good and fast. I won’t be back, so you can have the rest of my stuff.”

  “Oh, we’ll take it, trust me.” Hank paused. “Does that mean you’re leaving Glendale?”

  “I don’t know, Hank. You tell me. It’s going to be either Montgomery or Stainer next. Is either of them going to be out of town in the next month or so?”

  “I don’t believe you. You don’t have the balls.” From the corner of his eye, Hank saw Griffin frown.

  “Father Ed doesn’t like you challenging me like that, Hank, but don’t worry. I won’t take offense. We’re past that. We’re almost like brothers now, you and I.”

  “No, we’re not.” Hank spun around in a slow three-sixty, searching the horizon. There were numerous tall buildings in all directions. He could be on the roof of any one of them, watching with binoculars. Hank caught Karen’s attention and raised his eyebrows. “Can you see me right now, Bill? Are you watching us right now from somewhere close by?”