Serial Intent

by Steve Bradshaw

  “I’m not worried. Tell me what you know and how,” Wolfe pushed.

  “The phone call came in the middle of the night. I was lightly sedated in a private room. I heard the phone. No one picked up. The lady on the phone said she was sorry about Ellen, but the monster is dead—a bullet in his head. He would hurt no one else.”

  “What lady?”

  “I don’t know. I didn’t go to any meeting, Ellen did. This lady did not identify herself except to say she represented the Dario Group. She was old. She said I would never hear from them again. And she reminded me of our agreement.”

  “What agreement? You didn’t say anything about an agreement.”

  “It wasn’t much. Ellen and I had to agree we would never implicate the Dario Group. I guess I agreed not to do what I’m doing right now.”

  “Interesting request,” Wolfe said staring at the fire.

  “They would see it as an act of aggression. They could not allow anyone to put them in more danger than they already were. Their mission was too important to be jeopardized. They would protect their members, the victims, and the survivors. That was the deal.”

  “I’m sure you’re familiar with the Serious Crime Act of 2007,” Wolfe said.

  “Yes, I am. The offence of encouraging or assisting a crime is an inchoate offence. I encouraged and assisted in the act of murder.”

  “In your case you and the Dario Group are complicit in the deaths of at least two people, Ellen Dumont and Frank Pazrro. You participated in the planning and implementation of cold and calculated murder. As an attorney you know better than most our legal system does not differentiate between good and evil. Our justice is based on the premise no one should be killed by another.”

  Wolfe flicked his cigarette into the fire and put a wad of bills on the table for the drinks. “You leave me no room here, Mr. Woods. I gotta take you in. It’s my job.”

  “I understand and really don’t care. If the legal system was not screwed up, Ellen would be alive today and Pazrro would have been executed the first time he killed. Unfortunately our society seems to be okay with a monster killing five innocent people, destroying five families, and punishing the one meaningless person left standing.”

  “I agree with everything you said, but my job is enforcing the law. Someone else convicts and punishes. Right now you’re my ticket to the next dance.”

  “If people like you and I allow this craziness to continue, there’s going be a lot more death and despair in the world, Mr. Wolfe. We’re graduating 45,000 lawyers a year. When I got out of law school in 2011, there were 1.2 million licensed attorneys. If they don’t deliver results, they’re on the streets and replaced. In criminal law, that means find a way to get your client off. The judicial system is being gamed everyday like a two dollar blackjack table in Vegas.”

  Wolfe got to his feet. “We need to go. You can educate smarter people than me on this Dario Group. If those people are for real, we’ve got a much bigger problem than I thought.”

  The two stepped outside onto East Washington into a frigid blast of air whipping between the buildings. The plowed streets of Chicago were now covered with black ice, and the curbs were buried beneath glassy three-foot piles.

  “My car is parked on Dearborn,” Wolfe said turning west. He had no need to handcuff Barry Woods, a broken man going nowhere. Wolfe wanted to let him go, but he had no choice. The Dumont case connected to seven other unsolved homicides. Now Wolfe knew the sniper who killed Pazrro worked for the Dario Group. Careful dissection of Wood’s meetings and conversations with other CPD members could shed new light. Woods cooperation would be why the city prosecutor would offer a plea deal and send the broken man home.

  When they reached the alley, the crack of lightning rolled down East Washington. Wolfe knew instantly what he should have known at the fireplace in the Burnham—Barry Woods is a target. Wolfe instinctively tackled Woods. At the edge of the hotel, the second blast caught up to the exploding bricks inches above Wolfe’s flying and outstretched body shielding Woods. When the chunks of brick and mortar stopped raining down on the black ice, and when Wolfe and Woods stopped sliding across the alley into a mound of snow, the echo faded and sounds of winter crept back into the city.

  Wolfe was covered in blood—not his. Woods had been hit, most of his face gone. Wolfe rolled to his feet and sprinted east on Washington. The sniper had to be on foot—the shots fired at street level and close. Escaping the icy winter wonderland would be difficult, and the sniper had to hide a weapon. Wolfe had a chance.

  Fifteen

  “His existence was far less significant than a wisp of wind on the farthest edge of the smallest storm.”

  * * *

  What did I just do? Where have I been? Joe Hutson’s car steamed in the garage. He got out of the shower and threw on a robe—it was time to end it all. Standing in the kitchen he looked at his reflection on the sharp edge of the turkey carving knife. Go ahead. You gotta do this now. There are no more excuses for your miserable existence. You gotta stop—

  The knock at the door in the middle of the night came as a surprise. Joe dropped the knife in the sink. He had expected no one at three o’clock in the morning. He was released from the hospital six hours ago. His orders were to go home and go to bed. They gave him enough pain meds to choke a Clydesdale. Taking all of them at once had never dawned on him.

  When he opened the door, he saw his boss. Commander Landers stood under the light in the snow with two bags of groceries. “I knew you’d be up.” He walked by Hutson like he lived there. “Close that thing before you lose all the damn heat.”

  Landers set down the bags in the kitchen and started unpacking. He had stopped at an all-night deli and got sliced turkey, ham, beef, two cheeses, and three breads—French, rye, and Brioche. He picked up a head of lettuce, tomato, red onion, and handful of sprouts. “I’m assuming you got mayo, vinegar and oil, and mustard,” Landers said eyeing the knife in the sink—it looked out of place. Why would a clean shiny knife be sitting in an empty sink with nothing in the dish drainer and no signs of food prep?

  Hutson leaned on the edge of the counter in his wet robe with his head down.

  “Just get out of the shower?” Landers asked.

  Hutson nodded. “What are you doing here?”

  Landers draped his coat on a kitchen chair, pushed his gray shaggy hair off his lined forehead, and approached the detective he had watched grow over a decade. Landers put a hand on Hutson’s shoulder and shook him back into the world. When their eyes met, he spoke with the smile of a proud elder, “You’re not killing yourself today, Joe.”

  They ate most of the food and talked until the sun came up. Landers ignored his pager—the bee on the coffee table in the other room. Whatever it was could be handled by someone else or wait until he got to the office—the city never slept.

  Hutson needed someone now more than ever. He struggled over a day and night of total confusion. He had too much time in the dark closet to think about his lack-luster career and pitiful life. Both were boring, unremarkable, and now unbearable. He had convinced himself his existence was far less significant than a wisp of wind on the farthest edge of the smallest storm. In the closet at the Sorensen’s brownstone, Hutson had concluded his life made no difference. His end would go unnoticed. His memory would be forgotten faster than a bag of garbage tossed on a pile of swarming flies in a city dump. He had to accept the truth. He did not really know what happened at the Sorensen’s place.

  “We all have fears, Hutson,” Landers said. “Personally, I can’t stand to be alone. Don’t know why. Probably goes back to something as a kid. But I’ve never had a problem taking on responsibility or being held accountable. I’ve never been afraid of anything I do in my job on a day-to-day basis. Did you hear me? I’m afraid of being alone, Joe.”

  “I heard you,” Hutson muttered. “I go around all day afraid I’m gonna screw somethin’ up, and others counting on me are going to pay the price for my mistakes.�
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  “Okay. Then that’s your thing. Doesn’t mean it’s any more important or any more real than any other thing tugging at a man. It’s something you know exists. Next thing you do is manage it so it doesn’t drive you crazy.”

  “I don’t get that part—managing it.”

  “When I’m alone and my sick feeling creeps in, I get up and walk around. I distract myself. Before I know it, I’ve forgotten I was feeling alone. I work through it by not giving it all my attention. I discovered that works for me.”

  “So you’re saying when I feel inept and incapable, I should accept it as a feeling not as reality, and then I’m supposed to distract myself somehow?”

  “Exactly. It’s a feeling, Hutson. You’re not inept. You’re not incapable. If you were, you would not have lasted as a CPD homicide detective. That feeling is not a true measure of reality. Find a way to give it as little of your time as possible. Instead, focus on the problem that gave rise to that feeling. Take the Sorensen case. When did you feel you were in over your head? Let’s identify what triggered your worst fear? Did it happen the moment you took on the case?”

  “Not until I got to the brownstone and started asking the lady questions,” Hutson said.

  “Okay. What triggered the negative feelings?” Landers asked.

  “The way she answered my questions, like she already knew me.”

  “Good. Now develop that thought.”

  Hutson put his coffee cup down. “I got the sense she was being dishonest. I believed her husband was missing. She acted like she did not have great concern, but I felt she was holding back. She was sharper—more aware—than she wanted me to know. That’s when I felt like I was going to screw things up.”

  “First time for the feeling?” Landers asked.

  “I think so. Yes. It was.”

  “Let’s focus on that event. Something triggered your most negative personal feelings. You say you got a sense Mrs. Sorensen was hiding something. She was manipulating you.”

  “Yes. That’s when I started to—”

  Landers cut him off. “What made you think that, Joe?”

  Hutson took a long swallow of coffee looking out the kitchen window at the snow covered trees—Mrs. Sorensen appeared. “Her eyes, I read something in her eyes.”

  “Good. Go with that,” Landers pushed.

  “Her eyes darted around after she delivered each piece of information—she seemed to analyze her performance. Her eyes were intense, not tired and empty like old people. Each time I looked at her she looked away. She didn’t want me to read her. But I knew she knew something important. Mrs. Sorensen pretended to be old and feeble. I caught her studying me. It was as if she was waiting for me to do something or remember something.”

  “What else did you find out?” Landers asked. “Go back in your mind. You questioned her. You observed her. You saw a man in the hall. You had a confrontation. You were injured, tied up, and stuffed in a closet. You experienced more than you’re letting yourself remember. Instead of dealing with the reality of the moment, you’ve spent the last twenty-four hours distracted, drowning in your fears of inadequacy. It’s time to be a homicide detective.”

  He leaned back in the kitchen chair rubbing his neck like he was awakening from a coma. The commander’s words made perfect sense. Hutson started to let the details of his investigation flow for the first time. After six hours of talking to Landers, he stood at a crossroad. Either he changes his life, or he buries the turkey knife in his chest after Landers leaves.

  “She knew Dario was there,” Hutson said.

  “Mrs. Sorensen knew what?” Landers asked with a slight smile. He could see him evolving—stepping past his fears. Joe’s focus had moved to the right place.

  “Dario, the name Wolfe mentioned. She knew he was in the house and she was not afraid. She knew her husband was dead and that was okay.”

  “Keep going.”

  “Why did she go into the kitchen? Why did she make sure I stayed in the den by the fire? Maybe she went in there to hide her husband’s diary. She couldn’t remove it from the kitchen without me seeing, so she covered it with a newspaper. Maybe Dario was cornered somewhere. I should have walked through the residence the moment I arrived.”

  “You’re talking about the diary Wolfe brought to the station?”

  “Yes. That’s Dr. Sorensen’s diary. It may be helpful. Someone needs to read all of it.”

  “Do you remember hearing anything while you were in the closet?” Landers asked.

  Hutson got to his feet and walked to the kitchen window. The sun was up. A squad car pulled into his driveway. “I heard something about more monsters to kill.”

  “Okay. Good. Do you know who tied you up?” Landers asked.

  “No. When I regained consciousness, I was tied up. Mrs. Sorensen was in there with me. I was cold. She was warm. I thought maybe she was put in there later.”

  The knock at the door startled Landers. “Who the hell’s that?” He jumped up and ran to the door. Hutson poured more coffee and waited. Over the last hour he had not thought once about his personal inadequacies. He had focused on the case and it felt good.

  “Sir. There’s been another shooting downtown,” the officer said with urgent eyes.

  “I’ve been fully briefed on the Chase Tower shooting. Detective Wolfe is handling the case. You need to find him for questions and developments. I’m busy here.”

  The officer caught his breath as he waited for Landers to finish. “No sir. I’m talking about the shooting after the Chase Tower.”

  Landers straightened. “Another shooting?” Hutson stepped into the entry.

  “Detective Wolfe left Chase Tower and met Barry Woods at the Burnham Hotel. Woods is the boyfriend of Ellen Dumont, a homicide victim. Wolfe and Woods left the Burnham Hotel around midnight. The sniper returned, sir. Mr. Woods is dead. Shot outside the hotel. Detective Wolfe pursued the shooter on foot. Well sir, it’s not good.”

  Sixteen

  “The thing about the truth is, not a lot of people can handle it.”

  Conor McGregor

  * * *

  “Are we sure John Doe wasn’t hit by a car,” Dr. Provost said tongue-in-cheek as he adjusted the new LED light over the body. “Never thought I would actually see it,” he muttered. His team assembled in the autopsy room.

  “See what, doctor?” The field agent leaned in lowering his fat clipboard.

  Provost’s eyes continued to peruse the corpse like no one else in the room could, and they all knew it. “Someone with virtually every bone in their body broken.”

  Like androids the two gowned and masked dieners stood in the light on the other side of the naked body. With stocked carts on their sides, the histologist and toxicologist waited at the dead man’s feet. When the medical examiner completed his external examination, and the medical photographer’s last flash dissipated, Dr. Provost put a hand over his mic and said, “Okay people, let’s get started. They’re lining up on the runway.” And as always he added, “These people want to talk to us.”

  The ME always made the first cuts. In this case, he went further. Provost opened the chest and inspected the crushed rib cage with a magnifying glass. While shaking his head, he spewed Latin into his headset, and then waved his dieners into action.

  The first diener focused on the chest. With the skill of a surgeon, he moved his scalpel deep in the thoracic cavity isolating organs in the gathering blood pool. The second diener began work on the head. He dragged his razor on a course from one ear to the other across the back of the head. The single pass cut a perfect incision down to the skull bone. With a long curved spatula he probed the depths of the wound he had created. He sent the sharp metal tool in all directions separating the periosteum (underside of the scalp soft tissue) from the skull bone. He then grabbed the loose scalp flap. Like taking off a rubber Halloween mask from the back, he pulled the scalp forward folding it up and over the top of the head until the back hairline rested on the nose of the
deceased.

  The medical examiner studied the surface of the bloody skull. Every square inch revealed micro fractures radiating from the lateral aspect of the cranium and merging medially. Provost spoke into his headset as he dabbed at the bloody bone.

  “The macro examination of the external cranium reveals an intricate network of micro fractures emanating from the left and right temporal regions. The fracture network moves from a 0.1 millimeter matrix size to a 0.4 millimeter matrix at the crown. It appears an external force applied sufficient pressure equally and at the same time to both temporal regions crushing the skull inward. Severe damage to the brain and underlying soft tissues is expected.”

  Provost nodded to the diener with the bone saw. The circumferential skull cut path followed the largest head diameter on a line above the ears. The ME inserted the skull breaker instrument and hammered in various locations until the skull cap released. After removing the dura sheath he spoke into his headset again. “Consistent with the observations on the CT scans, the external aspect of the deceased’s brain tissue is severely bruised with more than a dozen subdural hematomas and micro tears homogenous on the right and left cerebral hemispheres. The Rolandic fissures are compressed and ruptured.”

  The Office of the Medical Examiner for Cook County was established in 1976. It is responsible for handling all unexplained and traumatic deaths occurring in an area representing half the Illinois population. Unlike the old coroner system it replaced, a medical examiner is an appointed position. The candidate must possess a medical license and be certified by the American Board of Pathology in anatomic and forensic pathology. Dr. Leonard Holt Provost had the credentials and experience. Sought by most major cities, the top-five forensic mind in the country chose to go home. With graying temples and a natural tan, Provost led the sweeping changes that transformed the Cook County ME Office into one of the top forensic facilities in the country. Today it efficiently processes several hundred unexplained and traumatic deaths from their region each month—all homicides, suicides, accidental deaths, and questionable deaths that may (or may not) be found to be due to natural causes.