Serial Killer Z (Prequel): Infection

by Philip Harris

  I kept my eyes locked on his. “A better front-page headline?”

  “Not if you don’t want it to be.”

  I frowned. “What do you mean?”

  “I’m prepared to give you the memory card and commit to not investigating this crime for two weeks.”

  “Which is enough time for me to leave the city. Why would you do that? I’m a murderer. Surely, you have a duty to the public?”

  “Doctor Taylor, I know that the work Hunter is doing is morally and ethically wrong.”

  “The patients have all signed medical research waivers. The families know what we’re doing. If HNR was breaking any laws, the govern—”

  “Spare me the corporate bullshit. We both know Hunter and everyone else in that facility is walking a very fine line. Half the families don’t understand what they’re signing; the others are given just enough hope to feed their desperation.”

  Spencer picked up a remote control from the coffee table and paused the video. On the screen, Hinkler was dead.

  “But then, you don’t seem to have any problem crossing that line yourself. Which makes me think we can both help each other.”

  “How?”

  “I’ve been investigating HNR for three years, but I haven’t been able to get any information on what they’re really doing. I’ve worked my way through every doctor of every patient Hunter has murdered. I’ve approached almost everyone who works in the lab, from the janitor to Alexei Kozlov. The only people I haven’t tried to convince to help me are Owen and Hunter himself. For obvious reasons.”

  “And what’s that to me?”

  “You’re in the ideal position to get me the information I need to blow the entire operation wide open. Do that, and the video is yours and I’ll delay my investigation.”

  “And if I refuse?”

  “The video goes to the cops. You’ll be arrested. Maybe they’ll start digging around HNR and expose what’s going on. I won’t get the story so it’s not an ideal outcome for me, but at this point I just want Hunter to go down.”

  “I’d be betraying my employer.”

  “I doubt you care. You’re a qualified doctor and as smart as anyone else in that company. Yet you’re basically an overpaid lab assistant. I think that suits you because of your unique… proclivities, but it probably also pisses you off.”

  I stared at the image on the screen. A drop of blood hung in the air, caught as it fell from the end of the table to the plastic-covered floor.

  “How do I know you won’t just print your story and turn me in anyway? You could have more copies of the video.”

  “Honestly? You don’t. But Doctor Taylor, I hold all the cards. You’re free not to take me up on my offer, but if you don’t, every law enforcement agency and newspaper gets a copy of that video tonight.”

  I wondered if that meant he had an accomplice, or an electronic dead man’s switch.

  “I can’t get any files out of the HNR building. There’s no outside network connection, and my PC doesn’t have anywhere to put a USB drive or memory card.”

  “That’s okay, I’ve got a bodycam. There’s enough memory on board that you can record a couple of hours of footage. The next time one of Hunter’s victims is brought in, I want you to record what happens.”

  “That’s it?”

  “That’s it. As soon as the world sees what’s happening in there with their own eyes, the whole thing will come crashing down. While it does, you slip out of the city. Everyone will assume you’ve left because you’re the whistleblower rather than a murderer.”

  “How will you write an exposé on me if you don’t have the video?”

  “You’re also going to tell me where you disposed of that man’s body. I’ll ‘discover’ it and kick off an investigation. I’m a smart guy, so I’ll work out it was you quickly enough to beat the big networks to the details.”

  I regarded Spencer. He’d only mentioned the one body. Did that mean he didn’t know about my other victims? He certainly didn’t seem to be the one who’d made the recording.

  Spencer looked at his watch. “It’s getting late, Doctor Taylor, and this is a limited-time offer.”

  I counted to eight then gave him a brief nod. “Seems like I don’t have any choice.”

  “Good call.” He broke into a smile like he was actually excited. He stood and seemed about to try to shake my hand but then thought better of it. “I’ll go get the bodycam.”

  I started to stand myself, but he held up a hand. “You can wait here. I’ll just be a couple of minutes.”

  He disappeared into the back of the house. I took another look around the living room. The books were an eclectic mix of nonfiction and nothing that couldn’t logically belong to a middle-aged journalist. The cushion where he’d sat on the sofa was creased, and there was a definite Spencer-shaped indentation. The other cushions looked almost new. He certainly seemed to live alone, which would make my task a lot easier.

  I heard footsteps in the hallway outside and slipped my hand into my pocket. My fingers wrapped around cold steel.

  Spencer walked into the room carrying a plastic case with a handle.

  He placed the box on the table and opened it. “Here you go; it’s pretty straightforward.”

  As he bent over to remove the bodycam, I leaped forward. I pulled the scalpel from my pocket. I collided with Spencer and swung the blade at his throat. The shadow screamed in pleasure.

  The collision knocked him back. We tumbled over the table. I felt the scalpel dig into soft flesh, then it was wrenched free of my grip. We hit the ground in a tangle of limbs.

  Spencer grunted and aimed an elbow at my face. It connected with my jaw. My head snapped sideways, and my vision blurred. Swinging wildly, I drove a fist into his side. He grunted and tried to elbow me again.

  This time, I was ready. The blow glanced off the side of my head. Spencer rolled sideways and took me with him. My shoulder hit the corner of the coffee table. Pain shot down my arm, and it went numb.

  He managed to break free of my grip and kicked out. His foot caught me in the thigh. He pushed back, scrambling across the floor away from me. When he reached the edge of the room, he pushed himself back to his feet. I did the same.

  He was breathing heavily, and I could see a tear in his shirt. Blood was pouring from the cut.

  Spencer pressed his hand against his chest. “You son of a bitch!”

  I shook out my arm in an attempt to ease the numbness. There was no sign of my scalpel.

  “When I’m done with you, I’m going—”

  I didn’t bother waiting for him to tell me what he was going to do. I charged across the room. He was ready and threw a punch. I ducked under the blow, wrapped my arms around his waist and drove my shoulder into his ribs.

  He stumbled back. His feet caught underneath him, and he fell. There was a solid crack. His body went limp, and we both fell to the floor. I let my full weight land on top of him and heard the crack of breaking ribs.

  I pushed myself away from him and raised my fists, ready to hit him if he went for me. I needn’t have bothered. His head was canted at an awkward angle, and his eyes stared sightlessly up at the ceiling. Thick crimson blood seeped into the carpet around his head.

  Chapter 8

  Crime Scene

  I was the one breathing heavily now. The shadow was a gentle pressure at the base of my skull—waiting to see how I would handle this new development.

  The roller coaster of emotions I’d felt over the last couple of days was ticking its way upward again. I strained to hear signs of some other occupant coming to rescue Spencer, but the house was silent. I counted to sixteen then searched for my scalpel. I found it beneath the sofa. With the blade back in my possession, I felt comfortable enough to survey the damage.

  It hadn’t been a clean kill. There was a smear of red on the corner of the mantelpiece where Spencer’s skull had hit it. The halo of blood around his head had stopped growing, but it had soaked into the carpet.
There was no way I’d be able to hide the fact someone had lost a lot of blood here.

  My initial thought was just to dump Spencer’s body alongside Hinkler’s. There was a certain delicious appeal to that idea, but eventually, Spencer would be missed. When someone did come to his house looking for him, they’d see the blood.

  One end of the coffee table was broken. A plausible explanation for Spencer’s death began unspooling in my mind. He’d come home late from work and disturbed a burglar. They’d fought, he’d fallen, hit his head and died. It was a simple, straightforward and eminently believable series of events. If I could paint that picture for the police, it might throw them off my scent for a while.

  Seeing no better options, I set about building my crime scene.

  I didn’t have gloves with me, so I pulled the sleeves of my jacket over my hands. It wasn’t ideal, but it would have to do. Avoiding the blood, I wiped down everywhere I thought I might have touched, then set about “robbing” the house.

  The ground floor held nothing of interest. The kitchen was immaculate, and the fridge was virtually empty. Presumably, Spencer did much of his eating out. The dining room was just as boring: a table and four chairs and more shelves filled with reference books. No art, no photographs.

  Spencer’s bedroom was upstairs, at the back of the house. I opened drawers, dug through clothes and left them discarded on the floor. My imaginary burglar would have been disappointed. There was nothing there beyond faded clothes and a few old photos and paperwork.

  The second bedroom was being used as an office and was more profitable. Spencer’s laptop sat on top of a cheap wooden desk that had seen better days. It was open but powered down. I resisted the temptation to check to see if he’d sent my video to anyone else. If he had, there was nothing I could do about it now, and the longer I spent faking my crime scene, the more likely I’d be to meet someone on my way back to my car.

  I grabbed the laptop and stuffed it into a backpack that was leaning against the desk. For added authenticity, I pulled open the desk drawers and rummaged through the assorted papers that were inside. There was a small pile of cash in the top drawer. I took the notes, left the rest behind and went downstairs.

  It took me a couple of minutes to work out how Spencer had been playing back the video. I found the memory card slotted into the side of the television and put it in my pocket. I considered trying to remove the television to add to my illusion, but it was bolted to the wall. In the end, I settled for pulling out the cables as though the burglar had been in the middle of removing it when Spencer caught him. I grabbed the bodycam and put it in the backpack with the laptop.

  I stood in the hallway for several minutes. My hand rested on the pocket containing my scalpel. The touch of the hard metal grounded me and stilled the shadow so that I could think.

  I was trying to work out if I’d missed anything. Was there some piece of evidence I’d left behind, or something that would give away the fact that this hadn’t, in fact, been a burglary? There was DNA of course, and maybe fingerprints I’d missed, but there wasn’t much I could do about that.

  Outside, a car drove by. The road sounded wet. I closed my eyes. The air seemed full of the smell of Spencer’s blood, even though it couldn’t have been. The shadow was there, waiting for me. Killing Spencer had done nothing to sate it. If anything, it had fed its desires. It would need a true kill soon. I’d need to find a subject. And a location.

  I counted to four then opened the front door. It had been dry when I arrived, but now it was raining steadily. Pulling my jacket over my head, I hurried back to my car.

  Chapter 9

  Cracks

  I yawned as I pulled my car into the Hunter Neurologics parking garage. A kind of blurriness hung over me. I’d returned home after visiting Spencer, but sleep had been impossible. Every time I closed my eyes, I felt the shadow begin to take control. There was an eagerness there that I hadn’t felt since my first kill a dozen years ago. Only the thought that the person who’d been spying on me might be out there or that Spencer might have tipped someone else off stopped me from going out to find a fresh subject.

  I needed to keep to my normal schedule. I’d spent hours during the night thinking about the crime scene at Spencer’s house, and I’d yet to think of anything that I’d missed. Even so, the shadow insisted it was likely the police would come calling. When they did, I needed to blend into the background.

  When I reached the main building, Doctor Kozlov was in the lobby, deep in conversation with the security guard, Barker. They stopped talking when they saw me.

  “Good morning, Doctor,” said Barker.

  “Hi, Edward,” Kozlov said.

  I nodded a greeting and hurried past. I could feel their eyes on me as I waited for the excruciatingly slow elevator that would take me up to the offices. When it finally arrived, I glanced back over my shoulder before getting into the cab. They were talking again, but I was sure I caught Kozlov watching me out of the corner of his eye.

  Most of the other researchers were in the office when I got there. Doctor Hart was standing at the coffee station, talking to Doctor Akimoto. She was laughing, but when she saw me the laughter seemed to fade.

  “Morning,” she said.

  “Hi.”

  I was almost past when Akimoto spoke. “I think Doctor Owen is looking for you.”

  Cold dread swept through me. “Oh right, okay. Thanks.”

  I found myself hesitating, not quite sure whether I should go to Owen’s office or my desk. Hart and Akimoto looked at each other with puzzled expressions on their faces.

  In the end, the decision was made for me.

  Owen appeared from a nearby meeting room. “Taylor, I need to talk to you.”

  “Of course, I’ll just—”

  “Now.”

  “Oh right. Okay.”

  As I walked away from the coffee station, Hart whispered, “Good luck.”

  Owen didn’t speak to me until we were in his office—him sitting in his high-backed leather chair, me on the much cheaper and less comfortable seat reserved for visitors.

  He leaned forward, his fingers pressed into a triangle. Anger flickered in his eyes. “I know what you’re up to, Taylor.”

  I feigned ignorance, but my mind was already racing. “I don’t understand.”

  “I think you do. I’ve been watching you.”

  At the words, the shadow rose up. It flowed through my body, crystallizing my thoughts. I had the answer I’d been looking for. Somehow, Owen had found out about me and made the recording. I had no idea why he hadn’t just turned me in, but now he was going to confront me and make his demands. The shadow reveled in the idea. I had my next subject.

  “I know you’ve been meeting with that journalist, Spencer.”

  There was a brief moment where my mind struggled to make sense of the unexpected shift. Then the cogs meshed, and I understood he wasn’t talking about Hinkler or any of my other work. The realization brought with it an odd mix of relief and disappointment.

  The question was, did he know I’d killed Spencer?

  He held up a hand. “Don’t try to deny it, Taylor. You went to see him last night.”

  I’d already decided I wasn’t going to play dumb. I needed to find out how much he knew.

  Owen leaned over and pressed a button on the intercom on his desk. “Send Mr. Coughlin in, please.”

  The door to the office opened, and a tall, middle-aged man with a craggy face walked in. The smell of cigarettes entered the room with him.

  “This is Patrick Coughlin. He’s been working for me over the last few weeks. Tracking down a mole.”

  The words “last few weeks” seemed to hang in the air. The shadow surged forward. I found my gaze flicking around the room, looking for something I could use as a weapon.

  “And it seems that mole is you, Doctor Taylor,” Owen said.

  Coughlin reached into his jacket pocket and removed a brown envelope. He opened it and tipped t
he contents onto Owen’s desk. Five glossy photographs slid into view. I leaned over and shifted them around until I could see them all.

  The idea that I might have found the person who’d recorded the video dominated my thoughts and made it hard to concentrate. The images shifted in and out of focus. I lingered on each one, slowly counting to four then moving on to the next image.

  As far as I could tell, they’d all been taken the night before. The first four very clearly showed me entering Spencer’s house. I turned the last one around so that I could see it properly. It was another shot of me. This time, I was pulling my coat over my head as I left the house. Every image was stamped with a date and time. They’d give the police a perfect timeline for my crime. I doubted they’d have any problem pinning down the time of death and lining it up with my visit.

  I nodded my head slowly then looked back up.

  Owen raised his eyebrows. “Well?”

  “There’s obviously no point in denying that I went there. And yes, he was trying to get information on Hunter Neurologics. He wanted me to wear a bodycam and record one of the experiments. I refused, and then I left.”

  “You were in there for twenty-seven minutes,” Coughlin said.

  “He was trying to persuade me.”

  “So, you’re not recording this conversation?” Owen said.

  I lifted my arms out to either side. “Feel free to search me.”

  He hesitated then nodded to Coughlin, who stepped forward and patted me down.

  “He’s clean.”

  The barest glimmer of surprise registered on Owen’s face.

  He nodded. “Good. We have a legal case ready to go against Mr. Spencer. Would you be prepared to testify that he tried to coerce you into illegally gathering information on our operation?”

  “Of course.”

  Neither I nor the shadow had any intention of letting it get that far.

  Owen was frowning. The meeting was clearly not going how he’d expected. He glanced at Coughlin.

  I’d have to deal with both of them as quickly as possible. Before it got any more out of control. Owen was roughly my size, and too well fed to be too much of a problem. Coughlin was tall and lanky and might be more challenging, but I’d have to find a way. In the meantime, I’d play the part of the loyal little employee whose only concern was that he might lose his job.