Patterns of Brutality: Erter & Dobbs Book 2

by Nick Keller

  It was as if his impulses had changed. He’d gone from animal to man, and she was more than intrigued. She had to ask herself—after a thousand other men and nearly two decades of escorting—if they weren’t becoming actual lovers.

  Afterwards however, the routine was still the same. Once he finished, he rolled his big body off her and reached for the smokes. He lit his, then hers. They lay quietly for several minutes just melting into the hotel sheets, everything expended, the A/C on cold.

  “Hey…” he finally grumbled.

  “Hmm?”

  “How much would it cost me to, you know—”

  “What?”

  “I don’t know. Nuthin’.” He reached over, tapped his cigarette on the ashtray and lay there rolling it inside two fingers watching the smoke rise up. She didn’t say anything. Irritated at her silence he said quickly, “To buy you. How much?”

  She paused unsure of how to feel, then said, “Depends on how long.”

  “What’s the usual?”

  “A weekend. But that’s…” her voice trailed off.

  “What?” he said.

  “A thousand. Maybe more.”

  “I’m not talking about a weekend.”

  “Well, how long are you—”

  “Couple weeks.”

  She puffed on the cigarette to hide her hesitation.

  “Iva,” he said powerfully.

  “Depends on the person, Bernie.”

  He huffed. “The person.”

  “Who’re you talking about, you? You got a thousand bucks, Bernie?”

  “Yeah me. And maybe I do.”

  “Uh—you want to buy me, Bernie?”

  “Oh, forget it,” he grumbled and threw the sheets off him. Smashing his cigarette out, he got up and started yanking his pants on.

  She propped herself up on her elbows not wanting him to be angry, not wanting him to leave. “It wouldn’t be much.”

  He stopped and looked at her.

  She gave him a devil’s grin and cooed, “You’d get my favorite customer discount.”

  He flapped his lips and started buttoning his fly sneering, “Awe gee, thanks a lot.”

  When he zipped up and went for his shirt she sat up. “You are, though, you know.”

  “What?”

  Holding the sheet up over her boobs she moved toward him on the mattress and whispered, “My favorite.” He watched her reach for his collars letting the sheet fall over her contours to the bed. “I don’t do this with anybody else.” She pressed her lips to his in a warm, long kiss.

  When she released, he sat down in the chair across from her. “Then how much would it cost me?”

  She settled back lifting the sheet up again. “A few weeks? No one’s ever gone that long, baby.”

  “Okay,” he said popping another smoke into his lips. “Then how about this?” He lit up and said, blowing out, “Forever.” The smoke took on a life of its own in the current of the room’s air conditioner, as if awaiting an answer.

  Her head tilted. “You proposin’ to me, Bernie?”

  “No, God, just talking.” He started buttoning his shirt.

  “You know the deal,” she said. “It’s not a question of price.”

  “Then I don’t know the deal. What’s the deal?”

  “Do I have to say it?”

  “Your pimp.” He assumed.

  She tried to laugh off his remark and said, “He’s not… a pimp.”

  “He’s a grease ball pimp.”

  “Well, he wouldn’t like it.”

  Bernie started to say something but didn’t. He looked at her sternly and said, “He wouldn’t be a problem.”

  She looked at him, guessing with her eyes. “What’s going on in that big ol’ head of yours, baby?”

  “Maybe I’ll convince him it’s time for your retirement party.”

  “Yeah, right.”

  “Why not?”

  “Uh—” she said, “I don’t think he’d like that, sugar.”

  Bernie sounded reassuring as he said, “Oh, I think he would.”

  “Bernie, Mr. G is a dangerous asshole. I’ve seen him in action.”

  Bernie reached over and flashed his badge. “You see that, babe?” Then he snagged his holstered revolver and said, “You see that? I know what dangerous assholes are all about. In fact, dangerous assholes are my specialty.”

  She settled back against the bed’s headboard defensively and said, “And that’s it? You’d expect me to quit, just like that?”

  “Yup.”

  “And where would I go?”

  “Where do you think?”

  She shook her head. “You don’t want that, Bernie.”

  “Maybe I do.”

  “Maybe I don’t.”

  “Of course, you do.”

  “Bernie…”

  “Look,” Bernie said, getting back to his feet. “What’re you going to tell me next, Iva? That you’re a whore and I’m a cop? That you’d be bad for me? You’d hurt my career? That it wouldn’t work?”

  “It’s not easy like that.”

  “Yes, it is. It’s exactly like that. It’s that fucking easy.” He could feel himself getting irate. He had to breathe, calm down.

  She slipped out of bed and moved to him, the sheet wrapped high over her breasts. “Listen, listen. Escorting—it’s all I’ve known, Bernie. I got a rap sheet. It’s big, baby. You don’t want to know everything I’ve done—”

  “I already do, Iva.”

  She stared at him close enough to feel his breath on her. “I’ve sucked off guys standing in circles.”

  He looked away.

  “I’ve sucked off guys standing in lines.”

  “Iva…”

  “I’ve fucked everything from politicians to high school virgins.”

  “Iva, stop it!”

  “I’ve fucked women, toys, whatever, Bernie. I’ve fucked anything they wanted me to. I’m just a fucking whore. A fucking, goddamn whore!”

  “Iva!” he yelled cocking a big fist back to strike, but stopping himself. Iva looked at him understanding his rage, knowing his limits. Everything settled and they found themselves staring at each other, Iva welling up, eyes turning siren red, Bernie melting and lowering his fist. He finally said, “You could have all that. Or you could just have me.” He went to his wallet, fished out his cash and handed it to her. She didn’t want to take it. Taking his money made her feel sick inside. It emptied her, but she took it anyway. He went to the door, stopped, pulled out another two hundred dollars and said, “Here’s a little extra. Don’t give it to him. This is for you.”

  She broke down and started crying.

  He put the cash on the table and said, “You got my number?”

  She nodded, sniffling and hating herself for crying like a stupid girl.

  “Okay,” he said and put on his fedora. “See you around, babe.” He left.

  BERNIE DROPPED down into his Crown Vic outside, but he didn’t start the engine. He just stared up at Iva’s hotel window. Her vague outline was there. He could almost see her staring back at him. With a huff, he started the engine and pulled out of the parking lot.

  The radio was on blasting some announcer’s call: “…Welcome to the weekly Better Letter Lotto, where you match two tiny letters and put up to a thousand buckaroos in your pocket book! And the winning letters are…”

  Irritated at the way he left Iva standing there crying, he yanked his wallet out of his pocket and fished around the cash fold for his Better Letter Lotto ticket. He needed the distraction. But he was left deflated. It wasn’t there. It had fallen out of his wallet when he went digging around for Iva’s fare. He sat looking at her window through the rearview mirror as the announcer declared, “H—the first letter is H! And now… D! H and D is your winning combo!”

  Her silhouette wasn’t there anymore. He wished it was. He wished he could see her clearly, watch her move. H and D—the winning letters. He chuckled bitterly and said, “H and D.” Like Hi-D
ef. He sighed hoping she’d won a big thousand buckaroos on his ticket, and drove away.

  4

  THE DEAD BIN

  December 2012. Candy Starr was next, or so it seemed.

  Her body was found the day after it had been tied to a security fence off the L.A. river in the railway area, sopped with regular grade eighty-eight octane gasoline and set on fire. No one reported to have heard any screaming, which suggested at first, she was deceased when it happened. Upon inspection, evidence rose which refuted that assumption. There were wounds around her ligature marks which suggested she was struggling before the fuel was ignited. The reason she didn’t scream was because the killer was careful this time. He lit her up from the top down. Her face ignited first, thereby pulling flame directly into her throat. Her vocal cords went into immediate shock. She didn’t scream because she couldn’t. But she probably struggled like hell while soft tissues melted and fused. Organs became liquid. Muscle became long, slow-burning kindle.

  Initially, investigators were baffled. This was new. This murder didn’t match any previous profile. Except in one key area. There was more indeterminate semen. It was as if the killer only burned her top portions in hopes they’d discover his seed still in her uterus, without superheating it from the flames. Her body from the sternum down was left perfectly unscathed.

  Because Candy Starr’s murder occurred nearly a year after Andi Jones’s, no immediate connection was made. Interviews and questioning followed, all leads cooled and three years later, in December of 2015, a Detective Chancey filed the case away as unsolved. Nevertheless, this killer knew what he was doing. Evidence was easily overlooked connecting it to certain other killings in its degree of brutality, and the fact that Candy Starr was a hopeful young actress trying to break into Hollywood.

  5

  BERNIE DOBBS AT WORK

  Unsolved Crimes Department. Cold Case. The fucking dead bin.

  Two girls, one hailing from some out-of-the-way place called Maysville, Kentucky, the other from Podunk nowhere called Beaufort, South Carolina, both murdered in 2012, one in January, one in December, no killer, both wannabe actresses, both had representation. Acid Phosphate screens showed semen, but no conclusions.

  Bernie Dobbs groaned, eyeballing their files. It was his job to shoot in the dark, to find connections where there weren’t any. Bernie sat at his station and leaned back in his chair holding the crime scene photos up, scowling at them and chewing on a day-old bear claw. “Andi Jones and Candy Starr. Andi and Candy, eh?” he mumbled. Was it a coincidence, or the killer’s M.O.? Whatever it was, it was a connection—no matter how thin.

  These girls weren’t raped. They were fucked, tied up and murdered. How sad? Two young women had come to L.A. to dream chase, and here was all there was left of them sitting on his computer screen.

  “There’s a sicko out there,” Bernie murmured, “at least there was in 2012.”

  “You casin’, shoog?” Donna’tella Grace said as she walked by. Bernie jerked and looked up startled. It got a laugh. “Sorry, big lovin’,” she said.

  “Yeah, casing,” he muttered.

  “Wachu got?” she said.

  “Would you believe a couple murders?”

  “Ha!” she laughed. “Which ones?” She was being ironic.

  He plopped the photos down on his desk rubbing his eyes and said, “Young girls. What else is new?”

  Donna stopped at her desk with her half-eyes gleaming out from her richly dark face. “I don’t believe it.” She was still being ironic.

  He chuckled and said, “Yeah, only in Cold Case, right?”

  “Mm-hmm.” She sat down making the chair creak and groan. She was one of those hefty-sexy-and-proud mommas, a BBW with sheer attitude, and boobs like melons. There was no shortage of homeboys vying for her amples. She said, “You say girls, as in plural?”

  “Yeah. Couple of bright-eyed starlets.”

  “Sheeeit,” she said, crooning almost melodically. “If you went chasing every young girl capped in the city of Angels, hell knows what you might find.”

  Bernie nodded his agreement still eyeballing the case files. “Yeah—but these two here. Bad joojoo, big momma.”

  “What year?”

  Bernie checked again. “Oh-twelve.”

  “Fresh then.” She rifled through a stack of cases on her desk coming to one in particular, then looked at him curiously. “You say starlets?”

  “Yeah—like that narrows it down.”

  She grunted in agreement and drew her braided gold & black extensions back off her shoulder. She reached a file over to him. “I got somethin’ for you, shoog.”

  “What is it?” he asked, not wanting to get up.

  “Dead girl, wachu think? Get this, her name was Dulce Dios.”

  Bernie drew his eyebrows together. He knew what it meant. It was Spanish. Dulce Dios meant Sweet Goddess. He knew what that meant, too. It was a screen name. Another starlet wannabe. He groaned, getting to his feet and walking over to take the file. He stood there looking through it.

  Donna clamped down on a Greek roll and said with her mouth full, “Just got dropped off this week from Investigations. Just went cold. Couldn’t wrap my head around it. I knew that name, though. It’s one of them cray, crays.”

  Bernie looked at her. “So?”

  She took another bite not bothering with the Greek gyro sauce sliding down her chin. “Well…” she forced a swallow, “then I remembered. She was in the news couple years back. Some local tragedy or something. Had the Hispanic population screamin’ Selena again.”

  Bernie flinched, remembering. “Oh yeah—what was that, up in the canyons?”

  “Yeah, you remember. Went missing for a couple days.”

  “That guy and his son reported it, or something.”

  “Yep. They found her up in Wildwood. Took a nosedive off a mountain road. Heh—sheeeeit.”

  Bernie looked back into the report flipping pages, then read. Dulce Dios was found in pieces at the bottom of a hundred-and-ten-foot fall. She bounced off a couple ledges on her way down, then shattered apart on the rocks at the bottom of a canyon.

  He pinched the autopsy report and pulled it up. Yep—semen. He shoved it back down and looked up. “This wasn’t an accident.”

  “Nah—keep reading, baby. Says they found ligature marks. Someone tied her up, put her in a trunk and drove her up there. See? Cray, cray.”

  Bernie read the Investigating officer’s name, “Officer Trumble. June, 2014.” He looked at her. “Did you look into this?”

  “Nah—haven’t got around to it.”

  “Mmm—” Bernie mumbled flipping the file closed. “Just got dropped off this week, you say? A three-year-old murder, huh. How do you know it’s connected to these other two?”

  She looked back at him and said, “I don’t. Do you?”

  He laughed at her and said, “Thanks, gal.”

  6

  CHRISSIE NEWTON

  When Chrissie Newton’s bus dropped her off nine years ago straight from Genesee, Idaho—or as she preferred to call it, Genesee fuckin’ Idaho—she didn’t have enough money for a week’s stay in a Hotel 6 and hardly two changes of clothes in her carry-all. But she had the nicest, most beautiful, farmer-girl, preacher’s-daughter smile some of the people at the metro bus station had ever seen. Plus, she wasn’t afraid to flaunt what her mommy done give her, too. That being a luscious, young set of firm C-cup ta-tas and an ass meant for Bond—as in Bondage. She was hell in jeans, and from how all the Genesee, Idaho boys came out of the woodwork as soon as word got out she’d handled her first cock, she knew it. She was fifteen. By seventeen, she’d had enough cummy fingers in the backseats of old sedans or the front seats of old pickup trucks to last a teenage girl a lifetime. Christ, she didn’t know there were so many boys her age in a town with a population of nine hundred. And actually, she wasn’t afraid of the big boys, either—the husbands down at the mill or the machine shop. Yeah, they were the ones who taught her
a thing or two. And they paid to keep her quiet. Not like those stupid, horny, hump-like-a-jackrabbit high school shits from her class. Those bumpkins would never see the likes of Chrissie Newton ever again. Shoot, they probably cried watching her bus pull away.

  But she didn’t. Oh, fuck no.

  She didn’t even wait to turn eighteen before flying the coop. She left a week early. Yep—she broke her promise to momma, but oh well. If she’d have had to sit through one more of daddy’s flabbergasting Bible stories about baby Jesus and all those obsessively compulsive apostles ever a-freaking-gain, she might not have made it to the Genesee bus depot for shooting her own damn brains out. And what’s worse, daddy ramped up his spiritual lectures once Chrissie made it clear she was moving to L.A. Holy divine diaper poop, Batman! Every night before dinner it was Jesus said this and Jesus said that.

  Well, fucking fuckity fuck!

  She couldn’t wait to leave, so there! She ran away a week before eighteen. Then, like a blink of the eye, here she was, three-days-on-a-bus later getting off in big, beautiful, endless, perfect, shining L.A.! Free at last, free at last—good God almighty, free at last.

  Then it was—now what?

  She learned quickly in L.A. there were a few fundamental rules one needed to understand in order to survive, and the faster you learned them, the better your survival.

  Number one: Without a car, learn the bus lines front and back, and even more importantly, figure out the train system—these were the transitway and the rail service, respectively. The guy Chrissie fell into conversation with on her first night in L.A. showed her everything he knew about the bus and subway metro, then she sucked the chrome off his bumper and made him scream.