Cold Justice (Kali O'Brien series Book 5)

by Jonnie Jacobs

  Family was a subject Kali preferred to pass over. Whatever fond memories she’d had of her own upbringing had been permanently marred by her mother’s suicide when Kali was sixteen. She steered the conversation in a different direction by asking Nathan about his work, and he obliged by telling her. By the time their food arrived, her head was swimming with talk of brokered deals, buyouts, and mergers. She wasn’t sure she could have said exactly what it was he did, but she wasn’t going to push the issue any further.

  Over their meal, they covered movies, San Francisco attractions, lawyer jokes and problems with mass transit. There were moments when Kali found Nathan to be a bit presumptuous, but on the whole he was good company. She was enjoying herself with a member of the opposite sex, something she hadn’t done in months.

  “I caught your name on the news this afternoon,” Nathan said. “Is it true you’re working for the DA’s office now?”

  “On a temporary basis.”

  “They’re shorthanded?”

  “In a nutshell, yes, although it’s actually a bit more complicated than that.”

  “Isn’t it always.” When she didn’t offer to elaborate, he continued. “Must be exciting working on a murder investigation.”

  “Frustrating and depressing is more like it.”

  “Interesting what they’re saying about Bayside Strangler case. Were you around then?”

  “I was with the DA’s office. Helped prosecute Dwayne Davis, in fact.”

  “Really?” He sounded impressed, which hadn’t been her intention. Or had it? She’d caught herself playing up to him on several occasions.

  By the time they’d finished dessert, Kali was in a mellow mood. She was glad she’d driven herself to the restaurant, and would drive herself home, or she might have been tempted to take the evening further.

  CHAPTER 19

  Owen had never been a fan of power lunches. He preferred conducting business on the phone or around a conference table. Straight and direct. Since plunging into the world of politics, however, he’d been forced to adapt. More than adapt really, and he’d gotten quite good at it. Still, he wasn’t looking forward to spending another noon hour (which usually turned into several hours) walking a tightrope of touchy issues over pasta in garlic sauce.

  “The Davis question is bound to come up,” warned Les Amstead, his key campaign strategist, as they walked through the city-owned garage toward Amstead’s car.

  “You talking about my stand on capital punishment?” Owen knew that wasn’t what Les was referring to, but he wanted desperately to put the recent murders from his mind.

  “That may end up being part of it, but what’s going to be on the tip of everyone’s tongue are the Bailey and Parkhurst murders. It was headline news in this morning’s papers and the lead story on every radio news program I listened to.”

  “Wonderful.”

  “You read the piece in this morning’s Trib?”

  Owen had. It was a lengthy account of the Bayside Strangler killings and their similarities with the two recent murders. It sounded more like something he’d expect to find in the tabloids than the mainstream press, and he half suspected that Jack Jackson had authored it under a pseudonym. Jackson’s own piece in the Chronicle bore striking parallels.

  “There are times,” Owen said, “I wish I’d never taken that case on.”

  “You might not be where you are today without it. Exposure is the name of the game here.”

  That was true. Owen spent as much time seeking out venues to be heard as he did planning what to say. Marketing was a big part of what separated winners from losers. He sometimes fantasized about chucking the whole thing for a quiet life in rural Idaho. Except that deep down he did want to be governor. Not for the power and ego gratification as his son and some of his critics claimed, but because he honestly believed he could do some good.

  “I’ll settle for wishing I’d not gotten involved with the book, then. Or the movie. People could remember the case without remembering me.”

  “I hate to break it to you, Owen, but the book and movie were what got you the exposure. The public doesn’t give a rat’s ass about your sound legal mind.”

  “Aren’t you the voice of inspiration today.”

  “Just telling it like it is.” Amstead pulled the car out of the garage and turned left. “Even without the Davis connection there’d be interest in the recent murders. So think about what sort of spin you want to put on them.”

  Spin. There it was again. The selling of Owen Nelson for governor. “Homicide is not a rare occurrence,” he pointed out. “Most killings don’t even make the news.”

  “Come on, Owen. You know this is different. We’re talking professional, upper-class women. White women. The kind of victim that gets people’s attention because it hits so close to home.”

  “I hope you never say that publicly.”

  “I’m not saying that’s the way it should be, only that it’s the way it is.”

  They’d reached the Sheraton, where Owen was meeting with would-be contributors. Amstead pulled up in front and waited for the valet parking attendant to take their car. “Besides,” he said, turning to Owen, “murders like this capture the public’s imagination in the way a simple drive-by, or even a shooting at the ATM, doesn’t. With those, you get a brief news story and maybe a follow-up a few days later. Then interest peters out. This is different. We’ve got ritualistic murders where the killer has targeted his victims, then turned around and taunted law enforcement. It has Hollywood written all over it.”

  “I’m running for governor, Les. Not auditioning for a part in a movie.”

  “The two aren’t as different as you might think.” As they moved through the lobby Amstead whispered, “Wait until word of the photo gets out. The wires will burn.”

  “I wish you wouldn’t sound so gleeful.”

  “It’s news, Owen. Like I keep telling you, exposure is good for the ratings.”

  “Unless I wind up looking like an ass.”

  Amstead grinned. “So make sure you don’t.”

  A drone of voices, mostly male, greeted Owen as he approached the West Ballroom, where the luncheon was being held. He knew the buzz would quiet briefly when he entered, then pick up again as he worked the room, shaking hands and mixing generic greetings with popular sound bites. He could do this, Owen told himself. He was, in fact, good at it. But for a moment before he stepped through the double doors, he almost choked on the knowledge that two young women were dead and his fortunes were somehow tied to their murders.

  <><><>

  When she was a little girl growing up in southern Kentucky, Diana Davis had fantasized about joining the circus. She wanted to fly from the highest trapeze, ride on the head of an elephant, crack the whip as the tiger stood atop his perch. She wanted to wear sequins and spangles, to wave to the cheering crowds and, most important, travel the world. Never in a million years would she have imagined herself as a waitress with a young son. But as she watched ten-year-old Teddy dribbling the ball down the court at the school gym, she couldn’t imagine her life without him.

  He was tall for his age and thin, like Dwayne, though not so dark-skinned. Teddy was bright, eager, kind and now, unfortunately, at an age when he was asking about his father. Really asking, and demanding answers. These weren’t the “where’s my daddy?” questions of childhood. Questions she could skirt with vague, ambiguous responses. Teddy wanted—deserved—to know whatever she was able to tell him.

  But what did she know, really?

  That she’d loved Dwayne once; that he’d stood by her when she discovered she was pregnant. That she’d been as shocked as everyone else when his name surfaced in connection the with Bayside Strangler murders.

  She could recall, as fresh as if it were yesterday, how stunned she’d been when the police first questioned Dwayne. Impossible, she’d said then, like everyone else who knew him. Dwayne was a dedicated and popular teacher. But the police questioned him again, and again.
And then, with the suddenness of a rattlesnake strike, they’d arrested him. She was certain there had to have been a mistake.

  During the course of the trial, she experienced her first inkling of doubt. As she listened to the evidence, she realized with alarm that some of it fit. The diamond pendant Dwayne had given her for her birthday was exactly like the one Angela Morrelli had been seen wearing the evening she was killed. The Wednesday night of Christine Krichek’s murder, Dwayne had called to make sure she and Teddy were truly at her sister’s place. One by one the myriad of little lies she’d caught him in surfaced in her mind.

  Once she started, there seemed to be no end to the things she remembered. She could recall the times he fell into dark moods, when he wouldn’t speak to her for days on end; the angry outbursts when she knew she’d displeased him but didn’t know how. Controlling was the word used by the therapist she’d seen early in their marriage. Dwayne was controlling and narcissistic. He saw the world only in terms of what it did, or didn’t do, for him. And she’d felt a chill in her bones when she’d heard the psychiatrist testifying for the prosecution say the same thing about the killer.

  She’d sat through the trial with her chin up the way the attorney, Al Gomez, told her to. Even without his prompting, she’d wept when the verdict came in. But she’d only visited Dwayne once in prison, and that was to tell him she was filing for divorce.

  Still, she couldn’t help wondering if some of it wasn’t her own fault. Maybe if she hadn’t gained so much weight when she was pregnant, or if she’d done a better job of keeping Teddy quiet in the evenings when Dwayne was home, maybe then he would have loved her, and that would have been enough.

  Six years ago it had seemed like a good idea to pick up and start over in an area where no one recognized her. She’d piled Teddy in the car and driven south. They’d gotten as far as Fresno when the car broke down, so Fresno was where they’d stayed. It had turned out to be a good move. The city was growing like gangbusters. New faces weren’t a novelty—even when they were the color of coffee rather than cream. And where you’d come from was less important than how you fit in. Diane had found good work waiting tables. Teddy had thrived in school. Fresno became home, and she put the past behind her.

  In the beginning she’d even considered taking back her maiden name, but she’d ended up sticking with Davis because she wanted the same last name as her son. It was a common enough name that people never connected her with Dwayne. Even her fiancé, Colin, didn’t know she’d once been married to a convicted killer. She knew she should tell him, but he and Teddy got along so great that she hated to take a chance on spoiling it. He’d feel differently about things if he knew that Teddy’s father was the Bayside Strangler.

  If Dwayne actually was.

  That was what she always came back to. Had Dwayne killed those women?

  And now there were two new murders. Did that mean that Dwayne had been innocent all along? Diana wouldn’t even have known about the new murders if Al Gomez hadn’t sent her the news clippings. He was always pressing her to speak out, to give interviews and make appearances, all, as far as she could tell, to further his own agenda. But so far he’d been good about respecting her privacy when she declined. With these new murders, however, she’d sensed a renewed energy on his part, and it made her nervous. She didn’t want the life she’d left behind thrust in her face, or in that of her son.

  The coach blew his whistle, and Diana turned her attention back to the game. A foul by the other team had put Teddy into free-throw position. He bounced the ball against the floor a couple of times, then took a deep, calming, breath. His long, skinny arms bent at his chest. Her own heart was beating as fast as his must have been. Teddy took the shot and dropped the ball smoothly into the center of the basket. And then again. He turned to look at her and grinned.

  Diana beamed back. In her pocket, her fingers found the newspaper article Gomez had sent, and she felt a slender ray of hope that Teddy’s daddy had not been a killer, after all.

  <><><>

  Kali had intended to take the slice of chocolate cake home for dessert, but by two o’clock in the afternoon it was calling to her so loudly, she gave in. Bringing a cake on your birthday was an office tradition she remembered from her early days as a DA, and it apparently hadn’t fallen out of favor. Gloria, the secretary she shared with another assistant DA, had turned fifty and was determined not to be morose about it. She’d bought a triple-layer chocolate mousse cake so rich looking that Kali was sure the fudge scent alone was filled with calories. She’d tried to politely decline, but Gloria had ignored her excuses and pressed a piece on her anyway.

  Kali used the plastic fork Gloria had also pressed on her (just in case) and took a bite. Delicious. She would have liked a glass of ice-cold milk to go with it, but settled for coffee instead. At least that would help her stay awake.

  She had spent the morning pouring over interviews the detectives had conducted with friends and family of both victims. She’d tried to reconstruct the days preceding the murders, hoping to find a common thread. Nothing had jumped out at her as significant. Yet the killer had clearly been watching his victims and, in Jane Parkhurst’s case, had been at least as close as her backyard. The notion of him hidden there in the bushes photographing her gave Kali the creeps. But creepier still was the thought that he could have appeared in his victims’ lives, befriended them even, in just about any guise.

  Like the Bayside Strangler.

  All the time she’d been looking through the reports, images of Dwayne Davis had filtered through Kali’s mind. She’d spent the hours since lunch looking over the Davis files and transcripts. Now, only several bites into her cake, she found herself engrossed in the testimony of Dr. Dunworthy, a psychologist who’d testified for the prosecution and had since made something of a name for himself as an expert on serial killers.

  Owen had felt the jurors needed a framework for understanding how a seemingly respectable man such as Dwayne Davis could have committed multiple murders. Carl Dunworthy, a gnomelike man with a pointy goatee, had suited the purpose to a tee. With an academic background and an impressive list of publications, he presented a highly credible witness. He was also a showman who delighted in sharing with an audience.

  Kali remembered wondering at the time what sort of person made his life’s work the study of deviant minds and serial killers, and maybe that was what had colored her impression of him. It was nothing she could put her finger on, but the man struck her as a bit odd. A good witness, but not someone she took an instant liking to.

  She took another bite of cake and then read further in the transcript.

  Nelson: Can you tell the court, Dr. Dunworthy, how you came to be involved with this case initially?

  Dr. Dunworthy: I first learned of the investigative task force by reading about it in the newspaper. It interested me and I immediately offered my services.

  N: And what did you do by way of assistance?

  D: Primarily, I helped them come up with a profile of the killer. Later, I also interviewed Mr. Davis.

  N: What do you mean by “profile”?

  D: Well, loosely, what we do is draw up a kind of psychological composite of the killer. As a start, we make a distinction between organized and disorganized killers.

  N: I’m not sure I understand.

  D: The crimes of disorganized killers tend to be opportunistic and impulsive. These killers pick their victims at random, use as a weapon whatever happens to be handy, take substantial risk of discovery, and rarely make any effort to hide or move the victim’s body. The so-called organized killers, on the other hand, are more methodical. They plan their crimes in advance and target victims who fit some preconceived notion in their minds. Indeed, they usually take a great deal of satisfaction from the planning stages and the process of selecting the victim.

  N: How do you make this determination about a killer?

  D: From crime scene analysis and reconstruction of events surrounding the
crime.

  N: And what was your impression of the person responsible for the so-called Bayside Strangler murders?

  (There was an objection here from the defense—it hadn’t been established that all the crimes had been committed by the same individual—but the judge overruled it. As Owen had told Kali more than once, they’d been very lucky in their draw of Judge Harrington.)

  D: These murders were clearly committed by a personality we call the organized killer. His victims were personalized. They were women he’d selected ahead of time and come to know on some level. He brought his own weapon to the crime scene and took it away after the commission of the crime. The planning for these crimes was quite elaborate as well—the clothing, the means of disposal, the rose sent to the victims. To say nothing of the taunting notes to the police.

  N: What else can you tell us about the organized killer?

  D: He often takes trophies—

  N: Excuse me, Doctor. What do you mean by trophies?

  D: Personal items belonging to his victims—earrings, a locket, that sort of thing. They allow him to recall the victim in his fantasies and often serve as an acknowledgment of his accomplishments. Much in the same way a hunter might admire the antlers of a deer he shot, the organized killer looks at the ring or necklace he’s taken and relives the excitement of the crime. Sometimes trophies are given to the killer’s girlfriend, wife or mother, and the killer finds added thrill in the fact that only he knows the origin of the object.

  N: It’s a game for them then?

  D: In a sense, yes. These are people who’ve never outgrown the “me” stage that all children go through. They think only of their own needs and see themselves as the center of the universe.

  N: What about the sexual aspects of these crimes?

  D: It is an attribute of the organized personality that the sex act, if it occurs, is completed with a living victim. A disorganized killer often does not complete the sex act, or if he does, it is only after the victim is dead or has been rendered entirely inanimate. It’s important to bear in mind, however, that we are not talking so much about lust as control, and the sex act as a means to this end.