by Tom Lowe
“No, it guided him. He heard the spirits that night. When the sun broke, he said he was moving to Arizona. Said he was being called there to teach…university.”
I said nothing, not sure what to say. Max barked at a lizard and I said, “It does seem odd that you walk down the river and don’t see the girl lying near the bank.”
He pointed to the thread in the bag. “I saw that.”
“It wasn’t easy to spot.”
“Things that aren’t a natural part of the surroundings can stand out.” His eyes moved slowly from the branches to the ground. “Things like this.” He stepped over to a palmetto thicket, knelt down. “Don’t think that little plastic bag of yours will hold this.”
Max followed me, sniffing, growling, and uttering throaty barks. It was a domestic animal’s reaction to the aberrant, to the incomprehensible — to evil.
“No, Max!” I shouted, stopping her from sniffing a long stick covered in dark blood. I looked closer and could see a single hair stuck in the bark and blood.
Billie sat on his haunches, pondering, staring at the stick. “Was she raped?”
“Yes.”
“Looks like whoever did it wasn’t satisfied with the sex part.”
“For this guy, wasn’t about sex. It was about power and humiliation.”
Billie stood and searched the area, stopping every few feet to turn a leaf or stick with the tip of his bow. “Here’s something.”
Almost hidden under the dried palm leaves was a piece of gray duct tape.
I stared at the tape and felt my chest tighten. My palms were moist. I touched it with the end of a pencil. I could see a dark hair stuck to one corner of the tape.
At the river’s edge, I could smell the odor of dead fish and honeysuckles. A half eaten catfish, probably ripped from a trotline by a gator, had washed ashore.
“Here,” I pointed to the spot I found her, “she was on her back here.”
He looked around the area, lifting a dead leaf or a broken twig, eyes moving like a bird of prey. “When I came upriver I was over on the far bank with my canoe. That’s Dickensen Point. I crossed to this bank about another hundred yards down. Pulled the canoe onto a sandbar and walked in the shallows until I came to your dock.”
Max looked toward the east and uttered a low growl.
Joe Billie smiled. “I’m startin’ to gain more respect for that little dog.”
“Why’s that?”
“Because she knows somebody’s coming.”
FIFTEEN
Within three minutes, Detective Slater arrived with a posse. Two unmarked cars and two Volusia County sheriffs’ cruisers pulled up, lights flashing, dust trailing. Max barked at the detectives and deputies spilling out of their cars at once.
Detective Leslie Moore wore her hair pinned up. Her partner, Detective Dan Grant, followed her. Slater took his time, staying in his car, cell phone pressed to his ear, eyes on me. He waited for the others to almost encircle us before he appeared.
“So, what do we have here?” Slater asked. “O’Brien and the crocodile hunter?”
Billie ignored the comment. Slater continued, “We have a man with a bow and arrow and a hunting knife. What are you hunting?”
“Artifacts. Spear and arrowheads.” Billie said.
“You won’t find arrowheads here unless the victim was stabbed with an arrow.”
I said, “Detective, we’ve found a couple of things that may have slipped through your first investigation. Between here and the road, less than a quarter mile, you’ll find a woman’s shoe, a bloodied stick and a piece of duct tape. The tape looks like it has a hair stuck to it. I’ll show you where we found them.” I wasn’t going to tell Slater about the thread or the dirt I’d taken from the shoe.
Slater turned to Billie. “I’d like to take a look at that arrow.” Billie handed him the arrow. Slater removed his sunglasses and studied it. “I see tiny pieces of something between the stone and wood. We’ll run DNA on it.”
“Unless you’re storing rattlesnake DNA in your database you won’t get a hit,” I said. “He saved my dog’s life when a rattlesnake was about to strike her.”
“This man shot a rattlesnake with a bow and arrow, huh? Don’t see that every day.” He adjusted his sunglasses. “Arrow’s going to the lab, that skinning knife, too.”
Billie unbuckled his belt and handed Slater the knife and arrow.
“What’s your name?” Slater asked.
“Joe Billie.”
“Got an ID, Mr. Billie?”
“You mean driver’s license?”
“That’d be a good start.”
“No.”
“It’s against the law to drive without a license.”
“Didn’t drive here.”
“Are you and Mr. O’Brien carpooling?”
Billie's face was flat, no sign of emotion. He stared at Slater for a moment then looked toward the river.
“You live around here, Mr. Billie?”
“Most of my life.”
“Where?”
“Hanging Moss Fish Camp.”
Slater glanced at my Jeep. “Hanging Moss is way upriver. How’d you get here?”
“Canoe.”
“Where’s your canoe?”
“Behind those trees.” Billie motioned toward some willows near the riverbank.
Slater turned to a deputy. “Check it out.” The deputy nodded and left
“What were my DNA results?” I asked.
“Negative,” said Detective Moore. Slater looked hard at her. She ignored him and said, “Where is this physical evidence you just mentioned?”
“About a ten minute walk from here.”
“Mitchell,” she said to Slater. “Want me to check it out?”
“Maybe you both should see this,” I said before Slater could speak. “The more eyes, the less chance something might not be seen.”
A muscle below Slater’s left eye twitched. He started to say something but was interrupted by the deputy who was returning. “There’s a canoe tied up down there.”
* * *
A deputy roped off a semi-rectangle between the scrub brush and pine trees. Detective Grant took digital photographs of the evidence and the surroundings. They collected and bagged the shoe, duct tape, bloody stick, leaves and dirt from the area.
I stood out of the way, holding Max and watching Detectives Slater, Moore and Grant work. She and Grant were thorough, organized. Slater smoked three cigarettes and looked at his watch four times in fifteen minutes. They approached us.
Detective Moore removed her gloves and petted Max. “Cute dog.”
“Thanks. Her name’s Max.”
Slater lit another cigarette and sucked a mouthful of smoke into his lungs. “Let’s cut the chitchat and get to the point. Mr. O’Brien, you are a person of interest in this investigation. Now, so is Mr. Billie. We’ll be taking Mr. Billie in for further questioning. Mr. O’Brien, we’re not done quite yet.”
I said, “You’re eloquent. I called you, remember? Now you have some hard evidence in your bag. Let’s see what you can do with it, Detective.”
He turned to Billie. “If you have no history, you’re a mystery. I solve mysteries.”
Detective Moore said, “Mr. Billie, we’d appreciate it, sir, if you could come to the department to answer a few questions. If you don’t have a car we’ll provide transportation back to your home or to your canoe.”
Billie said nothing. He looked in the direction of the river. A red-tailed hawk alighted on the top of a pine tree. The bird watched Billie being led away.
I stood there and saw the hawk fly to a cypress trees. Even with Max, I suddenly felt alone, out of sync with everything around me. The faraway sound of a train whistle beckoned down the St. Johns. It was a lonesome sound, a hymn carried by trestles crossing rivers of time to bridge the soul. In two weeks the girl would be a cold case. Forgotten. But I couldn’t forget the promise I made to her and to my wife.
A gut feeling
and a heartfelt promise often don’t mix. No easier than good and evil can sleep in the same bed. My gut told me one thing while my heart spoke another. I hadn’t asked to be tossed into this ring, but some choices are already made for you.
The girl I found had no choice.
“Come on Max. We’re told her name was Angela. Let’s see if we can name her killer.”
SIXTEEN
It was Monday morning, and I rose before dawn. I sat on the outside steps by the screened porch and laced up my shoes. The sunrise broke, resembling a ship’s light in a mist over the tree line along the river.
After a mile or so at a fast pace, I stopped to catch my breath. I stood there, sweating and watching the silent St. Johns for a minute. There was the scent of damp moss, orange blossoms, and honeysuckle. A hummingbird hovered at the opening of a trumpet flower, the bird's throat glistening like a damp ruby in the morning light.
My cell rang. It’s chirp out of harmony with the birdsong in the forest. “You sound out of breath.” Ron Hamilton said.
“Trying to get back in shape. Running again.”
“There’s another killing. Similar MO. Female. Young. No ID. Raped and strangled. Could be the same perp.”
“Where’d they find the body?”
“Brevard County. Not too far from you. Two teenagers on four-wheelers found the vic. Word I hear is the feds are making a half-ass effort to look into this one. Not much is done about it until it grabs the girl next door.”
“What did you come up with on similar cases, missing or unsolved homicides?”
“Florida’s got two things more than any state. The coastline is the longest and so is the missing persons list. I tried to triangulate it into stats that would correlate with the ethnicity, age and sex of your vic, and the one found today. Went back five years. There are ninety-three reported missing. Nineteen known homicides. Out of that number, four people have been convicted. So that gives us fifteen where the perp or perps are still out there. In each case, the bodies were found in some remote spots.”
“Was the cause of death the same?”
“Looks that way. Necks broken. Raped and sexually mutilated. But because he’s not killing college coeds, like Danny Rolling or Ted Bundy did, it becomes old news fast. Look how long the Green River Killer kept killing prostitutes. The people least likely to be reported missing.”
“For every girl reported missing, I wonder what the ratio or percentage is of them found alive or dead? What’s the death quotient?”
“There are girls missing that nobody files a report on because their families live in some other country. Human trafficking. Sex slaves. All here in the good ol U.S. of A.”
“You got it, partner.”
Ron grunted. “Out of the fifteen we know about, one body was found the first year. The second year produced two. The third season, if you will, there were three killings, about one a quarter. Year number four produced four dead girls. And this last year there were five. These killings were scattered in counties from the northern part of Florida to the tip of the Everglades.”
“If all the bodies were found, and it’s the same perp, he’s killing more each year, getting bolder, or an urge can’t be satisfied for as long. What’d you get on Joe Billie?”
“The print on the arrowhead could be from Billie. There’s no record of his prints anywhere. No criminal record. Nothing in DMV. Seems he doesn’t exist. The blood on the feather you sent matches the DNA of the hair follicle you found on the cot. Came from the same man, Billie, if that’s his hair. No hit in CODIS. Why his blood is on the damn feather, I can’t help you there, bro. I’ll send the arrow back to you.”
“Did you find anything on Clayton Suskind?”
“Ph.D in anthropology from Florida State University. Suskind was arrested in last year for unauthorized digging of a national historic site, the protected Crystal River Mounds. This is probably the biggest Indian burial ground in the Southeast. He knows, or knew, where to dig. Collectors pay a lot for this stuff. The good professor is another missing person who has never been found.”
“Check with the University of Arizona. See if he’s on staff.”
* * *
Back at my house, I dialed the Volusia County Sheriff’s Office. I asked to speak to Detective Slater. “There was a killing in Brevard County. Maybe the same MO.”
“We’re on it. You’re not a cop anymore, O’Brien.”
“Do you know where I can find Joe Billie?”
“Why?”
“He left something with me. I’d like to return it. Have you charged him?”
“Not yet. He’s probably lying low on the Seminole reservation. Sovereignty and all that shit. We’re watching him. Just like we’re watching you.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“You know what it means.”
“Did you come up with an ID on the victim?”
“That’s not your immediate concern.”
“I haven’t figured out your attitude yet, maybe it’s a turf thing, Detective, but your incompetence made it my business. I assume you haven’t got an ID. Maybe the killing in Brevard is related. It might be a way to help ID the girl I found.”
“I don’t need you to tell me how to do my job.”
“I think you haven’t come up with an ID yet or a real suspect.”
“This isn’t CSI Miami, O’Brien. Push me, I push back. Promise you that.”
“Here’s a promise: if you don’t find out who killed the girl, I will.”
He slammed the phone. I gripped the receiver hard, my knuckles like cotton.
I looked out at the stillness of the river and thought about my conversation with Ron. A second murder. Was it the same perp? Atlacatl imix cuanmiztli I heard her garbled words through the whisper of air from her punctured lung.
The room suddenly seemed cold.
There was a noise near my driveway. I picked up my Glock, looked out the window, and saw a car parked under the live oaks at the far end of my drive. By the time I got to the front door, the car was gone.
SEVENTEEN
I skipped breakfast the next day, loaded a case of beer and Max into the Jeep and drove straight to Ponce Inlet Marina. I was looking forward to a quiet Monday on Jupiter. I’d plan to install a GPS system on the boat.
As I walked by the tiki bar, on the way to my boat, Kim, the bartender, smiled one of her thousand-candlelight smiles and held up her hand for me to stop. She was in her early forties. Easy smile. Dark hair and brown eyes that had their own sense of humor.
“Looks like a party,” she said, glancing at the beer and then at me.
“I always seem to get thirsty when I work on the boat all day.”
“Hi Max!” Kim bent down and picked Max up, kissing her head. “So you’re the lucky girl who’s first mate.” Max’s tail wagged nonstop.
“Sean, were you on Jupiter a couple of nights ago?”
“No, why?”
“I was closing and thought I saw a light on your boat. Like a flashlight.”
“Sure it was Jupiter?”
“Not positive. But it looked like it was your boat.”
“Did you see anyone leave?”
“No.”
“Thanks, Kim.”
She set Max on the ground to follow me. “No problem. That’s what I’m here for, neighborhood watch.”
The breeze across the Intracoastal delivered the scent of a receding tide, barnacles drying on pilings, exposed oyster bars, and mullet feeding across the mud flats.
The St. Michaels had returned. Nick’s fishing boat, with its Old World look and feel, seemed to rest quietly in its slip. On the dock next to the boat, Nick's Calico cat squatted on its haunches, chewing a severed fish head.
Jupiter sat waiting for me like an old friend. I stepped into the cockpit and began carefully examining everything I owned. Deck chairs, cooler, ropes, anything that might look out of place. I raised the hatch to the engine and begin looking for any sign of intrusion or
something that didn’t belong in the bowels of Jupiter. Nothing.
I opened the salon door lock and stepped inside, Max following at my heels.
The first sign. Max darted around the salon sniffing every piece of furniture. The fur raised slightly on her back. “What do you smell, Max? Let’s check below.”
The second sign. Sherri’s picture had been moved, slightly, but I could tell. A faint dust line on the shelf gave it away. If it were not for Kim tipping me off, and Max’s antics, I may not have noticed that someone had been on Jupiter.
I examined the rest of the boat and could find nothing stolen. A few things seemed slightly out of place, but nothing gone. I would check topside in a moment. I didn’t think I’d find anything taken from there. If robbery wasn’t the motive, what was?
Through Jupiter’s portside window, I saw the feet with the flip-flops. A few seconds later, Nick Cronus bellowed, “Permission to come aboard.” Nick eased down like a sloth from the dock into the cockpit. He had thick curly black hair, moustache, smiling dark eyes, and skin stained the hue of creosote. A lifetime at sea, pulling nets, traps and battling storms had given him a Herculean build tempered with the survival skills of an Argonaut. Nick was a blend of Zorba and Will Rogers. He had a string of ex-wives, children, girlfriends, and creditors in his circle of acquaintances. But he had the heart of a St. Bernard, too, loyal and trusting where his friends were concerned. I was glad to be included as one of them.
By his slow movement, I could tell he was slightly hung over. I would wait a few minutes before asking him if he’d seen anyone around Jupiter.
Max ran out to greet him, her tail fanning. He leaned down and lifted her up using one hand like a giant with a toy. He held her over his head. “Hot dog, you come to sea with me! I feed you some octopus, give you’re a starfish for a chew bone, and let you bark at the porpoises. It’d be a good life, yeaaaah!”
He did a 360 spin, holding Max even higher in a Greek dance. It was more excitement than Max’s bladder could hold. She let loose a trickle that ran down his arm. I yelled and Nick laughed. Max looked dizzy.
