The Christopher Killer

by Alane Ferguson

  The room was absolutely still. She felt the slightest breeze, a kiss of air, coming from the bathroom. The door squeaked as she entered the small, black-and-white-tiled room, as scrupulously neat and inscrutable as Jewel’s closet and drawers. Faster now, she searched his toiletry kit, brimming with expensive skin-care lotions and cologne. She was less careful than she had been with his clothes. Rifling through its contents, she was taken aback by the discovery of Chanel mascara, in charcoal, as well as a heavy foundation formulated for maximum coverage of aging skin. Again, there was nothing. She made another sweep, of the bathtub, the nightstands, the closet—everything was clear and straightforward, devoid of any thread of a clue that might wind back to Rachel. So she couldn’t prove a thing. She hadn’t found a stash of Christopher medals. She hadn’t found receipts linking him to Silverton. She hadn’t found squat. Frustration welled inside her, jamming her throat. There was nothing here that spoke of a crime. Of course not. He’d been too careful to reveal how he’d been in two places at once. He was too slick to leave a date-rape drug in view. Jewel was an old hand at this game, and he knew how to win.

  Suddenly a thought flashed through her, one more place Jewel might have hidden damning evidence: beneath the bed.

  She zeroed in on the clock. Her time was up. Eleven minutes had passed since she’d entered Jewel’s room, and she knew it would be safest if she left right then, but…A second later she dropped to her knees, pulling up the bed skirt to peer beneath.

  At first it seemed empty in the half-light. Blinking, she waited for her eyes to adjust. Tick tick tick tick, sang the clock from the nightstand. Dust had gathered by one brass leg, like a tiny dune, and the air smelled of ancient sheets and dirty carpet. But there was something she couldn’t make out beneath the head of the bed, something the size of a fist. Straining, pushing herself underneath, her hand reached to grasp the object, but her fingertips moved it just beyond reach. By kicking her legs she propelled herself farther, reaching, reaching…She seized it, a used Kleenex, something the cleaning woman had missed. And then—

  “…I’ll see you in half an hour. Well done, Doctor,” said Stephanie. Her voice was close—too close!

  Dr. Jewel’s voice rang back. “Thanks. I feel we’ll get a lot of valuable coverage from this case.”

  “I know you’ve made a lot of believers.”

  “I’m only sharing what the spirits tell me. By the way, let’s make it fifteen minutes. Can you do that?”

  “Sure. Not a problem.”

  A key jiggled in the lock.

  While they’d talked Cameryn had pulled herself the rest of the way beneath the bed, scrunching her knees as close to her chest as she could squeeze them so nothing would show. Willing herself to breathe softly, her heart hammering beneath her ribs so loud she was sure Jewel would hear, she waited. The door opened, then shut with a decisive bang. A shadow that must have been his feet brushed by, the footsteps absorbed by the heavy carpet. She was trapped, alone with Jewel, in his room.

  Chapter Fifteen

  OH MY GOD OH MY GOD oh my God!!! The words wheeled through her head as she waited, afraid to move, afraid to breathe. She could hear Jewel scrape open a drawer, listened as he flicked his lighter, heard the sound of him sucking the end of the cigarette in small puffs and a long, lazy exhale. Soon, the smell of smoke wafted to where she hid. He kicked off his beaded moccasins, which dropped to the floor with quiet thuds.

  The bedsprings protested as he sat on the bed, and she could feel the metal press into the flesh of her arms. Beep, beep, beep beep, came the sound of the phone as he dialed. Beep, beep, beep beep, beep beep beep. Eleven digits—it must have been a long-distance call.

  The bedsprings hurt as they cut into her shoulder. Don’t move! she ordered herself, even though her arm, the one pressed underneath her body, was slowly going numb. She heard her own breathing as she panted softly through her mouth, and then, conscious of the sound, switched to breathing through her nose. Quieter that way.

  “Hi there,” Jewel was saying. “I’m calling about a car I picked up from your rental place last week. But I’m sorry to say the way I had to leave it was kinda messed up. Can I have customer service?…Thanks.” She could tell he was taking a drag from his cigarette. He sighed, tapping his foot as he waited.

  His voice had shifted somehow, as though he’d absorbed some of the West’s rhythms. And a car rental? That made absolutely no sense! Hadn’t Jewel flown into the Durango airport? Hadn’t he been driven to Silverton in a limo? Why would he have needed to rent a car? When would he ever have needed to rent a car?

  “Yeah, hello, Hertz Rental Car? I’m calling because I rented a sweet little number from you on the fourth of the month…. Uh-huh, that’s right, I picked it up from your airport in Santa Fe last Friday. So listen, I’m afraid I’m all the way in Texas now…. Yep, I’m smack-dab in Houston as we speak. I’m calling about the return…. Yes sir, I really screwed up getting the Corolla back to you.”

  Cameryn strained to hear every word. Jewel was lying through his teeth, spinning a tale for someone on the other end of the line. It would be important for her to memorize every single detail.

  “So here’s the deal,” Jewel went on. “I had to catch a flight from Santa Fe today, but I was delayed on the mess of a freeway. Did you know there was a real slow-down this morning?…Well, there was. I was delayed almost an hour! By the time I screamed into the airport I knew there was nothing I could do, so I left your Corolla in the airport parking lot…. Yeah, I know I was supposed to check it in myself but I’m telling you I barely made it on my flight.”

  Hertz must have been saying something back, because Cameryn heard Jewel utter a series of grunts. “Uh-huh, uh-huh, but you’re not getting what I’m saying…. I’m not arguing with you. I’ll pay any additional charges you want to stick on my account…. Yeah!” He laughed now. “No problem. Just add ’em right on my bill. I rented the car for five days. It’s a white Toyota Corolla, license…let me see, I wrote it down here…. ABD Eight-Seven-Four.” Another drag on the cigarette. The stream he exhaled whistled between his lips. “It’s in lot three, row six, slot A…. Uh-huh…Just a few hours ago. I locked it and left the keys under the floor mat—you have a second set of keys to open it, right?…Yeah, I thought so. Send someone to the lot to pick it up and turn it in for me.”

  A beat later, she heard, “That’s great, really great…. I didn’t give it to you already?…Man, I must be completely mental from all that freeway crap. It’s Jankowski. Raymond Jankowski. J-a-n-k-o-w-s-k-i. You’ve got my credit card, right?…I’ll call tomorrow to make sure there was no problem on your end…. Yeah, you’ll never know how much you’ve helped. Good-bye.”

  He must have flicked his ash into what remained of his glass of water, because there was a faint hiss.

  Beneath the bed, Cameryn stayed motionless, like stone. She didn’t understand what he was doing with the rental car, but one thing was clear: Jewel was a liar. And then, with sudden clarity, she realized, she had the proof that would show he was a killer. The pieces fit like dominoes falling in a perfect pattern, as if they were part of an elemental formula she had to learn in science class. Jewel had hatched a scheme where the car he used in a murder couldn’t be traced back to himself. He’d left the rental car—the car he must have used to abduct Rachel—back in the airport lot in Santa Fe, where it sat along with thousands of other automobiles in perfect, anonymous rows. Then, after he called it in, the Hertz people would find it, clean it up, then send it back out into its fleet, never knowing they just destroyed a crime scene. The plan was twisted and brilliant, like the man himself. Lights went off in her head, spinning like a glitter ball, and she could tell she was beginning to hyperventilate again. Steady, she told herself.

  Jewel began to whistle as he gathered up his belongings. He dropped his lighter and bent down to pick it up. Cameryn’s heart stopped when she saw his hand so close to her, but he picked it up, all the while whistling, not seeing a thing.<
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  She heard a drawer open and shut, then Jewel’s voice. “Front desk?…Yes, I’d like the name of your best florist…. Thank you very much.” And then, when he’d dialed the new number, she heard, “Yes, this is Dr. Raymond Jewel. I’d like to order a special flower arrangement to be delivered to the funeral of Rachel Geller.” He gave all of his information to the florists. “The card?” he asked. “Yes, I would like you to write down this personal message from me. ‘To the Geller family. Rachel soars with the angels, but is never far from home. You’ll forever be in my thoughts and prayers.’…Yes, and please, sign my name to the card. Make it a three-hundred-dollar arrangement…. Thank you so much.”

  Did he have any conscience at all? Cameryn wondered fiercely. He was sending flowers to the parents of the girl he brutally murdered only days before. She could barley breathe beneath the bed, the dust was thick in her eyes, and her stomach felt squeezed into her throat because the thought of what he’d done, of what he was doing, sickened her. Of course he had premeditated every angle. Jewel had been in his “cleansing period” right before the murder—Stephanie herself had said so. She’d also said Dr. Jewel didn’t see anyone, or even eat or drink, which gave him a perfect alibi. How long would it take to drive from Santa Fe to Silverton, then back again? Quickly tabulating the distance, Cameryn figured it was no more than eight hours each way. That gave him eight hours to pick a victim and kill her and leave the body. Eight hours to troll the streets of Silverton, looking for the perfect waitress to kill. Back in Santa Fe, no one would have realized he was gone, especially if he played a tape of him chanting in the room for anyone who might listen in. She had no doubt if she took her map with the locations of the other bodies, Dr. Jewel would have had a conference in a nearby state. Far enough away to lessen suspicion but close enough to strike. Her muscles were beginning to cramp, but she didn’t dare move.

  Jankowski. White Corolla, license plate ABD 874, rented by Jankowski, she repeated to herself. She didn’t want to lose even the tiniest fraction of information.

  And Justin: How could she have been so blind to even suspect him for a moment? Adam, Justin—they were victims, too. “Jewel couldn’t have killed her unless he knew how to be in two places at the same time,” Justin had told her. Ironically, Dr. Jewel had managed to do exactly that.

  Mentally, she counted the minutes. Breathe softly, she told herself again. Don’t move. Stay still. Her arms were slowly going numb, and she could feel the hexagon of the bedsprings imprinting her skin.

  Once again, the bed shuddered, and she watched Jewel’s feet, barefoot and only inches from her face, as he stood on the carpeted floor. The feet made their way to the closet. Out came the suitcase, which he placed on the area on top of her. A drawer scraped open and he removed the contents, then went into the bathroom and padded back. Items were placed into pockets and zipped. Through her small slice of sight she watched him pick up the shoes, heard him scrape the hangers across the rod, felt the weight as the suitcase grew heavier. For a moment she panicked, thinking he might check under the bed, until she remembered there had been nothing placed underneath. Just a few more minutes and she’d be safe.

  Ten more minutes and he’d be gone from the room, from the Grand. Ten more minutes and she’d be free to tell Sheriff Jacobs everything she’d heard. The alarm clock’s tick tick tick clicked like a metronome, marking bits of time, clicking away the seconds.

  Finally, Jewel zipped up his suitcase. Once more, he opened the drawers, checking to see if he’d left anything behind. Cameryn knew she was almost home free. She could taste it, could feel welling inside her the need for justice for Rachel and for all the other victims. He slipped on his beaded moccasins. Jewel was moving toward the door now, and her freedom was only seconds away. The luggage wheels squeaked as he pulled up the handle from his rolling bag and snapped it in place, and from beyond him she could see a sliver of light in the hallway, back-lighting the fringe on Jewel’s moccasins. Another yard and he’d be gone. He was through the threshold now; the door was beginning to creak shut. Yes! she cried inside her head as the door inched closed. Her left leg and arm felt like wood but at least now she could move them, and she’d just begun the contortions to free herself when it happened. Her cell phone rang.

  The Lord of the Rings theme song cried out from her jeans pocket in shrill notes, pointing a finger to her and her hiding place, giving her away. No! No no no! On her stomach, twisted into a knot of limbs, she tried desperately to grab her phone. Maybe he didn’t hear—the door was shut! Fumbling, she wrenched her arm around, not caring when the little barbwires scratched through her sleeve and into her bare flesh. She had to get to her pocket. Hair spilled into her eyes, blinding her as her fingers found the cell phone. By feel, she punched off the ringer and waited, watching the door, registering the seconds. One, two three, she counted. The door stayed shut. Four, five, six. There was no sound now except her own ragged breathing.

  Oh, please, don’t come back. Please, please, please! Shaking her head, she managed to get her hair from her eyes. She waited, watching the door. Nothing moved. Jewel must not have heard the ring of her cell phone, or he must have attributed it to another source. Thank God! she whispered. Oh, thank God!

  But then the door creaked open again and she saw Jewel’s feet rooted into the hallway floor. He stood there for a moment, unmoving. Then he moved inside. The door shut again, quietly, gently, and now she saw the bottom of the suitcase, saw the feet planted into the carpet.

  Cursing silently, she watched the edge of the bed ruffle as it hung, shielding her. Her heart was thumping now, frantic, hammering beneath her ribs. There was nothing she could do. She couldn’t move, couldn’t expose herself, couldn’t hide. The breath sucked back into her throat as those feet walked toward her and stopped at the side of the metal frame. Oh my God! she screamed inside her head, and she meant it. Oh my God, help me! My God, please don’t let him look here. Let him turn away!

  Light streamed in as the bed skirt flipped up. She heard his knees pop as Jewel squatted down and then his face, seamed and cold, stared at her.

  “Hello, Cameryn,” Jewel said softly. “Have you been there long?”

  She couldn’t answer. Fear jammed up in her throat, blocking her words. But even if she could speak there was nothing to say.

  “I’m sure you’ve been there long enough.” He maneuvered his arm and from somewhere inside his jacket he produced a gun, small and silver. As he aimed it at her face, she saw the black hole of the barrel pointed directly at her eye.

  “I have a permit to carry this. A celebrity like me never knows what kind of whacked-up crazy’ll stalk him. But I had no idea you were such a fan. Come on out, Cameryn,” he said again. His head dropped to his shoulder as he stared. With a chilling smile he added, “The spirits have a message for you. They want me to get it just right.” His eyes fluttered shut for the briefest moment, then opened. “Yes, I got the message,” he said. “They say it’s time you join the party.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  IT TOOK HER ONLY SECONDS to wriggle out from beneath the bed. She felt Jewel roughly grab her foot, pulling it so hard she thought for a moment it had separated at the ankle.

  “Stand up,” he commanded.

  She rose to her feet, shivering, her brain going a hundred miles an hour as she tried to figure out what to do.

  “I’ll take that,” Jewel said, plucking the cell phone from her hand and dropping it into the pocket of his blazer. He stared at her with an odd expression. Worry creased his brow, although his perfect hair was still in place, combed straight back, with miniature rows left from the teeth of his comb. He paced for a moment, thinking. Finally he waved the gun in her face. “Sit,” he said, pointing the barrel to the bed. “So you heard about my car-rental return. Pretty ingenious, don’t you think?”

  “I…I don’t understand. I mean, I was under the bed but I couldn’t follow what you were doing—”

  “I said sit!”

  She
did as he ordered. Her arm and leg were still numb, but the feeling was coming back into them. Once she’d read that when faced with a killer, the victim needed to personalize herself. Talk to the perpetrator, the books said. Engage him in conversation. Making sure to use his name, she said, “Dr. Jewel, you don’t want to hurt me. I swear to you I don’t understand what’s going on. The thing is, Dr. Jewel, I thought you were already checked out. I work for the Grand and they sent me to clean your room. That’s all!”

  “Drop the act, Cameryn. I’m sure you understood plenty—well, too much for your own good, anyway. But my problem is”—he grimaced—“what am I going to do with you now? I can’t let you go and I’m clean out of Christopher medals.”

  The admission sent a cold shock through her, like a wave of ice water. So there would be no more deception, no veneer of truth covering the lie. Dr. Jewel had just admitted he was the Christopher Killer. She sat ramrod straight, her fists clenching, unclenching. As the reality of the situation hit her hard, her first impulse was to collapse into it. She couldn’t let herself. If she did, she would die. Think, she commanded. Think! But the fact was that he had a gun and there was nothing she could do; there was no way to talk her way out or to strategize. The gun was small, maybe only a .22, but she knew it didn’t take much to kill. Helpless as she watched him pace, she began to say the Lord’s prayer under her breath.

  “Shut up!” he snapped. “I’m trying to go over my options, none of which are looking too good at the moment.” He ran his fingers through his hair, destroying the sheen. “I was on my way out and now this—you’ve really put a monkey wrench into my plans, Cameryn. I’m supposed to be out of here in one hour. You look like you have something to say to me, so say it!”

  She could only form one word. “Why?”

  “Why!” He stopped moving. His eyes widened as he answered, “Why? I would think that’s pretty obvious. I was a hick kid from a town no bigger than Silverton and look at me now. Look at me! I’ve got everything. I’m on Oprah. People listen to every word I say because they think I know. But in this business, if your credibility slips”—he snapped his fingers—“you’re gone. Done for!” He began to pace again, a tiger in a cage. “NBC was downstairs, interviewing me for the Today show. Do you know how big that is? The Today show!”