Family Matters

by Aiden Vaughan

  “Diana,” Jason then continued with his speech, “you are also a very special friend for us, already a talented cook and baker, and a great singer in your own right. But I think you have even greater meaning for Daniel, so I am going to have him make this presentation!”

  Daniel got up and took out another jewelry store gift box. “Diana,” he began, “ever since I came to this area several years ago, you have been one of my friends. When I first joined the choir at school, you deliberately sought me out and made friends, something greatly appreciated by the lonely new boy in town. Over the years we have been close musical collaborators, but it wasn’t until recently that I discovered that we had a mutual love for each other. When you clued me in that you loved me too, it was one of the happiest days of my life! Now I am proud to declare my love for you in public, and here is a gift for you as a token of that love.” Daniel handed Diana the box as Jason and Laura applauded and cheered. Inside the box was a pearl necklace.

  “This is beautiful, Daniel! I absolutely love pearls! Please help me put it on!”

  Daniel helped Diana remove the necklace from its box, undid the clasp, put it around her neck and closed the clasp. “You look so beautiful with that necklace on!” he told her. Diana then turned around and gave Daniel a warm embrace and kiss.

  Clearly Jason’s gifts were a big hit, adding to the warm glow at their table and the pleasure of the evening. Tomorrow they would be heading back to the Silicon Valley, refreshed, healed, and with memories of their coming of age that would last a lifetime.

  “May we always remember this special time together!” Jason said to conclude his remarks. After dinner, the four friends walked around the wharf for a while. It was dark outside now, and they could see the reflection of the stars and other lights on the ocean. Soon they would be back to their normal lives, if that was possible anymore, but this week would always be a special memory.

  The next morning they were up early. After breakfast they all worked hard to clean up the house, take out their trash, pack up their belongings and leftover food, and leave things the way they were supposed to for the next occupants. Caterina had called them yesterday and told them she would pick them up around ten o’clock in the morning. Just before ten, she arrived. Jason asked her how Nick was doing.

  “He has been making a great recovery, again thanks to you! Dr. Cartwright wanted to make sure that Nick stayed at home and continued to rest all week. Most of his wounds are now healed and his energy is coming back. He has met with Dr. Agoura four or five times now, and feels that he has made a lot of progress getting the demons, as he describes them, out of his head. Eric and Tim have been positively wonderful. They have come over to our house every day and spent time with Nick, so he wouldn’t be alone during the day while I was working. When I thanked them for being so generous with their time, they both said that they absolutely felt obligated to help out Nick, because they went through similar experiences themselves. Nick is so fortunate that you have all become his friends!”

  “We are very much looking forward to seeing him again,” Daniel said.

  “I know that Nick can’t wait to see you either. Next Tuesday is his birthday, and we are having a special birthday party to celebrate his coming out from his ordeal. Of course all of you are invited! I hope you will all be able to attend!”

  After getting everything packed, Jason and Laura left with Caterina, while Diana drove home with Daniel so they could tell their parents they were going steady. During the drive back, Caterina asked Jason how he was feeling. “I am very much recovered from the turmoil of Nick’s case. This week has really rejuvenated and refreshed me. Thank you for setting it up!”

  Chapter 34

  The Predator’s Tale

  (Monday)

  Monday morning, Captain Garcia invited Jason and Daniel to police headquarters, so they could be updated on what they found out from their interrogations of Salvatore Butera and Angelo Ciurro. This was also a good opportunity for Jason to fill in any details from the operation that the task force wasn’t aware of. Jason and Daniel arrived around ten and were quickly ushered into Captain Garcia’s office.

  After they shook hands and Captain Garcia had them be seated, he sat down at his desk and opened a folder with a huge report. “In the week while you guys were toughing it out at the beach, we had the opportunity to interrogate both suspects quite extensively. This case has an incredible story behind it, if you believe everything that Salvatore Butera and Angelo Ciurro have been telling us. Ciurro has been singing like a bird ever since he was arrested. The only problem with a lot of what he says, is that it comes with all of those annoying clichés. But gradually our team of interrogators has been able to get salient facts and information that we could use as a wedge on Salvatore Butera. To cover his butt, he will try to pass the blame for everything onto Angelo, but there were so many crimes committed by these two, that I think they already understand that they will never see the light of day again!”

  “Believe me, Captain Garcia, I heard my share of Angelo’s annoying clichés when I was his captive,” Jason replied. “But he was one very dangerous person, and the way he tore into kids like Nick was very scary!”

  “As I understand their story, both Sal and Angelo were illegitimate offspring of Gilberto Feraducci. According to them, he bribed or coerced two other men to claim their paternity when they were born and the birth certificates were filed. In their early years, they received support from Gilberto, envelopes of cash that would appear each month at their houses, which were properties that Gilberto had somehow acquired through his business dealings. At that time, much of the property around San Matthias was very inexpensive.”

  “How did he come by the house that Angelo was living in?” Jason asked. “That place is unbelievable!”

  “From what I understand, that house and also the one that Angelo used as his hideaway for Ben Kessler and other victims were originally owned by a very eccentric early settler of this area named Joseph Santoro. Santoro’s grandfather came to this area looking for mining claims and discovered the large lead mine that the house is partially built over. As the years went by, he became very paranoid about claim jumpers and thieves wanting to steal from him. He wanted to make sure that no one could get into the mine, so he literally built that house over the entrance to the mine. In the early days, it was just a gaping hole inside the house.

  “Then Santoro’s father, who was a mechanical genius, decided to make it even more secure. He was the one who designed and built the railway car down into the main cavern of the mine, and he also designed and built the moveable cabinet over the entrance. Joe Santoro assisted his father with these projects, and when his father passed away, he did more to hide the entrance by filling in cement all underneath the house foundation so that no one could see the passageway from the outside. He remodeled the inside to make the house look just like a normal house and not the entrance to a lead mine.

  “In the years after World War II, mining was no longer profitable in this area, with much larger finds in other states. Agriculture was still big in this area, but gradually that gave way to housing and light industry. During those years, Joe Santoro became more of a recluse. He never married or had a family or other relatives live there. But Santoro had one great weakness — gambling. That is how he met Gilberto Feraducci, at a high stakes poker game. One night they were playing and Santoro was so sure that he had the winning hand, he actually put the deed to that house in the pot. Unfortunately for him, his full house of aces and kings was beaten by Feraducci’s four deuces!”

  “Around that time, Feraducci was having an affair with Lena Fiorre, Angelo’s mother. When she became pregnant with Angelo, Gilberto put her into this new house he had won playing poker. Gilberto had no idea that the house had the secret passageway to the mine, until he was looking around the house for some tools in an outside work shed, and found a cache of papers that not only had information about the mechanical workings in that house, but contained the
deed to the other house. Within two years, Joe Santoro had died of natural causes, and since he had no heirs, there was no one to audit his assets. Gilberto looked up the house in the county record books and found that it was free and clear of any debt. All he had to do was pay property taxes on it.”

  “So Sal and Angelo were set up with houses to live in along with their mothers,” Daniel stated. “What happened to turn them into such horrible predators!”

  “Sal and Angelo were both raised by single mothers who struggled to survive after Gilberto was killed,” Captain Garcia continued. “They never really had any upbringing from their father. The men on their birth certificates were names only, and even when Gilberto would visit while he was still alive, he never spent any time with Sal or Angelo. Their mothers were women of ill repute. They worked in bars and supplemented their meager incomes as prostitutes. After Gilberto died, the money that supported them was cut off. When Angela Butera went to see Enrico Feraducci to explain who she was and about Gilberto’s illegitimate children, Enrico became very angry with her for trashing his name and had her thrown out. He refused to recognize their family connection and threatened her with violence if she ever returned. Eventually Sal and Angelo found out what Enrico had done when they were teens. Sal was especially bitter about this, and vowed to get revenge on the Feraducci family.”

  “When we went over to San Matthias High School we learned about Angelo’s accident, how he was scarred for life, and how that affected his social interaction with others. Was that when his downward spiral began?” Jason asked.

  “Yes,” Garcia replied. “From what we were able to get out of him, I think some interactions with little kids somehow got to him the most! Unfortunately, little kids can be really cruel when they see something abnormal. There were several aggressive kids that made a point of taunting Angelo, calling him Frankenstein, and other demeaning names. The high school kids weren’t much better, although it was mostly whispering behind his back. Angelo began withdrawing into a fantasy world where he would get even with those kids who taunted them. He began drawing pictures of what he would do. That is what that counselor at the high school saw when he found Angelo’s backpack.

  “After Angelo dropped out of high school, more circumstances worked against him resuming a normal life. Just before his eighteenth birthday, Lena, his mother passed away. She had never been a particularly robust person, and the years of late night partying, drinking, and being with many different men finally got to her. She developed a rheumatic fever and never was able to recover. After Lena was buried, Angelo was completely on his own. Ironically everything fell in place for him to do whatever he wanted. The house was free and clear of any debt. During more flush times a trust account had been set up at a local bank to cover the property taxes and basic insurance on the house, which wasn’t much. All Angelo needed to do to survive was earn enough money for food, clothing, utilities, and gas for his truck.

  “About a year later, a similar tragedy happened to Sal. His mother was out partying with two men who picked her and another lady up at a bar where they had all been drinking heavily. They went out for a joy ride and the driver lost control of the car. The driver and the other two passengers were killed outright, and Angela was severely injured. She was brought to a hospital but only survived for a day and a half. Bitter over what had happened to her in her life, she told Sal about who he really was and why they had to struggle to survive over the past several years. Sal vowed on her deathbed to get revenge against the Feraducci family, although at that time he had no idea how he would ever be able to do that. But Sal had some resources to work with. Like Angelo he was living in a free and clear house. Later he found the deed to the other house on the hill where we found Ben and Nick. Unlike Angelo, Sal had completed high school and was able to get a job at a local auto supply store in town. So he had money to live comfortably and finance his revenge.”

  “Well I can see how Sal could be bitter about things, and I understand how Angelo was able to survive with no direction or responsible support in his life, but how did he become such a determined and vengeful predator?” Jason asked.

  “Again, a very ironic situation occurred in his life, very similar to what happened to you, Jason!”

  “What do you mean?” Jason followed up.

  “A month or so after Angela’s death, Angelo was driving on the road when he saw a young hitchhiker. When he stopped to pick the kid up, he realized that it was one of the kids who had constantly made fun of him and called him names. The kid who was named Toby was several years older now, and had forgotten about how he and the others had teased Angelo. He told Angelo that he was on his way to the bus station. He was going to spend the summer with his grandparents because he wasn’t getting along with his father and stepmother any more. In fact, his parents didn’t even bother to take him to the bus station. They just gave him some money and told him to get out. Angelo pulled up to a stop sign, and stopped the truck. ‘You don’t remember who I am, do you?” Toby looked back at him quizzically, but before he could do or say anything, Angelo punched him in the face as hard as he could, knocking him out cold.

  “The next day, Angelo called up Sal and excitedly told him to come over to his house. ‘You have to see this!’ About an hour later, Sal arrived at the house and Angelo took him down into the subbasement. Toby was down there, gagged and bound to a pole. Much of his clothing had been ripped off, and clearly Angelo had been beating him and torturing him.

  At first Sal was shocked by what he saw. ‘What have you been doing, Angelo? Why do you have this kid all tied up?’ When Angelo explained that Toby was one of the kids who had made his life miserable a few years back, Sal replied, ‘So you are finally getting your revenge!’

  “Angelo then replied, ‘My daddy always said that revenge was best served cold!’

  “Sal was going to intervene and release Toby, but then something snapped inside him. He became fascinated to see how Toby would holdup under Angelo’s torture. He told Angelo that he wanted to see how Toby would hold up over the next few days. Angelo said he could come over any time. When Sal came back the next day, Toby was in a lot worse shape. Sal went over to him and pulled off his gag. Toby begged him to help him get out of his captivity. ‘I’ll do anything you want. Please help me!’

  “Sal realized that now he would have total power over Toby. If he refused to do anything he wanted, all he had to do was threaten to return him to Angelo’s basement. He took Angelo aside and explained that he wanted to borrow Toby for a couple of days, and then he would bring him back. Since Angelo was totally loyal to Sal, he agreed. Toby was now Sal’s prisoner. I won’t go into the gory details, but suffice it to say that poor Toby was horribly abused by Sal. Then after a couple of days, he got bored with Toby, and returned him to Angelo. Poor Toby then became Angelo’s first murder victim.”

  “This story gives me the creeps!” Daniel said vehemently. “And to think that this guy had his hands on you, Jason!” Daniel actually shuddered at the thought.

  “Now we know how those two got started as sexual predators, but how did they get focused on Nick?” Jason asked.

  “A few days later, Sal happened to notice a story in the local newspaper about a young musical prodigy on the piano who was going to give a recital at the Ponticelli Studios. Sal wouldn’t have paid much attention except that there was a picture of young Nick and a caption with the name Nicolo Feraducci. Suddenly the whole evil plot of how Sal could get his revenge on Enrico Feraducci popped into his head. First, he had to make sure that Nick was indeed related to Enrico. It took some research, but eventually he found an article about Gilberto at the time of his death that mentioned he was survived by his wife, Caterina, and young son, Nicolo. Sal now knew that eventually he could get his revenge on Enrico Feraducci, but he had to be careful about how he did it.”

  “So that is how the reign of terror against all of those kids began, isn’t it?” Jason asked.

  “Unfortunately so, Jason.” Capt
ain Garcia replied. “Sal’s whole rationale for this crime wave was to eventually get to Nick, but make it look like he was just another unfortunate victim. From what we have been able to learn so far, they started out getting their victims from southern California. Sal apparently wanted to perfect their kidnapping and torture methods by practicing on kids from out of the area before they began here. And I guess their perverted desires were addictive. They both developed a strong desire to systematically torture and abuse each victim before Angelo would finally dispatch them and bury them back in the cavern.”

  “How could someone hate kids so much that they would set up a mass murder factory?” Daniel said with a little agitation in his voice.

  “Our psychologists are trying to figure that out, Daniel. Clearly these two are sociopaths. There is no way that a normal person could torture and murder so many young children without feeling terrible guilt and remorse! We also think that the Angelo’s continuous exposure to lead from the mine has had an impact on his mental state. By the way, the huge content of lead in that cavern was the main reason why we lost total contact with you, Jason.”

  “When I observed Angelo, as his unfortunate guest,” Jason answered, “I could see that he was acting sort of like a bobble-head person. There didn’t seem to be any real thinking going on. He just lived in his nightmare world where nothing made any sense! I tried to find out more about how his “training program for kids” came about, but I never got a straight answer other than he set it up with his friend, who I assume was Sal. And where did this whole ‘daddy thing’ come from, if he never had a real dad?”

  “Good questions, Jason,” Captain Garcia replied. “We believe that Sal set both of those things up. After Angelo’s accident, where he was disfigured and became brain damaged, Sal tried everything he could think of to get Angelo back to normal. Since neither of them had fathers, Sal decided to use that to calm Angelo down. He found this old book of folk sayings and wisdom, one of Joe Santoro’s or his father’s books that had been left at Angelo’s house. He told Angelo that his daddy had left him this book so he would know how to live his life. He told him to study it a little every day so that he could learn the wisdom in it. The training program idea was also brilliant on Sal’s part. He knew that Angelo needed regular routines to keep going. He used it to soften up the kids, then he would take them out of there and molest them, and finally he would return them there for their ‘final training’. With Angelo killing each victim, who would know that a second person was part of the mix. Sal believed that Angelo would eventually do something stupid to expose the operation. He was planning to get out there after he finished with Nick!”