The Harbinger Collection: Hard-boiled Mysteries Not for the Faint of Heart (A McCray Crime Collection)

by Carolyn McCray

  They watched a man that Ruben had to assume was the serial killer they had been hunting for weeks. It looked like the sketches of Lucky 37, only cleaned up. In khakis even.

  Ruben glanced at Kent. He was watching the footage, engrossed as if he could learn something important just by Lucky’s gait. Then the serial killer stopped, faced the camera and said something. It was difficult to make out since the image was so blurry.

  “Can’t you clean that up?” Kent demanded.

  “Like we said, way too early,” Jimmi said. “Down there they still have old VHS cameras. That footage isn’t even digital.”

  “It’s going to take us a few hours, “Joshua insisted. “And even then we are going to have to use experimental software to fill the gaps, pixel by pixel.”

  “Your violin needs tuning,” Kent shot back. “I want that footage.”

  “Rewind it,” Rube instructed. His cousin was deaf and he’d learned a bit of lip reading. He was surprised that Kent wasn’t all over that. Was there truly a skill that Ruben possessed that the vaulted profiler did not?

  Jimmi did as instructed. “I’m telling you the resolution is too low for any of the programs to pick up --”

  “I think… I think Lucky 37 just said…” Ruben hesitated, “Rewind it again,” Ruben ordered wanting to make sure it is what Lucky said and not what Ruben wanted him to say. “I think Lucky just said, ‘Sucker.’”

  * * *

  Nicole’s eyes flashed to Kent. He did not like being dissed by anyone let along a serial killer he couldn’t catch.

  “Sucker?” Kent repeated. “I don’t get it.”

  That was a rarity. Usually after an unusual turn in a case like this, his face would cloud over and would rush out of the room with everyone chasing after him, physically and intellectually.

  “Seriously,” Kent said. “Does anyone have any idea why Lucky would call me sucker?” The profiler turned to Ruben, “Come on, you’ve got to have an opinion on this.”

  Ruben’s face scrunched up as if he was trying to decide if Kent was setting him up. Not that Nicole could blame her partner. Kent was known for his baiting as much as his profiling.

  “I mean it,” Kent said. “I can’t for the life of me understand why he’d call me that.”

  Ruben hesitated again, glancing around the room. “Isn’t it obvious?”

  “Not to me,” Kent replied.

  “Doesn’t it mean…” Ruben paused again. “That you are a sucker for believing that Lucky 37 is helping you?”

  Oh, no her partner didn’t, Nicole thought.

  Nicole got ready to intervene. To physically step between the two of them, but Kent, shocking the entire room just sighed.

  “No, it’s not that,” Kent said sounding sadder than she’d heard him in a long while. “I almost wish it were that. That would make sense.” Kent pointed to the video screen. “This… this doesn’t make any sense.”

  Nicole was slightly emboldened by Ruben’s brash statement. “Kent, we know that you feel convinced that Lucky is helping you, but don’t we have to, just for a second, especially in the face of this tape, have to consider that Lucky isn’t?”

  She expected a lot of things from Kent, but sitting down and stealing a sip of Jimmi’s Mr. Pibb was not one of them.

  The profiler’s tone was surprisingly even and calm. No recrimination or defensiveness. Just totally level. “So let me get your theory straight. You are suggesting that Lucky is playing the long con. Tricking me into believing he is helping me by actually helping me catch serial killers, but instead is ultimately going to turn on me and all he has to say is ‘Sucker’? And if your theory were true, why would he tip his hand like that? Your theory makes no sense.” Kent said with a shake of his head. “No, we’re missing something. Something huge.”

  Nicole’s eyes flickered over to Ruben. “Yes, that he is conning you.”

  Kent rose, looking like his usual arrogant self. “Okay, let’s say you are all right. That Lucky accidentally helped me solve two other serial killer cases. And now he is what? Teaming up with Buzz Kill?”

  “It wouldn’t be unprecedented,” Ruben countered, only riling Kent up more. The profiler was back on a roll. Nicole was glad to see it. Calm, cautious Kent seldom got the job done. Jerk, arrogant, rude Kent usually did.

  “So suddenly after decades of killing unchecked, Buzz Kill wants to hitch his wagon to a killer that doesn’t rape or strangle? In this theory of yours what’s the up side for Lucky?”

  “To mess with you?” Nicole offered.

  * * *

  It was like a blind man trying to describe to a deaf man the colors of a painting. Kent tried to reign in his impatience. It wasn’t their fault. Not even Ruben’s. They just didn’t get it. They just didn’t have a gut like Kent’s.

  After tracking down hundreds of serial killers, Kent got a feel for each. He could predict their movements. He could leap ahead of the killers and catch them in the act.

  Lucky 37 in many ways bucked the trend. His behavior had deviated significantly since Kent had spotted him in that biker bar. But even that deviation had a logical progression to it. Double crossing Kent just didn’t fit into Lucky’s moral code.

  That was the part that the others didn’t seem to understand. How a serial killer could be a vicious rapist/murderer yet still have a very rigid moral standard. Lucky and Kent had formed an unspoken pact. Lucky didn’t like other people killing in his territory and was helping Kent catch them. And Kent caught them. Pact sealed.

  Unless something else had shifted significantly, Lucky would abide by that pact. And he certainly wouldn’t call Kent a sucker for trusting his intel. That would reflect nearly as badly on Lucky as it did on Kent.

  “Can you just trust me?” Kent asked his fiancée.

  Her lips pursed as if she were going to speak, then she lowered her head. “You’ve earned that much I suppose.”

  “Thank you,” Kent breathed out. “Lucky was referring to something else, which I believe is the key to the case.”

  “But what?”

  Kent shrugged. “While Lucky isn’t conning me, it’s still a game to him. He isn’t just going to tell me. This is the fun to him. Giving me just enough information to frustrate me.”

  A loud ding sounded and everyone swung around to the screen.

  “Holy mother of…” Jimmi said as he typed rapidly bringing up a map of Great Lakes in the process. “Kent you were right to expand the search, a cable truck was stolen a month ago.”

  “And looky at this,” Joshua said as he brought up a rival screen, clearly trying to keep up with Jimmi. “There is a Marion Roslow, cable company employee who disappeared the same time as the truck.”

  Joshua answered in a sing-song voice, “Oh after he was brought in for questioning then released for a double homicide, which get this, was done by a machete.”

  “Machete?” Kent said as he sat back down. Now that was interesting. He glanced over the crime scene photos. They were pretty gory that Jimmi brought up. Lots of blood. And the perp didn’t just cut his victims, he sliced and diced them.

  “Is it that far a step up from machete to chainsaw?” Nicole asked.

  “It would be a consistent evolution,” Kent said as he chewed on this new information. Marion, Marion, Marion. What had you gotten yourself into?

  “You said arrested, but not convicted?” Kent asked for clarification.

  Joshua shook his perfectly coiffed head. “They had to cut him loose, not enough evidence to take to trial and they didn’t want to invoke double jeopardy.”

  Kent could imagine. If you ran the risk of a trial and lost, that was it. Two macheted girls would never get justice. Kent’s eyes scanned the screen, taking in all the information. And there was a lot. The victims were Marion’s girlfriend and her best friend. Witnesses stated that Marion and his girlfriend were fighting and that she wanted to break things off, but Marion didn’t want to. Pretty classic crime of passion. ‘If I can’t have you then no on
e can.’ However the machete made for a rather gruesome outcome.

  The file stated that Marion had no alibi per se. He said he was at a movie and had the ticket stub, but come on, who couldn’t slip out of theater, then slip back in at the end? That was about as soft of an alibi as they came.

  The detective’s in Chicago’s big problem was that the murder weapon was never recovered and just because Marion’s DNA was all over the crime scene could be explained by Marion nearly cohabitating with the victim. He could only imagine the detective’s frustration at having to cut Marion loose.

  Just another murderer to walk away. Or perhaps run away to their fair city. Big mistake on Marion’s part.

  * * *

  Since Kent wasn’t talking much, Nicole stepped in to fill in the breach. “Alright, let’s get a warrant for Marion’s phone records, bank statements, anything about him really.”

  “Plus, let’s see if he hasn’t inserted himself someway into the case,” Kent added.

  Nicole turned to her fiancée. “Because of the showy dump scenes?”

  Kent nodded. She should have thought of that. “Now that we have a face, let’s do some facial recognition on all the crime scenes, see if he showed up to any or all of them to check on his handy work.”

  “Absolutely,” Jimmi said, “But I can tell you he was already there.”

  Nicole frowned. “Don’t tell me you hacked into his phone without a warrant. I want any charges we throw on him to stick.”

  Jimmi shook his head. “No way. I’ve learned my lesson, thank you very much.”

  “Then what is it?” Ruben asked, moving from the back of the room to join the group. She’d nearly forgotten he was there. Which was kind of a good thing. It meant he wasn’t busy goading Kent.

  “I just scanned Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest for his avatar, MRDeath, and found a bunch of pictures of the Buzz Kill crime scenes posted along with some really inappropriate comments.”

  Nicole scanned the screen that Jimmi brought up. The tech was right. Marion was a piece of work. Commenting on the butchering techniques and glorifying the violence.

  “Would he be stupid enough to post this if he were the killer?” Ruben asked.

  Kent frowned. “I don’t know if stupid is the right word. Perhaps compulsed.”

  Nicole took a step back from the screens. It was a little too easy to get tunnel vision when you were so immersed in a case. When in a bubble like this, it was easy to get too comfortable with the theory and not poke holes in it. And it felt like this one needed some holes poked, ASAP.

  “Let’s back this up,” Nicole suggested. It was a little heady to go from absolutely no suspects to a prime suspect dumped in their lap.

  “Yes, let’s,” Kent concurred, pushing back in his chair.

  Nicole felt on the spot. Everyone staring at her, like she held the answers. Well, didn’t she? Or at least as few as any of them.

  “Okay, so let’s walk this theory through…” Nicole said then sputtered out.

  Ruben nodded for her to continue. He looked just a little glad it wasn’t him in the hot seat right now.

  She took a deep breath. Kent was always saying that while she stepped up to the plate, she seldom took a swing, let alone a big one. Well, here went nothing.

  “We are theorizing that Marion killed his girlfriend and best friend with a machete…” Nicole looked to Jimmi. “Is there evidence of any other violent crimes? Anything to lead up to the machete incident?”

  Jimmi’s fingers flew over the keyboard. “A few bar fights, but nothing major.”

  Nicole turned to Kent. “So on the basis of that, do you think Marion could have jumped right into murder by machete?”

  Surprisingly Kent took a few moments to think before answering. He seldom pondered. They really must be in trouble if Kent was pondering. What seemed straight forward, Marion starting with a machete, stealing a cable van, moving to their city and starting to murder with a chainsaw became less and less of a sure thing as silence hung in the air. Kent was uncomfortable with the new information which made Nicole uncomfortable over all. She really wanted to have a prime suspect.

  Kent went to open his mouth, at that exact moment, the door swung open and Bridget and her film crew blew in.

  “There you are!” Bridget exclaimed, turning around to face the camera as she walked backward into the room. “And here we are at the heart of the investigation. The team assembled to review the evidence before hitting the streets again in search of perhaps the most vicious serial killer in the United States.”

  Wow, Bridget really could pour it on thick if she wanted to. Nicole noticed that Ruben straightened in his seat while Kent leaned even further back in his chair, then swung his feet onto a desk. Nicole wanted to reach out and swipe those feet off the desk, but that probably wouldn’t look any better on camera.

  “And what are we doing now?” Bridget asked.

  “Solving crimes without you,” Kent answered.

  Bridget’s heavily eye lined lids narrowed. You could tell that she equally hated Kent and needed the profiler. Kind of like the rest of the world.

  “Want to catch us up?” Bridget asked Kent who promptly ignored her.

  “Nicole, why don’t you go on?” Ruben suggested.

  “I’d just asked Kent whether or not, without any kind of ramp up Marion could go from bar fights to murder by machete.”

  “Murder by machete?” Bridget exclaimed. “When did this happen?”

  Ruben was the one to answer. “About two months ago in Chicago.” Being the dutiful detective he brought Bridget up to speed. He truly was the opposite of Kent in every way. Ruben finished up, “Then the prime suspect left the jurisdiction along with a cable van. A cable van that now appears to have been used to surveil Lacey before the attack.”

  “Gotcha,” Bridget said, nodding vigorously. “So we’re looking at Marion as our prime suspect?”

  Nicole shook her head. “No, we’re going over the theory of the crime, trying to even see if this set of circumstances warrants our attention.”

  Bridget swung around, aiming the mic at Kent. “Well, does it?”

  Kent shrugged as he was apt to do in these situations. “Normally I would say that with the level of overkill in the machete murders, that no, bar fights and a few petty drug charges would not prepare Marion for that kind of violent escalation.”

  “But?” Bridget asked, leaning in making her long legs appear even longer on camera. Nicole was going to have to remember that trick.

  “But it was a crime of passion,” Kent explained. “My guess is the girlfriend tried to break up with him, he got pissed, the friend tried to intervene and voilà, the machete murders.”

  “So he is your prime suspect,” Bridget insisted, her piercing blue eyes flashing in the bright camera lights.

  “No,” Kent said. “He is a person of interest who we are going to pull in for questioning.”

  Bridget turned back to the camera, flashing that TV presenter smile. “There you have it. A crime on the verge of being solved.”

  How Nicole wished that were really true.

  * * *

  This crime was on the verge of nothing, Ruben thought but didn’t mention to Bridget. He’d had enough bad moments on film, he didn’t wish to add another.

  The room broke up with Kent and Nicole heading out the door and the techs turning back to their work. He noticed that Bridget was hot on the profiler’s tail, leaving Ruben to sit there with the techs once again.

  Ruben took it that it would be up to him to track down Marion and haul him in. Seldom did Kent do any kind of actual police work.

  “Do you have an address for him?” Ruben asked.

  “Oh, you’re still here,” Jimmi stated.

  “Yes,” Ruben answered not even bothering to be put out by his near invisibility. There was a crime to solve. “And the answer to my question?”

  “Texted to you already,” Joshua answered.

  Ruben looked to his p
hone. Sure enough an address on the east side popped up. “You’ll let me know once those warrants come through and you get his records.”

  “Sure,” Jimmi said without turning around.

  Ruben was certain that the tech meant “sure, I’ll let Kent know right away.”

  There was no point in lingering here so Ruben headed out to his car.

  It was quite a ways from the tech basement lair to the parking lot. Guess he wasn’t going to have to jump on the treadmill tonight. His steps echoed off the cement floor as he made his way across the complex in the underground tunnels. Just one more reason he hated coming down here.

  The garage was dank and depressing. He feared it mirrored his own mood. Normally he would have liked Marion for the murders, but with Kent being on the fence he began to question his own judgment. And he hated it when he couldn’t trust his decade’s honed instincts.

  Soon though he was out and into the fresh air. The day was already getting warm. He loosened his tie just a little as he got into his car. Nicole should, of course, be with him, but when was the last time that happened? Oh, just before Kent caught, re killed, the Plain Jane serial killer.

  Like two years ago now. How much things had changed in that time. Now Nicole was engaged to Kent and Ruben was promised to Paggie.

  His life was good so why did he still look at that empty seat with rancor?

  The trip across town wasn’t bad. He’d gotten onto the freeway just after morning rush hour and before the afternoon crush. He pulled up to Marion’s apartment building wondering if this was truly the abode of a vicious serial killer. It looked like an average apartment complex. Boring even. There were probably a thousand like it in the city.

  There was no security at the front door. No buzzer. No door man. Just a glass door that said Welcome to the Shady Brook apartment complex. Ruben noted that there was no shade, nor any brook.

  He made his way up the stairs to the second floor to apartment 214. He looked to the number. It didn’t seem to have any meaning to it. He had perhaps expected 666?

  Ruben knocked and an immediate “Be right there,” came from the other side of the door. Is that how serial killers answered their door? The sound of running steps came from the other side.