Last Words

by Mariah Stewart

  “So he’s probably single, right?” Sue asked.

  “Not necessarily, no. He may be married, in a long-term relationship, or divorced. The women he’s been involved in are probably very complacent, nonaggressive, which permits him to have his way, to feel superior.”

  “And if she protests?” someone asked. “Or becomes more assertive?”

  “Then he’ll react to that. Sever the relationship, have an affair, something that restores the balance to his world, where he is king and women are there to please him.”

  “Not in my house.” The mayor’s comment elicited light laughter.

  Annie smiled, then continued. “Now, let’s take a closer look at our man. He’s very organized. He has his victim picked out in advance, he’s probably stalked her and studied her so he knows where, when, and how to get to her. He takes with him what he needs to get the job done, which in his case is some rope-we know he keeps his victims restrained when he’s not with them…”

  She glanced around the room. Every eye was on her.

  “How do we know? Even without the medical examiner’s description of the marks on the wrists and ankles of the two victims she’s examined, it would stand to reason. In Colleen Preston’s case, for example, she’d been missing for several weeks, but the body, when found, hadn’t started to decompose, so we know she hadn’t been dead long enough for the tissue to begin to break down. I believe your ME determined she’d been dead for less than twenty-four hours. The marks on her wrists were both old and fresh, meaning she’d been in those restraints for long enough for the earliest ones to heal over. So if he’s had her for weeks, he’s had to leave her alone for hours at a time, and he’s not going to let her roam freely. He would have known ahead of time exactly what he was going to do. Everything would have been planned very carefully, as dictated by his fantasy. And you all know that most of these killings have their genesis in fantasy, right?”

  All of the law-enforcement officers nodded their heads.

  “So you know, then, that the primary source of pleasure for the killer is his ability to control his victim.”

  “Doesn’t he enjoy the sex?” the mayor asked.

  “Yes, he does, because the sexual attack is his best way to control,” Annie said, “because a large part of the control is in degrading his victim. Making her feel totally powerless, totally under his control, totally humiliated. That’s what he gets off on. He has to make his victims feel utterly helpless. That is his primary motivation.”

  “Why?” Susan asked.

  “Because at some point in his early development, someone important to him made him feel powerless, and that feeling of powerlessness, of helplessness, made him angry and frustrated. So for kids who never learned to channel those feelings into something constructive-sports, for example, or academics-they very often try to comfort themselves by making others hurt, too.”

  “So we’re back to Mom again,” the mayor said.

  “I’m afraid so,” Annie acknowledged.

  “I never really understood that,” Lisa admitted. “I mean, I’ve read it all, I even took courses in college, but I don’t understand how hurting someone else can make you feel better.”

  “That’s because you are emotionally healthy,” Annie told her. “Believe me, I’ve given a talk like this to a group of convicted multiple murderers and to a man, they all sat there nodding their heads, agreeing with every word I said. They immediately understood how being able to dominate another human being-having the power of life and death over someone else-can make a man feel superior. How that power overcomes their real feelings of inadequacy. Suddenly, they are invincible.”

  “And it’s the mother’s fault, these feelings of inadequacy.” Christina Pratt crossed her arms over her chest defensively.

  “Who has the most control over the developing child? Not always, but most frequently, the mother,” Annie replied.

  “So if Mom controls the child, locks them in the closet and abuses them or something like that-”

  “Yes, Mayor, those things happen. Unfortunately, they do. I’ve heard heartbreaking stories of abuse from these men. No mercy had been shown to them, therefore no mercy will be shown to their victims.

  “But it doesn’t have to be anything as overt or dramatic as extreme physical or mental abuse. Very often the abuse is much more subtle. Divorce of the parents at a young age, parents who are unable to show affection or who are demanding, perfectionists, or parents who separate themselves from the child-I’ve seen all of these conditions in the backgrounds of offenders I’ve studied. Alienation from one or both parents has been seen to be a factor in some cases.”

  “But it isn’t always the parents…” Hal said.

  “Of course not. There can be other adults-uncles, cousins, grandparents, even older siblings, or neighbors, friends of the family. Sometimes the abuse is at the hands of other children. Bullying is abusive. Maybe the child is overweight or has a physical disability, something that makes him different. If the abuse is harsh enough, the child may escape through revenge fantasies. He might learn very early just how powerful fantasies can be.”

  “Then how come every kid who gets teased or bullied in the school yard doesn’t end up a serial killer?” Lisa asked. “I was an overweight kid and was teased mercilessly, but I’ve never wanted to kill anyone because of it.”

  “Really? Are you sure?” Annie turned to face Lisa from across the room. “Think back. You never wanted to hurt any of the kids who teased you?”

  Lisa looked thoughtful for a long moment, then smiled. “Well, maybe a little…but I never thought about killing anyone.”

  “Everyone gets pissed off at someone or other at some time in their life. You think of a thousand ways to retaliate. We all do it. The difference between those of us who grew up to be serial killers and those who did not is that most of us learned other ways to deal with our anger and frustrations. Most of us had a safety net in place, or learned how to construct one for ourselves, and we managed our feelings and moved on. But some kids never get past it; they never learn to move on. And some of those kids fantasize about what they would do to get even, and get fixated on revenge. For those kids, acting out those fantasies becomes their way of alleviating pain. They do unto others what has been done unto them.”

  The room was very quite for a moment, then Hal said, “So the abuse can be mental as well as physical.”

  “Absolutely. One of the major forms of rejection cited by serial killers who have been interviewed wasn’t sexual abuse, it was an unstable home.”

  “Back to Mama again,” the mayor said dryly.

  “Many times parents have no idea that their actions are having a negative effect on their children. I’ve seen cases where the mother was very dominant and the father was outwardly very complacent, but inwardly, he was very resentful of the control the wife exercised over him. In cases like that, Dad may play the buddy role with the son. ‘Hey, it’s you and me, son.’ And the son grows up to resent his mother’s control the same way his dad did, resents the disdain with which his mother treats his father, because the son identifies more with the father. Mom rejects Dad, Mom is rejecting the son. Do the parents view this situation as abusive? Of course not. But often in situations like this, the boy will fantasize about showing his mother that he’s every bit as powerful as she is.”

  “There are a lot of powerful women in the workplace,” the mayor reminded her. “Just look around the table…Lisa, Sue…hell, even me. Are we running the risk of turning our sons into serial killers?”

  “Look, it’s always a matter of choice, and it always comes back to fantasy.” Annie told her. “It’s one thing to have those fantasies-many children do. But it’s something else entirely to act them out. The serial offenders we’ve studied all came from backgrounds where they felt powerless to control their situation-whatever that situation might have been-and never developed the coping skills necessary to overcome it. So it follows that there’s a really good chance tha
t our current offender came from a similar background. He’s abducting these girls so that he can control them, and by doing so, he’s become powerful, superior. That’s the bottom line on this guy.”

  “So we’re looking for someone local who came from a background where he was neglected or rejected by his parents or teased by his friends,” Sue Martin said.

  “That could be anyone.” Christina Pratt frowned. “Christ almighty, my own son went through a period where he was pissed off all the time at everyone because he had a minor speech defect and sometimes at school the kids made fun of him. Does that mean he could be the killer?”

  “What it means is that when you identify the killer, you will find there was some sort of difficulty in his background.”

  “I thought a profiler was supposed to be able to tell us who to look for.” The mayor closed her notebook with obvious annoyance. “So far, you’ve just talked about generalities. Oh, he could be this, he could be that. I haven’t heard anything yet that could help us figure out who he is.”

  “Profiling isn’t an exact science, it’s merely a tool, Mayor Pratt. I can study the victim and the crime scene-and in these cases, we don’t even have crime scenes, we don’t know where these women were abducted and we don’t know where they were kept or killed. I can tell you what type of personality is most likely to commit this type of murder. But I cannot conjure a name out of the air.” Annie did her best to hide her growing impatience with the mayor. If she’d understood Mia correctly, Christina Pratt had been the one who’d wanted a profiler assigned to the case. Why was she being so argumentative now that she had what she’d wanted? “That’s like asking me to pull a rabbit out of my hat.

  “Other things you might want to consider,” Annie continued, “is that this man has been able to fly under the radar for a long time. He’s very practiced at keeping that anger and need to control in check. I think he’s probably married, or has been. He may be a father, and if so, outwardly he might dote on his children, though inwardly he might be indifferent to them as individuals. He sees them as his creations, and therefore, in his eyes they are perfect. He’s socially capable, sexually active, and may well live with a partner from whom he’s successfully hidden his inner self. He’s also good at controlling his own emotions-if you listen to the tape he made while he was preparing to kill Colleen Preston, you’ll hear no evidence of excitement in his voice. He’s in total command, and he’s very cool about it. There’s a hint of superiority in his tone. He’s also going to be very interested in how the media covers his story, which is why so often you hear about the killer showing up at a funeral or a press conference or a community meeting.” She paused and looked across the room at Beck. “I’m assuming that’s one of the reasons behind the meeting you’re calling?”

  “That’s one reason, of course.” Beck nodded. “But both the mayor and council and I think the residents have the right to know what’s going on. They need to know how to protect themselves.”

  “One way of doing that is by finding the common thread amongst the victims,” Annie told him. “What did they have in common?”

  “Well, we know they were all in their early twenties and lived within about six miles of each other,” Lisa said. “They were all reportedly fun-loving, pretty, girls-”

  “There are probably hundreds of pretty girls who like to have a good time in the area. What was it about these girls that attracted the killer?” Annie leaned on the end of the table.

  “They all liked the beach.”

  “Why do you say that, Lisa?” Beck asked.

  “I was going to get into it when we talked about Mindy Kenneher. Whose background, incidently, is very similar to Colleen Preston’s in terms of her family life, education, job, that sort of thing.”

  “Get back to the beach.” Beck gestured with his right hand for her to get on with it.

  “Well, you know how Colleen was planning on a weekend at the beach with a friend?”

  “Are you telling me Mindy was going in on a condo in Ocean City?”

  “ Rehoboth Beach,” Lisa told him. “She and two of her friends.”

  “Tell me you have the name of the person who owned the beach house.” Beck stared at her.

  “No. Mindy was handling the arrangements. The other girls don’t even know what street the house is on.”

  “And you were going to tell me this when?”

  “Actually, I was trying to right before the meeting but you were on the phone. I only just talked to the girlfriends this morning. Unfortunately, no one seems to know who the property owner is.” Lisa paused, then added, “Including her parents. I already asked. And I called the Prestons. They don’t know who Colleen was renting from.”

  “We need those cell phone records,” Beck told her. “If you don’t have them in your hand by ten tomorrow morning, call the companies again. There’s a good chance the victims may have been in contact with the so-called property owners by phone.”

  “So we need to find out who owned the place in Dewey and the place in Rehoboth from those two older cases Agent Shields mentioned earlier.”

  “I’ll do the follow-up.” Lisa nodded. “And I’ll contact Ballard and Cameron PDs and see if anything showed up on the victims’ computers.”

  “When shall we have this town-hall meeting?” the mayor asked.

  “The sooner the better,” Beck told her. “I’d like to do it tomorrow night, if we can get the word out.”

  “I’ll call the local radio stations as soon as I get back to my office.” Christina Pratt stood to her full five feet ten inches. “I’ll also have a flyer made up immediately and ask the local shops and restaurants to hand it out to their customers. You think maybe seven, seven thirty, Beck?”

  “Seven thirty is good,” he agreed.

  “Fine.” She stepped away from the table and pushed in her chair. “I trust I’ll see you all then.”

  “That should do it,” Beck told the others as the mayor left the room, “unless someone has a question.”

  “I have a question.” Sue directed her question to the two FBI agents at the opposite end of the table. “If you’re right and the killer is from St. Dennis and he’s at the meeting, how will we know who he is? I mean, we know everyone in town. How are we supposed to know who we’re supposed to be watching, or what we’re watching for?”

  “Well, that’s a good question,” Beck replied. “I guess the best we can do is keep our eyes open and hope that he somehow does or says something that makes him stand out.”

  “What are the chances of that?” Hal asked.

  Beck shrugged.

  “Pretty much what I thought.” Hal nodded. “Slim to none…”

  Mia shrunk back from the bright sunlight as she stepped outside the municipal building.

  “Should have brought my shades.” She raised her hand to shield her eyes.

  “You don’t have to walk me to the car,” Annie told her. “Go on back inside.”

  “It’s okay.” Mia joined Annie on the sidewalk. “I want to. It’s the least I can do, after you pulled yourself off another case to look at this one, especially on a weekend. I owe you big time, and I’m sure Beck appreciated it.”

  “And you’ll pay up, one of these days. But what’s with Pratt?” Annie frowned. “I sensed hostility there.”

  “I don’t know. I’m guessing she’s a mama who resents her kids’ problems being foisted back onto her.” Mia shrugged. “And she probably watches too much TV. Thinks the profiler should be able to show up and pull a list of names out of her butt.”

  “Don’t I wish I could,” Annie said. “Damn, but that would make all our jobs easier, wouldn’t it?”

  “Yeah, no more long, drawn-out, boring investigations. Just, ‘Hey, it’s either Tom, Dick, or Harry. Let’s get DNA and see which of them did it.’ Sorry she seemed to be picking at you.”

  “Not the first time, won’t be the last.” The two women reached Annie’s car. She unlocked it and dropped her briefcase ont
o the backseat and her handbag onto the front passenger seat. “Thanks for the hospitality last night. It’s been a long time since we’ve been able to visit with one another. It was good to have some time to chat.”

  “It was. Let’s not wait so long between visits.” Mia gave Annie a hug.

  Annie got into her car and slammed the door, then rolled down the window. “Mia, if there’s something bothering you-”

  “There isn’t.”

  “…or if you just want to talk about anything, you know I’m always here for you, right?”

  “Thank you. I appreciate that.” Mia pushed back the lump that was beginning to form in her throat.

  “Just don’t ever hesitate, okay?”

  “Okay. Thanks, Annie, but I’m fine. Just a little tired.”

  “Then take some time off. When was your last vacation, anyway?”

  Mia shrugged.

  “That’s how agents burn out, Mia. I’ve seen it happen too many times. Don’t let it happen to you. You love your job too much, honey.”

  “I know. I’m fine, really.” Mia backed up so that Annie could turn the car around.

  Mia waved good-bye, then stood in the parking lot and watched Annie leave. When the car had disappeared, she stuck her hands in the pockets of her light jacket and walked back into the building, her head down. She could talk to Annie if she had to, she knew that. But what could she say? Forgive me for not knowing that my brother was going to kill your fiancé? The fact that Dylan hadn’t been the intended target really didn’t matter. Brendan had set out to murder his own flesh and blood. How do you get past that?

  And why, she asked herself for the thousandth time, why hadn’t she seen it coming?

  15

  Mia spent Monday morning in the conference room making calls. So far, she’d requested that her boss send agents from Columbus and Boston to interview the victims of the rape-abductions from 2000 and 2001, faxed copies of the reports she had to the office, and discussed the cases with the agents who’d been assigned. The first time she glanced at her watch, it was almost one in the afternoon and Beck was standing in the doorway, “Want to run up to Charles Street and grab some lunch?”