Cut to the Bone

by Joan Boswell

  “Dogs. Go and lie down.”

  Amazingly, they did. Rhona couldn’t imagine a cat doing that or even acknowledging that it had been given an order.

  “I need to bring you up to speed on what’s been happening and then you’ll know if you can help.”

  * * *

  Hollis felt her eyebrows lift and her eyes open wider. Since when had Rhona requested her help? Always a first time. She folded her feet under her on the couch and settled back.

  “First, Barney Cartwright escaped before we could charge him with Veronica’s murder.”

  Hollis swung her feet to the floor and straightened up. “I saw him less than an hour ago in the food court in the Eaton Centre. He gave me the evil eye, and the next time I looked he was gone.”

  Rhona flipped open her phone and relayed the information with a caution to be careful, since they had to assume he was armed and dangerous.”

  “That was a bonus I wasn’t expecting. What were you doing in the food court?” Rhona grimaced. “Stupid question. What does anyone do in a food court?”

  “I met my foster daughter’s father. I wanted to talk about her and about him, but he didn’t give me much satisfaction. He’s a mysterious man who appears and disappears, and I wanted to know more about him. He wasn’t into sharing.”

  Rhona showed no interest in Jay’s father. “I talked to Agnes Johnson. Tim O’Toole attacked her. I don’t know if he intended to kill her or warn her off, but he did it because he thought she knew more than she did and he wanted to shut her up. Women of that generation are tough and he didn’t succeed.”

  “What did he think she knew?”

  “That he murdered Sabrina Trepanier.”

  “What!” Hollis leaned forward. “You’re kidding. He’s such a nothing kind of guy.”

  “We have evidence he’s killed before and may kill again. That’s where you come in.”

  “Me. I hardly knew him.”

  Rhona shook her head. “Wrong track. We think he’s killed women, prostitutes, who have refused and rejected him. Fatima told us that Sabrina had been quite nasty when he propositioned her. I know that you did your research on Mary and what she was up to. Did you talk to her fellow workers or any of the women on the street about who might have frightened or threatened them?”

  “Before I tell you, I want to know if the police knew what she was doing before I told you?”

  “No.”

  “It seems like such a thankless, never-ending challenge. I can’t imagine how she continued year after year with so many failures.”

  “Half full, half empty. She must have seen it as half full. Never mind what she was doing. Did you talk to anyone who might give us some clues about Tim O’Toole.”

  Hollis reviewed the conversations that she’d had. “I think so. A young Aboriginal prostitute I talked to one morning while she was having breakfast gave me some information. Initially, hostile didn’t begin to describe her attitude. She ranted at me but calmed down and while we were talking, she did say that she chose who she wanted to go with. I must have looked as if I doubted her, since she gave me chapter and verse about the most recent man she’d refused. Thinking about her description, which wasn’t much, it could have been Tim.”

  “Would you recognize her again?”

  Hollis nodded.

  Rhona checked her watch. “We should go see. She’s probably home at this time of day but maybe we can find out where she lives.”

  Hollis fidgeted and didn’t respond.

  “You don’t seem enthusiastic?”

  “I’m not. I’ll volunteer to go, but I don’t think we should go together.”

  Rhona smiled. “Tactful, aren’t you? Okay, you go. Don’t do anything rash. If you see Tim O’Toole, report to us immediately but do not, I repeat, do not approach him.”

  Before she set out on her mission, Hollis made sure the dogs were okay and that there were no priority calls from tenants. She slipped on her denim jacket, shouldered her bag, and left checking that no one who seemed threatening hovered near the building. She waited until three high school girls giggled their way toward Yonge Street before she left the portico, fell in behind them, and turned into the subway entrance. On the platform she followed her routine and stood with her back against the wall, well away from everyone. On Jarvis Street she sauntered along, keeping an eye out for her quarry.

  Inside the Golden Goose restaurant, she greeted Bridget, remembering that both Bridget and her coworker had asked her to let them know if she heard from Mary. She felt a pang of guilt. Why hadn’t she remembered to do that? Sometimes you got so involved in what you wanted that you forgot your common decency responsibilities to others.

  “Did you find Mary?” Bridget asked, positioning herself so that her ever-present boss couldn’t see her talking.

  “I did. I apologize for not telling you that she’s okay. Now I need the name and where I can find a pretty Aboriginal girl I spoke to when I was here. You’d left with your husband, but I thought you might know her.”

  “More than one come in here. Can you describe her?”

  “Long, dark hair with neon red streaks, small scar on her forehead over her eyebrow. I can’t remember which one, but I noticed what good skin she had other than the scar. She was hostile.”

  “That makes it easier. Her first name’s Darlene — don’t know her last name.”

  Bridget bent forward and wiped the table.

  Hollis didn’t have much hope that Bridget could answer her next question, but it was worth a try. “Where can I find her?”

  “I’ll get you coffee,” Bridget said.

  “No thanks. It’s urgent that I find her.”

  “Urgent. That doesn’t sound good. She was in earlier and she’s sick. Something viral, probably. She was wheezing and coughing. One of the other girls told her to go home to bed and she’d pick up some medication and bring it to her place.” The coffee in the pot in Bridget’s hand sloshed from side to side. “I don’t know where she lives, but I know where her friend lives, because she was complaining about it the other day. It’s infested with bedbugs and she was looking for a new place and wondering how to make sure she didn’t take the bugs with her. It’s a building on Shuter. I’ll write down her name and the address.” She pulled out her order pad and scribbled the information.

  Hollis thanked her and walked over to Shuter Street, where she found the building, buzzed the apartment, and explained why she was there.

  Standing inside the door, she noticed how tidy the place was and acknowledged that when she’d been told about the bedbugs, she’d expected a dump. She hoped she wouldn’t be invited in and told herself that when she got home she should strip off her clothes and stuff them into a garbage bag ready for the laundry.

  “Tell me again who you are and exactly why you want to find Darlene?” the young woman with bleached, tightly curled hair asked. Without makeup, she appeared alarmingly young, too thin, and exhausted. Hollis wondered if she was supporting an addiction. The girl didn’t invite Hollis to sit down, so Hollis didn’t have to invent a reason for remaining at the door.

  “She may be in danger. A call girl was murdered in the apartment building where I work. The police officer in charge of the case knew I’d talked to women in the Golden Goose when I searched for Mary Montour. Darlene told me something the detective thought might make her a target and asked me to find her, because she may be in danger.”

  The girl held up a hand as if to stop the torrent of words. “Whoa. Start at the beginning — what you’re saying doesn’t make sense. Who’s Mary Montour?”

  “Mary, the Aboriginal waitress at the Golden Goose. She disappeared a few days ago and left her eleven-year-old niece behind. I’m looking after the child and I started tracking Mary to see where she might be. I talked to Bridget, Sandy, and Darlene. Mary is okay. But this doesn’t have anything to do with Mary. The murdered woman had turned down a possible client and we think he killed her because of that. Darlene told me she
didn’t go with men she didn’t want to go with and gave me a vague description of a man she’d refused. I think it might have been the man the police think killed the woman in my building, and I want to find Darlene and warn her.”

  “Why aren’t the cops doing this?”

  “Because the detective knew I’d been asking about Mary and had spoken to Darlene and believed I might have a better chance of finding her in time.”

  “In time. That’s scary. She lives near here. I’ll write down the address. There isn’t any security, so go up and knock on the door. Darlene may not answer, because I bought her a ton of heavy duty stuff for whatever she’s got.”

  Hollis grabbed the paper and headed for the stairs. She hoped she’d be in time.

  THIRTY-TWO

  Hollis found the seedy low-rise without difficulty. She pushed into the small lobby where the reek of a thousand cheap meals, unwashed diapers, and cat urine assailed her. She fumbled in her shoulder bag for a scarf to put over her nose but came up empty. The lobby was awash in discarded flyers and envelopes. The mailboxes, some of them pried open, told her C. Ross lived in 312. There was no buzzer, no inner door to protect the tenants from unwanted visitors, and no elevator. A glance upward in the unlit stairwell revealed empty sockets where light bulbs had once been. At night when she walked the dogs, she always pocketed a flashlight to enable her to pick up after them. She scrabbled in her bag before she remembered she’d left it at home hanging up with the leashes by the door. How she wished she had it now. In her purse her hand touched her cell phone and she hauled it out.

  It was turned off.

  How could she have been so careless? She allowed a minute or two for it to pick up messages. A text message from Rhona asked her to call.

  She tapped in the number and was instructed to leave a message.

  “I’ve found Darlene. I’ll call again when I’ve warned her.” She picked her way upwards.

  On the third floor a dirty window at the end of the corridor allowed her to see the numbers on the doors. Her target, 312, was at the end.

  She knocked but there was no answer, which was odd, as the girl who’d given the lead said Darlene had gone home to bed. A second flurry of banging also elicited no response. Maybe the girl was asleep or had gulped down so many pills that she’d passed out. Hollis tried the door and found it unlocked. To enter or not? Darlene might need help if she’d taken too much medication. Ill or not, she needed to be warned about Tim O’Toole.

  Hollis pushed the door open and braked as her eyes registered what her mind was unwilling to believe.

  Tim O’Toole stood facing her with one arm clutching Darlene and the second holding a knife to her throat. A thin line of blood trickled down her neck. Darlene’s ashen face told the tale, as did the smell of urine and fear.

  “My god,” Hollis said. Her stomach lurched and her mouth went dry.

  “Close the door and lock it. Don’t make a sudden move or I’ll slit her throat.”

  Hollis reached behind her, grabbed the metal knob, and clicked her fingers against it to make a sound she hoped would convince O’Toole that she’d locked it.

  At that moment Darlene coughed. A harsh hacking noise filled the room as she sagged back against Tim. “I’m sick,” she moaned.

  “Not for long,” Tim said and produced what must have been intended as a laugh but came out as a croak. “Nosy landlady. Couldn’t leave well enough alone. Had to meddle. Too bad. Your daughter and your dogs will miss you.”

  Why hadn’t she waited to actually talk to Rhona? What did this insane man plan to do? Surely he wouldn’t murder both of them in a downtown apartment building in the middle of the day. What was she thinking? What did the time of day have to do with it? Should she scream? In this neighbourhood screams were not uncommon and were probably ignored. A scream would enrage Tim O’Toole. No. She’d try to play it cool, try to talk him down, try to buy time hoping that Rhona would figure out where she was, although that wasn’t likely.

  She was on her own.

  “I’m going to enjoy this,” O’Toole said. “Usually I wait until my ladies are asleep. It’s the gurgle, the spurting blood that I enjoy, but now I can do it bit by bit. This could take a long time. It can take hours for a person to bleed out.”

  “The police know it’s you,” Hollis said and regretted the wimpy statement almost immediately.

  “Maybe so, but they have to catch me.” He frog-walked Darlene across the room to the kitchen table in front of an open window. He pushed her down on one of two chrome-and-red-plastic kitchen chairs oozing kapok stuffing. “Maybe decorations would be fun,” he said. “Tattoos? Now what would be appropriate for these two?”

  Decorations? Tattoos? He was mad. She shifted from one foot to the other and wondered if it would be worth it to bolt.

  “If you run, she’s dead,” O’Toole said in a level voice. He kept the knife at Darlene’s throat and pulled two pieces of yellow plastic rope from his jacket pocket. “You,” he nodded at Hollis, “come over here and tie Miss High and Mighty Too Good to Have Sex With Me to the chair. I know knots and I’ll tell you how.”

  Could she knock him over and get them out? What if she refused to move? He couldn’t grab her because he was holding Darlene. But Darlene wouldn’t be any help. Hollis mentally measured the distance.

  As if he’d read her thoughts, O’Toole said, “Move or I kill her.” His lips curled. “I’ll enjoy it.”

  “Please do what he says,” Darlene begged and coughed.

  “Bitch, put your hands behind you and behind the chair,” he ordered.

  Darlene lifted her shaking hands but seemed unable to make them move.

  O’Toole gave her a jab with the tip of the knife. “Hurry up.” The blood trickling down her neck flowed faster.

  Still holding the knife to her throat, once her hands were positioned, he moved to the side. “Bitch landlady, wind the rope around her hands and around the chair then tie a simple knot, left over right, right over left, and under.”

  Hollis gauged whether she could shove him aside but dismissed the thought. She couldn’t risk Darlene’s life. She obeyed.

  “Bitch, now it’s your turn. Pull that chair,” he pointed to a second chair, “over here and back it up against the first one.”

  Hollis’s cell phone rang. She looked at O’Toole.

  “A little excitement. Go ahead. Let’s see what kind of an actress you are. Say you’re busy and you’ll call them back,” O’Toole instructed.

  God, she hoped it was Rhona. And that she could think fast enough to find the right words to alert her. There wasn’t much time. Her knees felt like they might give way and her mouth was so dry she didn’t know if words would come out.

  It was Rhona. Tears blurred her vision. Maybe they had a chance. She listened and responded. “No. Not now. I left it at the Golden Goose restaurant.” Could she risk leaving it on, hoping Rhona would hear the conversation?

  “Turn it off,” O’Toole ordered.

  She clicked it off, praying Rhona had heard him and would get what she’d tried to communicate.

  O’Toole left Darlene for a moment and lurched toward Hollis, wielding the knife. “What did you leave at the restaurant?” he demanded.

  Think fast. Something plausible and non-threatening. “That was my daughter. I borrowed her iPod the other day and left it in a bag at the restaurant.” She tried a smile. “You know how kids are. They love their gadgets.”

  O’Toole stared at her. “Toss the phone on the table. No more calls. We have decorating to do.” He stepped back, moved the knife an inch or two away from Darlene’s neck, and ran his finger gently along the blade. “Nice and sharp. Good for a tattoo. Bitches, choose what you want me to make.”

  A sadistic, chilling laugh.

  Damn him. I’ll play his fucking game, Hollis thought. “Takes an artist to make a tattoo,” she said. “Takes more than an amateur’s couple of cuts.”

  He sneered. “How ’bout X’s and O’s. D
on’t need to be an artist for that, it’s pretty simple. Hold out your arm.”

  Hollis gritted her teeth and extended it.

  “You can play too. Won’t that be fun?”

  Hollis said nothing.

  O’Toole incised a line on her hand. Blood welled.

  “No. Your hand has too many veins, too bumpy. Your wrist would be better. I can always slit it if I get bored. Turn your arm over.”

  When Hollis did as she was told, blood dripped on the floor.

  Two parallel lines and two vertical.

  It hurt like hell.

  O’Toole smiled.

  Hollis shivered. It was technically a smile, because his lips curved upward, but it was a predator’s victorious acknowledgement that he had his victims and like a cat intended to amuse himself with them, watch their terror and pain until he’d satisfied himself.

  O’Toole stepped away from Hollis and pointed to her hand. “Not flowing fast enough to kill you. I think I’ll have a smoke and watch you two. You stand over there beside Darlene. I’ll run through the options of how to kill you, and I’ll let you choose which one you prefer. Maybe you’ll each choose a different one — that would be fun.”

  After Hollis moved and still holding the knife at Darlene’s throat, he slid a pack of cigarettes from his shirt pocket, pulled out a lighter, and lit up.

  Hollis hated cigarettes, but right now she welcomed anything that slowed him down and would give the police a chance to find them if Rhona had picked up and understood her message.

  He used his free hand to blow smoke in Darlene’s face as he leaned forward and again jabbed her neck. He chuckled as blood welled and dribbled down.

  Darlene coughed before she sobbed. “Please let us go. We won’t tell anyone.”

  Hollis recognized the futility of pleading. A sadist loved to watch his victims, and there was no doubt that they were in the clutches of a sadist. Their only hope was to distract him. She would call on every acting skill she possessed to feed his need to enjoy their pain the pain and terror she felt.