by Paris Morgan
Chapter 2
Leslie
The Zodiac Master had been one step ahead of us for a while, but it was beginning to feel like we’d had a few moments of victory when we’d learned something about him that he wasn’t expecting. His real name, Henry J. Stevens, had led us to some interesting discoveries. We hadn’t managed to find a picture of him because he’d burned down his childhood home before we could make it back.
His mother’s prediction had come true—her son had come back to kill her. Now that we knew where he’d grown up, we could track down a few leads that might help us identify him. Some DNA would have been wonderful, but he’d outsmarted us.
I still felt that we were missing something, but Ryan and I were going to take another trip out to the area and see what we could uncover.
Each step we made that we thought would bring us to the end of this journey, only turned out to be a small portion of the puzzle.
I’d become extremely paranoid after having a few serial killers show up right before we were going to make an arrest, or find the evidence to convict them. We had a leak in the department—or, rather, the FBI had one, and Ryan had agreed that we should keep things a little closer to the vest until we knew who we could trust.
We’d decided to include only those agents that we absolutely trusted. Adam Dalca, and now his brother Galen, along with our original ally, Agent Gavin Watson, from our first case with the FBI, were part of our small circle. They’d sent Kevin Johnson undercover to infiltrate the Urban Energy Corporation as an IT guy. He hadn’t come back with much, but we’d managed to connect the owner of the Dallas branch back to the foundation of the corporation and its evil affiliations. John Armstrong, or Reed, depending on which part of the company he was working with, was in the sights of our Zodiac Master. For some reason, he continued to target the company and its employees, with killer results.
Keeping up with who-knew-what information was difficult, but I had placed an inside man to keep an eye on Kevin. Not that I didn’t trust his information, but I wanted to give him a chance to find other stuff inside that the company wasn’t feeding our FBI informant.
If my hunch was correct, they knew exactly who Kevin was, and were letting him have access to things they thought wouldn’t hurt them. By having Mac on the inside, I knew what was actually important information, and what was just extras to keep us chasing our tails. No one knew about Mac, and I didn’t plan to tell anyone about him.
Every time I thought the Zodiac Master had run out of creative ways to kill people, he surprised me with a new method, keeping us on our toes. We’d had death by nunchucks, noose/suicides, bows and arrows, rapids and drownings, knives, with the added twist of killing twins. Then last month had really been outside of the box with chainsaws, until our killer had gone all Lizzie Borden and changed up to an axe. I guess, technically, they were both used to kill trees and could be interchangeable.
Who knew what this crazy man was going to pull out of his magic hat for the Leo killer, but I was sure it would be the last thing we’d expect to happen.
Then there was always my own brand of crazy, where the voice of our last killer’s spirit would pop in and out of my head on occasion. If that wasn’t enough to drive someone crazy, I don’t know what was. Adam had been a great help, teaching me to close off a room in my mind and lock the door. So far, I’d been able to keep Mary Ann locked away without even a buzzing noise to bother me. It was a huge relief after weeks of having to listen to her dating advice and whining all the time.
***
Going to work these days had an entirely different meaning. Somedays we were actually investigating murders, but mostly we were analyzing data that would help us catch this Zodiac Master.
It wasn’t at all what I imagined when I’d first gone to the academy. I knew that police work wasn’t always interesting or fun, but there had been a sense of justice to it when catching a criminal after chasing them for several blocks.
Training hadn’t been bad, but it hadn’t prepared us—better yet, me—for dealing with death on a daily basis. On the one hand, I’d known somewhere deep down that we’d have to deal with more than just pictures, but it was the psychological element that was the worst.
I’d done a ride along as part of the initial training, and we’d pulled up to this house that seemed completely quiet. There had been a noise complaint, and I had to wait until it was clear before going in with the patrol officer.
When there wasn’t an answer, the officer had looked in the window and called for backup.
I stood next to the police vehicle as the officers busted in the door, then moments later came out holding a small child covered in blood.
“What happened?” I’d asked the officer when he’d returned to the vehicle.
“The dad shot the mom. It looks like the little girl crawled to get to her mom.” He grimaced. “At least we were called to investigate, or that little girl might not have survived.”
It was when I knew that no matter how bad a crime scene got, I wanted to make sure that no child would ever have to live through that alone.
I hadn’t understood the amount of violence or sheer terror that the victims I’d heard about had to deal with every day. It was one thing to understand it, but it was another thing completely to see that kind of thing happen all the time. Children were the worst victims, and police officers were just the cleanup crew who hoped to help them move on to better things.
All the memories of when I hadn’t gotten there in time, or the aftermath of families devastated, weren’t what was keeping me up at night these days. It was the fact that we hadn’t caught this serial killer yet. He was killing hundreds of people, and we had no real idea how to stop him.
My phone rang, interrupting my morbid thoughts. It was Chris, the new guy I’d been on a few dates with. It brought a smile to my face.
“What’s up?” I answered, happy to think about something good.
“I was hoping that you’d be up for an outing tonight.”
“Depends on what you were planning.” I took a seat on the couch, placing my feet on the coffee table.
“Dinner and a movie?”
“Comedy only. I need a good laugh tonight.”
“Sounds like it was a long day,” Chris commiserated. “Those are the worst. I’ve got just the thing. I’ll pick you up in thirty minutes. Wear something comfortable for an outside event.”
“Where are we going? I though you said dinner and a movie?”
“Can’t a guy surprise you? My goodness, you’re super suspicious for a cop.” He laughed. “I think you’ll like what I’ve got in mind, and it’s in a public place, so you don’t have to worry.”
“If a girl can’t go on a date with the Assistant DA safely, then the world is in real trouble.” I sat up. “You’re on. Bye.”
I had a date to get ready for, and I needed a shower and a little make-up. Things were starting to look up just a little bit.
***
Chris showed up in a white truck, and I just laughed. Driving a truck in Texas was almost a rite of passage, but for a lawyer, it was an unexpected surprise.
“Are we going mudding?” I asked as I climbed into the passenger side.
“No. I’m too much of a city boy to do that to my truck. Do you know how many hours I’d have to work cleaning it if we did that?” He gave me a wink before shifting into gear.
“Aw, I miss those days of going to the backroads right after a good rainstorm and putting some mud on my oversized tires.” I sighed as I thought back to those fun days.
“You had a truck with oversized tires?” He glanced toward me, pulling smoothly onto the freeway.
“Well, remember, I lived out in a rural area. If we got too much rain, my truck was the only vehicle able to get down the dirt road without getting stuck until things dried out.”
“I’m always stuck in an office, so it doesn’t really matter if it’s rain or shine. There’s that one day each year we shut down for an
ice storm we call snow, that no one can seem to drive on, but it’s always suggested that we come in anyway.”
“As an officer, there are no bad weather days. In fact, we’re more likely to be called in for overtime during a storm.”
“Never really appreciated that until I started dating a cop. We are dating, right?”
“Hmm… I hadn’t really thought about it.” I tried keeping a straight face until he gave me a wounded look. “Okay, yeah. I’d say we’re dating.”
“Whew. I thought I was going to have to tell my mother to send back the wedding invitations,” he joked.
“Wow! Have you named the kids yet?” I asked wide-eyed.
“Nah. I thought I’d leave that up to your parents.”
“Right. My parents would give you such a look if you even suggested that to them. They raised independent daughters, and that wouldn’t work for them at all.” I could just imagine my family’s reaction to Chris in the first place.
“You brought home a lawyer?” would be the first words out of my sister’s mouth. “What were you thinking?”
“What will your family say when they find out you’re dating a cop? A homicide detective at that?”
“As long as you’re honest, nice, and don’t mind the long hours, then they’re really good with anyone. After my last few debacles in the dating world, you’re going to be a breath of fresh air for them.” He reached over and took my hand, giving it a squeeze.
“Most people run the other way when you say ‘cop’ or anything to do with murder, so breath of fresh air isn’t something I hear very often.”
“Here we are.” He pointed to the large rollercoaster rides sticking up in the air as we left the freeway.
“Six Flags Over Texas? The amusement theme park?” I could feel myself beaming. “Riding death defying rollercoasters is the perfect way to let off some steam without actually dying.” Impulsively, I leaned over and planted a kiss on his cheek.
“I know it’s not an entire day, but I figured we could get a few rides done in four hours.” He handed the attendant his card and we pulled through to the massive parking area.
“It’s been years since I did something like this.” Excitement coursed through me for the first time in months. “Come on, I want to go on the biggest one first. After that, all the rest won’t seem nearly as scary.”
“Sounds like you have a plan.” He grabbed my hand as we walked toward the entrance. “Let’s get started.”
***
Chapter 3
Ryan
I’d told Leslie to be ready early so we could arrive as things started to open in Henry’s hometown.
As I pulled up, the curtain fluttered moments before a guy in a suit walked out. He gave her a quick, steamy kiss before heading to the truck parked at the curb.
Leslie shut her door and gave him a wave before joining me.
“Who’s that?” The words flew out of my mouth as I realized how jealous that sounded.
“My new boyfriend, Chris Guy. He’s an assistant district attorney. I was feeling so horrible yesterday, as if we just weren’t getting anywhere with this, and he suggested we go out for the evening.”
Her face held a blush I hadn’t seen there with her last boyfriend.
“So,” I asked, choosing my words carefully, “what did you do?”
“We went to Six Flags and rode some rollercoasters. I was so excited that I made him eat cotton candy, and we shared a turkey leg.” She gushed as the details came tumbling out.
“Sounds like you got a refreshing reboot. Maybe it’ll give you a new perspective as we chase down these extra leads.”
It was nice to see her in such a good mood.
She took a deep breath and picked up one of the thermoses full of coffee she’d brought with her.
“I might after I get some of this caffeine in my system. It was a long night.” She grinned without regret. “It was energizing and exhausting at the same time.”
“Hmm, I’ll bet.”
“Ryan!” She playfully slapped at me. “I meant the rollercoaster rides.”
“Oh, you didn’t mean the new guy? Whose last name is Guy?” My brow crinkled as I took in his last name.
“You’ll have to ask his parents that question, because I have no idea. I did run him through the system and he’s clean. He couldn’t be the Assistant DA if he had a record.”
“This one sounds better than Jerome. He’s more thoughtful?” It was a comment, but almost a question because I wasn’t sure if her happiness was due to the fact that he was a good guy, or if the new relationship status was clouding things.
“He’s really nice. With his job, he works with cops and has his own set of crazy hours that go with his position as a lawyer. It’s a better fit because he understands how my life works.”
“With the crazy lengths of time and different locations this case has taken us, it’s a good thing he won’t be expecting you to be home cooking him dinner every night.”
Leslie laughed. “He’ll be waiting a long time if those are his expectations. Then again, I don’t think he’s home for dinner most nights either.”
“Speaking of dinner, Shea is really hoping to have a party with you and Flora, along with a few others before the baby gets here. She knows that it’ll be hard with our schedules, but at this point, I’d hate to tell her no.”
“We can work one night in for some fun, surely.” Leslie slipped her phone into the Faraday bag along with mine and zipped it up. “Now, what’s our game plan for today’s excursion?”
“I’d planned for us to go to the Jr. High and High School where Henry Stevens went for yearbooks. Depending on what we can find, I also want to drop by the newspaper office or library to look at old newspapers.”
“Which may have a few mentions of his name or picture that he might not have thought to destroy. Any and all ways that we can find out more about him will help us get a better picture of where he might be hiding now,” she agreed.
“I just wish that we’d thought of it before his mom died. She would have been the perfect person to discuss this stuff with.”
“We can’t stay in the past, and that’s exactly why he killed her. He didn’t want us to have access to the best information source about him we’d ever find.”
“Yep. I just hope that he made enough of an impression on his teachers that they can help us.”
I took a sip from the thermos that Leslie had brought.
“He can’t kill the entire town to wipe out his footprint, right?”
“Let’s hope not.” I couldn’t help feeling that we were climbing up a vertical wall, and someone was building it higher and higher so that we could never get over it.
***
I had forgotten that school wasn’t in session during the summer, but we were lucky that the secretary worked a few days a week.
“Um, I know this is an unusual request, but we were hoping that we could look through some of your yearbooks from about thirty years ago.” I leaned on the counter partition separating the small sitting area from the desks almost hidden behind it.
“It might be easier to tell me what you’re looking for. I’ve been here for almost fifty years now. I started when my kids were little so I could be on the same schedule, and then after they graduated, I needed something to keep me busy.” The well-put-together lady didn’t look a day over fifty, much less in her seventies.
Leslie spoke up. “We’re needing information, and hopefully a picture of Henry Stevens. His mother just passed away last week.”
“Oh.” The secretary’s face turned white. “I can help you, but this has to stay out of anything official. I don’t want him doing to me what he did to his mother. I might be old, but I’d like to live out the rest of my days the way I want to live them.”
“We completely understand,” I assured her. “He’s responsible for the deaths of over two hundred people. We just want to stop him from hurting anyone else. No one even knows we’re here, so hopefull
y we can take our information back and put all the pieces together.”
“He was a very strange boy. He never joined any of the athletic groups or clubs. He’s what we would have flagged back then as a problem child who needed to be monitored. Not that we don’t think children can be taught, but some of them show warning signs that lead to them doing atrocious things,” she hastily explained while pulling out a few books from one of the shelves behind her desk.
“It’s not any wonder that he came back to finish the job with his mother. He was always trying find ways to get others to show emotion. It was like he didn’t understand how it worked, and needed to figure out how others expressed themselves.” She gave a shudder as she opened the copy machine.
“We know that he left high school early. Was there a specific reason for that?” Leslie probed.
“Yes. He had a crush on one of the girls. He thought it would get her attention by putting a cat in her locker since she loved cats. What he wasn’t counting on was that it wouldn’t live over the weekend. When she opened it and screamed, he had seemed confused.” She put the books back onto the shelves after setting the copies on the counter in front of us.
“It wasn’t the excitement that he wanted, but instead, it had been an even better reaction for him than we understood. She’d been scared. If he couldn’t have her, then he would take her terror.” She shook her head at the gruesome memory. “He started leaving gifts for a lot of the girls, and would stand watching as they ran away in horror.”
“That’s how he got his start,” I muttered aloud.
“We didn’t mean to give him motivation, and maybe if we’d have understood then what we know now, we could have gotten him some help. As it was, we had to cut him loose, or start having trouble with the students and their parents.”
“There was no way you could’ve turned him from the path that he chose to go down. You might have delayed it, but I feel that he would’ve chosen this path no matter what was available to him,” Leslie informed her.
