by James Carol
Taylor’s expression reminded me of a puppy dog who’d been scolded for chewing up the sofa.
‘Don’t be so hard on yourself. It would make life so much easier if this guy was some sort of megalomaniacal computer genius straight from the pages of a Marvel comic, but he’s not. Unfortunately, it’s never that easy.’
Tell me about it, Taylor said with a roll of the eyes, and for a second he looked a whole lot older than he was. ‘And what if we don’t find the crime scene, Winter? What then?’
‘You’ll find it. This unsub’s a performer. He’s a show-off. He thinks he’s smarter than we are, and he wants to rub our faces in it.’
‘So we’ll find the scene because he wants us to find it.’
‘Got it in one. So what can you tell me about Sam Galloway?’
‘Nothing you haven’t seen in the files Sheriff Fortier sent you.’
I gave a derisory snort and shook my head. ‘The problem with files is that people are inherently lazy. When you write out a report, you cut corners. Everyone does. It takes time to write something down and there just aren’t enough hours in the day. Never trust reports, okay?’
‘Okay.’
‘Sam Galloway,’ I prompted.
‘Galloway was five-ten, forty-two years old, black hair turned mostly to grey.’
I let loose with another fake yawn. ‘Boring. I don’t need his shirt size, I need to know who he was. What made him tick. What made him get out of bed in the morning.’
‘He was a lawyer. Married for twenty years. He had three kids. A son and two daughters.’
‘Now you’re getting warmer. Did he have enemies? Affairs? The kids, are they on drugs?’
‘How the hell should I know?’
‘You know because Eagle Creek has a population of less than ten thousand people and Sam has just been murdered. That means there will be all sorts of rumours flying around right now.’
‘Cops are supposed to deal with facts, not rumours.’
‘And that sounds like a line that’s been fed to you. Fortier, perhaps?’
Taylor nodded.
‘Okay, forget what Fortier’s told you. Cops don’t deal with facts, they deal with information. Facts are great, but rumours can be just as useful.’
Taylor thought for a second, then shook his head. ‘No affairs that I’ve heard about. The marriage was solid. As for the kids, they’re a dead end too. They’re aged ten to fifteen and, by all accounts, they’re good kids. No drugs, no arrests, and no pregnancies. And, as for work, Galloway dealt with the dull end of the law. Divorces, wills, property, that sort of thing. It’s not like he was a criminal lawyer who’d made a load of enemies.’
‘Except he did make one enemy.’
‘And what if his murder was random?’
‘It wasn’t. The person responsible for this is a highly organised serial killer. Nothing he does is random.’
‘Don’t you have to kill a minimum of three people to get serial-killer status?’
‘That’s just a detail. Trust me, this guy’s a serial killer. The film clip and the countdown prove that. No one except a serial killer would go to those sort of lengths. By the way, the film was attached to an email, right? I take it you’ve tried to trace it?’
‘Not me personally, but yeah it’s been looked into.’
‘And nothing?’
Taylor shook his head slowly. ‘Nothing.’
I clapped my hands and rubbed them together. ‘Okay, are you ready for some fun? You might want to fasten your safety belt for this.’
Taylor’s eyes narrowed. ‘What are you up to?’
‘Get the flight attendant to buckle herself in, too.’
‘But you said safety belts were a waste of time.’
‘No, what I said was that they would be useless if we crashed. I can assure you that we’re not about to crash any time soon.’
I jumped from my seat and headed to the front of the plane. Since 9/11 the pilots on passenger jets have been locked away on the flight deck. But this wasn’t a passenger plane. The rules were different here. One law for the rich, one for the poor. I did a sharp rat-a-tat knock on the flight deck door then pushed it open.
The pilot was in his late fifties, and had ex-military written all over him. He was sizing me up over his shoulder, trying to decide if I was a friend or foe. Trying to decide if I was crazy.
‘Can I help you, sir?’
‘I really do hope so. You have the ultimate boy’s toy here, right? We’re talking at least fifty million dollars’ worth of fun, yet you’re flying it like you’re taking a load of old folks out to Florida. That must kill you.’
The pilot’s face relaxed. His whole body relaxed. He gave a knowing smile. ‘Yes, sir, there are times when it can get a little frustrating.’
‘Okay, so how about for the rest of the flight you fly this plane like it belongs to you?’
‘I can’t do that.’
‘Of course you can. What’s more, I’m betting that every time you take the controls you dream of doing just that. Compared to flying fighter jets this has got to be so boring.’
‘How did you know I flew fighter jets?’
‘Call it a gift.’
I smiled conspiratorially. The pilot stared at me for a moment, then a slow smile spread over his face.
‘Get back to your seat and get buckled in. Give me a holler when you’re ready.’
I jogged back to my seat, strapped myself in, grinned at Taylor.
‘You’ve no idea how many times I wanted to do this when I was with the FBI.’
‘What the hell are you up to, Winter?’ Taylor was tugging at his safety belt, pulling it as tight as it would go.
‘You’ll see. Okay,’ I shouted up to the pilot. ‘We’re good to go back here.’
The first barrel roll took my breath away.
5
The pilot did a low pass from the north so I could see Dayton Parish in all its glory. We came in over the Arkansas–Louisiana border at three thousand feet. Low enough to get an impression of what lay below us, but without the fine detail you get at a thousand feet. There were forests and lakes and farms, hills that would never be mistaken for mountains, and a scattering of small towns connected by winding two-lane roads. Lots of space, not very many people.
Every state claims to be unique, but some are more unique than others, and Louisiana was right up there in the top three. The state wears its differences like a badge of honour. For a start, it’s the only state divided into parishes rather than counties. Louisiana was formed from a mix of Spanish and French colonies, and the carve-up into parishes reflects those Roman Catholic roots.
The French and Spanish influence stretches way beyond the geographical borders, though. It can be seen in the architecture and the food, and in a hundred other ways both big and small that make Louisiana stand out from the other forty-nine states.
The first thing that struck me about Dayton was the lack of swampland. Think of Louisiana and you think of swamps and alligators and Cajun food and Mardi Gras. You don’t think of farms, yet that’s what was below us, a patchwork of fields in various shades of green and brown.
Dayton was two hundred feet above sea level, whereas parts of New Orleans were six feet below, and that simple fact separated north from south. To all intents and purposes we could have been in a completely different state from the Louisiana that everyone thought they knew.
Eagle Creek was at the bottom end of Dayton, sitting ten miles to the north of I-20, a six-lane interstate that cuts across the top end of the state from east to west. The town was laid out like thousands of other small towns. Offices and factories and a shopping mall on the outer ring where land was cheap. Move to the middle ring and that’s where you found the people. Apartments and houses, school buildings and community centres, parks and a Little League field. Move on to the centre and there were the municipal buildings.
On the south side of the interstate was the sprawling expanse of an abandoned oil re
finery. Grey concrete and scorched earth and tons of steel. The refinery shimmered in the summer sun, a confusion of pipework and tanks and tall metal. A railroad ran parallel to I-20 and split the town neatly in two, and a disused branch line led out to the refinery.
The big fancy houses were clustered in their own perfect sea of green to the north-west. Well out of earshot of the interstate, and well out of eyesight of the old refinery, and just a short drive from the golf course.
We banked sharply to the right and made our final approach into Eagle Creek’s tiny airfield. For a few seconds we were flying so low over the fields that you could have reached out and touched them. There was that moment where you hoped the pilot knew what he was doing, then the runway appeared from nowhere and we touched down, the reverse thrusters bringing us to a virtual standstill.
We taxied past a line of small private propeller planes and pulled into a hangar that had been built away from the other buildings. Like the Gulfstream, the hangar was painted white and had no markings to indicate who owned it. The only other vehicles inside the hangar were a helicopter and a black police cruiser covered in Dayton Sheriff’s Department markings. The Gulfstream rolled to a halt beside the car, and the jets idled then died.
It was almost three in the afternoon. The journey from Charleston to Eagle Creek had taken exactly two hours. I could picture those white numbers counting down to zero against that pitch-black background: 09:06:34.
At the door we said thanks and bye to the pilot and flight attendant, then climbed down the steps. The heat hit me straight away. It was like getting off a plane in the tropics. It smelled the same, too. Kerosene and sun-baked vegetation.
I got into the passenger seat of the police cruiser. Taylor squashed himself behind the wheel. The partition had been removed and his seat was racked back as far as it would go, but he still looked like he was squeezing himself into a toy car. My suitcase and laptop bag went onto the back seat and Taylor started the engine.
‘Sue,’ I said. ‘You’re the boy called Sue.’
‘What the hell are you talking about?’
‘It’s a Johnny Cash song.’
‘My parents are more into Motown.’
‘How about Marvin, then? Like Marvin Gaye. Marvin Taylor? Yeah I can see that. It’s got a nice ring to it.’
Taylor laughed. We pulled out of the hangar and the sound of the engine changed from a muted throb to a distant growl. Bright sunshine flooded the car and I put on my sunglasses.
‘You might as well quit now, Winter. You’re not going to get it.’
‘And that sounds like a challenge.’
‘Not a challenge, a fact.’
‘And you’re prepared to put your money where your mouth is? How about fifty bucks?’
‘Fifty? Let’s make it really interesting. How about two hundred?’
‘You sure you can afford to lose that on a rookie’s salary?’
Taylor let loose with a deep belly laugh. ‘No way am I going to lose this one.’
‘Okay, here’s the deal. If I don’t find out what your first name is by the time I leave, then I’ll happily pay you two hundred bucks.’
I reached across and we shook, Taylor’s gentle hand swallowing mine.
‘You might as well pay up now, Winter. Save yourself the trouble.’
I smiled and settled back in my seat, the sun blazing through the windshield warming my skin. ‘Funnily enough, I was just about to say the exact same thing to you.’
6
Five minutes after leaving the airfield we hit Main Street. We came in from the south and kept to the speed limit all the way. The first structure I saw was a church, and the first billboard had a large poster proclaiming that JESUS DIED FOR YOU! WOULD YOU DIE FOR HIM? in four-foot-high blood-red letters.
Get this far into the Southern badlands and poverty was rife. Small towns were dying. That’s a fact. It’s like a plague had hit. Abandoned, ruined buildings littered the landscape, and boarded-up shops were the rule rather than the exception. Most of the houses were rundown with dirt yards and rusty chicken-wire fencing.
That wasn’t the case in Eagle Creek. There was bright, shiny paintwork wherever you looked, and every single window sparkled. The road was so smooth it could have been resurfaced a week ago.
The park in the town centre was surrounded by buildings that shimmered in the afternoon heat. Large, important-looking grey and white monuments as opposed to the squat two-storey structures on the rest of Main Street. The courthouse, the mayor’s office, the library.
The Eagle Creek Police Department’s HQ was next to the courthouse, a couple of cruisers and a 4x4 parked out front. The sheriff’s department had got in there first and claimed black for its cars and uniforms, which meant the police department had to settle for tan. Black on a cop car was always going to look way cooler than tan. The police department vehicles looked as bright and shiny as everything else on Main Street, like they’d just rolled off the factory floor.
In the middle of the park was a tall white statue of a stern-looking man. The Stars and Stripes hung from a flagpole beside the statue. There was no breeze to stir the flag and it clung limply to the pole. The red, white and blue was so bright it hurt your eyes. The manicured grass could have been a golf green.
We carried on north and the buildings dropped down in size to two storeys again. Shops on the first floor, apartments on the second. The sheriff department’s station house was based in a large building right up at the north end of Main Street.
Taylor pulled into the lot at the back and reversed into a slot beside all the other police vehicles. There were four vehicles on our left, five on the right, a mix of sedans and 4x4s, the oldest only a couple of years old. A ten-car fleet like this indicated a recent investment in the hundreds of thousands.
On the other side of the lot were two rows of vehicles that weren’t cop cars. These cars didn’t look brand new. Most were at least five years old, and almost all of them were American. There was a mix of makes and models, a mix of conditions. Some were well loved while others were suffering from a serious case of neglect.
Stepping outside again was like stepping into a blast furnace. Mid-afternoon and the mercury had to be pushing past the hundred mark. The heat was a solid thing that slammed into you and stole your breath away. By the time we’d crossed the parking lot, I’d already worked up a sweat. I wiped the drops from my forehead as we walked into the air-conditioned cool of the station house. The heat was bad, but the humidity was the real killer.
The dispatcher at the front desk told us that Sheriff Fortier was expecting us, and Taylor led the way through a maze of corridors to a door with a smoked-glass window and SHERIFF PETER FORTIER stencilled in gold. Taylor knocked once and a voice on the other side told us to enter.
Like the rest of the station house, Fortier’s office was immaculate. A tidy oak desk with a large leather chair dominated the space, and the in- and out-trays looked well under control. The whitewashed walls were actually white, and the striplight had been cleaned this side of Christmas.
One wall was taken up with pictures of boats and fish. Fortier was in all of them, either standing at the wheel wearing a battered blue cap with a red anchor stitched on the front, or standing in that same cap holding up the catch of the day. There was a marked difference between the grim-faced man behind the oak desk and the smiling, tanned fisherman in the photographs.
Fortier came around to the front of the desk, arm outstretched, and we shook. He had a grip like a bear and I could feel my bones grinding together. He gave me the once-over, trying not to make it too obvious. I was used to being stared at so it didn’t bother me.
While Fortier looked me over, I checked him out. The sheriff was in his mid-fifties and stood at five-five, four inches shorter than me, and a whole foot and an inch shorter than Taylor. Put us in a line and we could have been the three bears. He had grey hair and a ruddy outdoors complexion from all that time spent fishing. There were red blooms on h
is cheek, and the skin was tight and shiny. His uniform was as immaculate as his office. Creases in all the right places and shoes spit-shined.
He looked tired, though, bone-weary, like all the fight had been knocked out of him. My guess was that he wouldn’t be running for sheriff in the next election. If that decision hadn’t already been made, then what happened to Sam Galloway had tipped the scales. Here was someone desperate to leave the troubles of the real world behind, someone who spent his days staring at the pictures on his office wall and dreaming of a time when he could while away his remaining years fishing for marlin and drinking bourbon.
‘Thanks for coming at such short notice,’ said Fortier.
‘No problem.’
‘I’ve got to admit, though, I’m surprised you came at all. When I contacted you, it was a real long shot. I know you usually only deal with serial killers and this guy isn’t a serial killer, but I’d been following what you’d been up to in South Carolina, and since Charleston is only a short plane hop away, I thought what the hell. Nothing ventured. Anyway, anything you can do to help, we’re all ears. Anything you need, just ask.’
The speech sounded rehearsed, like he’d spent all morning in here practising. ‘Serial criminals,’ I told him.
‘Excuse me?’
‘Serial criminals. I deal with them all. Kidnappers, rapists, arsonists, extortionists, murderers. And I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but this guy is a serial killer.’
‘How do you figure that one?’
‘Because Sam Galloway’s murder was pure theatre. Here’s a question for you: what do you think’s going to happen when the countdown hits zero?’ I could tell by the look on his face that he’d already considered this‚ and that we’d come to the same conclusion. ‘Unless you catch this guy, and catch him quickly, he will kill again, and again. He’s going to keep going until someone stops him. Believe me, he’s just got started.’
