The Elk (A Caine & Murphy Paranormal Thriller Series Book 1)

by Dominika Waclawiak

  Barney was on the eighth floor. She pushed the door to the servant’s stairs open.

  She took the first set of stairs down to the landing, when she heard footsteps ahead of her. She peeked over the balustrade and saw a hand. His hand.

  She ran down the remainder of the stairs, syringe out, ready to do what she should have done years ago. Dads, his eyes blazing, stood on the small landing.

  “Hello, Gillian. I’ve been looking for you,” he said with a smile that stopped her cold.

  Simon Michaels whistled an old tune as he washed the blood off his hands. He’d been worried that he wouldn’t be able to overcome her, but it hadn’t been an issue after all.

  It felt good to be back.

  He’d been lucky with good health, but it was time to change his strategy. He’d made no mistakes in over fifty years, and he wasn’t about to start now. He walked out of the bathroom and saw a brunette woman standing in the doorway of the bedroom, her back to him. He could see her shoulders moving up and down and knew her scream would alert the neighbors.

  He could use her.

  He’d need to get into her head but that wouldn’t be a problem for a man like him. He had learned from the best. He crossed the hallway without making a sound.

  She never saw him coming. He wrapped his left arm around her neck in a well-practiced sleeper hold, the crook of his left arm against her Adam’s apple as his right arm pressed her head against his left. She dropped in seconds.

  Simon appraised his work one last time. The blond woman’s mangled body laid spread eagle on the bed, his sign carved into her belly. The blood dripped onto the white shag carpet.

  The scene looked perfect.

  He looked down at the woman at his feet.

  He needed to get her out of here. He was lucky she was such a tiny thing.

  Sara Caine sat on the hard, plastic chair in the waiting area of the Hollywood Division precinct and waited. And then waited some more. She wished that Johan was here with her. She’d tried his cell several times, but he hadn’t picked up. That meant one thing. He had gone after Luther. She knew he couldn’t resist for long, not after all the years he’d searched for him. She wasn’t sure if she was making the right decision in coming to speak with Detective Murphy, but more people would die if the police didn’t know who they were dealing with here. She kept reminding herself that people were dying, and she needed to do what she could to help.

  She waited another hour and was about to leave when Detective Murphy finally appeared. Sara tugged at her newly purchased black, leather gloves and hoped the detective wouldn’t notice she wore them. She wasn’t entirely convinced she now had the gift of the empath, but she wasn’t taking any chances. She didn’t want to know any of Detective Murphy’s secrets.

  The dead woman with the elk sign carved in her body flashed in her mind, and Sara rubbed her eyes trying to get rid of the image. She didn’t even need to close her eyes anymore to see her. She stood up to face Detective Murphy.

  “I’m sorry to have kept you waiting so long,” Detective Murphy said as she extended her hand to Sara.

  Sara held up her gloved hands. “I’m ah— I get nervous touching people,” she said. Detective Murphy rolled her eyes as she turned away from her. She needed a better explanation than that. No one would take her seriously.

  “We can speak in one of the interrogation rooms.”

  “Is that necessary?” Sara asked.

  Detective Murphy put a reassuring hand on her shoulder. “It’s not like that. The rooms are plugged in for recording,” she said. Sara nodded and followed her into a stark room with nothing in it but a table with a tape recorder on top of it and three chairs. “Have a seat. Do you want coffee or tea?”

  Sara shook her head.

  “All right then.” Detective Murphy sat down and motioned to the chair beside her.

  “So what would you like to tell me?” Detective Murphy asked. Sara pulled the drawing of the rune out of her handbag.

  “Have you seen this before? One of my colleagues did a bit of research for me and found the link to the Jerry Killer. Have you heard of him?” Sara asked.

  Murphy’s eyes lit up, and she gave Sara a huge smile. “I’ve been trying to figure out where I’ve seen this all day. Thank you!” Detective Murphy explained, her voice rising in excitement. “Where did you see this?”

  “I don’t think you’d believe me if I told you.”

  “Try me,” Detective Murphy said and cocked her head.

  Sara hesitated. Would this woman laugh at her? People were dying, she told herself, and plunged ahead.

  “I saw it in a vision of a dead woman. This sign was carved into her body.”

  “A vision? Are you a psychic or something?” Detective Murphy’s eyes narrowed. “Were you at that séance with Louise Fairbanks and the others?” Detective Murphy asked. Sara nodded.

  “You had the vision at the séance?” Detective Murphy said and turned the tape recorder off. Sara heard the skepticism in her voice and looked down at her gloved hands. She needed the detective to believe her.

  “No, not exactly,” Sara said and held her hands up. “It’s why I’m wearing the gloves these days. It kind of snuck up on me.”

  “I don’t understand. So you’re not a psychic?”

  “It’s difficult to explain. I don’t even entirely understand it. I touched someone and got flashes of the dead woman. It put me in a coma for two days. You can call Cedar Sinai ER for confirmation on that.”

  “Help me understand this. You touched someone and saw this sign carved into a woman’s body? Who did you touch?” Detective Murphy asked, and Sara’s eyes dropped to her gloved hands. She didn’t want to point the finger at anyone without definite proof.

  “I don’t want to get this person in trouble. I don’t think they are the killer,” Sara said. The detective leaned in closer.

  “Who touched your hand, Ms. Caine?”

  “The vision was very confusing, and it was the first time it happened. I don’t…”

  “Who touched you?” Detective Murphy pressed her.

  “I don’t want to point fingers, and it doesn’t necessarily mean she killed.” Sara stopped, realizing what she had just said. Damn Sara, she thought. “The nurse. I touched Louise Fairbanks. But, it doesn’t mean she was the killer. The whole thing felt off. The view was wrong. What I mean is it was the wrong point of view.”

  “So you touched her, and then you saw this symbol.”

  “She touched my hand, and I went somewhere…and saw a dead woman covered in so much blood. She was young and blond and had that symbol cut into her abdomen. The blood was everywhere…” Sara stopped and rubbed her eyes again.

  Detective Murphy sat back in her chair and just stared at her. Sara could only imagine what was running through the detectives mind and kept still. For whatever reason, Sara really wanted this woman to believe her. The two women sat staring at each other for quite some time.

  The detective broke the silence. “No one ever thought that a woman was the Jerry killer. Is she even the right age?” Detective Murphy asked, deep in thought. “You touched HER? Not someone else.”

  Sara nodded. “Is that why you didn’t want to shake hands?” Detective Murphy asked.

  “It’s a precaution. This is new enough that I don’t know what to expect. It’s never happened before,” Sara said.

  “Never?”

  “In the past, I could sometimes call ghosts or see echoes from touching objects, like a wall in a building. But, it never happened with people before,” Sara explained.

  “But you see ghosts,” Detective Murphy asked and Sara heard the doubt.

  “Yes, but this wasn’t a ghost. It’s hard to describe really,” was all Sara could say. “You don’t have to believe me, but I felt it was my duty to let you know,” Sara said and stood up. “Thank you for your time, Detective.”

  “Please sit, Ms. Caine. I didn’t mean to make you defensive. You have to agree it’s a bit out t
here,” Detective Murphy said and Sara nodded. Sara slipped back into her seat.

  “I’m not taking it that well myself to be honest. I hate the images that are running through my mind. Each time I close my eyes, I see that poor woman. It took me years to get used to seeing ghosts. I’ve tried to make it useful, but I wish I had other more mainstream skills,” Sara said with the emphasis on the mainstream.

  “I can’t even imagine what that would be like. Could the Jerry Killer really be a woman though? I don’t remember the exact particulars of the Jerry case, but I remember it spanning many years going back to the late sixties,” Detective Murphy said, her mind clearly elsewhere. “Thank you, Ms. Caine. For coming in and…” she said and they both got up. “Being brave enough to tell me about your abilities.”

  “I hope it helps somehow,” Sara said.

  “Can you find your own way out?” The detective paused at the door.

  “Yes, of course.” Sara smiled and gave the woman a small wave. She cursed herself for being so lame, turned away from her and got out of there.

  Sara didn’t breathe until she got into her car. She wasn’t sure how well that went, but the detective hadn’t laughed at her. That was a start. She checked her phone and found no messages from Johan. He’d be thrilled she went to the police, she knew, and smiled. She buckled herself in and started the car.

  She also knew he wouldn’t want her going back to the Bockerman. But now that she had accused Louise Fairbanks of being the killer. She needed proof or to clear the woman’s name. She had to find out what Barbara wanted to tell her.

  She started up the car and wished Johan was with her.

  Detective Eva Murphy waited at her desk for Larson, fingers tapping. She had tried to access the files on the Jerry killer in the computer database, but the case was too old. She doubted they had even digitized them yet. She’d already called the murder library downtown to make sure they had the hard copy files there and was relieved to hear no one had checked them out. The librarian also confirmed that the files had never been digitized.

  Unable to wait any longer, Murphy wrote a message to Larson about the new evidence pointing to the Jerry Killer and her appointment downtown. Nervous energy shot through her at a possible break in the case. Could they have stumbled upon a monster by accident? She’d heard of cold cases going down like this before but couldn’t believe it was happening.

  Some two hundred pages of savage murder later, Murphy felt more exhausted and sickened than excited. The Jerry killer had indeed proven to be as elusive as he was brutal. The first murder recorded with his signature was of an Andreas Bauer in 1975, a seventy-year old man found castrated and shot in the head execution style. The press nicknamed the man the Jerry killer when the next three victims were all German men who had served in various positions in the Third Reich in WWII. They were all castrated as well and finished off with a bullet in their heads. The Jerry killer changed his modus operandi in the 1980s to include younger men and women, but they were still all blond Germanic named people. The women had their sexual organs removed, and the men castrated. All of them shot in the head.

  Another change in his M.O. came in 1987 when he starved his victims. Murphy closed the file. His starvation victims from the late 80s all looked similar to the victims from the World War II camps. The files had linked 65 deaths from Washington through Oregon to California. She noted that the ballistics from half of the murders came back to an old Parabellum Luger Mauser pistol dating from 1941. They never found that gun. He switched over to the more popular Glock in 1985.

  The last body attributed to the Jerry killer was a woman in San Francisco, LuAnn Herrmann, in 1990. Her sister, Gillian Herrmann, was reported missing at the same time. Her body was never found, and she was presumed dead.

  Murphy knocked over her chair when she saw the missing woman’s face.

  It was Louise Fairbanks.

  She had never considered for a moment that Louise Fairbanks was a victim. And if she was the missing woman—and judging from the pic she had to be—then Dads had to be the Jerry Killer. He was the right age.

  If he really had dementia, why wouldn’t she have made a run for it? The Angel of Death killings didn’t fit the Jerry killer’s MO at all, but he could have changed his technique as he did in the ‘80s to compensate for his growing weakness.

  Louise Fairbanks, rather Gillian Herrmann, was in grave danger every moment she spent with that man.

  She called Larson. “Larson, I’ve found out who Louise Fairbanks is. I’m on my way to Sunny Side—the old Bockerman,” she said as she ran through cubicles full of detectives.

  Sara Caine banged on Johan’s door hard enough to make the cheap walls surrounding it shake. His next door neighbor, Nancy, a woman in her sixties with hair curlers wrapped in her white hair, poked her head out of her door.

  “Sara, he’s not home. He hasn’t been home since last night,” Nancy said.

  “How would you know that?”

  “These walls are shit. You know that better than I do, don’t you?” She eyed her in a knowing way.

  “I wouldn’t know that Nancy and stop looking at me like that. I’m not sleeping with him,” Sara said.

  “You wish you were, though, don’t you? I’d be trying to hit that if I was your age,” Nancy said as her curlers bobbed up and down. She cackled at the very idea.

  “Since you’re all up in his business,” Sara said with a half-smile, “you wouldn’t by any chance have heard where he disappeared too?”

  “Santa Barbara. He was tracking someone. I overheard him saying the name Luther,” she replied.

  She was on her own as she suspected.

  “Thank you, Nancy. You’ve been helpful as always,” Sara said.

  “It’s the walls, young lady. If you want things private, then don’t talk so loud. Humph.” She slammed the door.

  Sara rested her head on his door and tried to convince herself that she could wait for him to come back to go back to the Bockerman. She closed her eyes and saw death again. Terror bubbled in her stomach and she puked up bile, sliding to the ground in dizziness.

  She sat there until her vision cleared and finally saw what she was missing. The images came from the viewpoint of an onlooker, a victim, and not a killer.

  A prolific killer wouldn’t feel the horror of the brutal death, Sara thought. He’d enjoy it. Nurse Louise saw what the Jerry killer had done to that poor woman but that didn’t absolve her from killing her patients. Her trauma could have made her snap and made her a killer. Sara might not be well versed in psychology but could imagine the woman getting to her breaking point.

  Sara got to her feet, her body rebelling against her. The nausea was just at the surface, ready to come up at any moment and hobbled down the hall to her car. Johan would tell her to go home, get a good night’s sleep and let the police take care of Nurse Louise and the Bockerman. She pushed the door open and stepped out into the foggy LA night and took a deep breath.

  Sara didn’t think that the Jerry killer would get his kicks off killing old people with air embolisms. She needed to see Barbara again. She’d let the cops deal with the Jerry killer, but she’d make another attempt at finding the Bockerman Angel of Death, she owed it to Barbara at least.

  Detective Eva Murphy showed her badge to Russell Hall, still on duty at the Sunshine assisted living home. She had assumed the place would have fired him after finding out about his family, but she was wrong. She shook her head in amazement. What did it take to fire people these days?

  “Diane left for the day, and I don’t have to let you in,” he growled at her.

  “I am just doing my job,” she said.

  “Right,” he said.

  A loud bang made Murphy jump and she turned around to see Larson at the doors. “About time,” she muttered. She turned back to Russell.

  “You gonna get that?” Russell said. Murphy gave him a withering look and walked to open the door for Larson.

  “Where the hell have y
ou been?” she whispered to him as he stepped in.

  “I’ll tell you later. Is she really the missing woman?” he asked. She could see the surprise on his face.

  “It looks like it. We need to get through this asshole first.” She jerked her head at Russell. Larson smiled. He was good for some things, she thought.

  She stepped aside as Larson lunged for Russell, grabbed him by his shirt, and pulled him across the security desk.

  “Nurse Louise Fairbanks. Floor?” Larson growled.

  “Tenth. She’s on the tenth. 1085,” Russell stammered out. Larson dropped him onto the desk and they walked past him to the elevator. Larson pressed the up button as Murphy checked her gun and phone.

  “You really think this Dads character is the Jerry killer?” Larson asked as they rushed inside.

  “The MO doesn’t match at all, but I’m positive Louise Fairbanks is Gillian Herrmann. The photo is fifteen years old, but she hasn’t changed.”

  “She’s killing old people while taking care of her fake father, the Jerry killer? Is this the scenario we’re working under,” he asked incredulously. The elevator dinged as they traveled up the building.

  “When you put it that way…” Murphy said. They remained silent for the rest of the ride. When they stepped onto the tenth floor, Murphy unhooked her holster, and made sure her gun was at the ready.

  She rapped on the door twice.

  “Louise Fairbanks, please open the door,” Murphy called out and banged harder. When no one came to the door, she put her ear up to it.

  No sound.

  She nodded to Larson as she pulled out her weapon. He followed suit. Murphy tested the door and found it locked. “What time is it?”

  Larson checked his watch. “Eleven. We’re gonna need a warrant.” He eyed the door. “We can’t break in, can we?”