American Devil th&dl-1

by Oliver Stark

  ‘It’s six a.m., Harper. Don’t you sleep?’

  ‘We got a case to crack. Eddie, I expected a little more commitment from you of all people.’

  ‘Fuck that, I’m kinda busy on a different kind of commitment here. Can’t it wait?’

  ‘I’m back on the case, Eddie, and that means you’re mine. Now get over here.’

  On the other end of the phone, a woman’s voice came on the line. ‘There’s only one woman in Eddie’s life and she’s lying next to him, so who the fuck are you?’

  Eddie and Harper agreed to meet in the Upper East Side residential street where the first victim was found. Eddie drove up with a look of disapproval on his face. He jumped out of his car and threw the door shut.

  ‘It’s no good you smiling, Harper, you don’t have to face her. She’s not a woman you want to displease. Especially not when it comes to her conjugal rights.’

  ‘It was six a.m. You two were fast asleep.’

  ‘It don’t matter to her. I need to be right there on tap, should she have any such need.’

  ‘Well, she’s a lucky lady.’

  ‘That’s what I tell her. Shit, man, what the hell did you do to your hands?’

  Harper started walking. ‘I got them caught in a door.’

  ‘Both of them? That’s a hell of a door.’

  Harper kept Kasper walking towards the first crime scene — a four-bed apartment in a luxury building. Mary-Jane had been found dead in the hallway of her own home.

  Harper opened the door to the apartment. The family had since moved out. They’d never move back, either. Their lives had been destroyed. Mrs Samuelson had come home, opened the door and seen her daughter, exposed and bloody on the floor. Harper held up a photograph of the scene.

  ‘She was right there, legs facing the door, head propped up on two pillows,’ Eddie said, pointing at the stained carpet.

  ‘He posed her for maximum shock and humiliation.’

  ‘Her mother’s not recovered,’ said Eddie. ‘I interviewed her twice. She’s bad, Harps.’

  ‘I imagine,’ said Harper, moving through the apartment. ‘How did he get in?’

  ‘He had a key or she let him in. No sign of forced entry.’

  ‘You mean you don’t know yet?’

  ‘He gets in and out without being seen. The only witness we got on this one is dead. I don’t think anyone’s come up with anything more yet.’

  Harper walked through the beautifully furnished rooms. The trail of blood ran from the hall into the living room. The windows looked out across Fifth Avenue. ‘What do you think happened?’

  Eddie shrugged. ‘He took her in here. We think he raped her on the couch. They found seminal fluid on the cushions. He wasn’t careful with this one. Left us his DNA, but so far no hits on CODIS and if he’s not on any DNA database then he might not have killed before.’

  ‘What next?’

  ‘He strangled her, went to the kitchen to find a knife, came back and took his trophy. After that, we think he sat staring at her for some time before he moved the body. Medical Examiner thinks she was lying in that spot in the living room for a good half an hour.’

  Harper wandered around the room. ‘Two things are different here. I saw the report. The knife he used was from the rack in the kitchen, right?’ Eddie nodded. ‘He didn’t have a knife with him. The second thing that’s different is that he left his DNA and fibres all over this one. Amy and Grace were cleaned. I think he took their clothes to be sure, but he left Mary-Jane’s on the floor.’ Harper looked closely at the carpet. ‘Any tripod marks?’

  ‘No. But Mr Samuelson’s camcorder was missing.’

  ‘She didn’t struggle at all, did she? There’s not a thing out of place. My guess is that he controls them with fear and promises. He promises that he’ll let her go so she does what he wants. He either has them out cold or he controls them. I guess he felt safe with Mary-Jane because she was younger.’

  ‘Yeah, that’s too true.’

  ‘What I don’t get is why he goes for such high risk targets. It’s strange for a killer to start so confidently. He seems fearless. He takes big risks to kill the most difficult victims. Why? What’s so important about their wealth and privilege?’

  ‘Jealousy?’ said Kasper.

  Harper shook his head. ‘It’s more than that.’ He had read the department reports and autopsy protocols on the first two murders and was convinced that the killer was an organized type of sociopath. He not only had a personal vendetta, he had a thing against society in general. He most likely chose these girls because their deaths caused maximum fear and maximum national heartbreak. Killers usually chose their victims from within their own social strata, but Harper couldn’t see it in this case. There was punishment going on here. And then the strange confessional poses and blossom. The poses that suggested the killer didn’t feel like he had the right to do what he’d done. He seemed to show remorse.

  Harper spent an hour walking through each room, piecing together the last few minutes of Mary-Jane’s life. ‘All three kills show confidence and hatred,’ he told Eddie as they left. ‘There’s an increasing degree of overkill. In all cases, the killer posed the corpses and took a trophy, and he sprinkled cherry blossom like confetti over the first two. Why is that?’

  ‘He’s a fucking mental case. That’s the only explanation you ever gonna get from me.’

  ‘Yeah, he’s crazy, but he took time to shift each body to expose them. He wants to degrade them — to hide their faces and expose them as if he was suggesting that that was all they were worth. I know they were all wealthy, but if you want my opinion, I think this is personal. He sees something in these girls that no one else sees.’

  Chapter Twelve

  One PP

  November 17, 10.00 a.m.

  A couple of hours after walking the crime scene, Tom Harper left Eddie Kasper to talk to the profilers at the FBI’s New York field office. Later he arrived right on time for his appointment at One PP. He knocked on the fake mahogany door of the suite on the fifth floor. The little brass sign read Dr Denise Levene, Ph. D.

  On the wall hung a little certificate: Dr Denise Levene, a fellow of the American Psychological Association, was honored as Distinguished Psychologist of the Year in 2003-4 for her pioneering contributions in cognitive behavioral psychotherapy.

  A warm voice from inside the office shouted, ‘Come in.’ Harper did as he was told. He had to these days. He pushed the heavy door across the thick carpet and stepped inside.

  There she was, Dr Denise Levene, sitting in a high-backed black leather chair in a white blouse, writing in her desk diary.

  Harper stood in the entrance and waited for her to look up. She didn’t. It gave him a second or two to run his eyes over her. Blond hair. He hadn’t expected that. Young, too. She had a petite frame. Then she looked up and a pair of bright blue eyes held his gaze directly. She was pretty, for a shrink.

  ‘Welcome. Take a seat,’ she said.

  Harper remained standing.

  ‘Take a seat, please,’ she said and smiled, all nice and accommodating.

  ‘Look, if you’re going to get all hooked on me, why don’t you just say something now and we can end this.’

  She didn’t blink. Good on her.

  ‘Take a seat, Harper.’ She was forceful now.

  He stood his ground, unsure how to play this one. Levene leaned back in her leather chair and chewed the end of her pen. ‘I get it. I’m blonde. I’m a woman. I’ve got letters after my name. You don’t know what to do with me, do you, Mr Harper?’

  ‘It’s Detective Harper,’ said Tom, flexing the muscles in his shoulders.

  ‘Not according to your file, cowboy. Not unless I agree you’re fit for duty. Officially, you’re still on suspension.’

  Harper sighed. She was a smart-ass. Just what he needed. A curt little city girl with an answer for everything. ‘All right, let’s get this over with,’ he said, moving into the room and sitting reluctantly o
n a wide brown couch. He was feeling distinctly uncomfortable. After he’d hit Jarvis the first time, they had made him sit through sessions with some tight-faced therapist who responded to every remark with ‘Well, that’s good. So gooood.’ He’d ended up blaming the therapist for destroying his career. Too much thought can kill you as surely as too little.

  Levene tipped further back in her chair. She studied Tom for a moment, unafraid of his negativity or of the silence. She was trying to get some angle. Tom felt her eyes on him and he lifted his head and stared back. She was confident. Dealt with his type before, maybe. Knew the road.

  ‘Let’s get some shit out of the way first,’ she said. ‘You don’t want to be here. Fine. I can read you like a book. You need to display your cynicism and negativity because you feel threatened in here. I understand that. But you don’t need to feel threatened. I’m here to help.’

  ‘I don’t feel threatened. You’re way off the mark.’

  ‘Not physically threatened, Detective. I mean emotionally threatened.’

  ‘Well, what do you expect? They didn’t teach us the moves to deal with an emotional attack at the academy.’

  ‘I like your sense of humour, Detective, but it’s just another way of deflecting the blows.’

  ‘I’m not afraid, Doctor. I’m just pissed off that you’re wasting my time.’

  ‘You don’t think this will help? Fine with me. You just want your shield and minimum fuss. Fine also. I’m not that interested in you, to tell the truth. I’ve worked with enough guys like you to know that I’d be wasting my time too.’

  ‘Well then, that’s all nice and easy for the two of us. Let’s just do the minimum and sign this off.’

  ‘Okay. Let’s do that. You need a clean psych assessment, right?’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘And you’re sure you’ve got that anger thing under control.’

  ‘Sure.’

  ‘So those bloody knuckles are just for effect, right?’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘Okay. Let’s do the minimum. You sign up for ten sessions and I’ll sign this psych form right now.’

  ‘Ten sessions? Fuck that. I want the minimum.’

  ‘That is the minimum, Detective. I had planned a couple of sessions, but after meeting you I realize we’re going to have to go in deep and that’s going to take time.’

  ‘No way. I’m fine. You know that and I know that, so sign the form and let me get back out on the streets.’

  ‘You don’t sign up for ten, I’m not letting you out on the street at all. You’re not fit.’

  ‘How do you know? You haven’t even assessed me!’

  ‘I can see everything I need to — you’re spoiling for a fight, you’re resentful and negative, and you have no idea what to do with those little things called emotions. So, in my view, you’re not ready to be issued a gun. But if you sign up for ten sessions, then that’s going to convince me that you do want to help yourself and help resolve the anger. You sign up, I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt.’

  ‘So it’s Catch-22?’

  ‘No, it’s CBT. Cognitive behavioural therapy. We focus on practical strategies to manage your behaviour and we focus on the now. I don’t need to go back to your childhood and I don’t go looking for your subconscious. I don’t try to interpret your world. I couldn’t give a damn about why you do things or what you think. All I know is that I can change those things.’

  ‘You sure about that?’

  ‘We agree behaviour we want, call it Behaviour A, and we agree behaviour we don’t, call it Behaviour B. In stage one, we set about noticing how much we are drawn to Behaviour A and Behaviour B. Stage two, we put in some rewards for Behaviour A and some sanctions for Behaviour B. So you see, we just retrain your mind a little and maybe your emotions, but they are secondary. We focus on getting the actions we want; the emotions will follow. But first, we got to agree what the problem is.’ Denise laid her arms on the desk. She was tanned and her silver charm bracelet rattled against the wood. She looked towards Tom for a reaction. ‘If there is a problem,’ she said.

  ‘Not my problem.’

  ‘Still a problem, though.’

  ‘Not worth your time. Nice as you are.’

  ‘Let’s dispose of the attitude,’ said Dr Levene. ‘I get it. I get it you don’t like me or trust me. I get it you don’t really think psychologists can help, period. I get it you like being angry. You’re a man. I get it. Why don’t you try to be a little more interesting? I could tell right from the moment you walked in that you’re a very emotional guy. I can see it in your curled lip and your twitching hands. So be emotional. Make my day.’

  Tom half smiled. She was good. He could see why the guys liked her. And she was good to look at too, if you didn’t mind the stuck-up, college-educated aura.

  ‘Looks like you’re the one with the attitude,’ he told her.

  ‘But I didn’t screw up my job. That was all you, and looking at you I’d say you did it all by yourself. Hope she was worth it.’

  Harper stood. He walked over to her desk.

  ‘That simple, is it?’ he growled. ‘This is some problem you’re about to turn around? Solve my anger? I don’t care what you do. I’m here because this is my only option to save some lives.’

  ‘You’ve got this saving-lives fantasy to a T,’ she said. ‘Hero cop with bad attitude cos he cares too damn much. Lover walks out, again, because he loves too damn much. Why the hell is the world mistreating Mr Perfect? You need to get your head out of your ass. If she left you, she left you for reasons belonging to both of you.’

  Harper was riled. He stared hard at Dr Levene. ‘Don’t believe what you hear, Levene. I read people too. You talk tough and act tough, but you’re scared of me. I can smell it.’

  Levene smiled, but his aim was good.

  ‘You want more?’ Tom said. ‘I come in the door. You’re writing but you’ve got nothing to write. Look on your pad. It’s empty. You’re play-acting. You’ve done your second blouse button up too, but I can see by the crease that it’s been open all morning. You’ve turned your personal photos away from me and you’ve turned your certificates out.. Jesus, you’re the one hiding, not me. Main motivation with you — to get what you want.’

  ‘Right on all but the last point. Main motivation is wildly off the mark.’

  ‘You know what? I think you’re flirting with me, Dr Levene.’ Tom leaned right over the desk.

  ‘You’re in my space, cowboy. Back right off.’

  ‘Get you excited when I’m that close?’

  ‘Yeah, the smell of whisky at ten in the morning really turns me on.’

  ‘Quit your games.’

  ‘You first.’

  ‘You sit here in Suite No. 32B. All the signs that you are a made-it lady. You even solve people’s problems. I bet you feel great. But out there, Dr Levene, out there is a maniac who tortures his victims and takes body parts. Watching them die and convulse as he.. Shit, lady. He tore open a woman’s chest, cut out her heart and then went home. Went off to his day job.’

  Levene nodded. ‘That’s the emotion I was talking about. Nice to see it as it really is.’ The smile had left her face.

  ‘My problems don’t amount to anything worth State dollars, so yes I resent the waste of everyone’s time.’

  A lesser doctor would have ended the session right there and then. Pressed the small red security button and had this psycho cop from the dark ages towed away. But that wasn’t Levene’s way and that wasn’t how Levene succeeded when others failed. She smiled. Unbuttoned the second button on her blouse, turned the photos out and the certificates in.

  ‘Just seeing how good you are, cowboy. Now let’s get to work.’

  Tom went for the door. ‘I’ve signed to ten sessions, right? Well, let’s keep them short. Session one over. Nine more to go.’

  ‘Then you agree to come back?’

  ‘If it’s the only way I can get out there to work this killer, then I’l
l endure you.’

  ‘Fine. But I want you back here tomorrow. I need to get started right away if you’re going to stay out of trouble, Detective.’

  Chapter Thirteen

  Blue Team Major Investigation Room

  November 17, 2.34 p.m.

  Harper spent the rest of the morning trying to get Denise Levene’s voice out of his head, so he went back to the other two crime scenes at Ward’s Island and the underground parking lot. He didn’t get much further with his thinking and drove back to the precinct. He wanted desperately to call Lisa, but resisted it. She’d told him not to. She’d said they both needed to work out how to live apart. He parked up, bought fresh coffee and a bagel from a street vendor and walked up into the open-plan sixth-floor office of Manhattan North Homicide.

  The detectives who made up the elite Blue Team were all sitting around in the far corner facing Nate Williamson. He’d just received the feedback from the Fed’s violent criminal apprehension programme, ViCAP — a database of sickening crimes.

  Williamson was a hard-nosed veteran of nearly twenty years. His age alone demanded respect, but he still worked out and he could floor a perp half his age. The Romario case had been his lead at the start. After four months they’d put Harper in charge. It wasn’t easy for Williamson, but he knew the younger guys were just that little bit smarter and faster. And Harper had done a good job. Williamson knew that he wouldn’t have made the links Harper had made. Not in a million years.

  Harper walked into the centre of the room for the first time in a long while. ‘Nice time last night, Harper?’ asked Williamson, looking at Harper’s fists. ‘We wondered where you got to.’

  Harper tried to shrug it off. ‘Got them caught in a door.’

  ‘Yeah,’ said Williamson, ‘we’ve just seen the door wearing a face mask.’