Daddy's Home

by A. K. Alexander

  “What do you think happened to him?” Holly asked.

  “I’d say somebody took him for a soccer ball. I don’t know where the blood came from, though.” He pointed to the caked-on patch of blood on the dog’s side.

  “We have an idea,” Holly said. “If he belongs to who we think he does, then his owner was murdered, and that blood could be hers. Do you mind cutting off that piece of fur so that I can send it to our lab for DNA evidence?”

  “Not at all.” The dog had fallen into a near coma and barely fluttered his eyes as Brendan clipped off the piece of fur. Chad reached into his coat pocket for a plastic baggie and put into it what they hoped would prove to be evidence.

  “Thanks,” Holly said. “Is he going to be all right?”

  “I think so. He’s a tough little bugger. Do you know his name?”

  “The dog that the ex-husband talked about is in the police report,” Chad said. “And I believe he matches the description. But I can’t remember the name. Can you?” He looked at Holly.

  “No.”

  “I’ll go and make a call to the station and find out.”

  “Good, I like to have names for my patients.”

  Brendan smiled again, and Holly thought she might melt. Cops were not supposed to feel giddy with butterflies in their stomachs! How stupid. She was acting like a lovesick teenager.

  Chad left the room, and Brendan took the dog back to his assistant to give her instructions, returning a few moments later. “Poor pup. Whoever did that to him ought to be shot.”

  “That’s what I’m hoping for. He’s a sick S.O.B.”

  “So you think it’s the same man who killed the woman and her daughter who I read about in the papers?”

  “Off the record, yes.”

  “Ah, geez, Holly, I don’t know that I like this.”

  Now it was her turn to smile. “What do you mean?”

  “This doesn’t sound like it’s safe for you. He’s a madman, for goodness sakes. I read what he did to that poor woman and her child, and it about made me ill. To think that you’re chasing after him . . . Well, dear, I don’t know that I can take it.”

  “Brendan, I carry a gun. I’ve been well trained, and believe me, I know what I’m doing. Besides, what’s all the concern? You’d think we’d made a commitment or something.”

  His face turned red. “I . . . I . . . I only worry ‘cause I care for you. And I care for Chloe. It must be hard having her mom fight the bad guys day after day.”

  “I suppose it is. There are times when I wish I could stay home, bake cookies, even clean the house. Well, maybe not clean the house, but at least be there when she gets home. But this is my job, Brendan, and I love it. I’ve worked really hard to get to where I am, and trust me when I say we will get this bastard. Hopefully the dog’s hair will provide DNA evidence.”

  “I pray so.”

  Chad came back into the room. “Dog’s name is Petie.”

  “All right then. Me and Petie got some work to do. He needs some fixin’ up, so I’ll call you later and give you a report.”

  “Thanks. I appreciate it,” Holly said.

  “Looking forward to tomorrow, Detective,” Brendan added.

  “Me too.”

  As Chad and Holly left and got into the car, Holly held up her hand to once again combat any of Chad’s curiosity. “Don’t go there. Besides we’ve got a case to solve.”

  “Anyone ever tell you that you’re difficult?” Chad asked.

  “Pretty much every day of my life,” she replied, thinking about her dad and wondering if he’d received her e-mail.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Holly and Chad went back to the station and headed for Carpenter’s office. He was sitting at his desk, eyes closed, feet propped up on an open drawer.

  “Hey, sleeping beauty, we hate to disturb you, but—” Holly started.

  Carpenter jumped, eyes now wide open. “Shit. I was resting my eyes. I’m allowed that on a break.”

  “Whatever. What did you and our night man find out about James?” Holly asked.

  Carpenter put his feet under his desk and shuffled through some paperwork. “Some interesting info. William James’s aliases include Will James, James Wills, James Williams, William Laine, Laine Williams, and more. But here, you can have the list.” He handed it to Holly. “Mr. James spent three years in jail on a sexual assault charge back in ‘90. He was also arrested on drug possession with intent to distribute, bad check charges, and fraud, all in the ‘80s. He used to make poor-quality porn, even starred in a few of his own films, and was really into the threesome and bondage thing. This is one bad mother. All of this was on the East Coast, back in New Jersey to be exact. He moved to LA in ‘95 and down to San Diego just a couple of years ago. I called a few friends up at LAPD and got some info from them.”

  Holly took note of the way he made a big deal about calling the Los Angeles police department. Good. Maybe they’d hire him. One could hope.

  “Apparently he pissed off a well-known porn director, and the dude told him to get lost or he’d lose his balls. He was trying to start up his own production company and entice this other guy’s girls into his business. So he moved here and, check this out, not only does he own and operate The Elegance Dating Service, he also owns and operates The Right Connection Dating Service.”

  “Where Patricia Collins was a member,” Holly said.

  “Yeah. But he’s got a partner at that dating service.”

  “Who?”

  “Darla Monroe.”

  “She was the gal working the front desk the other day,” Holly said.

  “And I also got a little more info from one of McKay’s neighbors. She said she saw a silver Mercedes out in front of the McKay house earlier in the evening. They may have voluntarily gone with James and his gal pal before or after they played around. Another hot item is that James is an asthmatic.”

  “Okay. Let’s bring them both in. I need to get a warrant,” Holly said.

  “I’ve already been by their homes and offices,” Carpenter replied. “You know, to sniff around a bit.”

  Holly raised her eyebrows pointedly and crossed her arms in front of her, “You did?”

  “Yes, I did. But don’t worry. I didn’t do anything against regulations. I knew that you’d want to get a warrant. I just wanted to make sure they were both around. I figured that you two were busy enough at the medical examiner’s office.”

  Holly really could not argue that point. Carpenter had gone on his instincts and done the right thing. When it came down to it, the man was a good cop, but it still didn’t change her personal feelings about him—good cop, total asshole. “So they’re around, right?”

  “Nope. The dating services both have signs up saying they’re closed for the Thanksgiving Holiday, and when I swung by each of their residences, no one was around. I’m thinking they jetted off for the long weekend. I doubt they know that we’re on to them, since you went in undercover.”

  “What if they put two and two together though, and skipped town?” Holly asked. “We better check airline reservation lists just in case that’s what happened.”

  “It won’t necessarily mean a thing. It is Thanksgiving weekend. Besides, it’s the busiest airline travel weekend of the year. By the time we get through checking things out, the weekend will be over, and we can walk right into their place of business and take them into custody.”

  “Okay, you do have a good point.” Ugh, she hated admitting to Carpenter that he was right, but she was also not above acknowledging the truth here. “Come Monday, I say we take a drive on over to Mr. James’s and his friend’s houses and see what they have to say. I’ll make my calls and get that warrant going.”

  She looked at Chad, who nodded his head. “Agreed.”

  “For now, I’d like to talk with Dr. Madison and see if she can help me get into James’s psyche. It should help when we do bring him in for questioning. Chad, you want to come?”

  She saw the he
at rise in Chad’s cheeks. Oh, great, the relationship with Brooke was going to interfere with his police work. If he couldn’t even hear the woman’s name without getting hot and bothered, well . . . this could be a problem. “Never mind. Why don’t you check out the gyms we talked about, maybe see if James or this Darla might have belonged to one. It could be another link. Then we’ll hook up back here afterwards.”

  “Deal,” Chad replied.

  “What about me and Maureen?” Carpenter asked.

  “Why don’t you continue running background on James and see if we can get a complete profile on him, especially what his family life was like, if he’s ever been married, and if so, find out if we can talk to the wife, that kind of stuff. If he and his girlfriend are the killers, I don’t want to leave any missing pieces lying around. I want to bring them in and seal it up. Case closed. And Maureen, I need you to check out Darla’s past, see where she’s been and what she’s been up to in the past fifteen years. I’m betting she’s got a history in porn.”

  “Okay.” Maureen headed back to her desk.

  Holly truly felt like they were on the brink of breaking this case. She headed for Brooke’s office.

  Dr. Brooke Madison sat behind her glass-top desk, peering over her eyeglasses, more than likely a designer brand, looking intently at whatever it was she was reading. She didn’t look up as Holly came in. The sight of Brooke, ever the model of elegance and grace, never failed to amaze Holly.

  Her modern office reflected her style and subtle taste, managing to look as if a human being worked there even when surrounded by the clutter and mess of the other precinct offices.

  Her shiny blonde hair (that Holly knew never went beyond four weeks without a touch up) was cut into a shoulder-length bob, and her crystal blue eyes shone brightly as if she were always on top of the world. Right. Holly knew what (or at least who) she was busy on top of these days.

  Holly cleared her throat. Brooke looked up at her. “Must be some interesting reading there.”

  “Well, hello, Detective.” Brooke removed her glasses. “I can only guess what has brought you to see me.”

  “I suppose you can.”

  “The ‘Family Man.’”

  Holly cringed at the title, but once the media named the murderer, it had stuck. Even the precinct staff was calling him that. “I’d prefer to call him something else.”

  “I’m certain you would. I’ve got some theories about him, and I think I might be able to help you come up with a profile.”

  “I am here for that exact reason, Doctor. We may actually have a suspect, but up to now, we haven’t located him. Once we do, and we confirm he is the murderer, I’d like to know exactly who it is I’m dealing with. What are you thinking?”

  “First, don’t expect this one to slow down anytime soon. If you don’t locate your suspect, or if he’s the wrong man, he will continue to hunt and kill.”

  “I was afraid that you might say that.”

  “And I don’t say it necessarily because I think he truly likes to kill and revel in his kill the way that so many psychotics and psychopaths do. No, there’s more to this person than that. He’s rather complicated, I’d say. I read your report about the possibility of his considering himself the father in these cases. I also had a good look at his letter. Very interesting. Quite an ego on this one.”

  “Great. So now tell me what you’re thinking about this loser.”

  “Like I said, it’s not about the killing. He’s got a romantic fascination with family life and what that means to him. My guess is that he was terribly abused as a child.” Brooke shifted in her oversized black leather chair.

  “It always starts at home, doesn’t it?”

  “A good share of the time. Here’s what I think. He has been searching for the perfect family, and he does a good job finding them, stalking them, and insinuating himself into their lives for however long he needs them to play along with his fantasy. Until he determines that it’s time to kill. Based on what I’ve seen in the reports, when the assault happens, the mothers go into a fright-and-flight response. Their main objective is to save their child. I read over Dr. Lareby’s reports and noted that he found sedatives in the children. I think that he rapes the mothers while the children are drugged, and all that the mothers can think about is saving their child.”

  “That would be a normal response.”

  “Yes. However, it’s not working for them.”

  “No kidding.” Holly sighed. “They’re all dead.”

  “Once his victim, the mother, starts to fight back, his murderous rage is fueled. This path that he is on probably originates from the abuse that he suffered. My guess here is it’s likely to be his father, and—”

  Holly interrupted. “Wait. Why do you think his anger is about his father when he’s victimizing women? Usually the profile would fit if his mother had beaten him. That would make him want to lash out and kill her.”

  “Yes, usually. Good question. I’ll answer that in a minute. So as I was saying, once the mother fights back, his entire fantasy is destroyed. I mean the perfect daddy, or ‘best daddy,’ as he refers to himself, would not have a disobedient wife.”

  “So he thinks he’s freaking Ward Cleaver and she’s June.”

  “That’s one way of putting it.”

  “Once he’s been disappointed, he kills them.”

  “Yep. He goes straight into a rage, maybe not even realizing what he’s doing.”

  “You’re not going to tell me that once we get him that he’ll be able to plead insanity?”

  “It’s very possible, and if he gets himself a good attorney, it’s likely. And I think he can probably afford a good attorney.”

  “What makes you say that?”

  “My gut says that he’s a professional of some sort, and it’s very likely that he could afford a skilled attorney.”

  “Great. So he could be a school teacher, a gym trainer, a financial planner, a lawyer, whatever.”

  “Yes.”

  “What about a sexual deviant?”

  “That’s obvious,” Brooke replied.

  “Specifically, someone who likes the S&M variety of sex?”

  “I’m not convinced of that. However, as he so viciously mutilated Shannon McKay, I certainly can’t rule it out. I’ll have to finish my analysis.”

  “Anything else that you might be able to tell me?”

  “That’s about it for now. I’m going to go through the mothers’ and children’s profiles and cross-reference them. That might tell us the type of women he’s looking for and what they have in common. Aside from both being attractive, the victims’ physical descriptions are very different from one another.”

  “He’ll probably pick another petite one like our first gal, after the way Shannon McKay tried to fight him off. Let me ask you, do you think he knows his victims, or does he do a random pick?”

  “Good question. I’d have to say that he knows them in some way. It might be a very small passing moment, one with either the mother or the child. They might not even remember ever meeting or seeing him.”

  “Like in passing on a street?”

  “Sure. Or more likely the park, the library, places where mothers might take their children on Saturday afternoons.”

  “Great. Just what I need to be worrying about, every McDonald’s and Chuck E. Cheese out there.”

  “Yes, you probably do until I can get a better profile of him. And no matter where he finds them, he has to blend in and not alarm them in any way. It’s not like these mothers took measures to guard themselves. I get the sense that they were not afraid. Not at first anyway.”

  “So they might have known him better than just a simple smile on the street.”

  “Possibly.”

  “Okay. Before I check out of here and let you off the hook for the evening, you said that you had a theory about the rage being against a father figure rather than the mother. That seems odd to me. From everything I know and learned as a priso
n nurse, I always thought that killers victimize the sex that they hate, usually because of some past connection to a parental figure, so that part I get. But why the father?”

  “Here’s what I think about that. As I’ve said, this killer comes from an abusive home where the dad was the above all and be all, probably a real angry character. The father took out his rage on our killer, his mother, and any siblings he might have had. When his family wasn’t behaving in what he considered an appropriate way, then you can imagine. Given the way your UNSUB’s mind is warped, whatever Daddy was doing to him and his family as a kid was horrendous.”

  “Are you saying that he’s playing the actual role of his father during his escapades?”

  “Maybe. I’m not sure yet. I don’t know if he starts out playing as his own father and then eventually ends up as his own unique father figure symbol. But I can tell you that his father factors heavily into this.”

  “Super. So all I have to do is find all of the abusive fathers in this country in over the last what? Thirty-five years?”

  Brooke gave a slight, haughty laugh. “If your suspect doesn’t pan out, then yes. Not an easy task, my friend. I don’t envy you bringing this one to justice. He’s smart, but I think if he is angry enough, he might get careless, and you may get a break.”

  “You think he’ll strike again if we don’t bring him in soon?”

  “Did you have any doubts?” Brooke leaned forward in her chair, rolling her fists up under her chin.

  “I was sort of crossing my fingers.”

  “Unless this guy takes a flying leap off the Coronado Bridge or a set of gang-bangers from Logan Heights gets a hold of him, I’d say he’s going to strike again very soon. It’s too bad you can’t locate your suspect. Is it this William James character? Carpenter sent me down a file and had me take a look.”

  “That would be the one,” Holly replied.

  “Don’t get your hopes up too high, Holly. This James character is a real scary man, and some of it fits. But some of it doesn’t. I’m not always right, but keep your eyes on the road and look for all possibilities. I know the lab is processing James’s DNA that you brought in. If it comes back positive, then you probably have your man, and I’ll be proven wrong.”