Ruthless: The Faces of Evil Series: Book 6

by Debra Webb

  The husband, Norris, hugged his wife closer.

  “Janey has never walked in her sleep or sneaked outside to play after the two of you went to bed?” Kids did that sometimes. Jess and Lil used to do it all the time—the sneaking-out part. It was a miracle either one of them survived childhood.

  Norris shook his head, his own face red and puffy from the tears he’d shed. “Not Janey. No sleepwalking. Not that we ever knew about, anyway. She’s afraid of the dark. Going outside alone at night? No way.”

  “That’s why she wanted a puppy,” Tammy said. “She doesn’t like sleeping alone. Since her sister died she’s been really terrified of the dark.”

  That was another part of this tragic story that tore at Jess’s emotions. This couple had lost an older daughter to cancer just last year. How were they supposed to cope with this, too? If the Man in the Moon had taken their daughter, the chances of finding her were slim to none. No parent should have to go through the loss of a child once, let alone twice. Jess steeled her determination. She would find this child, by God.

  “Would Janey have opened her window to a stranger?”

  “Oh no.” The mother’s tone and expression were adamant. “We talked about stranger danger often. Janey knows better.”

  “You’re certain all the windows in your home were down and locked last night?” She’d asked this already and gotten an affirmative, but the window in the child’s room was unlocked and in the raised position. Someone had opened it.

  The father nodded firmly. “We haven’t opened the windows since May. Too hot not to run the central air day and night.”

  That was the truth. It was hot as blazes already, and it wasn’t even noon.

  Jess went through the routine questions. Had they noticed anyone hanging around the neighborhood? Following or watching them? Had there been any trouble with friends or family or neighbors?

  A parade of nos followed.

  “Mr. and Mrs. Higginbotham, I’m going to do all within my power to find your little girl. But I need your help. I need a list of any family or friends, public or contracted workers, delivery people, the mailman, anyone you can think of who came to the house or saw Janey in the past couple of weeks. I need the names of anyone you’ve exchanged heated words with. Anyone who’s upset with either of you for some reason. No matter how irrelevant or insignificant it seems, I want to know.”

  They nodded in unison at the tall order. She sighed. Christ almighty, was there any chance at all that he’d left a clue this time?

  “Do you think it’s him?” the mother asked. Her lips trembled.

  “We’ve been watching the news,” her husband added, his voice shaky. “Last night wasn’t the harvest moon. Why would he do this now?”

  That was a very good question and Jess had no answer. “We don’t know that your daughter’s disappearance is connected to that case.” She couldn’t take that hope away from them. Anyone who’d grown up in Birmingham or watched the news recently understood what it meant to have a child taken by this monster. “My team is going to work hard at learning exactly what happened to Janey and getting her back home. I want the two of you to try as hard as you can to focus on helping us. As soon as we know anything, you will.”

  She left the parents in Lori’s capable hands and returned to the child’s room. The mother confirmed that everything was just as she’d left it last night when she kissed her daughter good night. Except for the raised window. Nothing was missing other than Janey’s favorite doll, nothing moved except the window. A photo of the parents and red-haired, freckle-faced Janey sat on the bedside table. More of that emotion she wasn’t supposed to feel on the job nipped at Jess.

  She thought of how close she’d come to telling Dan last night that they might be expecting, but she’d chickened out. Her arms went around her middle. If that was the case, she had to be more careful. She’d gotten so caught up in the game Spears had his followers playing she’d almost gotten hit by a truck.

  Gotta be smarter than that, Jess.

  She shook off the worries and shifted her attention to the rumpled bed covers and the stuffed animals scattered there. Janey wanted a dog.

  Instinct nudging Jess, she turned to the nearest tech. “I’d like you to check for animal hair around the window. Inside, on the stool, and outside.” It was a long shot but she was going for it. The ground was too dry and the lawn too grassy for tracks, human or animal.

  The tech nodded, and Jess decided on another walk-through of the single-level home. The parents’ bedroom wasn’t that far from Janey’s, but her door had been closed, and they’d stated they always fell asleep watching the little television perched on their bureau.

  If only they hadn’t left the television on last night… if they’d made a habit of not closing their daughter’s door…

  She imagined those same thoughts had already gone through their minds about a million times.

  “Ma’am?”

  Jess turned to the rookie who’d lost his breakfast this morning.

  “Sergeant Harper needs you in the backyard.”

  “Thank you, Mitchell.”

  He winced when she called him by name. He probably hoped she would forget his name after witnessing his embarrassing reaction to the Atkins’ suicide scene this morning. She’d have to explain to him later that it happened to everyone at least once.

  She’d puked her guts out the first time she explored a scene with scrambled body parts.

  These days it took a lot to faze her. Yet she fell apart when she saw a dog on the side of the road that had been hit by a car. That was the best reason in the world not to have a pet. You wouldn’t end up mourning something you didn’t have to lose.

  Same went for babies. How the hell was a mother supposed to survive this kind of tragedy?

  Don’t even go there, Jess.

  “I’ll show you the way, ma’am,” Mitchell prompted when she just stood there, borrowing trouble exactly the way she’d advised the parents of this missing child not to.

  Now who was having an embarrassing moment?

  Outside, the humidity was working overtime, making it hard to breathe. At least she didn’t have to deal with reporters shouting questions. Roadblocks had been put in place early enough to hold back the inevitable flock. Given a little more time the more resourceful ones like Gina Coleman would cut through a few yards and risk being arrested for trespassing to reach the scene in hopes of getting a shot.

  Even now, cops at the roadblocks were being grilled for information. As soon as word got out that a little girl under the age of ten was missing, the media would go nuts with theories. Rumors would be rampant, and speculation would push the boundaries and have the community in turmoil. Jess thought of last night’s impromptu visit, and she considered that maybe she should let Gina know how her construction company theory panned out. They were friends now, apparently. Friends did things like that.

  But that would have to wait. Between now and the press conference Dan would need something to give the worried citizens on this tragic new development. The disappearance of another child was the dead last thing a department wanted to confirm.

  Problem was, Jess had no more information than the police had thirteen or thirty-three years ago. Except another missing child who might or might not be related to the case. Bad for all concerned.

  Harper waited near the tree line at the back of the property. “I wish you had different shoes.” He glanced at her four-inch heels that were already giving her fits in the grass.

  Sometimes it was extra difficult being a woman. “We going into the ravine?”

  He nodded.

  She’d been afraid of that.

  “We got a body,” Harper told her.

  Adrenaline fired through her veins, followed immediately by terror. Her knees went a little weak on her. “Not the child?” She prayed it wasn’t that little girl. Damn it all to hell, don’t let it be that child.

  “No, ma’am,” he said softly, as if he spotted the fe
ar in her eyes. “Male. Late fifties, early sixties. No ID.”

  The terror she’d experienced turned to hope. This could be the break they needed. Her pounding heart ramped up another few beats. “I need different shoes.”

  “Mitchell,” Harper barked, “give the Chief your boots.”

  The young officer looked startled then jerked as if someone had kicked him in the seat of the pants. After an uncertain glance at Jess he asked, “My boots?”

  “That’s what I said,” Harper confirmed. “Make it fast.”

  Mitchell’s head yanked up and down. “Yes, sir.”

  While Jess slipped off her heels Mitchell tugged off first one police-issue boot then the other. She pulled on the boots and laced them up tight. As an afterthought she grabbed her shoes and handed them to the patient officer standing in his sock feet. “Keep an eye on these for me, please.”

  He nodded and Jess joined Harper, the too-big boots clomping with every step. She decided not to ask how the boots looked with the taupe dress she’d thought made her look thinner.

  She’d spent no less that fifteen minutes in front of the mirror trying to determine if her abdomen looked swollen.

  Just went to show how the lack of sleep and wine affected an overworked cop. Not to mention trying to hide all of the above from Dan, who’d spent the night.

  She kicked the static out of her head. They had a body. Maybe a lead.

  Harper pointed into the ravine. “There’s a flashlight near the body that he may have been carrying. No weapon and no sign of the little girl.”

  Jess could just make out a wide back and a blue shirt. Could this be the monster that had taken as many as twenty little girls? “Let’s get down there and have a closer look, Sergeant.”

  Harper assisted her down the steep incline. Thankfully the overgrown bushes provided the occasional handhold. Officer Chad Cook waited near the body. Jess’s pulse was racing. She wanted this to be him… but why break his pattern?

  Stay calm. She had a job to do, and letting her emotions run wild wouldn’t get it done.

  “I let the coroner’s office know we needed someone down here,” Harper said. “Evidence techs will start processing as soon as you’ve had a look.”

  “Any visible signs of injury?” They were almost to the body now, and her pulse was racing in spite of her best efforts to maintain her composure.

  “Looks like he got a hell of a knock to the back of his skull, which may or may not have happened before the fall.”

  As they reached the victim’s position, Cook spoke up. “Morning, ma’am.”

  He was right to leave off the good. There was nothing good about this one. Unless this guy was going to lead them to little Janey Higginbotham.

  “Cook.” She gave him a nod before crouching down to have a closer look at the victim. He lay facedown in the weeds. There was something vaguely familiar about him. She inspected the back of his skull with a gloved hand. If he had survived that kind of damage it wasn’t for long.

  “Let’s turn him over, Sergeant.”

  Cook and Harper wrestled with rolling the victim onto his back. Rigor mortis was well under way. He’d probably been dead at least eight or ten hours.

  When he was on his back, Jess gasped. Renewed anticipation started to simmer inside her. “It’s Bullock.” She turned to Harper. “One of Cagle’s meter readers.”

  “We were supposed to be talking to Corlew today about his missing reports on that crew,” Harper mentioned.

  Jess nodded, still reeling a little at the possibility of what this meant. “If Corlew gives you any trouble, you let me know. I spoke to him this morning.”

  At Harper’s raised eyebrows, she added, “Don’t ask.”

  To Cook she said, “Find Lori and get a warrant for Bullock’s home. We’re looking for anything related to the Man in the Moon case or an attraction to young children.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  To Harper, she said, “I want a search team out here looking for that little girl.” She considered the man who’d seemed a little nervous when she interviewed him yesterday. Corlew claimed he acted the same way when he’d interviewed him more than a decade ago. “If Bullock took her, she may be out here somewhere and there could be a dog with her.”

  But Jess had a feeling Bullock had died in this ravine all alone.

  Right where the Man in the Moon had left him. That was where she and Corlew, whether he knew it or not, were in full agreement. The Man in the Moon was smart, meticulous with the details, and obviously capable of considerable restraint. Bullock was too nervous, too twitchy, to pull off this kind of elaborate string of heinous acts.

  The Man in the Moon was, in her opinion, a sociopath. Talking to the cops or anyone else wouldn’t make him nervous. He manipulated, violated, and exploited other humans for his own entertainment. Being interviewed by a mere cop would hardly make him nervous.

  What Bullock may have been guilty of was withholding information. Maybe for fear of losing his job… or his life.

  “I want this guy checked from head to toe,” she said, more to herself than to Harper. “I want to know everything he touched from the moment he set foot on this property.”

  “Unless she’s unconscious or asleep or just too far away to hear,” Harper offered, “I think the child would be calling out for help if she’s injured, or already back home if she wasn’t.”

  Jess nodded. “I don’t believe she’s here, but we need to be certain.”

  The search for that little girl was priority one. Harper had ensured an Amber Alert had been issued the moment he got on the scene and confirmed the situation. Before leaving Jess snapped a pic of a photo of Janey holding her favorite doll. Since that was the one item she’d taken with her besides the pink-and-white polka-dot pajamas she’d been wearing, Jess needed to be able to identify the doll.

  After ensuring Lori was up to speed, Jess left her in charge of the scene. There was one more thing she needed to do and it could not wait.

  “I need to see Fergus Cagle.” Jess exchanged the boots for her shoes and thanked Mitchell. “Surely Cagle would have some inkling there was a problem with a man he’d worked with for more than thirty years. Why cover for him?”

  “You think this Bullock is our guy?” Harper led the way to his vehicle as they talked.

  “I do not, but he’s the first lead in this case in thirty-three years. I’ll take what I can get.”

  Sixth Avenue North, 12:15 p.m.

  “I’m sorry, Chief Harris,” Ruthie Jeffreys, the secretary said, “Mr. Cagle hasn’t been in the office this morning. He’s in the field.”

  “In the field?” Jess needed to see him… to talk to him. Her instincts were screaming at her that Bullock’s death was the avenue to a major break in this case.

  “Yes,” the secretary confirmed. “Sometimes he checks on his team and how their routes are going. Issues come up where customers believe their reading was wrong.” She shrugged as if she didn’t see why Jess didn’t get that. “It’s not unusual for him to spend an entire day in the field.”

  “What about Mr. Bullock?” Jess asked just to see what the lady would say. “Is he on his usual route today?”

  Ruthie shook her head. “No, he’s out sick. Someone else is taking care of his route.”

  “He’s sick?” Jess repeated. “Did he call in?”

  “Mr. Cagle said he had a call from him early this morning. Jerry has one of those stomach bugs or something.”

  Actually what he had was a fractured skull and rigor mortis. Jess would have to wait for time of death but she would bet her favorite pair of shoes Cagle hadn’t gotten a call this morning. “And what about Mr. Gifford and Mr. Kennamer?”

  “Both are on their usual routes,” Ruthie confirmed.

  “I need Mr. Cagle’s cell number, please.” Jess had the routes for the other two. It wouldn’t be too difficult to find them. Besides, it was Cagle she wanted to talk to.

  When Ruthie hesitated, Jess tacked on
, “This is police business.”

  “Well, all right then.” She wrote the number down and passed it to Jess.

  “If Mr. Cagle calls in, please be sure to let him know I’m trying to reach him.”

  “I’ll tell him,” she promised.

  With Harper leading the way, Jess hurried out of the building, barely able to keep her mouth shut until they were outside. As soon as she was in Harper’s SUV with the door closed she let loose. “We have to find Cagle.”

  “You think he’s our perp?” Harper started the engine.

  “What I think is that we have a missing child and a dead guy at the scene—a dead guy who worked as a meter reader for better than three decades. No one else had carte blanche for getting so close to each victim’s home every damned month of the year.”

  The coincidence was just too big. Cagle claimed to have heard from the victim this a.m., and that was most likely impossible. Cagle had dogs. There were pictures in his office. He loved them that much… which meant he knew how to handle a dog like Samson, the Myerses’ Lab. He had the means and he had the opportunity. All they had to do was find the motive.

  Jess struggled to restrain her anticipation and no small amount of excitement at the idea that she had him. She didn’t have squat in the way of evidence, not unless they got something from this morning’s crime scene, but she was certain as she could be without it.

  The jangling sound in her bag had her fishing for her cell. She stared at the number. Not one she knew, but it was local. Wouldn’t be Gina Coleman. Jess had already sent her a text to let her know her lead didn’t pan out, but there was a story to be told about Atkins Electric. Giving Gina the scoop was the least she could do. “Harris.”

  “Jess Harris?”

  Worry insinuated its way between the barely restrained sense of victory and desperate urgency thumping inside her. She was onto something here. She didn’t need any distractions. “This is Jess Harris.”

  What if her sister was back in the hospital? Her heart jolted and immediately she felt guilty for having thought she was too busy.