Painted Beauty (2019 Edition)

by J. M. LeDuc

“What’s in there?” Sin asked.

  Tiffany shook her head. “Just open it.”

  “Before I open it, I need to know who it’s from.”

  Tiffany lifted her mug with now shaking hands and sipped the fresh coffee. But as she tried to set it back down easily, the hot liquid spilled on her arm and sloshed all over the table.

  Taking a napkin, Sin handed it to the obviously upset reporter. “Why don’t you take a deep breath and tell me how you came to find the envelope.”

  “It’s from him,” Tiffany said.

  “Him?”

  “The Painted Beauty Killer.”

  Sin studied the woman as if wondering what kind of game Tiff was playing. Moving forward in her chair, Sin watched the tears fall down Tiff’s cheeks and began to wonder if this set-up was no set-up at all. “What’s inside?”

  “Open it.” Tears spilled over her lashes.

  Sin reached into her backpack and pulled out a pair of latex gloves. Once on, she opened the clasp and peered inside. Another envelope, similar to the ones found at the crime scenes, and some photos, met her gaze.

  After deciding Tiff wasn’t offering up crocodile tears in order to get an interview, Sin closed the envelope and took a deep breath, “Do you feel well enough to drive?”

  “Yeah, my nerves are starting to calm down.”

  Sin slid a twenty-dollar bill under her coffee cup.

  “Follow me back to the office. We can continue our talk there.”

  Tiffany shook her head and stared at the envelope. “The note says no cops or FBI except for you, or . . .” her words caught in her throat, “I’ll be next.”

  Sin pulled the stationery out of the manila envelope and read the threat. “Since the FBI refuses to show my art for the world to see, you will make sure that the photos of my masterpieces make it on the six o’clock news. If you don’t, I will be back to pay you a visit.

  “Jesus,” Sin exclaimed, “the bastard was in your house. Where exactly did you find this?”

  “On my kitchen table.”

  “Did he take anything?”

  “I don’t think so. But he did leave me something.”

  Sin’s eyes narrowed, “More than this?”

  “Keep reading.”

  Sin continued where she left off. “When you show my pictures to the public this evening, wear the little black Chanel dress with the matching shoes.”

  “The freak went through your closet?”

  “Worse,” Tiffany murmured. “There were shoes and a dress on my bed. They’re not mine.”

  Sin went back to reading.

  “Bring this letter to Agent O’Malley and tell her to back off. If she keeps prying, the body count will rise. You are to go to no other authorities with this information. If you do, I’ll know, and I’ll be back for you.”

  Sin thought for a moment. “I don’t want to go through all this evidence here in public. I’ll have to take it with me. Do you have anywhere you can go? A friend’s place or family?”

  Tiffany began to sob. “No one.”

  Sin bit into her lower lip. Fuck. Frank, you’re going to kill me, but I don’t see any other choice. “Follow me back to my houseboat. It’s docked across from the Fontainebleau Hotel.” She leaned in and stared Tiffany in the eye. “Do you think you can do that?”

  Wiping away the tears, Tiffany nodded. “I’m parked in the garage across the street; it may take me a few minutes to get back here.”

  Sin slid her backpack onto her shoulder and walked toward her bike. “No problem, I’ll wait.”

  When the reporter reappeared, she pulled in behind her driving a black-on-black Mustang.

  There might be hope for her yet, Sin thought.

  She waved for Tiffany to come up beside her.

  “In case we get separated, I’ll meet you on the boat.”

  Tiffany dropped her designer shades over her eyes. “Meet you there.”

  The muscle car jumped to life and its exhaust screamed its gratitude as Tiffany raced down A1A.

  Sin jumped on and kick started her bike in one motion and rocketed down the street behind her. Quickly catching up, she twisted the throttle and deftly weaved between the cars until the Mustang was in her rearview mirror.

  Tiffany wasn’t the only one trailing Sin. A white panel truck with stolen plates was following from a distance behind the reporter.

  “I’m starting to think the hunt is just as exciting as the art,” she cackled.

  Ash gripped the wheel tight but smiled. Me too, he thought, me too.

  26

  Sin waited next to the houseboat for Tiffany to pull even with her bike.

  “Where do I park?” Tiffany asked.

  Sin pointed to the Fontainebleau Resort and Spa across Collins Avenue. “Just tell the valet you’re visiting me. He’ll take care of you.”

  Sin—and Ash—watched as Tiffany made a tight U-turn and drove up the steep drive of the hotel. Sin waited for Tiffany to walk back down and cross the street not paying any attention to the white panel truck as it drove by.

  Inside the cabin of the boat, Sin pointed to the small table in the galley. Tiffany sat down and looked around. “Nice place you have here. This is prime dock space. I often wondered who owned this boat.”

  “It belongs to a friend,” Sin said. “He leaves it docked here. I just borrow it when I’m in town.”

  “Nice friend.”

  An image of Charlie flashed through Sin’s mind. “Yeah, he is.” She opened a cabinet and reached for a bottle of Patron. Placing two shot glasses on the table, she filled them.

  “I know it’s early but you look like you could use this, and I don’t think anyone should ever drink alone.”

  Tiffany didn’t hesitate. She lifted the glass and tossed the shooter down her throat like an old pro. Smiling, Sin did the same.

  “Now that you’re a little more relaxed, tell me what happened and how you found this envelope. You said earlier that it was on your kitchen table. I need you to try and recall all of the details.”

  “When I got home from the station, it was propped up against a bowl on my kitchen table.”

  Sin grabbed a piece of paper and handed a pen to Tiffany. “Let’s start with the basics. Write your address down and everything you did today from the moment you woke up. Even the smallest detail could be important.”

  “That won’t be hard,” Tiffany said as she wrote. “I woke up at six, got dressed, and went to work.

  “I went to the station and answered my voicemail, and then my cameraman, Donny, and I went to Waterfront Park and shot some follow up footage. After that, we went back to the station and spent the rest of the morning editing. I was hungry and wanted to shower before the midday news. That’s when I went home and found the envelope.”

  “Any roommates?”

  “No, I live alone.”

  In her mind, Sin imagined Tiffany’s path through her apartment.

  “Does anyone else have a key to your apartment?”

  “No, no one.”

  “Does the building have a maintenance crew or property manager?”

  “Yeah, we have maintenance as part of our lease agreement.”

  “I’ll need their contact information,” Sin said. She watched Tiffany write down the information and then continued her thought process. “You find a strange envelope. Then, what do you do?”

  “I opened it and took out the pictures. As soon as I saw the first few, I had a pretty good idea who left them.”

  “Then what?”

  “I opened the letter. After I read it, I called you. Then I ran into my bedroom to see if he took anything. I saw the…outfit, and ran out as fast as I could.”

  “Did you touch anything else in the apartment?”

  “No. As soon as I saw the clothes, I grabbed the envelope and ran out. I swear.”

  “What about the clothes you’re wearing. I don’t imagine you wore that for the footage you shot at the park this morning.”

  “I cha
nged at the station. The shoes I wear on-camera are uncomfortable, so I only dress up when I’m on location.”

  Sin nodded. She pulled a pair of gloves from her backpack and removed the pictures from the envelope. There were numerous photos of the killer’s latest work. Most were taken of the victim’s face through the metal bars of a cage. There were shots from different angles with a few showing the eyes peering through an opening in the steel.

  My God, Sin thought, they look so alive. A thought of the young woman being placed in that contraption while still breathing flashed across her mind, but she quickly blinked it away.

  The rest of the photos were of Tiffany, as well as his two victims—surveillance photos. There was a picture of Vivienne entering the Stokler Gallery in Delray Beach and one of her walking into her apartment building. There were similar shots of the latest victim waiting in line in a coffee shop, and a few of Tiffany. There was even one of Tiffany’s car and license plate.

  Son of a bitch. This freak is trailing her.

  Sin put everything back in the envelope and took off her gloves. “Wait here,” she exhaled, “I need to make a call.”

  Jack picked up on the first ring. “Where are you? I—we are worried sick.”

  “Yeah, well, no need to worry about me, but we do have other problems.” Sin ran down her conversation with Tiffany and what she found in the envelope.

  “We need to place her in protection,” Jack said.

  “I know.”

  As if reading her mind, he continued, “But if she doesn’t run the photos on the news, he’s going to try and kill again.”

  “He’s going to kill either way.”

  Sin thought about the poem. “I need to show you what I discovered while I was gone.”

  “All right,” Jack said, “bring the reporter here and we can formulate a plan. I can’t think of a safer place for her at the moment.”

  “See you in twenty.”

  27

  When Sin and Tiffany arrived at headquarters, the place was hopping. Agents were milling about and the drug taskforce was gathered for a debriefing. Sin heard a familiar voice from her past, and peeked into the room. Running the meeting was an agent she’d worked with back when she’d first joined the FBI—Bill Duggen. Her presence caught his eye, and he gave her a slight nod, not skipping a beat in his update to the team. Sin was happy to see Duggen.

  Evelyn was at her desk, but not for long. Sin asked her to take Tiffany to an unused room and Evelyn nodded, asking Tiffany to follow her.

  “I don’t mean to be a pain,” Tiffany said, “but is it okay if I call the station? I need to let them know that I won’t be able to make the midday news, and I need to make arrangements if I’m going to broadcast at six.”

  “That’s fine,” Sin responded. “Tell them you have breaking news and that you need to be on the air at six. Agent Gonzales will take you to the station, stay with you, and bring you back here when you’re finished.”

  Tiffany pulled at her tank top. “I’ll need to change.”

  “I hope you have something at the station because your apartment is now a crime scene and you can’t go back there until it’s cleared.”

  She nodded. “I always keep a change of clothes there just in case.”

  Tiffany pulled her cell phone from her purse and began to dial. Sin reached for it and took it away before she could finish the connection. Addressing Evelyn, Sin said, “Let Tiffany use the landline to make the call.”

  She then proceeded to the conference room. McGuire and Gonzales were already there.

  The whiteboard was full of new information.

  Jack looked at Sin with a questioning expression, and Sin acknowledged him silently.

  Jack had witnessed the conversation between Sin and Tiffany. “You think the killer has a trace on her phone?”

  “I have no idea, but I’m not taking any chances.”

  The three of them spent the next hour going over Jack and Alejandro’s conversations with the Stokler siblings. She took out the Blake poem, A Divine Image, she’d printed at Charlie’s and handed a copy to both men.

  “That’s some deep stuff,” Jack said.

  “Yeah, and it must mean something special to our killer because he’s using it as a blueprint.”

  “What do you mean?” Gonzales asked.

  “The murders,” Sin explained. “The first, highlighted the heart; the chest was cut open like a ‘hungry gorge.’ The second, accentuated the face, which was sealed in a furnace.”

  Jack and Alejandro reread the poem.

  “When we asked Ashley and George about the lines left by the killer, they denied ever having seen them but, I have to say, their expressions told a different story.”

  Sin ran down what she found out in the Keys and stressed the fact that she couldn’t find any information on Miranda that dated before 1978. When Evelyn returned, Sin asked her to run a background check, hoping she was missing something.

  Turning her attention back to the men, she pulled a stack of images she’d printed from the Internet. “Check these out. What we thought was a helmet, turns out to be a replica of an old wood- or coal-burning furnace. ‘The face a furnace seal’d.’ ”

  “Jesus,” Jack said, scanning the poem, “you know what this means?”

  Sin completed Jack’s thought, “It means he’s not done. There are two lines left to complete—”

  “His divine image,” Jack said.

  28

  As Sin was about to leave the field office, Evelyn showed up waving a file.

  “We have a positive identification on the second vic.”

  Sin was hoping this was the break she needed. Rifling through the file, she was soon disappointed. “Our perp is doing a better job of scouting his victims than we are at finding him,” she sighed. “Sylvia Lang seems to fit the same MO as Vivienne Spinner: a loner. Hell, except for her job, she appears to practically be a recluse.”

  Glancing at the clock, Sin asked Evelyn if she would call Quincy and have some of his techs go and scour Sylvia’s residence. “Who knows, we might get lucky,” she mumbled. Her own disbelief ringing through her tone.

  Sin and Jack watched the six o’clock Action News from atop stools in a sports bar on Brickell Avenue. They had just finished going over tomorrow’s plan of action concerning the Stoklers when the anchor mentioned that they had breaking news in the Painted Beauty case.

  She watched as the camera cut to a nervous looking Tiffany.

  Tiffany took a deep breath, appeared to center herself, and smiled brightly at the camera. “This is Tiffany Swenson reporting for Action News. I received a package from the Painted Beauty Killer—pictures of his latest victim. They are graphic, so I ask viewers to please use discretion.”

  Images of the victim wearing the furnace flashed on the screen. When the camera panned back, Tiffany was almost in tears. She began to choke up, and steadied herself once more. “The FBI has asked me not to divulge any further information at this time, and I will be respectful of that request. This is Tiffany Swenson reporting.”

  “She did a good job,” Jack said. “Brave girl.”

  “But did she do enough to appease the maniac?”

  29

  Ash watched with great anticipation as the camera switched from Jim Day, the news anchor, to Tiffany Swenson. He became frustrated when he didn’t see her wearing the clothes he bought her.

  His frustration turned to anger when the pictures scrolled across the screen. She didn’t show the close-ups of Sylvia Lang. His anger turned to rage when Tiffany failed to mention his “artwork.”

  “That little bitch,” she screeched.

  Ash balled up his fist until his fingernails began to cut into the palm of his hand. Physical pain dulled the psychological torture.

  “No matter,” her voice calmed once again, “the art must continue.”

  Ash unfurled his fist and wiped blood from his palm onto his jeans. He dropped his head and began to pull at the roots of his ha
ir. Don’t say it, he thought, please don’t say it.

  “ ‘Cruelty has a human heart, and jealousy a human face; terror the human form divine, and secrecy the human dress.’ ”

  Ash broke out in a cold sweat as he mouthed the words along with her.

  Words he had spent years trying to forget.

  Words that brought memories—bad memories—rushing through his skull.

  Words that years of therapy had erased or tried to erase from his mind.

  Before she returned.

  “It’s time to find a new canvas. It’s time to create something they will not be able to ignore,” she said. “We will give them a canvas they know well. If we can’t bring the people to the art, we will bring the art to the people.”

  With her last words, she began a hysterical cackle.

  Ash curled in the fetal position and rocked back and forth while praying for her to go away. Hoping beyond hope for the pain to stop.

  30

  Gonzales exited his car and looked around the neighborhood. “It’s been a while since I’ve been down a lot of these little side streets on the beach. I didn’t know these apartments still existed.”

  “Yeah, they’re not the most modern, but a girl has to start somewhere,” Tiffany answered.

  Gonzalez smiled. “I like it. It’s quaint. And you have a view of the ocean. If you squint,” he grinned. “And you probably don’t have to deal with all the pretentiousness of South Beach.”

  Tiffany’s eyes smiled back. “I like my place better when you describe its amenities.”

  “So, you’re on the second floor?” Gonzalez said, opening the front door.

  “Yep, the penthouse,” Tiffany mused.

  “I’ll tell you what,” Gonzales said, taking off his sunglasses, “why don’t you run upstairs and pack what you need while I try to locate the property manager.”

  Tiffany smiled. “Sounds good. I won’t be long.”

  Gonzales got lucky, found the property manager, Victor, onsite, and introduced himself. While presenting his credentials and handing him a business card, a piercing scream made him cringe.