by M. Z. Kelly
“What do you mean?” I realized that for the first time since I’d known him he didn’t have a cigar.
“I don’t think I belong in the world anymore. Maybe it’s time to exit stage left.”
I studied him for a long moment before my gaze drifted off, remembering how I’d had a breakdown after Jack was killed. I’d walked through the cemetery where he was buried and had an imaginary conversation with my father. At least I thought it was imaginary. I still wasn’t sure.
During that talk my dad told me about us dancing together when I was a little girl. He then went on to say something that I was still trying to understand.
You’re not the dancer, you’re the dance.
What my dad had said registered with me as I turned back to the little man on the bench next to me.
“Sometimes bad things happen, Morty. We think we have control over events in our life but we don’t really. I think all we can do is try to make a difference one day, one life at a time and move on.” I squeezed his hand. “Hang in there.”
He nodded. His voice was weak. “Maybe you can see if someone can give me a ride back to the Stardust.”
After Morty was gone, Buck and I spent most of the night at the abandoned house. When the medical examiner arrived, we set up a lighting system using a portable generator, developed a grid pattern, and began the task of looking for bodies. Around midnight some crime techies with the sheriff’s department on the mainland arrived with more equipment and took over the scene.
The morning sun was lifting the shadows of night when the head of the CSI unit came over to us. Sherman Oakley was around forty, bald, and squinty. He removed his wire rimmed glasses, mopped his brow, and told us what they’d found.
“There are three bodies. Young women, probably in their late teens, early twenties. There’s a lot of decomp but I’ve seen enough to know they were tortured. Some of the wounds are defensive.” He put his glasses back on, waved a hand. “I want to show you something else.”
I left Bernie with one of the uniforms as Buck and I went over to where the bodies had been buried. The open pits illuminated by the harsh lights and the remains of the young girls lying there, brought back the sadness that Morty and I had felt earlier. But there was something else about the scene that was so bizarre I pushed the sadness way, trying to comprehend what we were seeing.
“Even though there’s a lot of decomposition,” Oakley said, “You can see the cuts at the corners of the girl’s mouths. During the attack the muscles in the face contract, causing the cuts to extend up the victim’s cheeks all the way to their ears.”
The images were horrifying as Sherman Oakley went on about the victims, “The attack is something called a Glasgow Smile. It was originally used by street gangs in Scotland, but it’s been used in a lot of other places over the years.”
It wasn’t just the distress of seeing the mutilated bodies and hearing about the cause of death that shocked me. It was also seeing what the girls were wearing. Each victim was lying in her grave, the mutilated death smile staring up at us. As I examined the dresses the girls wore it broke my heart, knowing that their parents would never see them wearing in life what they now displayed in death. It made me wonder what kind of monster had been set loose in the world.
I turned to Buck, giving voice to what we were seeing. “The girls are wearing wedding gowns. They’re all dressed as brides.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
Bernie and I got home to the Stardust about ten in the morning and took a nap. We had to be back at the station by two for a meeting with the sheriff’s department’s sex crimes unit.
After showering and slipping into a pair of dark pants and a blue blazer there was a knock on my door. I let Natalie and Mo into my room. I was about to shut the door when Sammy Boxer, trailing behind my friends, also slipped inside. He again reminded me of his canine namesake to such an extent that I wondered if he might wag his tail.
Mo was distraught, pacing around the room like a wild woman. “Morty told us about the house, the girls you found.” She turned to me, hands on her hips. “What are we gonna do? If Sissy is in the hands of those lunatics there’s no telling what they’ve done to her.”
“I’m meeting with some sex crimes detectives in about an hour,” I said. “We’re doing everything...”
“That’s not enough,” Mo bellowed. “This whole thing is one turd short of a giant shit storm. Baby sis, Sammy, and me are going on the warpath.”
“What do you mean?”
“We’re going to the press,” Natalie said. “Making a public plea for help.”
“I’m not sure that’s a good idea. The press is already all over the story.”
“Somebody on the island has to have seen something,” Sammy said. He had on a bright green coat and dirty Levis. His head shimmered, slick with sweat. I wondered if it was possible to drip sleaze on the floor. He went on, “Maybe somebody knows something about the victims all being dressed as brides. It could be that the wedding gowns were sold right here on the island.”
“What? How do you know about the wedding gowns?”
Sammy shrugged his big, sleazy shoulders. “It’s a small island. People talk.”
“We need to make this personal,” Mo said. “I’m gonna also talk about Sissy. Maybe somebody’s seen her.”
I sighed. “I don’t see how getting the press stirred up is going to help. And the fact that the girls were dressed as brides is con…”
“Carmine Feckle is gonna interview us,” Natalie said, interrupting me. “He’s got that show Mysteries and Murder on one of them cable stations.”
“Oh great,” I said. I’d heard of Feckle, nothing good, of course.” I checked my watch, deciding it was hopeless to argue with them. “I’ve got to get going.”
***
The taskforce got a late start, waiting on the sex crimes experts to come over from the mainland. When they finally arrived Mike Penny and Jess Heywood were with an older detective named Lou Burr. The senior detective looked like he was pushing sixty. He had a big belly and snow white hair.
Before the meeting began, I whispered to Buck, “Looks like Santa’s come to town.”
Buck smiled. “Let’s just hope he’s brought us some gifts.”
We all gathered in the conference room. Julie Spencer was still without her ailing partner and made a point of sitting next to Buck. I took a seat by Sloan as Bernie got a love hug from Santa before settling down.
“So far, we’ve found three bodies on the Garrett property,” Sloan began, summarizing last night’s events and referring to the name of the original owner of the abandoned ranch house. The lieutenant took a moment, passing out photographs of the victims. “The probable ages of the girls is anywhere from sixteen to twenty-five. The bodies showed signs of defensive wounds and torture, including what you can see in the pictures. The M.E.”s best guess is they’ve been dead for about six months. We’re waiting on the DNA results. I’ve also got a couple of officers working with the local retailers here on the island hoping to get a match on the wedding gowns, but it’s still early. Not much in the way of trace and there were no prints in the house, but we’re continuing to process the scene.”
“We’ve had a few reports filed on missing girls over the past year,” Buck said. “It was assumed they were runaways but it could be that we’ve found one or more of them.” He passed out flyers on the missing girls.
After some more discussion about the bodies we’d recovered, Sloan turned to the sex crimes detectives. “Do you guys have any theories about why the victims were dressed in wedding gowns, or are we just dealing with some kind of crazy?”
“We not only have a theory,” Jim Penny said, “we’ve brought Lou with us because he’s got a probable match to the victim in Aster’s snuff video.”
As it turned out, Lou Burr aka Santa Claus, did come bearing a gift. It just wasn’t anything Buck or I had expected.
“The victim in your snuff film is more famous in dea
th than when she was alive,” Burr began, in a sonorous voice. “You might even know her by the name the press gave her. She’s one of L.A.’s most famous murder victims. Her name is Angela Mae Waters. She’s The Fallen Angel.
CHAPTER FORTY
The room went silent for a moment after Santa delivered his gift. Lieutenant Sloan finally broke the silence, probably realizing that Santa might be the Grinch in disguise. Sloan’s issues with the press were about to turn into a media firestorm and I hadn’t even told him yet that my friends were planning on meeting with Carmine Feckle.
“How can you be sure it’s the Waters girl? Sloan asked.
“I’ve had her case in the blue fridge for years,” Burr said. “I know it inside and out. Some nights I wake up in a cold sweat, seeing Angela’s face. It’s the same girl.”
Sloan said, “But there’s no evid…”
“It’s Angela. I have no doubt.”
“Can you go over the Waters case, fill us in?” Buck asked.
“I can do better than that.” The elderly detective opened a briefcase and handed out photographs of Angela Mae Waters along with a couple of copies of the original crime reports. The photos were close-up shots of the body. Angela was face-up in the street and bore the same facial injuries, the now familiar Glasgow Smile, our victims had also suffered.
Burr went on, “Photographs of Angela’s body were leaked to the press. When they realized that she was wearing a white dress on the night of her murder, both her attire and her name added to the mystique of the killings, and they dubbed her, The Fallen Angel.”
Burr sipped a cup of coffee that Sloan had offered up before continuing. “Angela’s body was found in an alleyway in North Hollywood on December 10th, 2012. She was twenty-one at the time, a wannabe actress who sometimes worked extra-help at the Golden Corral in Van Nuys.”
“The titty-bar?” Sloan asked, making me think he might be personally familiar with the establishment.
Burr nodded. “She also had a small part in a soap opera at Windsor studios, but, according to her mother, she wasn’t making ends meet, hence the pole work. Angela also had a couple of arrests for soliciting and drug possession. On the day of her murder, her mom said she left home around nine, worked a shift at the Corral until two, before she was found by a transient in the alley that same morning.”
“Were there any injuries besides what we can see in the photographs?” Buck asked.
“Several stab wounds, including a fatal one to the heart. According to the coroner the smile was the finishing touch.”
“I’m a little confused,” Julie Spencer said. “Aster’s video showed the victim being strangled. How can it be the same girl?”
“They didn’t complete the act,” Burr said. “Take a look at the girl’s close-ups.” Spencer picked up one of the photographs as he went on. “The abrasions around Angela’s neck are consistent with manual manipulation, no ligature marks. The session with your two guys probably went on for some time with partial asphyxiation followed by revival. The autopsy showed multiple arterial blood clots, consistent with compression of the neck, that occurred a day or two prior to the fatal attack.”
“I’ve seen similar injuries to DV victims,” I said, putting down the crime reports on Waters and thinking about the domestic violence crimes I’d worked as a patrol officer.
Burr nodded. “It’s a form of control, involving dominance and submission, common with batterers. The partial strangulation gives the perp power and control, making the victim increasingly submissive and terrified.”
“Was there evidence of sexual assault in Angela’s case,” Jim Penny asked.
“The autopsy showed signs of recent genital penetration, bruising, but no DNA.”
“I think my retired partner, Ben Howard, worked the Water’s’ case,” Buck said, apparently now making the connection. “I remember him mentioning it once.”
Burr laughed, not quite a ho, ho, ho, but it was deep and loud. “How is Ben? We worked together in Lomita for a few years. He originally caught the case with me before he got island fever.”
“He’s good,” Buck said. “I’ll have him take a look at the video, too, see if he can make our victim as Waters.”
“It should take Ben about five seconds to make the connection.”
“Was there a conviction in Angela’s case?” Buck asked.
“A guy named Collin Rae Hopkins made one fatal mistake, sending him to death row for Angela’s murder. He left a single fingerprint on a business card for the Golden Corral in her purse. It’s the only physical evidence tying him to the crime.”
“What about the wedding gown?” I asked. “Did you ever come up with a theory about why the girl was dressed as a bride.”
“Hopkins denied the crime so we have no idea what he was thinking. The profiler’s best guess is that it was a way for him to express extreme anger, maybe over a failed relationship. They also speculated that Hopkins might have been engaged at one time and the girl broke it off, causing his internal rage to build until it exploded.”
“Are you still convinced Hopkins was guilty?” Jess Heywood asked.
“Oh, I think Hopkins was involved, but there were probably others, maybe the two guys in your snuff video. I was never convinced that we got all the facts in the case. With what we know about Angela being on this island a couple of days before she died now I’m sure of it.”
“You mean because she was in the video?” Buck asked.
“That and the fact that yesterday her mother confirmed for me that she came to Catalina for a little getaway before she died.”
“Aster,” I said, looking up from the crime reports on Angela Waters that I’d been skimming. I said to Burr, “According to the original reports Clay Aster was the attorney of record for Hopkins.”
Santa nodded and released a throaty laugh. “You just stole my thunder. I remember Clay Aster from when he defended Hopkins. He was a first class asshole who worked with a paralegal who I think is now an attorney here on the island. You might want to go by and have a chat with him. The guy’s name is Peter Roth.”
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
“Chosen for what?” Grace asks Wendy through the wall.
The girl breaks down again, sobbing hysterically. Grace waits, again offering words of encouragement, before Wendy finally regains some control of her emotions and tells her what happened last night.
“I hid in a tree but they found me first, before the other girls. I know what that means. I’ve seen what happens to the girls, the ones who were here before you and the others got here.”
Grace now hears Sissy crying. She’s about to offer her some words of encouragement when she hears sounds from somewhere in the house again. The men have returned. She can hear their muffled voices.
She scrambles away from the wall, anticipating that they will come for her again. What was Wendy going to tell her? She can’t risk talking to her again. All Grace knows for sure is that Wendy thinks she’s going to die. Is that what’s going to happen to all of them? Will the games continue until they are all hunted down and killed?
Grace tries to compose herself but her arms and legs are trembling. She breathes slowly, trying to calm her nerves. If she has any chance to save herself and the other girls she knows she has to relax, think logically.
In her mind, Grace has gone over the layout of the house and what she knows about the woods dozens of times. She’s calculated the approximate number of steps it takes to get to the front and rear doors. If she has the chance, she thinks she could run from her room to the front door in less than ten seconds. But she would need a distraction, something that would occupy the men while she makes a break.
The other opportunity lies in the woods. She knows that the electric fence probably runs the entire length of the property but thinks there may be two ways to get past it. There must be a panel somewhere, a switch that turns off the power. The problem is finding the panel and then trying to unlock it. She thinks if she can find some kind of
pry bar or screwdriver she might have a chance. The other option is to find a way over the fence without touching it. She knows there are fallen trees in the woods. Maybe there’s a way she can use a branch to get over the fence without touching it.
Grace jumps, scrambling against the wall as her door swings open. It’s the man who always comes for her, the one named Priest. “It’s time. Let’s go.”
Grace hurries out of the room, down the hallway. Time for what? Are they all going to die? In a moment she’s in the living room again, waiting as the other girls are brought in one by one from their rooms. She briefly makes eye contact with Sissy, seeing that her eyes are puffy and swollen. When she makes an attempt to go over to her, the man who calls himself Lamech pushes her down into a chair. Then Grace realizes something. Wendy. She’s not here. Have they taken her somewhere else to be killed?
After Lamech leaves the room, the remaining man says, “I am Priest. Last night during The Rendering, there was a choosing. The girl named Wendy was selected.”
“Selected for what?” Maddie says. “You can’t…”
Priest comes over to her, grabs her by the hair, and slaps her. “Silence. Another word and you die.” He holds her head up, meeting her eyes. “Do you understand?”
Maddie nods, slinks back down onto the sofa when he releases his grip.
“Tomorrow night,” Priest continues. “Lamech will marry. It will be a very special ceremony. You are all invited to the wedding.”
Graces turns and sees Lamech coming back into the room. He’s carrying an armful of dresses. He says to them, “Tomorrow will be a very special night. You’re all going to be Wendy’s bridesmaids.”
Lamech hands each of the girls a dress as Priest goes down the hallway. Grace turns, thinking about making a break for the door but Lamech comes over, standing between her and the front door.
“I want you all to be beautiful for tomorrow night’s ceremony,” Lamech says. “The evening must be perfect.” He pauses, his gaze sliding over the girls. “One of you will be the maid of honor.”
