The Night Monster

by James Swain

  “So getting the license plate won’t do you any good.”

  “No.”

  My eyes were starting to hurt from staring at the screen, and I wearily rubbed them. There was no greater frustration than chasing down a lead, only to find that it was a dead end. I clicked my fingers, and Buster reluctantly left his spot beside Riddle’s chair.

  “Thanks for your help,” I said.

  “Sorry it didn’t pan out,” Valentine said. “I’ll show you out.”

  I followed Valentine across the surveillance control room. Riddle stared at his computer, oblivious to my leaving. He pointed an accusing finger at the screen.

  “Whoa! Take a look at this.”

  I hurried back to his desk. The film of Mouse in the parking lot was still playing. Mouse stood by the minivan along with two poorly dressed men holding knives. Mouse handed his wallet to them, then slipped off his watch and one of his rings.

  “It’s a stick-up,” Riddle said. “These two guys have robbed patrons before.”

  “You know them?” I asked.

  “They’re a couple of crackheads. They hide in the bushes at night, and rob people leaving the casino. We’ve tried to catch them, but never had any luck.”

  I watched Mouse hand over his jewelry. One of the crackheads pointed at the minivan. Mouse unlocked the rear door and stepped back.

  Both crackheads stuck their heads into the back of the minivan. As if being sucked by a giant vacuum, they were pulled inside. As they struggled helplessly, their weapons and loot fell to the ground. One lost a shoe. Although the tape had no audio, I could almost hear their screams.

  “What was that?” Riddle asked.

  “Your crackhead thieves just got the tables turned on them,” I said.

  “I saw that. But what was that thing inside the minivan?”

  I wanted to tell him, only I’d grown tired of telling a story that no one believed. On the screen, I saw Mouse close the minivan door, and retrieve his belongings from the ground. He got behind the wheel and drove away.

  “I need a copy of this, as well as the surveillance tape inside the casino,” I said.

  “Right now?”

  “Please.”

  Riddle burned two copies of each film and handed me the CDs. I slipped them into my pocket.

  “Tell me what was in the back of the minivan,” Riddle said. “If you don’t, I’m going to have nightmares about that thing.”

  “It was a bad guy with a bad attitude.”

  “But he looked like a monster.”

  “He is a monster.”

  Valentine was waiting on the other side of the room. As I followed him out, I glanced over my shoulder. Riddle had rewound the film taken in the casino parking lot, and was watching it again. The look on his face told me that he believed me.

  CHAPTER 16

  alentine walked me to the casino’s entrance. We shook hands, and he handed me his business card. It said Grift Sense and had a phone number.

  “Call me if you need me,” Valentine said.

  I pocketed his card. “I will.”

  Valentine reached down and petted the top of Buster’s head.

  “I like your pup. Is he much trouble?”

  “Him? Never.”

  I walked outside. The afternoon sunshine was blinding, and there was no breeze. The sunshine felt good on my skin, and I headed toward the back of the parking lot with the heat rising through my sandals.

  I was sweating by the time I found the spot where Mouse had been mugged. It was in the very rear of the lot, near a stand of bushes. I searched the ground for anything that might have been dropped.

  Buster hit the bushes with his nose to the ground. He reappeared with a sneaker in his mouth. I made him drop the sneaker into my hand, and he took several excited steps back, hoping I’d throw it.

  “Good boy.”

  I examined the sneaker. It was made by Reebok and was missing its laces. It was old, but not dirty. It looked like something a homeless person might wear, and I found myself wondering if it had belonged to one of the crackhead robbers.

  I walked to my Legend holding the shoe at arm’s length. It stunk to high heaven, and I unlocked the passenger door, and threw it on the floor. I made Buster get into the passenger side, which he happily did.

  The neighborhoods around the Hard Rock were upper middle class. I drove down their narrow streets with my windows down. Buster was good at picking up scents, and I was hoping he’d pick up the shoe’s scent in one of the neighborhoods. Mouse wasn’t stupid, and I had a feeling he’d gotten rid of the crackheads quickly.

  I entered a subdivision called Shady Oaks. Not a single oak tree in the entire place. A large number of “For Sale” signs were planted on front lawns. Nearly half the houses looked empty.

  Passing a street called Whisper Lane, Buster got animated. He stuck his head out the window and began pawing his seat. I looked around to see if there was another dog in the area, but didn’t see any.

  “What is it, boy? You smell something?”

  Buster’s head was firmly stuck out his window. Backing up, I turned down Whisper Lane. A dog’s sense of smell was a thousand times more sensitive than a human’s, and my dog let out a mournful whine.

  I braked at a two-story Spanish-style home with a “For Sale” sign on the lawn. The house was under construction, and looked half-finished. I leashed Buster and got out of the car. He pulled me up the path.

  Buster hit the front door with his nose, and it swung open. I didn’t like entering strange houses uninvited, even unfinished ones.

  “Hello? Is anyone home?”

  My voice echoed across the high-ceilinged foyer. The sweet smell of sawdust hung in the air, mingling with spackle and drying paint. I found it surprising that the house was under construction considering the number of “For Sale” signs I’d seen, but after all, this was south Florida. No matter what state the economy was in, they just kept building.

  Buster led me down a hallway to the back of the house. He was straining at his leash and pulling my arm. He had locked onto a scent and was not stopping until he’d found its origin.

  The hallway led to a family room, which in turn led to a screened-in lanai. The slider to the lanai was pulled open. I went up to it and stopped. Then I stared.

  The lanai contained a swimming pool shaped like a lima bean. The water in the pool was a sickening blood red. Floating in the water were two men, both bloated and very dead. One was missing a sneaker on his left foot.

  Buster looked up at me, his tail wagging.

  “Good boy,” I said quietly.

  I had seen the dead more times than was healthy. Something about these two wasn’t right. After a pause, I realized what it was. Their killer had twisted their heads so they were floating facedown in the water, while their torsos were floating face up.

  Protocol would have dictated that I call one of the several detectives that I knew in Homicide, but I wanted Burrell to see the crime scene first, and hear what I had to say. I called her from my car. Fifteen minutes later, she pulled up in her red Mustang with the racing stripes down the sides. It was the kind of car I would have owned if I could afford it. I told her about the dead floaters, and we headed inside.

  “Please leave Buster outside,” she said.

  “But he found them,” I replied.

  “Leave him outside anyway. I don’t want him contaminating the crime scene.”

  “He’s not going to piss on anything.”

  “Just do it.”

  I tied Buster to a tree, then led Burrell inside to the floating corpses. She picked up on the unnatural position of their heads quicker than I had, and turned her eyes away.

  “Jesus Christ. Who are they?”

  “A couple of druggies. They were mugging people in the parking lot of the Hard Rock, and picked the wrong victim.”

  “How did you happen to find them here?”

  I told her about my trip to the Hard Rock, and what I’d learned from viewin
g the casino’s surveillance tapes. When I was done, I removed the two CDs Riddle had burned for me from my pocket.

  “The first CD contains a casino surveillance film of a guy named Mouse who was stalking Sara Long,” I said. “The second CD shows Mouse getting mugged by these two guys behind the casino, and what happened to them. Mouse is driving the same minivan that was used to abduct Sara Long. He and his partner are responsible for Sara Long’s abduction, and for killing these guys.”

  Burrell stared at the CDs and shook her head.

  “You don’t want them?” I asked.

  “I’ll just throw them in the file.”

  Disgusted, I slipped the CDs back into my pocket.

  “I’m sorry, Jack, but more evidence has surfaced linking Tyrone Biggs to the abduction,” Burrell said. “I was in the process of charging Biggs when you called me.”

  “What evidence?”

  “Biggs secretly made sex tapes of himself and Sara when they were dating. They’re pretty steamy. In one, he’s ties Sara facedown to a bed and has sex with her multiple times. The tapes were found hidden in the trunk of his car.”

  “What does that prove beside they were into kink?”

  “He was blackmailing her with them.”

  “Why? He’s going to be rich once he’s in the NBA.”

  “He didn’t want money. He wanted Sara back. Biggs told us so after we confronted him with the tapes. He’s in love with Sara, and wanted to be her boyfriend again.”

  “That doesn’t prove Biggs abducted her.”

  “Yes, it does. It was his motive. We have our case, and we’re moving forward with it.”

  “You’re making a mistake.”

  “I don’t work for you anymore, Jack. Don’t lecture me.”

  Burrell and I did not argue well, and our arguments often ended with one of us getting our feelings bruised. She took out her cell phone and called for backup, then called EMS. Folding her phone, she gave me a harsh look.

  “I’m going to play devil’s advocate,” she said. “Let’s pretend you’re right, and the goons that killed these two guys are Sara Long’s abductors. Tell me what their motive is. Are they kidnappers?”

  “No,” I said.

  “Serial killers?”

  I shook my head.

  “Then what are they?”

  “Serial abductors.”

  “You still think this is linked to that cold case from eighteen years ago that you never solved?”

  “Yes, I do.”

  “All right, let’s pretend that these guys are serial abductors. What’s their motive? Why did they abduct that college student from her apartment when you were a rookie? And why did they abduct Sara Long?”

  “I don’t know. But I’m going to find out.”

  “Look all you want, Jack. No one’s stopping you.”

  “You’re still going to arrest Tyrone Biggs?”

  “Damn straight. Then I’m going to grill him, and find out where he put Sara Long. Biggs killed Sara, and I want to know where he hid her body.”

  Outside I heard the wail of sirens. As a rule, police cruisers only came quickly when another cop was making the call. Burrell walked out of the lanai, and stopped at the entrance to the hallway.

  “Without any real evidence that someone else abducted Sara Long, you’ve got nothing, Jack,” Burrell said.

  I gazed at the bloated corpses floating in the pool. I’d just given Burrell all the evidence she needed, only she’d chosen not to look at it. I was done with the police.

  CHAPTER 17

  sat on a chair in the empty room, and gave my statement to a Homicide detective, who wrote it down on a notepad. Then he videotaped me. Later, he would compare my answers for any inconsistencies or things I might have left out. The process lasted forty-five minutes, and was draining.

  When the detective was done, Burrell entered the room with Buster on a leash. She handed the leash to me, and we walked outside.

  “I took him for a walk and gave him some water,” she said, trying to make nice.

  “Thank you, Detective,” I said.

  “Are you still mad at me?”

  “Whatever gave you that idea.”

  I put Buster into my car and climbed behind the wheel. Burrell rapped the driver’s window with her knuckles. I lowered the window and she knelt down so our faces were a few feet apart.

  “I hate when you pout,” she said.

  Her conscience was eating at her. I jammed the key into the ignition and turned on the engine. I left the engine running and looked at her.

  “What do you want me to do?” she yelled at me. “Disobey the mayor, and get my ass fired? I don’t want to end up …”

  She didn’t want to end up like me. I couldn’t blame her, but that didn’t mean I was going to back off.

  “Go ahead and charge Biggs,” I said. “He’s pond scum and deserves the humiliation. When you talk to the press, tell them he’s the main suspect at this time. Then have a meeting with the chief, and tell him that you have doubts about Biggs, and you want to continue to pursue other leads. The chief will understand and give you his blessing. By doing that, you’ve covered your ass.”

  Burrell dipped her chin and shut her eyes. I thought I saw her lips move. The detective who’d interviewed me came to the front door of the house, and called to her.

  “All right, Jack. I’ll do it.” She banged twice on the hood of my car and went inside.

  I got on 595 and headed east. I had lived with Naomi Dunn’s abduction for so long, it had eaten an invisible hole in me. I could only imagine what Sara Long’s disappearance was going to do to my psyche if I didn’t find her.

  Soon I was driving south on I-95, my destination the FBI’s Miami field office in North Miami Beach. The office handled criminal activity stretching from Vero Beach to Key West, as well as Central America and Mexico, and was a hotbed of activity, with over seven hundred special agents and support personnel housed in a single facility.

  One of those agents was Special Agent Ken Linderman. Linderman ran the Child Abduction Rapid Deployment Unit, and was responsible for investigating nonparental abductions of kids in Florida. As a rule, the FBI didn’t work with private investigators, and Linderman was no exception. But he did work with me. We had a history, and Linderman never failed to take my phone calls, or see me if I asked for an appointment.

  The afternoon skies were darkening as I drove up to the guard booth. A man in uniform came out, and glanced suspiciously at me and Buster.

  “What can I do for you?” the guard asked.

  I handed him my driver’s license. “My name’s Jack Carpenter. I’m here to see Special Agent Linderman. He runs the CARD unit.”

  “Hold on.”

  The guard called into the building. I popped my trunk in anticipation of being searched. The guard came out and did a quick inspection.

  “Have a nice day,” he said.

  I did my usual hunt for a parking place. Finding one with shade, I rolled down my windows. Buster curled up on the passenger seat and went to sleep.

  Soon I was sitting in Linderman’s office. The office had a nice ocean view, only Linderman chose to sit at his desk with his back to the window. Nearing fifty, he was thin and compact, his gun-metal gray hair cropped short like a Marine’s, his eyes as hard as stones. Before coming to Miami, he’d run the FBI’s Behavioral Sciences Division, where he’d profiled the nation’s worst serial killers and mass murderers. Then, five years ago, his daughter Danielle had vanished while jogging at the University of Miami. He’d been looking for her ever since, and had taken the CARD job to continue his search.

  We’d met a year ago. We didn’t have much in common except a shared passion for our work. In that regard, we were like brothers. I’d helped Linderman chase down many leads. We had traipsed through mosquito-infested swamps together, and searched abandoned scrap yards. I had seen him break down when we’d found a bone in a shallow hole, only to later discover that it belonged to a dead ani
mal. I’ve heard it said that a person who loses a child dies every day. If that was true, then I’d seen Linderman die many times.

  “I need your help,” I told Linderman.

  He hit his intercom, and told his secretary to hold his calls.

  “I’m listening,” Linderman said.

  “Eighteen years ago I got called to an apartment complex where a coed named Naomi Dunn was being assaulted. I got knocked down by the attacker, and he left with Dunn slung over his shoulder. The case was never solved.

  “Last night, a Florida State female basketball player named Sara Long was abducted from her motel. It was the same guy who abducted Naomi Dunn. I tried to stop him, and he put me in the hospital.”

  “Did you get a good look at him?”

  “The abductor was this huge guy, and incredibly strong. I spent today running down leads and looking at evidence. This guy has a partner, and I’ve decided that they’re a pair of serial abductors who specialize in abducting athletic young women. I need the FBI to help me find them.”

  Linderman’s eyes narrowed. His daughter’s high school graduation photograph sat on the windowsill directly behind him. Danielle Linderman was tall, blond, and athletic, just like the two victims.

  “Could this pair have abducted my daughter?” he asked.

  His voice was flat and hard. I detected no outer emotion on his face, but I knew it was there, buried deep within him like a smoldering flame. I didn’t want to fill him with false hope, but for all I knew it could be true.

  “Yes,” I said.

  His eyelids fluttered almost imperceptibly.

  “I’ve spoken with the police several times,” I continued. “Unfortunately, they’re stuck on another suspect. Sara Long’s boyfriend is going to be charged with her abduction.”

  His jaw tightened. “You obviously came here with a plan of action. What is it?”

  “I’d like you to do two things for me. The cops have located the stolen minivan used in the abduction. The abductors wiped it clean of fingerprints, but there’s a chance they left behind some trace of DNA. I was hoping the FBI would inspect the minivan to see if I’m right.”

  “That’s not a bad idea. Where’s the minivan now?”