by Thomas Perry
The man disappeared into the market. Till got his cell phone ready, pressed the camera icon on the screen, and stepped into the market. He went to the right, looking down the first aisle at the vegetables along the wall and the bright fruit in bins. There were several shoppers with carts in that aisle, but the man was not one of them. Till kept walking to the back of the store, but the man wasn’t visible along the line of meat and fish cases. Till looked up each aisle he passed—the dog and cat food, the paper products, the alcohol, the water and soft drinks, the canned goods, the freezer cases.
Till turned into the alcove leading to the restrooms. He put the phone in his pocket and shouldered the door open, prepared for an attack. The men’s room was empty. He stepped into the ladies’ room and stared under each stall for feet, then realized he was alone. He went out and looked for the swinging metal door that would lead to the loading docks in back. He found it and moved through, walking straight and quickly without appearing to look either way. There were three young men engaged in stacking produce that they must have just unloaded, but they didn’t challenge him, probably because he was moving purposefully and was dressed like their bosses. When he got to the loading dock he looked in every direction. He jumped down from the dock.
Till walked around the side of the big building back toward the front. Maybe he had simply missed the man. Maybe he had not been aware that Till had been following him, and he had just gone to get some groceries for Kyra.
As Till went around the front, he saw what he had been looking for. The man was in the driver’s seat of the Jaguar, and he was just closing the door. Till stayed at the corner of the building and moved back out of sight. In a moment, Till looked out again to see the man turning right out of the parking lot. As soon as he was gone, Till ran to his car, got in, and followed.
He drove much faster this time, trying to catch a glimpse of the Jaguar. Another three minutes went by, and then two more, and he began to realize that he was not just physically behind. The man had been trying to lose him from the start. Till sped up to fifty. Seven or eight minutes had passed at forty and now fifty miles an hour in traffic.
There it was. The Jaguar had been pulled off the boulevard and was parked in front of a Mexican restaurant. He swung off the highway into the lot, got out, and walked up to the Jaguar. He touched the hood. It was hot in the center and cooler around the edges. He kept going.
He knew the man would not be in the restaurant but would have gone through it. Till walked in and went through the empty dining room to the hallway that led to the kitchen. He went past it out the rear door and saw the place where the second car must have been parked. There were seven spaces outlined by white paint stripes, and an empty one marked reserved.
Till went back inside. He endured the inquisitive stares of the cooks and waiters. He called out, “Did anyone see the unfamiliar car parked out back in the reserved space?”
There were a few thoughtful looks and a few people who ignored the question, but a young man said, “It was a Toyota Camry, about a year old. White.”
“Did you see the guy who came for it? He would have walked through the restaurant and out the back door.”
“No. People come through doing deliveries and stuff all day. He was in my space when I came to work at five in the morning. Overnight they tow your car if you park on the street here, or in the mall. Maybe now I’ll go move my car to my space.”
“Might as well,” Till said. “He’s sure gone now.”
Till went back through the front of the restaurant and looked at the Jaguar again. The guy had been pretty impressive. Though he’d had no reason to imagine Till was after him, he had stopped in the supermarket to find out. But the restaurant had been a different sort of maneuver. He had left his car in the back of the restaurant overnight so he could switch cars. He had prepared, but prepared for what? What had he been worried about?
Till got into his car and drove. He went back to Scottsdale Road, found the right housing development, and drove to Kyra’s house. There was no year-old white Camry parked nearby.
Till had a worried feeling as he approached the front door of Kyra’s small, neat, adobe-colored house. He knocked loudly. He heard no movement, so he rang the bell and knocked again. No response. He walked around the house to the back, which was a small gravel garden of desert plants and a Jacuzzi under a roof. The curtains were open, so he looked in the windows. The dining room had a big old-fashioned maple table and chairs but looked as though nobody had ever been invited into it. He suspected Kyra had put the furniture there as a replica of something she’d been brought up with. A home had a dining room.
He moved to the kitchen door and looked in. The cupboards were all open. Pots and pans had been taken out. In the sink were a couple of pint ice cream cartons that had been emptied. Till’s bad feeling intensified. He moved to the next window and looked into a bedroom. The closet was open; drawers had been pulled out of dressers; the mattress had been lifted and leaned against the wall. As Till walked toward the window of the corner bedroom, he prepared himself.
He couldn’t see in, because the plantation shutters were closed, and behind them was a dark curtain. Apparently this was where Kyra slept in the daytime. Till went back to the kitchen door, picked up a stone from the garden of succulents, and smashed one pane of glass in the kitchen door. He reached inside and turned the knob to open the door.
Once inside, he closed the door, then walked to the hallway leading to the bedrooms. He found the corner room, pushed the door open, and looked. Kyra wore a pair of pajama pants and a tank top. She was lying in the bed under the covers with the air-conditioning cranked up to keep the room at around seventy degrees. The electric hum of the fan and the whisk of air must have been nice for her, like white noise. She looked peaceful lying there with her eyes closed, but when he took two more steps he could see that the boyfriend had shot her through the left temple. Most of the blood came from the exit wound on the right side of Kyra’s head onto the pillow.
9
The boyfriend must have begun searching the house before Kyra returned from her night at the hotel, Till thought. The rooms that Kyra could be expected not to enter on her way to bed had probably been thoroughly searched before she got home. The boyfriend had undoubtedly left her bedroom untouched until after she was dead, and then scoured it. Her purse had been dumped out onto the floor, the drawers pulled out of the dresser, the closet opened and clothes thrown around.
Till looked down at Kyra. He had seen many dead people in his life. It was always a terrible thing, the utter, irreversible destruction of a hopeful, busy, eager, selfish, sensitive, thoughtful, gregarious, lonely creature, already decomposing as soon as the heart stopped. An hour ago this corpse on the bed had been a lively, beautiful, generous young woman.
Till studied the room, but touched nothing. There was no point in making things hopeless for the crime scene people. He knew that the boyfriend had done at least a fair job of staging a meaningless crime scene already. He could see that there were no visible signs that anyone other than Kyra had ever slept here, let alone lived here on her generosity. The boyfriend had proceeded this way before, and the results this time would be the same. The cops would make nothing of it, build no leads, get nowhere.
Till saw the jewelry box lying open and on its side on the dresser. He looked inside and around it for the distinctive necklace and anklet, then on the floor and behind the dresser, but they were not there. He turned and went down the hall to the kitchen. He reminded himself that he shouldn’t wait too long with Kyra. He stopped, picked up a dish towel to keep his prints off the kitchen telephone, and then called 911.
“Your name, please.”
“Jack Till,” he said. “I’m at the home of a young woman who has been shot to death.”
“Did you shoot her?”
“No, ma’am. I did not. I just came to speak with he
r, looked in, and found her dead. I believe the person who shot her is a young male Caucasian driving a white Toyota Camry, about one year old. He is probably heading out of town. He drives fast.” He said, “I’m at 9344 North Murietta Terrace.”
“I’m dispatching officers. Are you at the residence now?”
“Yes, I am.”
“Please remain there, because the officers will need to speak with you.”
“I will.”
“Are you positive that she’s dead?”
“Yes, I am. I’ve seen a number of bodies, because I was a homicide detective for many years. She has a bullet fired through her left temple. She was right-handed.”
“The officers should be reaching you shortly, Mr. Till. Are there any other people in the house?”
“No. The only one I know of who was here this morning was the gentleman I saw leaving. Presumably he shot her.”
“I’m getting word that the officers have reached your location. Do you see them?”
“They’re parking in front of the house now. That’s incredibly quick. They must have been nearby.”
The two cops who emerged from the car were both adjusting their utility belts as they came to the door. Till opened it and stepped aside so they could enter.
“Are you Mr. Till?”
“I am.”
The first cop put a strong arm on his forearm. “Could you please put your hands on the wall and let me check your pockets?”
Till leaned against the wall, spread his arms and legs while the cops verified that he was not armed. The cop said, “Thank you.”
Till said, “I know this is a little tricky for you, but if you could call in a bulletin right away on a male Caucasian about twenty-five years old driving a year-old white Toyota Camry, you might get him before he goes too far. He speeds, so that might help him stand out a little.” One cop walked deeper into the house while his partner spoke to Till.
“I assume you think he’s the shooter?”
“Yes.”
“Does he have a name?”
“Not yet,” Till said. “I think he was a live-in boyfriend. I saw him leaving when I arrived. His hair was dark, cut short and neat, and he was wearing wraparound sunglasses. He drove the girl’s new silver Jag a few miles, parked in front of Tio Fernandito restaurant, walked through the place, got into the white Camry, and drove off.”
“So if we go to this restaurant, the silver Jag will be there, but the Camry won’t?”
“That’s right. I think this girl also had an apartment somewhere, and he could be on his way there now, or heading out of town.”
“Why two places?”
“She was an escort. This doesn’t look like the sort of in-call place she would use for business. She would have problems with the neighborhood. I think the guy searched this place for money and valuables. He might wonder if she had money or jewelry hidden in the other place too. He has a history of killing girls like this and then robbing them.”
The other cop came out of the hallway. “Beautiful girl.”
“Yes,” said Till. “She was.”
“Tell me about you. What are you?”
“I’m a private investigator out of LA.”
“You on a case?”
“The parents of a girl named Catherine Hamilton hired me to find out who killed her. She was working as an escort too. This guy seems to form a relationship with a working girl for a while, then kill and rob her, and move on.” Till paused. “I don’t want to get irritating, but I can prove all of this, and I really think it would be worthwhile to try to have this guy pulled over right away.”
The younger cop looked at his partner.
The older cop said, “Mr. Till. Haven’t you heard a radio, or seen a paper yet today? When I came on duty, there had been a call that two city councilmen had been murdered last night in their beds. All morning there have been dozens of tips and leads that have had to be followed up on. We’re not a huge police force. There’s not much extra manpower to look for a car—the most common model in the country, by the way—when we don’t know more than this. Give us a chance to find out more.”
Till was looking at the floor. Suddenly he looked up. “Why do you think the councilmen were killed?”
“It could be a lot of things. We’re in southern Arizona. There are a lot of people with guns and opinions. There are people who smuggle drugs. We’ll sort all that out, but it’s making everything else drag. Right now, I think we’ve got to get you to the station and let you give your statement there. We’ll pull some crime scene people off the councilmen, so they can get started here.”
“All right,” Till said.
“I’m afraid we’re going to have to ask you to tolerate wearing handcuffs, Mr. Till. My partner is going to transport you alone.”
He turned around and let the cop cuff his wrists behind him. When they were in the car, the younger cop said, “Were you close to her?”
“No. I hired her last night so I could get her to tell me about her boyfriend, but she took her personal life off the list of topics. She didn’t tell me his name, or give me any details. So here we are.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean all I accomplished was to arrive the day before she was going to be killed. The next time I get close I’ll concentrate on going for him instead of trying to be cagey and learning everything from the girl.”
At the station Till gave his statement, then waited in an interrogation room drinking coffee while the cops made a few telephone calls. He knew that they had hoped he might be the one who had killed the two city councilmen. When they realized Till was what he said he was, the detective who had been assigned the case came in and told him he was free to go.
He got a ride back to Kyra’s house, where technicians were still going over the whole property. He didn’t talk to any of them. He knew they wouldn’t tell him anything, and even if they did, what they found would not be of interest to him. He had missed his best chance at this man, and all he could do was start again at the beginning and give the boyfriend time to surface again. He stopped beside his car and watched the coroner’s people moving Kyra’s body out on a gurney. Then he got into his car and drove.
10
Till began his drive back to Los Angeles after the sun went down, staying on Interstate 10 all the way, hoping the boyfriend was aware of him and ready to come after him. He wanted to be easy to find. Till stopped occasionally at diners and truck stops for coffee. He always sat facing a window so he could watch his car in the parking lot. Even as he watched, he kept hoping the killer was out there thinking about going to the car to ambush Till.
After he arrived at his office on Ventura Boulevard in Studio City, he went back to work gathering information about the murders. He searched jewelry outlets and manufacturers’ catalogs for the distinctive necklace and anklet. The gold disks had not been circles. They had been ovals. The little diamonds around the edge hadn’t been unusual, but the big diamond on each had been off center. He spent days looking, but he couldn’t find anything like them. He drew a picture of them with approximate sizes and descriptions, and drove downtown to the jewelry district. He walked from building to building, entering every store, every design and manufacturer’s workshop, and asked if anyone could identify the maker or the meaning. When he got home he scanned an enlarged and cropped photograph of the jewelry into his computer and sent it to dealers in estate jewelry and designers of custom jewelry all over the country. Then he kept looking.
He went back to study the information Sergeant McCann had sent him about the five girls who had been murdered before Catherine Hamilton. He was struck even more, now that he had spent a night with Kyra, by how similar all seven girls looked. It was as though the boyfriend kept browsing the escort ads until he found the same girl, and then he killed her again,
over and over.
The necklace and anklet didn’t appear in pictures of either of the first two victims. They seemed to have originated with the third, three murders before Catherine Hamilton. He spent more time trying to concentrate his efforts on jewelry sellers in the Miami area, where that girl had died. She was Jenny McLaughlan from Savannah, Georgia. She had appeared in Miami at the age of twenty-two last June, and had found an apartment near the ocean. She had apparently taken to the beach life and then catered mainly to tourists who checked into the big hotels. It was almost impossible to guess where the jewelry had come from. No custom jeweler he could find had any knowledge or opinion.
He studied each girl’s murder. The police reports varied in their detail and in the intensity of the inquiries that they reflected. Some of the investigators seemed to see the murder of a prostitute as a simple cause-and-effect matter. Young women, usually small and thin, who were doing something illegal, for which they collected money in cash, were going to be in exceptional jeopardy. Any customer could see the opportunity, and sometimes one took it.
There were hundreds of fingerprints belonging to unknown males in each of the first few girls’ apartments. Nobody had found any set twice. There were also complicated mixtures of DNA. If there were relationships, rivalries, resentments, they remained unknown because the girls would stay in a city for a few months at a time and then move on to the next city, like migrating birds. If the victim was foreign-born, the police would try to find out if she had been trafficked, but in these cases they’d had no success. They wrote the report, signed it, dated it, and filed it.
Dated it. He looked again at each of the police reports and noted the time and date of death and the city where it had happened. Then he went back to the Web sites of the local newspapers to find out what else had happened in each of those cities in the day or two before those murders.
