Carole closed her eyes for a moment, not wishing to see the jubilation at the defense table or the begrudging acceptance of the verdict by the prosecutor. The defense had gambled and won on an all or nothing verdict, opting for the one serious charge rather than lesser charges that might have made it easier on the jury to convict.
Blake Wallace would get to go home, probably to beat his wife again when the victory dance had long died down and the urge to inflict damage on her grew in him again like a tumor. For her part, in testifying on his behalf, Victoria Wallace had sacrificed her personal safety and that of her three children to keep the family intact, as well as her stake in her husband’s considerable business interests and their estate.
Carole opened her eyes in time to see Blake Wallace with his arm wrapped around his wife’s waist as they headed out of the courtroom. She could not help but think that justice had once again been denied the People. Particularly those who believed wife abuse should neither be tolerated nor rewarded.
She left the bench, feeling empty, as if she had run out of fuel or the will to carry on for another day. It was another case of domestic violence that fell short of desired results.
* * *
Victoria Wallace had lived in terror of her husband since the first day he hit her. It was on their wedding night when he had accused her of not being a virgin. He had broken her nose and then raped her. He had told her if anyone found out the truth he would kill her and himself.
Now some twenty-five years later she had learned never to take his threats idly. The beatings were less frequent now that he had his mistress and other interests to keep him occupied, but they were more intense and seemingly came with more pleasure on the part of her husband. This last time had come without warning. He had flown off the handle because of a deal gone sour and decided to take it out on her. She had suffered a detached retina, bruised kidney, lost three teeth, and received other injuries.
Neighbors had called the police and she had raced to them in fear of her life, not caring that she was naked for any sick lustful kicks the two male officers might have received. She only wished to survive the night for her children and live to see another day.
Blake had been arrested.
He had hired the best lawyer money could buy. There was even talk of bribing a juror or two, if need be. Victoria had seen the writing on the wall. Were she to go against Blake, she could lose everything. Including her life. Maybe even the precious life of her children.
She had decided, for the sake of her children and the life they were accustomed to living, that she had to support her husband through the trial while continuing to live under the veil of secrecy, shame, and apprehension.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Blake Wallace drove his white-on-white Mercedes to the townhouse he kept when he needed to get away. More specifically, when he needed to be with his mistress, Rebecca. The bitch couldn’t figure out left from right if you didn’t point her in the proper direction, but she knew which buttons to push in bed better than most. Something Victoria hadn’t accomplished in twenty-five years of marriage.
It was her damned fault he had lost his temper so many times. Right from the very start she had deceived him. Made a fool out of him. Only because she had gotten herself knocked up almost right away did he even bother to stay. Later, with more kids and a prospering career in real estate acquisitions, it was no longer good business sense to divorce her. He would be damned if he let that bitch wind up with the better part of his earnings and assets.
Right now Blake was just happy that prick of a lawyer he’d paid a fortune had succeeded in getting him acquitted of assault. The moment he’d made eye contact with the blonde woman on the jury whose kid he would put through college with some spending money on the side, he knew he was home free from a unanimous verdict against him.
But not until he heard the words “not guilty” did Blake Wallace feel confident that he had beaten this rap.
Now it was time to celebrate.
He pulled into the underground parking lot, unaware that another car had come in shortly after while keeping a safe distance.
Within moments Blake had parked right alongside Rebecca’s Subaru Legacy. It was a birthday present from him and he fully intended to be reimbursed in the way she best paid her debts. Hot and heavy under the sheets.
He got out of the car and headed towards the elevator in the lowly lit garage. When he heard footsteps that weren’t his, he stopped instinctively, turning around.
Approaching was a tall, curvaceous, blonde-haired black woman. Wearing dark gloves and a trench coat, she was carrying a long bag and a killer smile. He smiled back, feeling somewhat aroused.
“Aren’t you the Blake Wallace?” she asked politely.
He regarded her more carefully. Who the hell was asking? Was she a friend of Rebecca’s?
Someone Victoria knew?
Probably a damned reporter looking for a cheap story at his expense, he decided.
“Yeah,” he said cautiously. “Who the bloody hell are you?”
He watched as her pretty face suddenly became impassioned with fury. “Your worst nightmare, asshole!”
Before he could even digest what this was all about, she had removed something from the bag. It looked like a bat. With a swiftness that further took him by surprise, she had swung the bat backwards and brought it forward at lightning speed. It slammed against the side of his head, dropping him as if hit by a heavyweight champion’s right hook. Or running head first into a brick wall.
“Did you really think for one minute you were going to get away with what you did, you filthy bastard?” she cursed.
Dazed and in a state of shock, Blake tried to get up. But he was unable to ward off the next blow that crashed into the top of his head with such force it shattered his skull like an eggshell. Thick, dark blood spurted out.
“Your wife may have been too afraid to stand up to your violence,” the woman shouted, “but I’m not. You should have quit while you were ahead. Or had a head! Here, let me rearrange it some more, you son of a bitch!”
Another blow exploded into his cheekbone, fracturing it in multiple places. A second or two later came yet another. This one landed squarely on his throat, crushing his windpipe.
One more pounded into his head, what was left of it, brain tissue spurting forth like an eruption from a volcano.
Though Blake Wallace had ceased to be amongst the living, she continued to inflict punishment on his battered remains as if to beat his soul into submission as well. Only after she had exhausted herself from clubbing him with the bat, did the woman stop. Her breathing had become erratic and she felt perspiration pouring from her armpits down her sides and chest.
Again, like the others, she felt a tremendous amount of relief. The satisfaction was akin to an orgasm. Only much more powerful. And lasting. At least till the next time when the urge to kill a brutal abuser overcame her once more.
She tossed the bloodied bat on the corpse and walked to her car. Opening the trunk, she yanked off the wig, tossing it into a duffel bag. Then she took off the gloves, trench coat, and clothes beneath it. She quickly slipped into jeans, a jersey, and tennis shoes.
Within moments she had gotten into the car. She applied lipstick to her dry lips. She then put on some earrings, studying herself in the rear view mirror.
The woman drove out of the parking lot and calmly made plans for dinner, as she was starving.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
The detectives were glum as they viewed the crushed and battered body of Blake Wallace. Ray tried to imagine what it would be like to be the target of someone so full of hatred and rage. He supposed many battered women knew the answer firsthand.
And at least four men now knew, too.
“Wallace was acquitted today of charges that he assaulted his wife,” said Nina, taking an anguished look at the victim’s ghastly remains. “I imagine he thought he was on top of the world.”
“Think again,” said Ray d
isgustedly. It was more like the world was on top of him. Or at least one determined killer. “Looks like it wasn’t his lucky day after all.”
“Maybe in some ways he was lucky.” Nina twisted her lips. “My guess is that Blake Wallace was put out of his misery long before someone finished with his body in the batting cage.”
“But not before he saw his attacker and felt the sting of this bat.” Ray looked at the blood drenched murder weapon lying harmlessly on the torso of the victim as if drained of its own raw power.
“Wallace was apparently here to meet his mistress,” said Nina. “She’s over there giving her statement.”
Ray turned towards a young auburn-haired woman talking to an officer. “Why don’t you find out if there were any witnesses,” he told Nina. “I’ll see what she can tell us, if anything.”
“Maybe we’ll both come up with something,” Nina said, rolling her eyes doubtfully as she walked away.
Ray made his way over to the decedent’s mistress who looked like she was still in high school, aside from her obvious breast implants and heavily made up face. She had a mole on the right cheek and wore a small nose ring. Tears flowed freely from her lake blue eyes, which she wiped with the back of her hand. She was wearing a lilac robe and matching slippers, as if still waiting for her lover.
Ray identified himself, taking over for the officer, and learned that the woman’s name was Rebecca Ferguson.
“Ms. Ferguson,” he began, “I know this is difficult, but we need to try and find out what happened here tonight. Do you understand?”
She sniffled, and said in a high-pitched voice: “Yes.”
“You knew the victim?” he asked routinely while thinking: Obviously only too well in the intimate department.
“Yes. He was my...I was his...girlfriend—”
Ray met her eyes, understanding her awkward position, considering Blake Wallace had a wife and three kids. “So you were expecting him?”
“Yeah,” she said vacantly. “Blake called and said he was on his way.”
Ray hesitated. “And when did you find out he was dead?”
Rebecca wiped at her tear-stained cheeks. “I came down here to meet him. That’s when I saw—” She choked back the words and started to sob.
“Did you see anyone else?”
“No.”
“Did you hear anything?”
She sighed. “I think I heard a car pull out of the garage.”
Ray rubbed his nose. “Did you see it?”
“No,” she said apologetically. “It was gone when I looked up.”
Damn! It was probably the killer. Or someone who may have seen the perpetrator. Then he realized if she had come down a minute earlier, she might have caught the person in the act and in the process become a victim herself.
Ray glanced over at Nina and saw her talking to a tall and slender, well-dressed African-American woman. Several other people were nearby, as if waiting for their turn.
Though the crime scene had been sealed off from spectators, the most dogged, along with the press, had found a way in to gawk and snoop.
“Why?” Rebecca cried. “What would someone do this? Blake wasn’t a bad man, despite the problems between him and—”
“His wife?” Ray finished tersely. The man was an asshole, pure and simple.
Rebecca fluttered curly lashes. “She just didn’t understand him.”
“And you did?”
“Yes,” she insisted. “We loved each other.”
Ray looked down at her large breasts. There was only one thing—make that two—he loved about you. And it had little to do with affection, much less loyalty and commitment.
But none of it mattered now. Let the lady think whatever she wanted that made her feel better about her lover’s untimely demise.
* * *
“We’ve got a possible witness. Her name’s Jacqueline Davis,” Nina said to Ray en route to the victim’s residence to notify his wife. “According to Ms. Davis, a late model, dark colored BMW pulled out of the garage just as she was about to turn in.”
“Did she see who was driving it?”
“She thought it might have been a woman, but admitted the car shot out of there so fast she never really got a chance to focus on the driver.”
Ray stared over the steering wheel. “Maybe the car will be enough to point us in the right direction,” he said. “Let’s see if the witness can tell us anything more specific about the car—like the exact color, any marks, etc. Also, if she can remember any part of the license plate number, we might really be onto something.”
Nina took notes. Shifting her gaze to his face, she asked: “What about the girlfriend? She any help?”
“Not really. Just another starry-eyed kid full of dreams and fantasies who hooked up with the wrong man.”
“Some of us can relate to that,” Nina uttered thoughtfully.
When Ray met her eyes, he wondered if she was referring to her ex-husband. Or was she was referring to their brief affair that had gone nowhere?
Admittedly, they were wrong for each other, even if it seemed right at the time. But then he’d had little luck in the relationship department. Except maybe bad luck. His ex had turned out to be very wrong for him. The only thing they had in common was that they had nothing in common. Combine that with her lack of focus on anything but herself and how much she could bleed him dry and they had the perfect recipe for a marriage doomed to failure.
Sort of like Blake Wallace’s marriage, Ray contemplated sadly. Only someone decided to help put his wife out of her misery permanently, while sending Wallace straight to hell.
* * *
When Victoria Wallace was informed of her husband’s death, she appeared expressionless. Her face showed old and fresh signs of the abuse inflicted by her husband, particularly around the eyes, with one nearly swollen shut. Although in her early forties, she looked much older. Her graying flaxen hair was thin and listless, her body so frail it looked as if it might snap like a twig beneath the rose print jacket dress she wore.
At first Nina wondered if the Mrs. even grasped what she’d just been told. The woman had obviously been drinking. She observed her unsteadiness on gimpy legs.
“It was only a matter of time,” Victoria mumbled.
“Meaning?” Ray asked, as they stood on thick moss green carpeting in the study of what was an expensive tri-level home in the upscale neighborhood of Winston Heights.
She fixed her hazel eyes on the detective. “My husband had enemies,” she said without preface. “He didn’t get where he got without them.”
“Does that include you?” Ray narrowed his focus.
Victoria sighed. “I loved Blake. But I hated his temper and willingness to turn it on me whenever he saw fit.”
“Did you hate your husband enough to kill him?” Nina asked pointblank. “Or hire someone to do the job for you?”
Victoria’s head jerked back, as if she’d been slapped. “How dare you!”
Nina was undeterred. “With all due respect, Mrs. Wallace, your husband was beaten to death with a bat less than an hour after being acquitted of charges he beat the hell out of you.” She met her hardened gaze head on. “No suspects can be ruled out at this stage—not even you.”
Victoria seemed to gather her composure. “The last time I saw Blake, he was leaving this house to go to his mistress,” she said levelly, looking from one detective to the other. “Yes, I knew all about his affair. It wasn’t the first one. And wouldn’t have been the last. I stayed with my husband for the sake of the children. If I had wanted to kill him, I would have done so years ago when I still had the strength, and maybe the desire, to take away his life, the way he did mine—”
Nina made eye contact with Ray before saying to the newly widowed woman: “Can you tell us if you’ve ever been to the Rose City Women’s Shelter?”
Victoria’s face flushed, as if ashamed to admit such. “Why do you ask?”
“Because we believe that whoever
killed your husband may be affiliated with the shelter in some way.”
After a moment or two, Victoria said shakily: “Yes, I stayed there one night about six months ago when I needed somewhere to hide from Blake’s fists. Just until things cooled off—”
The detectives again exchanged glances.
“We’ll need a list of some of these enemies you said your husband had,” Ray told Victoria. “One of them may have decided to settle a score once and for all.” He wasn’t sure he believed that, not in this case, but would pursue all leads. “In the meantime, we’ll need you to come and identify the body.”
Rebecca Ferguson had already done that and had probably seen more of him in recent times than the man’s wife. But, in addition to standard and official procedure of positive identification by the next of kin, in some strange way Ray believed this just might put closure to this chapter of Victoria Wallace’s dark life with Blake Wallace.
Whereas their investigation still appeared to have a long way to go. Ray was admittedly more than a little disturbed that this was going on under their noses and they seemed almost powerless to do anything about it. With four men dead and countless others at risk, they sure as hell had their work cut out for them. And the clock kept ticking.
A madwoman was out there somewhere, waiting for the next opportunity to strike. Almost daring anyone to try and stop her before she put the bat and her rage to victim number five in continuing to draw deadly attention to the plight of battered women—and now battered men—in the Rose City.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
The jogging trail provided breathtaking views of the Willamette River with the Cascade Mountains peeking out of mounds of thick, white clouds. The morning itself was sunny and birds could be heard singing, as if for an audience.
This was hardly noticed by Carole, her mind preoccupied with work and working out as she did her daily run. She had been jogging for ten years now and loved pushing herself as hard as she could, as if to slow down would make it that much harder to catch up.
Justice Served: A Barkley and Parker Thriller Page 6
