The Killing Room

by Richard Montanari

  Martin Allsop. The white stones. The name of the next crime scene written on a stone.

  Unto the angel of the church in Thyatira … Jezebel … I will cast her into a bed …

  Michelle Calvin was found on that bloody mattress.

  Unto the angel of the church of Sardis … I will come unto thee as a thief …

  DeRon Wilson had his hands cut off.

  Jessica found that her own hands were shaking as she looked at the last two entries. The final two churches were Philadelphia and Laodicea.

  Her eyes roamed the page, looking for a clue, a thought, a line that might help her penetrate the mind of a killer.

  Unto the angel of the church of the Laodiceans … I counsel thee to buy of me gold tried in the fire … and white raiment …

  To the angel of the church in Philadelphia … he that hath the key of David … but do lie …

  The final page was a single piece of old onion-skin typing paper. On it was a hand-scrawled note from Father Leone, perhaps the last thing he ever wrote. To Jessica, it was just as cryptic as the pages of Revelation. It read:

  IT WAS A VESTMENT, KEVIN. THE FIRE OF THE HOLY SPIRIT.

  What did he mean by this? What vestment?

  Jessica considered calling Byrne again, but she knew she would get his voicemail. She looked at her key ring.

  ‘I’ll be back,’ Jessica said.

  ‘Where are you going?’ Maria asked.

  ‘I’m going to Kevin’s house.’

  ‘I’m coming with you.’

  Jessica glanced at the swarm of PPD personnel descending upon St Simeon’s. They had both given their statements, and neither of them were going to be the lead investigator on the case.

  ‘Let’s go,’ Jessica said.

  FIFTY-SIX

  Jessica and Maria parked on Third Street, around the corner from Byrne’s second-floor apartment. Jessica did not see her partner’s car, but that was not unusual. Sometimes he was forced to park more than a block away.

  Within a minute they were in front of Byrne’s door. Jessica knocked, listened. Silence. She knocked again. They heard no movement within.

  Jessica took out the key, gently slid it into the lock, turned it. She opened the door an inch. ‘Kevin?’

  No answer.

  The apartment was dark. The only light was from the green digital clock on the kitchen stove. Jessica flipped the switch, and three lamps came on. The apartment was exactly the way she had seen it the last time she had been there.

  ‘Kevin?’

  Nothing. She edged over to the bedroom. Empty. The bathroom was empty, too.

  ‘Jessica,’ Maria said.

  Jessica crossed the apartment. Maria was standing at the dining-room table. There, neatly arrayed, were three things Kevin Byrne never left home without. His weapon, his shield, and his cell phone. Next to Byrne’s phone was a blue flip phone Jessica had not seen before.

  She picked up the blue flip phone, navigated the menu.

  There were two text messages: One was the address of St Simeon’s. The second message made her blood run cold.

  IF YOU ENTER THE BUILDING THE BOY WILL DIE.

  What boy?

  Jessica then picked up Byrne’s cell phone. She knew she was invading his privacy, but she had no choice. She checked his voicemail messages, and she was right. Eighty percent of the messages were from her. Then she saw an SMS message with a photo attached.

  The subject read: how u lik me now???!!!

  The accompanying picture was of a young black boy tied to a chair. Jessica looked closely at the boy’s face. She knew who it had to be. Gabriel Hightower.

  She looked at the last number Byrne had dialed. She wasn’t familiar with it. Or was she?

  ‘Do me a favor,’ Jessica said.

  ‘Sure,’ Maria replied.

  ‘Could you run down to the car and get my portfolio?’ Jessica handed the keys to Maria, who was out the door in a flash.

  Jessica launched the browser on her phone and did a reverse lookup on the second-to-last number Byrne had called. It was an all-night pharmacy around the corner. She did the same thing for the last number, but hit a dead end. There was no listing.

  Maria returned with Jessica’s portfolio. Jessica opened it, pulled out the contents. She soon found the item she was looking for. It was a photocopy of a piece of paper they had found in Danny Palumbo’s backpack.

  Jessica put the paper down on the table, with the maddening feeling that what she was looking for was right in front of her but she could not see it. None of the numbers lined up.

  She closed her eyes for a moment, recalled going into Danny’s room at Loretta Palumbo’s rowhouse. The answer was there. Why couldn’t she see it? She recalled the neatly made bed, the empty closet, the magazines arrayed on the shelves, the acrostic number puzzles of which Danny Palumbo was a fan.

  Jessica opened her eyes, glanced back at Danny’s handwritten square of numbers, looked diagonally, and saw it. It was the same number as Byrne’s last phone call. Danny Palumbo had this phone number in his possession.

  Jessica looked again at the picture of Gabriel Hightower, and the last piece of the puzzle snapped into place. She crossed the room, found the box containing the framed photograph. She held up the picture of Byrne with Marcus Haines next to the picture of Gabriel Hightower. There could be no mistake.

  Gabriel Hightower was Marcus’s son. Marcus had taken a bullet meant for Byrne. That’s why Byrne was doing all of this.

  Jessica put the photograph down. She had no choice. With a trembling hand she picked up Byrne’s phone, hit redial, calling the last number Byrne had dialed.

  In a moment the phone was answered.

  ‘You’ve reached the voicemail of Dr Sarah Goodwin …’

  FIFTY-SEVEN

  The Bridgeview Motel was located just a mile or so from Philadelphia International Airport, the city’s main airport, located in the southwest part of the city. Just a few blocks from both the Delaware River and I-95, the motel was used by the business traveler who wanted two or three hours’ sleep between flights, but wanted to avoid the exorbitant rates charged by the big chain hotels.

  It was also used by both the city police and county sheriff’s department to hold prisoners en route to other locations.

  Byrne parked at the far end of the rear parking lot, farthest away from the light. The room in which he was interested was number 209, the nearest room on the end. The curtains were closed, the lights were on.

  He got out of the car, crossed the lot, knocked on the door. A few seconds later he saw the curtains part, then heard the chain being moved. The door opened.

  ‘Kevin,’ the man said.

  ‘What’s up, Tony?’

  Anthony Colasanto was a veteran detective, a few years older than Byrne. He had come up in three of the South Philly districts, had spent time in Major Crimes, and now was assigned, through the DA’s office, to various details, including protection details.

  ‘What brings you out here?’ Colasanto asked.

  ‘Restless night,’ Byrne said. ‘Plus, you know this was originally my case.’

  Colasanto nodded. ‘Sure. Of course. Come on in.’

  He opened the door wide. Byrne stepped through. Colasanto gave another visual sweep of the parking lot, the surrounding area, then closed, locked, and chained the door.

  Byrne took in the room. A queen-sized bed in the center. Beyond that, a small round table, one chair. To the left was a dresser and desk. Atop the dresser was an old 23-inch portable showing the news. Colasanto had a game of solitaire in the works on the table.

  Byrne held up the cardboard carry tray he had gotten from Starbucks, containing a pair of large coffees.

  ‘Thought you could use some real coffee.’

  ‘You are a fucking mensch,’ Colasanto said. ‘Or whatever the Irish call a mensch.’

  ‘I think we call it a mensch, too.’

  Byrne took one of the cups from the tray, put it on the table. Next t
o the cup he placed a handful of creamers, sugar packets, Equal packets, and stirrers. ‘I didn’t know how you take it,’ he said.

  ‘Like my women,’ Colasanto replied.

  Colasanto opened the coffee, took a small sip. Byrne had waited in the parking lot long enough for the coffee to cool down to a drinkable temperature. Colasanto raised the cup. ‘Thanks, buddy.’

  Byrne took his coffee, pulled the other chair up to the table. The two men caught up – who retired, who had what ailment, who got divorced.

  ‘Saw that fucking video,’ Colasanto said. ‘Did I hear this right? That POS in the tape got killed in North Philly tonight?’

  ‘Yeah,’ Byrne said. ‘Shame.’

  ‘Guess he won’t be pressing charges.’

  ‘Not unless there’s a DA in hell.’

  ‘I know a few who belong there.’

  Byrne laughed. ‘When’s your relief coming?’

  Colasanto looked at his watch. ‘Not until seven tomorrow morning.’

  Byrne nodded toward the adjoining room, which had its door half open. The room was dark. ‘How is it going?’

  ‘Easy tour, Kev,’ he said. ‘I mean, what’s he going to do, right?’ Colasanto drained his coffee.

  ‘Do you know the details?’

  ‘Not all of them.’

  Byrne told the story from the beginning. He knew he needed a little time. About ten minutes into his routine he saw Colasanto’s lids start to droop. Three minutes later the man was out cold. Before he could sag to the floor, Byrne got up, caught the man mid-slide. Byrne then picked him up, put him on the bed. Anthony Colasanto was not a big man, and Byrne handled him with ease.

  Byrne took out the small plastic trash bag in his pocket, bagged everything in the room he had touched – the coffee cups, lids, tray, creamers. Unless a federal team did a million-dollar sweep of the room, he had never been here.

  He moved over to the windows, parted the curtains an inch or so. The parking lot was exactly the same as it had been when he’d left it.

  He stepped into the second bedroom.

  ‘Detective Byrne,’ Roland Hannah said. ‘It’s nice to see you again. If you’ll pardon.’

  ‘Not a big fan of irony either, Roland.’

  ‘No. I imagine not.’

  ‘Are you ready?’

  Roland Hannah didn’t respond. Byrne flipped on the light. Hannah was sitting in a chair at the foot of the bed. He was fully dressed. He was not wearing his amber aviator sunglasses.

  ‘I hope you didn’t hurt him,’ Roland said.

  ‘He was a police officer,’ Byrne replied. ‘I don’t hurt cops.’

  ‘Just criminals?’

  ‘And those who would have me believe they are not.’

  Byrne looked out the back window of the motel room. The lot behind the motel was empty.

  ‘Why have you come for me?’ Roland asked.

  Byrne said nothing.

  Before they left, Byrne took Anthony Colasanto’s cell phone and two-way radio, then cut the motel room’s phone line. It wouldn’t prevent Colasanto from putting the word out when he woke up, but it would slow him down a little. If Byrne knew anything about the pills he had dissolved into Colasanto’s coffee – and over the years Kevin Byrne had become quite the expert on sleeping pills – they had a few hours. Which was more than enough time.

  Byrne led Roland Hannah to the door. There, he turned and did a quick sweep of the room. He had taken care of everything. He opened the door, checked the sidewalk and parking lot again. Silent and still. He walked the blind man over to his car, unlocked the back door. Roland Hannah slid in.

  Byrne handcuffed Hannah to the door handle of the back seat.

  Two minutes later, they drove into the night.

  FIFTY-EIGHT

  By the time Jessica and Maria reached the rowhouse where Sarah Goodwin kept her private office, there were a half-dozen sector cars in front of the building. The street was blocked off at both ends, and a SWAT team was in the process of deploying on nearby rooftops and fire escapes.

  Josh Bontrager, Jessica, and Maria would breach the entrance, accompanied by two SWAT officers. The entry would be a no-knock, hard entry. This was a suspect in multiple murders.

  As they prepared for the breach, the three detectives secured their Kevlar vests. Jessica silently berated herself for not putting it together before. Danny Palumbo, Adria Rollins, Michelle Calvin, and Martin Allsop were all prime candidates to have been analyzed by a psychiatrist before court proceedings. Sarah Goodwin did consulting work for both the county and city law enforcement agencies. Jessica knew that Byrne had seen her professionally, and it was very likely he had opened up about Gabriel and DeRon Wilson, knowing – or at least believing at the time – it was all confidential.

  Jessica also knew that the video camera they had found in the reporter’s car was either on its way to or had already arrived at the crime lab. Maria had tried to delay it as long as possible, but there was only so much she could do. Any second now the criminalists would place Byrne at the scene at St Simeon’s, and questions would start to be asked.

  As Jessica approached the door she scanned the area. She did not see Dana Westbrook on scene. This was a good thing. Jessica had a lot of explaining to do to her boss, and she was not prepared to do any of it yet.

  The SWAT officer with the ram took up position on the small porch. He looked to his two fellow officers. The other two SWAT officers carried AR-15 assault weapons. On a silent three, the ram hit the door, blasting it almost off its hinges.

  ‘Philadelphia Police!’ one of the SWAT officers yelled. The two men rolled into the front room. One of them flipped on the light. After a few seconds:

  ‘Front room clear!’

  The two officers methodically went room to room in the rowhouse, and ultimately found no one. The only space left to clear was a closet in the main office.

  Her weapon aimed low, Jessica positioned herself to the left of the closet door. She was flanked on her right by one of the SWAT officers. The officer raised his weapon, pointed it at the closet. He made eye contact with Jessica. The second SWAT officer pulled open the door.

  The dead body in the closet was that of a white woman in her forties. She wore a lab coat over a dark blue pantsuit, no shoes. There were no visible wounds on her face or hands, no blood, no apparent trauma. Heart racing, Jessica knelt down, put two fingers to the woman’s neck, found no pulse. Before she stood up Jessica noticed the edge of a plastic nametag peeking out from behind the lapel of the lab coat. Although she should have put on a latex glove, she had no time. She gently turned over the lapel. The nametag clipped to the dead woman’s coat read: SARAH GOODWIN, MD.

  ‘Shit!’ Jessica yelled.

  As the SWAT officers and detectives stood down, Jessica began to pace the small office. This did not make sense. Worse than that, she knew how it was going to look for Byrne. Sarah Goodwin was his psychiatrist, and now she was dead.

  ‘Jess.’

  It was Maria Caruso calling her from the waiting room. Jessica walked out there. Maria was looking at a framed photograph on the wall. In the picture two women sat on the edge of the desk in the main office. The caption read: Dr Sarah Goodwin and her assistant Antonia Block open a new office.

  Jessica looked at Dr Goodwin, then the other woman in the picture. She knew her, but not as Antonia Block. Jessica recognized the woman in the photograph as Mara Reuben, the woman she had interviewed across the street from the St Adelaide’s scene.

  She was looking into the face of a murderer.

  Jessica pulled the piece of paper out of her pocket, the one she had kept from the envelope Father Leone had sent Byrne. She looked at the hand-scrawled note.

  IT WAS A VESTMENT, KEVIN. THE FIRE OF THE HOLY SPIRIT.

  Jessica knew where Byrne was.

  FIFTY-NINE

  He is much bigger than she imagined. Or maybe she just sees him that way. She thinks it must have been this way for the Apostles as well.

&n
bsp; They are sitting in a circle surrounded by seven candles. Ruby, the boy, the detective. There is one empty chair.

  ‘What should I call you?’ the detective asks.

  ‘Ruby,’ she says. ‘I want you to call me Ruby. Will you do that?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘It’s been so long since anyone has called me that.’

  ‘Your father was Elijah Longstreet?’

  ‘Daddy.’

  ‘You are also Mara Reuben?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And also Antonia.’

  Ruby smiles. ‘Antonia Block.’

  The detective nods. ‘From Antonius Block. In The Seventh Seal.’

  ‘My little conceit,’ she says. ‘I was afraid you would see through that when you came to Dr Goodwin’s office.’

  ‘The last name wasn’t on your nametag.’

  ‘Of course.’

  When she had gotten the job as the medical assistant she didn’t know much about the computer system. It didn’t take long to learn. Forging the prescriptions from Dr Goodwin was much easier. Eventually Dr Goodwin allowed her to call the pharmacies using the office code. This night, when the detective needed the sleeping pills, it was effortless.

  ‘These people,’ the detective says. ‘The victims. You knew their psychiatric histories.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Why did you select them?’

  There were many answers to this. ‘We selected them because they all made a deal with the devil.’

  The detective looks at his hands for a moment, then back at Ruby. His eyes are cold jade stones in the candlelight. ‘And you collected what the devil was owed.’

  ‘Yes. It was the only way to rid my son of the demons he has carried all these years.’

  Night after night, after Ruby prayed, she had read the transcripts of Dr Goodwin’s consultations with her patients. She had been privy to all their thoughts, their desires, their shame, their guilt. She had seen inside their souls, all of them children of disobedience. The young girl had asked the devil to stop the abuse she was suffering at the hands of the building’s superintendent, the coupling that had produced the baby. Ruby had visited the building earlier in the day and granted Adria’s wish. Edward Turchek would no longer abuse anyone.