Deadly Obsession

by Michael Kerr

  Taking a sleeping pill, Penny set the alarm and went to bed. The future now looked decidedly brighter.

  Outside, he watched as the bedroom light went out and then spent another thirty minutes waiting and planning and smoking. He did not discard the filter tips. Instead, he flicked off the glowing embers and slipped the extinguished butts back into the packet. No one was going to retrieve DNA from traces of his saliva.

  Penny woke up feeling groggy from the effects of the pill. It was almost pitch black. No moon. Something had broken through her drug-induced slumber. But what? A dog barked nearby. She turned over and was almost asleep again when the voice cut through the gloom.

  “Scream or do anything stupid and I’ll cut your fucking eyes out,” he said. “I gave a lot of thought to what we discussed, Penny, and decided that you were out of order. I determine when and how it ends. You should never have followed me. It was without doubt the biggest mistake you’ve made in your whole miserable little life.”

  She might have been a waxwork. She could not move a muscle. His soft, menacing voice was powerful enough in itself to scramble the messages from her brain, leaving her affixed to the bed. She wanted to leap up, throw the duvet back and make a bid for freedom. If she could reach the landing and scream for help he would no doubt panic and leave as other tenants investigated the disturbance. But a part of her brain insisted that even as she attempted to pull back the cumbersome quilt, he would harm her. After what seemed an age, she managed to raise her head from the pillow, only to gasp aloud and draw back as something sharp pressed against her throat.

  “Did I tell you to move?” he said.

  “I’m s...sorry,” she murmured, and let her head fall back onto the pillow.

  “Then don’t do anything else that might upset me,” he said. “Now, very slowly turn over onto your stomach, put your feet together and your hands behind your back.”

  She complied.

  With gloved hands he uncovered her and then quickly bound her wrists and ankles with duct tape, and used more of it to wrap around her head and blindfold her with, using a knife he had taken from a block on the counter in her kitchen to cut the tape. He also cut the T-shirt and panties from her, and pulled them free. The forensic team that at some point would swarm over the flat, would not find any clue as to his identity. There would be no transference, as they called it. He would not leave any trace of himself behind for CSIs to paw over and analyse.

  He switched on the small bedside lamp, put the knife and roll of tape next to it, reached across, and with one hand on her shoulder and the other on her hip, pulled her over onto her back.

  She felt a surge of relief. He would not have blindfolded her if he intended to kill her. He had done it so that she could not identify him. But no, that made no sense. She had followed him across town and seen him on well-lit tubes.

  “I want the letters that I sent to you, Penny. They’re all you have to prove I’ve been in contact with you. Where are they? And don’t even think of telling me you destroyed them, because I know you wouldn’t do that. If I have to search this poxy flat to find them, I’ll make you eat every last one.”

  “On...on top of the wardrobe in a shoe box,” she said.

  He went over to the cheap, self assemble wardrobe, stretched up on tiptoe and let his gloved fingers search out the box. He lifted it down, removed the thick rubber band that held the lid in place and tipped the letters out onto the bed and counted them.

  She shot up into a sitting position as his fist sank into the pit of her stomach. The pain was a fiery explosion that left her winded and fighting to breathe. She doubled up in a foetal ball, chin almost touching her knees.

  “There are six missing, Penny. If you’re trying to piss me off, then it’s working. Where are they?”

  She couldn’t answer. It was all she could do not to be physically sick. He waited, not blind to her incapacity. He was in no hurry. This was what he lived for. To have a naked woman trussed-up and at his mercy was the ultimate high. It really didn’t get any better than this.

  A couple of minutes passed. “The missing letters, Penny?” he said.

  “I...I burnt them,” she whimpered. “I promise. Then, when they kept coming, I decided to keep them...as evidence.”

  He almost believed her, but would search the flat before he left, just in case she was holding out. Trust no one.

  “What about my address? You had to write it down. Where is it?”

  “In my purse, on a piece of paper behind my Barclay card.”

  “Where is your purse?”

  “In the drawer of the bedside cabinet.”

  He found it. There was also a thick, flesh-coloured vibrator in the drawer. After removing his address from the purse, he replaced the letters in the shoe box. The business part of the visit was done. He could now get down to the pleasure. He turned the vibrator on. It sounded like his electric razor. He held the oscillating facsimile of a penis against her left breast, to watch the skin dimple and ripple, before touching the tip of the sex-aid to her nipple.

  “Yes, yes, oh, yes!” he whispered.

  After a while he paused, stuffed the panties she had been wearing into her mouth and taped them in place. Penny was without doubt going to attempt to scream, a lot, and he didn’t want any undue noise to disturb the neighbours. This was like a gourmet meal; something he wanted to savour at length.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  THEY ate out of the cartons. Lisa had provided chopsticks, which she wielded with the dexterity of a coolie. Jack struggled with his, and dropped a lot of rice and prawns, but declined the offer of a fork. Lisa had poured herself another glass of wine, and Jack had opened the JB and poured a small amount and asked for ice to dilute it. He sipped it slowly. He kept in mind that he was driving.

  “Is this a date or a working supper?” Jack said.

  Lisa frowned. “I’m not sure whether that’s a politically correct question.”

  “I’m not into politics,” he said. “It was just a question, plain and simple.”

  “It’s just two people having a bite to eat before discussing the business at hand. Do you see it as being more or less than that?”

  “I’m happy to play it by ear.”

  Lisa could almost feel the air between them charged with expectancy. He had made his intentions quite clear. What happened next would be her call.

  “What do you do when you’re not chasing psychos, or turning up at people’s doors with food parcels?” she said.

  He gave up with the chopsticks and put them down side by side on the pine tabletop and said, “Maybe a fork would help, I’m dropping more than I’m managing to eat. And as for what I do when I’m not working; not a lot. I watch some sport; listen to middle of the road music, read pulp fiction and sleep.”

  Lisa went for a fork and placed it next to the cartons he’d been struggling to eat from with the sticks. “What do you read?” she said.

  “I like Yank pot-boilers.”

  “So do I.”

  “You’re kidding me.”

  “When we’ve finished eating, go check out the bookcase in the lounge, then apologise for being a doubting Thomas,” she said, wiping her mouth with a piece of kitchen towel.

  He ate a little more, then got up, took his glass with him and went to investigate Lisa’s reading material. The top shelf of the dark wood bookcase was packed with a mixture of weighty tomes and journals solely appertaining to psychology and psychiatry. The other three shelves could have belonged to him. He had many of the titles. There was even some of Evan Hunter’s books; the author of The Blackboard Jungle who, under his pseudonym of Ed McBain had written the popular 87th Precinct crime novels. Jack was both surprised and impressed.

  “What did you expect?” Lisa said, appearing at his side. “Chick-lit, rom-com, Jilly Cooper, or a shitload of the classics?”

  “My apologies for doubting your dubious taste in popular if not notably high literary fiction,” he said.

  “I lik
e a story that moves along, doesn’t get too flowery, and hits below the belt. Not waves crashing against cliffs when the lights go out in the bedroom.”

  There she goes again with the ambiguous expressions. He felt out of his depth. Wasn’t sure what to say or do next.

  “So what does the future hold for Jack Ryder?” Lisa said.

  “I never look beyond the case I’m working. The future will take care of itself, and I won’t be around for more than a small amount of it. There’s no point in contemplating something that’s out of your control. I’ve seen other people’s futures come and go, and it always ends in grief.”

  “Explain that to me,”

  “My parents are as good an example as any. When I was a kid they were young and had dreams to pursue. We had a small front garden. I remember that my dad used to jump over the fence. He never used the gate. Then he hit forty or so, and from thereon in he always used the gate. Now they’re both gone. They used up the future they had without leaving a ripple. They got caught up in just getting by and marking the time that rushed past them.”

  “That’s a depressing way to view it. What do you want out of life?”

  He wasn’t sure how to answer that. A part of him wanted everything, but expected nothing. He thought of how best to express himself without sounding glib, but he couldn’t.

  “You come across as some kind of Robocop, Ryder. I get the impression that when you aren’t working, you’re just on hold, waiting to be reactivated.”

  “Being here with you blows that theory out of the water.”

  “Not really. It’s work-related. What would you have done if you hadn’t joined the police?”

  “I can’t answer that. I am what I am.”

  “Surely as a boy you must have had the facility to look ahead and think what you wanted to be when you grew up.”

  “I didn’t want to have to prostitute myself for money. On reflection, I’d rather have stayed a kid. Who needs to become aware of all the bad aspects of life, and be weighed down with responsibility, bills, and other people’s expectations of you? So, if you mean did I consider career choices as a ten or twelve year old, then no. I never had a work ethic, and still don’t. I remember seeing the movie Jaws as a kid, and thinking that the cop, Brody, was pretty cool. He was petrified of water, but faced his fear to overcome the shark.”

  “Is that why you joined the force?”

  “I don’t know. With hindsight, it could be in the mix. But I’m not big on looking into the reasons for why anything turns out the way it does. Why cloud the issue with philosophy? I think most of what happens is down to being in the right or wrong place at any given time.”

  “Do you believe in God?”

  “Thankfully, no. I’d hate to think that if there was one, He would have been stupid enough to give human beings free will. I see what man is capable of doing and feel ashamed to be part of the problem.”

  “Then why―”

  “Enough, Lisa. I’m not one of your patients. What I think about anything isn’t necessarily right. We all have our own viewpoint. I choose to believe that no one has the right to rob, rape or murder anyone else. If I can make a difference, then it seems more worthwhile than being material and self-indulgent; just going through life trying to make money, or having fifteen minutes of meaningless glory.”

  Lisa stiffened. “Sorry. I’m a bit rusty at making polite conversation. I didn’t mean to quiz you. Do you want to look at the initial write-up I’ve done on...what have you tagged this killer?”

  “I don’t like labels. He’s just an unknown subject to me, although some of the team have christened him the Mimic, due to his staging the scenes to imitate details of that loony artist’s paintings.”

  Lisa went to her computer, opened the relevant file, brought up the rough profile and printed it out. Jack was mentally kicking himself. He had put a damper on their relationship by being defensive and pushing her away when she was obviously trying to build a bridge between them. He saw her as an academic and himself as not inferior, but from the other side of the tracks; Oliver to her Lady Chatterley sprang to mind. Shame it was winter. The thought of what they might do with daisy chains in a sunlit meadow was stirring stuff.

  “Here,” Lisa said, handing him the sheets of copy paper. “I’ll make coffee while you read through it.”

  “Thanks,” he said. “And Lisa, if I sounded a little abrasive, I’m sorry. I’m not used to being asked for my personal views on anything other than police work. I suppose I’ve got hang-ups that I keep close to my chest. Can we start over?”

  She reddened a little and smiled. “No need to. Life isn’t like a cassette tape. You can’t rewind it, or erase it.”

  “So we’re still friends?”

  “Yes, Ryder. Now sit down and read while I make the coffee.”

  He did as he was told. Lisa’s analysis of the offender’s personality made for chilling reading. He read it twice before she came through with two mugs of coffee and set them down on the tile-topped occasional table.

  “What do you think?” she said.

  “I think that if this is near the mark, then some young woman out there has contact with him, and could help us find him. But why do you believe that there’s a primary target? Couldn’t his MO be just what it seems to be at face value, in that he stalks them for a short period, then kills them, with no ulterior motive?”

  “Could be. But that isn’t how I read him. Stalkers don’t usually escalate so quickly, and the majority don’t kill. They follow a pattern that in some cases entails the harassment of their target for several months, or even years.

  “I think we’re looking at serious delusional fantasy. He will believe that he is in love with the true object of his obsession, and that she is in love with him, but for some reason is deluding herself. Her continual rejection will only spur him on. Nothing she can say or do will dissuade him. Spurning his attention will only harden his intent. I think that this man becomes so frustrated that he has devised an outlet for it. He stalks and terrorises other women, kills them, and by doing so lessens the inadequacy that underpins his personality. He reaffirms control by dominating and manipulating lesser targets for a much shorter period. They’re just a means of releasing the pressure, so that he can maintain his onslaught of unwanted attention on the woman that he wants to possess, not destroy. Trouble is, he’ll definitely escalate. The pleasure he derived from what he did to Emily and Christine will make him like a junkie who needs a bigger fix more often.”

  Jack read the profile again before speaking. “Why are you so certain that this head case isn’t just a straightforward ritual murderer, if there is such a thing?”

  “The numerous untraceable phone calls to Christine are a powerful indicator. Who would steal dozens of mobiles, use each one once to ring her, and then dump them?”

  “Someone who didn’t want to be identified.”

  “Exactly.”

  “But Emily didn’t get any calls that we couldn’t trace. And there was nothing suspicious on her computer.”

  “Maybe he just stalked her without making contact. Or he may have sent her letters.”

  “If he did, her flatmate didn’t know about them.”

  “Interview her again. She might recall that Emily became anxious, or presented a different personality over the last few weeks or months of her life. She may even remember regular mail that Emily got, but wouldn’t talk about. When she was initially interviewed, the police were looking for either a killer who was known to Emily, or a random attacker.”

  Jack nodded. It was true. The statement given by Mavis Horton had given no grounds to suppose that Emily’s killer was not a stranger to her. There had been no reason to assume that she had been contacted repeatedly before being murdered.

  “There were no letters found,” Jack said.

  “Which figures. Had there been he would’ve taken them with him.”

  “And what specific post-offence behaviour do you anticipate?”

/>   “He’ll go one of two routes while keeping up the deluded worship of the woman he truly covets. I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s already selected another ‘fill-in’ victim. Or he might go for someone high-profile to really make an impression.”

  “Elaborate.”

  “Remember John Hinckley Jr, who tried to assassinate the then President, Ronald Reagan?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Hinckley initially became obsessed with Jodie Foster, the movie star. He saw her in the movie Taxi Driver, and something clicked. It could have been a shop assistant or a girl who walked passed him in the street. Christ knows what chemical reaction in these people’s brains causes them to make their choices. He contacted Foster by letter and phone, and she thought he was just a fan. She was cordial, no more than that. In one letter, he wrote, ‘You’ll be proud of me, Jodie. Millions of Americans will love me… us’. He had decided that by killing the president of the United States he would alter history, and by so doing impress the actress, who was showing no interest in him.”

  Jack was beginning to get a feel for the total callousness and unpredictability of the man they sought.

  “Sounds a lot like the guy who capped John Lennon,” he said.

  Lisa shook her head. Jack loved the way her hair shifted and jounced against her cheeks.

  “Different mind set,” Lisa said. “Mark David Chapman was an inadequate nobody, who thought that by murdering the man he so greatly admired, he would be linked to him forever. He loved Lennon, but could only express it by gunning him down. The sad truth is, that he was right about the enduring association it would create. Chapman was looking for a place in public consciousness, and got it. He had once approached the author Stephen King outside Rockefeller Plaza in New York; walked up to him, clutched his arm and asked him to sign a piece of paper. King duly signed it, then headed for his limo. But Chapman produced a Polaroid camera and said, ‘Can I get my picture taken with you’? He says it twice. King says, ‘Yeah, real quick,’ and Chapman gives the camera to someone to take the shot, and while it’s developing he asks King if he will sign it. He agrees to, but knows that the strange-eyed young guy has done this before, because it’s almost impossible to write on a Polaroid, but Chapman has a special pen for the job. King writes: Best wishes to Mark Chapman from Stephen King. Chapman told King that he was his number one fan.”