The Ninth Life

by E. H. Reinhard

  “Nine total,” Ed said. “She has one in her stomach that I believe to be the first.”

  “How did you determine that?” I asked.

  “Inflammation and positioning,” Ed said. He grabbed a pair of gloves from the cart beside the table Erica Osweiler’s body lay upon and put them on. “See how this one is vertical?” Ed pointed at the one lowest in the woman’s stomach. It was longer vertically, while all of the other wounds were longer horizontally. “So that one would have been while she was standing, I’m thinking. Probably an underhand stabbing motion there. The direction of the wound travels upward inside of the body. Plus, the blood from that flowed down her waist. The other wounds, the blood flowed to the side, meaning that she was already on the ground, or in the trunk. We had a couple that actually penetrated the body.”

  “Penetrated the body?” I asked.

  “Yes,” Ed said. He slipped his fingers beneath her left shoulder and lifted her onto her side. “See these here? Those are our exit wounds from the knife. Violent stabbing, that’s for sure. We have four that came through, two that hit her spine, another two that hit the inside of her ribs. And then the one in the stomach.”

  I saw Hank crane his neck to get a closer look at the stab wounds.

  “What are you thinking, Ed, maybe a blade that’s an inch or so wide? How long?” Hank asked.

  “Over a six-inch blade. Maybe an inch and a half wide. In between about an eighth and quarter-inch blade thickness,” Ed said.

  “A big serrated hunting knife,” I said.

  Ed nodded. “Yeah, serrated,” he said. “I didn’t get to that part. What, are you taking a night course in wound shapes?”

  I pointed at the scars on the side of my head. “A knife like that was used in the original homicides. And used by the guy responsible for carving me up. Anything else of interest with her?” I asked.

  “About all that I have for you, Kane.”

  “Okay. I made contact with her next of kin. Her father said that he was hopping on the first flight that he could get on.”

  “Not local?” Ed asked.

  “West Virginia.”

  “Does he know that he’s supposed to come here?”

  “I gave him all of the information when I spoke to him.”

  “Okay,” Ed said.

  “All right. I think that we’ve seen what we need to see. We have to get back to the station and get going on this. We just got some new information a little bit ago.”

  “Sure,” Ed said. “Let me get the clothing for you and have you guys fill out the transfer of evidence forms for me.” Ed pulled the sheet back over Erica Osweiler’s body and took the gloves from his hands.

  We walked toward his office.

  Chapter 12

  I called the Madison Mental Health Institute again on our drive back to the station. After being transferred three or four times, I finally got someone on the phone—someone who wouldn’t give me anything, other than the fact that I needed to speak with the assistant director. Hank and I got back to the station a couple of minutes before six and split up. He headed for the bull pen and said he was going to see if Jones needed a hand with anything. I dropped off the clothing that I’d gotten from Ed down in the forensics department and walked back upstairs to the captain’s office—his door was closed, and I could see him on the phone.

  I stuck the key in my lock on my office door.

  “Kane,” I heard at my back.

  I pushed open my door, walked around my desk, and sat. I looked at the paperwork scattered across my desk, and it was all at damn near chest level.

  “This is ridiculous,” I said. I rose from my broken chair and wheeled it out from behind my desk. I dragged one of my guest chairs back and sat.

  “Better,” I said to myself. I woke up my computer and pulled up my email. The second new message in my in-box was the case files from Jim. The first new message was from my sister. It appeared to have various attachments, my guess was photos or videos of my nephew—I’d look at them later. I downloaded the file Jim sent and began the process of getting it printed.

  Bostok walked into my office. “I saw you walk past. I was on the phone with the major. He wants to sit in on our meeting. What do we know about this Kleeman woman?” Bostok asked.

  “Basically nothing. She’s a DOC employee. That’s where we got a hit on her prints, but I can’t get the damn assistant director on the line at the state hospital where Larry Koskinen is serving out his sentence.”

  “That’s where we’re thinking that she works?”

  “That’s what I’m thinking. She lives near the hospital. But I need to get this damn guy on the phone to either confirm or deny. I left a message but haven’t heard anything. I’m going to try calling him again in a second.”

  “Did you try calling the DOC directly?”

  “Tried. The office was closed for the day by the time I called. Did you get an arrest warrant issued?”

  “Too soon,” Bostok said. “Just her prints aren’t enough. Right now, we’re looking at prints and circumstantial evidence. But she’s damn well coming in to be questioned if we can locate her. What are we doing about that?”

  I was annoyed that we didn’t have enough to get a warrant, but Bostok was right, we still needed more. “I called in Donner and Reynolds to get started on digging into the woman,” I said. “But I wanted to see what you thought on getting her ID out there. Do we want to get something together for the press and start splashing her face around or just keep it in-house and spread the word to other precincts?”

  “Let’s wait until the meeting. Maybe Major Danes will have some insight on it. Did you get her identification out to our guys in patrol?”

  “About a minute after I got the ID on her.”

  “Good,” Bostok said.

  “Hank said that you were going to contact the family of Billie Webber?” I asked.

  “I spoke with her mother.”

  “What did you say?”

  “I told her what happened. What we found. Not an easy conversation, especially seeing as there seemed to be some kind of family disconnect there.”

  “Family disconnect like what?” I asked.

  “Like she hadn’t spoken to her daughter in a number of years. She didn’t even know that she was living in Tampa.”

  “So she didn’t know about a possible boyfriend?”

  “Had no clue,” the captain said.

  “Father, brothers, sisters, someone else we could contact?”

  “I asked,” Bostok said. “The mother gave me the name of Billie Webber’s brother, a guy named Brandon Clemmons, and a phone number that she described to me as the last one she had for him. I tried the number, which was a Florida prefix, but my call went through to someone else who didn’t know of anyone named Brandon Clemmons. You guys didn’t happen to see her cell phone on the scene, did you?”

  “Yeah, it was there. I would assume that Rick bagged it and has it downstairs.”

  “Maybe we could find something in it for her brother and make contact that way.”

  “I’ll see what Rick did with it,” I said.

  My printer made a long beep, signaling that it was out of paper. I walked over to it and refilled the tray.

  “What’s all that?” Bostok asked. He jerked his chin toward my printer.

  “I had my old partner send me the files from the original case. I’m getting a couple copies of it printed up. I figured I can distribute them at the meeting so everyone is familiar with how this all went down the first time. Who knows, maybe something from the original investigation could help this one.”

  “Sure,” Bostok said.

  I walked back to my desk, took a seat, and rested my arms on my desk’s surface. “Actually, I just thought of something else. I think I have my original notes from the investigation packed away in my storage unit at my condo as well. I’ll dig that out tonight when I get home.”

  “All right.” Bostok lifted his suit sleeve and looked at his
watch. “I’d like to get this meeting rolling here if everyone is back.”

  “Okay. This printing should be done in a couple of minutes, and I’ll be set. I’ll call down to Rick and then gather everyone up.”

  “Conference room two when you’re ready.” Bostok slapped the sill of my doorway with his hand and walked away. I scooped up my desk phone and dialed Rick. He picked up right away.

  “Rick Daniels,” he said.

  “It’s Kane. Are you ready for the meeting?”

  “In a couple minutes, I can be. I’m just getting Kevin to start working on the clothing that you brought in. Rob and I are going over what we collected from the apartment. I didn’t get a chance to tell you, but we got a couple prints, in blood, on the kitchen faucet handle. We haven’t run them yet, though.”

  “Good,” I said. “We needed something definitive.”

  “I’m guessing it doesn’t get more than that. Provided it belongs to this Kleeman woman. And checking against her prints is the first thing on my list. I wanted to get that done before the meeting. So, right now, basically.”

  “Okay. Do that and come up to the meeting. We’re going to get together in conference room two in a couple minutes.”

  “Sure. Need Rob too or just me?”

  “Why don’t you both come up? Another thing, did you get Billie Webber’s phone from the apartment?”

  “We have it.”

  “Okay. We’re going to need to try to get a number from it.”

  “It hasn’t been printed yet. Um, let me have Rob do that now. It should only take a second, and then we’ll bring it upstairs with us.”

  “Sounds good,” I said.

  I clicked off and tried the number for the state mental hospital. Again, I got put through to the assistant director’s office and received his voice mail. I left him another message. Five minutes later, my printer finally kicked out the last sheet. I separated the five copies of the case file that I printed into five different file folders, left my office, and found Hank and Jones at their desks in the bull pen.

  “Anything, Jones?” I asked.

  He stretched his back, stood, and then sat at the corner of his metal desk. I expected the far side of it to lift from his weight, but it didn’t.

  “I put in for phone and bank records on each woman,” Jones said. “That we should have in a day or two. I also touched base with Erica Osweiler’s father. He and her mother got a flight out later tonight, but with the connections, it won’t get here until the early morning hours. Unfortunately he couldn’t help much with friends that were local to our area. He rattled off a couple of first names that I wrote down, but that was about it. I figured that I could maybe just start going through these girls’ phones and fish for contacts that way.”

  “We’re going to need to try that route to contact the brother of Billie Webber as well. I’ll make sure you get both phones to go through,” I said.

  Jones nodded.

  “And we still need to find the boyfriend, if there is one,” I said.

  “Got it,” Jones said.

  Hank left his desk, two away, and came to Jones and me.

  “Are we ready for the meeting?” Hank asked.

  “Yeah, let’s go. Bostok said the major wanted to sit in. We’re headed to conference room two.” I looked a couple of desks over at Donner. He held a phone to his ear. “Donner,” I called. He looked over. “Conference room two when you’re ready.” I held up two fingers.

  Donner nodded and went back to his phone call.

  “One of you guys want to go and grab Timmons or Mueller or whoever is leading up patrol right now? It probably wouldn’t hurt to have one of them in on this meeting.”

  “I’ll grab someone,” Hank said.

  Jones rose from the edge of his desk, and we headed to the meeting room. I pulled the door open. Short gray commercial carpet covered the floor. A large conference table sat horizontally in the room’s center with ten or fifteen chairs tucked underneath it. The far right of the room had a podium standing in the corner. Against the back wall sat a couple of blank easels for pegging photos and information—both empty. Aside from a few potted plants and metal folding chairs leaning against the walls, the rest of the room was fairly sparse. Bostok sat at the conference table with Major Danes. Danes was a bald-headed, mid-fifties man with a white mustache that ran down to his chin. Wearing a suit, he sat at the table with his arms crossed over his large chest. Rick and Rob had yet to arrive.

  “Jones,” the major said.

  “Major. How are you doing?” Jones asked.

  Danes held up his big palms. “I’d be better if we didn’t have this shit going on.”

  Jones took a seat at the table.

  “Major,” I said.

  “Hey, Kane,” Major Danes said. “Did you end up hitting the gun show last week?”

  I slid out a chair and had a seat across from him. “I walked through. Didn’t pick anything up, though.”

  He gave me a nod. Danes regularly invited guys from the station out to his house—the last time that I was there, we had gotten to talking about firearms. I must have mentioned to him that I wanted to stop at the latest show.

  “The captain told me that we have an ID on our suspect?” the major asked.

  “Female by the name of Eve Kleeman. We don’t have a ton of other information on her yet, but I have Donner and Reynolds that are going to get started on it. I’m still waiting to hear back from the assistant director at the state mental hospital in Wisconsin.”

  “This is where she works?” Major Danes asked.

  “That’s what I’m trying to find out,” I said. “It’s where Koskinen is serving his sentence. I’ve made a couple of calls to the assistant director there and left two messages. I still haven’t heard back from him yet. I also tried calling the Wisconsin DOC main office. Closed, though.”

  “If you don’t get a callback in an hour or so from this assistant director, give me a ring and let me know,” the major said. “I’ll get this guy on the phone with you one way or another this evening.”

  “Got it,” I said. “You guys could probably have a look at these while we wait for everyone else.” I slid both the captain and the major a folder.

  “These are the copies of the original case file that you had printed up?” Bostok asked.

  “Yeah,” I said. “I’m not really sure if they are going to do us any good, but they’re still worth taking a look at, I guess. This is just the final write-up. The entire files would take up boxes, I’m guessing.”

  “The second victim,” Bostok said. “How, and where, was she found?”

  “In an alley, downtown Milwaukee. Stabbed like the others.”

  “In a trunk?” Bostok asked.

  I shook my head. “Propped up against the wall in the back of the building. There should be copies of a couple of photos in there.” I opened one of the folders that I had before me and dug through it. I found the page I was looking for about ten or fifteen pages in. “Here,” I said. I pulled the sheet out and passed it across the table.

  Bostok took it in hand. The major had a look and then found the page in his own file.

  “This was a couple nights after the first?” Bostok asked.

  “Three, I think. The dates are on there.”

  The captain looked at the major seated beside him. “Think we should put out some more cars canvassing the downtown area?”

  Major Danes looked up from his folder and over at me. “What do you think? Do you think this woman is planning to recreate these, or do you think the first was just to get your attention?”

  I shrugged. “No way of knowing.”

  Chapter 13

  Her phone rang.

  Eve smiled and snatched it from the coffee table. She hit Talk before it rang the second time. “Hi,” she said.

  “You’re set for this evening?” he asked. “You remember everything that you have to do?”

  “I’m good, baby. I remember everything.”
>
  “Good girl.”

  “I’m so bored without you. I’m just sitting here in this condo all alone.”

  “Remember what I told you,” he said. “As soon as you finish, we’ll be together forever. Together in the kingdom of our master.”

  “Should I maybe go and look for another woman?” she asked.

  “No,” he said. “The master will present one to you when the time is right.”

  “Okay,” Eve said.

  “Call me when you’re done with the plans for the night.”

  “But it’s going to be so late,” Eve said.

  “I don’t care,” he said. “I’ll turn the phone on vibrate and put it under my head so I can feel when you call in case I fall asleep.”

  “Okay.”

  “Until then, get some rest. You have a long night ahead of you.”

  “All right,” Eve said. “I love you.”

  “Love you too.” He hung up.

  Eve set the phone back on the coffee table. She thought of the night ahead and what had already been planned. The body would be left in a handpicked location at 3:00 a.m. Her instructions after leaving the body had been given to her.

  She lay facedown on the couch and fluffed the pillow under her head. Eve closed her eyes—as he’d said, she’d need a good couple of hours of rest for the long night that she had ahead of her. Eve flopped from one side to the other. She stretched her legs and set them up onto the arm of the couch—she was too large to stretch out straight.

  Chapter 14

  Our meeting lasted a little over an hour. Rick had confirmed that a handful of prints lifted from various spots in the apartment did in fact belong to Eve Kleeman, the damning one being in blood on the kitchen faucet. The major made a call and got us an arrest warrant. I went over my account of the initial investigation while the guys looked over copies of the case files. I wasn’t sure what good any of it would do—we weren’t dealing with the same suspect. We were dealing with someone other than Koskinen that, for some reason, wanted my attention and had no problem recreating murders to get it.