Next to Die: A gripping serial-killer thriller full of twists

by T. J. Brearton

  “And we don’t have any tags on this guy?” Hume asked.

  “Negative. We put out the BOLO, but so far, nothing.”

  “Tell me about him,” said Hume.

  Lena leaned toward the phone, her notes out. “Jameson Matthew Rentz, D.O.B. October fourth, nineteen ninety-three. Went to Almond High School, graduated 2012; attended Rochester Institute of Technology, dropped out in 2014. His father is an engineer. Mother doesn’t show a work history. Rentz has never really been gainfully employed. He’s got a juvenile offense, record sealed. But Mike spoke with Bobbi earlier about this and it’s most likely for battery. He was sixteen, beat up his girlfriend, also sixteen.”

  “But… so he’s got nothing to do with the Department of Social Services, here or in Watertown?”

  “We’re checking,” Mike said. “But so far we haven’t seen his name in any of the Fogarty or Lavoie files. If Harriet was killed by Rentz, it’s back to this whole thing possibly being this guy screwing up, killing her when he meant to go after Noelle.”

  “So,” Hume’s disembodied voice said, “you pretty much crossed this guy off before – I see Placid PD had someone looking in on her, but they weren’t there last night. So it’s like he’s been around, waiting, maybe, for the right chance. What’s he living on, if not his old man’s money? Where’s he living?”

  “In his car, maybe. He’s got an older Ford Focus registered in his name. It’s white. It’s four-door.”

  “Ah,” Hume said. “Okay. Well, we need to pick this guy up. He moved out of his family’s place… when?”

  “Looks like right after dropping out of school, so summer of 2014,” Mike said. He glanced at Lena, who added, “I just talked to the mother, Geena Rentz. She said Jamie and his father had a falling-out when he left RIT before graduating. Haven’t spoken in more than a year, he’s not coming home for holidays, that kind of thing.”

  “Was he squatting at the house on River Street?” Hume asked. “I’m looking at it right here – there was a white car, four-door, seen on River Street a few days before the Fogarty murder. I mean, Mike, what are we waiting for?”

  “Motive,” Mike said.

  “Motive? He’s in love with this Roberta Noelle, he’s obsessed with her. His life has no meaning without her, that sort of thing.”

  “It leaves out Corina Lavoie.”

  “She could know him,” said Hume. “If he’s drifting around… Maybe the sister knows him. You got a picture you could show her?”

  “I’m just not—”

  “It doesn’t fit into your ‘old score’ theory,” Hume interrupted. “I know. That’s your other main angle on this; that it all goes back to something that happened years ago, when Lavoie and Fogarty were under the same roof, sharing cases. In Lake Haven.”

  Mike said, “I can see someone traveling to Watertown to abduct, possibly kill Lavoie because of something involving the Pierce County DSS, but I’ve had a hard time seeing Rentz kidnapping and maybe murdering Lavoie because he’s a lovesick psychopath.”

  “Well maybe you’ve got to let go of Lavoie, Mike. Maybe you’ve got to face that you can’t get these to connect because they don’t.”

  Mike could feel himself getting worked up and was about to let fly when Lena spoke. “Can I say something here, please?”

  “Of course,” Hume said.

  “I think a little hashing out is healthy, okay, but we’re into total speculation. We’ve got enough probable cause to pull Rentz over whenever he pops up, search his car, and bring him in. Pritchard is in jail on the assault charge; we can monitor him, see if there’s someone he’s talking to or meeting with – or if his lawyer gets bail reduced, we follow him and see where he goes.” Her gaze flitted to Mike. “In the meantime, what we need to do is keep going through these cases. We started with eight cases that looked promising, and we’ve eliminated half of them due to deaths, imprisonment, and relocations, leaving us Dodd Caruthers, Charles Morrissey, Scott Earnshaw, and Susan Gann.”

  Hume was silent, then, “You’ve got a woman in there, huh?”

  “We’ve got four people for whom it could be said their lives were irrevocably impacted by the intervention of Pierce County Child Protective Services, all who have violent criminal histories. And Lavoie and Fogarty were involved with each of them. So, we need to knock on some doors and see where we’re at in twenty-four hours. Okay? But we’re going to start with Dodd Caruthers, who once left his kid in a hot car, and might have called the complainant and harassed him. He’s the right age, he’s the right size, he lives in Lake Haven.”

  “What’s his motive other than general antipathy toward society?” Hume asked.

  Overton answered, reading from the file on her lap. “That his older son Thomas was accidentally injured while a child in foster care.”

  “Accidentally injured?”

  “He was playing, got burned by the woodstove, there’s some permanent scarring.”

  Another pause from Hume, then, “That’s good enough for me.”

  * * *

  “I was in ’Nam,” Bill Caruthers said. “I was eighteen when I got sent to Da Nang.”

  Mike sat beside Lena on a couch that looked Vietnam era – orange- and red-striped. Caruthers’ small, modular home was gloomy, its walls paneled with fake wood, a flat-screen TV in the corner playing silently with closed captioning on the screen. A dog, the source of the musty smell in the air, had barely budged when they’d come in, and looked older than old Bill, who was at least seventy.

  “Thank you for your sacrifice,” Mike said. “How are you doing, sir?”

  “China Beach,” Bill Caruthers said. “March 8, 1965. Me and 3,500 US Marines, Operation Rolling Thunder. Three weeks later, a car bomb exploded outside the Embassy in Saigon. How am I doing? How do I look?” He wore a ragged bandage on his nose to cover the skin cancer, a tube beneath his nostrils snaking down to the oxygen tank beside the recliner, a cane resting nearby. “It’s a shit world for an old man,” he said.

  “Do you expect your son home soon?” Lena asked.

  “Oh… Dodd. Yeah, I s’pose. He was gettin’ my meds from the Kinney Drug. Sometimes he goes, you know… he goes around. Does whatever boys do.”

  Dodd Caruthers was in his forties; Mike supposed kids never really grew up in their parents’ eyes.

  “And he’s been working?” Lena asked. “Since he got out?”

  “Yeah, well, he does a bit of this and that.” Bill’s gaze sharpened. “What did you say you was here for again?”

  “We have some questions to ask your son regarding an ongoing investigation,” Lena said.

  “Does he need a lawyer?”

  “Well, let’s hope not. Just a couple questions, and we’ll see.”

  “Maybe he ought to have a lawyer,” Bill said, and grunted as he tried to get out of the easy chair.

  Mike spoke up. “Mr. Caruthers, there are no allegations here, just questions for us to gather information. Your son is…” He stopped as a rumbling truck turned in the driveway. Old Bill slumped back in the chair, defeated, while both Mike and Lena rose to their feet. The old dog lifted its head; its tail slowly flopped from one side to the other.

  Mike watched through the window as Dodd Caruthers got out of the truck, took a hard look at the Impala parked in the driveway, and walked toward the house with his brow furrowed. He pushed in through the squeaky screen door holding a plastic shopping bag. He stared at Mike and Lena as he crossed to his father and handed him the bag. “There you go. She said the antibiotic was strong, that you needed to take it for the full ten days.”

  Bill flapped a hand. “Yeah, yeah. Did you get my cigarettes?” He pawed around in the bag, pulled out a pack of USA Golds, and grimaced.

  Dodd turned to the investigators. He was tall, his blond hair going gray, eyes bright blue. He wore a patchy beard, part of which didn’t quite grow around a scar from his left ear to his chin. “What’re you here for?”

  Lena spoke first, introduced them, a
nd asked if he wanted to sit down.

  “I’m fine standing. What do you want?”

  Lena glanced at Mike, indicating he had the floor. Mike asked, “Are you Dodd A. Caruthers?”

  “Yeah…”

  “We’re investigating the murder of Harriet Fogarty.”

  “Okay. And?”

  “Your children were placed in foster care when you went to SCI Cold Brook for drug charges and your wife wasn’t able to care for them. You did thirteen years, out now for just over a year. Is that all correct?”

  Dodd’s gaze shifted from Mike to Lena and he looked her up and down before connecting with Mike again. “Yeah.”

  “Can you tell me where you were one week ago, the night of July 12th?”

  A quick look at his father, who was slapping the cigarette pack against his palm and seemed to have forgotten about everyone else in the room. “I was here,” Dodd said. “I was at home with my dad.”

  “Mr. Caruthers,” Mike said to the older man, “can you confirm that your son was with you last Thursday?”

  Bill unwrapped the plastic from the cigarettes and opened the top. He looked up, “Uh?”

  Dodd said, “They’re asking where I was last Thursday, Dad. I told them I was here with you.”

  “Yuh. Right. You was here with me.”

  “Mr. Caruthers,” Mike said to Bill, who fumbled to extract a cigarette. “That’s not what you told us before Dodd arrived. You said you thought he was bowling.”

  The younger Caruthers got red in the face, his jaw starting to twitch. “Yeah, okay,” he said. “Thursday is league night. I was thinking before that, and after that, I was here. Maybe you ought to be more specific with your time.”

  “Between 7 p.m. and 9 p.m.,” Mike said.

  “So then, yeah. I was at the league game. You can ask any of them.”

  “When’s that league game go from?”

  “From six until about nine or so.”

  “And you were here at home right up until you left for the game… Where’s that at, Silver Lanes?”

  “Uh-huh.” Dodd gave Lena another look-over. Mike thought he was being pretty obvious about it, too.

  Mike said, “Alright. We’ll check in with the league. Meantime, I’d like to talk about your older son, Thomas.”

  “What about him?”

  Bill lit up a cigarette at last, took a long drag, coughed, and squinted against the smoke. “They talking about Tommy?”

  “Don’t worry about it, Dad. What do you want to know about my kid?” Dodd wore jeans, despite the heat, and a black T-shirt with an AR-15 on the front and From My Cold Dead Hands written beneath it in lettering that was colored red, white, and blue. Heavy work boots on his feet.

  “While he was in temporary placement,” Mike said, “your son, Tommy, sustained burns. From a woodstove. Is that right?”

  Dodd let out a long breath, whistling through his nostrils. Mike wondered how many weapons were stored up in the home Dodd shared with his father. Maybe some nice hunting knives among the collection.

  “You got something you want to ask me?”

  “Sure,” said Mike, “I’ll ask. Have you harbored anger toward the Pierce County Child Protective Services for what happened to your son?”

  “Have I what?”

  “Have you blamed them for what happened? That Tommy was taken into state custody, and during that time sustained injuries? Have you been angry with them?”

  Dodd looked at his father again, who seemed lost in the pleasure of his cigarette. He’d removed the oxygen from his nose, the hose draped around his neck like a noose. When Dodd didn’t answer, Mike said, “You also had two CPS reports prior to your drug arrest. I’ve seen them.”

  “Okay. So?”

  “Under ‘alleged suspicions of abuse or maltreatment’ of your children, child alcohol use is cited, emotional neglect, inadequate food, parental drug and alcohol misuse, excessive corporal punishment, bruises… and then there was the call that you left your other son, Brandon, alone in a car on a hot day.”

  Bill started coughing. When he couldn’t seem to stop, he said, “Doddie, gimme somethin’—”

  “Shut up.”

  “Gimme somethin’ to drink.”

  Dodd stalked off into the kitchen, making Mike nervous. His hand drifted around to the small of his back, where he carried his pistol. He glanced at Lena, saw the concern reflected in her eyes, but gave her a nod – it’s okay. There was the snap of a can opening and Dodd strode back – those steel-toed boots thundering – and handed his father the beer. Bill took it, slurped it down, stifled a cough, had some more.

  At this point the old dog got to its feet – Mike didn’t know if it was the scent of the beer, the testosterone in the air, or what – and lumbered over to the easy chair. Dodd stood there watching his father drink, then lowered into a squat when the dog bumped against his leg.

  “Easy girl. Hey. Hey, it’s alright.” Dodd rubbed and petted the dog; he sunk his oil-stained fingers into her thick yellowish hair. Mike relaxed a little, dropping his hand to his side.

  “I don’t blame anyone for Tommy,” Dodd said. “Those were hard times. I got laid off – if anyone is to blame, it’s the US Government. Not taking care of my dad – who’s a vet, by the way – and the jobs have been disappearing up here.” He reached to pet the dog’s hindquarters, stretching his T-shirt. The short sleeve revealed more of a tattoo.

  Mike gave Lena a quick look to see if she saw it too.

  “And Tommy’s mother wasn’t in any great shape. We had some parties back then, okay, you know, just trying to unwind, and the kids got a hold of the liquor, so…”

  “Tommy was five,” Mike said. Couldn’t help it. The stuff he’d seen on little Tommy had turned his stomach.

  Dodd let go of the dog, rose to his feet, looking incensed again. “That woman, you said her name was Fogarty? I had nothing to do with that. I was at the bowling alley, then I was here at my house.”

  Mike looked back, saw the fire in Dodd’s eyes, and said, “Thank you for your time, Dodd.” He nodded to the old man. “Mr. Caruthers, take care.” He moved toward the door, brushing up against Lena, getting her going in the same direction.

  “My house,” said the old man.

  “What?” Dodd snapped.

  “You said this was your house.”

  “Drink your beer.”

  “See?” Bill called out as Mike was pulling open the screen door. “No respect. It’s a shit world for an old man.”

  * * *

  “That was interesting,” Lena said. She was drawn up against the door of the car, looking out the window as Mike drove along.

  “You saw that tattoo?”

  “Yeah. Was it what I…”

  “Yeah. The outer symbol replicates a swastika with Egyptian overtones, or something. I bet if we’d looked under his shirt, he’d have a big, fat heart with knives through it. Aryan Brotherhood.”

  Overton was silent.

  “Could be from his time inside,” Mike said.

  “Yeah but there was other stuff, too,” Lena said. “Did you see the…? Who was that in the picture? Framed, sitting a few inches away from the crucifix on the wall. I think it might have been Nathan Bedford Forrest.”

  “They should fire their decorator,” Mike joked. “Probably white robes, hoods, maybe a pulpit in the garage…”

  “Yeah… maybe.”

  The scene had made a real impact on her and he quit the foolish humor. “Hey – you okay?”

  “This shit just… you know?” She rubbed her temple with a finger.

  “We need to check his story.”

  “Silver Lanes isn’t open for another four hours,” Lena said. “But I know the guy who runs the local league – Philly Pete Randolf.”

  Mike cut her a look, couldn’t resist. “You’re a bowler, huh? I guess I could picture that.”

  She finally cracked a smile. “Pete’s a local guy; everybody knows him.”

  * * *
/>   Pete confirmed Dodd’s attendance at the previous week’s league night.

  “All night?” Mike asked. “Could he have disappeared at some point?”

  “Maybe; not that I noticed.” They stood in Pete’s living room, him in a Hugh Hefner-style robe. “Can I get you guys something? Drink? Bite to eat?”

  Mike didn’t feel like sticking around. Everybody seemed to have a damn alibi – Pritchard, Dodd Caruthers, even Jessica Rankin had turned over her phone records, showing a landline call to her sister in Missouri during the commission of the crime. Not that she’d been high on their list.

  He moved off down the walkway toward the parked Impala, leaving Lena to reminisce with Pete and get a list of the rest of the league members. For a guy who owned and operated a rundown bowling alley, Pete lived in one heck of a neighborhood. Some of the best homes in Lake Haven shouldered together, pretty elms lining the street, backyards overlooking the town below.

  The street made a sharp curve, and through the spaces between houses, Mike could see downtown. The trees obscured a view of the bowling lanes from here, but they were close. He wondered if Dodd could’ve spent the first part of the evening in the home on River Street, watching as the DSS employees left for the day, leaving just a few cars in the lot, then popped over to Silver Lanes, signed in, bowled a few frames, then left again. Maybe he would have told his buddies his father needed him. Maybe they were drinking, no one really paid much attention.

  Then he drives to DSS, Mike thought, either goes back to his nest in the house on River Street or maybe just hangs out in the woods, watches until Harriet’s Kia Sportage is the last car in the lot, slips into the back seat, kills her when she sits down.

  Couple of things, though: League bowlers probably took their Thursday nights very seriously. They’d make a fuss about someone taking off in the middle of a game, regardless of his excuse or their drinking. If it happened that way, one of them might say something to Mike, like Pete. On the other hand, if they distrusted cops, they might circle the wagons and protect Dodd. They needed to track down the other league guys and see.