The Cipher

by Maldonado, Isabella

  Trina’s gaze met hers.

  “They’re here to help you. We can’t unlock the shackles, so we need to cut the metal part holding them to the wall.”

  Trina’s eyes flicked back to the EMT and she whimpered.

  “What’s wrong, Trina?”

  “Can you stay with me?” she whispered.

  “I’ll be right here. Just focus on me. Don’t worry about what they’re doing. I know this is not the best time, but I want to ask you some questions. Is that okay?”

  It would serve the dual purpose of distracting Trina while gathering intel as quickly as possible to put out a BOLO for the Cipher.

  At Trina’s nod, Nina adopted a soothing tone. “What did he look like?”

  “Like one of those biker guys. He was huge. Really strong. He had body art all down his arms, a shaved head, and a black goatee.”

  A loud metallic clank made Trina jump. The hook had snapped in half. One of Trina’s feet was now free.

  Nina asked for more details as the medic went to work on the other ankle. “What about his eyes?”

  “Couldn’t see them,” Trina said. “He wore sunglasses.”

  Another loud pop of splitting metal and Trina was able to pull her legs together. The EMT moved to her wrist.

  “How did he talk?” Nina asked. “What did he say?”

  Trina shook her head vehemently. “I don’t want to repeat the stuff he told me.”

  The third hook fell apart with a loud crack. Trina clutched her free hand to her chest, holding Nina’s windbreaker.

  “I’m sorry,” the medic said. “But I have to get to her other wrist.”

  He leaned over Trina, who tucked her body into a ball under the jacket. Nina reached out a hand, and Trina squeezed it in a white-knuckled grip.

  “Damn,” the EMT said, grunting. “This one’s at a bad angle. I’m sorry, but there’s no other way for me to reach it.” He moved his leg, straddling Trina between his knees to brace himself.

  Trina thrashed hysterically.

  Nina grabbed the medic’s arm and hauled him off the girl. “What do you think you’re doing?”

  He let out an exasperated sigh. “Trying to cut her loose.”

  She kept her hold on his arm. “You need to find a different position.”

  A fragment of memory flickered in Nina’s mind. The pressure of heavy masculine legs pinning her down. Trapping her. Eleven years ago, the monster had straddled her that way, keeping her still, forcing her to submit. He had probably done the same to Trina when he shackled her.

  “I don’t like this any more than you do,” the EMT said. “But I don’t see another way to cut that thing off.” He held the shears out to her. “Maybe she’ll do better with you.”

  She took the shears and looked down at Trina. The girl was wide eyed, batshit, full-on panicked. She would have to position her body over Trina’s as the medic had done to get to the last manacle. Nina struggled to tamp down a distorted sense of déjà vu, reliving her own attack from both Trina’s perspective and the Cipher’s as she prepared to straddle the girl.

  “Listen, I want to free you, but I can’t do it unless you cooperate. Will you help me by lying still?”

  Trina simply stared at her, unwilling or unable to speak.

  Grasping the handles firmly, she leaned over the girl, lining up the sharp blades along the edge of the metal. She squeezed. After considerable effort, Nina was rewarded with a loud pop. Trina shot up, pushing Nina aside, struggling off the makeshift bed. The EMT grabbed her, feeding her hysteria, and Trina began flailing and clawing at him.

  “Stop!” He grabbed the girl’s wrists. “We’re trying to help you.”

  Something deep within Nina snapped. She hauled her arm back and elbowed the paramedic in the shoulder. Hard.

  He released his grip on the girl and rounded on Nina. “What the hell?”

  She was way out of line but didn’t care. She had reacted reflexively when she saw him grab Trina’s wrists. The girl was traumatized, and his actions weren’t helping. They were making things immeasurably worse.

  Trina flung her arms around Nina’s neck and sobbed. Nina figured she was done answering questions for the time being.

  “Can you treat her in the ambulance?” Nina said to the EMT over Trina’s shoulder, disregarding his outraged expression and keeping him on task. “I want to get her to the hospital before she goes into shock.”

  Nina urged the men to stand back and let her maneuver Trina to her feet. Supporting her with an arm around her waist, Nina took a blanket the second medic offered her and carefully arranged it to cover Trina’s head like a hoodie, only leaving a small portion of her face visible.

  “No one can see who you are,” she said to Trina, who nodded.

  They walked out to a sea of curious onlookers holding their cell phones aloft behind the yellow crime scene tape.

  Nina heard them calling her name as they caught sight of her. She bustled Trina into the back of a waiting ambulance and told Perez she would ride with her to the hospital. The detective agreed to bring Trina’s mother to meet them at the ER.

  After the doors closed, the second medic sat in the back next to Nina. He smiled at Trina, trying to calm her as he took her vitals.

  Satisfied with his care, she considered the situation. They would not catch the Cipher today, but at least he hadn’t claimed another victim. Which brought another thought to mind as the ambulance bumped its way along the city streets. He would surely exact revenge for Trina’s escape.

  And when he saw video of Nina escorting the girl from the RV, he would know where to direct his fury.

  Chapter 42

  The spicy scent of carne asada mixed with sautéed onions and jalapeños wafted through the Emergency Operations Center. Nina returned Perez’s grin as she sank her teeth into the juicy burrito. He’d arranged for a delivery from a restaurant called Casa Cruz Cocina, a South Phoenix place Perez had assured her had the best Mexican food in the city.

  “More red sauce?” Kent asked, pulling her attention away from the handsome homicide detective.

  “I’m good.”

  At the opposite end of the room, Buxton was deep in conversation with Steven Tobias, the Phoenix police chief. Carryout bags of Mexican food were spread down the center of the rectangular conference table. Everyone grabbed what they wanted and plopped it onto paper plates.

  Buxton turned toward the group and raised his voice to carry over the conversational din. “Let’s go over what we have so far. I’d like to start with the victim’s statement.” He gestured toward Nina. “Special Agent Guerrera took point on the interview at the hospital.”

  After the paramedics had pushed Trina’s gurney into the ER and transferred her onto a hospital bed, nurses had descended upon them. Nina stayed through the onslaught of medical poking and prodding, noting Trina’s responses to questions about various injuries on her body. She had done her best to keep the girl calm while a special nurse examiner administered the rape kit. The biggest challenge proved to be Trina’s mother, who had swooped into the room like a banshee, screeching at everyone within earshot when she wasn’t sobbing hysterically over her daughter’s bed. Nina had been fortunate to have a few minutes alone with Trina to ask a few more questions before passing the investigatory baton to a Phoenix detective.

  Conscious everyone was waiting for her report, Nina quickly swallowed and dabbed at her mouth with a paper napkin. “The victim is Trina Davidson, seventeen years old, temporarily living at the downtown women’s shelter with her mother. She’d never seen the unsub before last night and had no prior contact with him on any social media platforms.”

  “Did she indicate why the unsub left her alone in the RV?” Buxton asked.

  “She told me she tried to escape as he was shackling her to the bed. She took a swing at him, he blocked the punch, and her fist flew back and connected with a webcam clamped to a shelf above the bed. He went ballistic when it broke. She thinks he planned to livestream her
murder.”

  She noticed Wade making notes in his tablet.

  “He finished binding her to the bed and left—Trina assumes, but doesn’t know—to find a replacement camera,” Nina said. “She heard a motorcycle leaving but hadn’t seen him riding one before.”

  Buxton looked around the table. “Do we have any info on the bike?”

  Everyone shook their heads.

  Nina continued, “The RV has a built-in minigarage. It’s big enough for a bike or a Vespa, but it won’t hold a car. The space was empty, but Forensics found where oil had dripped on the floor inside.”

  “Must have been riding a Harley,” one of the Phoenix officers muttered. The detective next to him chuckled.

  “He’d been gone about half an hour when Detective Perez and I showed up. Which means he probably came back to flashing lights and wailing sirens. My guess is he turned his bike around and got the hell out of there before he came anywhere near the scene.”

  Buxton nodded. “What else did the victim tell you about the suspect?”

  “She said he wore black leather gloves the whole time. It’s October, but here in Phoenix it’s about eighty-five degrees out. He wouldn’t wear them for the cold.”

  “He must know we have his DNA,” Breck said, speaking up for the first time. “So why wear gloves?”

  “Trying to hide his fingerprints?” Perez suggested.

  Nina considered it. “Maybe they’re in a criminal database somewhere.”

  “There are a lot of professions that require prints too,” Wade said.

  “When I was in the navy, they printed us,” Kent said. “Maybe he’s in the military.”

  “He used medical tape,” Nina said, recalling another detail. “He taped a laceration on the girl’s thigh. Guess he didn’t want her to bleed out before he came back. Could he be a combat medic or a military doctor?”

  “We’ll get in touch with our contacts in the military to see if they can help,” Buxton said. “But I’m not holding out much hope. Let’s move on to the unsub’s profile. How can we add to what we have?”

  This question was aimed at Wade.

  “I don’t think this victim was preplanned like the others,” Wade said. “He went to the RV rental place wearing his biker getup. Drove into the lot on a motorcycle . . . might have been a Harley.” He directed a sardonic smile at the cop who had joked about the bike earlier. “Wanted to make sure it fit in the onboard minigarage. We haven’t found the bike yet, so we don’t know where he got it, but I’m assuming it’s rented too. He’s too smart to get pulled over on a stolen bike, and I doubt he rode it across the country from DC or Savannah.”

  “Why do you think he didn’t target Trina specifically?” Buxton asked.

  “My best guess is that he planned to stake out the shelter when Trina dropped into his lap,” Wade said. “She was in his age range and demographic, and she just waltzes out right in front of him. When the other girl left her alone to buy cigarettes, he couldn’t pass up the opportunity.”

  “A narcissist would probably think it was his due,” Kent said. “He’s so superior that he wouldn’t get caught. He’s smarter than the rest of us mere mortals.”

  Nina turned to Kent. “Where do you think that comes from?”

  “He’s likely been told since early childhood that he’s special,” Kent said. “That he’s better. He begins to feel entitled. When things don’t turn out the way he thinks they should, he would naturally look for someone to blame. It couldn’t be that he simply didn’t measure up. It must be someone else’s fault. And that someone must be punished.”

  “What about the camera?” Buxton asked from the other end of the table.

  Wade’s thick gray brows drew together. “He feels like his audience is still growing, and he needs a bigger show. He hasn’t got the thousand likes he demanded to air the next sixty seconds of the previous video, so he’s creating a new one that he will post regardless. Only it doesn’t work out.”

  Nina appreciated that Wade had referred to the video without mentioning her by name. Everyone in the room had no doubt seen it, but she didn’t need the distraction of discussing it in front of them. Still, she took a sip of cold coffee from the paper cup in front of her to hide the flush heating her face.

  “And you agree with Agent Kent that he will need to blame someone?” Buxton asked Wade.

  “Blame and punish,” Wade said. “A recurring theme for him. I believe he was punished severely as a child. Probably by a father figure. He vents his frustration on young girls, so something pivotal may have occurred during his adolescent years. Perhaps with a girl of that age, or perhaps with the parent who punished him. He became stuck in that phase of development and is fixated there in certain ways.”

  Buxton had opened his mouth to ask another question when an agent sitting next to him got his attention. “Sir, we’ve got activity on the unsub’s Facebook page.”

  Chief Tobias called out to one of his computer techs. “Get it up on the screen.”

  The tech’s fingers flashed over a keyboard, and one of the monitors mounted to the wall flickered from solid royal blue to the Cipher’s page.

  “Turn up the volume,” Tobias said.

  The silhouette of a cloaked male figure appeared in front of a plain white wall as the live-feed of a video began.

  “She calls herself Warrior Girl,” he said.

  Icy dread spread through Nina at the sound of his voice.

  “They call her a hero. But I know the truth.”

  The room fell completely silent. Every eye riveted to the screen.

  “And now it’s time for the world to know.”

  Nina’s heart thudded. What could he be talking about?

  “No one wanted her. Not even her parents. They tossed her in a dumpster. Threw her out with the garbage.” He leaned forward. “Because Nina Guerrera is trash. And they knew it.”

  His deep chuckle shredded her nerves.

  “What do you think of your hero now? Wait until you see her as I do. Nothing reveals character like pain, and, as you are about to see, she shows nothing but weakness.”

  Sweat prickled her scalp as she schooled her features. Aware some eyes in the room had covertly flicked in her direction, she held herself erect and kept her gaze straight ahead.

  “I’m going to show you the rest of the video,” the featureless dark shape said into the camera. “You will see exactly who you are holding up as an example for your daughters. You will watch her beg for mercy, grovel like a dog for her miserable life. She is no hero. She is a scared little girl.” His voice dropped to a whisper. “A worthless throwaway.”

  The video ended, replaced by a freeze frame of Nina as a sixteen-year-old girl. The new feed began, picking up precisely where the previous one had ended. The monster pulled back the cigarette from the girl’s bare flesh, leaving her gasping and sobbing on the steel table.

  Nina’s stomach roiled in protest. The room fell away and all she could see was the hideous spectacle playing out before her. Her breathing ticked up, matching that of her younger self, separate yet merged in agony.

  “That was just the beginning,” he said to the girl. “I have so much more planned for you.” He bent forward and pressed the tip onto her other shoulder blade. He waited with infinite patience while she howled in pain, fighting desperately against her bonds. Then he burned her a third time, in the center of her lower back, the scorched circles of flesh forming a triangle. He dropped the cigarette to the floor and stood back, surveying his work with cold objectivity while she begged him to stop. Oblivious to her pleas, he moved closer and put his gloved hands around the girl’s throat. Then he began to squeeze as he narrated for the camera.

  “Breathing. A primal instinct.” He spoke clinically, like an anatomy professor discussing bodily functions. “That’s why waterboarding is so effective. The body becomes deprived of oxygen and fights to suck in more. But there is no air to be had. After a while, you begin to black out.”

&n
bsp; He eased his grip, and her body contorted as she struggled to fill her lungs with great heaving gulps.

  “But then, you get a bit of air,” he said. “Just enough to let you stay conscious . . . so you can fully experience the next time.” He squeezed again. “If I keep this up, you will begin to spasm uncontrollably. Eventually, you will die.” He let go and stepped away to watch her thrash. “But I don’t want that. Not yet.”

  Without conscious thought, Nina grasped the edge of the conference table to steady herself. She felt the monster’s large hands wrap around her throat, heard his voice echo in her head, sensed his evil presence surround her.

  Suffocating her.

  Nina staggered to her feet and lurched away from the table. She registered movement and saw Kent start to stand up. Wade grabbed his arm, pulling him back down into his chair.

  “Let her go,” Wade said to Kent. “Give her a moment.”

  The video still played on the screen. She turned away from it. Her leaden feet began to move faster, carrying her away from the ghastly show.

  She pushed through the door and out into the hallway. Slumping against the wall, she slid down until her bottom met the smooth tile floor. Her head fell into her hands, tears gathering like a breaking storm.

  She had promised herself she would never let him make her cry again. She had escaped from him eleven years ago, yet he had managed to torture her as if she were splayed naked in front of him again. The helplessness returned and along with it, the anguish of knowing that a monster controlled her. He decided whether she would take her next breath or not.

  She began to shake. After a long moment, she realized she was no longer trembling with fear, but rage. She would not turn her power over to him. Never again. He was lashing out, trying to reclaim what had been lost to him. He blamed Nina for that loss and was meting out his punishment.

  She felt that she was at a fork in the road. If her assumptions about the material from the fight club were correct, the Cipher was a fighter. He would keep hitting her, coming at her from all angles. Like the mixed martial arts combatants she had seen on television, he would constantly change his tactics, using a variety of techniques to keep her off balance.