by Rob Ashman
Mechanic knew this would lead to a problem. When the kill was perfect, Daddy would go away satisfied and not compel Mechanic to kill again for months. But this one was far from perfect. Mechanic feared it would only serve to bring on another command to ‘Go please Daddy’ much earlier than expected. Keeping the urge at bay only worked in the early stages of a new attack and, under the circumstances, would probably only buy an additional couple of days.
Mechanic knew another kill was only weeks away. The preparations for Sophie Barrock needed to be stepped up.
Mechanic observed Sophie from a distance of about fifty yards across the club parking lot. She was going through the ritual of saying her theatrical goodbyes to those people who were in the ‘in crowd’. Mechanic pressed the button in the armrest of the truck and the window glided down to half open. Even at this distance you could hear Sophie’s voice trilling on the wind. It was difficult to make out exactly what was being said, but one thing was for sure, whatever it was, it was being said a little too loudly. Mechanic strained to listen and not for the first time thought that Sophie Barrock had all the vocal qualities of a Sea World dolphin trainer.
Eventually, she got in her car and drove away, down the tree-lined boulevard to the interstate. Mechanic eased the big truck across the parking lot and followed. Sophie made the busy junction well before Mechanic.
It didn’t matter. Mechanic already knew where she lived.
As Mechanic sat patiently waiting for a gap in the traffic, Lucas was climbing the stairs to the fifth floor landing heading for the shabby door marked 5 6. He hadn’t called ahead as he correctly figured that Harper’s phone was still disconnected. In any case, Lucas didn’t want to give him an excuse to be out when he arrived. He rapped on the door.
‘Who is it?’ asked Harper from deep within the flat.
‘It’s Lucas. I want to talk to you, if that’s okay.’
‘Can’t we do it in the morning? I’m busy.’
Lucas paused for a few seconds. ‘No, tomorrow’s no good. Can we talk now? It won’t take long.’ And tomorrow you’ll be conveniently out when I call round, Lucas thought.
‘For fuck’s sake.’ Lucas could hear shuffling from inside. The door clunked open and Harper swung it wide open.
Across the room was a single bright orange armchair with a low table directly in front of it. On the table was a microwave lasagne, still in its plastic tray, with a grubby fork sticking out of the top. In front of the table was the television. All three pieces of furniture were in a dead straight line, Harper’s very own version of feng shui. Around the base of the armchair, Lucas counted six empty cans of cheap beer, and in a bucket on the floor another four cans bobbed gently in cold water. Harper watched Lucas survey the scene. It was obvious why Harper hadn’t wanted an unexpected visitor. As he made it back to his seat, Harper was swaying, his eyes bloodshot drunk. He left a cloud of alcohol vapour trailing behind him.
‘The damn refrigerator broke and I’m waiting for the landlord to replace it,’ Harper slurred, explaining the presence of the bucket.
‘Oh,’ was all Lucas could think to reply. ‘Please, eat your food. Don’t let it go cold.’
Harper swung his leg over the low table and flopped into the chair. He picked up the fork and shovelled a slab of food into his mouth. His hand shook as he waved for Lucas to continue.
‘It’s about what you said when we last met. You said Galbraith was trying to tell you that his profile of Mechanic was wrong.’ Lucas watched Harper swallow down the food in one gulp.
‘What of it?’
‘Turns out you were right.’ Lucas allowed this to sink in, waiting for a response. Harper was about to cram another wedge of congealed pasta into his mouth but stopped in mid-air. He replaced the fork on the plastic tray and picked up a beer.
‘Go on,’ he said, taking a long drink from the can.
‘The original profile said that Mechanic was both a father and a sibling hater. But the problem with that was that neither you nor I could find one shred of evidence to connect the victims. It didn’t add up. We’ve uncovered evidence that suggests that the real targets were the women. He figured the worse thing he could do was to murder their families and leave them alive. The profile should have read, ‘Mechanic was a mother hater’. I believe Galbraith had come to that conclusion and that was what he was trying to tell you.’
‘Have you found a connection between the women?’ Harper took another long draw on his can.
‘Yes we have.’
‘What is it?’
‘Can’t say at this stage, it needs validating.’
‘So whats do yous want to talk to me about?’ Harper slurred, draining the can in his hand and crushing it before letting it drop to the floor. He reached into the bucket and retrieved another, the water dripping from the outside of the can into his rapidly cooling dinner.
‘I came here for two reasons. The first is that I wanted to tell you that it looks like you were right.’ It was clear to Lucas that his attempts to build a conversational rapport with a half-cut Harper were failing badly. ‘Secondly, I wanted to ask you if you had any suspicions about the investigation. Was there anything which didn’t feel right?’
‘Yeah, plenty, but we had no time to tie up all the loose ends. The heat from the media was too strong. They’d have lynched us if it came out that Mechanic might not be dead after all.’ Harper took a huge slug from the newly opened beer and burped loudly. He waved the can at Lucas in a curious circular motion. ‘We had a shitload of suspicions, Lucas, but absolutely no motiv … motiva ... motivation to turn over any more stones than we had to.’
Lucas was thoughtful, not about the answer Harper gave him but about how to phrase his next question without giving too much away. Even a drunk Harper had keen instincts and could put two and two together and get somewhere close to four.
‘Did you have any suspicions about any of the people working on the investigation?’
Harper looked at Lucas and screwed his face up. ‘Shushpicions … about our people? No nothing. What do you mean?’ The words merged together as the heavy alcohol session closed Harper’s brain down.
Lucas was regretting his question as soon as it left his lips. He was ill prepared to have an obtuse conversation with Harper in this state. He tried again. ‘What I mean is, did you ever question any of the decisions or motives of the people in your team?’
‘Shome of them barked up the wrong tree from time to time, but then we all did. Mechanic was a devus … a devinus … a devious bastard. We often spent time on dead ends.’
‘Sorry to bother you, I’ll leave you to your dinner.’ Lucas was keen to hit the eject button on this visit. He wasn’t going to get what he wanted without giving too much away, and Harper was fading fast. The best tack now was to bow out and come back another time. ‘I wanted to call by and say you were right and to thank you for taking the time to see me the other night.’ Lucas was trying to cover his tracks after his clumsy question.
‘But, I don’t get it. What do you mean sushpinions? Like what?’ Harper was grappling with his inability to string a short sentence together. ‘What do yous mean?’
Lucas ignored him and made his way to the door. Harper made a weak effort to get up to see his guest out but slumped back into the chair. ‘Shee yous again Lieuten .... Lieutenen …’ he called as Lucas closed the door behind him.
Lucas made his way back home to another evening of chili dogs and beer. After seeing Harper, he’d probably make that chili dogs and Coke.
Harper slumped in the chair, his eyes closing in a drunken stupor. His dinner lay half eaten in front of him while his right arm was draped across the side of the chair, still clutching his can. A pool of spilled beer soaked into the pile, soon to be invisible amongst the other stains on the carpet. The gravity of what Lucas had told him seemed to have been lost on Harper. However, as he slept, his brain would gradually unravel his words. His dreams would put the facts in order and churn them over and over
in endless possibilities. Possibilities which, deep inside, Harper had always known were there.
When he woke in the morning, the full impact of his conversation with Lucas would hit him like a freight train.
21
Lucas attended the morning briefing. There was a different feel to the investigation and the room buzzed with energy. Bassano gave the team their orders for the day. One group would visit the country clubs while Bassano and another team would interview the women who’d survived Mechanic’s attacks. The enquiries needed to be low key because no one outside the investigation knew of Mechanic’s reappearance. Lucas was clear that was how it had to stay, although an annoying voice inside his head kept reminding him – No one else knows, that is, except Harper.
Lucas was annoyed about his conversation with Harper the previous evening. He should have trusted his instincts and left well alone. Instead he’d persevered and ended up giving away far more information than originally intended. Frustratingly he’d got nothing in return. While his questions had been vanilla enough at first glance, a seasoned cop like Harper would now be putting the pieces together, albeit with a thumping hangover. Lucas was mad with himself but was trying not to let his frustration show.
He left the briefing and made his way back to his office. He opened the door and there was Jo Sells sitting in the same seat which she’d abruptly vacated twenty-four hours earlier. In front of her was the obligatory cup of steaming coffee along with an expertly crafted, bright white sugar twist.
‘Good morning, Lucas,’ she said in a quiet voice.
‘Well, good morning Doctor, how are you today?’ Lucas was well aware that his tone was patronizing. Jo allowed it to go unchallenged, conceding that she probably deserved it.
‘Much better, thanks,’ she replied. ‘Look, about yesterday—’
‘What about it?’ Lucas spoke abruptly. He wasn’t going to let her off lightly.
She held her hands up. ‘I apologize for my behaviour. It was out of order and unacceptable.’
‘Yes it was, and hiding out at the McKee house didn’t help matters.’
‘I got angry and I shouldn’t have. When you challenged the validity of the profile, all I could hear was you challenging the validity of Victor and that hit a nerve. When he was killed I not only lost a talented mentor but also a dear friend and it still hurts. He was with me all through my research and was inspirational for me at Quantico. I’m sorry. I saw red and had to get out.’
Lucas joined her at the table. ‘Losing people goes with the territory in this job. Sometimes we have to separate our personal feelings from our professional responsibilities. Yesterday you let them get the better of you.’
She nodded. ‘You can put in a request to have me removed from the case and I won’t challenge it.’
‘Is that what you want?’
‘No. Far from it. I want to catch this bastard for real this time and stop him once and for all. I can help, I know I can. It won’t happen again, I promise.’
‘Have you spoken to Bassano or any of the team this morning?’ Lucas asked.
‘No, I came to see you first. If you wanted me off the case, I figured there was no point in making any further grovelling apologies. So, no, I’ve seen no one.’
‘Then I suggest you get down to the briefing room, take Bassano to one side and start building bridges. He’ll brief you on the tasks for the day.’
‘Okay. Thanks.’ She got up to leave the office.
‘Oh, and by the way, we found something which connects the women – country clubs. Bassano will fill you in.’
Jo Sells looked stunned.
On the other side of the city it was a tale of two sofas.
Kaitlin was at home sitting by the telephone, her mind in turmoil. She wasn’t due to have another counselling call until 8.00pm the next day but her anxiety levels were through the roof. She needed to offload. The strain was driving her crazy.
She had tossed and turned all night only managing a couple of hours of fitful sleep which only served to cloud her judgement further. She was dog tired and irritable. Should she call or not? She was so desperate that she was thinking of breaking her own golden rule of always phoning from a call box. This morning she was stranded. Her car was at the garage for a service while the location of the pay phone was several miles away in a rundown roadside café. Her rationale for choosing this place was sound. She wouldn’t meet anyone she knew there since it was off the beaten track and anyway who would go for a coffee in such a dump? If she did meet someone, she could say there was something wrong with the car and she was calling home. She’d spent a long time choosing a safe location but was now prepared to blow it with one reckless act.
Her hand hovered over the receiver for a second then picked it up. She quickly banged it back onto its cradle and put her hand to her mouth. Mechanic had done a good job on Kaitlin. She was a wreck.
A mile and half away, Sophie Barrock sat on her sofa staring into space. What the hell should I do? she asked herself over and over again. With the kids dropped off at school and her husband working God knows where, this was her quality time to think. Only it wasn’t filled with quality thinking.
Should I leave? She churned it around in her head. She could pack a bag and go to her friend Jane’s place. But who was she kidding? She didn’t know Jane well enough to turn up on her doorstep with an overnight bag. I’ve left my husband and two kids and thought I could stay here for a while. That would be absurd. She was getting desperate.
Alternatively she could confront her husband with a list of ultimatums and force the issue that way. But that course of action was fraught with uncertainty. What if he just said, ‘Okay, I think we should separate.’ That would be awful. Not because of the separation, but this needed to be on her terms or not at all. This had to be done in the way they’d discussed it in the counselling sessions. She had to be seen to be in control and she had no intention of jeopardising what she had at the club. For Sophie, it was crucial that she should be seen to be driving whatever changes were going to take place. What to do?
Back on Kaitlin’s sofa, the situation was getting worse. Mechanic had told her focus on her issues in preparation for their next chat and doing so had made her even more agitated. She was now thinking all sorts of outlandish thoughts which had never entered her head before. She was falling apart.
She picked up the phone again, took a crumpled piece of paper from her bag and punched in the numbers. It rang five times then the answer phone kicked in. Kaitlin cursed and banged the handset down. The counsellor was out. She couldn’t wait until tomorrow, she was going out of her mind. She picked up the phone again and called the garage to see when her car was coming back.
Sophie sat staring into space. The ultimatum option sounded good, she could make it work if she stayed strong. This thought was interrupted by a loud knock at the front door. Sophie dragged herself back to reality, unlocked it and opened it wide. The Florida morning sunshine flooded the hall and Mechanic stood in the doorway smiling.
22
For most of the day, the police station was deserted and strangely quiet as Lucas sat in his office alone. Everyone was out working on the tasks they’d been given at the morning briefing. Despite the peaceful atmosphere, Lucas had experienced a troubled day. He couldn’t shake off his misgivings about the previous night’s conversation with Harper. He had overreached himself, divulging sensitive information through his clumsy line of questioning. Anyone with an ounce of common sense would have been able to join the dots. Lucas hoped that Harper’s drunken state would stop him making the connections.
He also spent time agonizing over the two pieces of paper which contained his thoughts and doodles from the sleepless night. Placing the sheets side by side on his desk, he racked his brains, trying to make sense of the convoluted deductions set out in front of him. But whichever way he twisted the chain of events leading up to Galbraith’s death he reached the same conclusion – there was a leak. Mechanic had known t
he direction of the investigation was about to shift and killed Galbraith to prevent it. The more times he went through it, the more times he reached the same uncomfortable conclusion.
He was about to embark on another painful game of ‘What ifs?’ when Bassano and Jo Sells walked in, casually chatting about the events of the day. Jo must have made her grovelling apologies.
‘What have you got?’ Lucas was pleased to have company at last and a break from the turmoil inside his head.
‘We uncovered something interesting,’ Bassano said as he flashed one of his winning smiles Jo’s way, which she ignored. ‘We’re having difficulties with a number of the country clubs. They aren’t being cooperative in granting us access to their member information, even though some of it is twelve years old–’
‘You said you had something interesting,’ Lucas interrupted.
‘We do,’ Bassano continued. ‘We interviewed Julie Tate. She’s the wife and mother of victims four and five. She was wary at first, but opened up when we told her we were pursuing an alternative line of enquiry about the killings. It appears that, following the murders, she’s had a dreadful time making any kind of adjustment. She’s had several stumbling attempts to pick herself up which have spectacularly failed. She lives on her own and swings between being a virtual recluse and other times when she’s a social junkie.’
‘What do you mean “social junkie”?’ Lucas asked.
Jo stepped in, ‘She shuts herself away for long periods and sinks into a morbid depression. Then she breaks out with episodes of completely the opposite behaviour. She goes to clubs, parties, rekindles old friendships and drinks heavily. She flips between one and the other.’
‘Is this a coping mechanism? Does it help manage the grief?’ Lucas asked.
‘Well, that’s the strange part,’ said Bassano. ‘It’s not driven by grief, more by guilt.’
