The 7th Victim kv-1 Read online

  seventeen

  Vail swung the car around and headed back to Deacon’s, taking care to obey the traffic ordinances of the local jurisdiction—actually, she was doing about eighty and swerving all over the road on the wet asphalt. Jesus Christ . . . she had to get there before he left with her Glock. Knowing him, he’d make sure the sidearm was found somewhere embarrassing . . . or he’d put it in the hands of a junkie in the bad part of DC so it would be used in a crime. That wouldn’t go over well with the Bureau. It’d be in all the papers, make national news. She’d be disgraced. And if it was used in a murder . . . how could she live with that?

  Vail made it back to his house in a little over five minutes. His car was still in the driveway. She ran to the front door, yanked it open. Deacon was somewhere in the house, singing. Singing? Why the hell is he singing?

  Her eyes scanned the room. Didn’t see her Glock anywhere. Knelt down, searched beneath the couch and coffee table when suddenly she heard—

  “Looking for this?”

  She spun, still on her knees. Deacon was standing there, ten feet away, her Glock in his hand, holding it up as if showing it to her.

  “Give it—”

  He lowered the pistol and pointed it at her. “Now just a minute, Karen. I don’t think I like your tone. See, I’m holding the goddamn gun here. Understand what that means?”

  Oh, she understood all right. She understood that she hated this man. She hated him so much that she envisioned taking her own serrated knife and ramming it through his eyes.

  “Stay where you are. On your knees.” He raised his eyebrows in mock excitement. “Hmm. How appropriate.”

  No, how infuriating. What to do? Rush him? Too risky. Not yet. She’d give it a bit longer to unfold before acting. It couldn’t get any worse than it was right now, so she had nothing to lose by waiting for, perhaps, a better opportunity.

  He unzipped his pants with his left hand and extended his right elbow, the one holding the weapon.

  She forced a laugh. “Keep dreaming, Deacon. No fucking way.”

  “Funny you should use that vulgar term. You know those pink slips they use in offices that say, ‘While You Were Out’?” He chuckled. “Well, while you were out, I mean, ‘out cold,’ I had some fun.”

  He raped me? No—couldn’t be. Could it? She wanted to put her hand on her crotch, feel to see if she was wet. But she wouldn’t give him that. From what she could tell, she didn’t feel any soreness or irritation. “Nice try, asshole. I’d know if you raped me.”

  “Rape? Such a strong word, don’t you think? We are married—”

  “Only in your warped mind. Divorce is just about done.”

  “So maybe I did rape you. And maybe I didn’t.”

  She shook her head in disgust. “When did you become such a vile human being?”

  “You’re being kind of harsh, Karen. I mean, don’t you deal with a lot worse?”

  “It’s just a matter of degree. And believe me, the dividing line between you and those scumbags isn’t that wide. You’re a lot closer to those monsters than you think.”

  He stepped closer, wiggled the handgun at her. “How’s your head feel? I hit you pretty hard.”

  Is that how I ended up on the floor? He hit me? But she hadn’t seen a bruise on her face—which she would have by now if he’d punched her. Still, her jaw did hurt. She looked up at him. “I’m getting up now, Deacon, and you’re going to hand over my gun.”

  “Well, you can get up. Let’s start with that.”

  She rose—and in one motion, pivoted on her back heel and swung her leg wide, her left foot side-slamming the Glock and sending it across the room.

  She scrambled after it—but so did Deacon—and they both dove forward onto the hardwood like linebackers pursuing a fumble, their bodies colliding and Vail scooping up the weapon with her right hand. She swung it around, and, while on her side, slammed the barrel up against Deacon’s nose. “You goddamn son of a bitch. Were you going to pull the trigger? Huh?”

  His eyes crossed as he focused on the Glock.

  “I should blow your goddamn brains out, you useless piece of shit!”

  “Go ahead, Karen,” he said, unfazed. “Pull the trigger.” He shifted his gaze back to her face. “Throw away your career. Leave Jonathan without parents. Come on, I dare you.”

  Her breath was coming in spasms, her heart pounding so forcefully she felt it in her ears. Calm down. Think. She looked into his eyes, seeing the malevolence she often saw in the killers she interviewed in prison. She wasn’t sure what it was, only that she knew it when she saw it: a cold depth, an emotional void.

  Vail got to her feet but kept the weapon pointed at Deacon. Her hand was shaking—not out of fear but out of concern she’d lose her nerve and pull the trigger. He was right—she had more at stake than he did. Given his shambles of a life, he would probably embrace suicide if he had the guts to do it.

  Vail backed out of the house and didn’t holster the Glock until she sat down in her car. She pulled away from the house and stopped at a light. She felt dirty, poisoned. He didn’t rape me, she told herself. He was just screwing with my head.

  Overwhelming unease pulled at her thoughts. The light turned green and she drove on, in the direction of the task force headquarters. She needed to get her head back into the Dead Eyes investigation, to do something useful and productive. To get her mind off Deacon, off what had happened.

  When she arrived at the house, a Verizon Communications van was parked out front, no doubt installing the phone lines Bledsoe ordered. Still in a semifog, Vail nearly ran into the technician, who was on his way back to his truck.

  As soon as Bledsoe caught sight of her, he opened his mouth to ask the obvious question. She had been so absorbed in her anger she had forgotten to brush her hair or throw on some makeup. I probably look like shit. Bledsoe placed a hand around her shoulders and led her into the room that had once passed as a rudimentary kitchen. He sat her down and stood there looking at her, clearly at a loss about what to do.

  A moment passed before he finally grabbed a seat in front of her. She realized he was in cop mode, which would explain why he was keeping his distance.

  “What’s wrong?” he asked.

  She didn’t know how to start. “Anyone else around? Manette, Hancock—”

  “Came and went. No one else is here. Just us.” Bledsoe gave her a second, but she still didn’t say anything.

  She noticed his eyes brighten—she figured the light had come on. Having worked with Vail so closely during the task force’s first tour of duty, Bledsoe knew the garbage she had to navigate during her custody battle with Deacon.

  “Your ex, something happen with him?”

  Vail nodded.

  “Did he touch you?” Bledsoe waited a beat, got no response, and then was out of his chair, hands on his hips, pacing. “You going to file a report? I can write it up, assault, and have him brought in. Scare the shit out of him.”

  She thought about it, then shook her head. “Truth is, I don’t know what happened. I went there to talk to him about changing our custody arrangement, and about an hour later I woke up on the floor of his living room.” She hesitated, unsure if she wanted to go any further.

  He stopped pacing and pulled his chair beside Vail. He rested his elbows on his knees and looked into her eyes. “You know what happened. It’s enough to file a report. Get it on record.”

  “Bledsoe, I don’t know what happened. I can piece things together, make inferences . . . but it’s not the same as knowing. Besides, it doesn’t look good for me to have gone to his place. He’ll just say I started the argument.”

  Bledsoe sat there staring at her, then finally asked, “You think he raped you?”

  “No.” Bledsoe was a good cop; she knew that—but she had never been on the receiving end of his investigative sensibilities. He had put it all together, perhaps seen something in her body language. He’d been around the block with enough victims to know what h
ad transpired.

  “But if you don’t remember what happened, how can you be so sure?”

  She tilted her head and gave him a stern look. “I would know if he—if something penetrated me.”

  Bledsoe stood up and faced the wall, as if he were studying the accumulated stains and layers of paint drips. Finally, he turned to her. “We gotta nail this guy, Karen. Just file the damn report.”

  “Yeah, that’ll go over real well, especially when the investigating dick pulls out his pad and says, ‘So, Agent Vail, tell me what happened. ’ And I say, ‘Gee, detective, I don’t know what happened. I can’t remember.’ Even if he goes the extra mile for the uniform and runs Deacon, how’s it going to look in court? The defense attorney will tear me apart: ‘Are you saying, Agent Vail, that you reported being assaulted, even though you can’t remember actually being struck? Maybe you tripped and fell and hit your head. In fact, you can’t remember anything about what happened, isn’t that true?’” To say nothing about leaving my Glock in his house, then threatening to blow his brains out. She waved a hand. “There’s no case.”

  And that’s when it hit her. “The case, shit. That’s what I was supposed to do at ten. Meet with my attorney about Jonathan.” Vail pulled out her cell phone and rescheduled the missed appointment, then called the school to get a message to Jonathan explaining why she hadn’t come for him.

  When she hung up, Bledsoe’s face was still crumpled in concentration. “We can bring him in, I can lean on him, get a confession. I know I can, Karen. And even if I don’t, it’ll be worth it just to see him squirm.”

  Vail slumped back in her chair. “I’ll deal with this in my own way. Thanks, though. I appreciate the offer.”

  Bledsoe regarded her for a moment. “Just don’t do anything you’ll regret later.”

  “I’ll let my attorney handle it, okay?” She managed a thin smile. “I’ll only regret it when I get his bill.”

  eighteen

  After talking with Bledsoe about Deacon’s attack, Vail settled down at the long folding table set up in the living room and began thumbing through the Dead Eyes file. She knew there was something in there she had missed. More than that, however, there was information she had not yet had time to adequately analyze.

  Around one thirty, Mandisa Manette arrived with a shoulder bag slung across her back stuffed with files and supplies. She claimed her space in a far corner of the living room, stretched a piece of masking tape marked with her name across a filing cabinet drawer, then began setting out her paperwork and materials. Yellow pushpins held a couple of photos of a young girl to the wall. Other than a nod when she arrived, Vail did not even exchange a glance with her.

  Bubba Sinclair was next to arrive, half an hour later. He chatted with Bledsoe for a bit about the Chicago Bears—his hometown team—and then took a spot at the table near the dining room. He set out a couple of picture frames that were facing away from Vail, and an autographed basketball.

  Sinclair looked up and said, “We lock this place at night, right?”

  “Locked and alarmed,” Bledsoe said. “They installed the system after you left this morning.”

  “What’s up with that ball?” Manette asked.

  “I helped some on Michael Jordan’s dad’s murder case. Did some legwork for Carolina PD. MJ appreciated the work I done, gave me a signed ball.”

  “What’s it for, good luck?”

  “Why not? We could use some. If this helps. . . .”

  “Hey, rabbit’s feet, lucky charms, no problem,” Manette said. “Just don’t be chanting any incantations, okay? That’s where I draw the line.”

  “How about this?” Sinclair pulled a large necklace from beneath his shirt.

  “Dare I ask what that is?”

  “My lucky hunting necklace.” He fingered the various animal teeth of disparate sizes and shapes strung together on the leather lanyard. “Took out each one of these. Bear, deer, even an elk. That was a tough one.” He found the bear tooth and held it up. “I don’t want to tell you what we had to do to take this one down.”

  “Put that thing away,” Manette said. “I like animals.”

  “Hey, I like animals, too,” Sinclair said.

  Vail sat back and ignored the banter; she was formulating an opinion and needed her concentration.

  Within the hour, Robby and Chase Hancock had arrived. They each carved out their own work spaces, with Robby predictably choosing one beside Vail, and Hancock taking a spot in the other room, facing away from her.

  “I’ve got something worth looking into,” Vail said once everyone had settled in. They each turned their bodies, or at least their attention, in her direction. “I’ve been trying to understand the significance of stabbing the eyes. It holds a lot of importance to the offender. It’s comforting to him, serves a deep-seated purpose. The fact that he does this as part of his ritual and not his MO tells me it could hold the key to understanding who this guy is.”

  “Why’s that?” Bledsoe asked.

  “Because he doesn’t have to do it to subdue his victim. She’s already dead,” Hancock said.

  Bledsoe turned to Vail for confirmation. She reluctantly nodded.

  “So why would this guy stab the eyes?”

  “That’s the question. My unit floated some theories last year on vics one and two, but nothing anyone could agree on. But I’ve got this feeling—I mean, theory—that he does it because he has a physical deformity. Scarring on his face, an old wound, acne, harelip, I don’t know exactly, but it’s worth looking into.”

  “I’ll do a search,” Sinclair said. “Ex-cons released in the past few years with a history of violent offenses who had a facial disfigurement. We can cross match it against anything we pick up on the blood angle.”

  “It’s just a theory,” Vail cautioned.

  Bledsoe frowned. “All we’ve got are theories right now.”

  Vail dipped her chin in conciliatory agreement.

  “While we’re on the topic of symbolism,” Bledsoe said, “what’s up with the hands, what’s that all about?”

  “Symbolism ain’t gonna catch us a killer or find us a suspect.” Manette tilted her head toward Vail. “No offense, Kari, but why waste our time with this psycho stuff?”

  “Behavioral analysis,” Robby corrected.

  “Whatever you wanna call it, it’s like looking into a crystal ball. And we all know there aren’t no crystal balls.”

  “The key is narrowing the suspect pool,” Robby said. “To give us a place to focus. With no eyewitnesses or smoking gun forensics, profiling can at least give us a direction. Tell us what kind of guy we’re looking for.”

  Bledsoe leaned back in his chair and it let out an ear-piercing squeak. “Right now, we got nothing.” He turned to Vail. “The hands?”

  Vail sighed, grateful Robby and Bledsoe had stepped in. She wasn’t in the mood to deal with another confrontation. Her headache had been dulled by Excedrin, but her thoughts still felt a bit fuzzy. She looked over at Manette, who appeared mollified for the moment. “He takes the hand with him as a trophy,” Vail said, “so he can relive the murder in his mind. Relive his fantasy. My guess is he’s probably got pictures, too. Of the vics after he’s done with them, maybe even of the walls, which I think he considers to be works of art.”

  “So if these hands fulfill his fantasy, why does he need to kill again?” Sinclair asked.

  “For serial killers, the act of killing their victims never lives up to their best fantasies. So they’re constantly refining and perfecting the fantasy. With Dead Eyes, when the hands or photos no longer bring him the excitement or satisfaction of the original act, the urges build and become overwhelming.”

  “And that’s when he kills again,” Robby said.

  “Exactly. Almost like an addict. Maybe more like a child who wants instant gratification and does whatever he needs to do to satisfy himself. Even if society feels it’s morally wrong.”

  “Does he know it’s wrong?”
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  “On some level, absolutely. But he doesn’t feel any guilt. If he did, he’d cover their faces or bodies. He doesn’t. He leaves them on display, right there in their bed. He doesn’t even bother to move them to the bathtub when he eviscerates them. Doing it in bed has to have special meaning to him.”

  “But a hand?” Manette asked. “How’s that a trophy?”

  “Like the eyes, the hands have relevance to him. Maybe he had an abusive father who beat him all the time.”

  “A left hand from each victim,” Sinclair said. “So to get to him, we find an abusive left-handed father.”

  Manette rolled her eyes. “You can’t be serious, Sin. You believe this shit?”

  Sinclair ignored her. “Let’s get back to the hand. These whackos really get off on severed hands? I’ve seen whips and chains and shit like that, but a whacked-off hand?”

  “Dahmer used to skin the flesh off his victims and preserve their skeletons,” Vail said matter-of-factly. “When looking at the skulls and spines, he saw the victims—as if they were still alive, still there with him. He’d actually masturbate over the skeleton.”

  “Jesus,” Robby said.

  “And you know this, how?” Manette asked.

  “He told us.”

  Manette raised her eyebrows. “So naturally we just believed him. After all, he’s an upstanding citizen and all. . . .”

  “Okay, let’s keep to the matter at hand,” Bledsoe said. He drew a dirty look from Robby for the pun.

  “Sorry, didn’t mean it.” He sat up straight in his chair. “Karen, obviously you’ve got enough now to give us something. Right?” He seemed to be pleading, or at least hoping, that Vail would produce.

  Vail looked down at her makeshift desk. A file was open and notes were scrawled on yellow lined paper. “The guy we’re looking for is a Caucasian about thirty to forty years old. Medium build, and according to forensics about five-eight. He works a blue-collar job but may be in business for himself. My bet is he puts a lot of time into stalking his victims because they’re all somewhat similar in age, marital status, and appearance. It’s likely his job gives him a flexible schedule to get all this stuff done. The job might also give him access to either photos or descriptions of the women he chooses. It’s possible he gets their addresses from a database, or he goes out hunting. When he finds one who fits his fantasy, he follows them home. I don’t know enough just yet to say which way he does it. We need to keep working the employee angle.