2 in the Hat (3 page)

Once Alves had the area secured, he focused on processing the crime scene. The detective would gradually work his way from the outside in, toward the most important pieces of evidence, the bodies of the victims. Connie watched as Alves took a minute to survey the area, planning his attack.

“Hey, Angel,” Connie called out. This was his best chance to get Alves’s attention before he got consumed by the crime scene.

Alves turned toward Connie and nodded. Then he looked back up at the hill. Even though the klieg lights lit up the area, nothing was visible beyond the woods from this vantage point.

Alves spoke with a couple of the civilian criminalists, pointing toward the hill. Then he walked over to Connie and the detectives.

“We were out looking for a witness on a shooting when we heard your call.” Connie pointed to the detectives. “Mark Greene and Jackie Ahearn, they work out of B-two. This is Angel Alves.”

“Nice to see you guys again,” Alves said. He paused, turning back to the hill for another look.

“Anything you want us to do, just say the word,” Greene said.

“I’ll put you to work then,” Alves said. “I’ve got a crime scene up there that’s as close to pristine as I’m ever going to get. I don’t think anyone’s touched a thing, except for the killer. My daughter saw one of the bodies at the end of practice.”

“Jesus,” Connie said. “Is Iris okay?”

“I don’t know. Marcy took her home.” Alves looked over toward the street. Like he could see the twins and his wife, safe in their car, headed home. His face was creased with worry. “I got up there right after the kids. Secured everything, touched nothing. If we process this thing right, maybe we come up with something.”

“Where do we come in?” Ahearn asked.

“The bodies are in about twenty-five feet from the edge of the woods. I’m treating the wooded area as the immediate crime scene. The killer had to get them in there somehow. I want to search the area between Veterans Drive and the dump site.”

“They weren’t killed here?” Connie asked.

“I don’t think so. I’d like to know how he got them up there without being noticed.”

“He must have parked somewhere close by and carried them up there,” Greene said.

“Exactly. You guys are going to grab as many patrolmen and detectives as you can and walk parallel lines from the street to the edge of the woods and back.”

“I’ll call the DA with an update,” Connie asked.

“Good. I don’t need you finding evidence and becoming a witness. The DA doesn’t want that either.” Alves turned back to Greene. “I need you and your men to search your lanes until you’ve covered the area from the street to the edge of the woods. You know the drill. Look for anything that might be relevant—tire tracks, footprints, candy wrappers, cigarette butts, discarded clothing.”

“Are the victims missing clothes?” Connie asked.

“They’re dressed like they’re going to a prom. I’ve got a feeling they weren’t dressed like that before they were killed.”

“Why does that sound familiar to me?” Ahearn asked.

Alves motioned with his hands for them to move in closer. “We’re trying to keep this quiet. We think it might be the Prom Night Killer.”

“I thought he was dead,” Ahearn said.

“He hasn’t killed anyone in ten years. Not that we know of. But the way the bodies are dressed, looks like his work.”

In the unnatural glare of the lights, the concentrated silence of the men and women intent on their duties, the cool night air full of purpose, Connie knew this wasn’t an ordinary murder scene. They were dealing with a serial killer. A killer who had outwitted Alves’s old boss, Sergeant Detective Wayne Mooney, and the Boston Police Department for more than a decade. “Should we take a look at the bodies?” he asked, pulling a pair of latex gloves out of his back pocket.

“You and your obsession with crime scenes.” Alves showed a little smile.

“You don’t know the half of it.” Connie laughed. “Do we get to see them?”

“I tell you what, you guys do a good job searching every inch of ground leading up that hill while I process the bodies and the rest of the crime scene, and I’ll give you a quick walk-through before the ME takes them away. But don’t go near them until I say it’s okay. I’ve got to take photos, have the ME do a preliminary examination and then have the criminalists process for evidence. I don’t want to miss anything.”

“What are we waiting for?” Connie said to Greene and Ahearn. “You guys get started. I’ll make my call.”

H
e tried to fall asleep, but they called out to him. They wanted to
play. He knew he couldn’t. It was against the rules. His Momma tried to stand up for him. “Let him play with his little things. What harm can it do?” But his old man had warned him. “Boys don’t play with dolls.” Action figures, maybe. But dolls? Never. Boys play sports, they play catch, they run, they hit. They don’t care about girls in pretty white party dresses or handsome young men in tuxedos or fancy table settings
.

But his Little Things coaxed him to come and play. They didn’t care that he wanted to sleep. Why should they? They were selfish, making all that noise. Hadn’t he put them back in the trunk? They were locked up where no one would ever look for them, under the wedding clothes, the costumes that symbolized the vows that meant nothing to the old man and Momma
.

There they were again, calling his name. He tried covering his ears, but he could still hear them. They would wake the old man if they kept at it, and no one wanted that
.

The boy eased himself out from under the sheets, careful not to make any sounds. He slid his feet into his slippers and moved across the floor, gracefully. If the old man knew he had kept them, fished them out of the trash and stashed them away, the boy would catch a beating. He needed to get to them quickly and play with them until they were tired. Then he could put them back to bed. They needed their sleep, just like he did
.

The boy knew where to place his feet on each step leading up to the attic so they wouldn’t creak. He wasn’t sure that it mattered, though, with all the noise they were making
.
He needed to hurry up and get to them. At the top of the stairs, he opened the door on the right, the room at the rear of the house. The room went quiet
.

Absolute silence
.

He closed the door behind him and listened for them. He whispered to them. There was no noise, no movement, no laughter. Where were they?

He reached to his right and felt along the wall for the light switch, but he instantly wished he hadn’t. They were in the room with him. Now they were like people, bigger, bigger than his old man. Giants, with doll faces. They came toward him, not laughing or smiling. They didn’t want to play. Maybe they were angry that he had left them in the trunk. But that wasn’t his choice. They had to understand that. It was the old man. He was to blame. He was the one they had to hide from. He was the one that needed to be punished
.

The boy tried to scream. His lungs were full, as if he were drowning. He reached for the door, but something grabbed at his arm. They were too big, too strong. Somehow he managed to shake his arm free and make a move for the door. He didn’t get far, but his hand hit the light switch. Everything went black again
.

SLEEP OPENED HIS EYES
. There was no need to panic. He knew the dream. It was the same every time. He no longer wet his bed the way he did when he was a child.

But boy did he sweat. Sleep lay there in Momma’s bed, drenched, the morning sun shining through the sheer curtains. No need to worry about hiding them anymore. The old man wasn’t around. He could play with them whenever he wanted. He could leave them out, sitting at a nice café table, having a tea party or sitting on the grass having a picnic of wine, bread and cheese. But this was not the time to play.

Sleep scanned the room for the clock. It was after seven. He hadn’t had much rest, but it would have to do. It was time to get up and get dressed. He needed to maintain a normal schedule, especially on the morning after the young lovers were discovered by the detective, the morning after the couple had affirmed their eternal commitment to each other.

Today would have to be the same as any other day. He wiped the sleepy seeds out of his eyes and slid out from under the sheets. He walked into the bathroom, gracefully, back arched, his body held straight to an imaginary string running down his back.

C
onnie looked up from his notes as the jurors shifted their attention
to the courtroom door, waiting for the arrival of the witness. Every three months a new set of grand jurors were sworn in. These jurors, seated for two months now, were a good group, very attentive. They asked the right questions and understood the big picture. Their job wasn’t to determine guilt beyond a reasonable doubt like a regular jury. Their duty was to determine if there was probable cause to indict.

As a prosecutor, Connie recognized that the grand jury was one of the most useful investigative tools available to law enforcement. The grand jury’s subpoena power gave prosecutors the ability to bring in witnesses, against their will if necessary, in order to lock in their testimony. His plan for today was to present the testimony of an uncooperative shooting victim, Tracy Ward, possibly a gang member himself.

Connie had been at the scene till early morning, showing the cops ways to get in and out of Franklin Park undetected. Still, they had found nothing. Now he had to focus. He was about to begin an inquiry into a shooting, a drug feud between rival gangs, he suspected. In the past year, a spate of shootings had commanded the headlines. The DA had responded by creating a Gang Unit with prosecutors who used the grand jury to help police investigations. Connie had a dozen investigations
going, half his time spent trying to locate witnesses. Once he located the witnesses, the trick was getting them to cooperate.

That was the challenge he faced this morning.

He still couldn’t get the image of that couple dead at the ball field out of his head. It was eerie the way their bodies had been positioned, the way the male looked like he was spying on the young woman. The way she seemed to be teasing him with her pose.

The courtroom door swung open and Detective Mark Greene led the witness into the grand jury courtroom. Tracy Ward looked like a skeleton. Connie had seen an old booking photo from an arrest about a year ago, and the guy had been beefier, solid. Ward was living proof that a shot in the gut was a great weight loss program.

The jurors focused their attention on the witness as he entered the courtroom in his orange jumpsuit, his hands cuffed in front of him and chained to his slim waist. He limped across the floor, his shackled feet shuffling along, six inches at a time. What the jurors couldn’t see was that he had a colostomy bag under the jumpsuit, courtesy of the bullet that had ripped through his abdominal cavity. He was lucky to be alive.

Tracy Ward had been easy to locate for today’s testimony, since he was serving a jail sentence for a probation violation. He was one unlucky bastard. Not only did he get shot, but he was out past his court-ordered curfew when it happened. The curfew violation triggered a probation surrender that landed him back in jail.

Ward’s attitude was pretty typical for a gang-related shooting victim. He hadn’t been overly cooperative with Connie and Mark Greene during their informal sit-down in one of the interview rooms. Connie was hoping to have more luck getting him to talk once he had him under oath, on the witness stand, in front of the grand jury.

Connie signaled to Greene that it was okay to leave Ward on the witness stand. The detective stepped out of the room, leaving only Connie, the witness, the twenty-four-person jury and the court reporter—no judge, no defense lawyers, not in the grand jury. Connie stood and approached the witness.

“Please raise your right hand, sir.”

Ward reluctantly raised his hand a couple of inches above his waist, as high as he could, his cuffed left hand trailing close behind.

“Do you swear that your testimony before this grand jury shall be the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, so help you God?”

“There is no God.”

Great. This was not going to be easy. “Fine, then do you affirm that your testimony shall be the truth and nothing but the truth?”

Ward nodded.

“I’m sorry, sir, but I need you to verbalize all your answers so that the stenographer can record your testimony.”

“Yes.”

“Thank you. Now, could you state your name for the record, spelling your last name?”

“Fuck You. Last name is spelled Y-O-U.” Then Ward laughed.

“That’s very funny, sir. I’m going to ask you one more time, then we’ll be going upstairs to see a judge who will hold you in contempt for not answering my questions. Do you know what will happen if the judge finds you in contempt?”

“Yeah. Absolutely nothing. What are you going to do, send me back to jail? I’ve been in the hole for two months now. You can’t do shit to me.”

“Please state your name for the record.”

“I already did. Fuck Y-O-U.”

Connie walked over and opened the door. “Detective, can you get him out of here? Just take him back to the interview room. I want to talk with him before we go to see the judge.”

Ward, looking sickly in his baggy orange jumpsuit, said, “Sorry I couldn’t be of more assistance to your investigation, Mr. DA. I already told you, I ain’t no snitch. But thanks for bringing me to court anyway. It was nice to get out of the hole for the day.” He let out another burst of laughter as the door closed behind him.

A
lves maneuvered through the parking lot pocked with mortar
-sized divots, the result of decades of poorly repaired potholes. He went in the rear entrance of the bakery and scanned the shop. Half the crowd had their newspapers held so high he couldn’t make out their faces. He went to the counter and ordered a coffee before walking over to the man at the corner table.