Cuts Like a Knife: A Novel (A Kristen Conner Mystery Book 1) (15 page)

“I didn’t. My mom did.”

“You’re kidding me!” he says with a laugh. He spills a little coffee on the tabletop and nearly jumps out of his seat in fear that a couple drops will stain his monogrammed, starched white shirt. I think Reynolds’ FBI “uniform” is rubbing off on him.

It’s my turn to laugh. “Don’t even ask why. My mom has always had a soft spot for stray cats and lost puppies. Dell is now her favorite lost puppy. Actually, my whole family adores him. Just for the record, Dell and I didn’t drive over together. Kendra and James sat between us at the dining room table. He was just there and it seemed like the most normal thing in the world to everyone—except me. In fact, he was still there watching the Cubbies with Jimmy when I left.”

“No way,” Don says.

“Well, actually the last I saw of him, he and Jimmy were pushing my car down the street so I could start it with the clutch.”

Don laughs again and shakes his head.

“Ready to order?” the waitress says. We both answer yes. We have a task force meeting in an hour, so we thought it’d be a good idea to grab a bite before the possibility of lunch or dinner disappears. Even though it’s early, I order tuna salad on whole wheat. Lettuce and tomatoes, with a pickle on the side. A big glass of water and an endless cup of coffee. After living on JavaStar for the past couple years, diner coffee tastes almost watery. I can live with that if it gets the job done and wakes me up. Don orders a full bacon and egg breakfast, adds half a bottle of ketchup on the hash browns, and chases it down with blackberry pie. I notice that he’s put on a few pounds since this serial killer thing started. He doesn’t show it, but he must be feeling some stress, too. I promise, I will make no reference to his weight today.

“Don’t you think it’s a little strange,” he says as we finish, “that you—the most controlling person in the world—have no say in your love life?”

“Did you just say ‘love life’?” I ask him, ready to stare him down for as long as it takes. Maybe I should mention those extra pounds.

He breaks the gaze, laughs, and says, “Okay, let me rephrase that. This guy looks and acts like your boyfriend, and he’s in the middle of your family life, and you don’t even know what you think about him. And you’re okay with that? Doesn’t sound right to me.”

“What I think about him is becoming increasingly clear. Now can we change the subject?” I ask.

“Hey, I’m just trying to be a good partner and I am tempted to point out that getting close to a member of the opposite sex can be a fulfilling experience. He seems like a nice guy to me.”

Et tu, Brute?
I look up to argue, but he holds up his hands in surrender. I hold my tongue. I’m worn out and don’t have the energy for a battle of insults. Come on, coffee, do your thing.

“So, how was your Sunday?” I ask instead. He is trying to suppress a smile, which makes me think he’s been waiting for me to ask.

Don’s bursting to tell me his news. “Vanessa sold another house on Saturday, so it was a great weekend,” Don says.

“She take you shopping?”

“Maybe she did.” He holds up his silk tie. I guess I was supposed to notice that it was new. It’s nice, but a tie is a tie. Don doesn’t look at it that way. He then turns sideways in the booth and kicks a leg out in the aisle, high enough for me to see his foot. I’m assuming the shoes are new, too. I’m looking at a shiny black loafer with a tassel.

“Nice. New Eddie Arnolds?” I ask, teasing him.

He rolls his eyes and says, “Allen Edmonds. I’ve been wanting to buy some Graysons. They’re not made quite as narrow as the other AE models, but they still feel great.”

“That’s two new pairs of shoes in two weeks.”

He doesn’t answer but just smiles. He and Klarissa should go shopping together. Make a Saturday of it.

“What do they cost? More than a hundred bucks?”

“Almost 400,” he answers quickly, pulling his foot back under the table and crossing his arms with a frown. I’ve hurt his feelings. I feel a little bad for purposely gigging him. But not that bad.

We’ve canvassed the first crime neighborhood in Washington Park, where Sandra Reed was murdered, since six this morning. It’ll be back to Rogers Park for Candace Rucker’s murder later, but we wanted to catch the early-to-work crowd from the first murder as they were leaving for the office or airport or wherever they go on a Monday morning. It’s been two weeks and we still haven’t been able to interview everybody on the block yet; we figure that even if we catch someone for a second or third time, maybe they’ll remember something they forgot to tell us earlier. It’s a good idea, but not very fruitful. We talked to a total of six people, all more interested in their wristwatches than us. I wonder if anyone even remembers that a real human being—their neighbor up until a couple of weeks ago—is dead.

“Have you finished reading all the notebooks from the other cities?” I ask.

“Yeah. But to tell you the truth, I didn’t find anything. How about you?”

“Me neither. This guy is a ghost.”

“I love that the FBI is involved and is bringing all these resources to the table,” he says, “but it seems to me that we’re going to catch him with old-fashioned police work. Until he makes a big mistake, we’re going to be spinning our wheels. I keep thinking that the AA meetings might lead to a breakthrough.”

“Would be nice of him to leave a business card or something, preferably with his confession written out, wouldn’t it?”

“We can hope and pray, but I’m not counting on that.”

“Well, tell Vanessa to pray, then. You say that God answers all her prayers.”

“She got me, didn’t she?”

I roll my eyes. We look at our watches, finish the last bites on our plates, and get up without a word. I pull seven crumpled dollar bills from my wallet and leave them on the green check the waitress has left. Don makes a face at my offering and leaves a crisp ten-dollar bill and two more ones. I’m no math wiz, but I figure that’s about a 40 percent tip.

“You need change?” she asks our backs.

Don turns and says, “Keep it.” To me he says, “I bet she’ll love what you left, Scrooge.”

“I’m not married to a real estate mogul,” I shoot back.

I hustle out the door and down the sidewalk to the driver’s side. Whoever gets there first, drives. Neither of us like being second. I hold out an open palm and he drops the keys in my hand with a frown.

“You limping?” Don asks as we pull out of the parking lot. I don’t answer, but my knee is barking after last night’s stair run.

• • •

Dell called last night to see if I wanted to go out for a quick dinner. I politely declined and spent my evening again going through the remaining notebooks, created by a computer I’ve named Virgil. A notebook for each city. A green tab in each notebook with an overview of that area. A red tab for each victim. Yellow tabs in the back with theories and data.

It’s been a tough month. Everyone I love has told me, in some form or another, that I’ve got an anger problem. Now everyone wants to know why I have bonding issues. I’m pretty sure everyone likes Dell better than they like me. Klarissa gives Mom and Kaylen big hugs. I get a polite sideways embrace and she misses the kiss on my cheek by a mile.

I wasn’t totally honest with Don. My weekend wasn’t even so-so. It was lousy.

21

The ChiTownVlogger

April 26, 3:30 a.m.

“WELCOME TO THE jungle; we got fun ’n’ games; we got everything you want,” Guns N’ Roses pounded out as the report title scrolled onto the screen: CUTTER SHARK ALERT: FALL ELECTIONS NOW HAVE A SHARP EDGE TO THEM.

Allen Johnson’s bifocals were propped atop his thick mop of messy white hair. He sported a tan button-down shirt with a ketchup stain a couple inches above his navel that he figured most viewers wouldn’t see. Nor would they catch the stubble on his face—it was a benefit of televising solely via the Net . . . a slightly grainy image that disguised

such things. It saved him so much time, not having to shave every day.
Leaving me more time to investigate.
He stood in his postage stamp front yard, one foot on a step, his black Labrador Retriever obediently at his side. With puffy, dark-rimmed eyes he knew he looked like he hadn’t slept since the last time he shaved. But he spoke into the camera with his best baritone that lent seriousness even in the midst of his rumpled condition.

“Welcome to my jungle, friends and foes alike—you’re all welcome here. You’ve come to the place where you get the news that matters. The news the others don’t report because they are in bed with city hall.

“Speaking of bed, I wonder how well Mayor Doyle has been sleeping lately. Is he having sweet dreams? Or nightmares? There’s a killer loose in our fair city. Never a good thing for a reelection campaign, even when you are an incumbent eight times over and the city’s octogenarian set thinks your daddy is still the ‘Boss.’

“But the historians on his staff surely remember Harold Jefferson getting voted out of office because he couldn’t shovel snow from our sidewalks fast enough, which spawned the evil Empire of Jane. Bottom line, Chitown is intensely loyal and fickle, all wrapped in one package. No, no Republican in this century or the next shall oust our mayor. But that doesn’t mean a fellow Democrat will not.

“But I digress from the matter at hand. We have a new resident with a proclivity toward knives and blood. So who is this denizen of the night? A vampire? A werewolf? George Bush and Hillary Clinton’s love child? Now that’s a scary thought.

“We do know he loves blood. You heard that first from the ChiTownVlogger. He’s a predator with two Chicagoland hits under his belt.

But here’s where the news gets worse, folks. According to my sources, I am going on record as saying it looks like he might just be warming up. “You know my goodwill toward all men and women, and you know that I would never make light of violence. But I am officially dubbing this twisted tortured soul Chicago’s very own Cutter Shark. I feel I have no choice after that moronic morning news muddler on WCI started calling our new friend the Windy City Whacker. The Windy City Whacker? Come on. I’m afraid Reporter Jenson isn’t the brightest bulb on the Ferris wheel.

“It’s quite clear that the Cutter Shark has a way with our lady folk. I want to give a big shout out to Nancy Reagan. She was right, girls. You can let a shark buy you a drink, but then you better just say no!

“Mayor Doyle assures us our crack police force is on the case and will turn over every stone to bring this
perpetrator of pain
, this
sultan of slice
, this
Faustian fiend of the flesh
to quick and certain justice. I will stay true to my political convictions and not buy a handgun—but I am going to break down and buy one for my daughter. I’m also going to make sure her college accounts are paid up so she doesn’t come home to the Windy City, asking Dad for more cash.

“Now, if our venomous villain was piling up a pack of illegal parking citations, I have no doubt that Mayor Doyle and Commissioner Fergosi would be able to handle that. The Cutter Shark would definitely be off the streets and in custody. But give us a killer that’s tough to track down? Our city’s finest seem to be floundering and our mayor pretends it’s not happening.

“Well, while Mayor Doyle can pretend all he wants—his only concern a reelection six months down the road—rest assured, your ChiTownVlogger will be on the case. I am going to be the first to offer a reward. I have instructed my financial planner to place $10,000 in an escrow fund, to be paid to the person who provides information that leads to the capture and conviction of the Cutter Shark.

“By the way, I asked an official at city hall why they weren’t offering a reward. She told me that they were afraid of receiving a deluge of calls and messages from nut jobs. Isn’t it good to know that your mayor thinks of you as nut jobs? How concerned can he be about the safety of our fair maidens?

“Check back in my jungle often, folks. It’s getting wild out there. If you want the real news behind the news, you’ll only get it from me, the ChiTownVlogger.”

22

TODAY’S MEETING IS not pleasant. Captain Zaworski is not happy. The press continues to be all over the case. And thanks to some nut job with a popular online video blog, who dubbed our killer the Cutter Shark, it’s grown tenfold. The people of our city—specifically single women between the ages of twenty-five and forty who are at least reasonably attractive and gainfully employed—are afraid. They’re staying home at night, which means the single men of Chicago are not happy either. Then there’s the bar and restaurant owners. My mom’s calling me and Klarissa every fifteen minutes, just to make sure we’re okay. Everyone’s clamoring for us to get off our tushies and make a quick arrest. Okay, then. Why didn’t you guys just ask? I’ll wave my magic wand and voila, the case will be solved.

There was an article in today’s paper interviewing guys who feel their dating mojo has been off since the killer arrived. One guy being interviewed in the paper claimed that every time he offers to buy a girl a drink in the bar, he fears he’ll be pepper-sprayed.

Mayor Doyle is not happy either, which means Police Commissioner Fergosi is not happy, so surprise, surprise, the good vibes have filtered down to Czaka and on to Zaworski. Now it’s our turn to feel the heat.