Killing Hope (Gabe Quinn Thriller) (32 page)

‘The hypodermic is his weapon of choice.’

And serial killers hate deviating.

‘I’ve sent swabs to Trace.’ He said. ‘But if he’s as clean as with his other kills, I’m not very hopeful. Ready for the best part?’

‘I guess.’

‘Helena’s blood work came back negative for sodium thiopental and pancuronium bromide. But the potassium chloride showed up in fatal quantities.’

I rocked back on my heels.

Helena Margolis had suffered a far more horrific death in real life than any she had ever acted out in her heyday.

87

^{___________________________}

I was in unmoving traffic. Out on Mission Road. Quarter of a mile from Benedict and the corpse of Helena Margolis. The sun had sunken fully in the west. Turning the downtown skyscrapers into gravestones silhouetted against the twilight. I was listening to the steady
ping-ping
of my
Uh-Oh Radar
. Trying to figure out if her murder had been an act of impulsion.

‘She was brought in late Tuesday afternoon,’ Benedict had told me, ‘from the Ramada Inn on Vermont.’

I broke out my phone. Got the switchboard to patch me through to the attending Officer. Had to wait awhile for him to come on the line. I wasn’t going anywhere.

‘Helena? Yeah, sure I can tell you about her,’ the Officer told me as he came through. ‘She was a well-known bag lady in that part of town. A real familiar face on the street. She’s worked that stretch of Vermont for the last twenty years.’

‘Worked?’

‘Not what you think, detective. Helena could spin a tale or two about Hollywood’s Golden Age. In exchange for gin money. She knew all the gossip. The tourists loved her.’

It was a far cry from her halcyon days.

‘So what happened, Tuesday?’

‘We got a call around four in the afternoon. Evidently, the pool guy had found her slumped in the foliage at the back of the pool area. Raised the alarm. We checked her over when we arrived. Didn’t see any signs of an attack or blunt force trauma. Looked like she’d been dead a couple of hours.’

‘And nobody noticed her?’

‘Low season, I guess. Not many hotel guests using the facilities. And the foliage is quite dense toward the rear of the property.’

‘Did you see anything out of the ordinary?’

‘Not that I recall. Anything in particular you’re looking for?’

‘Rose petals scattered around her body, for instance?’

‘Nada.’ I sensed the officer’s thoughts switch to my wavelength. ‘You think this is a homicide? I’ll be damned. She was such a sweet old lady.’

The rush hour jam eased up. I drove straight to the Ramada on Vermont through mindless twilight traffic. Ran one or two reds. Ignored the blasted horns. Didn’t stop until I’d parked at the back of the hotel and killed the engine.

No petals. No ash. No discarded hypodermics. None of
The Undertaker’s
stylized scene setup. So why was I here?

A hunch. Following my
Uh-Oh Radar
. Thinking that maybe – just maybe – he’d left an unintentional clue behind in his haste to dispose of Helena Margolis.

88

^{___________________________}

At that precise moment, the killer also known as Randall Fisk was over two-hundred miles away. In another city. In another State. Any memory of Helena Margolis long since filed away.

He was standing in a ring-shaped observation deck at the top of the tallest free-standing structure in western North America. Sweaty palms pressed against the cool glass of the window. Gazing out across a sea of multi-colored city lights over a thousand feet below.

The original settlers had called this place
The Meadows.
But there was very little left of them now – settlers or meadows. The city had spread far and wide in the intervening century. Covering the entire Las Vegas valley in a bejeweled carpet.

 
The killer swiveled the peak of his cap to the back of his head. Pressed a greasy brow against the hard glass. The big window sloped inwards towards his toes, so that it felt like he was suspended over the amazing drop. The view from the Stratosphere Tower was spectacular. A treasure trove of rainbow lights, glittering beneath the inky Nevada sky.

It was quiet in the doughnut-shaped gallery: just a few tourists going googly-eyed at the breath-taking panorama. No one paid any attention to his death-defying act. No one really cared. They were too busy snapping photographs for their Facebook accounts. Pointing out the huge, illuminated hotels strung along The Strip like charms on a bracelet. Having fun.

He pressed his head harder against the glass until his brain hurt. Wondered about the stress limit of the single glazed unit. It looked thick. Bulletproof. He wondered if it was.

89

^{___________________________}

The gated pool area at the Ramada Inn on Vermont is located at the back of the parking lot. In a corner. Out of the way. It’s a smallish, L-shaped area surrounded by leafy palms and those ubiquitous white plastic chairs found at every hotel poolside across the country.

There was nobody about. I slipped quietly through a metal gateway. Smelled chlorine and damp vegetation. Dusk-triggered underwater lighting was already on, I saw. Illuminating the pool from within. A pair of halogen lamps on tall poles just flickering into life up above.

I didn’t know exactly where Helena’s body had been found; there was no police tape strung between the palms, No chalked outline on the floor. But she had died here. In broad daylight. At the hands of our killer.

What did I expect to find?

I stood stock still. Soaked up the ambience.

Crime detection is one of the few cases where first impressions matter. You’d be surprised at just how much hidden information the subconscious gleans in the first few moments of entering a place of sudden death. A feeling, a mood, even a smell can shape our perceptions and help flesh out the bones of murders past.

But my subconscious wasn’t for gleaning.

After several unproductive minutes I sat down on one of the plastic chairs. Listened to the rumble of the traffic out on Vermont. Listened to the whirring of the air conditioning vents on the back of the hotel. Listened to the faint rustle of the palm leaves.

What was my
Uh Oh Radar
trying to say?

Then I saw it: a tiny red eye high up in a darkening corner of the pool area.

I blinked. It didn’t.

I stood up and ran towards the hotel.

90

^{___________________________}

He was riding one of the shiny elevators as it fell back to earth. A dozen excitable tourists crammed in around him. A group of boisterous young Hispanics poking fun at each other’s frightened expressions. Snapshots taken on one of the Tower’s thrill rides.

The woman standing next to him had no idea who he was. No notion that her personal space was already invaded by the man who would take her life. In the confines of the elevator her body odor was palpable. Not the smell of the unwashed, but rather the smell of fear. He’d seen her ride the vertical catapult rising from the summit of the Stratosphere like a huge hypodermic needle. Seen the fear injected into her face. No deodorant could mask that look.

He studied her out of the corner of his eye as the carriage hurtled towards the ground:

She was as dull as a rainy day in Detroit. Small, dowdy and dumpy. Pushing forty. Fifty pounds overweight. Oily skin, lank hair, milk-bottle glasses. She reminded him of a half-baked dough dolly left out in the rain.

Destined to grow old alone.

He’d be doing her a favor.

91

^{___________________________}

Sometimes the wheels of justice grind. I spent most of the night killing time at the Ramada Inn on Vermont. Firstly, waiting for the Manager to drag himself out of bed and come over. Secondly, waiting for his superiors to stop sitting on their hands and make a decision. And thirdly, waiting for the company legal department to give the thumbs-up. Sometimes twelve hours of pressure is enough to squeeze blood from a stone.

I got to the Station House around 6:45 a.m.. Ahead of the morning rush. I’d called Jamie at home. Told her about Helena Margolis. She’d come in early. Set up a TV monitor and a video player in one of the interview rooms. Now we were sitting on metal chairs. Intently watching the TV screen come to life as the Ramada surveillance tape whirred into action.

An image resolved out of black fog.

The camera angle was looking back towards the rear of the hotel. Across the parking lot. Only the half of the pool area furthest from the camera visible – including the little metal gate. The footage was black-and-white. Low quality. One frame snapped every ten seconds.

‘We need to be looking at around two in the afternoon.’ I said as Jamie picked up the remote control.

The time stamp in the corner said 6 a.m.. Shift change at the hotel. Jamie pressed a button and the time-lapse footage kicked up a gear as it launched into fast-forward. The time stamp accelerated through its numbers in the bottom corner of the screen. Hours of live footage flew by in minutes:

Vehicles zipping in and out of the parking lot. People blurring across the screen like day-lit specters. Clouds careening across the sky. Mostly, the footage was plain drudgery. Then, just after 1:30 p.m., something smacked me in the face:

‘Stop the tape!’

Jamie hit the brakes like our lives depended on it. The video player down-shifted to normal speed with a whine. Then a clunk. Then another whine. Old technology. The TV screen went black. A fuzzy white line skittered around on the top edge of the picture. She rewound the tape a few seconds. Pressed the play button. Then paused it.

We leaned closer.

The image on the screen was a monochrome snapshot, jittering slightly on freeze-frame. It showed a parking lot with a scattering of cars. A white van in the far background, making deliveries. No one lounging on the poolside. No people at all – except for a stick-thin figure emerging from beneath our viewpoint.

‘That’s her.’ I said.

Helena Margolis didn’t look much healthier than the last time I’d seen her. One more winter. Maybe.