Kiss of the She-Devil

Highest Praise for M. William Phelps

NEVER SEE THEM AGAIN

“This riveting book examines one of the most horrific murders in recent American history.”

—
New York Post

“Phelps clearly shows how the ugliest crimes can take place in the quietest of suburbs.”

—
Library Journal

“Thoroughly reported . . . the book is primarily a police procedural, but it is also a tribute to the four murder victims.”

—Kirkus Reviews

TOO YOUNG TO KILL

“Phelps is the Harlan Coben of real-life thrillers.”

—Allison Brennan

LOVE HER TO DEATH

“Reading anything by Phelps is always an eye-opening experience. His writing reads like a fiction mystery novel. The characters are well researched and well written. We have murder, adultery, obsession, lies and so much more.”

—Suspense Magazine

“You don’t want to miss
Love Her To Death
by M. William Phelps, a book destined to be one of 2011’s top true crimes!”

—True Crime Book Reviews

“A chilling crime . . . award-winning author Phelps goes into lustrous and painstaking detail, bringing all the players vividly to life.”

—Crime Magazine

KILL FOR ME

“Phelps gets into the blood and guts of the story.”

—Gregg Olsen,
New York Times
bestselling author of
Fear Collector

“Phelps infuses his investigative journalism with plenty of energized descriptions.”

—
Publishers Weekly

DEATH TRAP

“A chilling tale of a sociopathic wife and mother willing to sacrifice all those around her to satisfy her boundless narcissism . . . a compelling journey from the inside of this woman’s mind to final justice in a court of law. Fair warning: for three days I did little else but read this book.”

—Harry N. MacLean,
New York Times
bestselling author of
In Broad Daylight

I’LL BE WATCHING YOU

“Skillfully balances a victim’s story against that of an arrogant killer as it reveals a deviant mind intent on topping the world’s most dangerous criminals. Phelps has an unrelenting sense for detail that affirms his place, book by book, as one of our most engaging crime journalists.”

—Katherine Ramsland

IF LOOKS COULD KILL

“M. William Phelps, one of America’s finest true-crime writers, has written a compelling and gripping book about an intriguing murder mystery. Readers of this genre will thoroughly enjoy this book.”

—Vincent Bugliosi

“Starts quickly and doesn’t slow down.... Phelps consistently ratchets up the dramatic tension, hooking readers before they even know they’ve been hooked. His thorough research and interviews give the book a sense of growing complexity, richness of character, and urgency.”

—Stephen Singular

MURDER IN THE HEARTLAND

“Drawing on interviews with law officers and relatives, the author has done significant research and—demonstrating how modern forensics and the Internet played critical, even unexpected roles in the investigation—his facile writing pulls the reader along.”

—
St. Louis Post-Dispatch

“Phelps expertly reminds us that when the darkest form of evil invades the quiet and safe outposts of rural America, the tragedy is greatly magnified. Get ready for some sleepless nights.”

—Carlton Stowers

“This is the most disturbing and moving look at murder in rural America since Capote’s
In Cold Blood
.”

—Gregg Olsen

SLEEP IN HEAVENLY PEACE

“An exceptional book by an exceptional true crime writer. Phelps exposes long-hidden secrets and reveals disquieting truths.”

—Kathryn Casey

EVERY MOVE YOU MAKE

“An insightful and fast-paced examination of the inner workings of a good cop and his bad informant, culminating in an unforgettable truth-is-stranger-than-fiction climax.”

—Michael M. Baden, M.D.

“M. William Phelps is the rising star of the nonfiction crime genre, and his true tales of murderers and mayhem are scary-as-hell thrill rides into the dark heart of the inhuman condition.”

—Douglas Clegg

LETHAL GUARDIAN

“An intense roller coaster of a crime story . . . complex, with a plethora of twists and turns worthy of any great detective mystery, and yet so well-laid-out, so crisply written with such detail to character and place, that it reads more like a novel than your standard nonfiction crime book.”

—Steve Jackson

PERFECT POISON

“True crime at its best—compelling, gripping, an edge-of-the-seat thriller. Phelps packs wallops of delight with his skillful ability to narrate a suspenseful story and his encyclopedic knowledge of police procedures.”

—Harvey Rachlin

“A compelling account of terror . . . the author dedicates himself to unmasking the psychopath with facts, insight and the other proven methods of journalistic legwork.”

—Lowell Cauffiel

Also by M. William Phelps

Perfect Poison
Lethal Guardian
Every Move You Make
Sleep in Heavenly Peace
Murder in the Heartland
Because You Loved Me
If Looks Could Kill
I’ll Be Watching You
Deadly Secrets
Cruel Death
Death Trap
Kill for Me
Failures of the Presidents
(coauthor)
Nathan Hale: The Life and Death of America’s First Spy
The Devil’s Rooming House: The True Story of America’s
Deadliest Female Serial Killer
The Devil’s Right Hand: The Tragic Story of the
Colt Family Curse
Love Her to Death
Too Young to Kill
The Dead Soul: A Thriller (available as ebook only)
Never See Them Again

KISS OF THE SHE-DEVIL

M. WILLIAM PHELPS

PINNACLE BOOKS
Kensington Publishing Corp.
http://www.kensingtonbooks.com

All copyrighted material within is Attributor Protected.

Table of Contents

Highest Praise for M. William Phelps
Also by M. William Phelps
Title Page
Dedication
I - THE MURDER

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21

II - THE BLACK CLOUD

22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46

III - A VIEW TO A KILL

47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55

IV - CARRYING CROSSES

56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74

Epilogue
Bad Girls
Copyright Page

This book is dedicated to Kensington Publishing Corp.—and all those who have supported me throughout the years, including Michaela Hamilton, Doug Mendini, and publisher Laurie Parkin, with a special thanks to the Zacharius family and Kensington’s late founder, Walter Zacharius.

I

THE MURDER

1

I
T WAS JUST
about nine o’clock. Time for the library to close. Barbara “Barb” Butkis, a veteran librarian supervisor for fifteen years, planned on staying late. Barb needed to work on a few things related to the library’s computer system. This type of work had to be done after hours. Barb had told Martha Gail Fulton, one of her library aides, that there was no reason for her to stick around. Martha, who went by her middle name, Gail, was always asking how she could do more. Barb explained that she and another employee could take care of the extra work. Gail’s home life wasn’t so stable lately, anyway; in fact, it was no secret to most employees at the library that home was probably the best place for the forty-eight-year-old married mother of three grown children. Gail had recently taken her husband back after he had an extended and tumultuous affair. But that was Gail: the forgiving, devout Catholic, always willing to pardon for the sake of souls.

All the employees generally met near the staff door heading out into the parking lot at the end of a shift. Barb and another coworker, librarian Cathy Lichtman, stayed behind.

“Computer backup,” Barb said to the others as they gathered, ready to leave.

It sounded boring and tedious. The only plus for Barb was that it would take maybe ten or fifteen minutes, tops.

The Orion Township Library, on Joslyn Road, was a central point in the quaint Michigan town of Lake Orion, “where living is a vacation,” the town’s website claims. Lake Orion is about forty-five minutes due north of the more well-known and popular home of the Tigers and Pistons, the Motor City, Detroit. By small-town standards, the landmass of Lake Orion is infinitesimal: 1.2 square miles, 440 acres of which are eaten up by water. On that cool October night, when Barbara Butkis and Gail Fulton’s lives outside of books collided, there were fewer than two thousand residents registered in Lake Orion. So, without overstating it, one could say this was a town, literally, where not only did everybody know everyone else’s business, but nothing much beyond bake sales, PTA meetings, and bingo games happened. Lake Orion was as charming and dainty as any fabricated plastic town in the middle of a child’s train set: perfect and pleasant and quiet. Maybe even boring, too—just the way townies liked it.

Gail’s work imitated her life—she was flexible. Gail worked every Monday night (tonight) from five to nine, but she would come in on additional, alternate days and nights at different hours. Those Monday nights were Gail’s, though, and had been since she’d taken the job eighteen months earlier. The job Gail did—and did it very well—was what one would have expected from a librarian’s assistant. Throughout everybody’s time inside libraries, patrons have all come in contact with these everyday, average women and men. They push carts of books from one aisle to the next, quietly, in solitude, depositing each into its respective, numerically placed slot. Once in a while, they will answer a patron’s question. If a person loved books, this was a dream job.