The Prophet (14 page)

Belacourt and Stupak had already arrived at Glasgow Jewelers when Marcus pulled up to the curb. The store occupied the corner of a tan-colored building bordered by red-brick townhouses. Art deco windows lined the store’s entrance that was carved into a triangular recessed niche. A blue Toyota Camry with the license plate
MJA 459
sat in front of the store. The name on the car’s registration was Raymond Glasgow, the owner of the small shop.

Vasques stepped out of the vehicle and said, “Are you coming in?”

Marcus glanced at the shop and the car. “No, I’ll let the professionals handle it.”

She gave him a look. “You did a good job with that witness. I owe you dinner if this turns out to be the right guy.”

“I’ll take you up on that.”

She shut the door without further comment and crossed the street. The two cops exited their red Chevy Impala and joined Vasques, who held open the door for them. Marcus leaned his head back against the seat and closed his eyes, trying to get a moment’s rest.

From the back seat, Andrew said, “Okay, show and tell. Why isn’t this him?”

“You’ll find out in a few minutes.”

Andrew muttered something, but Marcus tried not to hear. He tried to shut out the world for just a few seconds. He only needed a moment to rest his eyes and recharge. Just as he was about to doze off for the first time in two days, Andrew said, “How long has it been since you’ve slept? You know being overly tired is as bad as being drunk. It’s going to affect your judgment.”

Marcus sighed. “I already have one shrink. I don’t need another.”

“Come on. I’m your best friend. Hell, I’m damn near your
only
friend. What’s been bothering you so much lately? Bottling all that up inside isn’t healthy.”

“Who are you, Dr. Phil? You want to help me? Then shut up and let me rest a minute.”

Andrew grumbled under his breath. “Fine. I’ll just keep my mouth shut. Won’t hear a peep from me. Not a word. You can just crash and burn. Doesn’t matter to me one way or the other. How dare I try to help?”

“Would you shut up!”

“Fine. Whatever.”

Marcus tried to close his eyes and rest, but his mind wouldn’t allow it. His head kept filling with a collage of a million unrelated thoughts, a million images flying through his brain at high speed—Ackerman, the missing time on the the tapes, the Anarchist, burnt bodies, eyes held open, a filthy mattress on the floor, a trembling girl, the bullet hole in Ty Phillips’s forehead, smiling faces, blood, pain, the night his parents were murdered, the voice in the darkness.

After a few minutes, Vasques tapped on his window, and he pulled up on the switch to roll it down. “Airtight alibi,” she said. “He was at a jewelers’ convention in San Diego. His flight came in yesterday morning. We’ll check it out, but I don’t think he’s lying. He claims that his wife drove him to the airport, and his car’s been sitting here since he left last week. We’re going to get a forensics team on the car to see if the Anarchist stole it and used it to kidnap Sandra Lutrell.”

“I figured the Anarchist would be too careful for us to get him off a plate number. And I bet your forensics team won’t find anything in the car, but tell them to check the plate itself.”

“You think he switched them?”

“That’s what I’d do.”

Vasques reached up and massaged her neck. “Then we got nothing,” she said.

Andrew leaned forward from the back seat and commented, “Not necessarily. If a cop ran the plate and it came back as the wrong type of car, it could lead to him getting caught.”

“So he drives the same car as Glasgow,” Vasques said. “That’s good. We’ll put together a list of every person who drives a Toyota Camry in the Chicago area. It’ll be a big list, but maybe we’ll find something to cross-check it with.” She looked at Marcus and pursed her lips as if considering something. “That also means that you were right in your assessment of what kind of car the killer drives. If memory serves, a Camry was the first one you listed.”

“Yeah, well, I’m not going to break my arm patting myself on the back. All it really tells us is that this guy is smart, methodical, and can do a Google search. I’m not sure that we’re any closer to catching him . . . or stopping him from killing again.”

Ackerman spun round on his bar stool and walked straight over to the big bald biker. He tapped a massive shoulder, and the man turned, looking down at him with a furrowed brow. The biker outweighed him by at least a hundred and fifty pounds and stood seven inches taller.

The bigger they are
, he thought.

“What the hell do you want?” the big man said. His voice was a low grumble. He gave Ackerman a look that the killer supposed had been practiced and honed by years of back-alley brawls. The look in the biker’s eyes announced him as a force to be reckoned with: indestructible, frightening, powerful. It was a good look.

Ackerman smiled back. He knew the type. The man’s size, bulk, and attitude had helped him to avoid more fights than he had ever started or participated in. The biker was little more than an overgrown bully, and behind the bravado he saw something present in the heart of every bully he had ever met: fear.

“Are you the one that gave the beautiful young lady over there that nasty bruise?”

The biker looked him up and down and laughed to his friends. He set his bottle of beer down on the side of the pool table. “Are you serious? You some kind of knight in shining armor?”

“Far from it.”

The biker growled out another throaty laugh. “I’ll do whatever I want to her, and it’s nobody’s business but mine. That answer your question?” A meaty paw shot out and pushed against Ackerman’s shoulder. The killer stumbled back but then returned to his previous position in front of the big man, his smile not faltering.

With a snarl, the biker said, “Did you come in here just to get your face smashed in? If so, you came to the right place.”

Ackerman replied, “I just came here to blow off some steam.”

His hand shot out and grabbed the bald biker’s bottle from its resting place atop the big Brunswick table. He smashed it against the edge, and the bottom half of the bottle shattered. He lunged forward with the bottle stretched out.

The big biker was ready for the move and reacted quickly.

Too bad for him that it was only a feint.

As the biker moved out of the path of the blow, all his weight shifted to his right leg. Ackerman’s foot shot out and collided with the inside of the man’s right kneecap. The joint buckled, and the big man dropped to one knee.

Ackerman slammed the man’s bald head against the side of the pool table and stabbed the jagged edge of the bottle into his left eye.

The big man wailed in agony and clutched his face. He fell the rest of the way to the ground and rolled around the floor of the bar. Screaming, cursing, spitting.

The black man with the dreadlocks just looked at his fallen comrade in wide-eyed panic. When he saw Ackerman staring at him, he dropped his pool cue and raised both hands in surrender.

“Don’t move!” said a woman’s voice at Ackerman’s back.

He turned to find the bartender holding an old black Smith and Wesson 9mm pistol. She had come around the side of the bar and stood a few feet away. Still mindful of the biker’s friends, he cocked his head to the side and examined her weapon. He took a step toward her.

“Stop!” she screamed, shaking the gun at him.

“There’s a layer of dust on your gun. How long has it been sitting back there under the bar, unused?”

She didn’t answer.

“You see, the smarter move would have been to stick a revolver back there. Maybe a .357 magnum. That 9mm has a clip, and if it’s been sitting back there loaded, the spring within the clip has been under constant pressure. Eventually, the spring will go bad. The shells won’t jack up into the chamber correctly. It’ll jam up on you or not fire at all.”

Slowly, he took another step forward.

“Are you willing to take the chance of that gun not firing or maybe even blowing up on you? Plus, you have to ask yourself if you really have what it takes to kill a man.”

“Just get out of here,” the tall woman said in a whisper. “Just leave.”

“I will. In a moment. But first, you need to make a choice.” Ackerman held out his hand, palm up. “You can either put that gun in my hand and get back behind the bar, or I’ll come take it and break your neck.”

She stood frozen. Time stretched out. But then she dropped the gun into his palm and scurried away. “Good choice,” he said.

He turned back to the bald biker and his friends. The big man had pulled himself up to his knees, still clutching the left side of his face. Blood ran out from beneath his fingers and dripped down his forearm to the floor.

Ackerman raised the 9mm to the man’s head and fired. Flame shot from the muzzle, and the big man dropped back to the floor, never to get up again.

As he twisted the Smith and Wesson in his hand and examined it, Ackerman raised his eyebrows and said, “Guess it fired after all.”

The place where Jessie Olague had taken her final breath was a tri-level on Jackson’s Grove’s south side with an orange brick and blue siding front and a private yard bordered by a wooded area filled with maples and oaks. According to the realtor, the house had been sitting vacant for the past six months with no serious offers. It was unlikely that interest would increase now that a young woman’s screams had filled the building’s corridors.

As they pulled up to the scene that was still surrounded by squad cars and barricades, Marcus first watched the crowd. Killers often visited their crime scenes pretending to be a bystander, but the Jackson’s Grove PD had been taking detailed photos at every scene and had drawn no correlation.

He then examined the area and asked himself a series of questions that would shed light on the offender. How familiar did the Anarchist need to be with the surroundings? What were the best points of ingress? Would the neighbors have heard anything or seen the car? The closest house on the left was also for sale, and trees bordered the right side of the tri-level. It wasn’t likely that they’d get lucky with any witnesses here, but he knew that the police would be canvassing the surrounding neighborhood to be sure.

Having seen nothing outside to shed new light on the case, Marcus, Vasques, and Andrew entered the house through the back door, the same entrance the killer would have used, and walked through to the crime scene. The place buzzed with the activity of crime-scene techs, photographers, and investigators. Tape measures were extended and cameras flashed. The rooms were freshly painted beige with light blue and brown-accent walls. The whole place reeked of burnt flesh and smoke.

Jessie Olague had been tied to a specially designed chair in the center of the house’s den. The fire had consumed most of her body, leaving only a charred husk. The chair had metal plates welded to the bottom of its frame and a high back that secured her head in place. The plates were screwed to the floor to keep the chair from moving. The Anarchist had done similar things at all the scenes, and Marcus guessed that the killer had set it all up before he’d brought the girl here and the actual killing took place.

Marcus hung back, letting the techs do their jobs and examining the killer’s stage for the murder. It matched the others perfectly. Strange symbols drawn in red paint covered all four walls, a mixture of satanic emblems and cryptic runes.

Jessie Olague’s body drew his gaze even though staring at the remains of the poor woman was the last thing he wanted to do. He’d seen many dead bodies during his years in law enforcement, and he’d never forgotten a single one. He could remember all the victims’ names and instantly recall the scenes of their deaths in vivid detail. There were many times in his line of work where an eidetic or photographic memory was a blessing, but also many times when it was a curse.

He’d smelled the odor of burnt flesh and charred bodies before at a few car crashes during his stint as a NYPD patrol officer and a few other times at murder scenes when he’d been a detective. The scent hadn’t been anything like he had expected. He had foolishly assumed that it would smell like a pot roast left in the oven for too long, just another cooked piece of meat. There were hints of that, yet it was also very different.

A body contained all manner of things that were normally never cooked. Livestock were bled and butchered, their organs and blood removed. But that hadn’t been the case with Jessie Olague. Her iron-rich blood added a metallic component to the smell. The keratin in her hair contained large amounts of cysteine, a sulfur-containing amino acid, adding its distinctive odor. Burning skin created a charcoal-like stink. When exposed to flame, cerebrospinal fluid generated a musky, sweet perfume.

The mixture of conflicting fragrant and putrid aromas wasn’t something that he would ever forget. And he knew from experience that it would cling to the inside of his nostrils for days.

“My God,” Vasques said at his side, covering her mouth and looking away from the body. “How could someone do that to another human being?”

Marcus didn’t answer. He understood the darkness inside necessary to take life in such a way, but it wasn’t something that could easily be explained or comprehended, even by those who had felt its power. Instead, in almost a whisper, he said, “What have you found out about the symbols?”

“Not much. We’ve contacted some experts, but as far we can tell it’s a mixture of satanic symbology and gibberish.” Vasques referred to her notebook, flipping through several pages, but she had to pause for a moment and cover her nose. She looked pale, and Marcus wondered if she was going to be sick. He should have warned her about the smell. One of the techs or cops might have had some Vicks ointment that she could have rubbed on the skin beneath her nose.

But, after a brief hesitation, she found the information and said, “The characters appear to be a mixture of Cypriot, a language used on the island of Cyprus from 1500 BCE to 300 BCE, and Glagolitic, used in Eastern Europe between the ninth and twelfth centuries CE.”

He shook his head and breathed out harshly in frustration. What could possibly be the correlation between the murders and these strange symbols and writings? It was the only part of the crime scenes that didn’t make sense to him. This killer was smart and organized. Why use random symbols and strange scripts that didn’t have any meaning or connection? He wondered if the killer believed that the symbols had been given to him from some supernatural source.

“The accelerant?” Andrew said.

“Same as the others. Aliphatic petroleum solvent, commonly known as lighter fluid. Available at nearly any hardware, department, or grocery store.”

Marcus squeezed his eyes shut. His head pounded and throbbed as though someone had buried a hatchet deep into the center of his brain. The migraines again. He needed painkillers and caffeine, and all he’d eaten that day was a Twinkie first thing in the morning.

Entering the den through another door, Belacourt and Stupak approached them. Belacourt shot him a look of distaste and said, “Now that you’ve seen his handiwork, big shot, you still think this guy’s not a psychopath?”

Marcus groaned. He didn’t like where this was heading, and there was something about Belacourt’s voice and derisive tone that made his head pound even harder. “Psychopathy is a personality disorder. One which he doesn’t have. If I thought you could read, I’d direct you to some books on the subject.”

Belacourt laughed, but there was only anger in his eyes. “You think you’re so slick, don’t you? So much better and smarter than all of us simple-minded detectives. I’m going to save us all some time and energy and just be straight with you. We don’t need you here. We don’t want you here. If this guy sticks to his pattern, he’s going to take another girl tonight, and I need Agent Vasques, someone who actually knows what she’s doing, in the trenches working this case. Not babysitting you.”

Vasques spoke up and said, “That’s way out of line. Agent Williams has—”

“Has contributed nothing to this investigation. He used an old trick to get a useless piece of info out of a witness. What did that accomplish other than wasting our time and resources?”

Belacourt stepped close and poked a finger into Marcus’s chest. Even through the smell of the dead body he could detect the stink of cigarettes and onions on the cop’s breath. “I’ll tell you something else. That fiasco today with you chasing after some guy that you claim was Francis Ackerman and shooting your gun all over the place, that kind of loose-cannon act is not going to fly in my town. I don’t know who you are or what you’re really into, but I am going to find out. What I do know, just from what I’ve seen and heard since this morning, is that you think you’re some kind of investigative genius. But you’re not. You’re just some stupid kid that a bureaucrat back east gave a badge to. You’re probably somebody’s nephew who wanted to play cops and robbers so they made up a position to stick you in.”

Vasques started to come to his defense, but Marcus raised a hand to stop her. He preferred to fight his own battles. He glanced down at the finger stabbing into his chest and then met Belacourt’s eyes. “I have a lot of respect for cops. I’m third-generation myself. So out of consideration for that badge on your belt, I’m going to give you one warning. If you ever jab one of those fat sausages that you call fingers into my chest again, I will break it off and use my investigative genius to find a place to stick it.”

Belacourt’s lip twitched in a snarl of contempt, and he looked as if he was ready to throw a punch. Marcus hoped that he would.

Stupak put a hand on his superior’s shoulder and said, “Come on. Just let it go. Let’s worry about catching this guy.”

Belacourt’s gaze drilled into Marcus. Through gritted teeth, the cop said, “Get out of my crime scene, boy, before I take off my belt and give you a spanking.”

Marcus smiled. “I don’t know how it works around here, but where I’m from you have to buy a guy dinner first before you start trying the kinky stuff.”

Belacourt just shook his head slowly from side to side. “You’ve wasted enough of my time. You’re not worth another second.” Then the cop turned and stormed from the room.

Vasques said, “You’re not good at making friends, are you?”

With a little chuckle, Andrew added, “Thank you. That’s what I’ve been trying to tell him.”