The Tangerine Killer (18 page)

The gator wrangler took over an hour to arrive. We wasted it watching the poor creature pitifully wiggle its way toward the tree line. No one attempted to stop his slow, painful escape. After all we didn’t have much choice. No one wanted to get that close to the giant relic. At one point it quickened its pace and I came up with the bright idea that several of us should jump on its back and pin it down. Needless to say my suggestion was met with stone faced glares except for one weedy faced cop who could have barely pinned down a pit bull let alone a ten foot alligator. He seemed overly excited by the thought of jumping on the back of the gator with me. Creep. So I just stood around with the rest of the cops who obviously had nothing better to do.

“Wow. What a beauty.”

The wrangler ambled up to the alligator and patted its bulging head like a large puppy. He walked bow legged and wore ripped jeans and boots made from the hide of some poor gator he had probably skinned himself. I could almost see him eying up the unsuspecting beasts hide as he stood there, calculating how many pairs he’d harvest from its unusual skin.

“Do you have to kill him?” I asked.

“Yup!” the wrangler spat a wad of tobacco juice at my feet.

“You can’t just release him into the wild or send him to a nice zoo?”

“Nope.”

“But he hasn’t hurt anyone.”

The thought of another death made me feel sick to my stomach.

“Not yet but he will. Look here.”

He pulled the tape to free the gators mouth and grabbed hold of his face. He pulled it this way and that, manipulating the beast like a giant dog. The gator hissed and tilted his head to eye the wrangler with his good eye but made no attempt to hurt him.

“He’s too tame for his own good,” he popped in another wad of tobacco thoughtfully. “Probably make a good pet though. I could take him back to my farm if you like. Give him a good home. Probably make a few bucks off people who want to see him. Not many albino gators about you know.”

“Well this one is evidence,” Olin said. “And I don’t think we have the facilities to keep a gator in the basement.”

“Evidence? All right then.”

Before anyone of us even had a chance to stop him, the wrangler pulled a gun from his belt and shot the gator at point blank range right between his good eye and his bad. He never made a sound. He just lay, limp and defeated on the tarmac of the road, only two feet away from the grass verge and the freedom that lay beyond.

“There’s your evidence then. Don’t know why you bothered me. Quiet as a kitten, that one. It’s a crying shame, rare gator like that.”
 

The wrangler ambled off to his truck and rocketed off into the night with a belch of smoke.

“I could have done that,” Olin said grumpily.

Anyone of us standing there with our sheathed guns in the warm night air could have done what the gator wrangler just had. Deep down I hoped he might have been relocated after the police had done whatever they were going to do with him or at least been euthanized peacefully. But the poor, unsuspecting alligator had just become the latest in the growing line of victims.

“Bag him up boys,” Olin roused the group of stunned cops into action.

It took six of them to heave the gator up into the bed of a truck and even then it wasn’t a pretty sight. Lucky for the gator he wasn’t able to feel anymore as they kicked, stuffed and punched until he was finally secured.

“We should have just set him free,” I told Olin sadly.

“I know but if he helps us catch this psycho then he won’t have died in vain.”

I looked at Olin to see if he was making fun of me but his face was serious. Jill had been brutally murdered. At least the alligator had died a quick and painless death. I was pretty certain if the Tangerine killer got hold of me, I wouldn’t be so lucky.

Olin didn’t say much on the way back to the station and as I sat beside him in silence I realized I didn’t have anything to say either. The killer was a giant black cloud who loomed over our heads with increasing intensity. There was no escape and there was no turning back. His actions grew louder and clearer with each step he took and we had nothing in our power to stop him. Basically we were screwed.

The last time I was at the police station it had been bustling with the usual everyday activities. Now it had been transformed into Tangerine killer central. Cars were lined up outside in a never ending line of black and white and inside there was standing room only.

“Quiet down people. Quiet down.”

The captain addressed the gathering crowd. His head was bald and shiny on top and his ears stuck out like handles on a tea cup. He didn’t look that intimidating but his men still came to order when he spoke. He stood before a giant pin board where photographs of all the crime scenes had been plastered. There were also photographs of the victims and various notes. There was an unflattering shot of me stuck next to a copy of the poem from the church. I tucked myself behind Olin, wondering if the captain would object to me being there.

“As you know all man power has been redirected to this case. Everything else stops until we find this lunatic and put him behind bars.”

The captain’s voice was deep but soft and I found myself grateful he was now the man in charge of finding my psychotic stalker. He emitted a sense of calm control that seeped through the entire room. I liked that.

“Now the timeline originally projected showed that he should have abducted Miss. Weber by now. He hasn’t. That means he has deviated from the plan he himself created. Essentially he’s a loose cannon that could strike at any time.”

“But Sir is it right that Miss. Weber is still the intended target?” one of the cops in the front of the crowd queried.

I felt surprisingly numb as I heard them talking about my fate in the third person. I saw Olin’s finger twitch and wondered if he had the sudden urge to reach for my hand and had stopped himself at the last moment. I told myself he probably just had an itch.

“That is correct. We have to assume she is still the primary target. Ploys such as the alligator that was encountered this evening are simply intended to draw our focus away from her and waste precious man power deciphering his clues instead of tracking him down.”

I bit down on my tongue to stop myself from blurting out. The clues weren’t a stupid waste of time, they were extremely important and the only thing we had to go on. He was laying them out for us like breadcrumbs, we just hadn’t figured out why. I knew he wasn’t just wasting time, he was probably far smarter than most of the cops who were standing right there in the room. Given my track record with cops, for all I knew maybe he was even one of them.

“I’d now like you to give your full attention to Dr. Carmichael.”

The captain stepped aside and a tall, thin man wearing small round glasses stepped to the front of the room.

“Thank you Captain Bright.”

His steely gaze cut through the room and settled on me. A chill ran down my spine. Whoever Dr. Carmichael was, I didn’t like him. Not one bit.

The muted whispers dwindled into silence as everyone realized Dr. Carmichael was not going to speak until he had the full attention of every person in the room. Even when the captain addressed his troops there had been nudges and dull whispers. Now you could have heard a pin drop.

“Our man is organized and practical. Each action he takes has a purpose, one which he sees as getting him closer to his ultimate goal. He is probably middle-aged, white and lives alone.”

“Aren’t they all,” one of the cops in front of me whispered.

“Yeah. Stupid profilers don’t know what the hell they are talking about half the time,” the one next to him replied.

“Unfortunately,” Dr. Carmichael carried on a little louder. “Most serial killers do fit the same profile. These are not crimes of passion or carried out in a fit of violent rage. They are calculated killings which he takes great care over and much pleasure in.”

He motioned for Captain Bright to move aside and I saw photographs of the crime scene in my motel room just hours before. I was sure that I was looking at Jill but I knew something was horribly wrong. I just couldn’t make out what it was.

“Most of you won’t be able to see from this picture but our killer carved out a most intricate design on the victim’s skin.”

That got everyone’s attention. People shuffled closer to try and get a better look. I tried to inch my way forward but Olin put his hand on my arm and pulled me back. He shook his head gently as Carmichael continued.

“He then removed portions of the skin and those pieces were not recovered at the crime scene. It’s pretty safe to assume he kept them as trophies. The detail which has gone into this design and the amount of time he was able to keep the victim alive while he carried out this procedure indicates that he is someone skilled in the medical field.”

“Great. So he’s a doctor?” someone blurted out.

“I don’t believe he is a practicing doctor no,” Carmichael tried to calm the outrage that had broken out in the room. “It is more likely he is someone who started medical school but never finished.”

Someone laughed.

“Don’t kid yourselves that he didn’t finish because he wasn’t smart enough. He was probably smarter than most of his professors. I expect he only attended to further his own goal.”

Dr. Carmichael finished up with insights about the different crime scenes but I wasn’t listening any more. All I could think about was the design etched into Jill’s skin and the troubling sensation that although I could barely make it out from the back of the room, it was somehow familiar.

When the cops began filing out of the room I was still lost deep in thought and Olin had to nudge me to get my attention back. That was when I realized Dr. Carmichael was standing right in front of me, his glasses reflecting the florescent light from the ceiling with an eerie glare.

“So, our ultimate victim is right here in this very room. Now why do you suppose our intelligent, masochistic serial killer has focused his attention on you my dear?”

“I don’t know. Perhaps it’s my charming wit and sparkling personality,” I smiled sweetly. “Don’t try and psychoanalyze me Doc, I’m not one of your patients nor do I intend to be.”

“Touché,” he replied.

“She’s just tired,” Olin apologized.

“I’m not tired, I’m pissed off. What the hell does this guy want with me?”

“The truth is, I don’t know,” Carmichael said.

“Wow, an honest psychiatrist. I am impressed.”

“Look, despite what you may think I really do want to help.”

“Because it’s your job,” I flatly stated. “Not because you care.”

“Of course I care,” Carmichael threw his arms out in a gesture of just how passionate he was. “This killer is a fantastic specimen. I have been waiting years for a case like this, my whole career. I can‘t wait to get inside his head and delve around. See what makes him tick.”

“Well I’m glad you have your priorities straight,” said Olin.

I didn’t say anything but I was actually pleased. Helping to catch the guy just because it was his job or his sense of duty was far less likely to motivate Carmichael than his own personal sense of gain. After all, I wanted him caught for my own selfish reasons. So I could stay alive.

Dr. Carmichael wandered off, quite obviously caught in his own thoughts about the killer. I turned to Olin whose face was considerably paler than it had been when we first arrived.

“I need to get a closer look at that picture,” I whispered.

“I can do one better than that.”

Olin took me by the arm and ferried me out of the room and down an endless maze of corridors. The further we got away from the hustle and bustle of activity, the creepier the old building got. When we finally reached a steel gray elevator I had to wonder what on earth Olin was up to.

“Secret hideout?” I asked as the elevator door opened ominously.

“Not unless you like it dank and smelly.”

“Um no, not really,” I said.

As the elevator plummeted down to the basement I sank against the wall with a tired sigh. The adrenaline that surged through my body since waking up next to Jill was beginning to wane and the now familiar aches and pains were returning. Since I had sworn off pills and booze, I was doomed to suffer through my recovery but I could have used a hot cup of coffee. Where was Olin’s chivalry when I needed it?

When the elevator opened, it deposited us in a dark, concrete hallway. An unmistakable odor hung in the air. The stench of death and cleaning fluids.

“How romantic,” I said.

“Romantic? What? Why would you think that?” Olin blushed.

“Don’t sweat it Olin. I’m just kidding.”

“Oh yeah, I know,” he back peddled.

“So I take it Jill is down here somewhere?”

“Yes, we have a small morgue facility for special victims.”

Special victims. This was obviously one case where being special didn’t pay off. The morgue was a large gray room with steel tables hooked up to hoses and sinks. Large round drains sat in the middle of the concrete floor and one entire wall was made up of metal freezer drawers where they stored the bodies.

One of the tables held a corpse covered by a white sheet. The gray hand that hung just below the edge confirmed it was Jill. I took a deep breath and stepped forward, preparing myself for what I was about to see.