Two Graves (A Kesle City Homicide Novel) (21 page)

As he straightened, he knew he had found Greer’s complication. When he turned, Greer was standing over him.

“That’s vic number two, Lou.”

“Let’s see the rest.”

“Prepare thyself.”

Mann followed Greer along the tape. As soon as the got past the dumpster with its distinctive odors, Mann could smell the foul stench being pushed ahead of the warm breeze coming down the alley. His stomach began to tighten when he reached the top of the steps. Greer handed him a flashlight. Mann paused a brief moment before turning it down the stairwell. In two seconds, he had seen enough to haunt him for a long time. He turned away and walked back to stand over the shooting victim. He could handle a simple shooting. What was in that stairwell was beyond normal comprehension.

“Tell me about it.”

“That is Mr. Nickolas Thorman there,” Greer began, pointing at the corpse in the suit. “We have him entering the alley with an unidentified male known to Mr. Thorman. The wife, who doesn’t know the shooter, was with the husband until he went into the alley. Description of the shooter sucks. Mr. Everybody. Anyway, the wife was sent on ahead. She got suspicious and returned in time to see her husband shot.”

Greer pointed at the corner of the building. “She panics and trips running into the alley. The shooter took a shot but missed when she went down. A patrol car was passing when she went down. They saw what was happening and the radioman got out of the car. He checked the woman and gave chase. The car went around the block but they both came up empty.”

“So we have one cop running up the alley?”

“Oh, they trampled things up real good. He came back down the alley too. By the time he got back, the wife had her husband rolled over. The Uniform got her away and tried to put the body back the way it was.”

“What about the…?”

“It’s a girl. At least, it was. Anyway, the uniform wants to secure the area. He starts to go down the stairwell to check the door. He figures to mark it so the detectives will know if anyone has used it to get into the area.”

“He was starting to think.”

“Maybe. Anyway, he made the smell as he approached. At first, he figured it was just a shitter for the street people. Almost didn’t go down. He had his light on the steps so he wouldn’t step in anything. He flicked his light down to see what he was getting into and saw her. Well, bits of her.”

Greer flashed his light to a spot across the alley from the stairwell. The beam danced across some lumpy liquid and then darted away. “He lost it over there.”

Mann stared off into space for a moment. He had seen enough for now and started back to the street. Greer followed him. Once under the lights but still inside the perimeter away from the crowds, Mann looked down the street. The CSU van had pulled up and the technicians were unloading their equipment. They would be setting up some lights which would make operating in the alley easier. Mann wasn’t sure he wanted to see the girl under the better light.

He saw Dani behind the barricade and followed her gaze to the windows in the alley.

“Make sure they tent the stairwell right away before they put on any lights,” Mann told Greer. “I don’t want this out there for everybody with a camera phone. I want a cop on every window that over looks this alley. If I see a picture of the vic surface on the web, I’ll have somebody’s ass.”

“Yes, sir,” Greer said.

“You got anything more on the shooting vic?”

“He’s an accountant with Curtis, Devine and Hayes.”

“Oh this is too good,” Mann said, his voice betraying his excitement. “That’s one of Angelino’s firms. I want to lock this one down. We are going to be taking point on this one if I can possibly swing it. I want a unit at this Thorman’s house. Get on to Davis and see if we can work out jurisdiction. And…”

“Uh, sorry Lou,” Greer said, pointing to the edge of the perimeter. Two plain clothes detectives, both in three piece suits, were flashing their badges at the uniform in charge of the line. “Looks like SOCU to me.”

“Damn it,” Mann said, recognizing the two detectives. “How did they get here so fast? OK, stay with the plan. I’ll fight over this one and see if we can keep it.”

“Where is my freaking money?”

“That wasn’t my problem,” Hill reminded Angelino. “He saw those two idiots you had watching him and decided to make a run for it. Your words were, ‘I want him brought to me, if possible. If not, take him.’ I had no choice.”

“So what was he doing in that alley with you?”

Hill had been expecting this. It was the one part of his otherwise tight story that had some wiggle in it. Hill had two ways to play it. The best defense…

“I was trying to save your money.”

“Thought you said that wasn’t your problem?”

“Not my problem but I’m not a bloody idiot. I’m the last resort guy, right?”

Hill waited, staring at Angelino until the big man was finally forced to nod.

“When have you ever told me to wait? I don’t wait. I’m in, I’m out. The longer I’m in this city, the longer I’m exposed. I don’t like being out there, especially in this city. But you needed me here because this guy isn’t your usual mug. This guy was smart, right? He did you right up the ass and you had to prove you were smarter, right?”

Again, Hill waited.

“I underestimated him once,” Angelino admitted. “I wasn’t going to do it again.”

“Good choice. He got a silenced .45 while your boys were all over him.”

“They paid for their mistake. But you still haven’t answered my question,” Angelino said, his impatience showing. “What were you doing in that alley?”

“Ya, I did. I was trying to save your money.”

“How?”

“By not having to take the guy out. Like I said,” Hill said, pointing at himself, “not a bloody idiot. We’re talking a lot of money, right? Normally, you plug the leak, you plug the guy and everybody else is scared shitless to screw you but not this time. You had to show you were smarter than him. You got a big ego.”

Angelino’s eyes tightened.

“Hey, not saying it isn’t deserved but you blew it. You know it, that’s really what you are pissed with, not me. I went above and beyond.”

“How you figure?”

“I saw him take your guys out.”

“You didn’t stop him?”

“Again, not my problem. They screwed things up for me so screw them.”

“You are a heartless bastard, you know that?”

“But I’m still alive, right? Guy sends his daughter out of town. Guy gets a silenced gun and takes out your guys. I’m thinking your plan isn’t working. You should have just sweated the guy. Let some of your guys do his wife in front of him. He would have folded and you would have your money. That was plan B for me but I had to bring him in first.”

“So why didn’t you?”

“Because he drew down on me. I tried to keep him in public so we could talk but he walked into that alley. That little accountant was fast, you know? Desperate people will take chances and he thought he could take me. I guess he figured he had to take his shot, right?”

“So I should be thanking you?”

“The rest of the payment is more than sufficient. I am out of this town and I don’t think I’ll be coming back for a while.”

“You might want to rethink your travel plans.”

“Don’t threaten me,” Hill said, steel going into his voice. “I fulfilled your contract as per your specifications. I got no more responsibility here.”

“What about the witness?”

“Thorman’s wife wouldn’t know me if I slapped her in the face.”

“Not that witness. The other one.”

Hill looked at Angelino, sizing him up, wondering what his game was.

“What the hell are you talking about?”

By the time Angelino had finished explaining, Hill knew he was stuck in the city for a while longer.

Mann rolled his shoulders, trying to take the kinks out of his tired muscles. Taking another drink of Pepsi, he realized that he had never made it down to the gym with Blaak. He patted his stomach. Even without the workouts with Blaak, he was losing his gut. Not eating will do that. He leaned back in his chair and stared around his office.

Hart’s connections, at least his boss’s connections, had pressured the Mayor into expanding the task force. The Division muster room couldn’t handle it anymore. The task force was relocated to an empty warehouse a few blocks from Southfield Division headquarters. Mann had brought his chair with him. Chairs were a cherished commodity in the force. When you found a chair you liked, you brought it with you if you could. More than stripes, bars, and clusters, chairs were the true gauge of rank in the force.

The small office he had been assigned used to belong to the accountant of the firm that owned the warehouse. Mann had dealt with the accountant when they had arrived at the empty building. The number cruncher had told Mann why he had put up with the cramped office for so many years when he rated a larger one. The peculiar shape of the alley next to the warehouse created a draft that went right in the window of this office and no other. Proximity to the lake brought in a fresh smelling breeze. The accountant had guarded that secret for years and was the only one that never sweltered in the summer.

Outside, in the open area of the warehouse, the telephones rang constantly. The task force had been assigned its own numbers that had been published in the papers and on TV. Tips now came directly into the task force. However, a complicated method of sorting still followed every tip. Mann knew that the tips would soon overwhelm the task force.

Stacks of paper littered the desk of each detective. Was the killer in those piles of paper somewhere? Or, was he just living out a normal life, taking only a night out every once in a while to strangle and hack a citizen to pieces, then going back to the dog and the family barbecue. Christ!

Mann got up and wandered into the open area. Last night had gone on forever. When things had finally settled down, he had gone home to sleep. He had tossed and turned for two hours. The vision of the girl kept intruding on his thoughts. The brutality and plain sickness was more than he had ever seen in his life.

The doctors said that this one proved that the killer was sliding farther into his sickness. There appeared to be less planning and control of the kill site and still no rape.

Mann tried to ignore the visions of the girl and looked instead at the large chart of times tracing the girl’s movements immediately before her death.

With an effort, he shifted his mind, forcing himself to refer to her by her name. Normally, he made an effort to identify with the victim. This time was different. He had trouble reconciling that mass of human tissue as a living person or at least he didn’t want to. Especially with what he had been doing while she was being killed.

But Andrea Seymour was her name and she was an actress. She had been celebrating her first big break. Then, she left her friends and was brutally, disgustingly, viscously murdered. The chart continued in sickening detail, estimating times for the various acts of the killer. Almost as disturbing was the chart beside showing the last moments of Thorman’s life.

The times overlapped. Both killers must have been in the alley at the same time. And the cops had run right past him.

At least they still had a fighting chance at keeping Thorman’s murder. Mann was working hard at that. If he was right, there could be some really interesting records in Thorman’s possession that could be collected as part of the murder investigation quite legally and then used against Angelino.

If not, given the timing of the two killings, nailing the Slasher might get the shooter. And that would definitely lead to Angelino.

SOUTHSIDE SLASHER KILLS FOURTH VICTIM

Dale Lewery reporting

Last night in a dark alley only steps away from a crowded downtown street teeming with unsuspecting theatre goers, the Southside Slasher brutally murdered his fourth victim in less than four weeks. In a dark stairwell, strewn with garbage and human waste, the body of 23 year old Andrea Seymour was found and quickly identified as victim number four of the Southside Slasher.

The actress, poised for the premier role of her short career, was killed in what Deputy Inspector Livermore described as “the most brutally sadistic murder” he has ever investigated.

Andrea Seymour had just left a celebration at a local restaurant in honor of her recently announced starring role in the upcoming play
Ice And The Maiden Sister
. Having spent the past 3 years in Kesle, struggling to land that breakthrough role, Andrea’s hopes had finally been realized. At a time friends described as the pinnacle of her life, she was dragged down an alley and brutally murdered by a vicious, psychotic killer.

With everything to live for, her life was taken by a deranged killer who has the twisted mentality to call himself the “victim”.

In a further twist in this increasingly bizarre murder investigation, sources in the police department confirmed to this reporter that officers literally ran past the killer in the middle of his horrendous crime.

Just feet from the scene of Andrea’s slaying, Nikolas Thorman, an accountant, was gunned down in what police are calling a “gangland murder”. (See Accountant, page A2). During the pursuit of the underworld hit man, police ran directly past the Southside Slasher who undoubtedly had a front row seat to the shooting. In fact, police fear that the ensuing distraction provided by the second killing allowed the Southside Slasher to walk away from the grisly scene.

As the city braces for more violence, the Mayor is promising to devote even more resources to the…

Preston folded the newspaper carefully. His rage was barely controlled and the slow deliberate movements helped to calm him. He looked across the street at the sidewalk café outside the Starbucks and his rage boiled up again. Closing his eyes, he breathed and felt the calm descend over him. When he thought he could look again, he slowly allowed his eyes to open.

It would be so easy. Just get in his car, a nice leisurely cruise down the street. At the last second, gun the engine and plow through the flimsy tables. Before the idiot could even begin to think, he would be under the wheels. Nothing would be simpler. But where would the satisfaction be in such an easy kill?