A World Without Secrets (23 page)

As the driver left the vehicle momentarily, she slipped her hand into the pack and withdrew a mean-looking nail file. It had a plastic handle and appeared to be about eight inches long, with most of the length allocated to the chromed file portion. The victim dropped her hand to her side and held the nail file close to her leg so the driver wouldn't see it. She may have been dazed, but she was still thinking clearly enough to strike back at what she probably believed to be a rapist. When the driver returned to complete the task of incapacitating her, she buried the nail file into his gut with all the force she could muster. At least five inches of chromed steel entered his body. It was a shame she hadn't managed to put it into his chest. An upward stoke just beneath the sternum could have pierced his heart. But it was amazing she was able to do what she had, given her dazed condition.

After withdrawing the nail file, the driver looked at the weapon in horror, then dropped it to the floor. As he rested against the wall for a few seconds, I saw the edges of his mouth curl downward. When he moved forward to where the victim was lying and I saw his right leg swing backwards, I knew his intent. I had read the autopsy. An instant later his leg swung forward and his foot impacted her head in a kick so vicious that her neck was broken.

The perp climbed back into the driver's seat after closing the door between the front and rear areas, then drove to the large garage where he was living. He had taken each of his victims there and then tortured them before ending their lives. Although the fourth victim was already deceased, he performed the same ritual on her, but not before he had seen to his wound. He cleaned the area where the nail file had entered his body and then wrapped a bandage made from a tee-shirt around his torso. I could tell from the grimace on his face that he was in great pain, but he couldn't go to a hospital without having to explain how the injury had occurred.

After completing the mutilation of the body, he wrapped it in a large garbage bag and used a small SUV that had been parked in the garage to drive it to his preferred dumping spot. Placing the body on the edge of a ravine, he kicked it as hard as he could. I saw him grimace in pain as the body rolled over the edge. He continued to grimace all the way back to his living quarters.

The garage where the perp had set up his operation appeared to have been built for commercial use as a warehouse or small manufacturing plant. It was located in a warehouse district where most of the warehouses had seen better days and were already empty and dilapidated. After each of the bodies had been disposed of, the perp had returned to his garage and cleaned up thoroughly. A high-pressure washer was used to scrub the interior of the van and the metal table where he mutilated the bodies of the women. All residue disappeared into a drain in the floor and then probably into a sewer. He was careful to clean everything and burn the women's clothes in a furnace. The only thing he saved was their ears. After performing some kind of process that I assumed was designed to preserve them, they were placed into glass baby food jars filled with a clear liquid, perhaps alcohol, then put into a small wooden box with a top that had an inlaid appearance. To this point, his 'collection' included four sets of ears.

Following his cleanup process with the third victim, he had made himself dinner and then gone to sleep after showering. On this occasion, however, he had taken out a paint sprayer and filled the paint container with a clear liquid. He donned a safety mask, then began spraying the entire truck. In minutes, the brown paint began to bubble up. The pressure washer was then used to clear most of the brown color from the vehicle. Beneath the brown color the truck was white, and the vehicle looked more like a laundry truck than a package delivery van when he was done.

After burning virtually everything that pointed to his occupancy of the building, he got into his small SUV and left. I assumed he was going to a hospital at that point and had wanted to make sure he hadn't left any evidence behind that pointed to his activity in the garage, so I was surprised when he drove onto the interstate highway.

The perp drove for almost five hours, ending up at a small cabin by a lake. He seemed barely able to walk as he exited the SUV. He first headed for a small shed and worked to start a generator. Once he managed to get it going, he stumbled to the house where he dug in the soft dirt next to a porch support pillar until he came up with a brass key protected in a plastic bag. As he reached the front door he fumbled with the key to unlock it. He seemed to be getting worse by the second and I wondered if he would even make it inside.

He finally managed to open the door, and as I followed him inside, I saw that the cabin was filthy. Moreover, it appeared that no one had been there in many months or perhaps several years, but the roof appeared intact and the interior dry. Solid wood shutters on the inside of every window were held closed by a steel bar that had a hinge on one side and a padlock on the other. The perp flipped on the light switch to illuminate a single bare bulb on the ceiling, slammed the door closed, and immediately headed for a small bed in the corner of the room. He barely made it before collapsing.

Once he was down, it seemed like he wouldn't be getting back up for a while, so I began jumping ahead an hour at a time. Over the next three days his condition seemed to worsen hourly. At times he would shake violently, as if he were cold.

After five days the perp seemed to fall into a deep sleep, but when he failed to move even the slightest bit after a full day, I moved the window in close to his face. That was when I noticed his eyes weren't completely closed. I watched for several minutes and he never blinked. I also never saw the slightest movement of his chest. I had no way to check his pulse, but it appeared to me he was dead. I smiled. No one had ever deserved a violent and painful death more than this monster had.

Thanks to the gizmo I knew everything that had happened and how it had happened. The perp was dead and presented no further danger to anyone. But I didn't have a clue to how I was going to explain how I knew what I did. I knew the first thing I had to do was identify the perp. So far all I had was a garage location and the location of the cabin where he died.

I began jumping ahead to learn when the perp's body had been found. I thought that with the remoteness of the cabin he could possibly lie there for a year before someone discovered him, but it actually only took three weeks. A boater, who I later learned happened to be a Neighborhood Watch member in his community, spotted the perp's SUV and came ashore to investigate since he couldn't remember having seen anyone at the cabin for years. He banged on the door several times before trying to open it. The generator had long since run out of fuel, so it was dark in the cabin, but the boater knew something was wrong as soon as he opened the door. The stench of the rotting corpse had to have been overpowering, and he pulled the door closed and coughed several times before vomiting as he bent over with his hands on his thighs. When he felt better, he walked around outside the cabin, trying to get a signal on his cell phone. He finally got a connection when he walked down to the lake.

The local sheriff didn't arrive for several hours. He opened the door fully and then, holding a handkerchief over his nose, used a rock to break the locks on the shutters protecting the windows. When all four windows were wide open, he hurried outside.

It was two more hours before a coroner's vehicle arrived to take the body away. I made a note of the date and time so I could check the county death records. That should give me the identity of the perp.

I still had no idea how I could report the perp was dead so the case could be closed without admitting to having the gizmo. I decided a road trip was in order. Perhaps actually seeing the crime locations in person might give me a clue as to how I could wrap this case up.

I had no desire to drive to the other side of the country, so I put the gizmo away and reconnected my computer to make airline reservations. As the computer completed the boot process, it notified me I had mail waiting. The airline reservations could wait. I was hoping to temporarily forget about the gruesome murders I had watched by stroking my ego with a few fan letters. But all that popped up was one of those emails from whoever knew I had the gizmo. I opened it and read, 'You've been warned repeatedly, Mr. James. There is little time left. Destroy the device before it destroys your life.'

Since the beginning, the emails had been telling me to destroy the gizmo before it destroyed me. But so far, all it had done was enrich my life beyond measure. Where I had been on the verge of surrendering my dream of becoming an author to take a job flipping burgers, I was now, to quote the media, a world famous art recovery expert. I had a seven-figure bank account, my love life had gone from zero to a hundred, and I had served my country by solving two 'unsolvable' cases. Three, if the new serial murderer case counted. Sure, I understood the danger represented by having the device and using it unwisely, but the benefits far outweighed the possible dangers. I was keeping it.

I completed my airline, hotel, and car reservations, then shut everything down and headed to the bedroom to get a little rest. I had been driving myself hard during the past few days and I needed to recharge my batteries.

I made the most of my weekend with Kathy and waited until Sunday to tell her I was going out of town on business because I knew what would happen when she learned. And it happened.

"What?" she said. "You're going out of town tomorrow? And you wait until the night before to tell me?"

"I didn't want you to worry," I said a second before I pushed the final forkful of crab-stuffed chicken breast into my mouth. I had thought she'd exhibit less angst if we were in a swanky restaurant on the East Side. It didn't work as well as I'd hoped, and most of the other patrons had turned to look at us.

She lowered her voice and said, "I thought there would be no more secrets between us?"

"What secrets? I just made the reservations Friday afternoon. That was two days ago. Are you busy for lunch tomorrow?"

"Yes. I'm going to lunch with the girls. We're having a small party for Marsha. She just got engaged."

"Why didn't you tell me?"

"Tell you what?"

"That you were going to a party on Monday."

"It's not— " She stopped mid-sentence because she understood what I was getting at. "That's different."

"Why?"

"It just is. Your work is dangerous."

"It's my job. Besides, the case is twelve years old. And I suspect the criminal is dead."

"Why would you think that?"

"It's a serial killer case. Those guys don't just suddenly stop. It's like pedophilia. Once they get a taste for the crime, they can't help themselves. They have to keep doing it until they get caught— or they're dead. In this case, I simply have to find out what happened to the perp so the case can be closed."

"You're sure he's dead?"

"Either dead or incarcerated for another crime."

"Where are you going?"

"Northern California."

"San Francisco?"

"Sacramento."

"I don't remember hearing about serial killings in Sacramento."

"This guy was just getting started when he suddenly stopped. That's why I think he's dead."

"When will you be back?"

"When I solve the case or give up."

"You never give up."

I smiled and said, "Is that a compliment?"

"An observation. You're tenacious."

"I'll take that as a compliment. And— you're right. I tend to keep working at things until I succeed. 'Never give up. Never surrender.'"

"Where have I heard that before?"

"It was the slogan in a sci-fi movie parody a few years ago."

"Oh, yeah."

"Ready for dessert?" I asked.

"If it's tiramisu."

"I
think
I saw raspberry tiramisu on the menu."

"That sounds wonderful."

It was.

I arrived in California at dinnertime so there was nothing I could do the first day. Compared to New York, the weather was practically balmy, although the locals were bundled up like Eskimos. I checked into my hotel and then went out to find a restaurant where I could get dinner. After returning to my hotel, I checked my email and worked for a short time on a new story I'd been thinking about for several days. Flying always wore me out for some reason and I felt exhausted, so I went to bed early and got a good night's rest.

I checked in with local law enforcement the next morning so they'd know I was working the case and was asked to wait until the Sheriff was free because he wanted to speak with me. I was escorted to an area outside his office and offered a cup of coffee by his secretary while I waited for the Sheriff's other visitors to conclude their business.

Sheriff Beronson was a friendly man. He told me he had worked the investigation of the first two disappearances when they were classified as missing person cases. After the bodies had been found and they understood they had a serial killer on the loose in the county, the Bureau had been called in to assume main responsibility for coordinating the law enforcement effort. Since I didn't know how I was going to explain my knowledge of the perpetrator to Brigman, I cordially pumped Beronson for everything he knew. He talked freely. I think it made him feel more important. I'd heard that local law enforcement officials were sometimes left out of the loop once the FBI showed up, but as I now knew from personal experience, that wasn't the case. The FBI always worked with all other law enforcement personnel in a team effort. Plus, I wanted Beronson on my side.

In all, I spent over an hour at the sheriff's office. When I got up to leave, I said, "Thank you for your information and insights, Sheriff. It always helps to get a personal perspective from someone who was on the scene. It often gives you a different slant on the crime."

"I'm happy to help, Special Agent James. If this guy is still out there, we want him caught. We also want him to pay for the heinous acts he committed. You're welcome here anytime if I can be of further assistance."