Every Wickedness (27 page)

A medical textbook he happened upon highlighted an interesting case. An infant had accidentally
received a high dosage of warfarin, a powerful anticoagulant, through an umbilical catheter. The baby, in spite of emergency treatment, bled through the umbilical stump and intravenous punctures.

The crazy 90s had been chock full of displaced Californians trying to figure out who they were, running from therapist to therapist, embracing every fad and mania in order to soothe their dispirited souls. Each decade had its share of quacks, healers and weirdoes, and the new millennium would be no different. Reflexology, biofeedback, aromatherapy, all designed to slow the hectic pace, to transport a person to another, better place. He could do that at will. He didn’t need anyone prodding the soles of his feet to get him to relax. His methods suited him just fine.

He wondered about the tension in Beth Wells’s life, how running a successful business must take its toll on her well-being. Once, he had followed her to a massage therapist’s on Fillmore, sat in his car imagining her being rubbed and oiled, the knots worked out of her shoulders and neck. Still, there was a better way to relieve stress, headache, the ills of everyday living, and he knew it would be effective on Beth Wells.

Acupuncture.

K
earns shook his head, not only in disbelief but also to make sure there were still a few brain cells functioning inside his thick skull. William Prescott was now responsible for the deaths of six women, and he had begun his career early, setting his mother’s bedroom afire. He wondered if Nora actually believed that her son’s three kittens had run away.

“At the time of the fire, how old was William?”

Nora poured more tea and added milk and sugar to her cup. Kearns was ready to throttle the woman, infuriated with her calm demeanour and her apparent desire to pace the conversation at tortoise speed. She clearly was not going to upset herself or go into hysterics. Just as he was ready to rip the teaspoon from the woman’s hand, Nora replied, “William was eight.”

Kearns fought to remain expressionless though his insides churned. He wished Nora’s teapot was full of scotch. “You didn’t report the fire, I take it.” He already knew the answer.

“I decided to send William to parochial school,” she replied. “A week later, he was enrolled at the School of the Good Shepherd. I believed the all-male environment and the strict regimentation would be good for him.”

Who was she kidding? This woman had no interest in what would be good for her son or anyone else for that matter. Her priorities revolved in a tiny orbit, with her as the axis. Knowing her son was a killer, she had calmly burned his latest trophy and was prepared to sacrifice human life so she could remain — what? A member of respectable society?

Kearns had long ago declared a moratorium on the endless debate among his task force about whether serial killers were born or created. He had seen too many homicide cops get hot under the collar and damn near come to blows over a discussion that had no resolution. Now, after listening to Nora Prescott and watching her conduct her cozy tea party in the midst of discussing murder, Kearns realized that this woman had not only spawned evil but also casually excused it. William Prescott, for whatever recessive gene he might possess, had been created by another kind of monster, a woman who cast off men like yesterday’s underwear, a woman who treated disaster as a trifling inconvenience.

Nora’s silence was William’s ticket to carte blanche murder.

Within days, William Prescott would capture another victim, and Nora would have let it happen.

He forced a civil tone. “What became of your boss?”

“Gregory took pity on me, of course. He kindly paid William’s tuition, called it a loan, but we both knew I could never repay him. Relationships can’t
survive on kindness and pity, and soon it became uncomfortable seeing Gregory at the office every day. I quit my job, found another through one of Gregory’s business associates —”

“Husband number one?”

Nora nodded. “William’s tuition was not inexpensive, and a secretary’s salary didn’t stretch far —”

Kearns held up his hand. “Wait a minute. Parochial school isn’t Harvard. In those days, what would it have cost to keep William at the school, a few thousand a year?”

“I made several —” she cleared her throat “— charitable donations to the school. Later on, William needed other things, a car, clothes —”

Then Kearns saw it. “You paid the school off. To keep your son there. They were going to kick him out, weren’t they?”

“Several times. Father Francis Xavier called almost monthly to report some mischief or other. He said William was undisciplined, unrepentent, a bad influence on the others.”

“But with a handsome cheque now and then, the staff could overlook William’s behaviour. What kind of trouble was he in?”

“They told me William smuggled liquor into the residence. Pornographic literature, drugs. The priests were at their wits’ end. I knew the feeling.”

“I can understand that those offenses might seem serious, Mrs. Prescott, particularly to members of the clergy. I’m a Catholic myself, but detentions,
withdrawal of privileges, getting booted off a sports team—the teachers at the school would have had some kind of leverage, something they could hold over your son’s head.”

“They tried all those things. Nothing seemed to have any effect. It was, as Father Francis told me, as though William was laughing at them.”

“And counselling?”

Nora waved away the notion. “Completely useless. He had a few sessions with a young priest. They amounted to nothing. The psych. ed. reports stated that William had potential, was highly intelligent but often distracted.”

Father Daniel’s words? Kearns wondered.

“I told the school officials to do what they had to do,” Nora continued, “but begged them to keep William there. I was afraid of him, you see. I suppose I’ve always been afraid of him.”

It was not lost on Kearns that Nora continually shifted the conversation away from William and neatly onto herself. He would ride this conversation out and be the listener she so obviously needed. Eventually, he’d get to where he wanted to go. “Mrs. Prescott, Father Daniel Fortescue telephoned me this evening. He told me about Father Francis’s death, and the death of another priest, Father Anthony Benedetto. There had been a fire at the school. A dog was hung. Did anyone from the school ever contact you about these things, express any suspicions about your son?”

“No,” she said. “I read about the priests’ deaths in the paper, and the fire was reported in the monthly bulletin the school sent to the parents. But no one called me.”

He wasn’t surprised. What good would it have done? Nora had washed her hands of her son, figuring that money not only talked, but also kept people quiet, too.

“Mrs. Prescott, there’s no point in my being subtle. You’re engaged to Phillip Rossner, a very wealthy man. Your son must be how old — in his mid-thirties? Earning his own living. Why the marriage to Rossner?”

Nora Prescott looked around the room as though the answer should be obvious, then heaved a resigned sigh. “Phillip is an ass, of course. A ridiculous, silly ass. But what does it matter? I give him what he wants, and he gives me what I want. I still support my son financially, Sergeant Kearns. I’m sure he has some kind of job, though what, I don’t know. But I pay him, and pay him well, to stay away from me. And there was one other condition.”

“What was that?”

“He had to change his name. I wanted nothing to do with him.”

Kearns had come to the moment he’d been waiting for since he arrived at Russian Hill nearly an hour ago. “Mrs. Prescott, what is your son’s name now, and where is he?”

She looked about to reach for the teapot again, then withdrew her hand, placing it calmly in her lap. She looked at Kearns. “I haven’t the vaguest idea.”

He wondered if Nora would look this unruffled if he took the silk sash from around her waist and choked her with it. “You pay him,” he stated, his voice carefully modulated. “Where do you send the cheques?”

“I give him cash. When he asks for it. William writes to me, a different postmark each time, and encloses typewritten instructions specifying where I should leave the money. It’s all a game to him. Once, he made me leave it in a dark alley between two strip clubs in the Tenderloin. Can you imagine? Another time, it was at a gas station in the desert, in the men’s washroom. I’ve sent money to post office boxes in Europe, flown to Denver … All these years and he’s still tormenting me. Then the gifts started.” She lowered her gaze. “I’m his prisoner, just like I’ve always been.”

That did it. The sight of Nora Prescott cowering on her fancy sofa in her fancy clothes, making like she was the true victim ignited Kearns’s fuse. He sprang to his feet and snatched the pink zipper from the silver tray, the charred toggle a pathetic remnant of Patricia Mowatt’s too-brief life. He thrust it toward the woman. “Six young women have been slaughtered in your place, and you think you’re the victim?” He spat the words. “Well, here’s a news flash for you. One, you’re gonna bring me every gift
sonny boy has ever sent you, and two, you’d better start searching your memory for anything, and I mean anything, that will help me find him.”

The trophies materialized quickly, the Cartier watch the last item to drop into Kearns’s hands.

“I don’t know where my son is, Sergeant,” Nora repeated, her manner indignant once again. “I can’t even tell you what he looks like now.”

“No photos?”

Her look seemed to suggest that Kearns had lost his mind, and for the third time, he wanted to strangle her.

Kearns needed to get the hell out, to find a place where he could breathe clean air. He knew the longest, hottest shower wouldn’t cleanse his pores of the infestation he’d been exposed to here in this elegant parlour. His parting shot as he opened the heavy front door gave him a modicum of satisfaction. “Lady, with the trouble you’re in, the very least you can do is start addressing me as
Lieutenant
Kearns.”

S
ince Kearns’s last visit, the Irish pub had undergone a minor facelift. Gleaming brass sconces and deep green-black textured wallpaper gave the place an aura of gentlemanly sophistication. The three-man band had just finished a set and were stepping down from the stage. The bar was as well stocked as ever, and Kearns was glad they hadn’t done away with the row of wooden booths that lined one wall. He slid into the one nearest the bar and gave his order to a redheaded waitress who had Killarney written all over her.

He unzipped his windbreaker and remembered all the times he had sat here, as though being among the convivial Irish and listening to some toe-tapping tunes could somehow lift the shroud of depression.

Kearns glanced at his watch, punched in Fuentes’s home number on his cellular phone, apologized to a sleepy Rosa, then called the Night Investigations Unit. Fuentes was still at work.

“Manny,” he said when he got hold of him, “tonight I met the mother of the devil himself, and I wish I could say I was exaggerating.”

“Well, I hope she told you where Satan’s lair is, because CLETS has turned up zip on William Prescott.”

Kearns had pinned little hope on the California Law Enforcement Tracking System.

“All I’ve got for my trouble is a stiff neck and eyes that feel like they’ve been through a sandstorm,” Fuentes complained.

“He changed his name, Manny.”

“To what?”

“She doesn’t know.”

“You’re kidding.”

“I’m not. And if our man’s got a driver’s license or passport, they’re bogus. That’s why CLETS isn’t picking up a new name in the query.”

“Dammit,” Fuentes said. “Didn’t that woman give you anything we can use?”

Kearns shook his head. “Next to Nora Prescott, Rita Bailey is Mother of the Year.” He told Fuentes about his discussion with Nora.

“All I got was one shitty yearbook photograph, courtesy of Father Daniel Fortescue. Ninth grade. Bastard’s standing in the back row, his head half hidden by the guy in front of him. Don’t suppose the Prescott woman had anything more recent?”

“Nope. Nora Prescott isn’t what you’d call the sentimental type. No childhood photos, no old report cards. Hell, it’s like she never had a son. I bet none of the poor saps she married had a clue about William’s existence. The invisible kid. He’s sure making a name for himself now.” Kearns signalled for the waitress. “And all those times Nora’s dropped money off somewhere, she’s never clapped eyes on
her son, though she felt he must have been watching her. Big help, huh? At least I got the brooch back.” Kearns pointed to his empty glass, and the redhead nodded, returning quickly with another drink.

“Recover any other trophies?”

“You bet. First thing tomorrow, I send Anscombe and Bauer back to the families to identify the belongings.”

“So,” Fuentes said, “let me get this straight. Prescott’s our man, except he isn’t Prescott anymore. He could be anybody, living anywhere.”

“You’re just trying to cheer me up.”

“Speaking of which, it hasn’t been all dull compu-biz here tonight. Your friend Beth Wells’s secret adversary’s been picked up.”

Kearns listened as Fuentes gave him the lowdown on Rex McKenna. “Thank Christ,” Kearns said when he was done. “Beth’s too nice to be a victim of that kind of bullshit.”

The musicians returned and immediately launched into “Black Velvet Band.” Drunker patrons sang along.

“Hey,” Fuentes said, “are you where I think you are?”

“Sí.”

“Jimmy, there’d better be soda water in your glass.”

Close enough, Kearns thought as he put the cell phone back in his pocket. The waitress brought a third ginger ale. Kearns glanced at the bottles of Glenlivet, Johnny Walker, and a ten-year-old
Glenfiddich lined up behind the bar like Broadway hookers waiting for a customer. Trays full of draught sailed by. Kearns could have easily grabbed a frosted mug of Smithwicks, but he didn’t. He felt like shit, deserved a drink, for the love of Mike, but instead, he had walked headlong into his personal nest of vipers and ordered ginger ale instead. As if he was strong enough to be put to any kind of test right now, he thought, then realized he had passed with honours. Still, he was too pissed off and too exhausted to congratulate himself.