Spectrum (The Karen Vail Series) (34 page)

“The missing DD-5.”

“And the missing book.”

“The killer brought his book back to his lair.”

“Assuming it’s not a different copy.”
The one on the DD-5 was described as “worn.” This isn’t new, but it’s not worn. How subjective is “worn”?

Vail bent down, turned her phone light on again, and swept the hole. “One more thing down here.” She reached her arm fully into the space and fished out what looked like a photo album.

She set it atop the pile of books and sat down beside it, then opened it.

“What the hell?”

“A scrapbook of his kills. Newspaper clippings.” She continued turning the pages and found a photo of herself.
Okay, that’s creepy.
“Wonder if that’s when he sent me that note.”

“That doesn’t make me feel so good. He’s been watching you?”

“If he wanted to kill me, he would’ve—could’ve—done it years ago. I don’t think my life’s in jeopardy.”

“Still … ” Russo crouched beside her.

Vail flipped another page and stopped, sat up straight. “Oh.”

Pictures of each victim, meticulously laid out on the pages.

“Those aren’t crime scene photos,” Russo said.

“No, they were taken right after death. By the killer.”

They both sat in silence as Vail paged through the pictures, three for each one: the face and neck, the logo he drew, and a long shot, straight on, between the legs.

Russo cleared his throat. “If there was any doubt that this Dmitri is our killer, I’d say they’re all gone now.”

Vail went back to the beginning and turned the pages more slowly, taking in the precisely cut newspaper articles, small and large, from New York’s major tabloids, covering the murders Vail and Russo had been fretting over the past nineteen years.

Russo’s phone rang, pulling them out of their fugue. He said, “Talk to me, Protch,” then placed the call on speaker.

“I remember the kid’s name. Dmitri—”

“Yeah,” Russo said, “we got that. We found a shitload of stuff here, books on killers and death, and a scrapbook of keepsake articles on all his murders.”

“Shit. I was really hoping it wasn’t gonna be the kid.”

“Protch,” Vail said, “no offense, but we’ve been chasing this asshole for almost twenty years. Russo and I are—”

“Ecstatic.”

“I care about the family is all,” Proschetta said. “They went through a lot of crap.”

“Can’t make it
your
crap,” Russo said. “We’ve talked about this.”

“Since when do we take each other’s advice?”

Vail set the scrapbook down and stood up. “Any progress finding the mother—or even better, Dmitri?”

“Spoke with Jenkins, the detective who caught the girl’s murder back in ’81—Cassandra—and he said they looked at him, hard, but there were no forensics tying him to the crime scene. No witnesses who could place him there. And the mother wasn’t very cooperative.”

“You had a good relationship with her,” Vail said.

“Livana. Don’t know why I thought it was Laura, or whatever I called her. Nice lady, she trusted me. But it wasn’t my case, so I had to turn everything over to Jenkins and the homicide detective. I did take a look at the Castiglias, just to make sure they didn’t have a hand in it. Found nothing. So I did as ordered. I dropped it. Haven’t talked to Livana since. But I got some calls out to locate her. And the file should be here any minute.”

“Call us back as soon as you get it,” Vail said. “Actually—wait a minute. That guy, Gregor? Whatever happened to him? And his wife. See if Jenkins knows.”

Russo disconnected the call and they searched the remainder of the building, including a storage area underneath the staircase that led to the second floor.

“They really did a nice job fixing this place up. Even mothballed for thirty-plus years, it’s in pretty decent shape.” Vail stopped at the circuit breaker box, its door severely rusted. She pulled it open and chuckled. “So according to this, this building was the ‘staff house.’ And H. Z. Altberg, Incorporated, was the electrical contractor who did the wiring. The phone number starts ‘Circle 7.’ That tells you how old this place is.”

As they ascended the stairs, Russo said, “I remember when phone numbers were like that. Mine was Fieldstone 1, which got shortened to ‘Fi-1’ before they dropped the letters altogether and went with numbers only.” He shook his head. “Guess I’m showing my age.”

They finished the search upstairs, found nothing of note, and walked into the kitchen when Russo’s phone rang.

“You’re on speaker, Protch. Go.”

“Right, so I spoke with Livana, but I also got a hit on the kid. Get this—Dmitri Harris is a ranger with the National Park Service, stationed at Liberty Island for the past twenty-four years.”

Ranger Harris? Holy shit, I remember that guy. The resident expert on the statue. He took Jonathan up to the crown when I got called away.
Vail felt dizzy.
She steadied herself against the cabinet. I left my son with a serial killer?

Russo moved to the window and peered out. “I’m looking at the place right now.”

“Are you telling us,” Vail said, “that the killer we’ve been chasing for nineteen years is just a few hundred yards away?”

“That’s what I’m telling you. And he’s on duty today. Wait, hang on a second. It’s Livana, his mother. Call you back.”

THEY TOOK THE hardcovers, paperbacks, and scrapbook in tow. Bringing them along was not ideal, but there was no better alternative. They couldn’t leave them unattended.

“I saw the ferry pulling in when we were upstairs,” Vail said. “Gotta still be loading. If we hurry, we can get on it, have them take us over.”

They ran out and headed toward the inlet, hoping to flag down the ferry captain and signal him to wait. As they approached, they got the attention of a ranger on the pier and conveyed the message. They sprinted along the water’s edge, Russo getting winded and falling back as they made it within fifty yards of the dock.

“Get us over to Liberty ASAP,” Vail said to the deckhand between gasps, her throat raspy and painfully dry. She held up her creds, bent at the knees to catch her breath, and said, “Stop loading. Take us to Liberty.” She stood up and looked the man in the eyes. “Now!”

That got him moving, and as Russo huffed his way on board, the ferry started to back away.

Russo sat hard on the bench seat against the windows.

“Makes sense,” Vail said. “Working on Liberty. He can keep close to his sanctuary. No one’s gonna question a ranger making occasional trips to Ellis Island. Perfect setup.”

Russo grunted, still out of breath, just as his BlackBerry rang. “Shit.” He pulled it off his belt and handed it to Vail. As she took the phone, she grabbed a water bottle from the concession and handed it to Russo. In this heat and humidity, she didn’t want him to suffer heat stroke. She brought the phone to her mouth. “Protch, it’s Karen. Russo’s winded. We just ran to catch the ferry to Liberty. What do you got?”

“Livana gave me the lowdown on Dmitri. He—”

“You didn’t tell her what we found—”

“Karen, give me a little credit, huh? I wouldn’t give her a chance to tip her son off. Just asked her how she’s doing, where she ended up, and then I asked about how Dmitri was doing. She said he really grew up and matured, went to Queens College and majored in history. He overcame some learning problems and hooked on with the Park Service after graduating—which we already knew.

“But she said he’s still kind of different and doesn’t have many friends. He mostly keeps to himself, but they go to church together and have dinner every Sunday. She seemed sad that he wasn’t well-integrated into society—those are my words, my interpretation. I was tactful about it, but she said he doesn’t have a girlfriend or anyone he’s close with, other than her. Even at that, he seems distant. Her words, not mine.”

“Anything on that guy—”

“Oh, yeah. Gregor and Alysia Persephone. They were found murdered in their home in ’85—”

“Murdered? How?”

“Execution style. I called the loo at my old precinct. He’s having the file pulled, but he remembered they were lookin’ into the father for mob ties. Father’s the furrier Basil was gonna rat out—”

“Right, got that.”

“Anyway, they never made an arrest, but they were pretty sure it was the Castiglias. Word was that the family wanted more of the profit, but the fur business was tanking because of all the bad publicity about animal rights and shit. Gus Persephone, the owner, supposedly said no, and about three weeks later, they found his son and daughter-in-law shot behind the ear with a .22.”

I’m not so sure it was the Castiglias. I bet it was Hades taking out the primary cause of his problems. Maybe his first in a long line of revenge killings. If the MO was too much like Cassandra’s death or the subsequent ones, they might look at Dmitri instead of the Castiglias. He couldn’t risk that.

Vail leaned down and glanced out the window. The ferry was nearing Liberty Island, the copper green profile of the statue looming large. “Okay, good stuff, Protch. Do me a favor and call the Park Police, let ’em know we’re coming. But don’t tell them what the deal is. I don’t want them freaking him out. It may be an island, but I’d rather not spend the rest of the day combing the place for a fugitive serial killer.” She thanked Proschetta, then handed Russo back his phone. After giving him a quick recap, she said, “You feeling better?”

“I haven’t run like that since my forties. I’m too old for that shit.”

“Well, captain-to-be, you shouldn’t have to. That’s why old guys like you got young’uns like me.” As she finished relaying the information Proschetta had gotten from Dmitri’s mother, the ferry slowed and started moving laterally toward the dock. Vail paid for the water she had given Russo, then grabbed a large plastic tote bag and slipped Dmitri’s books into it. It was not an ideal way to preserve evidence, but it was better than lugging them around without any protection.

They headed toward the gangplank, picking their way through the crowd, much to the consternation of the waiting patrons who were lining up for their closeup glimpse of Lady Liberty.

Moments later, they made land and hung a right along the newly laid brick path and lush green lawn that fronted the statue’s granite-block base, headed toward the center of the island. Vail grabbed the first ranger they saw and told her they were looking for Dmitri Harris.

“He’s right there,” the woman said with a head gesture over her left shoulder as she fielded a question from an Italian tourist.

That’s him. Slow down, take a breath.

“Son of a bitch,” Russo said.

Vail could tell by his heaving chest that Russo was as amped up as she was.

Dmitri was in front of a low brick wall chatting with a woman and her son, who looked to be about eight. Behind them stood bronze statues of people significant to the statue’s creation. If Vail recalled, they depicted the sculptor, the architect—who had also designed the Eiffel Tower—and the woman who wrote the sonnet with the famous line: “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses.”

“Should we call in the troops?” Vail asked. “Park Police. Surround him.”

“Lots of loaded guns in a public place packed with women and children? Not to mention an unstable violent offender.” Russo shook his head. “If we had time to prepare, we could do this right. But we don’t have time. And I’m not letting him out of my sight. Which means at some point he’s gonna realize I’m following him.”

“Then how do you want to play this?”

“Easy. I walk up to him and put a fist in his nose. Then I cuff him and haul his ass outta here. Short, sweet, effective.”

“I got a better idea.” Vail nonchalantly glanced at Dmitri. Still with the mother and her son. “First, we should breathe.” She grinned at him. “Do what I’m doing. Wipe the stress, the urgency, from your mind—and your face. Relax your fists and let your shoulders drop. We’re just gonna go up to him and start talking. Totally disarming, right?”

“He knows what you look like. That letter he left at your place. The photo he took of you—”

“Even if he knows who I am, he doesn’t know that we know he’s the killer. That’s why we go in quietly, smiling and friendly. He’d never expect that. He’d expect a full frontal assault. And a punch in the nose.” She studied his face. “Okay?”

Russo clenched his jaw. “I’ve been chasing this fucker for two decades, Karen. He’s killed—” He lowered his voice. “Lots of people.”

“Then maybe you’d better let me handle this.”

“You outta your mind? My biggest collar in a dozen years, you think I’m gonna sit it out?”

“Fine, then smile. Or I’m going to tickle you.”

Russo took a deep breath. “Okay.”

“Okay. Follow my lead.” Vail walked toward Dmitri, who had bent over to shake the boy’s hand.

“Ranger Harris,” Vail said as they approached. “Karen Vail, remember me?”

Dmitri tilted his head.

She smiled broadly. “You gave me and my son a tour of the crown about eight years ago. Actually, you took my son. I got a phone call and couldn’t go up.”

He shook his head. “Sorry, don’t remember. I do lots of tours. I’ve
done
a lot of tours. This is my twenty-third year on the island.”

“This is a friend of mine, Carmine Russo.”

They were standing in front of Dmitri, a gleaming brass name badge pinned to his well-pressed, perfectly tucked in clay-colored ranger shirt, a pair of dark sunglasses resting on his nose. He seemed at ease. But it was unnerving not to be able to see his eyes. The eyes were said to be the windows to the soul—for a psychopath, however, they were even more than that. Theirs had a penetrating snake eyes look that seemed to bore right through you.
I want to see your eyes, goddamn it.

“Good to meet you,” Dmitri said with a nod at Russo. “Do you have a question about the statue?” he asked, looking first at Russo, then at Vail.

“Not exactly,” Russo said. “My question’s a little more generic. Like, are you armed?”

Dmitri jutted his chin back. “I’m a park ranger, not Park Police. Rangers who are GS4s don’t carry sidearms. Article 5 of the Federal Office of Personnel—”

“That’s okay, Dmitri,” Russo said. “I just needed to know if you had a weapon.”