The Beast A DeckerLazarus Novel (30 page)

“You know, I think we had another occasion to work together.”

“Father Jupiter and the Order.” Decker took a bite of his turkey sandwich. It was after one, and he was hungry. “You worked with some of the orphaned children.”

“Some of them, yes. Do you know what happened to any of them?”

“I know what happened to Vega.”

“I remember her. She was very bright. Is she doing well?”

“Very well. My sergeant, Marge Dunn, actually adopted her legally. She graduated from Cal Tech about a year ago.”

“That’s certainly a success story.”

“Vega’s lovely. A little hesitant socially. Could be because of her
strange upbringing, but it also could be because she’s so brilliant and thinks in another stratosphere. She has a boyfriend, though. Marge is thrilled.”

“Very good news.”

The conversation stopped. Delaware said, “If you could recap the case for me again, that would be helpful. I know I’ll have questions.”

“Sure. Like I told you, I’m dealing with an odd whodunit. Hobart Penny: an eighty-nine-year-old millionaire and recluse who died from blunt force trauma to the forehead. He also sustained a gunshot wound in the back from a twenty-two-caliber bullet.”

“Did the tiger have anything to do with his death?”

“It doesn’t appear that way. Strangely enough, it does seem that Hobart did have a good rapport with the cat.”

“The animal didn’t turn on him?”

“We don’t think so—no bites, deep scratches, or anything to suggest a mauling. What we haven’t leaked to the press was his collection of highly venomous animals—snakes, insects, and fish. All the animals appeared to be neatly confined to their cages or habitats. But we still had to fumigate the entire apartment building because some of the insects were very dangerous and we had no idea what might have escaped or what might have been hiding.”

“So the reptiles and the insects coexisted with the tiger?”

“No, he had a separate apartment for the reptiles and another one just for poisonous insects and fish.”

“The man was also a hoarder.”

“Interesting way to look at it.”

“What about Penny’s past relationships? Anything to shed light on that?”

“He was married twice, each ended in divorce. His second wife and his adult children claim that he went off the deep end twenty-five years ago.”

“When did he and the second wife divorce?”

“Twenty-five years ago.”

“How did he go off the deep end?” Delaware asked.

“At that time, his ex, who is now in her fifties, claimed that Penny thought he was a tiger in a man’s body. The final straw happened after he tried to rip off her face with his nails and attempted to bite her neck.”

“Okay, I understand why the wife would think he was crazy,” Delaware said. “Why do the children feel he went off the deep end?”

“For starters, he kept a tiger in a small apartment.”

“Any other reasons?”

“He was a recluse, I suppose.”

“I’m just wondering if they painted him as strange in order to deem him incompetent and take away his money.”

“No lawsuits have ever been filed. No incompetency hearings that I know about. They seem wealthy in their own right. The son is the father’s executor.”

“What about the ex-wife?”

“Also wealthy. She had money to start with and then got a very generous divorce settlement from Hobart Penny. That caused friction between the ex-wife and the adult children. So the ex actually gave some of the settlement money back to Penny’s grandchildren.”

“That’s unusual.”

“It’s a first for me,” Decker said. “I didn’t see the house, but my detectives told me that it looked like something out of Mansions R Us.”

“Have you met the adult children?” Delaware asked.

“Yesterday. Brother and his sister seem to get along. Money doesn’t seem to be an issue, although we all know it’s always an issue. They’re not primary suspects. That could change, but right now we have others who are higher up.”

“Can I ask who?”

“Sure. A couple of massage therapists took off for Nevada after Penny turned up dead. The rumor is they did way more than massage. Penny seemed to have quite a large and unusual libido.”

“The little blue pill.”

“Doctor Delaware, what can you tell me about a guy who had millions but chose to live in a crappy one-bedroom apartment with
a tiger. What can you tell me about a man who collected venomous snakes and dangerous spiders and poisonous fish?”

“What have you learned about him before he became a recluse?”

“Like was he always weird?”

“Something like that. What do you know of him as a young man?”

“Not much. His daughter hates him, and I use the present tense on purpose. She told me he was a mean man. No love lost with his son, either, although he is the executor of the estate. The ex-wife said he was always sexually aggressive, even before he started acting like a tiger. He used to cheat on her. Then he started going to sex clubs to indulge his fantasies.”

“What about the first wife?”

“She’s dead.”

“I don’t like armchair analysis,” Delaware said. “But I’ll say this. The man didn’t suddenly turn weird. I suspect he was probably always a little odd. People who hoard—animal hoarders are just a subset—fill their homes with junk in order to shut out human contact. In the past, real relationships have been a challenge for them if they had existed at all.

“People like Penny tend to be socially awkward—not necessarily shy, the man doesn’t sound shy—but maladroit with a limited range of emotional responses. They also have an underdeveloped sense of empathy.”

“Like a psychopath?” Decker asked. “Or is it sociopath?”

“Psychopath, sociopath, anti-personality disorder, renaming things don’t change the condition. I don’t know if Penny was or was not a psychopath, but people like him tend not to read faces very well. And since they don’t pick up on nonverbal social cues, they often respond in a maladaptive way . . . which pushes people even further away, and you get a vicious cycle.”

“Okay,” Decker said. “So he was always weird?”

“Probably.”

“So what’s with the tiger?”

“I’m speaking in generalities, okay. This may or may not fit your man.”

“I hear you.”

Delaware said, “Hobart Penny was wealthy and brilliant; he was an engineer/inventor, correct?”

“Correct.”

“Unlike most inventors who tinker with very little outcome, he was highly successful. And like most successful people, he probably had a sizable ego. Men like Hobart Penny can afford to push people around—his children, his wives, his staff. But Penny sounds like a man who doesn’t really relate to or care about people. So dominating them wouldn’t be a big thrill.”

“As opposed to dominating a tiger.”

“Exactly. Dangerous animals and the notion of being able to control them would generate a feeling of omnipotence that, in my opinion, would be a very powerful aphrodisiac. When acting like a tiger failed to give him enough sexual pleasure, he went out and got himself the real thing. It feels like he decided to
own
his delusions. And since prostitutes were involved, I have this thought in the back of my mind.”

“Lay it on me.”

“I don’t know if it fits your version of the murder, but here goes. Hobart Penny was still screwing hookers. But that wasn’t enough for him or his delusions. I think he might have trotted out the tiger to scare his women to increase his sexual pleasure.”

“He got off on fear?”

“Maybe.”

Decker mulled it over. “Yeah . . . makes sense. The girl is doing a routine act and then all of a sudden, he trots out a Bengal tiger or a cobra to frighten them. Using his animals as lethal weapons.”

“Think of it from the girls’ perspective. Say the old man wants you to do something and you don’t want to do it. He threatens you with a cobra if you don’t cooperate.”

“In a way, a cobra is worse than a weapon,” Decker said. “A gun or a knife can be wrested away. A snake . . . well, you’re kind of helpless. So before he can carry out his threat, the hooker bashes him in the head and runs away. It could be self-defense.”

“That’s your call, Lieutenant.”

“The problem is that it wasn’t just the threat of a tiger. The actual animal was with him when we found him. You can understand how the tiger coexists with the hookers when the guy was alive. He had control over her—the tiger was a she. But after he’s dead, how does the girl or girls get past a tiger?”

“Was the animal chained up?”

“When we sedated her, she was dragging six feet of chain. So she could have been chained up. But the apartment was small. If she was chained in the bedroom, then the girls wouldn’t have been able to get out of the door. If she was chained in the living room, she had a wide radius to work. Penny could have sedated the tiger such that it was nonthreatening. Of course, then the case isn’t self-defense anymore. And where’s the fun in dominating a sleeping tiger?”

“The thrill could be that at any moment the animal could wake up.” Delaware paused. “Anyone on your short list of suspects other than the missing hookers?”

“We’ve got several people that we’re looking at. One is a woman who works in an exotic animal sanctuary. My detectives are there now with Penny’s son. The old man gave money to support her place. Plus she took care of the animal, so the tiger knows her. She’s also mentioned in Penny’s will. We always make a point to follow the money. But in this case, the guy was already giving her money. You’d think she’d just wait him out.”

A pause.

“I may be working with more than one killer with more than one motivation,” Decker said. “Got another question for you, Doc. Hobart Penny was renting several apartments to house his collection—his menagerie. One of the apartments was used as a pantry for the animal food. We were going through that apartment thoroughly, including a freezer that was filled with meat. One of the packages we opened was a bunch of fingers frozen together.”

A long pause over the phone. “Human fingers?”

“Yes. Dismembered fingers, and not from the same person.”

“How many digits?”

“Fourteen I think. The coroner thinks they were taken off of the bodies postmortem. We have no idea where they came from. We’ve taken prints but haven’t gotten any hits yet.”

Silence.

Decker said, “I know you work with Lieutenant Sturgis on stumpers. Did you two ever run into cases like that? It would be helpful to find a precedent.”

“We found baby bones buried in a lockbox last year.”

“Yeah, I remember that,” Decker said. “But you got a solve on that.”

“We did. I’ll ask Milo to go through his case files.”

“Thanks. I’ll take any help I can get.” A pause. “Any other ideas, Doc?”

“I’m probably having the same thoughts as you.”

“Probably,” Decker said. “The human fingers were taken as trophies by a serial killer. If that’s the case, we might have a victim who is far less sympathetic than his killers.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

W
HEN TALKING ABOUT
the animals, Vignette was transformed. Her spiel was informative with just the right amount of passion. Had she not been a suspect, Oliver might have even forked over a donation. Odd lady, but she knew her stuff. It was almost two by the time they returned to the parking lot. Penny blotted his face with a handkerchief. The walking, while not overly vigorous, had caused him to sweat. “Thank you for the tour.”

“I hope I answered all your questions, sir,” Vignette told him.

“I didn’t ask any questions,” he said.

“Well . . . do you have any questions?”

“I do.” He took his phone from his pocket. “What is the best number to reach you?”

Vignette rattled off her cell phone digits. “Reception is poor up here. If you call, I’ll get back to you as soon as I can: early in the morning or late at night.”

“I’m in New York. Early to you is midmorning for me. And I’m almost always at my desk.” He handed her a card. “If you have questions, give a ring.”

Vignette rubbed the tip of her boot in the mud. “I’m assuming there’s a reason that you’ve decided to visit our sanctuary.”

“Indeed I did not come out for the air.” Penny sniffed and made a face. “I will keep in touch and let you know when things are settled with my father’s will. That’s as much as I can tell you right now.”

“Your father was always so generous.”

“So it seems.” Penny turned to Marge and Oliver. “I have what I need. We can leave whenever you’re ready.”

Marge said, “We have a couple of questions for Ms. Garrison right now.”

Vignette said, “I’m running a little bit late with the animal checkups. Can we do this another time?”

“You just gave us a tour,” Oliver said. “Everything looked fine.”

She gave him a condescending smile. “It’s more involved than that. Plus I have to start making the rounds in the city to collect food. We have a lot of animals, and that means a lot of meals.”

“Just what we wanted to talk to you about.” Marge smiled. “How lucky is that?”

Penny said, “I hope this won’t take too long.”

“That makes two of us,” Vignette said.

Marge feigned a cheerful demeanor. “How about if Mr. Penny and I wait in the car to keep warm while Detective Oliver and you chat for a few minutes?”

Oliver said, “Where to, Ms. Garrison?”

“Vignette.” She gave a sigh. “I suppose we can talk in my office. I won’t say it’s warm in there, but it isn’t nearly as cold.” She brought Oliver over to the biggest trailer. The furnishings included a metal file cabinet, several mismatched chairs, a scarred wood-top desk, and a floor heater that was giving off a few thermals. She plugged in an electric kettle. “Do you want some tea?”

“Hot water is fine.”

Vignette gave him a forced smile. “Like I told you before, I’ll be happy to help you with relocating Mr. Penny’s reptiles.”

“That’s not my problem, right now.”

“There’s a problem?”

Oliver rubbed his hands together and placed them in front of the minimalist heater. “I know that you helped Mr. Penny with the care of his animals. I’m thinking that most of the critters had special dietary needs, right?”