The Tangerine Killer (11 page)

“Jill’s missing,” Olin said.

“Define missing.”

He stood at my motel room door, looking like he hadn’t slept since the previous night. The neck of his shirt was loose and his tie hung from his jacket pocket like a limp tongue. He looked worried but I hardly cared. We had spent the rest of the car ride in silence and he dropped me off without a word. His feeble apology hardly sufficed and I still hadn’t forgiven him.

“Perhaps your questions pissed her off.”

I wanted to argue but Olin didn’t take the bait.

“Let’s get some breakfast. We need to talk,” he said.

He was being evasive. Not quite making eye contact. It wasn’t a good sign.

“Look, I thought we were just going to forget it?” I leant against the doorframe and lit up a cigarette.

“We are. This isn’t about that.”

“You’re sure?”

I didn’t believe him.

He nodded and touched my arm gently. “I said I was sorry.”

I pulled my arm away. “That didn’t mean you meant it.”

“But I do.”

“Fine.”

“So you’ll come to breakfast?”

“I guess.”

I half closed the door under the pretense of fetching a jacket but I also slipped my gun into its holster. Having witnessed the kind of crazy psycho we were up against, there was no way I was going anywhere without my gun. I knew my rights, I had a concealed weapons permit and I was dammed if I wasn’t going to use it. I didn’t know if I could count on Olin to protect me now. I had to take care of myself and that was something I was an expert at.

The diner was across the street from the Eight Ball bar. Most of the breakfast patrons had just wandered over after closing time to get their fix of bacon and eggs. The majority of them had a glazed look in their eyes.

Olin picked a booth in the corner which meant I had to sit next to him. I didn’t like the idea of not being able to look him in the face when he spoke. How would I know if he was telling the truth if I couldn’t look him in the eye?

“Two coffees,” he told the waitress.

“And two specials,” I added.

He lifted an eyebrow and for the first time that morning cracked a smile.

“I’m hungry,” I said. “Sorry to disappoint you but I’m not a fruit cup kind of girl.”

“I never thought you were.”

“So I’m sitting down in a crowded place. What’s going on?”

He paused for a moment. “This.”

He held out an evidence bag containing a crumpled piece of paper. It looked like it had been screwed into a tiny ball then re-flattened. As I read it, I began to think ordering the special was not such a good idea.

I have Jill lying on a steel bed,

By the time you find her she’ll be dead,

You’ll never see what’s before your eyes,

The Tangerine killer never tells you lies,

Sam came swiftly,

Sam came quick,

Sam’s got a new friend,

The clever dick,

But Sam has to end,

Sam has to fall,

She’ll never see it coming,

The end of it all.

“Not exactly Shakespeare is he?” I laughed.

“It’s not funny Sam.”

“I know.” I tossed the note back on the table. “But really, bad poetry isn’t going to scare me.”

“This guy is bad news. He’s sick. Twisted. This isn’t just your run of the mill killer here. I’ve never seen anything like this before.”

Olin rubbed his hand through his hair. I almost felt sorry for him.

“Trust me, he’s just another crazy,” I said as our waitress brought the food.

“But this crazy wants you.”

He was right. I’d run the gambit of emotions since the funeral. Anger. Fear. Denial. Now I felt nothing. If this sick bastard had a hard on for me then he needed to step out of the shadows and face me. I was ready for him.

Olin left his breakfast untouched. He kept glancing around the diner as though the killer was going to spring on us at any minute.

“Don’t worry. I’m sure he wouldn’t just snatch me from a diner. I don’t think that’s his style.”

“You’re probably right. Besides, everyone down at the station is on this now. God damned Tangerine Killer.”

“You have to admit it’s catchy.”

Olin shook his head. “If that sick fuck even so much as breathes on you, I’ll rip his head off.”

“Steady there cowboy,” I said. “Last night you didn’t care that I’d been raped. Today you want to kill a guy for breathing on me? You’ll give yourself an ulcer.”

He didn’t say anything. Just sat there looking sadly pathetic.

“So, no fingerprints?” I asked, desperate to pull Olin’s focus off my sordid past and back onto the case.

I held the paper up to the light, hoping to see some clue.

“No. We found it taped to the windshield of Jill’s car. It was abandoned off the side of highway 441. A passerby reported it as suspicious because the engine was still running and the driver’s side door was wide open.”

“And no sign of Jill?”

“Just this note and not much else.”

“He killed Lisa and now he has Jill. Then he’ll come for me.”

“Not if I can help it.”

“That’s sweet Olin,” I smiled sarcastically.

“Mock all you want but he won’t get you on my watch.”

“And what about while you’re sleeping? You can’t watch me twenty four hours a day.”

“I can try.”

“I’m not worth it and besides, I can take care of myself.”

“So you keep telling me.”

Olin didn’t look convinced. He dropped me back at the Golden Sun Motel so he could go home and freshen up. I had strict instructions not to leave the room. Not to answer the phone or door and to wait for him to return. It was like he didn’t know me at all. He almost insisted on seeing me to the door but I adamantly refused, explaining how the desk clerk was firmly on the side of the law when it came to dispensing room keys. I left out the part about Joe.

Standing outside my door, key poised in my hand, I wasn’t so sure I had made the right choice in dismissing Olin. Sitting on the doorstep was a package the size of a jewelry box, wrapped in brown paper and tied with orange ribbon. I knew who it was from and I knew it was for me. What I didn’t want to know was what was inside.

The slut has been a lot more trouble than she’s worth. He’s beginning to wish he never snatched her. He’s been forced to do things he would never usually do. He’s an artist. He creates masterpieces but his intended medium has been less than co-operative.

The chloroform does its job. The first part of the plan goes off without a hitch. He even remembers to leave the note. It isn’t really of any importance but he has fun writing it and thinks it will keep the slick dick on his toes. Maybe even scare him a little. He’s seen the way he looks at Sam and he doesn’t like it. Not one bit.

The trouble starts when the slut finally gains consciousness and finds herself strapped to his steel table. He usually likes to converse while he works, it’s therapeutic and enlightening. Sure they usually scream too much towards the end but the pitch of their cries is like music to his ears. It soothes his soul.

In the beginning they usually try to befriend him. Tell him how they understand, how he doesn’t have to hurt them and if he would just let them go they won’t tell anyone. He always laughs at that. Then later they beg and plead for their lives, telling him he can have anything he wants if he just sets them free. He always tells them he has what he wants right there on the table before him. What can he possibly trade that for?

The slut hasn’t even attempted to befriend him. She screams bloody murder, spouting profanities about him with a vengeance. She calls him a sick fuck. That pisses him off. She’s the one who spread her legs on the hood of a car and allowed different men to fuck her every night. She’s hardly in a position to criticize the deviances of others.
 

He leaves her alone for a while, hoping she will eventually tire but when he returns she just takes up where she left off. Apparently his time out has done nothing except give her a chance to save her strength. Exasperated, he tapes her mouth shut with his orange tape. This time there will be no artful conversation, just him and his work.

But she won’t lay still. He has to tighten the leather straps. They have always been perfectly sufficient before but the slut is willful. She has reserves of strength the others never even tapped into. Her desire to live fascinates him but she’s still supposed to be his trial run. He can’t practice the maneuvers he’s fantasized about in his head for so long if she doesn’t lay still.

Perfect slices require a steady hand. He can’t work like this. It’s ridiculous. So he cuts her finger off. With the threat of losing more digits she becomes far more compliant and he gets an unexpected bonus out of the deal. The finger will be a special gift for Sam.

“It’s a finger,” Olin said.

“I know.”
 

He looked at the present that had been left outside my door with revulsion. The severed finger sat on a bloody bed of orange tissue paper, its nail painted with purple polish. It was slightly curled as though flicking off anyone who dared peer inside. It smelt of death.

“Why didn’t you call me? I would have come back.”

“I knew you’d be back eventually besides, I told you I only touched it with rubber gloves. I know what I’m doing. Remember?”

“But it could have been a bomb, anthrax, filled with deadly gas.”

“Filled with deadly gas?” I laughed.

“I have to call this in. Get a team here. Dust your door for fingerprints.”

“There won’t be any.”

“It’s procedure.”

He was stone faced. I’d offended him but it was just too bad. He offended me when he questioned my credibility. Now we were even. Besides, the insatiable curiosity to see what was inside had been overwhelming. I couldn’t resist even though I knew who it was from. I had to admit I underestimated his originality. I’d expected to find another decomposing, maggot filled orange or maybe another witty prose about my upcoming demise. The finger had certainly been a surprise.

“Do you think it’s really Jill’s?” Olin asked.

“Of course. She was wearing the same color polish.”

My stomach churned a little for the first time. A severed finger was one thing but a finger from someone you knew was something else entirely. I certainly had my own issues with Jill but that didn’t mean I wanted to receive her dismembered finger as compensation. The Tangerine Killer certainly knew how to get my attention.

“We have to find her,” I said. “I don’t want any more of her body parts left on my doorstep.”

“We’re trying. So far we have no leads.”

“Well, let me help.”

“You are helping.”

He smiled for the first time and reached out to touch my arm in a comforting gesture. I let him even though I still wasn’t ready for him to touch me. I managed to smile back, until I realized he was wearing an orange tie. My stomach churned again.

“I hate orange,” I mumbled.

“I was in a hurry. It was dark in my closet,” he flipped the tie between his fingers. “My ex bought it.”

I didn’t ask why he kept it, even though I wondered why.

“So what do you want to do now?” I asked.

“Interview suspects.”

“Suspects? What suspects?” I laughed.

“Everyone in town.”

I was still laughing but the look on his face was serious.

“You’re not kidding are you? You think someone we know could be the killer?”

“Not necessarily but they may know him.”

Olin seemed to have developed a renewed sense of conviction and this I could work with. He obviously had someone in mind, someone I had probably already been in contact with. My main lead had been Jill, before the maggot mountain and her subsequent disappearance.

Olin didn’t elaborate much on the theory of who his suspect was but we wound up outside Lisa’s house. Faye was about to get a surprise visit and I already knew she wouldn’t be happy about it.

She answered the door wearing another swirl of floating material masquerading as a dress. This one was a rainbow of yellows and oranges, hardly appropriate for a grieving mother.

“Yes?” she sighed.

“We’re so sorry to disturb you,” Olin said, smiling sweetly. “May we ask you a few questions?”

“Well that depends.”

Faye threw her hand up on the door frame, blocking access to her home with a provocative pose. She looked ready to throw herself into Olin’s arms in order to avoid being asked any questions.

“Depends on what?” Olin said.

“What you have to offer me.”

“How about a cell downtown where you’ll spend the night for obstruction of justice.”

The sultry look slid off her face and she eyed me with a cold glare. She obviously thought I’d pulled him over to the dark side. Reluctantly she stepped aside to let us enter. I fell in behind Olin, dragging my feet to get a better look at the photos on the wall. There were plenty but none of the illusive baby who had mysteriously disappeared.

“So what is all this about then?” Faye said.

“Jill Hatchel is missing.”

Olin sat down on the couch even though we had not been offered a seat.

“Good. I hope she gets what she deserves.” Faye stood there glaring at him.

Awkward silence hung in the air for a moment before Olin continued.

 
“You knew Frank was having an affair with Jill didn’t you?”

“Stupid little bitch,” Faye said. “She thought she was so much better than my Lisa.”

“But you said Lisa never figured it out did she? Not like you,” I said.

“I never said anything but she knew. Frank never touched her after he started seeing Jill, he could barely stand to look at her. That’s why she started taking the anti-depressants and the sleeping pills. Going to see that stupid old quack. She should have got a backbone, that’s what she should have got. Not some old fart who held her hand and told her to cry it out.”

Faye was acting even crazier than usual. I spotted an open bottle of wine on the counter. It was almost empty. Perhaps she was grieving after all.

“But if Frank was so in love with Jill, why didn’t he just file for divorce?” Olin asked.

“Because then he’d be out in the street and not such an attractive conquest for that little slut,” Faye snapped.

“Because the house is yours,” I added.

“That’s right. I told you before, it’s mine.”

“But he could have moved in with Jill,” Olin said.

“You really think that slut has a home? She lived out of that awful orange motel.”

“The Golden Sun Motel,” I said under my breath. Jill had been there all along. Had she been watching me the whole time?

“So what were you planning to do about this slut who was ruining your daughter’s life?” Olin leant across the table. “Surely you had some plan to get her out of the picture. You couldn’t have Frank leaching off you indefinitely while his seed was being sown in someone else’s garden.”

“I would never have done anything to hurt my daughter. She loved Frank despite all his faults and trust me, there were too many to count. If I had hurt him, then that would have hurt her. I couldn’t do that.”

“Okay but Jill on the other hand, surely it would have been relatively easy to get rid of her? No more Jill, no more problems. You could all go back to being the happy family you once were.” Olin sat back and crossed his arms like he had it all figured out.

I fought the urge to laugh. There were plenty of things Faye’s family had been but happy was not one of them.

Olin reached out and took Faye’s hand in his. “You’re a clever woman. You couldn’t just stand by and let your daughter’s life fall apart.”

“Of course not,” she swelled like a proud peacock. “That’s why I had Harvey threaten Frank. Rough him up a bit. You know, like they do in the mob.”

I stifled a laugh. Harvey beat someone up? I mean sure, Frank hadn’t been in the best shape of his life but he could have easily swatted Harvey away like a giant, annoying bug.

“You think that’s funny?”

Faye’s face was red. She stepped closer to where I stood against the wall, her fists curled. I thought for a second she was going to hit me.

“So did he do it?” I asked, my voice still not sounding very serious.

“Of course he did. I send my boy to do something he does it, end of story.”

I wondered if she sent him to put his hands on me the day we had lunch but thought better of mentioning it in front of Olin. Now wasn’t the time.

“So what did he give Frank?’ I asked. “A black eye? A split lip? A suffocating bear hug?”

“You little slut,” Faye slurred.

She lunged at me, her sharp nails clawing at my face. I pushed her away but she kept coming in a cloud of chiffon and fury. Instinctively my fist tightened and before I knew what I was doing, it connected with her jaw bone. She let out a guttural roar and came at my throat with her bony hands. But before I had a chance to hit her again, Olin was between us.

“Ladies,” Olin shouted. “Please. Settle down.”

“Arrest her,” Faye screamed.

“For what? I was standing right here. I watched you start this Faye.”

She threw herself on the couch dramatically. Her fingers fluttered to her face and she felt her jaw gingerly. I socked her pretty good. It was going to hurt like hell later but she deserved it.

“For attacking me,” she wailed. “And discrediting my son.”

“Now you’re the one who was in the wrong here Faye. You’re lucky I don’t arrest you.”

Olin was talking in a calm voice. The one people used to talk to crazy people. He looked at me and rolled his eyes. I knew it was best to just keep my mouth shut.

“You don’t know her,” Faye pointed a shaking finger at me. “She’s a slut, a home wrecking whore just like Jill. She’s a killer too. Bet you didn’t know that. She shoots people in the back so you’d better watch out. She’ll fuck you then kill you, that’s what she’ll do.”

“How dare you.”

I started towards Faye, blood racing through my veins. Olin caught me before I reached her and held me tight.

“Get off me,” I yelped.

“You see,” Faye said. “She’s psycho.”

“You think I’m psycho? You haven’t even seen psycho yet,” I shouted.

“Is that a threat?” Faye asked.

“No it’s a promise,” I yelled as Olin hustled me towards the front door.

“We’ll be seeing you later Faye. Thanks for the lovely chat,” Olin called out.

“Don’t bring that bitch back here again,” she shouted. “I’m getting a restraining order.”

I was still shaking as Olin pushed me out into the sunshine.