Kill Me Once Read online

  A floor in their rickety old log cabin, for example, was truly scrubbed when the task was assigned to him. And if he were ordered to organise the pantry, he’d carefully wash the dust off all the jars of preserves before neatly stacking them. Each label pointed outward and was perfectly aligned, the foods alphabetised and arranged for the most convenient access.

  As he grew older, Nathan’s obsession with cleanliness eventually sharpened to the point where a mere speck of dirt beneath his fingernail was enough to send him scurrying for their outdoor shower to frantically scour his entire body from head to toe with the harsh lye soap, even in sub-zero winter temperatures.

  Eventually, everything in his life – at least everything he had control over – had to be perfect.

  Perfect and clean.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  Four hours after leaving the horrific murder scene at the Otero house, Dana slipped beneath the covers at the downtown Wichita Hyatt. She’d just closed her eyes when the phone on her bedside table rang.

  She fumbled in the darkness to pick it up and placed the receiver to her ear. ‘Hello? This is Special Agent Whitestone.’

  There was a crackle of static, the trace of a garbled voice.

  ‘Hello?’ she repeated, sticking a finger in her right ear to cut down on the background noise. ‘Who is this?’

  The line finally cleared. ‘Hello, Dana.’

  Dana sat up straighter in bed. ‘Who in the fuck is this?’

  The voice on the other end of the line was deep and robotic, computer-altered by a speech-masking device. ‘In good time, my dear. All in good time. But you do know who this is, don’t you? I’d hate to think you’ve forgotten about me already.’

  Dana’s heart thudded in her ears. Tears pooled in her eyes. In a fraction of a second she was reduced to being four years old again. The adult Dana fought for control. She fumbled open her cellphone and attempted to text Brown – who was staying in the same hotel – to get him to set up a trace on the phone line, but she was too shaken up. The killer had caught her unprepared, just like always.

  She tried to keep the fear out of her voice, her hands trembling as she held the phone to her ear. ‘Why are you doing this? Talk to me and maybe we can figure a way out of this trouble you’re in. Nobody else has to die if we work together.’ It was important to keep him on the line for as long as possible.

  A robotic chuckle filled Dana’s ear. ‘Come, now, Dana. You know that’s not going to happen. Besides, I’m not the one who’s in any trouble. You are.’

  Much as Dana didn’t want to talk to him for a moment longer, she had to keep hearing his chilling words. She willed herself to stay calm.

  ‘Fine, then just come after me,’ she said. ‘Leave everybody else out of it.’

  ‘Can’t do that.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Patience, Dana. Patience, my dear. You’ll find out why not soon enough.’

  There was a click as the connection was cut. ‘Hello?’ Dana shouted into the phone. ‘Hello? Are you still there?’

  Nothing. Only silence.

  Dana dropped the receiver and jumped out of bed. She had to move fast. She was pulling on a pair of jeans when the phone on her bedside table suddenly rang again, almost giving her a heart attack. She raced across the room and picked it up. ‘Hello?’ she screamed. ‘Are you there? Just talk to me, goddamn it!’

  The static crackled again. Then a puzzled voice came on. ‘What the fuck are you talking about, Dana? Is everything OK?’

  Dana’s heart slammed against her ribs. ‘Jesus Christ, Crawford. Where the hell are you, a wind tunnel? I have to clear this line. The killer just called me here at the hotel. Call me back on my cell.’

  ‘Did you set up a trace?’

  ‘Just clear the line, Crawford!’

  The phone clicked dead. Dana’s cellphone rang ten seconds later.

  ‘What the hell’s going on?’ Crawford asked. ‘Did you set up a trace?’

  ‘I’m calling Brown and meeting him in the lobby now.’

  ‘Call me back when you’ve got it done.’

  Dana hung up with Crawford and punched in the number for Brown’s cellphone. She related the details as quickly as she could.

  ‘Christ, Dana,’ Brown said when she’d finished. ‘I’ll make some calls and get some people over here to trace the call. I’ll meet you in the lobby in ten minutes.’

  Twenty minutes later the lobby was teeming with FBI phone techs from the Wichita office. A tall thin woman named Sandy Lecroix had two cellphones to her ear and a third line plugged into a conference call with AT&T. Lecroix fiddled with wires and pecked information into her laptop. After half an hour, she turned to Dana and sighed.

  ‘It wasn’t easy, but I managed to trace it,’ she said.

  ‘Where did the call come from?’ Dana asked.

  Lecroix flipped her laptop closed and handed Dana a sheet of paper. ‘It was set up on a relay system. The landline originated in Cleveland, but it was shuttled through Los Angeles.’

  ‘What does that mean?’

  Lecroix rubbed her neck. ‘It means whoever made the call did it from a cellphone. The cell called the landline in Cleveland, which in turn called a landline in Los Angeles, which in turn called the number of your hotel room.’

  ‘Can we trace the cell number?’ Brown asked.

  Lecroix shook her head. ‘I’m afraid not. The number’s been masked. Probably originated outside the country. The best I can do is tell you what cell tower the call connected to first. As far as I can tell, whoever made the call is still here in Wichita.’

  Dana’s mind raced. That couldn’t be true. She knew in her gut that the killer had already moved on. He was playing them – again. To Lecroix, she said, ‘Couldn’t the cellphone have been activated by another cellphone? Couldn’t he have left a dummy phone here in Wichita that he called from somewhere else?’

  Lecroix pursed her lips. ‘Well, that’s certainly a possibility, I suppose. Theoretically, there could be an infinite number of relays involved.’

  Dana looked down at the sheet of paper that Lecroix had just handed her. Her heart almost stopped. ‘Is this number the one from Cleveland? This (216) 288-9686?’

  ‘Yeah. Are you OK, Special Agent Whitestone? You look sick.’

  Dana fought the urge to throw up. ‘I’m fine,’ she lied.

  The truth was, however, that Dana wasn’t fine. Not by a long shot. The number on the paper was the same number as her home phone as a child. Her parents had insisted she memorise it when she was three years old, along with their address, in case Dana ever got separated from them. Despite the precautions taken, the ultimate separation had occurred less than a year later. No amount of calling the number of her youth would ever get her parents back.

  Dana thanked Lecroix and called Crawford back in DC. At the risk of inviting an investigation by the Office of Professional Responsibility, the FBI’s version of internal affairs, she kept the information about her childhood phone number to herself. She was thankful she had when she heard what Crawford had to say next.

  ‘I’m getting a lot of pressure from the Director to withdraw my support from keeping you on the case, Dana. I’m fighting Bill Krugman with everything I’ve got, but I don’t know how much longer I can hold him off.’

  Dana shook her head. If they found out about the phone number it would be the straw that broke the camel’s back. Fuck the goddamn rule book. Crawford was right. This shit was personal now. ‘We’re making some real progress here, Crawford,’ she said. ‘I promise. I just need a little more time. Please do what you can.’

  ‘I’ll do my best, but you have to hurry. And just remember, Dana – it’s both our asses on the line now. Don’t make me regret this.’

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

  Growing up poor in West Virginia was difficult even in the best of times, but the gods had eventually smiled down on Nathan and provided him with a key to another place where he felt safe.

  A
library card.

  As a boy he’d been absolutely delighted to discover the wonderful world of books. The first compilation of true-crime murder stories had initially horrified him, but then a strong, nameless urge had taken him over.

  He had to read it again.

  And then again.

  He read it until his eyes were bloodshot and bleary. He read it until the library closed. He checked the book out and read it some more at home. He read the stories so many times that the murderous cast of characters eventually became such an integral part of his psyche that they began to visit him every night in his dreams.

  For the first time in his life, Nathan Stiedowe had finally found some friends.

  With the help of the wonderful books he managed to survive his abusive childhood long enough to enlist in the Navy at the age of eighteen. Assigned as a radioman to the USS William H. Standley in Norfolk, Virginia – a guided-missile cruiser that was haze-grey and under way eighty per cent of the time – he’d avoided Vietnam and visited such places as Paris, Sweden, Greece and Egypt along the way. They were nice places – much nicer than West Virginia, certainly – but even in those faraway foreign ports he could still sense his father’s rage reaching across the miles for his throat. Distance was no salve.

  When Nathan’s enlistment was finally up four years later, he returned home reluctantly for a short while until he could figure out what to do next, mostly because he simply had nowhere else to go. That was when his life changed for ever.

  His parents were off at church that fateful Sunday morning when he’d stumbled across a box of documents while searching for his discharge papers to include with a college application that he was sending out – the GI Bill would cover the cost. What he found instead took his breath away.

  Adoption papers.

  It took a month of ignoring the voices in his head before Nathan finally broke down and heard them out. As always the ringing sounded in his ears.

  They have to pay. For the beatings. For the abuse. For the childhood you should have had. Make them pay.

  Yes, Nathan finally agreed. I will make them pay.

  Soon enough, everyone would have to pay.

  Especially her.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

  Dana said goodbye to Brown outside the terminal at Wichita Mid-Continent Airport the next morning. An awkward silence passed between them during which she felt as if maybe she should give him a hug or something. But in the end they’d parted ways with a simple handshake.

  ‘Take care of yourself, Dana,’ Brown told her. ‘Call me if you need anything.’

  An hour later Dana settled into her seat in the economy section of Continental Flight 353 non-stop from Wichita to Cleveland Hopkins and watched the Kansas skyline slowly fade away into the distance.

  At least now she had even more of a reason for heading out to Cleveland. And not just to pick up her notebooks. Her early ones had everything she’d ever written about her parents’ case; she wanted – needed – them with her now. And the truth was that she felt herself getting a little too close to the edge. She needed the comfort of familiar surroundings, a little time out, however brief. She didn’t want to admit it but the case was finally getting to her. She knew why, of course, but she couldn’t give up now. They were so close. She could feel it. She needed to be back at the top of her game. She had to catch this killer. He had taken those she’d loved best in the whole world. When she was only an innocent little girl he’d ripped her world apart. Now he’d killed innocent little girls like her, a defenceless old woman and a happy family. He had to pay.

  Checking out the house in Cleveland that the previous night’s phone call had been shuttled through would legitimise the trip and give Dana a chance to catch her breath. Still, a cold dread coursed through her veins at the prospect. It was the house of her youth. She had no idea how she was going to keep that a secret – or for how long – but she knew she had to try.

  The home had been purchased through a number of intermediaries, which made finding the true owner virtually impossible. It would have taken months just to track down all the paperwork, and they didn’t have that kind of time. That fact would work both for and against Dana. It would help keep her on the case, which was certainly a good thing, but it also meant she probably wouldn’t find the Cleveland Slasher holed up there, either. Sadly, he just wasn’t that stupid. Sadistic and sick? Hell, yes. Stupid? Fuck, no.

  Dana shuddered. The obvious care with which the killer had plotted his every move chilled her blood. Still, even though he was clearly the best killer she’d ever come across she just had to hope that she was a better hunter.

  After the events of the previous night, Dana had resisted the urge to crack open the bottle of Absolut in her hotel room only by the slimmest of margins. But without the assistance of the alcohol she had found it impossible to fall asleep, so now she was utterly exhausted. Exhausted all the way down to the bone.

  To hell with it. She could always sleep when she was dead. And at the rate this case was going, that outcome might come a hell of a lot sooner than she’d ever planned.

  Dana plucked a magazine from the elastic holder on the seat back in front of her and leafed through the pages of People with little interest for several minutes before she realised she was having trouble concentrating on the words in front of her. The watery word jumble was swimming together on the page and not making the least goddamn bit of sense to her. She had too much on her mind at the moment, too many things to think about; too many unanswered questions.

  Chief among them: how was she going to catch this killer finally? They were getting closer to him all the time now – she could feel that much – but he was still managing to stay one step ahead of them at all times.

  The People article was talking about how another lottery winner had squandered away his instant fortune over the course of a couple years, but who could feel sorry for people like that? Once again it was painfully evident that the saying about a fool and his money soon being parted had some real teeth to it.

  Some time after the plane had lifted off and was cruising along at an altitude of thirty thousand feet a pretty flight attendant sashayed down the aisle pushing a drinks cart in front of her. She stopped at Dana’s seat and smiled at her.

  ‘Care for a drink, ma’am?’

  ‘Vodka, rocks,’ Dana heard herself saying. Then, ‘Better make it a double.’

  Dana knew that she shouldn’t be drinking, even just a little bit, at this crucial point in the case. But if the alcohol helped her to steady her nerves and think more clearly, what the hell harm was there in having a drink every now and then? She just had to watch herself, that was all. Drink in moderation. Don’t overdo it.

  The flight attendant poured the drink into a flimsy plastic cup and tonged in three crescent-moon slivers of ice before handing it over. Dana threw her head back and took it down in one quick swallow.

  The strong drink burned like hell as it slid down her throat, but at least the jolting sensation reminded her that she was still an inhabitant of the real world, not some ghostly apparition floating through the nightmare existence she’d found herself in since flying out to LA a few days earlier.

  Coupled with the mental weariness weighing on her mind, the alcohol caught up with Dana twenty minutes later and pulled her down into the confines of an uneasy sleep. When she awoke two hours later, she lifted her arms over her head and desperately tried to stretch the kink out of her slender neck. Economy class was worse than a straitjacket.

  A moment later the captain keyed the intercom and announced they were beginning their final descent into Cleveland Hopkins.

  Dana rubbed at her tired eyes and tried to shake off the remnants of the recurring nightmare she’d been having almost every night since she was four years old. The dream was every bit as much a part of her now as her short blonde hair, pale blue eyes and the small brown mole perched just above the right side of her mouth.

  In her dream, the man with the strange brow
n eyes is standing directly over her bed and holding a huge knife in his enormous hand. Drops of bright-red blood slide down the silver blade and cling to the sharp tip for the briefest of moments before gravity causes them to fall like rust-coloured water from a leaking faucet. One by one the droplets fall in slow motion before plopping onto her face and sizzling away into vapour with a nasty hiss.

  Five minutes after the captain’s announcement the plane landed with a bump, taxied down the runway and came to a complete stop. When the seat-belt sign was switched off, the passengers stood up, collected their things and filed out toward the exit.

  When it was Dana’s turn to disembark she smiled a goodbye at the flight attendant who was posted by the door and robotically thanking everyone for flying Continental.

  The flight attendant smiled back. Up close, the woman’s meticulously made-up face looked drawn and tired, with fine crow’s feet etched deep into the corners of her soft brown eyes. ‘Have a nice day, ma’am,’ the woman said.

  Dana reached out a hand and lightly touched the other woman’s shoulder. ‘You, too, ma’am. You too.’

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

  Books had truly saved Nathan’s life.

  His enduring love of words soon translated into a journalism degree from Anderson Community College, and after graduation he’d finally left home for good to start work as a newspaper reporter across the river in Shockley, Ohio. His parents didn’t act as if they cared very much when he left, but he wasn’t terribly surprised by their lack of emotion. In his heart of hearts he knew that they were as happy to be getting rid of him as he was to be rid of them.

  ‘Walk the path of righteousness, son,’ his father told him that day, a Winchester rifle bent into the crook of his left arm. ‘Walk the path of righteousness or the devil will certainly get you. Make no mistake about it, boy: you’ve already been marked. You’ve been marked just as surely as Cain himself was marked.’