Kill Me Once Page 7

  Jamie nodded. Again, it seemed to make sense. ‘What will we do when they’re all lit up?’

  ‘We’ll jump our cars over them just like the motorcycle daredevils at the state fair.’

  The little girl still looked uneasy, glancing around the barn to make sure no one was watching. ‘OK. Just hurry up and do it already before we get caught.’

  Nathan plucked out another match and slid it across the scratch-strip. The head of the match popped, flickered for a moment, then finally caught hold.

  ‘Hurry,’ Jamie urged.

  Nathan kicked a space in the hay and dropped the matchbook on the floor. Leaning down, he carefully applied the burning match to the rest. The entire book immediately went up in flames.

  ‘C’mon,’ he said. ‘We have to hurry.’

  They knelt down on the floor of the barn and jumped their cars over the burning matches for thirty seconds before Nathan’s ears suddenly began to ring.

  He looked over at Jamie and grinned. ‘Hey, wanna play another game?’

  The little girl didn’t notice the swirling in his dark brown eyes. ‘What game’s that?’

  ‘You go up into the loft with the police car and jump it down after the bank robber from there. It’ll be just like Robert Mitchum in Thunder Road. You be the cops and I’ll be Robert Mitchum.’

  ‘Who’s Robert Mitchum?’

  ‘The actor in the movie.’

  ‘What movie?’

  ‘Thunder Road.’

  ‘What’s Thunder Road?’

  Nathan sighed. ‘Just go up into the loft, Jamie. It’s gonna be a lot of fun, I promise.’

  The little girl brushed her sweaty blonde hair out of her face with both hands and picked up the police car before heading toward the loft. She looked over her shoulder at him as she climbed the rickety ladder. ‘OK, but this better be a lot of fun, Nathan. If it’s not, then I’m definitely telling on you.’

  Nathan nodded. ‘OK, just go up into the loft already. It’s going to be so much fun, I promise. Just wait, you’ll see.’

  The little girl ascended the ladder and looked down at him from above. She was afraid of heights, but Nathan had promised a good time, so she was willing to take a chance. ‘Now what?’ she asked.

  Nathan waved a hand in the air. ‘Hold on a minute, OK? I have to do something real quick before we can start.’

  He walked over to the ladder and pulled it away from the entrance to the loft before making his way back over to where she could see him.

  ‘Now what?’ Jamie repeated.

  ‘Now we have some real fun,’ Nathan said.

  He was very careful not to burn his fingers as he picked the matchbook up by one corner and pressed it against the hay covering the floor of the barn. The hay smoked for a moment, then burst into bright orange flames.

  ‘Hey!’ Jamie shouted down from the loft. ‘What are you doing down there? Is this part of the game?’

  Nathan smiled up at her. ‘Sure is, Jamie. Just stay up there a minute, OK? I have to go get something from outside, and then we can play Thunder Road.’

  ‘What’s Thunder Road?’ Jamie whined.

  But Nathan only smiled as he pulled the barn doors closed behind him. Inside, the fire began to spread. Thirty seconds later it reached the metal drum filled with heating oil.

  The deafening explosion ripped both doors off the barn. A tractor wheel shot fifty feet into the air. The blue sky instantly turned black.

  He quickly worked up an eyeful of tears as he ran toward the farmhouse to get their parents. He had to tell them that Jamie had insisted on playing with the matches even though he’d begged her not to. She just wouldn’t listen to him, he’d say.

  The whipping that night nearly flayed the skin off his backside, but it had been well worth it. If he lived another hundred years, Nathan didn’t think he’d ever see anybody die hotter than little Jamie Hufford.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Cleveland – Hopkins International Airport – 3:30 p.m.

  Dana exited a yellow cab outside the busy terminal, flipped her cellphone open and punched in a number. A deep voice answered.

  ‘Templeton.’

  ‘Gary,’ she said to the Cleveland cop. ‘It’s Dana Whitestone. Something’s come up and I’m gonna have to go to DC, I’m afraid. I’m really sorry. You’re in charge while I’m gone, OK? Can you keep me updated on any developments? I’ll be on my cell.’

  ‘What’s going on?’ He sounded temporarily panicked. ‘We’re in the middle of a case; we need you here. How long are you going to be gone for?’

  Dana filled him in as quickly as she could on the possible connection to the murder out in LA. ‘I’m not sure where all this is going to lead, but if there’s a connection I’ll probably head out to Los Angeles with this Jeremy Brown guy to investigate the scene if I can get the proper clearance. How’s it coming along with the court orders for those other four autopsies?’

  ‘Still working on it,’ Templeton said, happier now that he understood the situation. ‘Should hear something back any time now. I’ll call you. Good luck.’

  Dana stepped off the kerb just in time to avoid getting run over by a beeping motorised baggage cart piloted by a bored-looking black man in his late fifties and wearing white earmuffs and a scraggly grey beard. ‘Thanks, Gary,’ she said, casting an irritated glance at the driver of the cart, who gave her a disinterested look in return. ‘I really appreciate all your help.’

  She switched off her call to Templeton. Once again she wondered if she was doing the right thing by heading off like this at Crawford’s beck and call. Then she reminded herself of Crawford’s phenomenal instinct for the tiny details that could crack a case wide open. If he thought she should go to DC then chances were he was right. Any possible clue, however small, that might lead them closer to this brutal killer had to be worth it, whatever the inconvenience to her or anyone else. She picked up the overnight bag at her feet and entered the bustling terminal. Inside, harried-looking mothers dragged small children behind them while businessmen in rumpled suits thumbed through slender copies of Fortune magazine. Bundled-up vacationers and college students wearing North Face backpacks hustled to their respective destinations with the heavy smell of Starbucks coffee hanging in the air.

  When she’d been younger – never an especially happy time in her life following the untimely deaths of her parents – Dana had nonetheless always found airports hopelessly romantic. Without fail she’d fall in love at least three times in ten minutes, wondering where certain young men were off to in such a hurry. Were they on vacation? Off to attend a business seminar in Las Vegas? Rushing to be reunited with their estranged parents, whom they hadn’t seen or spoken to in more than ten years? The possibilities were always endless, and they let Dana’s imagination run wild, giving her mind a welcome break from the cold realities of her everyday life.

  These days her everyday life seemed to consist of little more than work, work and still more work. A few months ago she’d joined a Thursday-night pottery class at the YMCA in the hopes of meeting some new people on a social level, but she’d found it hopelessly boring. She’d always enjoyed art in college, but shaping ashtrays out of clay just didn’t appeal to her all that much. Not only did she not smoke, if she had smoked she could’ve easily picked up a ten-pack of cheap plastic ashtrays at Wal-Mart for a measly five bucks. What was the fucking point? Besides, the class had been filled with people just like her – lonely women rapidly approaching middle age who seemed more interested in finding a man to take them away from the drudgery of it all than in fashioning another useless trinket out of clay to clutter up the house.

  It was forty-five minutes before Dana made it through the security line and another half-hour before she finally settled into her seat on the plane next to a middle-aged businessman wearing an immaculate blue suit and what smelled like at least two gallons of expensive cologne. Dana’s eyes watered as she tried to identify the scent. No luck.

  Ten minutes lat
er the plane raced down the runway and lifted off into the air, shooting sharp little thrills through her stomach. She looked out the window and watched Cleveland disappear behind them in a fog of grey and white.

  When they were flying at thirty thousand feet, Dana dug the morning edition of the Plain Dealer out of her overnight bag and read quickly through the grisly account of Jacinda Holloway’s brutal murder again, wondering if the Cleveland Slasher was reading the same story at this exact moment, reliving his horrible crimes over and over again in his mind. No doubt the sick bastard was getting a charge out of the coverage he was receiving. If it were the last thing she ever did in this life, Dana would shove it all down his throat and make him choke on it when she finally caught the motherfucker.

  And she would catch him. She had absolutely no doubt about that. She always caught them. From the child pornographer in southern Virginia to the gunrunners operating out of the Port of Miami to the meth-dealing motorcycle gang she’d helped bring down in Pennsylvania, she’d never not solved a case that she’d worked on, and she had absolutely no intention of ruining her perfect record over this murdering son of a bitch.

  Above all others, though, it was killers that Dana wanted the most. Nothing more than sick animals whose only motive was to hurt the innocent. Even though they might not know it as they drifted off to sleep each night in their Strawberry Shortcake nightgowns, little girls all around Cleveland were counting on people like Dana to make sure the animals didn’t hurt them too.

  In addition to her current case, she’d worked on three other notable serial-killer cases during her thirteen-year career with the Bureau. She’d cut her teeth in DC as a junior agent working on the task force assigned to tracking down John Muhammad and Lee Boyd Malvo, the serial snipers who’d perpetrated the Beltway attacks along Interstate 95 in the Washington area in 2002, leaving ten people dead and three more seriously injured. That had been when she’d first met Crawford Bell. It had been a major turning point in her career, not to mention her life. For some reason he’d taken a special interest in her professional life, taking her under his wing and teaching her everything he knew about serial killers and how they operated.

  ‘I just like your face,’ he told her once when she asked him why. ‘You remind me of my daughter.’

  Dana had winced at that, knowing that Crawford had lost a wife and daughter to murder as a young man. That loss had prompted him to join the FBI, much like her own loss had driven her to join the Bureau. The three years of requisite full-time work experience in a criminal psychologist’s office after college couldn’t pass fast enough for Dana before she’d happily bolted for the FBI. After that, it was all killers, all the time.

  When they’d finally caught up with Muhammad and Malvo, she and Crawford had worked closely on two other notable serial-killer cases during her time in DC – cases that the media inexplicably decided were unworthy of much attention. In her heart of hearts, Dana suspected she knew the reason for the lack of coverage, though. Probably because all the victims in both cases were black prostitutes, and if you didn’t have fair skin, blonde hair and blue eyes – which was to say if you weren’t white – you just didn’t get all that much ink. That was the sad reality of a press corps constantly seeking the next big sensational story to increase readership and viewership, and hence charge higher rates for advertising. Money ruled the world.

  Dana and Crawford’s professional relationship had become extremely close while they’d been working those three investigations, and their personal relationship had become even closer. Probably a little too close, to tell the truth. There was nothing physical about it, of course, but Dana eventually found herself relying on Crawford’s expertise a little too much, unable but to wonder if it was stunting her own growth as an agent.

  When Crawford had been pushed into a teaching role because of his age, Dana applied for and was granted a transfer to Cleveland. She’d wanted to spread her wings and fly on her own, and Cleveland was the place where she’d started out in this world. Maybe it would also be the place where she finally found some goddamn peace.

  She’d felt bad for Crawford when he’d been taken out of the field, of course. After all, chasing killers was what had kept him going for thirty years after the brutal murders of his wife and daughter. Still, Dana was also secretly relieved finally to step out of his enormous shadow and make a name for herself.

  She folded the newspaper back up with a sigh and tucked it into her bag before flicking through her notebook for the remainder of the flight. The businessman was preoccupied with his own work, but Dana was careful not to open the notebook too wide. She’d learned a valuable lesson when a young child had once asked her what she was reading, looking eagerly at the gruesome details scribbled across the page.

  Now she revisited the details of Jacinda Holloway’s brutal murder over and over again in her mind until she thought her head would explode. No matter how many times she went over the information, nothing was adding up. It was like one of those unsolvable maths equations that sadistic professors foisted upon their earnest students, telling them only at the end of the semester that there was no answer.

  When her plane finally touched down at Ronald Reagan International Airport two hours later, Dana caught a cab over to Quantico and headed straight for the indoor shooting range to blow off some steam. She wasn’t due to meet Crawford until a bit later – she reckoned she might as well put the time to good use. During her time stationed in DC, the shooting range had been the place to which she’d always come while working on a particularly difficult case, and this current case was rapidly shaping up to be the hardest one of her entire career.

  Twenty minutes later she was peering down the sight of her Glock-17 and squeezing off three shots in quick succession. The metallic ring of shell casings hitting the concrete floor echoed throughout the otherwise deserted shooting range for a moment, and then everything went silent once more. She paused and aimed the gun again. Three more shots rang out.

  Taking off her standard-issue yellow-tinted Wiley X shooting glasses, Dana removed her hearing protection and pressed the button to activate the pulley system that would bring the paper target to her. Fifteen seconds later she was examining the tight pattern of bullet holes in the target’s head and chest areas.

  Dana closed her eyes and wiped a line of perspiration from her forehead, picturing a face at the top of the target. A face she didn’t know at all and yet saw every day. Weird how your mind could make something you so desperately wanted to forget the only thing you could remember.

  She snapped a fresh magazine into the Glock and clipped a fresh target into place while running through the case in her mind again. Everything from finding the first dead body in a garbage dumpster behind a grocery store in September to the discovery of Jacinda Holloway’s mutilated corpse on the east side of Cleveland the previous night.

  Each of the little girls had been sexually molested, but not in a sexual way. In each instance the vaginal tearing had been caused by a foreign object. No semen – no DNA at all – had been collected from any of the bodies.

  The Cleveland Slasher was a very careful man; that much was clear. And unlike some of the other killers that Dana had come across in the past, he obviously had zero interest in getting caught.

  The lack of DNA on the bodies didn’t necessarily mean he wasn’t getting a sexual charge out of the murders, though. Most serial killers got their pleasure out of the feeling of control they exerted over their victims, not from the sexual act itself.

  Still, how was he not leaving any trace of himself behind at the scenes? It was almost impossible not to do so in this age of advanced forensics.

  Unless, of course, you happened to know exactly what the authorities would be looking for. Of course, anyone could claim to be an expert these days with all the TV shows and books on the subject but this killer knew all the extra little details that only someone closer to an actual case could know. Either that or he was very smart indeed.

&n
bsp; Dana’s heartbeat quickened as a thought occurred to her. It was unlikely that anyone would be so audacious but she made a mental note to have background checks run on everybody who’d been involved in processing the crime scenes up to this point. She berated herself for not thinking of it earlier. If Crawford had taught her anything it was to not leave anything out. However fanciful or unlikely something might seem, sometimes that was where the truth could lie. She couldn’t afford to ignore any thought or hunch, however random. Not when people’s lives depended on her doing her job properly.

  When the fresh target was in place fifty feet away, she quickly riddled it with bullets again. This time they all went to the head.

  Ten minutes later Dana exited the shooting range and made her away across campus to the packed lecture hall. It was as if she’d never been away – everything was so familiar. Inside, close to a hundred students were listening to Crawford Bell explain the bizarre circumstances that had surrounded the case of a notorious serial killer known as ‘Don Juan’.

  It was the same lecture he gave to all students, of course, but Dana was always amazed at his ability to bring a fresh slant to each lecture he gave, the way he was always able to make things sound new and interesting again. No wonder the man was a New York Times best-selling author five times over. The guy was good. Captured the bad guys like Eliot Ness and then wrote about it like Truman Capote. A pretty potent combination, to say the least.

  She watched him from the back of the hall. He hadn’t changed in the months since she’d last seen him – physically, anyway – but there was something different about him. It was probably only visible to her because she knew him so well, or thought she did, but she detected a slightly distracted look in his eyes, his demeanour. And then it was gone. Perhaps she’d imagined it.

  Crawford ended his lecture five minutes later and dismissed the class with a quick wave of his hand, which caused the simple gold wedding band on his left ring finger to flash in the bright overhead lights. Crawford might have been a widower for more than thirty years now, but the ring had never left his finger once. Dana’s mentor and former partner might have been a lot of different things to a lot of different people, but unfaithful sure wasn’t one of them.