Since he’d arrested Audrey. His first mistake in a litany of them.
The instant he’d felt that ridiculous pull he should have uncuffed Audrey Larue and let her go. Instead, he’d followed his cock and wound up sorry for it. What man didn’t?
Back then he’d still been on patrol. Audrey had been selling jewelry in Jackson Square. He’d arrested her for carrying concealed. In Louisiana, one could carry openly without a permit. However, as Audrey had pointed out—
“Tourists get hinky if they see a gun.”
When he’d asked why, then, she had one, her reply made sense too. “Too many hinky tourists.”
He’d had to take her in; there’d been a complaint. But the charge wasn’t serious. In a city like New Orleans where most crimes were, a concealed weapon on a street vendor just wasn’t. He advised her to get that permit. They got talking about how and the next thing he knew, he was driving her home.
Audrey had been stunning. Tall and built, with long red hair and ridiculously green eyes. Not a freckle on her face, but elsewhere … there’d been a lot of them. He’d found out just how many the very first night. He moved in a week later. Moved out a year after that.
The problem with Audrey was she lied. She was selling a lot more than jewelry in her stall. And what she was selling, she also smoked, shot, snorted, and swallowed.
Because of her, he’d developed a sixth sense for untruths. Sometimes he thought he could almost smell them, like a distant, raging fire. That sense had helped him become a detective. But it hadn’t helped him become a better father.
Because of him, his daughter had died.
Bobby went inside, fell on his bed, and watched the spindly shadows of tree branches play across the ceiling. He dozed on and off; however, thoughts of Audrey and their little girl had never made a good bedtime story. He finally gave up trying to sleep as dawn seeped into the sky. He checked his e-mail and found one from Dr. Christiansen asking both him and the chief to meet in his office first thing.
As Bobby had learned, first thing in New Bergin meant Oh God thirty, so he showered, shaved, and left before either of the Larsens stirred.
His breath streamed out as white as the frost sprinkling the grass. An October dawn in northern Wisconsin was freaking cold. Luckily his rental car had a fabulous invention called heated seats, something he’d never had a need for at home and therefore had not known existed. With a toasty backside, his shivering stopped before he reached the main road back to town.
He bought coffee at the Perk-o-Latte, three doors from the funeral home, and walked in the front door as the chief came in from the station. A nod was all they exchanged as they descended to the doctor’s lair.
“Whaddya got, Doc?” the chief asked.
The maniac lay on the table, all of the holes Bobby had put in him, as well as the ones Christiansen had, sewn or plugged. Bobby did not want to know with what.
The dead man was big enough that he could have doubled for Frankenstein’s monster. The jagged scars and the Cro Magnon brow only added to the image. Even lying there dead, he gave Bobby the creepies.
“Cause of death, bullet to the heart.” Christiansen glanced at Bobby. “Nice shot.”
“I do my best.” He’d learned long ago that if he needed to shoot, he’d better make it count or not bother at all. “Tell me something good.”
“I think you’re gonna like this. Anne McKenna’s blood is on the blade.”
No big surprise there. Two meat-cleaver maniacs in one small town would be something out of a horror novel. Though lately Bobby had started to wonder if he’d stepped into one. To get out, he needed answers.
“Any idea who he is?”
“No ID.” The chief took over. “But most murderers avoid carrying their wallets. However, it’s difficult to walk around without their fingerprints.”
Bobby perked up. “He’s got a record?”
“He hauls hazardous waste.” The chief shrugged. “A lot of jobs require fingerprints now and that’s one of them.”
“What does hazardous waste have to do with anything?”
“No idea.” The chief removed a small notebook from his pocket, flipped it open. “Karl Wellsprung, from Ohio. As far as I know he’s never been to Wisconsin, though we don’t check folks at the border. The feds are interviewing his wife. Maybe they’ll uncover something, but right now it appears as though he slipped a gear and went on a killing spree.”
“Randomly choosing New Bergin by pinning the tail on the donkey map?” Bobby asked.
“You got a better explanation?”
“The ring brought me here, linked this murder to others.” He glanced at the doctor. “I don’t suppose you got anything off that.”
“The FBI wanted it.” Bobby cursed, and Christiansen lifted his hands in surrender. “I took a gander at it before I sent it to them. Seemed to me like the guy had cleaned it pretty well. Smelled like bleach. Feds will have a better chance of getting something off it than I would.”