I heard a match strike. An expulsion of breath.
“Why kill Pomerleau?” Ryan asked. “And why shift to Charlotte?”
“Better climate?” I didn’t believe it.
“Then why the delay? Why go to New Hampshire, then West Virginia?”
“Ajax needed time to rebrand himself.”
“Maybe.”
“Pomerleau probably told him about Montreal. About my role in bringing her down. Maybe that excited him. It’s not uncommon for serial killers to try to up the ante.”
“Increase the danger, increase the thrill.”
“The danger being me.”
We both considered whether that had legs.
“How about this,” Ryan said. “Ajax wants to be arrested. He loathes what he’s doing but can’t stop himself.”
“Subconsciously, he wants me to catch him?”
“While consciously, he tries to avoid it.”
“Hmm.”
The voices exploded into a frenzy.
“Who scored?”
“Desharnais.”
“Why would Ajax, or anyone, continue to strike on dates significant to Pomerleau?”
“He’s taken over her compulsion? Or maybe, unknowingly, he’s sending out a clue.”
“A clue I would understand.”
“That plays.”
“And the next date comes in less than six weeks.”
CHAPTER 32
LITTLE HAPPENED OVER the next forty-eight hours.
Turned out Ajax couldn’t reconstruct his movements on the day in 2007 when Nellie Gower disappeared. He was in New Hampshire by then, but the clinic’s pay records didn’t reflect exact dates worked, and it didn’t keep schedules going that far back. Neither did the doctor.
As in Charlotte, Ajax had lived alone, in a rental home on the edge of Manchester. He ventured out only to work, shop, and run errands, never socially. He did not attend church. He had no colleague with whom he was close, no friend or neighbor with whom he discussed gardening or sports. No one to contact to help jog his memory.
Ajax claimed to be at the hospital or at home on the dates Koseluk and Estrada went missing. Tinker worked on verifying his hours with Mercy. Talked to people there.
Ajax’s lawyer refused access to phone, credit card, and bank records. Tinker started the process to obtain warrants.
Leal was a different story. Ajax knew exactly where he was the Friday she was abducted.
November 21 was a rare day off. That afternoon he shopped at the Morrocroft Village Harris Teeter, then at a Walmart on Pineville-Matthews Road. Filled and washed his car at a service station one block up.
That evening he ate dinner at home, then went solo to see a film at the Manor Theatre. Unfortunately for him, he’d used no credit card, kept no receipt, no ticket stub.
Slidell showed Ajax’s photo to employees at the stores, gas station, and theater and requested surveillance video for the day in question. Began viewing it.
Barrow continued with video taken from locations Leal had frequented in the months before her death. Phoned out to Oklahoma. Learned Ajax’s wife and daughters had moved back to India.
Rodas floated Ajax’s picture in Hardwick and St. Johnsbury. No one recognized him. The man who serviced the furnace at the Corneau farm said he’d been too far away to see the guy’s face.
Tuesday morning the IT tech phoned Slidell. He’d found a visitor to the dysmenorrhea chat room he thought might be of interest. Ham-Lover. Ham. Hamet. Slidell told him to do what it took to identify the user.
Tuesday afternoon, under increasing pressure from the media, the CMPD press office agreed to a news conference. It took place in the courtyard outside the LEC. Under a sunny sky, Salter and Tinker fielded queries on the Leal homicide. Gave no real answers. Didn’t mention Lizzie Nance or the other girls. Didn’t mention Hamet Ajax.