Or a rendition of the same and then slam the phone.
One prisoner had been interested in talking. From his breathy voice and overuse of the word “fabulous,” Mason had inferred the man was a flamer with a major crush on DeCosta. He’d blathered on and on how he’d admired the man and how ecstatic he’d been when they were assigned as cellmates. Dramatic sorrow had filled the flamer’s voice as he related how DeCosta had ignored his advances. Then he’d continued in a much cheerier tone to describe his current boyfriend’s finer points in descriptive details that made Mason flush and feel like he’d rolled in mud.
Overall, the call had given Mason nothing except a desperate need to exercise his heterosexuality. He’d taken a break and dashed down the block to flirt with the baristas at Starbucks. Now back to work and sipping on a venti coffee, he felt cleansed.
Mason eyed a fax from a buddy, Special Agent Jeff Hines, at the Portland FBI office. He’d put in a request for some profiling help on their killer, but the office was backed up and terrorism was number one on their priority list. They couldn’t get anyone to him for a month or so.
Mason couldn’t wait that long.
As a favor, Jeff had taken a quick look at their two recent cases and gave a general categorization of their killer as “organized.” Meaning their killer was of good intelligence, socially competent, and planned the murders carefully. Jeff thought he was possibly highly intelligent with a masculine image. He was possibly charismatic, controlled his emotions during the crime, and probably had a high interest in the media response to the crime. This was in contrast to a “disorganized” serial killer who spontaneously carried out killings with sudden violence and a below-average intelligence.
This was supposed to help? Mason crumpled up the fax.
How about an address for the bastard?
Ray slid into his desk chair and laid his forehead on the closest stack of paperwork. His tie was shoved in a jacket pocket and his cuffs stained with ink. Apparently his search wasn’t going any smoother. Mason had given him the shit task of finding the people he hadn’t located right off the bat. It entailed a lot of online searching of public records and frustrating busywork, but Ray was more computer savvy than he was. Mason was lucky if he could check his e-mail.
“I can’t find his family.” Ray’s voice was muffled by the stack of arrest records.
“What do you mean?
“They seemed to have vanished out of Oregon and off the planet.” Ray lifted his head and Mason cringed at his bloodshot eyes. They looked like a road map. Too much time staring at the computer screen.
Mason thought on the family for a minute. “You checked death records?”
The look Ray shot him stated Mason was an idiot. “Of course. First thing. Why wouldn’t I?”
Mason shrugged. “Just checking.” He flipped to the copy of DeCosta’s birth certificate in his binder.
Dave DeCosta’s birth certificate was blank where the father’s name should be.
Mason was positive that DeCosta wasn’t the result of an immaculate conception.
The blank space usually meant the mother wasn’t sure who the father was, hated the jerk, or the bastard had cleared out before the birth. It created a big hole on the paternity side of Ray’s hunting list where uncles or grandparents would usually be. “The family’s got to be somewhere.”
“All dead on the mother’s side. She was an only child.” Ray raised a brow and said succinctly, “I found the death records of her parents.” Mason made no comment and Ray went on. “I’ve talked with some neighbors. They don’t remember much.”
“She probably remarried and changed her name.” Mason was grabbing at straws. The mother had been an insecure clinger who never looked anyone in the eye and mumbled when she talked. She had always clung to the arm of the closest cop. She’d driven the task force crazy. Mason doubted any man would decide to marry her. Unless a man wanted a woman who looked like the world had chewed her up, spit her out, and kicked out her teeth. All of them.
Lack of teeth was a big turnoff to him.
“If she remarried, she didn’t do it legally. I keep hitting dead ends in that area too.”
The relatives of Dave DeCosta didn’t even come close to the sketchy profile from the FBI. Charismatic? Socially confident?
Churning these facts in his mind, Mason unscrewed his pen, separated the pieces and then reassembled them. His fingers needed to keep moving. “What’d you find out about Suzanne Mills’s ring?”
Ray consulted his notebook of bird tracks. “Her mother says it definitely looks like Mills’s ring. She had no idea what happened to it after her daughter vanished. She never saw it again and had assumed Suzanne was wearing it at the time.” He flipped a page. “No fingerprints on the ring other than partials of Dr. Campbell’s. Oh, and Dr. Campbell says she can’t find her own ring from that championship year. She’s wondering if someone stole her ring out of her home.” Ray sighed. “Dr. Campbell has no idea when it could have disappeared. She hasn’t worn the ring in years.”
Mason rubbed the back of his neck. Two rings. What a mess.
Ray grabbed at his cell as it vibrated across his desk. “Lusco.” He paused. “You’re absolutely sure?” Ray flipped to a clean page in his notebook and covered the mouthpiece, looking at Mason through strained eyes.
“He’s killed another one.”
Police cars jam-packed Barrington Drive. No civilian cars had been allowed into the upscale neighborhood. He surveyed the scene, standing with the group of neighbors and reporters who crowded as close as possible to the yellow crime scene tape. A blue uniform dotted the tape every six feet. How many police did you need when the victim was already dead?
He tucked away his grin. It was the notoriety of the murder that was bringing cops out of the woodwork. Where were they when the victim screamed for two hours straight?
Only murder would keep spectators out on the street in this icy weather. He shivered. Occasional flurries dropped from the gray sky, but mainly the wind pelted and froze the crowd.
He turned to the older woman next to him who wore a red Trail Blazers stocking cap. She was tall and bent with age, but animation filled her narrow face as she scanned the street. She yapped on her cell phone, gushing in amazement that a murder had happened across the street.
“Did you know the deceased?” He liked the word deceased. It sounded professional. According to the phony badge clipped to his coat, he was Jeff Thomas and worked for the Portland Tribune weekly newspaper. He gave her a warm smile.
She frowned at his question, annoyed at the interruption, but she glanced at his credentials, his ready pen and notepad. Her eyes grew greedy and she thawed under his interested gaze.
“Gotta go, Shirl. The press wants to talk to me.” She slipped the phone in the pocket of the velvet bathrobe she wore beneath her bulky ski jacket and gave him her full attention.
“Did you know Richard Buck?” He repeated the question and watched the woman’s eyes sparkle with the need to gossip. What a nice guy. Someone should give him a medal for making the senior’s day.
“Of course I did. I’ve lived across the street from him for years.” She pointed at her mini-mansion with the seven birdbaths spotting the front yard. He blinked as he noticed each one had the snow cleaned out and had been filled with fresh water. How’d she keep the water from freezing? Brightly colored bird feeders dangled from every branch of her birch trees.
She noticed his stare. “Someone’s gotta feed the birds when it snows. They don’t all fly south for the winter, you know,” she said sharply.
He doubted she took the feeders down in the summer.
Her ritzy neighbors must love her. The homeowners’ association apparently forgot to add a clause about bird feeders and bad taste.
He turned back to her and showed his perfect teeth. “That’s very kind of you. Did you hear or see anything unusual in the last twelve hours?”
“Twelve hours ago? Is that when it happened?”
He caught his breath at the slip. “I overheard a cop mention the time frame.” He shrugged a shoulder. “I don’t know how accurate it is.” Yes, he did.
“Nope, didn’t hear a thing. Did see the UPS man ring the bell early this morning. He dropped off that package and left.” She pointed across the street at the cops swarming the mansion. The UPS box still sat near the door. Nearby, two detectives were having a heated discussion, gesturing at the box, their faces tense.
He remembered hearing the doorbell ring. It’d startled him for the briefest moment. He’d peeked through the upstairs blinds and seen the familiar brown truck, its driver jogging back to his vehicle in the icy cold. He’d finished his work and slipped out of the house minutes later.
His source kept talking. “Buck worked on some big cases over the years. He defended that serial killer down in Corvallis. You know, the one who killed all those college girls. He did a good job in that one. Got that murdering ass dumped in prison.” She cackled.
He took a second look at the two arguing detectives and recognized them from the previous body discoveries. He made a mental note to get their names and send them a gift for all their hard work. That’s what a good citizen would do. The police were vastly underappreciated.
“They say Buck’s legs were broken. Just like that old cop the other day and the other murdered lawyer from that same serial killer case.” She leaned close and whispered, eyes darting about to check for eavesdroppers. “Somebody’s taking revenge for putting that killer in prison.” She nodded emphatically.
“Yes, that’s what I’m starting to think too.” How had the broken legs information spread so fast? As far as he could tell, the police weren’t divulging a word about the body to the crowd on the street, but gory details had a way of jumping from mouth to ear.
His chest puffed out and he straightened his back. This was perfect. Exactly what he’d planned. The public was getting sucked in and the police were clueless. He wondered when the fishing supplies would become part of the public’s knowledge.
Hard to kill someone with a fishing rod, but he liked to use something close to the victim, something that reflected their livelihood or favorite hobby. He’d done the best he could with the rod and tried to be creative with the fishhooks. Earlier he’d seen three green-faced cops stumble out the front door and heave in the bushes, so he figured he’d done pretty well. He eyed the detectives on the porch who were still gesturing at the box. They probably thought it was a bomb.
Hmmm. He hadn’t fiddled with packaged explosives in a long time. At one time he’d been fascinated with them. Mix a few things together, package it just right, and KABOOM. What a rush. Stumps, mailboxes, and even a couple of cats had been victims of his exploding experiments. As he remembered his last explosives victim, his gut churned woozily.
It had been that teenage bitch’s fault. The one who’d laughed in his face in high school when he’d offered to help her with a science project. He’d known she was failing the course and thought she’d be grateful for help from the class genius. How wrong he’d been. She’d recoiled from him like she feared catching his nerdiness. Then she’d laughed at him. And told her friends, who laughed. High school sluts. They always were strutting around, flashing hints of their bras and panties through their clothing, and then they’d snub and scorn anyone caught by their trampy lures.
He’d planted the explosive on her front porch. It’d been a work of art. He’d been so proud of it and he’d spent hours meticulously putting it together. The goal had been to pay her back for the laughter, scare her a little, that’s all. He hadn’t known the house would catch fire and her baby sister would die. The slut never came back to school. The rumors said her parents had moved as far away as possible from the memories. Kids at school had whispered behind their hands and given him a wide berth for months afterward. Some had known he experimented with explosives. All knew she’d humiliated him.
Many times he’d visited the tiny grave and stood there uncomfortably, feet shifting, staring at the small headstone, wondering if the baby had suffered. The guilt had surprised him. Back then, he hadn’t known he had a soft spot for babies.
“Do you know Tony McDaniels?”
He’d forgotten the old woman and jerked his head back toward her. “Who?”
Her eyes glanced at his badge again and narrowed. The neurons in that brain were sharper than he’d given her credit for. “Tony McDaniels. He writes sports for the Tribune. He’s my grandnephew.”
“Ohh. That Tony. Of course. I’ll tell him we met.” He glanced at his watch. “I need to get going. Thanks for your help.” Bits of tingling stress touched the base of his spine. He had to get away before she whipped out her cell and called her grandnephew to tell him she’d met Jeff Thomas. He took two steps backward and spun around.
“My name’s Evelyn Wakefield,” she hollered after him, shouting out the spelling of her last name.
Not turning back, he raised a hand in acknowledgment, hoping no one was paying attention to his hasty exit down the sidewalk. Was he was moving too fast? He slowed down to pretend to write some notes, looking from the house to his notebook a few times like he was writing a description. He noticed one of the detectives glance his way and then turn back to the package.
He’d pushed his luck. Why’d he detour from the original plan? Stupid, stupid, stupid.
The urge to see the aftermath had been too strong. The power still tingled in his fingers. Seeing the cops confused and the crowd excited. He’d done that. Everyone wanted to know who he was.
He stopped and exhaled deeply, eradicating the poisonous pride from his system. He had to exercise better control if he was going to succeed.
He wouldn’t make a mistake again.
Against his better judgment, Mason had decided to open the package on the site. The bomb squad had x-rayed it and cleared it, and he’d waited until someone who knew what they were doing showed up. He watched the woman photograph, dust the shiny tape, take trace evidence, and then carefully open the box. The UPS label was addressed to the victim. The return address was a PO box in Portland.
He and Lusco had argued about opening it. Lusco had wanted to take it back to the lab. Mason wanted it open here and now. The crime scene tech didn’t want to open it at the scene either, but Mason overruled her. The slaying inside the mansion had shown all the same characteristics of Trenton’s and Cochran’s murder scenes, except for one: a physical connection to a previous crime.
Their guy liked to leave things behind. Trenton’s badge at the Mills scene. Trenton’s hair at the Cochran scene. Even the video on Dr. Campbell’s porch and the ring in her lab coat.
All Mason’s senses screamed to rip open the box. He shifted weight from one foot to the other and repeated the movement. Lusco shot him an odd look, probably wondering if he needed to use the john. Mason stopped and twisted his fists inside his overcoat pockets. His breath steamed in the air.
What the hell was going on? This was looking like the third murder related to that damned serial killer DeCosta. Someone was definitely making a point. The broken femurs on each body were deliberately telling the police that the same person was murdering each man.
Had they put away the wrong man back then? Missed an accomplice? And who was next?
The questions were starting to haunt him in his sleep. He clenched his teeth. The little dentist could be next. She’d played a big role in putting DeCosta away. Thank God the presiding trial judge, Stanley Williams, had died a few years ago. At least that was one less person to worry about.
They’d warned Richard Buck two days ago. Suggested he take a vacation or get out of town for a few days. Just like they’d warned Dr. Campbell. But Buck had been in the middle of an important trial. He’d laughed at Mason’s suggestion that someone else finish the trial.
Mason bet Buck believed him now.
Finally. The package was coming open. God, she was slow! He ducked his head and flexed his hands. The tech was doing her job and she was doing it right. But damn it, he knew there was something in there.
Several of the neighbors had told the police they’d seen the UPS truck. They’d all thought it looked legit, not fishy at all. The delivery would be easy enough to check on. The company was so computerized, they knew where everything was and when. Mason knew it would check out as a normal delivery, but the return address would be bogus—the package dropped off at a mailing center.
He bent and peered over the tech’s shoulder. And felt no surprise at the sight. There was a baggie of hair that he knew would belong to Joseph Cochran, but in the baggie something gold glinted. The tech lifted the bag to eye level with long tweezers.
Mason stared at the gold ring inside the plastic and felt his heart stop. He knew the ring would have Dr. Campbell’s initials. Another connection.
Shit.
Pulling out his cell phone, he whirled to the uniform on the porch and pointed. “Get a patrol car over to Dr. Campbell’s house. Have him check on her, plant his ass in front of her house, and not move until we get there.” He glanced up at the defense attorney’s gigantic home as his phone speed-dialed Dr. Campbell. “Tell him we’re going to be a while.”