It was too easy.
While the police focused on his house, he’d simply hidden in a house down the street. The owners had asked him to feed the dog while they were on vacation. He liked dogs and the home provided the perfect foil to avoid the police and watch as they surrounded his home. He’d even parked his car in the neighbor’s garage.
Thank goodness, his mother had cared enough to call and warn him.
She’d hesitated on the phone, uncertain she was doing the right thing. He’d cajoled as usual, lying about his involvement, claimed the police were trying to pin things on him because he was Dave’s brother. He’d convinced her he would talk to the police and straighten it out.
So gullible. All women were.
Even the untouchable Dr. Campbell.
She hadn’t blinked when he rushed up to the truck, saying Detective Callahan wanted her out of the street, out of harm’s way, and in the safe house. The police at the roadblock had been distracted with the events down the street. They weren’t watching behind them and didn’t see Lacey get out of the truck and cross to the house. He’d seen the flicker of recognition spark. She’d known him from somewhere, but couldn’t place him. He’d worn a navy blue ball cap and windbreaker. Generic police-looking enough. She’d probably thought she’d seen him with the detectives. The momentary confusion had her following him silently as she tried to place his face.
As the two of them stepped through the door, and he laid his hand at the small of her back, she’d known.
He’d felt her twitch the second comprehension dawned. By then it was too late; she was in the house. He’d simply followed the same routine as with the Harper woman. Cloth over the face, make them inhale, and then into his car.
This one had fought. Fought like a furious little cat. She’d knocked two pictures off the wall and broke some sort of Chinese figurine. She’d used teeth, fingernails, and feet to fight him. He gently touched his face. He’d have a scratch on his cheek and bite mark on his arm for a week. Bitch.
The police hadn’t glanced his way as he backed out of the garage and drove off. The snow in the street in front of the house had been flattened and messed up by police vehicles and boots. His tracks were indistinguishable.
He downed his coffee and scanned the main room of the cabin. He needed to prepare. Since the police had tracked him to one house, it wouldn’t be long before they traced him here, just as he needed them to. Out here in the center of the forest, he was alone. He’d always loved this ramshackle cabin as a kid. He and Dave had spent months here during the hunting seasons. Both animal and human. This was the place where his brother had initiated him into his private, twisted world. He’d felt flattered. Together, the two of them had dug out a cellar, lined it with concrete, and built a heavy door for locking up their women.
He’d realized then his brother was sloppy and careless with his women. No finesse. Dave never concerned himself with technique. Dave simply got the job done.
He’d realized the kill could be so much more. An opportunity to enjoy the chase and relish the power. And develop a signature. The broken femurs. It’d been his idea to break the femurs on the girls Dave took and he’d carried it on with his own kills. Not only was it an incapacitating move, but the femur was the longest bone in the body, one of the strongest bones. To him it was a symbolic gesture of his power over the victim. With his more recent kills, adding the signature of using something close to the victim was unique and distinguished him from the sloppier killers. It showed he’d studied his vics and used some careful reflection. He smiled behind his coffee cup. He’d spent years getting it perfect. The recent three victims had been works of art.
He regretted pushing the Mount Junction girl into the river with her car. She’d been his first kill without Dave’s involvement, and he’d worried about trace evidence. So he’d disposed of the girl, covering his tracks. In Southeast Oregon he hadn’t had a remote place where he could keep someone for a few days. He’d had to get rid of her immediately, but least he’d been able to leave his signature with the femurs. No one had recognized it until lately. That reporter from The Oregonian had put the pieces together. It was a relief somewhat. He’d wanted credit for his work but hadn’t known how to publicize it without exposing himself. Thank you, Mr. Brody.
He opened a kitchen cupboard and pulled a photo album off the top shelf, gently flipping the pages. The pictures were starting to discolor a bit. His favorite pictures were curling at the corners from his excessive handling over the years. It was one of those albums with the slightly sticky pages to hold the photos, but the stickiness was long gone. He’d had to add glue and tape to make the photos stick.
He twisted his lips as he studied a photo of Amy Smith on the beam. He still wasn’t certain why he’d stolen it so long ago. He’d broken into the gymnast’s apartment expecting to find her home, but the place had been empty. He’d been furious; he’d wanted her with a soul-deep longing. He’d spotted her on a billboard along the highway in Mount Junction, and had been hooked by the come-hither pose. He’d started following the gymnasts, trying to place a name with her face, find out where she lived. He finally did and she wasn’t home. So he’d snooped through her things, fascinated with the trivia of a college girl’s life. Posters of rock bands, cheap stuffed animals from fairs, clothes, clothes, and clothes. The album had been lying on her bed, half-finished. After flipping through the pictures he’d known he had to keep it.
He’d memorized the pictures of Amy, Suzanne, and Lacey until he nearly believed they were his pictures. His friends who laughed and panned for the camera. Tight, revealing leotards, amazing feats of balance and flexibility. His fascination for gymnasts had been locked in from that moment. A few years later he’d visited Dave in Oregon, timing it with Southeast Oregon University’s appearance at the gymnastic invitational in Corvallis. He’d shown his brother the pictures, suggested a gymnast be their next victim, and his brother had agreed. The result was Suzanne.
Almost Lacey.
His eyes ran a hand down a rough wall of his hidden nest. No running water, a simple stove for heat and cooking, and silence. Here he felt connected with nature, living the life of a settler from two hundred years ago. Hunting, trapping. He pointedly ignored the generator, grocery store firewood, propane lamps, and can opener.
The police had never connected this place to his brother. Originally it’d belonged to an acquaintance of his mother’s who’d let the two boys use it whenever they’d wanted. Years ago, he’d convinced the old man to sell it; after all, he never used it. The two brothers were the only ones who’d stepped foot in it for twenty years.
Now it was his. His mother had moved him from western state to western state, searching for a job or men to mooch from. He’d ached for a place to put down roots. That’s what the cabin was. Where he was rooted.
Sometimes it was lonely. He missed his brother, their discussions on bondage, sex slaves, and weapons. When he’d found out his brother was going to die in prison, he’d funneled his anger into planning revenge on those who put him there. The cabin was where he’d created his perfect plan.
Dave didn’t breathe a word about his brother’s involvement in the college girls’ deaths. He’d kept quiet on Suzanne’s fate to the police, because she was his special project, not Dave’s. When he was fifteen, he’d been toying with the idea of having a sex slave. Someone who was ready whenever he wanted her and then disappeared when he was finished. He’d been a frustrated teen. Girls didn’t want anything to do with him and he’d started to doubt that he’d ever have sex. Dave had said a sex slave wouldn’t work, but he’d still wanted to try. They’d tapped into an online newsletter for people in the sex slave trade, studied their habits, the dos and don’ts. He’d wanted to keep Suzanne for himself forever. All that gorgeous hair and spunk.
His hands tightened into fists as his groin hardened.
It hadn’t worked. His big brother had been right. Suzanne had too big a mouth and got on his nerves, fighting him every step of the way. When he’d realized Suzanne was pregnant, he’d been surprised by his desire for a real family. Mommy, daddy, and baby. But Suzanne wasn’t docile enough. He’d picked the wrong type of woman. After the baby was born, he’d finished her and buried her deep in the forest. Dave had always left their victims to be found. He’d wanted to keep Suzanne for himself in death if he couldn’t have her in life.
His thoughts drifted to Lacey, snug and silent in the cabin cellar. Would things have been different if his brother had caught Lacey instead of Suzanne? Would she have driven him to kill her like Suzanne? Or would they be a family today?
Questions. Questions. He knew better than to play the what-if game.
He’d injected Lacey on the drive from Molalla, knowing the original inhalant wouldn’t last long. At least Lacey had been easier to move than the Harper woman. Lacey couldn’t weigh more than a hundred pounds.
He flopped into a ripped easy chair, slouching, and pictured Melody Harper. What a waste to leave her behind, but she’d served her purpose as bait. Harper and Lacey had come out of hiding as if he’d called them on the phone. Just like he knew they would. Perfect planning.
It would have been nice to follow through on some of the interesting scenarios he’d dreamed up for Melody. He liked her name. Melody. It turned his mind to musical things. Piano and guitar strings, violin bows and drumsticks. He liked to stick to a theme. It got his creative juices flowing.
He heard humming.
Annoyed, he abruptly stood and threw two perfectly cut pieces of wood on the fire. He took a moment on one knee, watching the red and yellow flames attack the new fuel. Beginnings and endings.
He was nearly done. It felt like he’d put his plan in motion long ago. He’d carefully recovered Suzanne’s bones from her burial site and then hid them and the cop’s badge in a hole beneath the apartment building. Not everything had flowed exactly as planned, but he was still on schedule and sitting exactly where he’d foreseen he’d be at the end.
He was as far as he’d get on his list of five targets. Three dead, one waiting in the cellar, and one unknown. If only he’d figured out who the fifth person was. The one who’d given Dave AIDS. He would’ve offed the fag. He had to settle for assuming the fag would slowly die of the disease. Maybe he was already dead.
He closed his eyes. Today was the tenth anniversary of Dave’s sentencing. An echo of the pain from when the judge slammed his gavel and sent his brother to his death rattled through him.
The cop, the two lawyers, and the witness. Too bad the judge already was dead. Emphysema. It was a hellish disease to die from, gasping for every breath as the lungs failed and the body screamed for oxygen. Good.
He’d considered adding Jack Harper and Michael Brody to his list. They’d interfered substantially along his chosen path, wreaking havoc here and there. It wasn’t reason enough for their deaths. Brody had efficiently covered his quest. Robert had loved reading about his own exploits and the police’s confusion. Harper had raised the stakes, made things more challenging, and he’d appreciated the competition. He’d known Harper owned that apartment building. He’d chosen that site specifically to muddle the investigation, because it belonged to a former suspect in the Co-Ed killings. He leaned on a hand against the mantel of the fireplace, scowling. He hadn’t dreamed his actions would push Harper and Lacey Campbell into bed.
Kelly Cates had been an unexpected kink in his path. He pressed his lips together. Maybe she’d been scared by the murders in the paper and hid. After all, she was linked to the original Co-Ed Slayer case in her own fucked-up way.
She had a good reason to be nervous.