The Stranger You Seek

21





It was an odd feeling cleaning Charlie’s blood off my floor. Sweet Charlie, the guy who brings me presents in a baseball cap. My goofy friend Charlie.

Neil helped scoop him up and agreed to drive him home, wherever home was. I felt a pang of guilt. I’d nearly broken the man’s nose and I didn’t even know where he lived. We all had the idea he was on some kind of assistance, but I’m not sure why. God, what would I do about Charlie now? He’d been my friend. He was part of our weird group. I had never ever had a moment’s pause about being alone with him. So this was Charlie off his meds? It was going to change everything between us. What had happened to his brain in that accident? Who was he before that truck ran him down in the street, before all the surgeries and the lost job and the lost family? I made a mental note to speak with Neil about getting ahold of Charlie’s medical records. Apparently, confidential files weren’t all that hard to come by. After all, mine had just been aired out in vivid detail on Channel 11. Suddenly I wanted to understand more about what had happened to Charlie. We all loved him in our own way. I wanted to believe it really was just his medication.

The door opened and Rauser walked in. “I gotta eat,” he announced. “And we need to talk. Look, Keye, I know you’re pissed off, but just so you know, I argued for you to stay on the case. This was not my choice. You gotta cut me some slack here.”

I was silent.

“Want to blow this joint and grab some Chinese food?” He grinned at me. “Ever hear of it?”

“We just call it food,” I said.

He wrapped an arm around my shoulders. “If that joke wasn’t so old and lame, I’d laugh,” he said, and laughed anyway. “How you feeling? Hell of a f*cked-up week, huh?”

A shadow in the open door drew my attention. Jacob Dobbs was standing there. He looked like someone had pooped in his Cheerios.

“Oh joy. It’s the Prince of Darkness.” My blood pressure started a series of wind sprints. Let it go, I told myself. Hatred is unhealthy.

Rauser snickered, and Dobbs said, his eyes on me, “Professional and charming as ever, I see.”

“We were just on our way out,” Rauser replied coolly. I didn’t think Dobbs had done himself any good with Rauser when he’d arrived in town and put on a press conference before even discussing the murders with the department investigating them. I had hated seeing Dobbs on those steps too, the pompous bastard, but the press conference had been brilliant in design. Dobbs understood that giving that conference on the courthouse steps sent a message to the killer. I know where you’re hunting now. I’m coming after you. And it would make all kinds of subliminal connections with the families of the victims—safety, protection, authority.

Dobbs ignored Rauser. “Nice place,” he said of the old warehouse that had been converted into a modern loft. “If you like concrete. Really pulled yourself back up by the bootstraps, I see. Well, except for all the unfortunate media coverage.”

“What can I do for you, Jacob?” I’d pinched my face into a tight smile. I thought I might be developing a twitch.

“I’d have thought you’d be expecting me. I did say I’d like your notes and any other information that might be in your possession relevant to the Wishbone case.” He removed his suit coat and draped it tenderly over the back of Neil’s desk chair.

Rauser threw up his hands. “You got anything in your fridge? I’m starved.”

Dobbs followed Rauser to the kitchen. “Good idea, actually. I’m famished.” He rolled his shirtsleeves up while Rauser and I rummaged through the refrigerator. “It’s this business of the letter being sent to you,” he continued. “I don’t like the idea of you being pulled back in.”

I bet you don’t.

“And I’d like to know,” Dobbs went on with a wafer-thin smile, “why this offender attempted to communicate with you. Is it merely that you are accessible and involved in the investigation and therefore fair game? Or did you offer some encouragement? You must have felt … disregarded after you were fired.” He paused, then added, “Again.”

“Encouragement?”

“You’ve had no other communication with this murderer? No letters before this email you allegedly received from him?”

“That’s ridiculous and you know it.” My temper spiked. I slapped cheese and lettuce on bread, squeezed on mustard, and dropped it unceremoniously on a plate in front of Dobbs.

“He sent roses to the hospital,” Rauser added, and described the card.

“Florist?” Jacob asked.

Rauser nodded. “Florist found an envelope with written instructions and a cash payment when they opened yesterday morning. So they delivered the roses. We got the envelope, but it’s clean.”

Dobbs turned his attention back to me. “Roses too? An email, a tire adjustment, and now roses. Fascinating. Anything else you’d like to tell us? You wouldn’t actually obstruct, would you?”

“Now wait just a goddamn minute.” Rauser pulled a chair out and sat down across from Dobbs. “Keye’s not obstructing. She didn’t ask for this. She’s the victim here.”

Dobbs’s smile thinned even further.

I hit my palm against the tabletop. Dobbs’s sandwich jumped on the plate. Rauser looked at me as if I’d slapped him. “I am not a victim.”

“Well, well, look at that. Lovers’ quarrel?” Dobbs’s eyes had the happy sparkle of confrontation and they held me in a way that made me uncomfortable, had always made me uncomfortable. His eyes, his words, his stories, his hands. I’d spent a lot of time at the Bureau dodging them all.

Rauser was on his feet. “Just what are you trying to say, Dobbs?” His right fist was clenched.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa.” I held up my hands. “Just calm down. Rauser, sit, please. Let’s just take a minute, okay?”

Rauser grabbed his sandwich off the counter and sank back into his chair, scowling.

I looked at Dobbs. “I would never intentionally engage in any communication with a suspect outside an investigation. Never. That would be improper, unethical, unprofessional, stupid, and extremely dangerous.” And then, in an effort to keep the peace, I told him I understood that he was the man on the case. In fact, he’d earned it, deserved it, he was just about the most deserving gosh-darn guy in the whole world. I stopped just short of slobbering all over him. Rauser groaned a little, stuffed some stale Pringles into his mouth. I went to the refrigerator, peeled the plastic wrap off a plate of brownies, and pushed them in front of Jacob Dobbs like a peace offering.

Dobbs eyed me skeptically for a moment before his sharp features softened. Then, palms together, chin rested lightly on his fingertips, something calculated to show depth of thought, the self-serving little bastard said, “Let’s lay our weapons down, then, shall we? What do you say?” He picked up a brownie, took a bite. “You’ll give me your notes and we can do some brainstorming?”

I knew his MO. Dobbs would grab the credit for anything I handed him, and, of course, I would have to give him anything and everything I could to benefit the case, Rauser, the victims, potential victims.

“Absolutely,” I agreed, and set another brownie on his plate next to his sandwich.

Rauser had a sour expression on his face and we ate in silence. Eventually, Dobbs finished his sandwich and four brownies, stood and politely excused himself to the restroom while I struggled to unravel Neil’s espresso machine.

Then the three of us, Rauser, Dobbs, and I, moved into the main area with coffee. Dobbs yawned and propped his feet on a cube.

“Anger excitation,” he said, and made one of those mysterious hmmm sounds that doctors and mechanics have mastered. He was reading aloud from the preliminary profile and victim assessments I’d finished in the hospital and then printed when I’d gotten home, as if he was grading a paper. I didn’t mind. If your work can’t withstand peer review, it shouldn’t be out there, and however selfish and lazy Dobbs was, he had once been one hell of a criminologist, someone I had admired, even trusted. I wondered when he had stopped needing to find the truth in a case, any case and any truth. When had his fame become the most important consideration in his work? What had changed him?

“You don’t see it as retaliatory at all?” He looked up to ask me.

Rauser leaned forward. “Like, somebody hurt me so I’m taking it out on you ’cause you remind me of them?”

“Exactly,” Dobbs answered.

“We’re seeing a lot of stabbing. We’re seeing attacks that last an extended period,” I said. “That’s not simply retaliatory. It’s about needing to experience the victim’s suffering.”

Dobbs hmmmed again. “Perhaps sadistic behaviors are emerging at the scenes. But the amount of rage evidenced suggests that it’s personal. Given the link established between your victims, it makes sense that the killer came from a family involved in similar lawsuits at some level—plaintiff, defendant, mother or father or siblings somehow impacted by an unfavorable ruling, perhaps. Somehow this tore away at something in the offender’s life, directly or indirectly.” Dobbs looked at Rauser. “This will be one of the things you’ll look at in a suspect’s past. Once you actually have a suspect, of course. Along with the other things Dr. Street has already listed, such as mobility of profession, maturity, only child, donations to children’s orgs, et cetera.”

“First victim and the last two victims triggered some kind of emotional response in the offender,” I pointed out. “Anne Chambers, the first victim we know about, experienced far more brutality than all the others until LaBrecque, the last one. What was the trigger? We know it wasn’t about some civil lawsuit. LaBrecque had none in his past and neither did Anne Chambers. Then there’s David Brooks, who was shown care and respect, killed quickly and apparently silently and tucked into a sheet. I have some theories, but that’s all they are at this point.”

“Oh, come now, Keye, let’s not be so modest.” Dobbs shook his head. “Toss them out. Perhaps they will lead us somewhere.”

“Okay, well, as you said, this kind of rage is usually about some personal connection. Because of the way Anne Chambers was killed, because her nipples were removed, which is all about Mommy, and she was sexually mutilated, I believe she’s representative of the mother figure in the offender’s life, of a very interruptive and intensely competitive relationship with the mother figure. David Brooks might represent a loved and desired father, or even an incestuous relationship with the father. Only Brooks was allowed to die without suffering. With the others, victim suffering was the turn-on. That says something vital about the killer’s pathology. Suffering’s all about anger excitation or sadism. Victim needs and desires aren’t important to him. Killing the victim is just another precautionary act. He’s just tidying up, really, and acting out his fantasies.”

“And what’s the fantasy again?” Rauser asked.

“The fantasy is undoubtedly complicated,” Dobbs answered, then used the index finger on each hand to rub his eyes. They were red when he was done. “The phrase ‘multi-determined’ was used in one of the letters and that’s very accurate. It’s about a lot of things—sex, revenge, eluding law enforcement, needing validation, involving journalists. Seeing his letters in the newspapers, hearing about what he’s done—that must feel almost as good as returning to the scene of his crime. And communicating with you both must really be a thrill. It feeds our man’s delusion that he’s on the inside, in the power structure, keeping you two in his intimate little circle. The circle must widen now that I’m here,” Dobbs added. “Wonder how that’s sitting with our killer.”

“You’re extremely visible,” I reminded Dobbs. “I would expect him to include you now in his communications.”

Dobbs bristled. “I remind you that I am visible because I am paid to be visible.”

Oh sure. No one would ever accuse you of showboating.

“So where does LaBrecque fit?” Rauser wanted to know.

“I don’t know,” I admitted. “The selection processes we’ve identified, like the link to civil law, just doesn’t fit with LaBrecque. Whatever the link is to him is too personal to identify at this point.”

Rauser said, “Our tech guy ran down the address of the computer where the email was generated. An Internet café with a stationary computer in Midtown. No cameras. We’ll have surveillance there by the end of the day.”

Dobbs sank back comfortably into the puffy chaise. “Yes, well,” he muttered, and didn’t finish his sentence.

Rauser pulled his ringing phone from his pocket, answered, and left Dobbs and me alone while he took his call.

Dobbs tucked his hands behind his head. “Well done, Dr. Street.” He smiled at me. “You’ve worked hard on this and it shows. I couldn’t have painted a better picture of our unsub myself.”

“I had some time on my hands in the hospital.”

“How are you feeling, by the way?”

“I’m fine,” I answered. His concern made me uneasy.

“I am sorry, Keye, about all that happened between us at BAU.”

I was silent. I didn’t believe he felt remorse and I certainly was not ready to let him off the hook. I’d had some problems my last few months at the Bureau. I was struggling. I was under review. Jacob Dobbs had written quite a scathing report about me in which he recommended I be dismissed. If I’d slept with him, he would have recommended a paid furlough rather than dismissal. He had been quite clear and unapologetic about that. I had needed rehab, a hand up, not a kick in the head. He had made my time there nearly unbearable with his constant comments and advances, and then he had turned his back on me completely.

Rauser rejoined us. “We got the restaurant where Brooks ate the night he was killed. A waitress recognized his photo. She seated him and took a wine order because the shift was just changing and the waiter wasn’t on yet. She said the reservation was for two, in the name of John Smith. Original, huh? Said Brooks drove her nuts picking out the right wine like someone on a date. Waiter showed, so she left. Never saw his dinner partner. We have the waiter’s name and address. Balaki and Williams are on the way there now. We weren’t able to locate a credit card receipt. Brooks was paying cash for everything—dinner, drinks, the hotel. Married, obviously didn’t want a paper trail.”

“Anything from the courthouse?” I asked.

“Our people are still going over the surveillance tapes. Brooks is the only vic to show up on the courthouse tapes, but we’ve only gone back sixty days so far. Brooks was in the courthouse almost every day. Unfortunately, there’s no surveillance on the elevators themselves, but all the elevator lobbies are crawling with cameras. We’re running checks on any nonemployee who appears more than twice. It’s going to take time to look at it all.”

The door opened. “Well, that was totally weird,” Neil said, and walked past us into the kitchen. He opened the fridge, then looked at Rauser. “I had to take Charlie home.” If he wondered what I’d told Rauser about Charlie’s attack, his face didn’t show it. Instead, his eyes settled on Dobbs.

“Neil Donovan, this is Jacob Dobbs,” I said.

“Ah, Dobbs.” Neil clearly recognized the name. “Big man on campus, right? Nice to meet you.” He gave Dobbs a nod and turned back to the refrigerator.

“Speaking of Charlie,” Rauser said. “He’s on courthouse video a lot, must be in there several times a week. Detectives brought it to my attention.”

I went cold. Today Charlie had just reminded me that you never know about someone’s interior life. Charlie had a mean streak. I’d seen that. Charlie the courier. Charlie who was in the Fulton County Courthouse frequently.

Rauser nodded. “Gotta check everyone. No exceptions.”

Neil laughed and popped open a soda can. “Total waste of resources. Come on, Charlie can barely remember to bathe. Anyway, he’s there all the time because the courier company he works for does real estate deed searches and a lot of simple filings for attorneys. I know this because I actually bother to talk to him about his life.” He looked at Rauser. “Keye tell you she put some Bruce Lee on his ass today? I had to pull over and let him throw up on the way home. It was brutal. I’m just sayin’.”

“Who’s Charlie?” Dobbs asked.

“A friend,” I said.

“What happened?” Rauser was frowning, picking up vibes the way he always does.

“He got a little out of line, that’s all,” I told him.

“Out of line how?”

I rolled my eyes. “Settle down there, cowboy. I handled it.”

“You know he lives down off DeKalb Avenue in some pretty nice condos?” Neil asked. “I thought the guy was in public housing or something.”

“Because you know so much about his life?” Rauser asked.

Neil was rummaging around for food. “You guys decided to eat some brownies after all?” He grinned. “Dang, there’s only a couple left.”

We all looked at Dobbs. He had fallen asleep, just drifted off with his hands behind his head, mouth open.

Rauser looked at me as if my head had just done a three-sixty and I’d spit up pea soup. “Tell me you did not give him the stoner brownies! I hope you realize that raises about a trillion ethical issues for me.”

“Oh, please,” I said. “You were on your feet two minutes ago ready to smack him. That didn’t bring up any issues?”

“That was just good clean fun,” Rauser retorted.

I studied Dobbs. “He’s such an angel when he’s snoring and drooling, isn’t he?”

“He wakes up stoned and figures out you gave him spiked brownies, he’s gonna be a real pain in the ass.” Rauser was still indignant.

“Or not,” I said. “He could wake up bright and sunny and eager to help.”

“Uh-huh, and maybe Madonna will come in here and shake her ass for us too.”

I considered that. “The Madonna or just Madonna?”

Rauser shrugged. “Which one would you want?”

“To come in here and shake her ass?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Definitely not the Madonna.”

We gathered keys and things to leave, both of us heading in separate directions. “Hey,” Neil called. “What am I supposed to do with Sleeping Beauty?”

“Give him some strong coffee and call him a cab when he wakes up,” I said. “Oh, and Neil—don’t mention the brownies, okay?”