Harper’s hand falls to Ida’s shoulder. “Are you ready?”
Ida swallows. “Yes. But bring that chair over, so I can sit when I’m done. Save me from hitting the floor like a bag of feed.”
“Got it,” Stu says, fetching the office chair from the other side of the room.
Ida places her hand on the woman’s forehead and sinks into the woman, sinks into her skin.
That telltale warmth fills the room and the low lights dim further.
That voice. There’s something about that voice. Julie tries to scramble to the side, but the man is quick. He steps in her way, a little chuckle coming from beneath the mask. Julie lashes out as he grapples to control her, dropping to his knees, and she somehow snags his head covering. Julie pulls and it rips, separating from the section pinned by the belt.
She knows him. His ugly, brutish face is red-hot and flustered from battling her on the bathroom floor. She is about to say his name when his right arm goes back, and Julie knows what is coming. His fist hits her and it’s like a million-watt bulb explodes in her brain.
Her vision swims. The mask hangs from the belt around his neck, and he glares at her.
“That wafn’t nife.”
“Listen . . . what are you doing?” Julie murmurs, half dazed from the blow.
He grabs her hair and forces her to turn around. “On your kneef.”
“No!” Julie struggles, but his iron grip on her hair stops her. He’s not letting go.
A part of her speaks up: Let him do what he’s going to do. You might live. Cooperate and you might live.
Sobbing, Julie has her back to him, and she lowers herself forward, exposing her rear end to him. She hears him deal with his jeans. His breathing comes hurried, almost snorting with excitement. The pain of him forcing his way inside makes her cry out, makes her try to fight him off again. He shifts around behind her, pulls her head back by her hair. Julie screams.
He holds her hair with his right hand, and reaches around with his left. He finds the soft, delicate flesh of her bare throat and caresses it with his fingers, all the while forcing himself into her.
“You gotta know when to keep your mouth fhut.”
His left hand closes on her throat and he grits his teeth, growling like an animal as he crushes Julie’s windpipe. Taking the spark of life and crushing it in his hands.
Shutting out the light.
Ida flops back, the connection broken, and her backside finds the chair. She sags into it, exhausted. Stu hurriedly pushes the body back into cold storage and closes the door. Harper squats next to Ida. “Are you okay?”
She has one hand to her head, as if it threatens to blow apart. “Yes . . . yes, I’ll be fine . . . Just give me a minute . . .”
“What did you see?” Stu asks her.
Ida swallows. “You know what he did. Beat her. Raped her from behind. Strangled the life out of her. But she knew him. She tore his mask off.”
“You saw his face?”
Ida frowns, remembering. “Vaguely. It was a blur. But I know one thing. He has some kind of problem with his mouth. He speaks with a lifp. He’s got some kind of facial deformity.”
“This is great, Ida. Any name?”
She shakes her head. “Sorry.”
“No, no, no.” Harper holds Ida’s hand. “You did great.”
“I don’t think we’ll be able to do this again,” Stu says.
“Not with Fat Ass at the counter, we won’t.” Harper checks outside the door. There’s no one else there. “Ida, can you stand, do you think?”
“I can try.”
Harper waves Stu over. “Get her other side. We’ll walk her out.”
They position her arms around their shoulders and steer her into the hall. When they get near the desk, Stu sets about freeing Barnie from his handcuffs while Harper continues with Ida toward the car.
Barnie rubs his wrists. “What’s to stop me from reporting you for this?”
“Nothing,” Stu admits. “But just remember, I know where you live, Barnie. It wouldn’t be a very good move.”
The fat man looks down at the floor.
Stu taps the side of Barnie’s flabby face. “Lesson learned. Don’t get greedy.”
“Ida, let me drop you at my place. You can rest there. I don’t want you driving home in the dark the way you are,” Harper says, looking at her in the backseat. She looks worse than she did the first time around, after doing a reading of Gertie Wilson’s body. Drained.
Ida shakes her head. “No . . . I’ll be fine to drive. Honestly.”
“No offense, but you look like death,” Stu tells her as Harper starts the engine.
“Trust me, sugar, I feel like it,” Ida concedes.
“Then it’s settled. I’ll drop you at my apartment; then I want to head to the station,” Harper says.
“Really? You know what time it is?” Stu asks. “It’s late!”
“Yeah, well, doesn’t matter. We need to search the records, Stu. And we can’t do that in the daylight because we’re not supposed to be there.”
Stu shrugs. “Point made.”
“What about my truck?” Ida asks.
“Stu can drive it back. His car’s parked at my place.”
“Okay,” Ida says.
Stu hisses: “Thanks for volunteering me.”
“Anytime,” Harper says with a smile.
Harper ushers Ida into her bed, pulling the covers up over her.
“Do you want a light on?” she asks her, but Ida is already asleep. She closes the bedroom door and goes to the kitchen, where Stu is hunting in the fridge for a drink.
“You don’t have a Coke in here?”
Harper shakes her head. “I don’t buy them.”
“You don’t? What do you drink?”
She shrugs. “I don’t know . . . water?”
Stu pulls a bottle from the fridge. “Too early for Chardonnay.”
“Come on. Let’s get going. I’ll buy you a coffee later,” Harper tells him, holding the front door to her apartment open for him.
“You say it like that, but it’s really because you want to buy a coffee for yourself, isn’t it?”
“Well I don’t want to leave you out,” she tells him.
There is minimal staff on duty, and no one takes any notice when Harper and Stu walk into the station, heading straight for the basement. Down there, they use the computer access terminal in the corner—better to do it out of sight than at one of their desks, where they might draw attention. It allows them to gain access to the same generic files as anyone with limited clearance throughout the entire building.
Harper hovers over Stu’s shoulder as he pulls up hospital records for the immediate and surrounding area.
“So how old do we think this guy is?”
“When he killed Ruby in nineteen eighty-five, he probably was in his twenties or thirties at least. Ruby was twenty-four years old when he murdered her,” Harper says.