Dirty Devil Read online

“Give me half an hour, and I’ll compile all the data,” Carver said, his flingers flying over the keyboard. He was talking to Magnolia under his breath and the conversation seemed to be pretty intense.

  I decided to take the autopsy files to the chair in the corner and read through them. I started with Dana Martin’s since she was the most recent and her murder was most similar to Donnelly’s.

  I read through the file and made notes. “You’ve perfected your technique each time, haven’t you?”

  “What’s that?” Jack asked.

  I hadn’t even realized he’d taken the chair across from me and was going through the case files of the other victims.

  “Just talking to myself,” I said. “Carver, can Magnolia multitask?”

  “Sure thing,” he said. “She’s programmed to listen to your commands. Just tell her what you want her to do.”

  “Thanks,” I said. “Magnolia, put on screen all information on Dana Martin, including financials.”

  “You got something?” Jack asked.

  “Just trying to get to know her a little better. Why was she a target?” I asked. “She’s a young, attractive woman. Early thirties. She’s been married two years to her second husband, and she’s got two small kids. She’s a trauma nurse at Heartland General and works nights. She and her husband pull in a good living. They’ve got a nice house, and are involved in their local church. But the killer targets her. He watches her and knows her work schedule, and he abducts her in the parking garage when she’s going off shift.”

  “According to the case file,” Jack said. “The husband reported her missing right away when she didn’t make it home before he left for work. In his statement he said she always got home about seven fifteen and then he’d leave for work. She’d get the kids packed up and take them to daycare, and then she’d come back home and sleep.”

  “That’s a rough schedule,” I said. “It’s bad enough to hardly see each other, but add in two small kids and I can’t imagine. Maybe they were having trouble.”

  “The detective in charge looked at the husband hard. But there was nothing to tie him with. He also spent quite a bit of time looking at the ex. Apparently the first marriage ended because she had an affair.”

  “With husband number two?” I asked.

  “No, someone she worked with at the hospital,” he said. “The trail went cold. There were no cameras in the parking garage, and there were no witnesses who saw her, or anyone, leaving. Her car was missing from the parking garage, so they could only assume he drove her out in her own car like with Donnelly. There were no calls for ransom. Search parties were formed and they combed miles and miles of territory. Two days later her body was found on top of city hall.”

  “What about her vehicle?”

  “They didn’t find her vehicle for five weeks. It was parked in long-term parking at the airport. Her purse was in the back seat, everything still intact.”

  “Her bra was missing,” I said.

  “What?”

  “In the medical examiner’s report, he itemizes her clothing. She was wearing the scrubs she’d left the hospital in. But she wasn’t wearing a bra. Just like Donnelly was missing his belt.”

  “Souvenirs,” Jack said. “In Pritchett’s police report, there was a notation that his wallet was never found. They had credit cards and the bank monitored to see if charges would show up, but they never did. And Carlisle’s shoes were missing. His co-workers said he habitually wore white sneakers when he was doing surgeries. There were no sneakers in his locker at the hospital or his home closet.”

  “Did Cole find anything in the Porsche?”

  “They found the other champagne bottle in the passenger seat, and blood in the back seat.”

  “Blood?” I asked. “How much blood?”

  “Not much,” he said. “But the lab said it matched Donnelly’s.”

  “He had a cut on his finger,” I said. “Pretty deep. But the blow to the back of the head didn’t break the skin. Anything else?”

  “There was a briefcase and trench coat in the trunk, along with the missing suit jacket. Donnelly’s wallet was inside the coat.”

  “No cell phone?” I asked.

  “No, but that’d be the first thing I’d get rid of. If someone reported him missing, it’s too easy to triangulate location by using your cell phone.”

  “Something else I noticed in the ME’s report,” I said. “The knife used to disembowel the victim is similar, if not the same. Our notations are almost exact. Given the direction of the cut, it’s most likely the killer is right-handed. And given the depth of the cut, I’d say the knife is no longer than four inches, very sharp, and with a smooth blade. There are no variations in how deep the cuts across the abdomen were, which tells me the knife was probably all the way in, but it was sharp enough for him to cut in one smooth stroke. But the interesting part is I found rope fibers inside the cut. Just like the medical examiner found rope fibers inside the cut on Dana Martin.”

  “I’d say that makes the link between the two a pretty high probability that the killer was one and the same.”

  “You guys want to see this?” Carver asked.

  “Oh, I’d forgotten you were here,” Jack said. “It’s been hours.”

  “I could’ve gone faster if I’d had a snack,” he said. “Maybe an ice cream bar. Or a Hot Pocket.”

  “Now I see where Doug gets it,” I said.

  “Kevin Fischer’s financials had so many protections and passcodes I started to wonder if he was working for the CIA. But it just turns out he’s got some shady dealings. If he’s not the killer I think a call to the IRS is in order. But Fischer’s financials aren’t the only interesting things Magnolia has found. Check this out.”

  The whiteboard lit up as pictures and information were added rapidly. Lines connected people and places, so it looked like a map. It reminded me of a spider’s web, and in the center was John Donnelly.

  “Magnolia found your connection,” Carver said. “Dana Martin used to work at Virginia Hospital Center before she transferred to Richmond and started a new life. The same hospital as Dr. Steven Carlisle.”

  “Let me guess,” I said. “He’s the guy she was having an affair with.”

  “Bingo,” Carver said.

  “The affair would explain the betrayal aspect of the way she and Donnelly were killed. Carlisle was found in his garage. He was upright and his hands tied so they were straight out. But there are subtle differences.”

  “Killers perfect their message and skill the more they kill,” Carver said.

  “Now we just need to figure out how Carlisle and Martin are connected to John Donnelly,” I said.

  “We’ll talk to his secretary tomorrow,” Jack said. “She’s got all the information on threats he received and all of his case files.”

  “He’s old school,” Carver said. “All of his case files are on paper. I hacked into his office computer and other than general client information, there’s nothing in there.”

  “What about the first victim? I asked. “Any connections there?”

  “Actually,” Carver said. “I’ve run into a little snag with the first victim. Carson Pritchett didn’t exist three years before he was murdered. Now someone went to a lot of trouble to make it look like he existed—they gave him a background, parents, both deceased of course, an education and medical and dental records. But it’s too clean. I’ve seen enough files like that before to recognize government interference.”

  “What do you mean?” I asked.

  “He was witness protection?” Jack asked, catching on before I did.

  “Yes,” Carver said. “And even I can’t get into those sealed records without calling in some massive favors. But in his new life, Carson Pritchett was head of the American Donor Society.”

  “That’s a medical connection at least,” I said. “It also seems like a job you’d need to be qualified for. Not just something you could be plugged into fresh into WITSEC.”

 
; “I’d guess he was a doctor in his previous life,” Carver said.

  “A doctor, a nurse, and the head of the largest organ donor organization in the country,” Jack said.

  “Yeah, something stinks about the whole thing, and John Donnelly is the connecting factor.”

  “Speaking of things that stink,” Jack said. “I’ve got a package that had a dead cat in it. I’m sending it to the lab tomorrow to check for fingerprints and to pull DNA if they can, but I took a picture of the label so you could run it. It’s got a return address and I want you to see what you can find out about the postmark. It’s pretty faded, but I figure Magnolia is up to the task.”

  “Sure am, sugar,” she purred.

  Jack shot Carver a look, but Carver just grinned like a fool.

  “Did the other victims show signs of torture like Donnelly?” Carver asked.

  “Yes,” I said. “Extensive on the two men. Dana Martin’s injuries weren’t as bad. Bruising and lacerations for the most part, and she showed signs of burns, though not with a cattle prod like Donnelly. I looked at the photos and it looked like a branding iron of some sort.”

  “I read the autopsy report on Martin,” Carver said. “I think the killer had a harder time hurting a woman. That’s the only explanation for the differences in injuries. When I run something like that through my profiling program, there’s a high probability that the killer has an important woman in his life—a wife, a daughter.”

  I nodded and said, “Cause of death for all three victims was strangulation. No signs of sexual assault for Martin. I wasn’t able to decipher what was used for branding. Could’ve been a ring or a keychain.”

  “I’ll see if Magnolia can get a better look,” he said.

  “Martin, Carlisle, and Donnelly had natural-fiber rope burns around the neck, wrists and feet. Pritchett had synthetic-fiber rope burns.”

  “He adjusted his technique with each victim. The natural-fiber rope, the high-gauge wire, even the blade he used to gut them—all of those things are as common as you get. Most people around here probably have that stuff in their garages or toolboxes. He used the rope to strangle each victim instead of his hands. Using his hands would’ve been too intimate. He wanted to get the job done.”

  I flinched. I couldn’t help myself. I knew what it felt like to have someone’s hands around my throat, squeezing until the pressure built and my lungs burned from trying to gasp for air. But gasping for air was impossible. Only the instinct to breathe. And that’s when the fear and panic come. Because it’s that moment you know you’re going to die, and all you can do is wait until the urge to breathe disappears altogether and everything goes black.

  I’d somehow managed to live. I don’t know why or how. But I did know it’s a horror I’d never wish on my worst enemy.

  Jack squeezed my shoulder as he came to stand next to me. “So are you saying you don’t think he’s a typical serial killer? He’s not doing it because he enjoys it.”

  “I think he’s doing it because it fulfills his agenda,” Carver said. “Somehow, those four people wronged him, and in his mind the only punishment for their crimes is death. Even the way he tortured them doesn’t adhere to someone who enjoyed the work. There’s anger there. He’s not a pro. A pro knows where to cut, where to hit, to do the most damage while keeping them alive long enough to feel the pain. The torture of these victims was almost an afterthought until he was ready to kill them.”

  “They never did find the kill site for any of the victims,” Carver continued. “There were no cameras in the alley where Pritchett was found. It’s not a great neighborhood, so there were no witnesses that came forward. People said it was like a ghost did it. One minute there was no body, and the next, Pritchett was tied upright to a chain link fence, his arms splayed and the whole front of him bloody.

  “Carlisle’s body was found hanging from the rafters in his garage—again, upright and arms splayed wide. His security system had been disengaged. There were no prints or DNA found other than Carlisle’s, so police think the killer was there just long enough to leave the body and disappear. But no neighbors saw anything except for a ninety-two-year-old woman at the end of the block who said she saw a white truck parked in the driveway of the house next door, but no one was living there at the time so she didn’t know who it belonged to.

  “Police are baffled as to how Dana Martin’s body ended up on top of city hall and strapped to the radio tower. The building has twenty-four-hour security guards and a system. But the security cameras went out for thirty-two minutes, and the security guard thought it was due to lightning in the area, so he called maintenance to get things up and running again. By the time the system rebooted, Dana Martin had been tied to the radio tower and her guts spilled all over the roof.”

  “Can you put the four crime scene photos side by side on the screen?” I asked.

  “Do bears poop in the woods?” Carver asked.

  I watched as the photos appeared on the wall. Pritchett, his lifeless body upright against a chain link fence, his arms splayed wide, his guts spilled open. Carlisle, hanging from the rafters in his garage, his arms strung up so he looked like a marionette, his guts at his feet. Dana Martin, her body fragile and tiny pressed against the metal of the radio tower, her arms stretched to each side, her abdomen splayed open. And John Donnelly, upright on the scarecrow pole how we’d found him two days before.

  “Judas,” I said. “But who did they betray?”

  “We need those case files,” Jack said. “I think the answer is in there.”

  10

  I set my alarm at six so I could hit snooze twice before I absolutely had to get up and get in the shower. The snooze button was part of my essential morning routine. I didn’t understand people who could just wake up—like Jack.

  By the time my second alarm went off, the smell of coffee was wafting beneath my nose, and the aroma was making my heart beat a little faster. Jack always brought me coffee in the mornings and set it on the nightstand. I seriously had no idea how I’d functioned all the years before Jack. He made life much more enjoyable.

  I halfway scooted into a sitting position and reached for the mug, my eyes still closed. The shower was running in the bathroom, and I knew that Jack had turned it on for me so I didn’t have to wait for it to warm up. He really was the best.

  I managed to find my way into the shower, and I drank the rest of my coffee while letting the hot water hit me in the back of the head. And then I remembered I’d washed my hair the day before and hadn’t planned on getting it wet this morning.

  I had to go straight to the funeral home as soon as the will reading was finished, so I chose black trousers with a wide belt and a pin-striped button-down shirt. I half dried my hair and pulled it into a loose bun on top of my head. I’d left my nice black booties at the office, still covered in mud, so I slipped on my black ballet flats and hoped it wasn’t supposed to rain.

  I headed downstairs and heard voices in the kitchen, but I slowed down when I heard mention of Floyd Parker’s name.

  “I’m just saying,” Carver said, “he’s not someone to underestimate. He’s not your regular small-town hick reporter. The guy’s got a brain. And he’s got connections. Not as good as yours, but he’s got some. He’s getting some big-time donations—”

  “You ran his financials?” Jack asked. “Carver—”

  “Don’t Carver me in that tone. You’re my friend. And no one is going to catch me. I built the program. What I’m telling you is that there are people in the state of Virginia who want to see you fail. You’ve got the ear of the governor, and you’ve got friends in high places in D.C., including me. That doesn’t make sense to people sitting on the other side of the aisle. Why would a sheriff in King George County have such influential people in his pockets unless he had higher ambitions?”

  “You know that’s not true,” Jack said. “And I don’t really care what people say. My friends are my friends, and not because of who they are or what positi
ons they hold. And if somebody is lining Floyd’s pockets to beat me and keep me from higher aspirations, then it’s money wasted. Floyd still has to win over the voters, and he’s not going to do that.”

  “He doesn’t have to win over the voters,” Carver said, his tone serious. “He just has to discredit you so badly that the voters have no other choice in who to vote for. The election is in a couple of weeks. All I’m saying is be careful.”

  “I always am,” Jack said.

  I figured I’d lingered at the bottom of the stairs long enough, but Carver’s warning worried me. Floyd had always been a nuisance, but it ran much deeper than him disliking Jack or being mad at me for tossing him aside all those years ago. He was jealous of Jack, and he always had been, even in school. And Floyd had spent much too much of his life trying to come out on top and failing.

  I grabbed my black leather jacket from the coat closet, and made enough noise so they’d know I was there. And then I went in the kitchen.

  “There she is,” Carver said, his grin infectious. “It’s always a pleasure to see you in the mornings, Jaye. So bright eyed and bushy tailed.”

  “Shut up, Carver,” I said, and I took the to-go mug of coffee Jack handed me. “What does that even mean? I’m not a squirrel.”

  Carver was a morning person like Jack. Actually, Carver was an all-the-time person. His brain and energy functioned on a different plane than the rest of us mere mortals. He was always alert.

  “If you hadn’t hit snooze so many times,” Carver said. “Maybe you’d have gotten down here in time for breakfast, and I wouldn’t have had to eat all your bacon.”

  “I’m used to not getting to eat with the Carver boys in the house,” I said. “I’ll get donuts on the way to the office.” I hadn’t forgotten that I’d promised Tom I’d pay him a visit during the week, and somehow single-handedly buy enough donuts to keep him in business.

  “We’ve got to go,” Jack said to Carver. “It’s a busy morning of witnessing hopes and dreams flushed down the toilet.”

  “You always get to have all the fun,” Carver said, pouting a little. “Maybe one day I’ll decide to work in the field.”