The private jet touched down in Valparaiso, Indiana, four hours later and a car picked them up at the ramp. Victoria had remained mostly silent on the short flight, but did fill them in on the old cold case. When she described the bruising around the mouth and the Diethyl Ether, Jaxon interrupted and asked where the body had been found.
“In a small pond. It had frozen over and some kids had seen something beneath the ice. They got their parents and in turn the parents contacted the local sheriff’s office.”
“How did you find the boy’s parents after so much time?” Sally asked.
“Very similar to yours,” Victoria said. “The local Police Department called the FBI after a few months. We were able to narrow the time of death down to within a year and we found him using missing person’s files from the surrounding counties and states. Of course, I wasn’t involved then. I was still with the FCPD. This was 2001.”
The year was not a good one for Jaxon. Victoria either. Just the mention of it brought the temperature down in the cabin a few degrees. Nobody said a word for the rest of the flight.
They arrived at the local sheriff’s office and met with the detective who had handled the case back in 2001. His name was Vernon Scoggins. Jaxon disliked him immediately. He was bald, overweight, and wore sneakers with his suit. He chewed tobacco and chose to spit the juice into an empty Zephyrhills water bottle he carried around with him. Jaxon swore if the son-of-a-bitch spilled one drop on him, he would break his leg. Victoria seemed to like him.
Holt had discussed the information they had obtained through the web-cam’s manufacturer with Scoggins and his chief, so they knew what the three of them were there for. Scoggins told them the address associated with the computer I.P. address was in a section of town known for its extracurricular activity, mainly prostitution. The house was currently under surveillance, and per the FBI’s instructions, no one was to interfere with anyone entering or leaving the premises. So far the place had been quiet as a tomb.
Public records showed a deed recorded under the name of Walter Peacock. Contacting the owner had been relatively easy, but the information he provided on his renter proved useless. The tenant, William Smith, paid in cash every six months through the mail and the only contact information he had provided listed a name and address which did not exist. William Smith apparently did not want to be bothered. Mr. Peacock could not remember ever meeting the tenant. Scoggins said the man sounded drunk on the phone.
Scoggins told them the neighbors had very little information about the man except to say he usually showed up late at night and was very white.
“White?” Victoria asked.
“Yes,” Scoggins said. “You know-pale-albino-I don’t know. One guy told me he’s only ever seen him from a distance and his face was very white.”
Jaxon and Sally shared a look.
“What?” Victoria said looking back and forth between the two.
“Our perp looks to be wearing a white Halloween mask on the two surveillance videos we have of him,” Jaxon said. “At first I thought he was albino, but Sally said it was probably a mask. I think she’s right.”
“Could be our guy, right?” Scoggins said.
No one answered.
“The plan is to wait until he shows up,” Victoria said, “and then move in. If he doesn’t show, we get the warrant to search the place. Right now, we sit tight and wait.”
“Great,” Jaxon said. “Can we at least join the surveillance team?”
“No,” she said. “I don’t want anybody spooking this guy. We wait for the call.”
Three hours had passed and everyone was on edge. Jaxon noticed Sally was on her third cup of coffee and Victoria was sucking down Diet Pepsis like they were going out of style. Jaxon kept busy with a crossword puzzle.
Victoria walked over and sat next to Jaxon. “You know, you haven’t said more than five words to me the last six hours.”
“Actually, I said seventeen.”
She smiled. “That bad, huh?”
“Torture,” but he didn’t smile. He was in no mood for playful banter with his ex-wife.
“So, how is Reverb?” She asked.
“Old and nearly dead.”
“I miss him.”
He looked up from the puzzle and searched her face. She hadn’t so much as asked about the dog in ten years. Reverb had only been two years old at the time of Michael’s death and he distinctly remembered a time before that when she said the dog had to go. The only reason he eventually stayed was because Michael adored him. She couldn’t break his heart, but she was angry at Jaxon for weeks because he went behind her back and brought the dog home without consulting her.
She was smiling and he wondered if she genuinely meant what she said. Probably not.
“I thought you hated him,” he said, turning back to the puzzle. “You’ve never come to see him.”
“It’s not for lack of trying. I can’t even get you to return my calls much less answer the door.”
“You’ve knocked on the door?”
“Three times.”
“Wow-three times in ten years. You must have wanted to see him pretty bad.”
“I’ve wanted to see you,” she said.
He looked her in the eye, expecting her to look away, but she held his gaze with a strange look on her face. One he hadn’t seen in a long time. It brought back a flood of memories; times that had been good, but now seemed bitter in the light of the florescent lamps. He didn’t know what to make of this conversation and hoped it would end soon.
“Me. The dog. We’ve both been there. I’ve never heard you knock.”
“Maybe you weren’t listening,” she said, cocking her head slightly and giving him the little grin that used to drive him crazy. Now, it was just pissing him off.
“What? Is there supposed to be some deep meaning in there? Because I’ve missed it. What is it, Vick? What do you want?” His voice had grown louder and he saw Sally look up and Scoggins staring.
“Apparently you’re still deaf,” she said, getting up. “I’ll try pounding on the door next time.”
“You do that.” And she walked away.
The radio crackled to life. “We’ve got a visitor.”
Time to move.
Luke and John were hunched over his desk watching the blip creep up the street behind Luke’s house. Ellie was sitting on the bed and Jimmy was standing looking out the window. Luke’s room faced the rear of the house and even though there were quite a few trees in the backyard, you could still see headlights if a car drove into the cul-de-sac behind them.
“I got lights!” Jimmy said.
“That’s him,” Luke said. “Is he stopped?”
“Yeah-the lights just went out.” Jimmy stepped back away from the window and looked at the computer. Luke pointed to the blip that was now stationary on the map.
“Alright, remember,” Luke said, “this is just for verification. We don’t want him to see us. John, set up the three way call with me and Jimmy. When we’re in position, Ellie, you send the Facebook message and we’ll see what he does. Come on Jimmy.”
Luke and Jimmy left the room and Luke’s phone vibrated first. He had the earpiece in and he said, “Got ya’ John.”
“Roger,” John said, and put Luke on hold. When the three way was set up, they were all linked, and Luke and Jimmy went out the back door, splitting up. Luke went to the back of his fence slipping through the hole between it and the hedge, and snuck around the tennis courts to a spot he could easily see the car, yet remain hidden. The night was moonless, and the darkness, oppressive. Luke shivered in his spot despite the warm, humid air.
Jimmy went in the opposite direction, hid in the neighbor’s backyard and watched from around their fence. When he was in place he said, “I can see the car. He’s still inside.”
“Yep, he hasn’t moved,” John said.
“I got him too,” Luke said. “I can’t make out his face but I see his silhouette. Tell Ellie to send the message.”
What Luke hoped for was that the killer owned a smart phone. When Ellie sent him the message on Facebook, he should get some kind of notification. At least if he was as meticulous as Luke thought he was. Then they would watch and see if he would use the phone while they observed him. Visual confirmation was their only option at this point. They did not want to alert him to the fact they knew his cell phone number.
A few minutes went by, and Luke asked, “Did she send it?”
“Yeah,” John said. “Give it a minute.”
Luke’s legs were starting to cramp from the position he was in, and he shifted a little trying to get comfortable. A soft glow of light showed inside the car and Luke could see him bring what must be a phone up to his face. Luke was shocked at what he saw. The man was completely white. His face, hair, and lips looked to be the shade of vanilla yogurt. He wasn’t even sure if he had any hair.
“I can see his cell phone!” Jimmy said, excitedly. “He’s doing something.”
Luke then heard Ellie’s phone ringing through the connection with John.
“Her phone is ringing,” John said.
Luke watched as the man put the glowing phone to his ear, then the light went out and all he could see was his silhouette. He listened carefully but could only hear the sound of Ellie’s voice, but not the conversation. At least at first.
Her voice rose and she started yelling. “I don’t want that!” she shouted. “You leave them alone! Please don’t hurt anyone else! Hello?! Hello?!” and then Luke heard the sound of her crying.
“You guys better get back in here,” John said.
They were down from the house about a hundred yards, crammed in an unmarked van with two other detectives. A small SWAT team was set up and waiting behind the house next to their guy’s shack. That’s exactly what came to Jaxon’s mind when he saw the place. Run down, piece of shit, shack. The roof sagged in the middle and what was once a porch now resembled a listing or sinking boat. One lone rusted chair stood on its side in the section that remained intact. The windows were mostly glass, but one just to the right of the main entrance was covered in plywood. The yard was overgrown and weeds poked up through cracks in the broken driveway. No vehicle was visible.
The night was quiet except for a lone dog barking somewhere in the distance. Movement caught his eye and a drunken man weaved down the street approaching the van from their right. He moved past and they could hear him mumbling to himself. Something about Layla wantin’ to blow Henry, but Henry don’t know no Joe.
“He’s been in there how long now?” Victoria asked one of the detectives.
“Twenty minutes.”
There were no lights on in the house and no movement had been seen since the detectives observed a darkly dressed individual enter the residence from the rear. He had crept along the street near the front of the houses as he made his way to the shack. They said he looked like a man not wanting to be seen.
“Alright, we move in two minutes,” Victoria said, and opened the van door exiting to the street. Jaxon, Scoggins, and Sally followed.
They each had an earpiece and radio, and wore Kevlar vests and FBI Jackets. The SWAT team would move in first, then Jaxon and Sally would follow with Victoria and Scoggins. They remained hidden from view behind the van, but Jaxon peered around the rear of the vehicle and watched as the SWAT team moved silently into place at the front and rear of the shack. It was like watching shadows as they crept around the plants and trees in the yard.
Jaxon’s cell phone vibrated. Victoria glared at him, but he pulled it out and read the text message. His knees suddenly felt like jelly. The text message was from him.
I know where his ears are. You’ll have them soon. My gift.
Jimmy caught up with Luke in the backyard and they went up to his room where John was doing his best to console Ellie. She leapt into Luke’s arms when he stepped in the room. He held her tight and stroked her hair softly trying to calm her. She finally looked up at him and said, “He’s going to kill somebody tonight.”
“What did he say?” Luke asked.
“I asked him how he knew so much about me and he ignored the question, but told me with that creepy voice he has that one of my friends would be gone tonight.”
“Who?”
“He didn’t say.” She looked around at all of them. “We can’t let him. We have to call Jaxon now. We know this guy,” she pointed out the window, “is him.”
“Let’s do it,” Luke said and pulled out his cell phone and the business card Jaxon gave them. He walked over to his desk and glanced at the computer program showing them the position of the killer. His phone was still in the same spot. Luke hoped that meant William Smith was there too. Just then a little window popped up on the computer screen showing some text.
201106172012 OUTGOING MESSAGE SENT TO 555-432-2020
MESSAGE COMPOSITION AS MMS
BODY OF TEXT:
I KNOW WHERE HIS EARS ARE. YOU’LL HAVE THEM SOON. MY GIFT.
END OF MESSAGE.
“What the hell is this?” Luke asked no one in particular.
“Oh,” John said. “That same kind of thing popped up when he called Ellie’s phone. Her phone number showed up along with all these numbers and then went away when the call ended.”
“He just sent this text message to this phone,” Luke said pointing to the screen. The telephone number bothered him. He knew he’d seen it before and wondered if the killer was playing games with other kids. He looked down at the business card and saw his mistake.
“What the hell?!” he said.
“What’s wrong?” Ellie said.
“He just sent that message to Jaxon’s phone.” He held up the card so they could see.
“What?!” Ellie came up and looked at the card, then the computer screen, then back at the card in disbelief. “Why would he be texting Jaxon?”
“Apparently to send this message,” Jimmy said.
“I wonder what the hell it means,” John said looking over their shoulders. “Whose ears is he talking about?”
“We need to call Jaxon now!” Ellie said.
“Right,” and Luke dialed the number. It went straight to voice mail. “Crap! It went to voice mail! What do I say?”
“Tell him to call us right away,” Ellie said.
Luke did just that. “Now what?”
“We wait and watch, I guess,” John said.
“Dammit! Turn that thing off, Jaxon!” Victoria chided. “I thought you knew better.”
Jaxon stood there staring at the message. He looked up at Victoria and his face must have betrayed what he felt because she came over to him and said gently, “What? What is it?”
He showed her the message. She looked like she had been slapped.
“Is this from him?” she said.
He nodded. He was afraid to speak. Not because he felt like he couldn’t. He was scared to hear what his own voice would sound like right now.
“They’re about to move in,” Scoggins said. “What’s the deal, here. You two gonna stand there gawking at each other or do your jobs! Let’s go!”
Their earpieces came alive. “Moving in…Now! Now! Now!”
Jaxon finally spoke. “He may know we’re here.”
“Shit!” Victoria said. “Come on!” She turned and ran across the street with Jaxon, Sally, and Scoggins in tow. “And turn that thing off!”
Luke sat and watched the blip on the screen waiting for Jaxon to call back. It had only been a few minutes but it felt like hours. Jimmy was using the bathroom and John was talking to Ellie while they waited and watched.
Another window popped up on the screen and Luke said, “He’s doing something on the phone again.”
John and Ellie walked up and looked over his shoulder. The window filled with letters and numbers they couldn’t understand.
201106172017 OUTGOING MESSAGE SENT 015552319000
MESSAGE TYPE MMS
BODY OF TEXT: EXECUTE *##*
END OF MESSAGE
“Where did that one go to?” John asked
“I have no idea,” Luke said. “I wonder what ‘EXECUTE’ means?”
“Maybe he’s getting ready to kill his next victim,” Ellie said.
“But he hasn’t moved,” Luke said.
“I don’t get it,” Ellie said.
Neither did Luke. “Come on Jaxon! Where the hell are you?!”
The swat team had just entered the structure as Jaxon was crossing the street at a run. He trailed behind Victoria, Sally, and Scoggins, in that order. Victoria was just about to the front door when the house self destructed and a giant fireball filled Jaxon’s world as he was tossed backwards into the street. The concussion knocked the wind out of him, his ears ringing from the blast.
Jaxon lay on his back, dazed. Things swam in his peripheral vision, but the world around him remained eerily silent. The stars above winked down at him as an orange glow began to wash them out. Suddenly a face was above him, the lips moved, but no sound escaped them. Another face appeared next to the first and Jaxon recognized the two detectives from the van. One was gesturing frantically at something beyond Jaxon’s vision while the first continued to shout something at Jaxon he could not hear.
A low roaring began to rise in his ears and faint voices bled through the noise. Jaxon tried to sit up, but pain in his back forced him back down again. He realized he hadn’t taken a breath in a long while and opened his mouth, breathing in. He choked on something and spasms racked his body as he coughed uncontrollably. He rolled over on his side, gasping for air and saw the destruction laid out before him.
The shack was nothing but a burning pile of rubble on the ground. Fire shot up in a plume thirty or forty feet in the air and Jaxon’s mind was having a hard time wrapping itself around what it was seeing. Maybe a ruptured gas line? One of the detectives from the van shouted in his face and Jaxon barely made out “…alright?!”
Jaxon nodded and tried to sit up again taking it slow. Pain shot up his back but it was bearable. Something was laying across Jaxon’s legs and when he realized it was a severed arm clad in black with the words ‘SWAT’ stenciled on it, he kicked at it frantically, ignoring the pain that shot in spasms up his back. He saw blood dripping on his shirt and realized it was coming from somewhere on his head. Reaching up, he felt warm liquid ebbing from his nose, though he could not feel his fingers touching it. His face felt numb. He went to a kneeling position and tried to stand.
“Don’t think you should try that, Detective,” a voice said, faintly, through the roaring that continued in his ears.
He tried his voice. “Victoria?”
“What?” the detective yelled, but to Jaxon it sounded like he was whispering through cotton.
“Where’s Victoria?”
“I don’t know. I haven’t found her yet. It’s chaos. Are you ok?”
He nodded and stepped toward the burning wreckage. He had to find Victoria. The detective grabbed his arm, trying to hold him back. “No Sir! It’s too dangerous!” Jaxon shook him off and stumbled through the debris toward the fire.
“Vick!” he shouted, but his voice sounded so far away. “Victoria!” He tripped over something and saw a leg protruding from under a piece of siding. Ignoring the searing pain in his back, he bent and flung the siding off to find Sally staring face up at him, her eyes open and vacant. Her face was calm and unharmed. No dirt, or soot, or even a scratch could be found, but the lower half of her body was a mangled mess. Jaxon knelt and retched to the side. She was gone.
“Oh shit! Sally! Dammit!”
Scoggins was just to the left of where he and Sally were, or at least what Jaxon thought was Scoggins. He looked back down on Sally’s face and a feeling of emptiness swept through him. He could not believe how wrong this had all gone. This son-of-a-bitch had set them up and led them right into the lion’s den and now Sally lay dead in front of him, the SWAT Team more than likely suffering the same fate, and Scoggins in pieces scattered across the yard. He had to find Victoria, though he was terrified at what he might discover.
One of the detectives came up next to him. “Oh Damn!” he said. “I’m sorry Detective. Shit!” He then saw Scoggins and took a step toward him, but stopped. He turned and vomited all over his shoes.
Jaxon stood, pain shooting down his legs now, and scanned the area. A small swatch of white caught his eye in all the destruction and he shambled toward it. Victoria had been wearing a white blouse that evening but had covered it with the blue FBI jacket. He hoped he was not seeing part of her in the wreckage. Stepping over a piece of burning door, he saw an arm and hand sticking out from underneath it. He lifted the door and pushed it over out of the way exposing Victoria laying face down in the weeds. She was bleeding from her head and her FBI jacket was torn half off. He knelt and placed a shaking hand on her back. She was breathing.
“Hey! You! Detective! Help me. She’s alive!” His voice still sounded far away, but he could see the detective react to his voice and step quickly through the debris toward him.
“The ambulances should be here soon,” he shouted. “We called them as soon as the blast went off.”
“Help me carry her away from here,” Jaxon said.
They picked her up carefully and lay her by the street. Her hair was matted with blood and she had small spots of it soaking through her clothing scattered all along her back, but Jaxon could see no other injuries. He was relieved. She had been the one closest to the front door, yet had survived while Sally and Scoggins had not.
She came to and rolled onto her back, moaning. Jaxon knelt down next to her and smiled at her when she looked at him. “Hey there,” he said.
“Are we dead?” she asked, and though Jaxon’s hearing was starting to come back, he still could not hear what she said, but could read her lips.
“I was worried there for a minute you were,” he said.
“You were worried?”
He nodded.
“About me?”
“Scared shitless,” he said and she finally smiled, but then winced in pain.
“What the hell happened?”
Jaxon looked up at the destruction and shook his head. “He must have rigged it to blow. He must have some surveillance cams around here somewhere. He knew exactly when we were going in.”
“Sally?”
Jaxon shook his head and looked away. “Scoggins too. I don’t know about the SWAT team. I haven’t seen anybody else come out of there but me and you.”
“Aw shit, Jaxon.” She looked angry, even with all the blood streaked on her face.
He saw flashing red lights and watched as the ambulance pulled up followed by a fire truck and two squad cars.
“You look like shit,” she said.
“Thanks. So do you.” But he smiled at her and reached for her hand. She clasped it in hers and held it tight to her chest.
“Stay here with me?” she asked.
“Sure.”