I jotted down the address and nudged Felicity into wakefulness. After dragging on a pair of jeans and a button-down shirt, I started a pot of coffee and proceeded to put on my socks and tennis shoes. By the time the coffee was finished brewing, my wife had dressed and was sitting at the breakfast nook with her camera bag slung over her shoulder.
“You want some of this?” I asked her as I filled an oversized travel mug with the hot black liquid.
“Aye, is it decaf?” she asked sleepily.
“No. Sorry.”
“I shouldn’t then,” she said with a slight yawn. “The doctor said I should be avoiding caffeine, what with the baby and all. I’ve already broken that rule a couple of times this weekend.”
“Makes sense,” I agreed. “Would you rather skip this and go back to bed? I can go by myself.”
“No.” She shook her head and stifled another yawn. “I’d rather go along and see if we can catch this guy. That way we can all go back to bed and get some sleep.”
I tucked the address into my shirt pocket and snapped the lid onto the travel mug. Upon opening the front door, we were greeted by slightly cooler temperatures than earlier in the day, though the air was still heavy with humidity. Moments later we were on our way, my petite wife behind the wheel.
The clock was just clicking over to 2:30 A.M. when we rolled to a halt on what should have been a quiet side street in the small suburb of Stone Knoll. The scene was similar to the methodic confusion I had experienced just one night before, minus the rain. Felicity was quickly mesmerized by the flickering lights and sat momentarily transfixed until I rescued her from the stupor with a gentle nudge.
News vans were already rolling in on the scene as we made our way past parked patrol cars to the crux of the activity. A uniformed officer executing his duty blocked our path as we neared the yellow tape that cordoned off the house.
“You’ll have to move back folks,” he stated evenly as he insinuated himself between us and the end of the driveway. “Press isn’t allowed in this area.”
Apparently, we had been mistaken for members of the media, and I quickly understood why when I remembered the bulky camera bag slung over my wife’s shoulder.
“We aren’t with the press,” I told him. “I’m Rowan Gant, and this is my wife, Felicity. We were called here by Detective Benjamin Storm.”
“Hold on just a second,” he returned with a nod and then spoke into his radio handset.
A few seconds later, Detective Carl Deckert came out of the front door and trundled down the driveway to the barricade where we stood.
“Rowan, Felicity,” he greeted us, nodding at the officer who acknowledged and extended a clipboard for us to sign in. Deckert waited patiently for us to finish then held up the tape so we could duck under and shook our hands quickly as we walked.
“Ben’s inside. Sorry no one was out here to meet you,” he apologized. “But it’s a little on the busy side around here.”
“Aye, that’s understandable,” Felicity told him, her voice laced with a full Celtic lilt.
“So you’re pretty sure it’s the same guy?” I asked.
“Pretty sure,” Deckert answered, pulling out surgical gloves and handing them to us as we neared the door. “But there are some changes in the M.O. That’s why you’re here.”
“What kind of changes?”
Deckert opened his mouth to reply and then paused for a moment before continuing, “I’d better let you see for yourself.”
“Do you always carry these things around in your pockets, then?” Felicity queried, indicating the gloves as she drew them over her hands.
“In my line of work…” he shrugged and then added with a grin, “Besides, my brother-in-law owns a medical supply company so I get ‘em cheap-as in free. So… if you don’t mind me askin’, what’s with the heavy accent all of a sudden?”
“What accent?” my wife asked, cocking her head to the side.
“She’s the real-deal Irish,” I interjected, answering for her. “It tends to really bleed through when she gets tired.”
“O’Brien, yeah.” He nodded. “Makes sense. Just wasn’t expectin’ it.”
“You get used to the linguistic flip-flops after awhile. You should hear her when she’s had a couple of drinks.”
“Aye, will you two quit talking about me like I’m not even here, then?” Felicity declared.
“Sorry, honey,” I told my wife as I turned my attention to her. “Now, when we go in, ground, center, and be careful. You’re gonna feel a lot of stuff flying at you, and if you don’t watch it, you’ll zone out. Trust me, I’ve already been through it. If you feel like you’re headed for trouble, get out.”
“Okay.” She nodded assent, and I literally felt her falling into a slow, rhythmic breathing pattern that mimicked my own. “I’m ready.”
We entered and followed Deckert toward the rear of the house, carefully weaving our way around crime scene technicians who were focusing intently on their jobs. The cold aura of death surrounded us as we advanced down a narrow hallway and through the doorway at its end. The frigid atmosphere permeated the room, stabbing me with its sharpness. A quick glance at Felicity showed me she was feeling it as well.
The room was simple, basically rectangular in shape, with an antique chest of drawers dominating one corner. Against the wall, a matching dressing table resided. The makeup and perfumes that adorned the top of the table were neatly arranged to the back, and occupying the center were two hardened puddles of candle wax, one white, one black. Next to them, a wine glass was wrapped around its volume of crimson liquid. An ornate, pivoting frame, supported by similarly carved wooden arms, was canted slightly against the wall. The mirror it had once held now lay shattered, spilling like silvery gems across the floor. The once hidden wall behind it now bore the pastel-shaded image of a Pentacle and three familiar words inscribed in a dripping scrawl.
A queen-size bed, stripped of the top layer of linens, jutted out into the middle of the room from the wall opposite the dressing table. Occupying the center of the bed was a long mass covered with a white sheet. Hands protruding from beneath the edge of the fabric and bound to the headboard with duct tape gave clear evidence as to the identity of the mass. The pungent odor of burned sage and rose oil still hung cloyingly in the air.
Ben was talking to the medical examiner when we walked in, and he looked up as we ventured farther into the room. The forensics team had recently finished dusting for fingerprints, and the dark grey powder coated any likely surface they had checked.
“Keep it up and the department is going to have to issue you a badge.” A grim-faced Dr. Sanders greeted us as we stopped at the foot of the bed.
“Dr. Sanders,” I said and motioned to the medical examiner. “This is my wife, Felicity O’Brien. Felicity, Dr. Christine Sanders. The doc here is the one that stitched up my head.”
“O’Brien, huh,” Dr. Sanders said as she canted her head in my wife’s direction. “Maiden name?”
“Aye,” she answered.
“Good for you,” the doctor approved. “I kept mine too.”
Felicity smiled and then returned her own nod. I’m sure she was relieved at not having to explain the difference in our last names for once.
“Thanks for comin’ down, you two,” Ben said, once the introductions were over.
“No problem,” I replied and then motioned to the covered body. “Same as before?”
“Not entirely,” he answered. “That’s why I called you.”
“What’s different?” I queried.
Ben nodded to Dr. Sanders, who skirted around us to the other side of the bed and grasped the corner of the sheet.
“You gonna be okay with this?” He directed the question at my wife. “The real thing’s different than pictures, ya’know.”
“Aye,” Felicity drew in a deep breath and let it out heavily. “I’ll be all right, then.”
“You must be really tired,” he observed aloud.
“Well it IS the middle of the night.”
“Yeah, and yer doin’ the accent.”
“I don’t have an accent,” she replied. “You do.”
“Yeah, right.” He nodded then turned. “Go ahead, Doc.”
Dr. Sanders threw back the covering to reveal the nude corpse of a young blonde woman. The victim’s glassy, dead eyes stared up at the ceiling, frozen for all time in sheer terror. Her torso had been flayed but not completely as with the previous two. This time the killer had removed only patches of her skin, carefully arranged in a geometric pattern that formed a Pentagram.
“The killer removed the heart in a fashion similar to that of the Barnes woman,” Dr. Sanders began, “but the removal of the skin was much more precise than the previous cases. I would venture to say he’s getting better at it.”
“I was wrong,” I said, kneeling down to have a closer look. “Karen Barnes was just lesson number two for him.”
“Whaddaya mean?” Ben asked.
“He’s still practicing,” I explained. “Lesson one was Ariel Tanner. He taught himself to skin a living human. Lesson two, Karen Barnes. How to remove a still beating heart… Now, lesson three… He’s refining his technique. Making it more complex… More exacting…” My words trailed off as my eyes roamed over the mutilated remains of the young woman. My stomach revolted against the sight, and I forced it back down, fending off the nausea.
“There’s another twist to the whole thing,” Ben told me then turned his attention to the medical examiner. “Doc?”
“There is trace evidence of semen on the sheets,” she explained. “I’ll have to check her back at the morgue, but the preliminary exam indicates that she was subject to sexual intercourse very recently.”
“Maybe the asshole is startin’ to get off on what he’s doin’ to these women,” Ben spat.
“I don’t think so,” I told him. “The killer is too involved with the ritual. To defile his sacrifice would make no sense.”
“Skinnin’ people alive then rippin’ their hearts out doesn’t make any sense either.” Ben was becoming angry with the situation, and it showed in his voice.
“To you and me, no it doesn’t,” I calmly stated. “To him, I think it does.”
“Well, when I find this son-of-a-bitch, it’s gonna stop makin’ sense to him real quick,” Ben returned. “As for the semen, I have to assume he raped her, and that might let us ID his blood type and maybe narrow the field down.”
“I know,” I answered, “but I don’t think that’s what happened.”
“Who is she?” Felicity, who had been silent until now, asked somberly. “Do you know?”
She was facing the wall, avoiding the hideous display. I could see that the color was just returning to her pale cheeks.
“Ellen Gray, per her driver’s license and work ID in her purse,” stated Detective Deckert who had been observing quietly. “According to the neighbor, she’s separated. Her old man moved out about two weeks ago.”
“Does he know yet?” she pressed.
“No. Not yet.”
“I take it the door was propped open like the others?” I questioned.
“Yeah,” Deckert answered. “Lady across the street works the three-to-eleven and noticed it when she got home. She came over to see if something was wrong and found her. Luckily, she had enough wits left to dial nine-one-one. By the time the paramedics showed up, she was so hysterical they had to sedate ‘er and take ‘er to the hospital.”
“Any ideas about how the killer got in?”
“Sliding doors on the basement,” he returned. “Looks like someone popped the latch with a pry bar or something.”
“Then she probably didn’t know him,” I submitted.
“Maybe, maybe not,” Ben announced. “She was a nurse at County Hospital.”
“Where R.J. works,” Felicity almost whispered.
“‘Zactly,” Ben replied.
“Did you talk to him like you planned?” I queried.
“He wasn’t home. And it was his day off, so he wasn’t at work.”
“That still doesn’t prove anything, Ben,” Felicity told him.
“Maybe not, but he sure as hell just moved another coupl’a bricks over to the other side of the scale.”
“Has anything turned up to indicate that R.J. knew Karen Barnes, then?” she asked.
“No, not yet,” Ben answered, “but we’ll be talkin’ to the husband and neighbors again in the mornin’.”
“Ahem,” Dr. Sanders cleared her throat, and we all turned to her. “I hate to interrupt, but if you’re finished with the body, I need to get her to the morgue.”
“Sorry ‘bout that, Doc,” Ben told her. “Go ahead. We’re done.”
“Any revelations, Mr. Gant?” she said, looking at me.
“Excuse me?”
“You were correct about the fingerprint on the Barnes woman, even if it was smudged,” she explained. “I was just wondering if you had any new ideas.”
“Not at this point in time,” I answered. “Sorry.”
“Just checking,” she said with a thin smile.
We moved off to the side and allowed Dr. Sanders and her assistant to carefully place the lifeless young woman into a body bag and zip it shut. They expertly placed her on a gurney and proceeded to wheel her out.
“I guess she’s been reading what the papers have had to say about me,” I stated after they left.
“She’s okay with it,” Ben told me. “She doesn’t necessarily believe in it, but she’s okay.”
Felicity was still looking a bit pale, but she seemed to be holding up well so far. She had retrieved a camera from her bag and was going about the task of photographing the back area of the room where the killer had performed his atonement ritual. We knew the pictures would be redundant, but cameras were like a focal point for her, probably due to her profession. Simply peering through a lens brought an entirely different clarity and dimension to the world around her, and she used it to her advantage.
“When do you think you’ll be notifying the husband?” I asked.
“We’ll be contacting him as soon as the M.E. gets to the morgue,” Deckert told me. “It shouldn’t be long. Why?”
“Something just doesn’t feel right,” I answered.
“You think the old man did it?” he questioned. “Like a copy cat or something, to cover it up?”
“No, that’s not it,” I replied. “I think it was the same guy, but I’ve got a really weird feeling. The whole sex thing just doesn’t fit with what this guy seems to be up to. Maybe she and the husband got together for a fling, or maybe she’s got a boyfriend, and that’s why they split up. I just don’t believe the killer raped her.”
“We’ll be checkin’ all of that out,” Ben agreed. “But remember, we’re dealin’ with a sicko here.”
“You’re right,” I told him. “But it’s too much of a deviation. I think there has to be some other explanation.”
“Hey, you two,” Felicity’s voice came from behind us. “Come over here and have a look at this.”
My wife was still holding the camera deftly in her hands but had pulled it away from her eye and was staring at the dressing table with a puzzled expression.
“Aye, is this fingerprint stuff supposed to do this?” she asked, pointing at the hardened puddle of white wax where a candle had once been.
“Supposed to do what?” Ben responded to her query with one of his own.
“Glow like that. Don’t you see it, then?”
“See what, honey?” I asked. “All I see is what’s left of a candle.”
“The fingerprint,” she pled in exasperation. “Right there in the wax. Open your eyes.”
“There can’t be a fingerprint there,” Deckert asserted. “Forensics already dusted over here, and they said the candles were clean. Besides,” he contended, “an imprint on wax would be pretty obvious.”
“It’s not an imprint on the wax,” explained Felicity. “It’s a fingerprint IN the wax. It’s like it’s inside it.” She stepped closer and thrust her index finger at the center of the small mound.
Ben and I both leaned closer but still couldn’t see anything other than the remains of a candle. Felicity was becoming more agitated each time we told her as much.
“It’s glowing, you guys,” she volunteered. “It’s like the person had something phosphorescent on his fingers or something.”
Her last statement gave me the clue I needed. Though I was still unable to see what she was seeing-and neither was Ben nor Detective Deckert, I was sure-I suddenly realized what was happening. My wife was definitely seeing the fingerprint in the wax; however, she was seeing it with what a Witch calls Second Sight. This ability is not something that can always be turned on or off at will. It is the stuff of clairvoyance and psychometry-the talent to witness the future and read the energies and impressions of inanimate objects. It was the simple gift of being able to observe those things that are hidden from earthly eyes.
“Felicity,” I posed, “could the fingerprint be on the underside of the candle? Is it possible that you’re visualizing it?”
“Aye, I suppose it could,” she said as a look of understanding spread across her face. “Yes. Yes, I think that could be it!”
“You’d better get your forensic guys to check the underside of that pile of wax,” I told Detective Deckert as I turned. “If they plan on collecting and bagging this stuff for evidence, they might destroy the print if they aren’t careful.”
Deckert hurriedly left the room and soon returned with a member of the crime scene unit who had been working elsewhere in the house.
“We already dusted this area,” he told us as he was led to the melted candle. “There’s nothing there.”
“Just humor us,” Ben told him. “I need ya’ ta’ check the bottom of the wax.”
“The bottom?” the evidence technician echoed.
“Yeah, the bottom,” Ben replied.
The young man stared at the hardened puddles with a baffled expression on his face, then shrugged. He knelt on the floor and opened a thick case he had been carrying. After rummaging briefly through its contents, his hands emerged holding a can of compressed air and a tool resembling a putty knife. Using the compressed air, he blew away the residue from the earlier dusting and cleared the area around the piles of wax.
“The white one,” Felicity volunteered. “That’s where it is.”
“Okay,” the forensics tech acknowledged in a humorless tone.
After rapidly shaking the can of air, he turned it upside down and aimed it at the remains of the white candle. The propellant in the can that normally expelled as a jet of gas when held properly upright now streamed from the nozzle as a frigid mist.
“What’re you doin’ that for?” Detective Deckert questioned.
“If I cool it down enough,” the tech explained, “I should be able to lift it off the surface in one piece.”
The technician quickly moved the spray back and forth across the wax for a few moments then released the trigger and set the can aside. Slowly and carefully, he slipped the thin, knife-like tool under the edge of the now somewhat frosted mass. With great patience and skill, he worked the blade gently around the edge as we watched on, until finally, the oblong heap of dull white paraffin popped loose in one complete piece. Setting the bladed tool aside, the technician gingerly turned the wax over in his gloved hands and inspected it closely.
“Right there in the middle,” Felicity intoned, trying to peer around him.
He remained silent, but from where I stood, I could see his face, and the expression now crossing it was one of disbelief. He placed the wax upside down on the counter then quickly retrieved a brush and small bottle of powder from his kit and began gently dusting the mass.
The candle had been a votive type and had apparently been mass-produced in a factory as was evidenced by a thin metal plate embedded in the center. The piece of metal had been the anchor used for the wick when it was originally made, and it was the focus of the evidence technician’s scrutiny at this very moment.
“I don’t believe it,” he muttered. “There’s a print there big as shit. It’s partial, but it’s a good one.”
“Son-of-a-bitch,” Deckert said slowly.
“How in hell did you know that print was there?” the forensics tech asked, turning to Felicity.
“Lucky guess,” Ben answered for her. “I want that print lifted and run yesterday,” he continued. “And while you’re at it, check all the candles from the previous crime scenes.”
“That might be a problem,” he replied.
“Whaddaya mean ‘that might be a problem’?” demanded Ben.
“There were no prints on them.” The tech visibly inched away from an angered Ben Storm. “So we just pried them up. They’re in quite a few pieces.”
“Dammit!” Ben exclaimed, turning in place and rubbing the back of his neck in a physical display of his exasperation. Once again he faced the tech and stabbed his index finger at him purposefully. “As soon as you guys are done here, I want you checkin’ out those candles. You understand me?”
“I’ll do what I can, Detective,” the forensics tech assured him, no longer exhibiting his earlier cockiness.
“And you,” Ben continued, turning and hooking his arm around Felicity. “Let me know if you ever need a job.”
A younger, but no less stone-faced desk sergeant issued Felicity and I visitor’s badges when we entered the police station where the Major Case Squad was currently headquartered. We walked down the long, familiar hallway and entered the room where the core of activity had been occurring when last we were here. At this early hour of the morning, the space was dark and still, entirely devoid of the earlier urgent bustle. Detective Deckert flipped a wall switch as we entered, bringing the stubbornly flickering fluorescent lights to life.
“Go ahead and have a seat,” he said. “Anyone besides me interested in coffee?”
He hung his jacket on the back of a chair and ambled over to the coffeemaker, rolling up his sleeves as he went.
“Me,” Ben announced.
“Make that two,” I added.
“Would you be havin’ any herbal tea?” Felicity queried.
“We got a box of some kinda lemon tea or some odd thing like that,” Deckert called out.
“Aye, that’ll work,” Felicity told him, heading over in his direction. “Here, let me give you a hand, then.”
I took a seat at one of the long cafeteria tables that had been set up to serve as a staging and conference area. Ben stripped off his own jacket and loosened his tie then joined me. He rubbed his tightly shut eyes then the back of his neck, shoulders drooping as he let out a long sigh. His hair was unkempt and his shirt stained with sweat. He was obviously still operating on little sleep.
“You didn’t take our advice did you?” I asked him.
“I took it,” he answered tiredly, head tilted back and eyes closed. “I just didn’t get a chance to use it.”
“You know, Ben, you can’t catch this guy all by yourself. Let some of the other cops do some of the work.”
“They are, I just like to know what’s goin’ on, and there aren’t enough hours in the day to keep up.”
“Remember how worried you were when you thought I was dying earlier?” I asked.
“Yeah, what about it?” he replied. “That’s what bein’ a friend is.”
“You’re right,” I told him. “And I’m starting to get worried about you.”
He let out another heavy sigh and slowly tilted his head forward, opening his eyes as he did so. His gaze came to meet mine, and we sat there silently for a long moment.
“I know you are. I know the little woman is too. I appreciate it, I really do,” he finally said. “Let’s just catch this asshole, then I’m takin’ a vacation. True story.”
“Here you go,” Detective Deckert said as he slid a cup of coffee in front of Ben. “It’s still brewing, so this is a bit thick if ya’ know what I mean.”
A similar cup appeared in front of me, placed there by my wife as she sat down. She clutched a cup of hot water and was rhythmically dipping a tea bag in it.
“How are you feeling?” I asked her.
“Fine, but I’m tired,” she replied and leaned against me. “And a little queasy, but I’ll be fine.”
“Allison had morning sickness for the first six months,” Ben offered.
“Morning sickness?” Deckert stated rhetorically. “I didn’t know you two were expecting. Congratulations. How far along?”
“Early yet,” Felicity told him. “Six weeks.”
“Well, it’s nice to hear some good news in the middle of all this crap,” he said and lifted his coffee cup in an informal toast.
“I hate ta’ bring it up,” Ben interjected, “but we have to talk about the case. The way I see it, we still have an asshole out there killin’ women, and we aren’t much closer to knowin’ who it is than we were when we started. Now personally, I think R.J.’s pile of bricks is startin’ to add up on a side of the scale where he’d rather not be.”
“You still need to talk to Devon,” I offered.
“True.” He continued, “And his pile isn’t exactly tiltin’ the scale in a positive direction either, but the fact is, R.J. very possibly worked with the latest victim.”
“You know,” Felicity stated thoughtfully. “It might not be either one of them.”
“That’s true,” Deckert chimed, “but you follow the leads you have.”
“What about that partial fingerprint?” I queried. “How soon do you expect to know anything?”
“The lab guys should have somethin’ for us in a coupl’a hours,” Ben answered. “It’s all gonna depend on how soon they get finished at the scene and how much of the print we actually have…”
“And if its owner is in the system,” Deckert added. “If he isn’t, then it could be weeks before we get any replies from the non-participating municipalities.”
“We haven’t got weeks,” I told them flatly. “This psycho has killed three women in less than ONE week, two of them in as many days.”
“You got any better ideas?” Ben asked.
“No,” I replied candidly, “and it irritates the hell out of me.”
“Welcome to the club,” he replied.
They were still processing the fingerprint from the latest murder scene when Felicity and I left to go home. With Detective Deckert’s help, we convinced Ben to do the same, as repeated calls to the forensics lab had only served to frustrate him more. It was agreed that we would attack the situation anew after whatever modicum of sleep we could get. I half expected to find Ben at my door for breakfast the next morning.