So Simple, page 10
He opened the folder and looked at the five-by-eight image of the Duke Elementary School’s Kindergarten Class. He lifted the photograph, careful to pick it up by its edges so the oils from his fingers didn’t damage the ink. He held it to the light and stared at the beautiful blonde-haired, blue-eyed Hannah, her bright smile matched by those of the twenty or so small children that clustered around her. The picture was captioned BROUGHT TROOPER TO WORK TODAY. KIDS LOVED HIM!
Hannah's arm rested around a gorgeous black and russet-colored dog with deep chocolate-brown eyes. The dogs ears perked up, two nearly perfect triangles with a slight tuft of golden fur at the top. He gazed at the camera with the wide-eyed, open-mouthed smile that these sorry descendants of the greatest land predators on Earth always wore when they were with the people they had been bred to love unconditionally.
When the killer was young, he had wanted a German Shepherd. He had believed that a dog, at least, would love him even if no one else would. When his first victim had finally brought Georgie Porgie home, he was ecstatic with delight. Here was the friend he could love forever, the one who would be there for him when all others ignored him. He ran downstairs, excited to meet his new companion, and instead of welcoming him, the dog had leaped in between him and his soon-to-be victim and barked savagely, committed to protecting her from the monster that now rushed toward them.
Maybe the dog had sensed the darkness in him, and its weak mind had assumed such darkness was a foregone conclusion. Ironically, its rejection had forever sealed the killer off from the light. If a dog didn’t love him, no one would.
But they sure loved that dog, though. Georgie was a superstar. Everyone wanted to be his friend.
He didn’t blame Georgie for that. He was a dog. Dogs were slaves of their masters, warped so utterly from their ancestry that they lacked the capacity to understand how they had been twisted. They couldn’t be blamed for their feelings any more than a computer program could.
He blamed people. People had ruined dogs. People had abandoned him. People would suffer for that.
Hannah Peterson would suffer for this. She claimed to love her class, claimed that the children she was responsible for educating were the most important things in her world, but she also avowed that she would never have children of her own, laughingly telling her friends on social media that six hours a day with a bunch of screaming five-year-olds was enough to show her that she could never raise a child herself.
Amazing that no one picked up on the hypocrisy.
But he did. And in the darkness, he watched and waited.
And now he would pounce.
He traced his finger lovingly around Hanna’s smiling face, careful to keep from actually touching the image. He grinned, imagining the moment just before her death when her smile would be replaced by… what would it be this time: confusion? Understanding? Despair? Pleading? Perhaps anger?
Whatever it was, it would be more fitting to her face than a happiness she didn’t deserve.
He placed the image back in the folder and pulled out the file that had her address, contact information, and a list of her personal habits. He made a mental note of these habits and decided that he could strike soon. Very soon.
His heartbeat quickened in anticipation of the work to come. The killer had never felt anything that could properly be called lust. Sex with someone who didn’t truly love him was meaningless, and since no one had truly loved him, there was no point in feeding that desire.
But if he ever did feel lust, he imagined it would feel something like this, a need bordering on desperation coupled with anticipation and excitement.
And if anything in life equalled the thrill of sexual climax, it was the culmination of his revenge, the moment of release when for an instant, he could feel as though he had avenged himself of those who had hurt him.
Yes. He would strike very soon, and Hannah would learn the price of preferring pets to people.
He replaced the file in its folder and switched on the den’s lights. With the darkness gone, the room looked like little more than a combination office and storage room. Who knew that the fates of so many would be decided in such an unassuming place?
He chuckled to himself as he blew out the candles. Darkness would return soon enough. Let Hannah enjoy her last day in the light. After all, the day was short, and the night very long and very cold.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Faith strained against her bonds, grunting with effort as she struggled to find any play in the cords that bound her arms and legs tightly to the chair. The bonds, like the chair itself, wouldn’t budge. Trammell was nothing if not thorough. She was stuck, and no amount of effort would free her.
“Look at you,” a gloating voice called. “Your legs don’t work anymore.”
The voice was not Jethro Trammell’s. Faith stiffened as a figure came into the light that streamed from the small window near the ceiling of the barn.
“I told you, Faith,” Doctor Franklin West said. “I told you that I would make you skitter around until your legs didn’t work anymore. Then I would squash you like the bug you are. Looks like it’s time to make good on that promise.”
“You’re going to have to get permission from your master,” Faith sneered. “This is his handiwork, not yours.”
“Trammell is dead,” West reminded her. “Michael shot him, remember?”
He pointed at the ground, and Faith followed his gesture to see the desiccated corpse of Trammell, a hole in his head where Michael’s bullet had ended him. He stared lifelessly up at the ceiling and didn’t react as West pushed at him with his foot.
“He hurt you,” West replied, “but he missed his opportunity to break you.”
Faith heard a dry crack, and a portion of Trammell's chest caved in. West regarded this calmly, then looked away from the body and back at Faith. "His problem was that he went for your body first. A swift and brutal approach that I have to admit was highly effective, but very dangerous. Trammell was a visionary, but like many visionaries, he was blinded by his vision, unable to consider anything that might get in the way of the perfect ideal he had created in his mind. He never even considered that Michael might find you. He had eyes only for his masterpiece.”
West walked to the cart with its array of surgical implements and cutting tools, but he didn’t pick up any of them. Instead, he selected an object that leaned against the cart. Alone among the tools placed there, this weapon was rust-free and gleamed brightly in the ray of light that illuminated the cart.
The object was a baseball bat, an aluminum copy of the original Louisville slugger, and aside from being constructed of aluminum and not wood, a perfect replica of the original. West hefted the bat, testing its weight and balance. He swung it casually, the light from the window scattering like sparks as the barrel cut a swathe through the still air. Faith could hear the hum of the metal as West swung, and a cold sweat broke out on her forehead.
West noticed her discomfort and smiled, his teeth bared like fangs. “I told you, Faith. I told you I was going to break you. Did you think I was lying? Did you think I couldn’t do it?”
He approached closer, resting the bat over his shoulder, letting the pommel balance lightly against his palm. “I will succeed where Trammell failed because I didn’t go straight for the heart. I studied you, learned your defenses, memorized every avenue that led to the core of you.”
He shifted the bat so the barrel fell against his other palm. “And one by one, I took those defenses away from you. One by one, I broke you down until there was nothing left but a bitter, empty shell that lacks even the power to run.”
"Not true," Faith said. "This is only a dream. Out there, in the real world, you're the one running. You're the one hiding. David's alive. So is Turk, and so am I. And we're coming for you."
“You’re right about almost everything,” West replied. “Except that last. You’re not coming for me, Faith. I’m coming for you. And when I finally take you, you’ll know that I was right to call you a parasite and right to squash you like a bug. Ask yourself, Faith. Why is David in the hospital at death’s door right now? Is it not because of our relationship, yours and mine? You selfishly clung to David so he could make you feel like a princess in the arms of her knight. I told you this, remember?”
“You’re wrong,” she said, “this is your fault, not mine.”
West stopped in front of her and grinned. “Are you sure?”
Tears welled in Faith’s eyes. It hit her that if David had never met her, he’d still be healthy. He’d be somewhere else now, happy in the arms of a woman who wouldn’t leave him vulnerable to a psychotic killer. Instead, he was in the hospital bleeding from his brain because he had had the misfortune to fall in love with the nemesis of the most prolific serial killer to terrorize the United States since John Wayne Gacy.
West’s grin widened. “There it is. Now you see it. Now you understand.”
He leveled the bat, pressing the sweet spot of the barrel to Faith’s temple. A shadow fell over his face, the darkness contrasting with the gleaming white of his teeth and making him appear almost demonic.
“Goodbye, Faith,” he said softly.
He drew the bat back over his shoulder. His smile twisted into a snarl. With a cry of rage, he swung.
***
Faith gasped and sat bolt upright in bed, heart pounding. Turk leaped immediately to her side, pressing his head to her chest and licking softly up at her face. She blinked and lifted her face away, wrapping her arms around him and holding on while her breathing calmed.
Michael looked over and frowned. “Are you all right?”
She nodded, still gasping for air. He left the desk and came over to her, taking her hand in his. “Hey,”
he said, "It's okay. You're safe now."
She grasped his hand tightly, and he squeezed back. Warmth spread through her, soothing her and calming her pounding heart. She met his eyes and saw compassion and love, so unlike the hatred and death in West’s eyes. Gradually, her breathing slowed, until she was able to say, “Okay. I’m all right now.”
He nodded and took his hand away. “Good.” He smiled tenderly. “Nightmares again, huh?”
She nodded. “Ever since West hurt David.”
His smile faded. “Yeah. I figured that would happen. I’m so sorry, Faith.”
She nodded again. “Me too.”
She realized then that the desk lamp was on, and a fresh cup of coffee sat steaming next to Michael’s open laptop. “Couldn’t sleep?” she asked.
He sighed. “Yeah, that seems hard to come by lately. The coffee probably isn’t helping. Ellie tells me that I’m going to die of a heart attack before I reach seventy if I don’t cut back.”
His lips curled into a slight frown when he mentioned Ellie’s name. “Is everything all right?” Faith asked.
He chuckled. “That’s a loaded question if there ever was one.”
She smiled wryly, “and that’s a loaded answer.”
“Yeah,” he agreed. “I suppose it is.” He fell silent a moment, then said, “Ellie wants me to leave.”
Faith lifted an eyebrow. “Leave?”
"Yes. She wants me to leave the Bureau. She said she's sick of being surrounded by death everywhere she goes. First, she was married to a serial killer, and now she's married to a man who has to hunt them for a living.”
Faith’s eyes widened. “She compared you to West?”
“No, no, not like that. She just compared her life with me to her life with West.”
“That doesn’t sound any better,” Faith said.
"No," no, it doesn't," Michael agreed.
“So are you going to leave?”
Michael leaned back and stared at the wall. He didn’t answer for a long moment before finally saying, “Not yet. Sooner or later—and probably not that much later—but not yet. I still have work to do. You know what I mean.”
She did. Faith was just starting to consider leaving herself, but she knew she couldn’t until after West was brought to justice, and even then, she wasn’t sure that she could stomach retiring somewhere to work on cars for the rest of her life while other maniacs were out there dropping people into wells or braining them to death with baseball bats. It was a vicious cycle that chewed a lot of law enforcement officers up and spit out empty shells.
It was that cycle that Ellie hoped to avoid. Faith could understand that, but it still angered her a little that she would expect Michael to deny his nature to be with her.
Then again, could anyone who wasn’t a detective really understand that nature?
Michael didn’t think so.
“She’ll never understand that. No one understands that unless they wear a badge. I can’t be all that angry with her for wanting me to quit. But if I don’t…” he sighed, “well, if I don’t, I think I’ll lose her.”
He smiled sadly for a moment, and when the smile disappeared, he looked old and tired for the second time since they had taken this case.
A memory flashed across Faith’s mind of an earlier time, an earlier Michael with an earlier Faith. Both looked young and happy. Both were in the prime of their careers in the prime of their life. For a time, they were in love, both certain that just like the success they enjoyed in the FBI, there was nothing that would ever get in the way of the closeness they shared.
She lifted her hand and caressed Michael’s cheek, moving instinctively and not quite realizing what she was doing at first. “You’ll be okay,” she said. “You’re a lot stronger than you think you are. Besides. You’ll always have me.”
His eyes met hers, and Faith felt a thrill move through her that she hadn’t felt in years. Her heart began to pound in her chest again, and with an effort, she pulled her hand away and tore her gaze from Michael’s.
Turk looked between the two agents and cocked his head, trying to understand why the mood had grown tense between his two favorite humans. Faith began to stroke his fur to give her hands something to do. The silence between them hung heavy and thick.
“Well,” Michael said, “that’s a worry for another day. We have a case to solve, and I have an idea.”
“What’s the idea?”
“Well,” he said, “I don’t know if you’ll like it.”
“Try me.”
“They’re holding Kenneth Langeveldt at the Fargo Federal Penitentiary. I think we should go talk to him.”
Faith frowned. “You’re right. I don’t like that idea.”
Kenneth Langeveldt, dubbed by the media the Family Man. In Washington, D.C., Kenneth had killed several people by poisoning them with a cocktail of animal tranquilizers that paralyzed his victims but left them alive for several days. During those days, he would keep them in his home and pretend they were his dead family—a family he had ironically been responsible for murdering as well when he was a teenager.
“I don’t blame you. I’m not a huge fan of the idea myself. But we’ve been chasing our tails for days now—no offense, Turk—and I don’t feel like watching victims pile up while we do.”
“And you think talking to a deranged killer is going to help us?”
“I do. I think we need to get inside the mind of a very sick individual, and we have one right here who can talk to us.”
“What makes you think he’ll talk to us?”
“He likes talking about himself. And we’re admitting that we need his help, which he’s taking as a sign that we’re admitting he’s more intelligent than we are.”
Faith lifted an eyebrow. “Taking?”
“Yes.”
“You made an appointment already, didn’t you.”
Michael shrugged. "I knew you'd say no, so I did it before I talked to you. You can still say no if you want, but you know this is the right thing to do."
She hesitated a moment before asking, “What does it say about us that we need to talk to a criminal to solve this case?”
“That we’re willing to do whatever it takes, and our egos don’t matter.”
Faith bristled slightly at the soft scolding in Michael’s tone, but he was right. “All right. Let’s go talk to him.”
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Dawn was still some time off when they reached the penitentiary an hour later, and the facility looked eerie under the yellow light of the streetlamps.
“Why are they keeping him here?” Faith asked. “I would think he would go straight to Florence after what he did.”
“Florence is full of terrorists these days,” Michael replied, “and would-be terrorists. I guess a garden variety serial killer just doesn’t rise high enough up the ladder to warrant twenty-four-hour isolation.”
“You mean he’s in with the general population?” Faith asked in disbelief.
“So they tell me. I guess once he was caught, the little rift in his personality closed. Now he’s just an angry and violent person instead of an angry, violent and insane person.”
“I still think this is a bad idea,” Faith said as Michael showed the guard his credentials and drove through the gate.
“I still haven’t heard a better one,” Michael countered.
He parked in the visitor area and the three of them began the process of making it through the various security checks that stood in between them and Langeveldt.
The prison was eerily silent as they entered. The inmates still slept, and as they made their way through the concrete hallways, Faith got the impression of descending into a catacomb. That brought to mind another recent case involving another highly disturbed killer, and she shivered.
Faith had been in prisons a few times before, but never to visit a killer. The fact that this particular killer owed his incarceration to the three of them made the entire situation that much more surreal.
They reached the steel-reinforced concrete room where Langeveldt waited, and the guard informed them that he would be just outside, and if they needed anything, they should call or bang on the door.
_preview.jpg)
